Penn Jillette On ‘Tim’s Vermeer’

Penn Jillette produced Tim’s Vermeer, a documentary about his friend Tim Jenison’s quest to recreate “The Music Lesson” by Johannes Vermeer with technology that would’ve been available in the 17th century.

When Jillette had sought out his friend of 25 years for some non-work related conversation, the inventor shared a theory that Jillette felt had to be turned into a movie. “I said, ‘Well you know, Tim, you failed. This does have something to do with work,’” Jillette told Uinterview exclusively. “’Drop everything. We’re going to make a movie of this.’ Well, Tim said, ‘I thought it’d probably be a paper in an art magazine and maybe a YouTube five-minute video.’ And I said, ‘No I think we can do more than that.’”

Jillette, proud of his friend for having completed the arduous task he set before himself, is equally proud of the kind of documentary they made together – a happy one. “This isn’t a complaint, but it’s a fact, most of your documentaries are really depressing,” Jillette mused. “They’re often call-to-action, with a huge amount of sadness, and a huge amount of suffering. We have to get that kind of information, but I was so proud of making a movie that is happy. It’s inspirational.… There’s something wonderful about doing something beautiful.”

Tim’s Vermeer is currently in limited release.