After reaching out to Adam, we decided to not only discuss a potential collaboration but also to document that journey.

In this video conversation, we get to know each other, delve into how 'Backgammon' and 'Box of Rain' might transform from page to screen, and even touch on the quirks of adapting short stories into film. There is also talk of short films, getting stuff done, and our respective careers.

I think this is only the beginning of this collaboration. Our goal is to turn Backgammon into a screenplay for a short and then hopefully get it made.

Through Substack, we plan to document our journey, and also our encounter.

We hope you enjoy the video. This is the first time that we attempt something like this, so we're genuinely eager to hear your thoughts on this new venture—be it the video format, our decidedly unique haircuts (or the absence thereof), or anything else that catches your eye!

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Dear reader, I was thinking the other day that most of you have actually never seen any of my film work, so I decided to share my latest short.

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It’s also a film that means a lot to me personally, with a topic close to my heart and one I’m rather proud of. I don’t really want to spoil it, but here is the pitch.

Things get wild at the 'VISA and immigration services' when Karim, a young Iranian father living in the UK, is mistakenly threatened with deportation.

If you are interested in knowing more about the genesis of the film you can check out this nice article.

I would also recommend not watching this on a phone, but it’s up to you.

Either way, I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed making it. As always let me know in the comments!

NOTE: The film is about ten minutes long, and was funded by the British Film Institute in collaboration with Film London and the production company Sweetdoh.

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As always, I would advise starting by watching the entire scene without trying to analyse it and just see what feelings it brings along. Then we’ll look into the directing and why.

Personally, when I come out of this scene, I am struck by how much I sympathize with the main character, and this despite him doing things which I would find horrifying if I was sitting right next to him. The director has successfully made me connect emotionally with his antihero character, and this in about two minutes sharp.

I also get a very strong sense of control from the direction. It’s sharp, elegant, and skilled. I feel in a safe pair of hands, both amused and intrigued. Considering that this is the beginning of the movie, I look forward to what will happen next, so it also works rather well as a strong hook.

Now, let’s have a closer look as to how Park-Chan-wook built the scene.

It all begins with a sharp musical cue leading straight to these shots.

This start, in film grammar, is the equivalent of starting a novel with a shout and an exclamation mark. The shot is an extreme close-up, and the man is almost staring straight at us, putting us right into his head from the get-go.

To give you a sense of what I’m talking about, compare this last shot to the one below.

It’s a different character and framing, but you can see how the angle of the eyeline itself makes the woman more distant, harder to read. In general, the closer you get the eyeline of a person to a lens, the deeper the emotional connection with the character.

Well, up until the character looks straight into the lens that is. But that is a bit different as it breaks the fourth wall. It can still make us connect, but it can also be deeply unsettling. In fact, the director gets really close to doing this later in the scene, but not quite, as we will see.

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On the first cut after he says his name ‘Oh-Dae-su’ to us, it’s not quite clear yet that we are about to go for a long jump cut sequence; it cuts as if it was direct continuity. We only start to understand on the second cut—the first real jump cut.

A jump cut is a cut that breaks continuity on purpose. In the case of this second shot, we see the character literally ‘jump’ on-screen, creating an ellipsis. The ellipsis can be short like in this case, or it can be a day, a year, it doesn’t matter.

After this, there is a bit of drunken dialogue with the two characters before another jump cut raises the stakes, and he is made to sit down.

By now, we understand the code of the scene: the actions we are witnessing are happening over an extended period of time. This type of sequence with jump cuts is often used to condense long sequences where time passes into energetic chunks.

The scene then carries on with a bunch more jump cuts…

One thing to remember with jump cuts in general is that the more the image looks different visually, the better it jumps. If things are too close, it becomes really jarring.

Here is an example of another scene using jump cuts to jar on purpose. From ‘Le Mepris’ (Jean-Luc Godard). A purely Brechtian sequence, as per usual with Godard.

But back to our friend Oh-Dae-su and his Aristotelean but complicated night.

After more comedy on the bench, we hard-cut on him much closer and almost looking straight at the lens once again. It took me a minute to decide whether he was looking straight in or not, but I believe he is looking at a mark slightly on the left side of the lens itself. It’s as close as the director could get before making him look straight at us, which would have risked bringing in a sense of confrontation into the scene.

