I don’t have any particular excitement about working with any specific director or actor at this point.
I’m a great bum, and I’m a pretty good director.
I’m a director’s actor; I’m a storyteller’s actor.
An actor finds things in the moment with a director and other actors that you don’t have time to hand-draw or animate with a computer.
I’ve definitely become more aware and conscious of what directors I’m working with because it’s so important. The director is really more than half the battle of the film. You really rely on that. That’s become really, really important to me, for sure.
It does make you a better director and a better actor.
From a writing point of view, you now have teams of screenwriters working with a director. What’s lost in the process is the power of that one heart, brain, gut and soul that makes something an original piece of writing.
I think there has only been one time in my entire career that I’ve ever gone back to shoot a scene. And it was a scene that, when we were shooting it, we knew that it wasn’t working. We knew there was a disagreement between the actor and director. So, we went back.
I’ve worked with some of the great cinematographers. So I’m always watching what they do and I’m watching how the director composes his shots, just because I find it interesting as an actor; you’re trying to help them out as well.
I was definitely incredibly close to my dad, in a way that was all-encompassing. I am close to my mum, too, but there were areas that she and I did not share. So his loss to me was huge, personally and professionally. He believed in me, not just as a father, but as a director, and that always meant a lot.
To be a good director, you have to have good life experience. I’m getting there.
Since signing with Universal, I have been working closely with Gary Ross, the director, producer and screenwriter. We have spent many hours on the phone, and I’ve been sending him information and items that have been useful to the writing process.
I had a director who told me a story about a fan who had commented on how nice it was to see her sister laughing and how happy the show made her. I like to make people happy and make them laugh.
When I made my first film, I didn’t think of it as directing, so it wasn’t like I set out to become a director.
I spent all my time on my movies worried that people were eating and that the schedule was being kept, so to have experts in those areas giving me the brain space as a writer and director is huge.
When I auditioned for my high school band the band director was excited because my father was known to be a great musician. When he heard me, he said ‘Are you sure you’re Ellis’s son?’
And later I thought, I can’t think how anyone can become a director without learning the craft of cinematography.
Different people have different styles, but there is an opportunity as a director to be a writer in every moment, with every visual cue and every piece of production design. Everything is a decision, and everything can be obsessed over.
The 9/11 Commission strongly recommends that the National Intelligence Director be fully in control of the budget, from developing it to implementing it, to ensuring that the National Intelligence Director has the clout to make decisions.
I never suffered from the absence of a father. On the contrary, as a child I was more inclined to see men as a disturbing factor. It made things difficult for me when I started working as a director.
I think if I wasn’t a musician, I would be a high-school band director or orchestra director. I like working with large groups of musicians and bringing out the dynamics and accomplishing something as a team.
I realized the exciting place was behind the camera with the producer, director and so on.
Short films really helped me develop as a story teller, animator, and as a director.
A director is a very selfish person. For him, his film is like his baby.
Now, I have big-money offers on three movies, and I have director approval. That’s kind of scary,’ he says. ‘No directors have been attached. That’s a lot of pressure on me.
Film is shot in fragments, and the same moments can be shot again and again until the director is satisfied.
I wouldn’t not want to be a director and write as I wouldn’t not to want to be a writer and direct movies.
I worked with the best – Givenchy, Dior, Yves Saint Laurent – and it gave me an ability to be confident. It turned me into a CEO and a creative director and a brand.
It’s kind of interesting to be a director who is all of a sudden being an actor playing an agent. This is my whole world!
I have no interest in directing. I’d be a bad director.
You can do 12 great takes, but if the director is no good, he’ll end up picking the wrong one.
Working on a play is a vibrant and collaborative business. Everyone from the choreographer to the music director to the director to the writers work together toward the same goal, and everyone chimes in on everything.
I think film and television – particularly film – you are very isolated as a writer. If you’re lucky, you have a good relationship with the director. Then you do make that development and come on set and be part of something. But ultimately, your work is kind of done by the time you come on set.
The marvels of daily life are exciting; no movie director can arrange the unexpected that you find in the street.
The ladder of success in Hollywood is usually a press agent, actor, director, producer, leading man; and you are a star if you sleep with each of them in that order. Crude, but true.
As a writer, you have control of the words you put on the page. But once that manuscript leaves your hand, you give control to the reader. As a director, you are limited by everything: weather, budget, and egos.
I feel like I might be a designer or stylist – or a director because I have always been super interested in cameras and editing.
I follow the director’s lead because they generally know more about the big picture, but I also trust that the director will give me enough freedom to play.
A man sooner or later discovers that he is the master-gardener of his soul, the director of his life.
Originally a record producer more or less hired a bunch of professionals to participate in a recording session, the performers and the technicians, and a music director was put in charge. That directly related to a film producer’s job.
I’ve always had the utmost respect and awe of what the lens can do and what a director can do with just a camera move.
The smartest thing a director can do is surround himself with really good people.
As the director of an opera, it is my responsibility to unify the style of the particular performance, but one can certainly approach the piece from different points of view. That’s what makes it interesting and keeps it alive.
I became a director by accident. M.S. Raju garu asked me to direct a movie, and I said OK. It all happened in 5 minutes.
Ah, there’s a director. Astonishing, Spike Lee. A feisty guy, but a guy who’s, I think, incredibly misunderstood. I think people review his politics or his color as opposed to his filmmaking sometimes. Because he’s a wonderful, wonderful filmmaker and a lover of the art.
I’ve loved musical theater ever since I was a kid. My mother’s a pianist, and my grandfather was an amateur theater director and stand-up comic. And I was an only child. And I loved attention. So from an early age, my family was teaching old musical songs.
I realized that I need to protect my films because the director will move on, the producer will move on too, but as an actor I will be considered a flop if things will not work.
Interestingly, ‘October Sky’ is an anagram of ‘Rocket Boys’, the same letters just moved around. This was discovered by director Joe Johnston using an anagram program on his computer.
The thing about For Better or Worse is the only thing that made me an okay director for that is that I have a sense of humor, and it was supposed to be funny.
There’s no doubt about Prakash’s abilities as a director.
I think the director is becoming more important. To work under rushed conditions, you need to have an extremely professional director. If the director’s good than the end result will be good.
If I feel the part is right, and I know that the producers and the director want me, I’d go for broke. Always.
When you look at a movie, you look at a director’s thought process.
I don’t have a director. The audience directs me.
Cinema is a director’s medium, so you’re saying, ‘What do you want?’ Being an actor is about adapting – physically and emotionally. If that means you have to look great for it and they can make you look great, then thank you. And if you have to have everything washed away, then I’m willing to do that too.
Use people whom you’re excited by and who share your excitement… The ideal collaboration is one in which the actor and director are saying to each other, ‘I can’t believe how lucky we are to be making a movie together.’
Ultimately in the end, it’s the director’s choice.
The importance of the assistant director cannot be overemphasized.
The funny thing about directing is that you have your own opinions, but it’s a collaboration. Directing is a group effort. Even though you might think something works, the smartest thing you can do as a director is try and weigh the opinions of the people around you.
