So, um, I talked to Francis Ford Coppola a couple of weeks ago.

It was just a phone interview, tied to tomorrow’s release of “Tetro”; someday, I hope to sit down with him in person for a proper conversation, possibly with a couple of bottles of good red wine.

We talked for about half an hour. It was supposed to be 20 minutes, but he was very generous with his time … and with his answers, as you’ll see if you click over to the extended interview on the NOW site. And don’t forget the audio clips.

Coppola isn’t the only director I talked to for this week’s issue; I’ve also got interviews with Bill Plympton and Neill Blomkamp, directors of “Idiots & Angels” and “District 9”, respectively. Unfortunately, for some reason they’re not up on the site at the moment, but I’ll post the links as soon as I have them … assuming I can get to a keyboard, as I’m spending most of my day running around bagging chats for next week’s paper. (UPDATES: There they are!)

Jeez, you’d think there was a festival on or something.