Here, we really experience the scene from the officer's POV. We empathize with the officer's growing headaches, and at the same time, we can see from their perspective that Oh-Dae-su is harmless and a bit pathetic. We even get a sense of empathy from their attempts to mostly ignore him.

The filmmaker cleverly uses these faceless officers as witnesses to the madness. By not humanizing them, it’s almost as if he is leaving room for us to observe all this from their eyes. And like the officers, we don’t dislike Oh-Dae-su.

The scene takes a slightly tragicomic turn with the mention that he is missing his daughter’s birthday by being there tonight. He even has her present, and he goofs around as if it didn’t matter to him at all. But we don’t buy it. We can see through it; the subtext is strong and starts coloring the rest of the scene...

I like the fact that it rains continuously throughout the scene, and the sound design really emphasizes this. It gives a sense of claustrophobia, of things being wet and lengthy. I also find the portrait behind the hero quite amusing, as it looks like another person witnessing things with a straight face.

We then get another jump cut and some more comedy, with another soliloquy from Oh-Dae-su. There is another build-up with him yelling and getting agitated, and then a hard cut on the shot below.

This is the kind of visual humor that is rather hard to convey in script form and highly depends on execution. The timing is perfect in the film, and we see his little tantrum being instantly silenced by the appearance of the three thugs. This is almost commedia dell'arte territory, but it works great. I love how the sadness is mixed with physical humour in the scene. It’s very bold, and the director pulls it off nicely.

This is the moment we see the hero for what he truly is, a small guy, a random guy who's got nothing to do in a police station in the first place.

It seems like the actor is improvising. Most likely, everything in this scene is coming out of a bunch of very long and wild improvs by the lead—this is another strength of jump cut sequences: you can let an actor loose and pick the best moments. There are probably 40 minutes of rushes and they turned this into these two minutes.

Then again, a hard cut. It’s always quiet to harsh, harsh to quiet to mark a high contrast and keep the scene pumped up with energy.

We discover a new angle for the rolling on the floor moment—I think this is the moment where the scene could have become repetitive had they stayed on the same angle. I like this shot. The floor is filthy, he is half-naked, basically unstoppable, ridiculous, kicking like a wild animal.

This scene is really successful because of how grounded the whole thing is in reality. Imagine the same scene with a more sleek production design, costume, and photography, and it wouldn’t be anywhere as funny. The fact that all of this seems almost straight out of a documentary… The cables, stains… The guy with no socks. Cigarette butts in the corner. It really makes his mental implosion stronger because it’s anchored into our world.

This is key to good comedy btw and why I usually dislike pinkish rom-coms. You need that reality anchor for the humour to come across, if everyone and everything is looking too good… it kills the satire.

The scene then ends on him basically back at the beginning, having gained nothing but a more uncomfortable position. I like how unbalanced the composition is in this shot.

The protagonist is at one of the key visual points of the composition alright, but there is so much dead space on his right, that it makes him look very small, very vulnerable. He is also cropped at the waist, so it looks like he is naked, defeated. The tiger poster gives a feeling of a schoolboy being disciplined.

I must say that this scene really stayed with me, and much more than the famed 3-minute long one-shot fight choreography in the corridor later in that movie. To me, there is so much more delicacy, elegance, and wit in the directing of this than the fight scene!

It’s a bit like music, sometimes the simple things performed to perfection are stronger than the immensely difficult but impressive pieces.

Before I finish I would like to make a quick poll about this series of posts. I was vaguely considering doing them as videos, with me streaming directly, but I’m actually not sure if that’s any better or interesting to you reader. So feel free to chime in. I suppose there is something to reading and having enough time to process things as opposed to pausing a video, but I might be wrong.

As always, let me know your thoughts and impressions in the comments below!

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Act 3 and Climax

THE SHOOT

In previous articles, we’ve seen how dysfunctional my working relationship with my co-director Cacia was before even the first shot was canned—and how unprepared and irresponsible the production team was. Believe it or not, at first, when we started shooting, things went smoothly.

As a matter of fact, the camera guys, the lighting guys, the AD guys, the sound guys—these were as good a film crew as you’ll ever get, and they worked damn hard.

