#1976 - James Fox

**James Fox** (0:04)
The Joe Rogan Experience. Hello.

**Joe Rogan** (0:13)
Good to see you, my man.

**James Fox** (0:14)
Thank you so much for having me on.

**Joe Rogan** (0:16)
Oh, my pleasure. The moment I saw that documentary, I was like, wow. Let me just be honest, off the bat. I loved your first documentary, but when someone says there's a documentary about a crashed UFO and it happened in Brazil, I'm always like, man, people tell stories, you know? I'm like, maybe it was one of those. Like, I didn't think too much of it. When I hear stories, even Roswell, I always go, man, I don't know. I don't know. It's so hard to know. 1947, you know, I think some shenanigans are going on, but what was it really? And how much of this is just people tell stories? And those stories grow and change over the years. And, you know, almost like the story becomes their real memory after a while, because they've been doing it for, you know, so many years.
But then this one, this one, just right away, the way you captured all the information and the evidence and the eyewitness accounts, the photographs that people got, the depictions of the actual being, the fact that there was live beings, this is a, and everyone that didn't even know each other having these like really similar stories about what they saw. And when people got a hold of the wreckage, like when you first started making this documentary, did you have any apprehension like, oh, this one, how do I sell a documentary on a crashed UFO? Like, what's the best way to put this together? Because that's part of the art of what you do, right?

**James Fox** (1:43)
You were skeptical. Let me tell you how skeptical I was, okay? So I was making my second documentary on UFOs in the late 90s. I just finished a documentary called UFOs, 50 Years of Denial.
I'm starting on my second film. It was 1999
And I partner up with a couple of guys. Boris Zuboff has been a partner. I'm still working with him today. And this guy, Tim Coleman, who's a British reporter.
And we, like, mapping out the film concept, like, hey, we should cover this case, and we should do that. And he's like, hey, mate, we gotta do this amazing UFO crash in Brazil with these aliens. We're walking around the town, and I looked at the guy, and I thought, I think I picked the wrong partner. This guy's fucking batshit crazy. And literally, I dismissed it on the spot, and I refused to even read one word about it. I said, there's no way in hell that that happened, and the whole world doesn't know about it.

**Joe Rogan** (2:39)
Right.

**James Fox** (2:39)
So I have to remind your audience, I was making my second documentary.

**Joe Rogan** (2:45)
On UFOs.

**James Fox** (2:46)
On UFOs, and I dismissed it. Like this, like how fast can you say howdy doody?

**Joe Rogan** (2:52)
It just always seems like, if someone's telling you about something like that, like you would have heard about it.

**James Fox** (2:57)
Absolutely. I can't tell you, Joe, how quickly I dismissed it, and I didn't look into it till 2011 Okay, so here's what happened. I'm going to, I get invited by this guy, AJ. Javard, to a place called Pero Ibi in Brazil.
And I'm speaking at a conference. About a film I did called I Know What I Saw. And this guy calls me, Jeff Zaganski. He was very high up on the food chain in the entertainment industry. He's been kind of like my mentor and opening doors for me over the years. And I've asked him over a period of time, like, why are you so kind to me? He's a very wealthy guy in New York. And he goes, you know, Jackie Gleason told me one time that these things were real. Don't listen to anybody else. I know for a fact. And so when I saw you as an independent, struggling young filmmaker, I always wanted to lend a helping hand. And by the way, you're going to Brazil. You gotta look into that Varginha case. And I thought, oh God, not this again, right?
So I was like, well, I had a lot of respect for Jeff Saganoski. I mean, you can look him up. The guy's very famous. I mean, very, he's big time. And I said, oh yeah, sure, Jeff. I'll look into that for you while I'm in Brazil. And just to be nice, right? But in the back of my mind, I was like, I'm not wasting one second on that stupid case.