BPS 384: Building a Hollywood Directing Career with Brad Silberling

thousand dollars, and we wanted to focus on that. At Bulletproof Script Coverage, our readers have worked with Marvel Studios, CIA, WME, NBC, HBO, Disney, Scott Free, Warner Brothers, The Blacklist, and many many more. So if you need your screenplay or TV script covered by professional readers, head on over to covermiscreenplay dot com. Well, guys, I promised you a special episode and I hope I deliver it with this one we have on the show today,

writer director Brad Silberlin. Now, I've had a long love affair with Brad from a distance for a long time. I love his films. He made films like City of Angels, Casper, Lemony, Snickets, and also has worked on some amazing television shows like Jane, The Virgin Dynasty, Charmed, La Law, NYPD, Blues, Doodiy Hauser,

and many, many more. And I sat down with Brad and talked to him about his journey, what it's like having a mentor like Steven Spielberg in your life, and how he's been able to overcome a lot of the obstacles that this business throws in front of all of us. So, without any further ado, please enjoy my inspiring conversation with Brad Silverlin.

he would move from that job into network television. Don't ask how they made that leap. It was a smaller business then. So we moved out to la in sixty seven and he started working at that point at ABC as a programming executive. So oddly enough, they thought his skills would translate. So he worked as a network executive the whole time I was growing up. But he always loved production, and so I took advantage of that by I would go beg to be dropped off at a

set at any point I could. From probably about age nine, when I was old enough to ride a bike, I would steal over to Universal I'd met a really nice secretary who would like slip me call sheets at a drive on which was a bicycle, and I would spend every Friday afternoon there. But I just was fascinated by the process. And again my dad was always coming at everything from a story perspective. But I'm that guy who you know, I still hadn't really picked up a camera.

I was just absorbing. And then I was there that first day in nineteen seventy five, first day for showing of Jaws. I made my dad drop me off. There was a we had a theater called the Plit. It was in Century City where ABC was, where he was working, and I begged him to just drop me off. It was like an eleven am showing and I'm sitting there alone. The theater was not full, even though obviously days to come it was going to be incredibly full, huge airplane

kind of recliner seats. Some alone in my row, and I get to the attack on little Alex Kintner, the kid on the raft, and I'm just having a heart attack, and I don't know if I can make it through the movie, looking around to see if there's anybody there, but I hung in thank God. And by the time it was done, I had that feeling, which was who got to do that? Who did that? Who took me through that ride? That is something I will never get

out of my system. And I went home that day and snuck into my dad's photography Clauset stole his He had a it was it was it a Minolta super a camera and I started shooting. So that day it was just like the switch was thrown. And Steven's really funny about this because I'm not alone. I mean, I can tell you the number of other filmmakers who were switched on in that moment by that movie. And so I started shooting. Yes, So I was all. I did two things in junior high school. In high school, I

shot movies and I played soccer. And that was what I did. And this was duper eat again, where was I mean? I look at everybody now with their phones in which possible, and back then you're shooting three and a half minute cartridges. Every second counted. You had to really, so you're getting in the camera, you're really thinking through your material, you're splicing your little you know, super eight splices. But I so that's what I did, and I was

very obsessed, and I did that right up through. I got a lot of good advice to not do film as an undergrad, but to try to actually learn anything else, have sort of more an open humanist mind, start writing. And so then I went to grad school and I went to CLA and made you know, sc is more famous for its, you know, thesis final films, whatever they're called,

but I made I made my thesis film. And I was fortunate that we fought to have our first industry screening because UCLA was super egalitarian and they didn't normally like things like that, but we did. And so coming out of that screening, I ended up going under contract. I went under contract Universal. There had been a woman there who's still a great friend, Nancy Nayer. She ran casting at Universal. She was there just aatrol for actors. She saw my film and she said, would you mind

if I took your film back to the studio? And I was like, yeah, no, please, please don't plead, please don't know. Can I walk you to your car? I mean it was And so I got a really funny set of phone calls. One was from from the TV group and one was from the Future Group. And again at that point in time, they did not communicate. They still don't often, and they basically both one to try

to put together some sort of deal. They hadn't really done term deals for directors since like the early seventies, Stephen Stielbert, Richard Donner, a number of these guys actually basically were on term deals, and so they dusted off an old term deal and they they just did like, he's young, he's cheap, Hopefully you know some talent, let's do this. And they covered everything from writing, directing, producing, you know, making omelets. They they had me, but it

was incredible. So I was prepared to start, you know, parking cars out of grad school, but I went under contract. So that meant immediately trying to figure out who's producing on the lot, is there television, who's making movies? And that became home for the first two and a half three years that I got started. And then ironically Steven Botchko and his then sort of in house director, a really great guy named Greg Hobblett.