For me, out of loyalty to me. That’s incredibly humbling. None of these guys cared for the film and all disliked Cacia, but they still worked as if their life depended on it for the entire shoot—like myself. A proper lesson in fact, and a token of friendship. That film didn’t deserve it, but if you lead by example and fight, people follow you. The fools!

Some people are just incredible. Remember the still photographer who’d had that car accident? He was not only doing his job with an arm in a cast but had also decided to help the camera team. He acted as a semi assistant camera and semi grip! With one arm! It’s amazing to see someone lay down dolly tracks and level them with a broken arm, but this guy did it for the entire shoot.

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Of all the nasty things one can expect from an indie film, catering is often one of the worst. Yet, since the shoot was in France, the crew had somehow concluded that the food would be nice. Wrong. The caterer was a French, sweaty, bald, and tattooed ex-convict who only served raw salad and salami. All I remember from this guy is that he had this huge salami with him in his fridge and would just slice some and put it on plastic plates for us. He got fired midway through the shoot after serving raw bacon (and salami) at breakfast.

FOOTSIE-GATE

The only actual moment of note in week 1 was soon to be called ‘Footsie-Gate’.

It happened during an extremely long scene that we shot in a restaurant with an 80-year-old English actor who had worked with Antonioni. A fantastic actor, who on his first day after being greeted by the first AD, looked up wearily and said in a deep baritone, “I have just been hit by a tremendous tiredness.”

That scene involved never-ending dialogue, and what I remember vividly is that during these pages and pages of unnecessary dialogue, some footsie action had to happen under a table, followed by a slap on someone’s knee, and it made no sense geographically. We spent three hours on the footsie, trying to explain to Cacia why it wasn’t working. The 80-year-old actor even snapped at some point (his first scene of the movie) and said to Cacia, “You don’t even understand what you wrote in your own script,” which I thought was legendary of him after being there for less than 3 hours.

TOMATO-GATE

Tomato-gate involved the two leads in the film (who were seeing each other IRL by that point), somehow desecrating the statue of Jeanne D’Arc in the middle of the town by throwing tomatoes at it. It was a random scene with no symbolism, no connection. Cacia just found it cool.

Imagine a small town in France. The only thing they have in that town is their statue, and we spent four hours throwing tomatoes at it in front of a puzzled and shocked crowd. Luckily for them, it turned out to be almost impossible for anyone to hit the statue from below; it was quite small and high. So, we kept buying more cases of tomatoes, and the entire crew tried it. Three hours again on a shot of a tomato hitting a statue, which in the film looks anticlimactic by the way as it happens once or twice, and we barely see it. We did litter the town square, though. How did they let us do this? People are just too nice in the countryside; do this in Paris, and people will murder you.

WEEK 2

Week 2 started with a massive clash between me and Cacia. It had been building up, and everyone was aware by then of the tension. The stuff she asked of me, the way she spoke to me in front of everyone, was getting unacceptable, so I started talking back. From that point on, we were fighting in front of the crew and actors. What a nightmare. But the first argument was the worst. I have no recollection of it. Just my friends told me it was horrible, and everyone felt sorry for me.

Amusingly, right after the mega clash, me and Cacia... Had to give an interview to Arte, a Franco-German arty TV channel. The interview is excruciating to watch; you can see us barely looking at each other, furious.

GENDARMERIE-GATE

Imagine 10 elderly French actors and their spouses turning up on an indie film for their first scenes. Now imagine the same thing but the location has no power, no water, and no toilet. Yes, you read right: production did not think of water or toilets! It was just beyond anything… My levels of embarrassment were through the roof; I felt like it shone a terrible light on me, as some of these actors were legends in my country.

But these actors took their revenge, oh yes they did. The scene was 15 pages of dialogue between the ten of them, and not a single one knew his lines. At the start, they barely understood or managed to speak English, and the text was entirely in English. Besides, it was a never-ending ramble of pseudo-intellectual references mixed with bizarre slapstick jokes. We ended up having to wave papers with the beginning of each line to the main actor... In the film, you see him looking off-screen before every line… Unbelievable. He had something like 100 films under his belt. What madness.

That moment marked my surrender, recognizing the inevitable disaster ahead. Until then, I harbored hopes for a miracle, but once the actors started...

