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I suppose they call me a womans director because there were all these movie queens in the old days, and I directed most of them. But I also directed Jack Barrymore and Ronald Colman and James Stewart, to name a few.
The first time I ever intersected with the quote unquote industry or Hollywood or being given a paid job as a director all came because of the reputation I got coming out of Sundance as a veteran Sundance filmmaker.
When I just write something, it's usually because I love it, I love the material, but I feel like I really need a creative partner to crack it. And I certainly need and have a lot of creative partners as a director.
There's something mystical and wonderful about being in the room with the actual live performer s on stage that works. In film, it doesn't work so you're dependent on a great director to keep the thing moving along.
I need to gain a lot more experience. I think so much of being a director, other than the technical aspect and the artistry of it, is the confidence that you are, I think in many ways, you're the captain of the ship.
It's a lucky circumstance when you get to usher in new work, because you are able to ask the playwright and the director (who in a new work is always in dialogue with the playwright) an unlimited amount of questions.
You've got to be flexible. Directors do a massive amount of planning and homework, and if after all that your director decides to throw it all out of the window and shoot spontaneously, then you must follow his lead.
To suddenly be working with one of the top-10 directors in the world, plus the film was in China, I almost blurted out, "How much do I have to pay?" It was just like a dream come true. That was an amazing experience.
It was actually the opposite of what a director once said to me. He said, 'Remember, everyone is here to serve you.' And as he walked away, I thought to myself, 'It's exactly the opposite: I'm here to serve everyone.
It's very, very technical, what we do in film. While all of the lights are there and all of the crew members and directors are staring right at you, you have to be honest. It's a very difficult, but technical medium.
And I think being a good director is being able to be completely tyrannical and you?ve got to be an absolute dictator while at the same time, you have to listen and see everything because it can all change on a dime.
With the film, you have a bunch of executive producers, directors, writers, scripts. There's, management, lighting, the union and etc. There are so many components a part of that game, so naturally it isn't my world.
The rule of thumb for a director or producer - which prevents them from just sticking their names on everything - is that you have to contribute substantially more than 50 percent of the character dialogue and story.
Well, it's so cheesy to say but you can't find a comedy director who makes movies for critics. When a movie does $580 million worldwide, I'm not saying that proves anything except people were enjoying the experience.
There have been directors that I did not enjoy working with, but for the most part I realize that I have been unbelievably spoiled in my career because I have worked with some of the greatest, greatest directors ever.
It is only the untalented director who imagines him or herself in every part, wants his or her own thoughts and emotions portrayed; it is only the untalented who make their own limitations those of the actors as well.
I think they quite like me when I work because I'm one of the safer directors to back, because even if my films don't bring their costs in back home, once they're shown outside of India they manage to cover the costs.
In general, the few directors that I've worked with that I really respect have taught me a lot about who I am and they've opened me up as an actor. I want to take some of that to apply it to when I'm directing actors.
Some directors can tell stories and it becomes very intimate and small, and it's almost like a secret. Some directors have the gift of finding a way to show it and tell the story, in a way that brings in the audience.
But when you work with the director and the real person who is playing opposite you, it changes everything. You are almost in a working session. I was very comfortable, and that’s maybe what helped me to get the part.
I really think the mind of someone who hasn't been welded into place by their work or studios or actors or this whole society is a wonderful mind to work with, so I'd like to do a big picture with an unknown director.
A successful director is someone who has the combination of skills that you can learn, but there's also an intuitive sensibility that they bring to it, that they've developed on their own and that is singular to them.
Really, what I'm doing is an attempt to continue the best work of the people I adore: Francis Coppola and Scorsese and Robert Altman and Stanley Kubrick and those amazing directors whose work I grew up with and loved.
When you're in the editing room, as a director, you get the opportunity to look at your work. As a writer, you can rewrite. But as an actor, unless you're watching playback, you really rely on the director to help you.
I think it's very easy to get caught up and think that how many hits you get in a magazine because you were seen out somewhere has anything to do with a director's opinion of you, and whether they could use you or not.