like very much. So this was the problem. And you know, the whole I did musicals is you only you only burst out into song when you have to when when when basically the spirit moves and the story needs it. But he didn't approach it that way. The cop rock outlines were like normal Hill Street. It was like procedural, procedural, Uh, maybe a song in here. And so there's the problem. They were ledged in which meant that in production they came very late. So it wasn't like you had this

great chance. I mean, Steven Spielberg talks about this beautiful process on one side, story about working for six months even as they're doing the choreer and just say cop rock. You would be shown the number on the day of shooting because the music had only just got into the choreographer who's kind of winging it, and so all the actors are like the fuck and and but it was recorded live. In terms of the singing, which also is

usually you do you know that a pre record. It was crazy and and yet there there would be there were numbers that kind of worked, and then there were a lot of them were called groaners that were just like oh no, and you just felt for these actors who had to commit and you know, so it was it was an exercise in insanity. And like I said, it was not. If somebody who just loved the musical form could tried it, maybe it would work. But anyway, yeah, it was good. But that was my second hour Dollarson.

the kid next door to me, my crew. Now this is good. So my crew got bigger. But the single biggest reason my Canadian friends are going to kill me, but the single biggest reason I didn't fully of that was my first episode for Universal. I ended up being in Toronto. They were doing a second batch of Alfred Hitchcock Present, and so I finagled my way into one of those, and I swear I don't know what it was, but I was not intimidated by the Kine crew and

I was working. It was awesome. I was working with Mike Connor's Mannix. He was lead, and he was couldn't have been more dear and awesome, and so I just thought, of course, why not me? So it that part didn't really overwhelm me. I felt, fine, I'll tell you the moment that you're thinking of. It was less imposture than just like, how did this happen? So that's my first

directing job in television. My first feature directing job is Casper and We're shooting in nineteen ninety four, and as I've told you, I picked up a camera because of Stephen Steven ended up becoming my mentor and giving me my first feature job. And the first morning of our shoot we were shooting in the big kitchen. There was a big, long kit sequence. I was gonna end up having more CG than all of Jurassic part was insane.

He's awesome. He shows up a call to be there for my first shot and would go and rehearse and it's awesome. And when the time came to call action, I just sat there and he's next to me and I'm looking at him. I'm looking at this whole situation and it's like everything just dropped on my head. I was dumbfounded by the universe that this was actually the case. And he just looked at me and smiled and he meant to say it, and I was like action and

it was. It was still one of the most incredible moments, and it was just that thing of confluence, like how did this happen? I'm grateful it happened, but yeah, so in a weird way, that was my bigger moment, but I did. Yeah, I had maybe unfounded, but I did always have a belief that if you have the story and you know what every setup is and you're there, the crew is going to follow you. Doesn't mean that there's not going to be testing and that they're not

going to sit there with their arms folded. At times, you get all of that. I had the DP on that very first Alfred Hitchcock episode by I don't know, it was like night number three, like wanting to quit because I'm very hands on. I don't just say yeah, let's go do a nice two shot and I'm going to go get some coffee. I'm still a kid with a camera. I set every shot, I I rehearse with a lens in my hand. I'm just who I am. And this guy wasn't used to that, and it was

really funny. I've had that a few times, even in some of my movies Where to Pay, So I now my litmus test for whom I'm going to collaborate with as a DP. In particular, it has to feel like a friend from film school. It's not agistic. They can be ninety, but it has to be that spirit We're in this thing together. Ooh look what I'm seeing? What are you saying ooh, look at this. But those who work in such a way that it's like, I'm the director of photography. You go sit in your chair, little man.

