Episode 55: Director on Director
Welcome to the Vermilion podcast, a free audio library of business strategies,
creative inspiration, and industry knowledge for actors, filmmakers, writers,
and anyone looking to activate their creative potential. I'm Misha Calvert, a writer
-director who helps artists build the careers that they dream of. I really hope that
this podcast inspires you in some way. Thanks for tuning in.
- Welcome to a brand new show. I'm Misha calvert, and it's so great to be with you
in a brand new set. And we've got a guest today who is gonna interview me
actually. So I'm very glad that you're joining us for this studio recording and this
is AMT. Hi AMT. Hi, happy to be here. Very happy to have you.
You're a director and you're gonna interview me, also a director, but why don't we
hear a little bit? They know who I am, whatever, who cares? Who are you and what
is your background with directing? I just graduated from school for directing for
theater specifically, but while I was there I really got into film and so I started
taking film classes.
And although most of my background is in theater, I want to learn how to really
get into directing for film. So I have some questions about that. - Amazing, I love
that. And we've been working together on the team for a little bit. So I already
know you. I'm not scared of your questions, but they might be pretty heavy hitting.
I don't know, we'll see. We'll see, indeed. - So how did you get your start in
directing? I got my start in directing, well, really as a child. And I was setting
up film shoots in my backyard in theater performances in my backyard without anyone
telling me how to do it or what to do. It was very natural and very,
like I had to do it. There was no way that I was going to not put on plays and
movies. So I was quite a prolific soul maker when I was a kid. Then a lot of
stuff happened, kind of got derailed by junior high and high school. And then in
college, I went back to directing for the stage, and mainly because there was
opportunity. There was opportunity to take the Black Box Theater and rent it, and
you could propose a show to put on there and I had read this play I think For a
class maybe and I fell in love with this play and I was like, oh my god I have
to put on this play and that will play that play was who's afraid of Virginia
Woolf So there's a 19 year old college student. That was the first Thing that I
directed as an adult Yeah, pretty cool And then with the film directing that was
about 10 years ago, and that was just desperation, like I was acting and I wasn't
getting the roles that I wanted, so I decided to create something that it was a
role for myself that I knew I could play. And someone, a producer, found the script
and wanted to make it, and I was like, wow, this is crazy. She's like, yeah, you
should also co -direct it, because you're a woman and women need more credits as
directors, so I was like, okay. So then I did. Never look back. What filmmakers and
directors do you take inspiration from? Any woman who is a director who's made a
big film is incredible. It's very hard to do as a woman and you know people don't
want to trust you with the budgets, it won't trust you with production so hats off
to any female
identifying director who has made a film. I have been a fan of Spielberg for my
whole life. I feel like I've talked about this in a previous podcast, but yeah, his
work and his epic movies and his action adventure movies and his just the way the
man understands camera and is willing to play to a wide audience has really informed
my taste. And they're kind of movies that I want to watch.
There are also the ultimately kind of movies that I want to make. So that's been a
little tough meshing that with being an indie director, which you never have that
kind of money on an indie set. So it's been interesting to try and navigate my
voice as a filmmaker and somebody who does gravitate towards kind of bigger concepts
and not having bigger budgets to match. But I would say he's probably one of the
biggest influences.
- And since you have worked both in theater and in film,
I was wondering what you think the biggest difference is between directing for stage
and screen? - With indie film, the director isn't usually just directing.
They're usually helping produce or writing or executive producing or you know helping
set up like the furniture at least in my experience so I don't know is it that
way in indie theater or like off off Broadway I would say so I think it really
depends on the people you have supporting you.
If you have enough money to have a crew and you have a bunch of people that you
know how to work with, so maybe it's not so different after all. I don't know,
what do you think the biggest difference is? I feel like a lot of the preparation
is maybe different or at least like I was able to direct a short at school and
like I had to learn about how to frame, which is so different from what you do on
stage because there you have this entire stage. And you can try to force people's
eyes to certain parts of the stage based on blocking and everything, but with the
camera, you have a lot more like control over that 'cause you really specifically
frame things for the audience to see. I mean there's vast differences between stage
acting and screen acting and I talk about that a lot. I tell actors a lot on set
that I don't want them, I don't want to see the acting at all. No acting, no
acting. So you say that to a stage actor and they're gonna be like what?
