I had become a film director because I thought I could express something in an artful way.
Normally as a director, you do look at other films and things that are relevant. But with this film, it became impossible because I became so aware of the camera placement.
I was not born a size 2. I'm not skinny, period. I'm not willing to sleep with the director or step on somebody else's neck to get the job.
But for me, the challenge is how you turn a character into behavior. Once the director says 'action', you just try to live between those two worlds.
Sometimes jobs are jobs, and when you guest star on television, you're also working with a guest director. You're the new kid on the block, because everyone else is already in the ensemble.
It is universally agreed that Jean Renoir was one of the greatest of all directors, and he was also one of the warmest and most entertaining.
When I was very young I wanted to be a professional horseback rider. Then I wanted to be a pop singer. Then I wanted to be a psychiatrist. Then I wanted to be a movie director.
I'm such a fan of Daniel Waters, who wrote the script, and also Mark Waters, his brother, who directed. 'Vampire Academy' has, I think, an iconic director.
There has never been a female director who has won an Oscar. There has only been one woman who won at the Cannes Film Festival.
I'm in awe of directors like the Coen brothers who can shoot their script and edit it, and that's the movie. They're not discovering the movie in postproduction. They're editing the script they shot.
As a painter you're responsible yourself, 100 percent. In film, you have the editor, the director, the other actors. It has the advantage of not being solitary.
Of course I'm schooled in the old school method: taking what I think the director wants, then reworking it through my own brain and heart.
Writing for television is completely different from movie scriptwriting. A movie is all about the director's vision, but television is a writer's medium.
My first soldier role was in 'Flags of Our Fathers.' Casting director Jay Binder saw that movie and was looking for soldiers for 'Journey's End,' which led to 'Generation Kill.'
It's pretty clear to me that working as a director for hire agrees with me. I like it. The films that have come out of that, I personally like better than the ones that didn't.
'The Color Purple' is the kind of character piece that a director like Sidney Lumet could do brilliantly with one hand tied behind his back.
Be extremely subtle, even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of the opponent's fate.
With Alien, because we always use a different director, each one kind of stands on its own. So I guess it's possible for them to make another one, but we have no plans.
The only other things, and again these things are hearsay, is that he could be pretty rough on directors, because he knew exactly the way he wanted to play the part. And he did so.
'Killer Joe' provides a lot of red meat for the theater. Pam MacKinnon is the perfect director to shepherd a group of actors who share a certain bloodlust.
Directors tend to be more underrated than overrated because it's a quiet job and people don't really understand it.