I'm just not there. So that was that was an interesting early moment for me with my confidence, but how to keep a collaborator close without losing them?

and roar, and it was a deal. It was a deal, and it was were There was like an early glimpse of motion capture that was experimented with, but it was not ready from prime time, so unfortunately I didn't have that to go to. It was all here and then I basically had to go with a with an old school two D line animator. I had to go and basically after making the movie, direct every performance in pencil sketch right, then take those to ilm and go through the So it was very handmade.

because I'm a tribe member. But Gary said, yeah, you directed the least jewy episode that we did, because it was an episode about this kid and his family going to Abittsfield to try after this thing, and it was so non jewey that it was more of an Americana episode, and they ran it and it's crazy. I was just thinking about this this morning. It was in Thanksgiving of ninety one, so thirty years ago. Last Move, you know,

a month ago. They ran this episode because they needed to fill the extra half hour after the first running CBS did of et Sote Steven's movie ran. They needed to fill a half hour. They thought, oh, this is

a very heartwarming, very Americana apps. So Gary called me the next week and said, you're not gonna believe the phone call I got and I said yeah, and he said, my friend Steven Spielberg was obviously watching his own movie and stayed through the commercial break and he saw your show and he called me and wanted to know who did it. That's how I met Steven. So I went and sat down with Stephen and he happened like a

Schwab story. He happened to see that episode and he walked in his office and amble and and you know, my heart's through my mouth at that point. He's the most disarming, kind, warm human ever. So that goes away in thirty seconds. But he didn't even let me say anything. He said, Okay, let me tell you about your last three years. And I look at him, and he proceeds to tell me exactly what I had been going through

as a young director under contract in television. And I'm like my jaws hanging open, and he's loving it, and he said, yeah, I know I because I experienced that, and I saw what you did, and I could see you were making a movie, but she's only a half hour to make it, and I'd like to help you make a longer movie. And so that, Yeah, so that's what started us. Originally, he had in mind a much more reasonable first movie. It was like a little Louis Mall.

And there was a thing called The Divorce Club that we were going to do that was about kids and divorce kind of comedy drama was Warner Brothers. And so when he went to go make Schindler's List, I was starting to prep that movie, but I noticed some real foot dragon from the studio about hiring my crew, and so I called it. Lucy Fisher, who's great producer now was the executive and I called her. I said, Lucy,

is there are problems? She said, I think you should call your friend Steve and I don't think they want to make this movie. And so I called him in Poland and he was like, hey, haw's it going on? Your first movie. Isn't it amazing? Isn't it great? And I was like, dude, it's wonderful, but I don't think they want to make the movie. What that's crazy. I'll call them. And he called Terry Semmel and Bob Dale and he called me back two days later. He said,

I'm so sorry. You're right. They don't they're scared of it. They think it's the subject is too sensitive, and he said, I don't know what to say. I'm so sorry. I'm like, don't worry about it. I'll go back to my day job. Thank you for trying. And that was the timing where I went backack to watch go to direct one of the first ten episodes of NYPD Blue. So that so Steven takes credit for my marriage because I ended up hearing Amy Brenneman, who was in the cast of NYPD

below at first eason. But then he called me and he said this is months later. I was doing a pilot in white for Botchko and he said, Okay. He starts the call saying, Okay, this one's really going to happen. Promise it's going to happen. We have a start date, I have a release date, and the movies kind of I said the movie's what He's like, He's like, can you say it's Casper? And I said, Casper Mike is in the Friend that goes yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, but

it's going to be live accent. It's gonna be CG. I just did these dinosaurs. You're going to be this and that, and I'm dumbfounded, you know. And I said to him, you know which Brad you called? Because I was like, dude, I you know, I had no animation background. I'd done some small visual effects work in television, but I dated an animator at UCLA. It's like I I but I really didn't have any clothes. And he was amazing. He was like, no, what you do You're technically savvy.

What you do and emotionally, what you do and what this movie needs is you and so. But I didn't just say yes on the call. I had to take a weekend because I was overwhelmed by the prospect of mass failure.

about it. He did a very shrewd thing. What he did was he sent the young producer, Colin Wilson, who was going to do the movie. He sent him to Why with a trunk of basically almost like illustrations from my alemba about how this could work, what the modeling would be like, blah blah blah blah blah. And I'm just driving around to Scout my pilot with Colin the whole weekend saying I said, no, this can't work, you know.

