I never made the movies for the critics; I've done the best I could with the material and the directors and the actors I had. But the thing that's really exciting is that once I do that one project that's different, that stands out, everyone's gonna ...
In acting, you are fulfilled if you give justice to your role... if you are able to do a credible performance and touch the audience. Same with directing. If you are able to draw out the best from your actors, then you fulfill your job as a 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, I've been able to combine with what I've learned as an actor and as a producer: it melds quite nicely into what I feel like I should have been doing all along.
I've stood up to producers before, and even a director. I saw them being abusive. A lot of people on the set are scared to say stuff when they're not being treated right.
Don't get me wrong: I'm overjoyed with my career to date. But perhaps I could have done more. Mostly, I just did whatever the directors told me to do.
The challenge to me as a director was for the audience to see the film as going on in a straight line, so that they did not sense all of these break-ups. I did not want a film to be a collage of all these images.
If I had not been successful as a director, then I'm sure I would still be telling stories. I would have continued on 16mm or found a different medium through which to tell them.
I've been fortunate in my career to have the opportunity to pick and choose the parts I play. I've also been lucky to always be involved with quality actors, quality directors, quality writers.
Quentin Tarantino was fantastic. I mean, he can be almost unbearable as a person. At a party, you can't get a word in edgewise for, like, an hour. But as a director, he is so completely open and just... present.
I was a VP of marketing, I was regional sales manager in fashion, and marketing director in communications and product development. I was always a corporate Fortune 500 girl.
Arnold and Jamie Lee must have worked over the years with directors that did 50 takes, because I'd get like three takes or so and say, Ok, that's it, we're done.
I'm supposed to be the director of a television company, but I've only ever seen that company as a vehicle for making the kind of programmes we wanted to make, getting our ideas on the screen.
On 'Darjeeling,' I was on set every day and I acted as the second unit director and a producer on that film. I was there throughout the whole process. On 'Moonrise Kingdom,' I showed up for one day.
I've directed things that other people have written before, and I've written things and given them to other directors. So I'm very versatile in terms of that, and I enjoy all of it.
Every character I've ever played, I always try to take him right to the edge and not allow him to fall over, but directors have a tendency to pull me back a little bit.
I decide intuitively what I want to do. When directors like Imtiaz Ali, Ayan Mukerji, Anurag Basu and Anurag Kashyap, who have stories to tell, come to me, why would I not be a part of it?
I've been working with Spanish, French, some more American, and Japanese directors. And then I realized I have to study English, and that's why I moved to New York two years ago.
There are a lot of actors who will watch the monitors. They'll do a scene, and then the director will look back to see if he got whatever he wanted. I just find it odd to sit there and watch yourself.
On 'Glee,' the director can be like, 'Hey, your face is looking a little too intense here.' And they can show me the screen, and I can be like, 'I know exactly what to do here.'
Every actress has a line she'll draw, where she'll say, 'This I will do and this I won't.' For me, everything has to be important to the story and the director has to be able to tell me why.
