David Ellefson has opened up about the upcoming documentary on Nick Mendoza, titled This Was My Life: The Story Of Nick Menza.
During an interview with Francisco Zamudio of KNAC.COM, Ellefson spoke on his involvement in the film and said, “So I got asked to narrate this movie called This Was My Life: The Story Of Nick Menza. And it's his life story, from birth until he passed. And obviously, 10 years in there was with MEGADETH, which is certainly one of the more public parts of his life as a professional drummer. So getting asked to narrate it, and then, like I always do — look, I've lived with Nick on the road; I spent 10 years in the yellow submarine with him, so I know a lot of that. I know a lot of people, obviously, to connect it.”
He continued, “So when we did the interviews, reached out to people… Former MEGADETH guitarist Jeff Young actually really stepped in, too; he helped us get the facility where we filmed a lot of the interview footage. We were able to get with our other fallen brother, Bob Nalbandian, to get him to comment before he passed from cancer last year. Some crew members, tour managers — really, I think, a nice spread. His family, his mom, his dad. Nick's dad, Don Menza, is a very, very well, highly esteemed woodwind player. I mean, first chair tenor sax for Buddy Rich, Louie Bellson. So when Nick was a kid, I think he was born in Munich, he was at these jazz festivals in Europe with his dad, and guys like Buddy Rich and Louie Bellson were handing him the drumsticks, going, 'Have at it, kid. Hit the kit.' So, Nick's story is super colorful and very cool.”
Ellefson says the documentary took a lot of work to put it together. He went on to say, “It's an independent film. We're all kind of pitching in to make it happen,” he said. “We set a deadline to get the thing finished now and to get it out. We, of course, will go to some of the film festivals. Most of this stuff now ends up digitally on the Netflix, Tubi, these kind of platforms. So I thought this is a good time to sort of roll out another little clip of it and show everybody kind of the spirit of what the movie's going to look like and some of the people that are in it and do a little Q&A after for the fans and some of the media that are there.”
He continued: “It's a really heartfelt story. Nick sister, Donia, who's kind of the ambassador for all things Nick as far as his career and professionally from back in the day… I mean, it's her brother, so she has a real passion for this film and keeping Nick's story alive. Like she said, it's her way to stay connected to Nick since he left the planet clearly too early.”
The documentary will premiere on Saturday (January 27th) at 12 p.m. PST at the Ellefson Coffee Co. booth the NAMM show inside the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California.