And then it was awesome because I had a conversation with with now my wife then girlfriend Amy, and she's like, Okay, it's like pros and cons. Why you know what are the pros. I'm like, well, it's an incredible opportunity and I love the fact that the movie's actually embracing this idea of loss and that there's an emotional story. But and she's like, okay, so what are the cons? I'm like, I could tank. And so that's when I just realized, Okay, the only thing keeping me from this is fear. I

gotta fucking dive in. And so yeah, I called him back and I said okay, let's go, and it was just like lightning from there.

haven't done it. So finally I said, hey, can we grab five minutes. He's like yeah, great, great, And I said, okay, well, first of all, I think this affects budget doesn't really reflect what it's going to be. And he looked at me with that great Grannie said I wouldn't worry about it, just go shoot your movie. And I was like, Okay, this is the guy. This is his like close Encounters, thinking.

have to communicate that. And that was exactly the right advice. So I stopped thinking, Wow, I have to kind of put on a different filter, and I treated those four ghosts just like any other character in the movie. And I'm gonna stage with them, I'm gonna counter the camera.

The focus shift's gonna happen, because there's the moment It made me look like a madman on set, because it's like orchestrating, you know, getting the crew to understand where these ghosts were, how quick they were moving, getting the camera operator to tilt at the right moment to an empty part of the set, and then so I was doing this all the time. It was it was crazy,

but it felt completely natural. And that movie made me fearless because once you've done that, they can't throw anything at you that you And also I have friends who are live action directors who still have this envy of going to do a big effectstrip movie right, and it's funny. For me, It's just another tool in the tool kit. I don't thirst for that, but I know how to I know how to basically use those tools and how to communicate with with the lighting TV, you know, lighting

tds and animators. And so it was like this incredible two year learning curve that was invaluable. I've had the.

helping a little bit out here. And I've heard nothing but the nicest, wonderful things about I mean, the craziest stories. It's amazing stories. But and I know he That's why I knew that he worked with you and Casper. But your story about him doesn't surprise me in the least.

do that. That's going to freak them out. And so I literally took Steven to my first you know, audience recruit. They didn't see him, but he wanted to come because he felt so you know, proprietary, and we felt like family and indeed like the studio was freaking out there like oh shit, And yet it was the best because he just had this reaction and then he's like, hey, I carved out a day next week. You know you want me to, I'll run the picture when do you want?

You know, do you want to hear some thoughts? I was like, yeah, man, he's done that a couple of times, three times on movies where he'll come and spend the day, just run the picture in the cutting room again, offer up thoughts and no, no, you know, no ties to any of those, like here's what I see do with that? What you will, I'm so proud of what you're doing, blah blah blah, and that's it. Actually what is?

I feel like you like actors a lot. And so we talked and I finally said to him, this is so kind of you to do do do this, and he said, you know, I didn't for many years. I didn't know it was too competitive, he said, but I'm getting a holder and I like to acknowledge great work. And that was the most incredible thing. And then, of course I took that because then I built him into my next movie. But I Steven has been ahead of that curve, and I think it is because he knows

the pain. You know, people forget his first directing job for him was a nightmare, you know, the night gallery sent him back to Arizona for a year and a half. He was like, I'm not ready to do this. So he knows what it's like to get real support, he knows what it's like to he always he always says it to me when I made a film, a film, my Nether Light Mile again with something that I'd written, and he's like, it is your DNA, it's you, true and true, I feel you in every frame. That is

what we're here to do. And so he's it's it's an incredible thing. And I know, I know he knows it, but I remind him of it yearly. I'm like, you know, in Yiddish, like what a mitzvah it is you do for your kind every every day? He and he loves movie, loves television. He watches everything.

like my methadone. He said, if I'm not actually shooting, I need to be really close to it and get a fix. And that's his true So he calls he calls the movies he produces or the TV shows his methadone. And I've always thought of that because I share that it's my favorite thing. I'm the best director ever. When I go visit a friend set, I got no pressure. I'm really happy with the snacks the actors look really nice. I'm really he just loose, you know.

I was like what. I couldn't put those elements together. Don, who's been gone down twenty years, was arguably one of the most commercial movie brains as a studio head and then as a producer, so I went in to meet her, and what I realized, and I say this lovingly, I don't know if she ever saw the original film, and that's what that's what set me free. I was like, Oh, okay, she's thinking of this as a high concept premise and

had engaged Dana Stevens, who's a wonderful writer. Dana as well, was late to the Dana was not a Venders Efficionado was not, so they were freed up at the initial stage of development by not chasing that but by trying to come up with a story. And I knew that for me, if I could bring the emotional response I had to Vim's film and some of the tonal play, but also be able to just own it and just think, again, we're not doing because it obviously wins. It desires like

gossamer threads. It's there's that much story. And the incredible thing is so Nick Kidge and I have a real instinct because I remember asking Don Steele. I said, so tell me about your conversations with Vim, what has that been like, And she's like, oh, oh, I haven't talked to him. I was like, really, you've never engaged her.