WEEK 3

Week 3 was an entire week of night shoots. This sounds like nothing, but a full week of not seeing the sun, getting up at 5pm, and shooting all night really takes its toll. I think people lost all connection with reality during that week. That, the isolation, the alcohol at night… Everyone sleeping with everyone. It was all unhinged by then. Me, well, while I wasn’t sleeping with anyone, I was barely sleeping at all, but for other reasons. I was haunted by the race to find solutions, to make it work, to do my job somehow.

MOUSE-GATE

In one scene, a dead mouse was needed, and we knew production was worried about this. At some point, between shots, the DOP and I were stunned when we saw a poor prod assistant going to talk to everyone in the crew one by one while holding a bizarre large paper bag. We inquired and yes… It was a live rat. They hadn’t found a dead mouse as they left it for the last minute and so they had gotten hold of a rat from a farmer. The girl was looking for someone to kill it instead of her.

I remember the third AD snapping and saying something along the lines of “Alright , fucking give it to me , I’ll drown it” and my DOP replying, “Darling , if you drown this rat, I’m heading back to London in the morning.” We won, the rat lived, and we forced production to find a bloody dead mouse from a pet shop. I don’t know how Cacia and the exec managed to convince people to do all this crazy stuff. I think once things get crazy, people lose track… Which leads me to one of the most absurd episodes of all…

FOX-GATE

Another scene required seeing an animal’s insides; it was a tricky one, and we hoped to use the same mouse, but , long story short , we couldn’t. Production was running around trying to find a solution. Everyone became so obsessed with this problem that one night my first AD came back to the hotel room we shared , furious and depressed. I was like, “What’s up man, what happened?” and I think his reply was something like, “I’ve just picked up a dead fox that got smashed on the road, I’m so pissed.” He had found the carcass of a dead fox and, in his desperation and insanity as the only man that stood between production and disaster, he had actually picked it up with a rubbish bag… Brought it back… And hid it in a flower pot just outside the entrance to the hotel! I’m crying with laughter just remembering this.

He also had truly lost the plot by then; I told him to move the fox away from the flower pot, we couldn’t just keep it there, we would trigger an epidemic. Eventually, and thank God, we didn’t have to use that dead animal. Production design created something with an industrial chicken.

WEEK 4

Coming off that mad night week, we were all on a different planet. And the very next day, we had to shoot a complicated scene in an open-air market.

MARKET-GATE

I never thought, based on the script heading: EXT. BUSY MARKET - DAY, that when I’d turn up that morning to the set, there would be nothing. Like… NOTHING AT ALL. It was unbelievable. We were rolling the camera one hour later for a busy marketplace scene, and our location had no extras, no stands, not even an apple. Of course, since our main producer was in London, phone calls were made, and, as often in disaster teams, the blame game started. Production assistants shifted blame with “But I told you...” until it landed on the least experienced, unfairly blamed for the absent marketplace design.

To be fair, the production team was past it at that point. To give you a sense, we had this alcoholic production manager. The PM is supposed to be everywhere on a film and facilitate these sorts of things. Once my first AD was looking for her everywhere, she wasn’t on set. He found her sitting on the terrace of a restaurant, drinking a pint… The PM! While we were shooting lol.

I wasn’t even angry at that point; I remember laughing, sitting on the dolly and smoking cigarettes with the DOP, telling everyone that we’d shoot whenever production was ready.

Miraculously, and I must say that was the most amazing feat of film production that I have ever seen, our French fixer whipped up an entire market in less than three hours. We were late, but in that time, she had brought over thirty locals, stands, fruits and veg, vehicles. It was unbelievable. Once again, people pulling miracles for a bunch of complete assholes.

STUNTMAN-GATE

In a scene requiring a hanging, we enlisted a professional fight coordinator for safety amid firearms and stunts. Despite precautions, a Belgian ‘stuntman’ playing the hanged man turned alarmingly pale and collapsed, having hyperventilated into unconsciousness. Onlookers, including the panicked coordinator, feared the worst. Though he recovered, the ordeal was terrifying.

I could share more anecdotes, but I think you get the idea…

THE WRAP

That we completed that film without anyone dying or getting more seriously hurt was an achievement in itself. But back then, my main angst after the shoot was whether or not I’d take my name off the film altogether.

