RANDY RHOADS Documentary Film '80 Percent Done'

Director Peter Margolis of Dakota Pictures has told Knoxville's Metro Pulse that he is "about 80 percent done shooting" his much-anticipated Randy Rhoads (OZZY OSBOURNE, QUIET RIOT) documentary film. "But the first 80 percent took as long as it's going to take for the last 20 percent," Margolis explained. "It's the same as if you've ever built a house. Pouring the concrete and putting up the walls is easy. It's the finishing touches, the final stuff, that takes forever....I work, too. I'm doing the film because it's something I want to do, but I can't ignore my career. I'm doing it around my schedule, so at times it's slow going. Realistically, it'll be summertime before I finish all the interviews, then trimming it, adding pictures and music.”

In 2005, Margolis, a veteran TV producer, director, and production manager who's worked, in varying capacities, on "NewsRadio", "Just Shoot Me!", and "The Larry Sanders Show", was working on a televised awards show in Los Angeles. He sat down for lunch with a camera operator he'd worked with several times but only knew casually. The operator told Margolis he was from Burbank, and Margolis told him he'd taken guitar lessons there from Rhoads in 1978 and '79.

"In the middle of L.A., where there are 5,000 camera operators, I was talking to the one guy who was Randy's guitar tech when he was in QUIET RIOT," Margolis says. The camera operator introduced Margolis to Lori Hollen, who had been president of the QUIET RIOT fan club when she was a teenager. A few weeks after Margolis met Hollen, he was pitching a documentary film to Randy's mother, Delores Rhoads, in her living room in Burbank.

"She'd been approached by writers, directors, filmmakers, and repeatedly said no," Margolis says. "She felt like it had to be someone who knew him. Anybody else couldn't understand what he was about and who he was."

Margolis and his crew started filming on March 19, 2007, when hundreds of fans gathered at Rhoads' grave in San Bernardino, Calif., to commemorate the 25th anniversary of his death. Since then, Margolis has filmed almost 80 interviews, with Rhoads' family and friends and people who worked with him. The list of names includes Kelli Garni, the original bassist in QUIET RIOT; Carlos Cavazo, the guitarist in the "Metal Health" line-up of QUIET RIOT; Sarzo and his brother Robert, who was considered as a replacement for Rhoads in Ozzy's band; Jodi Raskin, Rhoads' girlfriend at the time of his death; Grover Jackson, whose company made Rhoads' signature guitars; Randy's brother Kelle, who's wearing the silver "RR" ring Rhoads had on when he died; and MOUNTAIN guitarist and '70s legend Leslie West, one of Rhoads' idols.

Margolis says he has a distribution deal lined up, but he also plans to shop the as-yet-untitled documentary at film festivals when it's done.

Read the entire article at Metro Pulse.

(Thanks: The Govner)