Keep It Simple: Lesson for Directing Actors on Film

 Last week, I attended the Austin Film Society's (AFS) 30 Year Anniversary Party.  Each year AFS selects three lucky emerging Texas resident writer/directors to participate in an Artist Intensive weekend.  The weekend includes meetings, screenplay readings and rehearsals with a cast of guest actors and is instrumental in providing artists with creative feedback, resources and momentum for their projects.  Over the course of  the weekend, each writer/director  is matched with a writer/director/creative advisor and a producing mentor.  Each script is read in full and workshopped with a cast of professional actors.  

While at the party, I was congratulating winner, Alex R. Johnson, whose most recent project was the critically acclaimed feature, TWO STEP. We began discussing his weekend experience.  He told me he was paired with Academy Award film director, Jonathan Demme of SILENCE OF THE LAMBS and PHILADELPHIA fame (When I lived in LA, I had the privilege to work for the P.R. firm that repped PHILADELPHIA).  When it came time for Alex to work with the actors, Alex said he asked Mr. Demme for advice. Mr. Demme said the two things he often asks actors to do was:  1. Do a take where the actors concentrate on looking into each others' eyes 2.  Ask actors to do a take without using their hands.  He tells them if they look away or use their hands, he will cut. After the session, Alex said he and another AFS Artist Intensive recipient, Yen Tan, were later philosophizing the whys and the purposeful deep meaning of these directions.    Feeling as though he and Yen had not deciphered the true intention behind these directions, Alex asked and waited for the mind blowing revelation. However, Mr. Demme responded simply with,  "Sometimes I  just need a take with the actors looking into each others' eyes and and clean take without any hand movements."  

Lesson to actors and filmmakers:  KEEP IT SIMPLE.