The dilemma stemmed from my certainty of not being paid if I withdrew. With existing tales of unpaid crew, this fear was grounded. I wished for financial stability; money can compel foolish actions. Yet, it was also about principle. After enduring daily hardships and striving to salvage the project, the thought of them profiting at my expense felt wrong.

During my hesitation, post-production began, forcing close collaboration with Cacia, which inevitably soured. She rejected significant edits I suggested, opting instead to tweak minor details and replace takes to look better…

Consulting my film school teachers, they advised against removing my name, suggesting I could “bury” the film instead. Believing it doomed to fail, I stayed on, ending up only in the end credits. Despite the film’s failure—a detail now seemingly trivial—I never received the final cut due to a fallout with Cacia. I’m left with just a work-in-progress version, revisited occasionally, like probing an old wound.

I wonder why this experience has harmed me so much. It might not show because of my slight wry tone, but I’m an idealistic person, and until that film, I had always worked on projects I loved and led. It was my first real confrontation with reality, a form of coming of age, albeit a tragicomic one.

You also have to understand what a first feature means for a filmmaker. It’s a bit like your first lover; it’s something you dream of and romance. Of course, I don’t consider that film my first feature, but I’ve always wondered if it had ever hurt my chances at one. It’s been ten years, and I have done more shorts and commercials but never another feature. I’ve never had a shot at doing my own thing, and to me, it’s hurtful. I wouldn’t want this experience to have damaged my dreams, especially for such an insignificant sum of money.

Ahh, money… How I wish I had enough back then to say no. But I can’t remake history. I took the film, I fought and perhaps should have quit. Perhaps I fought the wrong thing, but there’s nothing I can do about it now.

Now, I’m more cautious. It may seem naive, but some individuals are far from nice. The film and art industries attract unchecked egos, a realization that has sharpened my wariness.

It’s odd. The basic premise of my Substack is that I don’t cheat; I just speak my mind, and I don’t want to care too much. Yet in doing so, I know I expose my inner thoughts and fragility to many people, to the open, where people like Cacia, like this exec, are trying to build their little empires of vanity.

All I’m hoping now is that I will eventually bounce back from this and find catharsis in the entire project by making another feature. Then that experience will make sense, as it would have prepared me, reinforced me. I’ve already moved on and gone back to more love projects, including my most successful short to date. Yet that elusive feature…

I know a lot of you have suggested writing something about the experience. Others have suggested potential lawsuits that could be aimed at me if I did. I think I need to think about it. Maybe I could romanticize this, turn it into something a bit different but still thematically linked? I’m not sure. I have plenty of ideas for features, but I’m not that well connected, so it always takes time for me to get projects together, plus I’m a Frenchman in exile; it’s complicated.

Either way, I hope you enjoyed the full series of posts on this. As always, please let me know in the comments, and know that somehow, sharing this with you has helped me move on in some way.

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In fact, I do remember reviews of this film when it came out, and people were split about this scene. As to whether or not this is acceptable. I personally wouldn’t have done this on my set—there is enough CGI these days. But I’ll let you be the judge.

As for the film, I hadn’t seen it before and it was a suggestion from a reader, so I went for it. (Thanks for the mood boost 😉)

I would be lying if I said that this is my favorite type of film lol. I would classify this as a genuinely ‘interesting’ film. It’s very well made, it requires a ton of skill. Essentially it’s a good film, but in a style that I don’t particularly cherish. It’s cold, it’s hard to connect with anyone, it’s slow. It’s a Cannes-type film.

I guess what I’m saying is, make sure to brew some coffee and watch this during the day.

Anyway. I will warn you one last time. THIS SCENE IS PRETTY HORRIFIC, so don’t complain if you click. Here we go.

So we start the scene with this shot below. In the film itself they actually hold this shot for a rather long time. The guy with a beard has zero other scenes in the movie, but his dialogue is really distracting and you end up listening to him rather than Juliette Binoche who is one of the key characters. He pontificates about the ‘end of the story’ from a philosophical point of view, talks Heidegger and other philosophers and even mentions Hitler… The actress reacts with irritation as he speaks loudly and seemingly a bit drunkenly about all this.

Such a weird and interesting shot. It’s very busy which is unusual and makes it oppressive and suffocating. The man with the black t-shirt is favoured, the eye naturally goes to him, but since Juliette Binoche is in white, we are also looking her way, making the watching of this rather jarring.

