I am really, REALLY loose with lines when I direct. When I write, I don't expect a 100% translation from paper even though I work very hard to include vernacular, dialect and appropriate slang into conversational sentence structure.
But none of that really matters. When we're on the set, the actor (or actress) and I work out the character. Not just my take on the character, but their's as well. Unless you have an actor that just doesn't "get" the importance of the story element or whatever, I don't think anyone can figure out the character as well as the actor who plays them. They're the ones channeling that character and so it's really important for them to take that character on.
At that time, I usually encourage the characters to exchange lines in the feel of the scene. To me, the most important thing is the way they play off of each other, that's even more important than the actual words. It's a combination of body language, the dialogue, and the level of comfort they have with each other. At that point, it starts to get defined.
I let my actors play with lines, quips and improv all the time. If I really have a problem with a line then I'll point it out, but I'm not a minor-detail-oriented person. If I have two actors, a husband and a wife and the husband asks the wife to do something and she misunderstands him, my approach to the joke has ended. Then he tosses in a "Women, eh?" quip and it's great. We don't have to use it. but it's there. It tells you about his character beyond the blueprint I've laid out. And he feels good as an actor because his input was listened to and appreciated and added to the overall feel.
We wound up cutting a lot of the improv for the sake of time, but even without that actual banter, the relationship between them that sprung up was far more realistic than what i simply had on paper.
Contrast that with the director I worked with recently who wrote very specific lines, wrote the emotional state in the parantheticals, and stuck cold to the lines. He was working with an actor and actress who'd been in many features who would offer him their perspective on the character, all of which he would reject (he did the same with me the night before, where he ran through the lines with me as he was making them up - i suggested alternate methods of expression because he wanted *one* thing to be communicated and all of the dialogue ran around that. the actors later suggested the exact lines that he had turned down from me the night before).
Eventually he relented on later takes when the performances had just been too stale. Even for the couple, who knew each other for years, the lines are too constraining because he wanted an exact performance. He would show them the blocking and speak the words with the exact vocal inflections he wanted and tell them to repeat it exactly. But by then, you're not acting, you're mimicing. IMO, mimicry does not give a believable performance because the actor is too concerned with pulling off exactly what needs to happen instead of letting it flow out. That's when things get stiff.
I haven't had any feature films or anything big come out yet so you can take my advice with a grain of salt, but I've been told by a lot of different people who see my shorts that the directing works really well, and all of the actors and people who work on the crew talk about what a good time they had and how proud they were of their work.
oh and (god this is long), I take the exact same approach to my crew. When I bring on a DP, I hand over the camera. it may even be my camera, but I hand it over. A lot of people I work with on jobs, they bring me on, then they direct, DP, camera op and do just about every single thing they can on their own (and I wind up holding the clipboard for 2 days
but i digress). But there's so much distraction to deal with there. The director/dp/cam op winds up spending so much time fussing over every small detail in so many different fields that he wound up missing so much of the big picture.
I don't know if that's so much an issue for you, but man I see so many people doing this. There are a lot of people who can do a lot of things at the same time, but they are very far and few between and unless you absolutely need to, it's so helpful to break up the jobs. If you're behind the camera and watching their blocking to make sure they don't step out of the frame, you're not paying so much attention to their facial gestures and the tone and pitch of voice. Maybe you can, but I'll freely admit I can't pay as much attention as I could.
But none of that really matters. When we're on the set, the actor (or actress) and I work out the character. Not just my take on the character, but their's as well. Unless you have an actor that just doesn't "get" the importance of the story element or whatever, I don't think anyone can figure out the character as well as the actor who plays them. They're the ones channeling that character and so it's really important for them to take that character on.
At that time, I usually encourage the characters to exchange lines in the feel of the scene. To me, the most important thing is the way they play off of each other, that's even more important than the actual words. It's a combination of body language, the dialogue, and the level of comfort they have with each other. At that point, it starts to get defined.
I let my actors play with lines, quips and improv all the time. If I really have a problem with a line then I'll point it out, but I'm not a minor-detail-oriented person. If I have two actors, a husband and a wife and the husband asks the wife to do something and she misunderstands him, my approach to the joke has ended. Then he tosses in a "Women, eh?" quip and it's great. We don't have to use it. but it's there. It tells you about his character beyond the blueprint I've laid out. And he feels good as an actor because his input was listened to and appreciated and added to the overall feel.
We wound up cutting a lot of the improv for the sake of time, but even without that actual banter, the relationship between them that sprung up was far more realistic than what i simply had on paper.
Contrast that with the director I worked with recently who wrote very specific lines, wrote the emotional state in the parantheticals, and stuck cold to the lines. He was working with an actor and actress who'd been in many features who would offer him their perspective on the character, all of which he would reject (he did the same with me the night before, where he ran through the lines with me as he was making them up - i suggested alternate methods of expression because he wanted *one* thing to be communicated and all of the dialogue ran around that. the actors later suggested the exact lines that he had turned down from me the night before).
Eventually he relented on later takes when the performances had just been too stale. Even for the couple, who knew each other for years, the lines are too constraining because he wanted an exact performance. He would show them the blocking and speak the words with the exact vocal inflections he wanted and tell them to repeat it exactly. But by then, you're not acting, you're mimicing. IMO, mimicry does not give a believable performance because the actor is too concerned with pulling off exactly what needs to happen instead of letting it flow out. That's when things get stiff.
I haven't had any feature films or anything big come out yet so you can take my advice with a grain of salt, but I've been told by a lot of different people who see my shorts that the directing works really well, and all of the actors and people who work on the crew talk about what a good time they had and how proud they were of their work.
oh and (god this is long), I take the exact same approach to my crew. When I bring on a DP, I hand over the camera. it may even be my camera, but I hand it over. A lot of people I work with on jobs, they bring me on, then they direct, DP, camera op and do just about every single thing they can on their own (and I wind up holding the clipboard for 2 days
but i digress). But there's so much distraction to deal with there. The director/dp/cam op winds up spending so much time fussing over every small detail in so many different fields that he wound up missing so much of the big picture. I don't know if that's so much an issue for you, but man I see so many people doing this. There are a lot of people who can do a lot of things at the same time, but they are very far and few between and unless you absolutely need to, it's so helpful to break up the jobs. If you're behind the camera and watching their blocking to make sure they don't step out of the frame, you're not paying so much attention to their facial gestures and the tone and pitch of voice. Maybe you can, but I'll freely admit I can't pay as much attention as I could.