How NOT to treat your actors.

I don't think I would treat actors this way, but if this is how this guy rolls, so be it. He was seemingly honest with them before they started. Further, contract or not, if you hate what you are doing that bad, quit. Clearly the wrong people were cast for the film. It worked out in the end, but had he cast a couple people who understood what he wanted, they would have done it without being yelled at. Do you think this is the first film that has someone physically abused on film? To each their own.
 
Adam J McKay said:
I don't think I would treat actors this way, but if this is how this guy rolls, so be it. He was seemingly honest with them before they started. Further, contract or not, if you hate what you are doing that bad, quit. Clearly the wrong people were cast for the film. It worked out in the end, but had he cast a couple people who understood what he wanted, they would have done it without being yelled at. Do you think this is the first film that has someone physically abused on film? To each their own.
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"Sorry I hit you last night, honey, but if I'd married the right woman, I probably wouldn't be hitting her. To each his own, amiright?!"
 
Adam J McKay said:
I don't think I would treat actors this way, but if this is how this guy rolls, so be it. He was seemingly honest with them before they started. Further, contract or not, if you hate what you are doing that bad, quit. Clearly the wrong people were cast for the film. It worked out in the end, but had he cast a couple people who understood what he wanted, they would have done it without being yelled at. Do you think this is the first film that has someone physically abused on film? To each their own.
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Not sure how it is there in Ontario but over the pond here in Europe we have laws about working conditions. The film business isn't exempt from those laws.
 
"The film business isn't exempt from those laws." Sometimes it feels like it. In America dogs cats and kids are looked out for(as they should be), but extremely long crew hours leading to dangerous driving conditions aren't(many crew members have been seriously hurt or killed after multiple 16 or 18 hour days driving home).
 
lambert said:
"The film business isn't exempt from those laws." Sometimes it feels like it. In America dogs cats and kids are looked out for(as they should be), but extremely long crew hours leading to dangerous driving conditions aren't(many crew members have been seriously hurt or killed after multiple 16 or 18 hour days driving home).
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The laws are in place. It's just that like with everything else, some people refuse to comply with the laws.
 
lambert said:
"The film business isn't exempt from those laws." Sometimes it feels like it. In America dogs cats and kids are looked out for(as they should be), but extremely long crew hours leading to dangerous driving conditions aren't(many crew members have been seriously hurt or killed after multiple 16 or 18 hour days driving home).
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http://www.dir.ca.gov/iwc/IWCArticle12.pdf

It's actually illegal to work over 16 hours...Again, some people refuse to comply with those laws and then others refuse to enforce them.

This guy does not sound like a pleasant man to work for. I hope he has trouble making films in the future after the reputation he's creating for himself.
 
Adam J McKay said:
I don't think I would treat actors this way, but if this is how this guy rolls, so be it. He was seemingly honest with them before they started. Further, contract or not, if you hate what you are doing that bad, quit. Clearly the wrong people were cast for the film. It worked out in the end, but had he cast a couple people who understood what he wanted, they would have done it without being yelled at. Do you think this is the first film that has someone physically abused on film? To each their own.
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This seems like a very misguided view on this whole situation. How do you know the actors weren't right for the roles? Are you saying that the director abused them because he wasn't getting what he needed from more traditional directing methods? As far as I can tell, he knew he wanted to be abusive regardless of who was cast because in his mind that was probably the only way he could create the performances (something I disagree with, actors play tortured characters all the time without being put through this torture) . I just don't see how you can know that the director suddenly would have been a nice person if only the right people had been cast.

Also, just because people have been abused before does not mean that it's ok.

Ultimately I would say the director was lucky to have worked with these actresses. A lot of actors would have given him the middle finger and walked off.
 
As production manager, I've had to separate a Director and an actor, facing up to each other nose to nose, and it happens. Howeve the law of natural selection works. If the end product is amazingly good, then the Director gets the kudos, and people will wish to work with him, because it will be good for their career and pocket. If it sucks, then he's gone! Nobody will say one good thing about him, and word spreads making him a pariah.

I've worked with one character who was quite unpleasant to everyone, and he's fired me twice for opening my mouth, and then phoned up and just said "8am call ..... slam phone down". I've had this guy refuse to come in the building if a certain lighting person was present, and negotiated compromises. Some people are just horrible, but if they're horrible and brilliant - oops!
 
Well in over 33 years of film and TV production I think I can count on less than two hands the really good directors and they all have one thing in common, they can communicate with people to get the best out of them and certainly don't bully them. Some of them may have been passionate and lose their temper at times and I have had a good ticking off when I have made a mistake but they all had the grace to apologise and that just makes you respect them even more.
 