This scene is very Brechtian, it calls for thinking, it’s almost deliberately trying to take us out of the film. A reminder for those who didn’t do 5+ years of Drama: Brecht was an advocate for didactic plays where the audience was encouraged to think objectively and engage with the theatre production directly, instead of being passive spectators. This, as opposed to the Aristotelian view, which advocates for catharsis and dramatic identification (99% of stories).

In this case and especially with the transition to the chicken killing, we are really pushed away, sort of prompted to think, rather than feel.

The scene transitions when Juliette Binoche goes ‘Me too, I kiss you’, then boom, the poor chicken. In fact, as much as I dislike the fact they killed a chicken, the transition is brilliant. It’s really sick, but that’s what’s good about it, that’s what makes this artist who he is.

It’s very very dark humor, tongue in cheek, but in a very ‘Cannes’ kind of way. Although I wouldn’t be surprised if many people walked out on the Croisette during the film premiere as well. Not everyone will pick up on these sorts of meta jokes, I suppose.

But now let’s get to the horrific part. So this chicken gets its head chopped off. Not even straight away. It takes two massive axe hits to get it done. It’s absolutely shocking, the bird is flapping madly and right after the last hit, we cut onto a young boy…

Who gets splattered in the eye with a huge stream of thick blood. He then opens his eyes, looking absolutely monstrous.

It looks genuinely hard for the boy and that makes the scene all the more atrocious. He throws the agonizing chicken on the floor next.

By the way, as a side note, this scene reminds me of a scene in Alien 1979. Granted, it's a weird parallel, but it stems from the fact that some scenes are just so strong and shocking that they would work regardless of how they're shot.

This Haneke scene works like this. He could have shot it in 10 different ways, it would have worked. But of course, Haneke is a very talented filmmaker.

After this, and for long seconds we witness the agony of this poor animal.

And at long last, we discover the protagonist of the scene. Another boy, looking younger, innocent, as horrified as we are.

The fact that we find an emotional anchor in the scene reinforces the horror. Especially considering that it’s a child. The sound design of the agonizing chicken keeps playing in the background and there is no music. There is never a single music cue in the entire film, by the way.

Then we have this shot, and the use of shadow. We can’t quite see the boy, we don’t want to see the boy, there are a whole bunch of chicken behind him ready for his vicious treatment. But he is staring at us, at him… It could hardly be harder to connect with the character, we can’t see his eyes, but that opens up our imagination instead and turns him all the more threatening.

Back on the other boy, and you can seldom make a shot that is closer emotionally to a character than this—the most ultimate contrast with the previous.

We are level, and he is probably looking at a mark right on the side of the lens, that’s how close his eyeline is from looking straight at us. This really puts us into the boy’s head. And we can see how this is not the first time he has seen such thing. Yet, he dreads what’s to come.

Then we get a full 6 more seconds of agonising chicken and another close up to bring it all home.

Then the other boy comes our way. He moves slowly, almost mechanically, gradually revealed by the light, like some mythical figure.

The camera becomes handheld for the first time in this answering shot, and it moves forward on the boy, as if from the POV of the axe wielder. It’s shaky, incredibly uncomfortable, again emphasizing his internal fear. He is also dead centre, making the shot creepy and disturbing.

Haneke clearly wasn’t too happy with the pacing of the shot, because you can see he slowed the footage in post by probably as much as he could get away with.

As the other boy gets closer he looks truly monstrous, like an evil shadow.

We are powerless, unable to move as he hits us.

But of course it was all a dream. Thankfully.

Let’s hope it was all a big nightmare for that poor bird... We can pray they didn’t just have 30 people circled around this log with 4/5 live chickens at the ready, to make sure that boy or whoever stood in for him, managed to kill it just ‘the right way’. Maybe I’m just a city boy…

Truly, I don’t know what to think of this on the whole. It’s memorable, well made, and incredibly skilled. But there is a ferocious sadism in Haneke that is not quite for me, I’m afraid.

What do you think?

Welcome back, dear reader, to this feature film journey of misfortune. In this part, we shall focus on the crew’s journey to France and my doomed ‘clear the air’ conversation with Cacia.

