EXCLUSIVE: Unfolding in New York’s East Village in 1978, the Nova Convention has gone down in history as a legendary counterculture meeting headlined by Naked Lunch novelist William S. Burroughs, and also featuring Patti Smith, Frank Zappa, Allen Ginsberg and Laurie Anderson.
Aaron Brookner and Rodrigo Areias documentary’s Nova ’78 – which debuts out of competition at the Locarno Film Festival in August – revisits the three-day event which ran from November 30 to December 2, 1978 in the Entermedia Theatre, now the Village East by Angelika cinema.
It uses original newly restored and digitized 16mm footage shot at the Nova Convention by Aaron Brookner’s uncle Howard Brookner, Tom DiCillo, and Jim Lebovitz, with direct sound by Jim Jarmusch.
Howard Brookner originally started filming Burroughs for a NYU film project, which evolved into a long-term collaboration, culminating in the 1983 work Burroughs: The Movie, broadcast by BBC Arena and produced by Alan Yentob and the filmmaker.
Ahead of the Locarno premiere, Deadline can reveal never-seen-before archive footage of Burroughs featured in Nova ‘78 as he gives an idiosyncratic opening address at the event gathering artists across all disciplines to discuss the legacy of his work.
Giving a taste of the ambiance, Burroughs is seen arriving to applause, and then prompting laughs as he pulls out a thin folded sheet of paper out of his inner breast pocket and starts to read.
“People have asked me what the whole Nova Convention is about,” says Burroughs. “This is what it is about in very few words. This is the space age, and we are here to go. However, the space program has been restricted so far to a mediocre elite. Now, they are not really looking for space. They are looking for more time. Like the lungfish and the walking catfish, they weren’t really looking for new dimensions, different from water. They were looking for more water. But some of them found that they had taken an irretrievable forward step. And for better or for worse, left their gills to their makers.
“And as we leave the Aquilung of time, we may step into an epic comparable to the days when the early mariners set out to explore an unknown world. I can see all manner of spacecraft, some of them obviously lethal, preparing to take off. Only those who are willing to leave everything they have ever known in time need apply. It is necessary to travel. It is not necessary and becoming increasingly difficult to live.”
Nova ’78 builds on Aaron Brookner’s research into his uncle’s legacy which resulted in the bio-doc Uncle Howard, which played at Sundance and the Berlinale, as well as the restoration of Burroughs: The Movie and his 1985 documentary Robert Wilson and the Civil Wars, which screened at Il Cinema Ritrovato 2025.
The documentary is produced by Pinball London (UK) in co-production with Bando à Parte (Portugal).
The post ‘Nova ‘78’ Teaser: Doc Featuring Never Before Seen Footage Of William S. Burroughs To Debut At Locarno appeared first on Deadline.