Excuse me? I don't know my mind is blanking on this. I know there's like very
obvious clear differences between the two, but to me, the biggest difference is in
the acting itself. And maybe that when you're in film,
the kind of sets that you're creating, and also that the acting itself,
it's meant to be real. You're not trying to make fake things. You're trying a lot
of the time. I mean, sometimes, you know, it's like a severed head, obviously, but
for the most part, everything, you have to create something that is real. The best
way to make it look real is to have it be real. So that includes the acting
where,
I mean,
that's, it's a little edgy when we're getting into like making actors recreate
traumatic scenes, but I always tell them go as far as you possibly can it's
actually believing what you're saying and doing without it causing you psychological
harm. - Yeah, I found a lot of my actor friends have like difficulty, you know,
going too far and then hurting themselves too. - I never had that problem. I'm like,
I'll just hurt myself as an actor. I'll just, I'll cause psychic damage and then
I'll fix it later. I know that's not everybody. - What kind of technical skills do
you think you need to have in order to direct. None. None. When you started,
did you know a lot about different lighting techniques and sound? I still don't know
about lighting techniques. I don't know anything about lighting. I was told once by
a lighting designer to let them do it, because that's what they're in charge of.
It's their job. It's the piece job to know how to shoot, lighting Gafford know how
to light, sound know how, like I don't need to know how a microphone, I don't know
how this microphone works. Well it's a good thing we have people, we trust to do
all those things. Yeah, Quentin Tarantino talks about this, that it's not your job
to make the vision happen, it's your job to have the vision and then other people
make it for you. Yeah, this is a very specific question because I'm not a good
artist and when I first started like making films. Do you think you have to be a
good visual artist in order to create storyboards? No.
No. Mine are like stick figures. Like circles and lines. Lines and circles. I guess
it's all in like the communication with the DP and like making sure that they
understand. Well there are certain things that like I don't have a whiteboard now
but
There's certain different kinds of drawings that you can include in your
storyboarding, so Some of them might be like layouts of the room and where the
camera is going to be positioned and where it's aiming on certain shots Like those
can be really helpful or if it's tracking shots or dolly, you know, you kind of
can draw little arrows to show Everyone like what is happening here like little,
you know blueprints But as far as pictures of the frame,
usually for me it circles the lines. I mean sometimes if I have time I'll like go
up on and beyond but I don't usually have that time. You talked earlier about as
an indie filmmaker you kind of have to take on a lot of roles. So I'm wondering
like what was your hardest day on set and why? I spoke about this in One of the
episodes, but at one point I was I had just concluded a relationship with the DP
who had signed on to shoot a series of mine and he
He still wanted to shoot the series even after he brutally dumped me for no reason
Stupid said yes, why did I do that? I think that was the hardest of all of the
feelings that I still had. And he was being so mean to me on set. And we were at
a mansion that was like two hours outside of the city. And we had brought like 20
cast and crew, maybe more. And it was like a 18 hour day,
including the drive there, and he was being mean to me, and it was very stressful
because I didn't know if we were going to make the day. The whole day I didn't
know if we were going to make the day. We did make the day because I almost
always make my day because that's a director's job. But at the end of the day, it
was a very tough day. The AD also screamed at me at the end of the day. She took
me to another room and she screamed at me for 20 minutes. And that was fucked.
- Switching subject. Steering away from the hard times. As an like early career
director, I guess. I'm wondering where you go to gain experience. Like what websites
do you look for? What listings? - Social media. - Wait, let me focus on this. Okay,
early career director. Where - Where do you find jobs? - Yeah. - You get people to
give you money to make a movie.
- And how do you get them to-- - Like you're not gonna get a job that you apply
for. Like almost never will you get a job as a director that you like cold apply
for. There's just too many wannabe directors.
They're gonna have like 500 applicants, because everyone's a director now.
By the way, there's too many film programs, there's too many film schools just
churning out hundreds of directors every year.
There's not enough work and they're deluding people into thinking that there is going
to be the work, so the only way to guarantee that you're going to get work as a
director is to make your own work. You have to get in the habit of getting people
on board with your vision before there's ever any money in the bank. And if you
can do that, then there will be money in the bank.
And if you have money, you have a film. So sorry, I hate to tell you, but I
don't think I've ever gotten a job because I applied to one. And kind of in like
the same vein of, you know, making your own work and finding those people to fund
your work. Is the industry all about who you know? And if so,
how do you break into it? Hold on. Let me answer that first. Kind of. Basically
because filmmaking is already like an 11 out of 10 of hard.