He goes, oh, no, I was like wow. And so when Nick had signed on, he and I both were like, I'd really love to get the script to Vim and just sort of who knows, get any thoughts, but more so just reach out and say we want there to be a continuity, because we really are so indebted to

the initial impulse he had. And he was amazing, and he read it quickly and responded, and then he ended up becoming like a beautiful kind of godparent to the movie from that point, or an angel, if you will, or an angel, a guardian angel, a German guardian angel. He was great. But what he said to me and Nick at that point, which was amazing, he said, this

is crazy. Do you know that in my original concept for the movie, it was going to take place in a hospital, and the female lead, of course, who's a trapeze artist, was going to be a doctor. He said, my dad was a surgeon. That's where I wanted it to take place. We couldn't afford it. We couldn't afford a location, and we couldn't afford it. That's why I think about it, that's why she did trapeze Artist. We put a tent up and we were like, oh my god,

that's the beauty of film. It's like, you can't imagine that film any other way. And the you know, the visual conceit a flight and all that goes no, no, no, no,

that was budget. You couldn't afford it. So again, so them came to my first test screening with his wife, and they were fantastic because I you know, the way test screenings go, lights come up at the end, you as the filmmakers at the studio, you leave through everybody gets handed their little note cards and they fill out shit and Vim and Donata his wife, were really funny because they nobody knew where he was, so they were like spying on people's cards and then they would come

running out to me, Oh, it's looking really good. They like this, and they like that, and they need to run back in. And so he was awesome through the whole process. But again didn't expect it to be, you know, a xerox copy. Appreciated that we weren't just doing that, but still fel really happy to be connected to the film, and that was the only way I was able to do it. Otherwise it would have just been.

because the script it's interesting. Handler is a friend of mine and Daniel Handler, who's the real Lemony Snicket, and Daniel had done an adaptation, but the adaptation was like bonkers. It wasn't it really wasn't honoring his own work, which amazed me. And I think because he's so prolific and he's so imaginative, I think he thought, why am I just going to go recreate what I've done? I want

to go do some other stuff. So what I remember asking if I could read where they had been headed, and it was crazy town, but it was also very expensive. So that's how DreamWorks got involved was they basically decided they were going to have the wrong path at Paramount reached out to DreamWorks partner on the movie, and it was mutually decided that they would bring on a whole new filmmaking team, new script, new director. And so I

was in Europe. It was with Dustin Hooff and I was in Europe promoting Moonlight Mile when I got a call from Walter Parks, who was then running DreamWorks under Steven and he said, are you familiar with these books? And I said no, and he said, go get your

hands on them and call me back. And I went to the biggest toy store hat have Leys, I think it's called in London and bought the first three books and was so again for me, it's like tone and character, and it was so blown away by you know, the essential premise of those books, which is that the kids are the adults, adults are idiots, and that there's a real straight look at darkness, that there's a real straight

look at loss and perseverance and what that means. And so I was reading these and just again the sense of wisdom, huge intelligence, tone. I just thought it was fantastic. So I called them back and I said, this is great. What's the situation and he said, well, when you come back, come sit with me, Stephen. But if you want to do this, we should do this. And so that began the process. You know, there's thirteen books. At that point there weren't thirteen, but it was decided that we would

tackle the first three. But by nuture, they are like cereals, they're episodic, and for me, the biggest challenge was going to be making it still feel like a three act film and not just like and then we're here and then we're here, which some of it is naturally still that way, but that there had to be some sort of little, bigger arc. So we spent a good bit of time, and thankfully Handler was willing to come back into the process because I didn't want to lose his voice.

I didn't want to lose his you know, just that sort of sweet and sour thing that he does. And then we had But yeah, I mean, it was a very expensive movie. I asked Cherry Lansing not to make my life harder. But I said to her when I met her, don't you want to, frankly, give him them money or spending Don't you want to do it's you know, it's Back the Future two and three. Don't you want to do two back to back and amortize the costs? These sets are going to be insane.

