A director could be 20 years old and an actor 60, or vice versa; it doesn't matter. It's about connecting sensibility and energy together, and having a vision that goes together and anchors the film as you go along.
The importance of the assistant director cannot be overemphasized.
When you're really working well with a director then you can be as outrageous as you like and so can he. And there's no worry about it.
I tend to, if I decide to do a job, want to be able to trust my director.
I think that what kind of is making this different is the creative group of us that has come together and we're all kind of on the same page working towards the same goal. So it is a real collaborative effort of our hearts more than it is oh you have the writer, you have the director, the producer, whatever.
I recognize the amount of time that it takes as a director. I made the choice to stop taking roles outside of L. A. because I didn't want to miss any of my child's life.
For me, there was never an end game for becoming a director.
David Fincher is probably the best comprehensive director in terms of being a manger of a process that must drive forward. He has such confident command of cinema language and visual language and script and performance. He knows more about f-stops than any cameraman, he knows more about lighting than any gaffer, he is a wonderful writer, and he can give you a good line reading. Under pressure, he is the kind of guy who you will just dive in with and trust and follow because his vision is so intense.
I just think there are a lot of celebrities who don't feel that they have a voice. A lot of actors come from a place of fear, and that's just a general statement about actors. You're terrified the casting director won't like you, you're terrified the producer won't like you, you're terrified the director won't like you, and on and on.
A leadership culture is one where everyone thinks like an owner, a CEO or a managing director. It's one where everyone is entrepreneurial and proactive.
You can only have one voice on set, and that has to be the director.
A director once told me, "You need to act like you're on mute and speak as though the viewer is in the other room doing the dishes. " You become a part of the house. We can make fun of telenovelas, but not to the point where we're mocking them.
I like working with a first time director. I'm more likely to work with a first time director than I am a second time director.
I feel fortunate. I've really gotten to work with amazing talented people, and to learn from them, which is why I'm doing this. If I can work with the best director I'm going to do it.
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.
You stay with the foundation and then you just try different things because you don't know how the director will cut it and you want to give him, what will work, and you want to give him some options, give yourself some options, discover some things when you start to play. That's what we do; we get paid to play.
You never know what you do that could be totally out of left field, which actually might work and give something fresh to the whole scene, to the character, whatever. If you have that with a director who then knows how to shape it, either in the direction, in the moment, or in the editing, then that's good.
I always thought it would be very funny if I was a blind film director.
One has the responsibility to oneself, to the writer, director and the people who put up the money, to put out the best of what one has experienced and understood about the human condition as it relates to the role one has been hired to portray.
As a director myself, you want to have colleagues and collaborators that respect your authority as the director. I'm very comfortable with that, and I've done a lot of work in second unit.