DGA Monthly

J U N E 2 0 2 6 I 6 5 Bill D'Elia on approaching Actors with honesty: "Actors have a tough job. I have real respect for Actors, and I love Actors. And if you approach them with an honesty about what you have to say, you're gonna be fine. Now, does that mean that you don't manipulate? Sometimes you just have to. Sometimes you just have to trick somebody into something. But the bigger the star, the more secure the star, the more experience that star has had, the more they'll respect an honest approach about things. I learned early on that it's not necessarily what you say, it's how you say it, how you present it, and what you have to bring to the party." The DGA's Visual History Program is an endeavor designed to explore the art and craft of the Director and the Director's team via peer-to-peer interviews with other Directors, Assistant Directors, Unit Production Managers, Associate Directors and Stage Managers. Created in 2000 by the Special Projects Committee and consisting of more than 250 videotaped interviews, the Visual History Program serves as an invaluable teaching source for those curious about the craft, a preservation of the professional wisdom of DGA members, and a unique repository for Guild history. The interviews, which last between three and eight hours, emphasize reflective and collegial discussions about all aspects of the creative process in film, television and other media. Visual History interviews are accessible to all Guild members as well as to the general public on the DGA website. The Visual History database is fully searchable by topic, and each interview is indexed, allowing for quick retrieval of segments pertaining to specific interests and topics, either within a particular interview or across the entire collection. Featured here are a few excerpts from Directors regarding working with Actors. Perspectives on Working with Actors from the Visual History Program Archives View more excerpts and interviews in the Visual History Collection via the link on the homepage of www.dga.org. Ted Kotcheff on improvising with Actors: "I like improvisational Actors. When I was teaching acting, part of the technique is improvisational. I mean I'd say to one Actor, 'You're the father of these three kids and your doctor just told you that you have cancer; you're dead in three months. Conceal it from them.' And then I go to them, I say, 'Your father's going to say that he's ill, obviously you want to find out what the doctor said. All right, "Action!"' and just let them improvise. Give the line of action is the important thing; what are you doing in that scene? That's what interests an audience, when a character walks into a scene, what's he doing in that scene? The audience doesn't know that he's coming in with cancer. He's concealing it, but you got to feel the concealment, why he's dodging the issue. But it's all improvisational." Barry Sonnenfeld on his preferred place from which to direct: "I direct from the camera. I think Actors like an audience and by standing at the camera while you're filming, several things happen. One is, you're watching them live and they sense you laughing or smiling. They sense you being there. Also, as soon as they're done, as soon as you say, 'Cut,' you can go right in and say, 'Don't step on the line. You're overlapping. Talk much faster.' Whatever. Third of all, if you're directing from video village, here's what happens. You start to get lazy, and you start to yell, 'One more. Just faster.' Or you say to the AD, 'Tell them to do it faster.' They don't want to hear from the AD. They want to hear from you. So, I think that if you're standing right there at the camera, it's the way to be." Gail Mancuso on finding the "funny" in a performance: "All those years of script supervising, it's like the best position you can be in because you have all these different Directors that you're working with and there were times I would articulate to myself, 'What would I tell an Actor? How would I make this better?' And there's no right or wrong. I always say there's no right way to direct a scene. There's just your way. And it's just practice. It's that constant being able to practice the verbiage and finding the funny. You know, we're always like, 'What else can we do?' Maybe if it's not on the page, is there something we could do to augment the comedy in a scene, whether it be physical, or is it a line or something that's usually character-driven." Rob Reiner on the occasional need to demonstrate a performance: "Meg was gonna do the scene [in When Harry Met Sally] and she's nervous. The first couple of times she does it and it's a little bit tepid. I said, 'Meg, if you're gonna do this, you gotta go full out…' Did it again, again, it was a little mild. I said, 'Look, let me show you want I want.' I've done this with a lot of Actors. It's a simple way to communicate what you want. I sat opposite Billy and I'm going, 'Yes, yes, yes!' pounding the table. I did that for John Cusack in The Sure Thing, where there's a scene in a truck where he goes crazy. If you can't communicate and get them to what you want, you show them what you want. The good Actors say, 'Tell me how you want me to say that,' and then they take it and they make it their own."

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