And so when I started scouting and trying to kind of design the film with Rick Heinrix, who's awesome, we were actually going out into the real world looking for Lok and we both were like, can't do it. This is Night of the Hunter. We have to find a way to make everything feel handmade times more two dimensional than three dimensional. That means we have to control it all. That means we're gonna have to be on set the

whole time, including for exteriors. And so that's how we approached it, and then gain in the studio back to but yeah, it was was it was an expensive movie.

do that and still capture all that's Jim? And what I realized was I want to basically get the most out of his freedom and then create. So normally, when you do makeup hair wardrobe tests on a film, they're no sound recorded. You just put it after up there.

And I had this crazy idea that I got from actually John Schlesinger doing this on Midnight Cowboy, which is I brought the sound mixer and I decided to interview each of these potential characters that Jim was going to do, meaning Jim's Olof and then Jim's you know, Stefano, and

then Jim is. I'd ask him about public policy, asked him about his thoughts on you know, secondary education, you know, on Las Vegas, and he just had a great time and we were recording it and we looked at each other after the first day and thought, it's all in there. That's amazing. It's all in there. And so what we did was I I went and took from these really

hopefully well prompted, but great improvs. I took the best of what we thought could play within the story, because I did bring it around often to the kids, into the situation and what he's gonna do with the money and Titanic sucked. I could do better. And so what you do is you it's less hemming him in and more like, here's your pasture, let's go play, and I'm gonna take your best moves and we're gonna bring that

into the story. And so that's what we did. We brought all that material back into the s So the script, what you have on screen is all material that derived from improvs that we did well ahead of the time. And again, like a kid, you know, teenagers with a camera, he and I responded on a really fundamental level, like pals, and I realized that I had to make him feel safe, but also not just pull big surprises, but that let's

go through let's prepare. He would know if he had to work the staircase in that mansion, he knew how many steps there were, how many he was going to take before a gesture, and if God forbid, the night before the construction crew changed the number of steps, that's where he'd get thrown. Because it was like, no, I'm so, I'm so, I'm a dancer, I'm so prepared. And so if you know that's the animal you're dealing with, you lean into it and you make him feel safe. The

studio got very scared. They got scared off and through the process about you know, the reason kids loved those books and why they love them series is because it's super honest. Is it goes really dark. They got very scared of that at times, and like the eleventh hour, they got a little worried about count all loss makeup, and I said to them, oh, we're past that point and this is exactly what it's supposed to be, you know, And they they but they I forget what they did.

And they asked the Walter Parks to see if there was anything he could do, and I was like, oh, this is not going to end well, because we've committed it's going to get in his head and it's going to blow up. And our first day of shooting, Jim never got on camera because I think one of the producers had gotten in his ear, like, well, maybe we can have a little less darkness under the eyes. And I remember saying to the producers like, that is going

to come at a cost. You wait, And sure enough I went into Jim's trailer and he was like, wow, are we are we just making a mistake? What's going on? And I said, absolutely not, you are the character. This is the makeup. Go home. Today was a great rehearsal from putting on your makeup for three and a half hours. Go home, get some sleep. We're going to start tomorrow morning. Fuck then, And that's what we did.

we're losing the sunlight. The camera fell in the lake, And every minute that goes by, it's literally thousands and not hundreds of thousands of dollars go by. What was that day for you? And how did you overcome that obstacle that day?

and forty six days on that movie. It was amus one hundred and forty six days, and I remember like a third of the way into it, thinking this could really become overwhelming. And I remember just driving my cart with my happiest moment was like driving my golf cart to the stage with my little one cup coffee, and I thought, I think I'm just like a minor. I go into the mine and I come out with film each day. I can't even begin to think about the end of this journey because it will take me out.

I just have to go in and really concentrate one shot at a time, one performance at a time, and that's how you can persevere and not get overwhelmed. I over the years have gone to sit just again my method done. I'll go sit with Steven on a set, and it's what's always given me the joy of one shot at a time, because as much as people like to prepare, he prepares, but he still comes up with it.

It's like jazz. He comes up with it a shot at a time on set, and if you do that, you could be shooting ten days or one hundred days, and as long as you're getting some sleep and you're eating okay, and you believe in what you're doing, you can get through it. The one I remember one day that was pretty amazing on Lemony Snicket that is about as close to what you're describing as I probably ever come.