This isn't even film, but generally how bosses treat workers issue .... No nature of any business except maybe war can sensibly allow for abuse of any kind. I had a year and a half with the worst boss I've ever experienced. Ruined my goddam life, and am putting it back together now. He would bully everyone, micromanage, and fire ppl repeatedly and get upset when they wouldn't come back the next day. There's no excuse for Kechiche's behavior. Even trying to put myself in his shoes makes me cringe. I don't think any level of work/end result can trump abuse like that. That he got the award makes me lose respect for the jury even. To the viewer, ok it may be all about the end result, but as far as the artists go, the real reward is the process. I think the process has to be considered when judging a piece of work. At least in this case. I don't even wanna watch the flick.
 
It's an illness that befalls especially European directors at times - full Caligula modus. It has not much to do with art or craft or abilities or necessities or high concept. While some of the before mentioned things can be around while they work, the basis on which they work has much more to do with sadism & masochism, with a kind of group therapy gone bonkers or a semi-religious urge for subjugation and domination.

I've seen such directors on set when I started. Some extremely prominent in Europe. What I learned from them was: They squandered time, money, energy, creativity, willingness, motivation of other people on their own vanity and cruelty - and their breathtaking inabilty to learn their craft. They were most times, with few exceptions, poseurs and director impersonaters. And the outcome was most times dull "art pour l'art" - only ever so often with out real art. With very few exceptions where something was produced worthwhile but which could have been made to the same result another way.

Directing the Madame Blavatsky style and hoping the press will go for the bait. Old trick also for young dogs: If you can't produce an interesting film, produce at least a scandal.
 
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I may have the beginning of an explanation for kechiche's way of work, i don't want to find some excuses for his behaviour but he started his career on directing non-profesionnal actors and made a very good movie ( his second ) "la graine et le mulet". This movie was truly amazing especially for that reason. Sure, he knows how to tell a story but he might not understand what acting really is, like many other directors especially in france. And i would add that this is the result of a certain way of "doing cinema" in france where actors and directors grown up separately until they find each others on a set. And i continue, i think it's because cinema especially in france is not an industry, you may have heard about french "cultural exception" wich literally means : this is not an industry. Competition is biased, there are not enough people who practice their art, which often produces anomalies. And bad people can stay up longer than elsewhere and they can quickly become too big for their boots.

Cheers.
 
greymog said:
Reading about MAdame Blavatsky but can't make the connection... can u elaborate?
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Some people - writers, directos, actors - and theater groups in Europe work(ed) on what they believe are the proto-theosophic theories of Blavatsky (and, later, Steiner). So her influence "post mortem" on acting and theater was quite strong. She herself would stage show-like performances with strong theatrical aspects when travelling and presenting herself and her group at certain times. So for me "Blavatsky's Theater" was a strange mix of even stranger human beings getting themselves worked up into certain stages of exaltation, when they would do rather strange things in front of an audience - which where interpreted as proof of her theories and/or very, very serious art.

Having been in my student days a member of a group of people searching for truth, wisdom (okay, and a bit of fun) and the last and hidden knowledge about all and everything, Blavatsky has become for me the perfect "maitresse d'affair" and metaphor whenever there is the urge to camouflage something as "deep" when it's often just a set up for people who want to live in a dominance-subjugation relation. Clearly it's everyones decision to do that and kive such a relation if they want it.

If I would be a producer, btw, I would try to get Tim Burton or Terry Gilliam to do this movie: Blavatsky's Theater .... ;-)

I understand the urge of some directors to work in an un-hinged state of mind with un-hinged actors because they may believe they get something special out of them. And yes: At times this may happen. Very, very few times. But - as in this group I was a member as a student - in nearly all cases you just find out later that all the un-hinging produces more nonsense and embarrassment than anything else.

But: It is an incredible strong mechanism for people with the urge of hiding a lack of both craft or art behind a curtain of voodoo-gymnastics and mumbo-jumbo talk. And, btw, a lot of people can get hurt this way.
 
sounds to me like he was just trying to get his rocks off making this scene, disguising as trying to be a perfectionist artist
 
Rolf Silber said:
But: It is an incredible strong mechanism for people with the urge of hiding a lack of both craft or art behind a curtain of voodoo-gymnastics and mumbo-jumbo talk. And, btw, a lot of people can get hurt this way.
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THIS. Even if you take away the fact that he treated these women worse than cattle, you're still left with an incredible lack of professionalism. Reminds me of the Michael Wincott character (the pseudo-artist director) from What Just Happened.

This guy just signed with CAA, and if they don't enroll him in some basic etiquette classes, he's going to crash and burn here in the states.

-EMB
 
@Rolf: I was sitting earlier with a mathematician. We've been talking about this since you posted it :) Thanks for setting off one heck of a discussion here ...

On that last statement that pretty much sums it up, this happens a lot over here, and people as a result usually never go past a first draft an anything done. The concept and the fact that they tried is commended as brilliant.

As far as people getting hurt, I can relate to that on a much much more personal level, but that'll just make me break down. Still, I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who doesn't really buy voodoo-gymnastics and mumbo jumbo. It takes a certain amount of trouble to get work done. Coasting by under the guise of anything else usually spells disaster.

Anyway, thanks. For real. Today was refreshing as a result.
 
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