Because you're creating this imaginary second universe on top of the existing
universe.
So you're basically playing God and constructing an alternate reality within reality.
That is very hard. And then you're battling the elements, you're battling time,
sunrise, sundown, other people who are also think they're gods. So basically,
if you have to do all that, you want to work with people who are going to take
as little energy from you as possible. That you automatically are using energy to
work with someone you don't know, because there's going to be even just like 1
percent of anxiety of the unknown that's natural like and if you have social anxiety
then there will be a lot of anxiety working with people that you don't know because
you don't you don't know if they're gonna have an attitude problem you don't know
if they're good at their job you don't know like I mean at a certain level you
can kind of presume that people are gonna be good at their jobs or you hope but
even then like that's not a guarantee and that there is such a thing as personality
conflict. So the unknown part of things creates an energy sink that you needed that
energy to do your job. I was directing over the weekend and there were so many
things where I noticed my energy and my focus diverting to things that they
shouldn't have been diverted to and I was consciously like, And I really needed that
energy to focus on what I am doing and I so That's sort of the positive reason
behind People working with folks that they already know because you don't want to
take a risk That they might be a bummer Because if they're a bummer and you only
have a hundred energy units in a day and Ten of them have to go to managing that
bummer person in the corner who's supposed to be doing their job but is like
instead of complaining, then you only have 90 energy credits left and you needed a
hundred to do your job as a director. Does that make sense? Yeah. So you often
find yourself working with the same people, like if you have a good working
relationship why if it's not broke?
me, that is not the case. I wish. And I think if I weren't in indie film still,
I am trying to move into higher brackets of budget and so on. But the good people
who are like extraordinary at their jobs, they are usually only available for indie
projects for a limited amount of time. And then if they're good, they get picked up
and they rise, right? I've sort of been lately like one foot in, one foot out of
filmmaking and because it's never been my source of income. I've always had a second
business that I was running on the side. So I've basically been being a full -time
filmmaker and a full -time entrepreneur simultaneously since I started 10 years ago.
So I feel like I haven't really done as many projects as a director as I would
like. There are some people who are still willing to work with me after all these
years and I love them and they're great and everyone else I can't afford anymore.
They're just too good. Yeah. So I know you often write a lot of your own work,
but when you're working with another screenwriter and you're directing,
how do you offer suggestions or put in your own input without,
you know, breaking that working relationship. The first thing is to ascertain if they
even want feedback. Almost nothing that I'm going to suggest is going to make it
worse. I've been writing even longer than I've been directing. So if I make a
suggestion, it's because I really like pretty accurately think that it's going to
make it better and not worse. But they may not be open to that. They may not want
to make it better. I did break one project one time in terms of the working
relationship with the creator. I was directing. I asked to do a director's pass on
the script. She agreed ahead of time. But then we did get into it. She just didn't
want that. Like she said yes. And then as I was giving her, I think I did like
four passes on it. And it was getting so much funnier. Oh my God, it was getting
way better and way funnier. And then in the end, she's like,
"Oh, I just have a few tweaks." And then she added like eight pages to it
for a very limited budget. I was like, "That's not a tweak." - That's eight minutes
more. - That's at least double the length of the film, honey. That's like, that's
not a tweak. That's a whole new movie. - You're talking about situations where you've
had to like stop those relationships or like break a project and it's important to
know like when yeah I should have walked away on that one sooner or I should have
just been like I will shoot this C plus B minus script and just and do minimal
feedback or just get them to improv make improv on the day and then you know
that's usually gonna be funnier anyway for comedy scripts so let her see it in the
edit, but, you know, when you're sitting down with a creator and you're thinking
about whether to work on a movie or not, you have to be aware you're going to be
working closely with them for, like, two years. It's not just the length of the
shoot, like, cut, and that's it, you part ways. So the director needs to make sure
that each stage of the post -production is good. Yeah. It's like a two -year
relationship. You have to really not not be annoyed by them. Kind of in this same
vein. How do you get through disagreements on set and work through those? I don't
have much ego, honestly. I'm strong with my opinions,
but that's different than ego. And so I don't think I get along well with people
who are bringing their ego into the conversation. And that does happen, you know?