Where we had we were doing a sequence with Billy Connolly and there's a character in the books, the incredibly Deadly Viper. It's this huge viper, of course is harmless, but it looks really meant. So we had a giant prosthetic version of the viper created just to basically be able to rehearsing for the camera operator and scale.

like just a came rehearsal. I always roll and it gets everybody focused, and so we rolled on the rehearsal and the grip, who was sort of manipulating this huge fake snake, got a little too overzealous in his performance, and like what And the gate of this pen that the snake was in was, you know, flies open, goes right at the baby who's being held by the kids, and she and it's all it's in the movie. She looks and screams bloody murder and she's toast. She's like off.

They got to take her off the set. She was scarred. I still feel bad she was scarred from that for the rest of the movie. Most of the rest of the movie was her twin sister, who was just like a joy baby. She though freaked out and at that point, when you're dealing with incense, you only have so many minutes on set. Her sister had already worked that day. I had nowhere else to go. There wasn't another scene we could jump into there was. It was one of those where it was like and I remember, I just

it was that moment's like, holy shit. I turned to my ad who's done every movie with me, and she's amazing, Michelle vinnie Is. I turned to her with this look, and I said, I need to take a walk. I've never in my career left my set. I never leave

the camera. I was so overwhelmed by this wall we had walked into that I literally walked out the stage of this a paramount, and you know, on a big movie you've got, it feels like a thousand and radios all around, there's PA's, there's cranks, right, And what I hear as I'm walking out of the stage and I'm walking down, you know, I hear, don't let him get to Melrose. Don't let them get to Melrose. They literally

thought I was gonna walk and never come back. And I don't know if I didn't think about it, but it was amazing.

Boston next week. I was mentioning a lot of it takes place at a boarding school. He just lost two weeks out his primary location, like incredible primary school location, all the architecture because of COVID. The board of directors, I guess got together and we're like, no, can't do it. And I was on the phone with him when he got the other call in the other line and he's like And I checked in with him next morning, he's like,

you know what, this is what happens. We do this long enough, we kind of get unflappable, and you do. It's not that you don't care. You just know there's going to be a solution. And as always happens in film, you look back and think it couldn't have been any other way. So there's a faith in the process. Yeah, casting and recasting. No, you're absolutely right.

And uh, it's beautiful. But it's I've spoken to so many filmmakers over the course of my career that there's an insanity to what.

that I made, and he got really smart. At one point he started saying, I'm all tired today, Like you hold his hand out, I have to give him five bucks, and you know, it's my first time dealing with unions. He but it was funny because he the compulsion. He would look at me some days and go, oh no, you've got another one, because you just get bitten and you want to tell another story and you want to go do that thing. And I always say different with

different filmmakers. I can look at their movies. Paul Anderson, another fantastic director from the Valley. We are Valley people here in La I adore and I looked at it and I said, he wanted to make a movie, meaning he was very excited to create a feeling. It wasn't that he was sitting there chiseling out a story that was just like this, and just like that. He got really excited to go make a movie. And sometimes our

movies are that. It's like, I want to go make a movie and I'm going to find enough that I can care about to hang on this movie and just enjoy the process. Peter Weir, who among you know the Pantheon of Living directors, is one of my faves. And I sought him out after castp actually because I was going to go to Australia. He happened to be in

La and he's become this incredible again friended mentor. He said a really brilliant thing about he made a movie called Green Card with Depardieu and yeah, that's right, and the movie flopped and just got kind of and and he just had the greatest attitude and he said of it. Later, I realized that the audience was in the wrong place.

They should have been with us while we were making the movie, because the process was so pleasura when we had such a great time, and I guess I wanted them there maybe less so sitting in a theater watching the movie, and I knew exactly what he meant, which is, you know, sometimes it's just I want to go and have this great experience and so but it's all from that compulsion, and part of your job, and people do it with more or less success, is how do I

manage that compulsion and have a life. You know, it's not for reason that most of these marriages go down with filmmakers and other artists, and it's like, you have to find a balance, and we're always working at that, but the bug is still always there. And you know, it's this I called the great harum. It's this creative harum for your unsettled because you're searching for that next thing to just lock into.

used to make one thousand, hundred fifty thousand dollars movies. Don't get me wrong, it still could be a high for them as well. But I can only imagine the level of like height you get the car movies get released, you get huge audiences, You're working with the best collaborators in the world. You have Steven Spielberg sitting there visiting the set. I can imagine as a director you that that compulsion must be even more so. I think that's

probably why you do so much television. That because television you're constantly or as opposed to features that think.

one of my oldest friends. Kevin was on the Universal lot and he God, I don't know if he was in post on water World or ninety five. I think he was.

first audience, we're sitting there. If the movie costs two million dollars, two hundred million dollars or twenty thousand, your heart is here because how are they going to receive this? How are they going to laugh? Are they gonna cry? That's the great equalizer, and for me is still what I'm most excited about. It's one thing to sit and just go make a film for myself, but it is an audience experience that I crave. Nothing is better, or it can be worse, but usually nothing is better. And

that's kind of an interesting equalizer. The rest of the size is again, can be great at times. It can be like I say, like, oh shit, I just got to put on my mining cap because this thing.

