Dan's Papers - January 16, 2009 - Who's Here: Brenda Siemer, Filmmaker

Having come to the end of a 20-year, "amazing love affair" with her husband, Roy Scheider, who died last year after a long battle with cancer, Brenda Siemer is in transition.

Since 1992, she and Roy and their children, Christian and Molly, had lived in Sagaponack in the house they built on the edge of the ocean. "We were living the golden life, sitting and staring at the sea all those years," she said.

But when Sheider became ill, they decided to sell the beach house and move to Sag Harbor. "It seemed like the end of an era, but with all the medical costs, we decided it was time," said Siemer, sitting on the plush couch in the spacious living room of her traditional country home in Sag Harbor, where the family has lived the past year. She has also become active in "Save Sag Harbor," a group that is trying to preserve the small-town, community quality of the area.

Having recently turned 60, but looking much younger, Siemer said she feels she is in the midst of a "giant karmic cleanse."

"With all the changes going on in the world, and with my own personal transition, I feel as though the slate is clean for a whole new chapter," said the blonde, 5'10", former model, artist and actress turned filmmaker.

Although she's clear that she needs to move on, Siemer pays tribute to her happy life with her husband, whose pictures hang on the walls and sit on shelves in her living room. There are framed portraits of Scheider and Siemer on the beach and on their Sagaponack porch, and then with their kids, reading, playing baseball, and at their favorite spot on the ocean.

Over the fireplace mantle is a large picture of the handsome Scheider, at 30 years old, from the play Stephen D, which won him an Obie Award. On another wall is a watercolor of Scheider at the annual Artists-Writers baseball game. The Scheiders have been deeply involved in the East End community on several fronts, including education.

"When we first moved out here, we wanted a progressive school for our son, so we helped start the Hayground School in Bridgehampton, where both our children attended," she said. "Hayground was a great demonstration that things can be done differently - that kids don't have to grow up in a box, but that they can think outside the box."

Siemer credited her husband, who was 15 years her senior, with giving her and her children a wonderful education in the arts. Their son, Christian, who produced a film about Hayground School which was shown in the Hamptons International Film Festival, is now studying the arts at Bard College.

Siemer was a fine arts major at the University of Buffalo, in her hometown.

"My family, of German descent, has been there since the turn of the century," she said. But Siemer quit college her junior year and moved to New York City with a singer whom she met in school and later married.

"I was in love, and Buffalo was boring compared to New York City," she smiled. "After we moved there, he got a part in a road company musical, 1776, and we toured all over the country together."

While in Chicago, they were joined by a young dancer named Ann Reinking, who went on the road with the two.

"Ann and I became great friends, and still are, to this day," said Siemer. "She got an audition with Bob Fosse, who cast her in Dancin', and she became one of the most famous dancers of all time."

Years later, when both Siemer and Reinking were divorced from their first husbands, they became roommates back in Manhattan.

"I wanted to model and act, so I took lessons from Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler," said Siemer. She landed an agent and moved to Los Angeles, where she got small parts in films including The Great Gatsby, Rocky II, and a comedy, Take This Job and Shove It.

An ad Siemer placed for a roommate was answered by Helen Hunt, then a budding teen actress. "I was 35 and Helen was only 19 when we met," Siemer recalled. "She had grown up in Hollywood and had been acting since age 12, under the guidance of her famous father, director Gordon Hunt, who had also directed Roy Scheider."

Siemer spent her time acting in Los Angeles and Manhattan, where she met Scheider by chance.

"I was in a pharmacy, and I looked down the aisle and saw him," she recalled. "I had seen him in All That Jazz, and I decided to tell him how great he was in the movie."

They started dating soon after, but they were both busy traveling with their acting careers. Siemer was also taking care of her mother, who had Alzheimer's disease.

"It was during this time, in 1987, that I decided to write a monologue about my mother, and then I decided to film her," she said. Siemer then made her first film, a 20-minute piece about caring for Alzheimer's patients titled, I Know a Song. "I called it that because it was also about music," said Siemer. "With Alzheimer's patients, the last thing they lose is their ability to enjoy and hear music."

Siemer won several awards for Song, and was invited to tour Scandinavia with other winners. "I understand the power of film, which is visual and storytelling, and seeing someone's life as a work of art," said Siemer, who has created several other documentaries since. In 2004 she produced Is It Really Me?, about young women coming of age and viewing the changes in their bodies. It was shown in film festivals from the Hamptons to Santa Fe and Avignon, and won several awards.

Siemer recently started her own film company called "Sister Productions," and she is now working on her latest film, In My Hands, about Marfan Syndrome, which is a connective tissue disorder that can result in an aneurysm of the aorta.

"My friend, Ann Reinking, has an 18-year-old son with this genetic disorder, which affects young people," said Siemer. "She hired my company to make the film."

Siemer said she likes to make films to help people, and to raise awareness of different health issues. "Your health is a wake up call as to how you're living your life," she said. "From seeing the deaths of my mother and my husband, I've learned how precious life is."