We do have American Idiot picked up by HBO and I wrote the record and concept to it. [We have] the writer Rolin Jones and [director] Michael Mayer [who also directed the Broadway production], so we'll see what happens.
When Shana Alexander interviewed me for Life magazine in 1952, she gave up after 4,000. At one time or another, I've worked for every studio in Hollywood, for almost every director with most of the actors and actresses.
They seem much rarer now, those auteur films that come out of a director's imagination and are elliptical and hermetic. All those films that got me into independent cinema when I was watching it seem thin on the ground.
The thing about Hitchcock which is quite extraordinary for a director of that time, he had a very strong sense of his own image and publicizing himself. Just a very strong sense of himself as the character of Hitchcock.
Do you know what directors go through? It's just hell. Like, why do I work so hard - to think I'm only going to see this movie five times and then never see it again 'cause I'm so sick of it? What is it worth, honestly?
There's nobody who loves being around actors working more than David Mamet, especially actors bringing his tremendous dialogue to life. I've never seen a movie director who was happier to be directing a movie than Dave.
When you're the director and the writer, you never have to remember your lines, and there's no one to call you on it. On Garden State I did different lines on every take, just making crap up. And it was great each time.
I would love to see more women directors because they represent half of the population - and gave birth to the whole world. Without them writing and being directors, the rest of us are not going to know the whole story.
I'm just happy when directors make a movie that is really sentimental but without being maudlin or saccharine or too much like Chewels gum. I don't want to be involved in a movie that's too much like a piece of Chewels.
I had to go and sing with the musical director of the film, Simon Lee, who is just incredible, and it went great. I sang with him about five things, things we'd worked on. And then I went to sing for Andrew Lloyd Weber.
Obviously I'd love to work with any of these great directors because every time I've worked with them I've gained a tremendous amount as an actor. Each director has his own way of pushing you towards improving yourself.
By the way, I'm not sure the managing director who was 50 in 2005 understood that the job had changed - that when he or she came out of school in 1986, that it was different. How would they know? We've got to admit that.
Unlike a lot of British directors, I hadn't done any theater. But, I had a great mentor who said, "What you're looking for is exactly the same thing you've done in your documentaries, which is moments of emotional truth.
Sometimes directors may not give you words, you know? They may not talk at all! You've just got to use your radar to figure out how you can get to the center and not lose yourself, but still be directed at the same time.
As an actor, I'm attracted to drama; as a director, it's humor - because it's the story of my life, and I can't be that serious about it. Being alone is a big theme in all my movies, both as a director and as an actress.
Once in a while I come across a director who hasgrown up thousands of miles from me, and the work touches me.Through these issues/50/images I am connected and something is illuminated.And I know then that I am not alone.
Boards of directors are allowed to work together, so are banks and investors and corporations in alliances with one another and with powerful states. That’s just fine. It’s just the poor who aren’t supposed to cooperate.
As a director, you're only as good as your collaborators. You surround with collaborators that are going to understand what you're trying to do. Not only that, they're going to push and fight for what you're trying to do.
If there's a criteria that really gets me interested in a work besides any type of personal interaction with the theme, it's if I feel like this is the right piece of work for that director at that moment in their career.
If I had to choose criteria, for me, it's about first the director. I want to be a part of something that's good and intellectually challenging. After the director it's the character and the story. That's the deal for me.
It is tough to be a woman. Also as an actor, but more so as a director. And even more today, when distributors and producers are looking at different kinds of films and maybe not necessarily what a woman would want to do.
Once you get the script, you then hope you can get the director that you want. Then you hope he can get the cast he wants. Again, you can go quickly or there can be a million stumbling blocks. There's just no way to know.
I worked with great, brilliant directors. I've been so lucky. It's terrible to compare anyone, because you can't. But I can just tell you that this experience was just a truly magnificent experience for everyone involved.
As a director who does not like to write, I am always looking for scripts that I can contribute to through directing. I don't want to do the same thing that the writer is doing; I want to add an angle or highlight a theme.
I have an association that director means total authority. Director means they will never let you down. Director means just trust them and fulfill their vision, and know that the story will be told in its best incarnation.