Getting the Gits

In 2002, Steve Moriarty, former drummer for legendary Seattle punk band the Gits, noticed that a certain eBay buyer from Los Angeles had started buying up almost anything he put up for bid—from vinyl copies of old Gits recordings to sweatshirts, T-shirts, and posters, sometimes paying outrageously generous prices. "They were winning things and sending me notes through eBay saying 'I really like your band, and boy, if you have anything else, we'll bid on anything you put up,'" recalls Moriarty. "And I was like, 'OK, who are these weird people?' I was kind of creeped out."

When the buyers drove the auction price for a live Gits album recorded at Portland's now-defunct La Luna club up to $110, Moriarty decided it was time to contact them via e-mail. He had an entire box of that particular record, and didn't feel right about accepting such an exorbitant sum. "I said 'Look, I'll give it to you for $10'." But the buyers insisted on paying the full eBay bidding price, so Moriarty tossed in some T-shirts and additional records to compensate them and assuage his conscience. Following this exchange, a tentative friendship sprung up between Moriarty and the buyers—who turned out to be two women in the film industry: aspiring producer Jessica Bender and budding director Kerri O'Kane, who shared an obsession with the Seattle band and their late singer, Mia Zapata.

O'Kane was the one who turned Bender on to the Gits and Mia Zapata. While battling ovarian cancer, O'Kane was reading a book entitled Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism and the Future and saw a footnote in the resource section about an organization called Home Alive. Home Alive was founded in Seattle in 1993 after the violent murder of Zapata, who was 27 at the time of her death. O'Kane began researching Zapata and the Gits online, and eventually bought a copy of the Gits' posthumous album Seafish Louisville, a purchase which unwittingly set her up not only for a compulsive eBay addiction, but for an absolute immersion in a band that won her head and heart in a way she never expected.

"I didn't know how inspired I would be," says O'Kane, still sounding incredulous at how deeply the opening track "Whirlwind" marked her. "I'm from L.A., I grew up with [female-fronted punk] bands like X, but I was so incredibly moved by Mia's voice. She's so unique in her vocal presence. She has a little bit of punk, a little bit of blues, but there's a candor in her lyrics that's just not in a lot of the music you hear today.

"I became obsessed with [Zapata's story] and my whole intention was to see the film that was made about her," continues O'Kane, sitting in the dining room of her Hollywood home—a humble but meticulously decorated 1930's duplex, once belonging to her grandmother and now filled with vintage furnishings and Gits memorabilia. "I figured there must have been something, but there wasn't anything except for Hype!" Doug Pray's 1996 movie about the Seattle music scene features brief live footage of the band.

After they received the generous care package from Moriarty, the women decided it was time to act on the dream that had slowly been taking shape in their heads. Via e-mail, Bender gingerly suggested to Moriarty the possibility of a movie about the Gits. He and the other surviving band members, bassist Matt Dresdner and guitarist Andrew Kessler (aka "Joe Spleen"), were initially uninterested. "I was kind of neutral to the idea," says Moriarty. "But Matt and Andy—which is their nature—said 'No, what are you talking about? We don't want to make a movie. We want to leave it alone.' So that's how we left it."

Now, on the 15th anniversary of Zapata's murder, the final cut of Bender and O'Kane's documentary, simply entitled The Gits Movie, is about to screen in Seattle and a half-dozen other cities, including Louisville, where Zapata is buried. With Moriarty's help (he eventually became a producer), the two women were able to get interviews with those among Zapata's friends and family who had been previously reluctant to speak, and access to obscure tracks and memorabilia. They also made a film that respected the wishes of those most closely associated with the band—capturing the life of the music, rather than the tragic death of the singer.

On July 7, 1993, Mia Zapata said goodbye to her girlfriends in the band 7 Year Bitch after a seemingly normal night of beers and bonding. She left Capitol Hill's Comet Tavern to head home, but within two hours had lost her life to a predatory transient named Jesus Mezquia. He beat her, strangled her with the cord from her hooded sweatshirt (which bore the name of her band), and, after sexually assaulting her, left her body on a dead-end street in the Central District, a little less than two miles from the Comet. The case went unsolved for a decade, until a DNA match was found tying Mezquia to the crime. He was sentenced to 36 years in prison.