It's one thing if they're like an A -list actor and that's just part of the game,
like you have to just go with it. But if they're like on the crew and they're
bringing that, that can be tough. So I don't have very much patience for that.
We are all working toward what is the right answer and what's the thing that's
gonna make the movie or the show the best. And if you're really agreeing about what
the right most appropriate answer is, I find it usually comes down to either taste,
like, "Oh, this person's sense of humor is very different from mine," or it comes
down to a sense of risk aversion.
I am not very risk averse, and some folks are very risk averse so I feel like the
conflicts that I've had have been around risk and I'm usually the director that's
gonna go for it even if the producers like freaking out. I remember one time we
were filming All Hail Bath and this scene it's a really good show on brick TV that
I created and there's a scene where the lead actress runs into the street, and we
were filming under the Manhattan Bridge in this, in Dumbo,
in this, like, pretty big intersection, and she runs out into the street and
screams, ah, and 50 extras run after her,
and Neil in the street worshipping her, because she's become a Babylonian goddess.
And
We didn't have a permit and the best we could do was like a couple people trying
to slow down cars before
Before they hit us and we got the shot looks frickin great But my producers were
were pissed I'm like, well, why don't you get the permits? If it's so if it's so
unsavory to you you know that's how they filmed that 28 days later yeah which has
the new movie coming out 28 years correct yeah have you seen 28 days later no I
actually haven't it's fucking terrifying you have to see it and with like a like a
zombie horror kind of Killian Murphy he stars in it he stars in it when he's very
young and they do this - Amazing scene, like, let's be honest,
the best part of most zombie movies is when they're first waking up and the world
has ended and they're catching up to what's going on. So before they see the
zombies and they're just like, "Where is everybody?" Like, that really is the best
part of those kinds of movies. So they filmed it at like 5 a .m.
in London when no one was on the street illegally, no traffic stopping. - All right,
so my last question, what's a piece of advice you would give to an early career
director that you wish you had known when you started out? - An early career
director, for example, you. - As in me. - Yes. My advice is to you specifically to
get high on your own
And I'm not going to say that applies to everybody, but for you,
you know, some non -binary people are going to not take you seriously and you have
to have a louder radio signal than them. You have to be like,
that's nice. Anyway, and just do your own thing really loudly,
loudly, and proudly. And no matter what other people are thinking,
well, first of all, get the money, right? And then once you do have the money and
you have the people or the resources, be like, "No, this is it. This is where it's
at. This is where culture is at. This is where comedy is at. This is where
filmmaking is at." that, and I'm gonna fuck what you think I'm doing.
You're a loser.
And just keep doing it. I made some of my most interesting work when I was between
the ages of 18 and 25. Like really out there stuff.
That was so cool, I'm so proud of it. Like, that was when I got on all the
covers of all the newspapers. The Times, The Post, A .M. New York, Gawker,
Wack, Rest in Peace. But that was when I was Village Voice, like cover stories,
because I didn't care what other people thought. And if I had just kind of stayed
with it, some stuff happened and I left New York for a bit and then came back to
go to acting school so I kind of abandoned that devised theater and performance art
aspect and I just wish that I had had the confidence to stay with it because I it
really got traction that kind of that kind of I'm gonna do what I want thing is
that what do you think of that and now that really resonates because my department
like my program was all about devised work was all about collaboration. And so I
think, you know, having just graduated, it's really scary, you know, stepping into
the real world. But it is really about having the confidence in yourself.
And even though I'm young and just graduated and everything I know what I'm doing
and I know what work I want to do and what other people will joy too.
And just trusting that I do know what I'm doing. And just all I could do is try
to convince other people that I do know. Yeah, exactly. Because young people think
that the older people are where it's at and that they have all the answers and
that they're winning at life. And let me fucking tell you, older people think that
young people have all the answers and that you know what's going on and that you
are winning at life and they wanna be you, older people want to be young. So don't
have any delusions of inferiority because they all wish that they were your age and
doing it all over again. Like you actually are in the most powerful position,
I think. That's our show. Good to hear. (laughs) Yeah, It's been great chatting with
you, AMT. I don't know what I... Are you shaking hands? We're shaking hands. It's
been great chatting with you. Thank you very much. Thank you for having me. And
yeah, we'll see you next week. The Vermilion podcast is sponsored by Vermilion,
a home for artists. We offer classes, coaching, and community for creatives and
innovators in the arts. If you're ready to find your voice and build the life of
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