The Rural We: Bobby Houston

For more than a decade, Bobby Houston was part of the Hollywood scene. Starting as an actor in Wes Craven’s cult classic “The Hills Have Eyes,” he turned to directing, for which he received an Academy Award for his documentary, “Mighty Times: The Children’s March” in 2005, His previous film, “Mighty Times: The Legacy of Rosa Parks” was nominated for an Academy Award in 2003 and won an Emmy. After being fired by HBO (on the night of the Oscars, no less), he retreated to the Berkshires, where he was fixed up with his-now partner Eric Shamie and decided to retire here. But he’s hardly retired: he has been active in rehabbing houses, developing The Green Houses, a sustainable co-housing community at the Dolby Florists site for retiree co-housing, and opened Scout House, a new boutique in downtown Great Barrington.

I studied documentary filmmaking at Harvard, and made some movies using actors, which was considered crazy and radical at Harvard. After I graduated, I went to LA. The easiest way into the business is acting, but I felt uncomfortable as an actor. I transitioned into writing and then directing. I did that for a decade or more until my partner died of AIDS in 1995. At that point I rebooted in two ways: I stayed in the countryside in our house in Ojai, and opened a bookstore, which became kind of a community thing. To finance the bookstore, I would direct documentaries and TV.

The documentaries lead to bigger, better assignments and Academy Awards, but when I was fired by HBO, I came to the Berkshires, and felt right at home. I started buying homes and fixing them up. During potlucks with our friends, we began visioning a co-housing community around people who have the same food and home cooking sensibilities — this area has the most remarkable home cooking culture. The idea manifested in a small community setup, five timber-framed houses on the site that was once Dolby Florists. Eric and I live there now. The folks who live there — artists, actors, writers — all get along. It’s like the world’s smallest commune.

During Covid I got a little antsy and bought the former Berkshire Record building, floating behind Main Street. It’s a building I had always admired. It had 18 rooms and two false ceilings. As we explored, we found 12-foot ceilings, and it turned out to be this big, beautiful house. Jennifer Bianco, an interior designer, Kristen Alexander-King, and I launched Scout House, a curated department store with full design services. Scout House is a flagship for design ideas, fashion, beauty, home goods and soft furnishings.

I’m also one of the founders of the W.E.B. Du Bois Sculpture Project, which commissioned and will be installing a statue of Du Bois in front of the Great Barrington Library. It should be a wonderful breakthrough for the town — it will make a bigger difference than people think.