Watch Duty CEO Honored at American Cinematheque Event: “‘Hero’ is Something I Find Hard to Bear”
American Cinematheque hosted its Tribute to the Crafts celebration on Friday night, marking one of the first events to return to Los Angeles since wildfires broke out in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena on Jan. 7.
The night, which celebrated below-the-line craftspeople from Wicked, Dune: Part Two, Emilia Pérez, Challengers and The Substance, had a noticeably different feel, as it featured a casual dress code and encouraged attendees to come as they were (many in jeans and sneakers) without the usual Hollywood glam factor. The night also featured a special tribute to Watch Duty CEO and co-founder John Clarke Mills, the man behind the wildfire alert app that kept millions of Angelenos informed during the crisis.
Inside the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood, Mills was presented with the Unsung Hero Award as he pushed back on the label — “‘Hero’ is something I find hard to bear at times” — and instead pointed to the firefighter friends he had brought with him and the “men and women, mostly men, incarcerated, who are cutting lines in the middle of the night to save Brentwood out of Mandeville Canyon for $1 an hour.”
Mills began creating the app in 2021 after almost losing his Sonoma home to a fire, and invested $1 million of his own money in the process.
Mills also shouted out the people of Los Angeles who are “staying here and doing this work; not giving up on this city, on California, the American West and this dream, is important me. I’m going to fight as long as I can, continue to do this work, to make sure that I can watch over you and watch over the first responders when they’re fighting their fight.” The CEO concluded, “I’ll accept this award but I can’t accept hero, because I know heroes — they’re in this room.”
Mills was presented his award by Steve Guttenberg, who was active in helping his Pacific Palisades community as the fire broke out and moved cars that evacuees were leaving behind so that fire trucks could reach the blaze.
“I was starting cars and moving them, but there were people who locked their cars and took their keys like they were going to Macys. And then there were cars I didn’t know how to start like a Tesla; I never drove a Tesla and there’s probably 20 of them,” Guttenberg joked. “I got to drive cars I never drove before. People were getting their Lamborghinis and Maseratis and these really fancy cars and bringing them down, then the firemen said get out of the cars and run because the fire’s coming, so I’m jumping in like a Lamborghini; I drove it 20 feet but I got to drive a Lamborghini!”
Many of the honorees — which included Wicked costume designer Paul Tazewell, Nickel Boys cinematographer Jomo Fray, Emilia Pérez editor Juliette Welfling, The Substance hair and makeup team, The Fall Guy‘s stunt coordinators and the visual effects and sound teams from Dune: Part Two, as well as career achievement award winner Ed Lachman — also thanked firefighters and sent love to wildfire victims in their speeches.
Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, who were recognized for their Challengers score, sent a video message, as Reznor said, “We just got back into our workplace after being evacuated and frankly we’re just a little bit mentally freaked out as I’m sure everyone here is. I hope that everyone is doing the best they can during these very trying and strange times we find ourselves in.”
