Do you direct with a tons of description and background or just a few words?

[john threat]

I tend to direct on the small side. I dont say much. Just a few words. Often time just grumble "go do that thing you are here to do" or something. I answer questions, but I dont talk much, often just saying one word for motivation.


What about you? Do you drone on for 50 minutes about motivation and script? Do you yell and jump around and act it out? Do you show copious notes? Do you mentally will things to happen saying less than I do?

What is your directing style and does it work!

 

[Gary Huff]

It depends on who I'm talking to and how much time I have to talk to them. If we have some downtime for the lights and I want to expound more on the scene, that's what I do. Otherwise, if pressed, I just use short phrases that give out the action verb. However, I may just tell the actor what to do based on their level of experience. Giving action verbs to inexperienced actors usually results in a "deer in the headlight" look and in those circumstances it may be better just to tell them to do exactly what you want (even to the point of giving line readings). Would never dream of doing that to an experienced actor, however.

 

[Jordan Scott Price]

Never, ever drone. Directors aren't motivational speakers - they're coaches, who often have a handful of seconds to dish out the play from the sidelines, with more time to talk before and after the game.

If you have prepared enough - cast early, studied the script, done research, broken the script down, come up with options for rehearsal, rehearsed scenes with the Actors, improv'd, taken more notes, come up with more options, talked to the Actors on the phone or over a meal - shooting it should be simple and fun. If you prepared, your comments to the Actors on set will usually just be reminders, short and sweet. Most often, I find the exchanges on set between Director and Actor have to do with blocking, as the lighting has changed or the location changed, or scenes had to be rewritten, so a slightly or totally new blocking has to be created. This can be horrendous or a great opportunity to find new life in the scene.

I've found a few tell-tale signs when a Director is talking too much - when the Actor says, "I got it," yet the Director keeps talking; when Director gives a long speech and the Actor shrugs and says, "So what do you want me to do?"; when the Director himself/herself fumbles with his/her own words and the Actor comes up with the gameplan instead, for better or for worse!

If you don't have time or opportunity to rehearse before principal - which is common - you just have to know what the scene is (a reunion, a chest-thumping, a battle of the minds, a proposal, etc.), what each character wants from the other (for her to kiss him, for him to leave), and what happened before this scene (she just found out he's cheating on her, etc.). You can work with your Actors from there, as those are the most simple, playable, relatable concepts for Actors to wrap their heads around, but it still takes some script analysis.

Backstory can be wonderful or terrible on set, as it can easily become heady and convoluted - I only use backstory if I know where I want to take it. When I was most recently directing two kids, I used backstory to incite their imagination and arrive at their own conclusions about why the characters act the way they act, instead of playing to a cliche - of course, I knew what idea I wanted them to arrive at, so I asked a ton of questions and guided them to invent parts of the backstory that led them to the internal realization they needed to have about the characters. It was a lot of fun because kids are so unbiased and imaginative - you simply can't do that with adults because they're realize what you're up to.

And with regards to your notes - I always give the Actors a clean script. Actors tend to lose scripts, so I bring several clean copies (usually in sides). I don't let them see my binder because the ideas I've chicken-scratched in the margins are for me and me alone. Nothing should taint the Actors' performances. I made that mistake once recently and had to spend 5 minutes backtracking them out of an idea I didn't want to pursue after they read a note of mine in my script. If I want to explore something new, it will be when I think it's worth it.

I've also found that with very experiences Actors, I can give them a result direction and they can make it natural, personal, and intuitive. If I've done my homework, I can say something like, "That was good. Let's go for another take. This time, a little hesitation after that beat there." The Actor thinks for two or three seconds, and then nods, "Got it." That's a powerful relationship on set because we're on the same plane of creativity but still keeping things brief and personal.

I hope that rambling helps. By no means are these all my ideas - some are just discoveries, others are from the life-changing book Directing Actors, by Judith Weston, which everyone who directs should read. Period.


Cheers.