And the only way for filmmakers to get to guarantee their place unless they're coming off of, you know, John watt last movie, the only way you're going to guarantee your place is primacy of And this was Stephen has said to me many times too. It's like that's the thing when it's your baby. They may not don't want to make it, but if they make it, it's only going to be with you. Always be writing, always be dreaming. And like I say, truly, if you're not a writer,

then find somebody to collaborate with. It's going to be the I mean, I will say without a doubt, my most enjoyable experiences, be the large or small, have been on the films that I've written. I've done both, and I've loved my other movies too, but the experience of it. I'm the most free in a weird way. I'm not like I remember Dustin Hoffmann on Mulight Mile was waiting to see if I was going to be like mister letter perfect, and I was like, oh God, no I

because I've already written it. Now we can play if we need to play. So But but it's that it's always and the other thing too. It's like when I was growing up soccer player. You know, we used to watch these Pepsi training films that they would scream and they were always starring Pele, of course, and Pele was always basically dribbling a grapefruit on a beach in Brazil, and his whole thing was, anybody can do this with

just a grepe fruit. And I think of that all the time, which is, if I have that creative, if I to have to wait to pull together one hundred million dollars, ten million dollars two hundred thousand, if I have to wait to be creative because of other people's money, I'm going to be doomed and bitter. And so writing gives me the control. There's nothing but keystrokes or a piece of paper or journal that's going to stop me from continue, you know, And Stephen has a great phrase Bilberg.

He he talks about your your your your writing eye and your directing eye. And he has said to me, you know that that the reason he knows I love to write is it's my directing eye getting to play but lay on the page. So that's that's the key is. I can't stress it enough. I every time I go back to film schools and talk to young people, I'm like, you have to be a creator.

in nineteen ninety three. I made it in two thousand and one. Ten items are less similar picture I did with Ben Kingsley Ordinary Man. By the time things got together fell apart. So I'm stubborn. What I've realized is that I can't be singular and stubborn, meaning of the open too. I was always of the belief that I have to just stay on one project. I can't be

distracted by others. And the challenge there is that's fine if you literally are prepared to not go and do something for a long period of time because there are elements that are out of your control. And so I'm both creatively staunch, but I do. It's like you can jumble more plates in a successful and enjoyable way. The more you do it, you get confident. So I might be developing a limited series that might go, but I'm also out to cast on another movie that it would

have been once upon a time. I would have only just sat and waited for that cast come together on that movie it light mile and suddenly or the money to come with it. And so suddenly it was from two thousand and eight to time we released the movie two I Sorry ninety eight to two thousand and two like almost four years. And on the one hand, like Peter Weir had always said to me, make sure you live your life. Some people just go movie to movie to movie. You need to take time and read and

hike and listen to music and fulfill yourself. So I'm I have both in me. I can wait. But I've learned to not cut off other opportunities, and so that initially would have been probably more of a challenge for me, and I have a bigger view of it now.

It's like this, and then I'm gonna give you it only because I recently saw it again and I was like, God, I wish I had made that movie. I'm going to even mention a Jhong Yimou movie that most people have not seen and they must see it. And it's it's the smallest movie he ever made. It's called not One Less. He made it with with non actors in a little Chinese village, and it is the most breathtaking beautiful. It's like not even verite because it's still beautifully controlled the

way he can. But it's what movies can be. And I come back to it from time to time to you know, reinvigorate me. I'm a big o Zoo fan and I love I love Floating Weeds. Floating Weeds is a movie that I come back to for tone, for just exactly where that camera is on that fifty millimeter lens. So those are movies that always stay with me. But I do have those movies that I call like, oh, that's just a perfect movie that you can go back

to from time to time. And they can be indifferent, they can be all the presidents men, it can be can be the verdict, it can be you know, you name it. So I have a I have a you know, one of those revolving CD changers. It's not too fix.