The Journey to France

The busy prep weeks ended, the casting was complete, the crew confirmed, and the spirits were high. There was just one thing really… A ‘minor’ detail which was the first harbinger of things to come. We found out that the main producer, the one who was running the show, would not be coming to France.

Say what?

Well, she was running this film school, you see, and she could apparently do everything remotely. She had crewed up other producers and would be in touch. OK, then… This was rather weird, but we shrugged it off.

Me, Medium (First AD), the DOP and Cacia had our Eurostar the next day for several days of recce (where we go to all locations). Production design would also be there but they didn’t speak a word of French and needed to source everything locally—In this small French village where no one spoke English...

What gave us a bit of hope is that they had this local French fixer to help. She was running a film festival and had helped them on their previous short. She had cast the entire film, a casting that was more than impressive—the only thing that was ever impressive with that film, really. She was to sort everything out, to be a super production manager who spoke French.

We had no actual sense of the level of experience and professionalism of the English production team—at least I didn’t, as I had little contact with them at that point. I’m guessing that Medium and the DOP already had their doubts, as they spoke to them daily, but if they did, they showed nothing to me. Bless them, they probably knew this would be a shit-show and didn’t want to worry me.

So we set off for our small village. Aboard the train I kept grappling with this brick of nonsense that was the shooting script, my notes filling every white space about what I would change and needed to discuss with Cacia during the recce.

Once there, for five days, we were driven around by our French pm—let’s call her Nadine—in what turned into a pretty tense huis clos. The good news was that Nadine was great fun and had as much energy as a space rocket. The bad news, however, was that my hopes of rewriting that film shattered on a massive and never-ending rock called Cacia’s ego.

The tension between us went crescendo, along with my frustration at her passive-aggressive communication style. I would spend so much energy explaining, convincing, showing and reasoning, to no results whatsoever. Nothing was ever clear with Cacia. She constantly pouted and sulked and turned white and pretended to listen. The surrounding crew acted more and more like they were walking on eggs. Worried to side with either of us, in fear of the other.

At the end of the five days recce, I felt drained and ahead of me were 26 days, including a week of night shoot, with Cacia in every. Single. Shot.

I knew things would be bad if we didn’t connect before principal photography, so I decided to have a clear-the-air convo with her one-on-one. Maybe in front of other people, it just cornered her? Maybe she would listen better in private? We booked lunch on the next and final day before the shoot.

But first, we had to receive the crew, the actors—and face up to the first real disaster of the shoot.

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The Worst Possible Start

The crew had the daunting task of driving the kit all the way from London—a nine-hour drive.

There was just no way around this; we were transporting a plethora of equipment, including vehicles, a dolly, and even a power generator.

The long evening stretched into the night and slowly people started arriving. Everyone was on the phone with them, trying to guide them. It was like being at the bivouac of the Paris-Dakar rally race.

At some point, Cacia approached me, Medium, and the DOP, pale as a ghost.

She whispered that a car accident had occurred: the 4x4 that was towing the generator.

What!?

The worst nightmare. I’d been to film school in the UK, we had to fill risk assessments for someone standing up on chairs. They’d had someone ending up paralyzed from a shoot after falling from a set—health and safety on film is no joke. Should be no joke.

Every year film crew die because filmmakers are either utterly stupid, reckless or both.

The horror was compounded because the driver of that 4x4, was a behind the scenes still photographer, that I had sourced for the film. The nicest guy… I was mortified and eaten by sheer anxiety. We looked at this production team in a different light suddenly. A bunch of kids in their early twenties—petrified, pretending that all was fine in front of the rest of the team. You could read the fear of prison on all their faces, and the exec was in fucking London.

To make everything worse, Cacia, in her great wisdom ordered in our aparté that we should keep the accident a secret—Because otherwise… it would spoil the momentum of the film!

I will always remember the expression on my DOP’s face in that precise moment.

It was as if someone had just thrown a scorpion onto his lap. He just stared in total disgust. It was one of those instances that you replay in your head and you wish you had said something different, smarter. It was insane. It was also futile. As if the crew was a bunch of kids that needed to be shielded from the truth…

Eventually, she relented, and we made production announce the news. A deep silence fell. But also anger. For a start, this guy had no reasons to be driving one of the cars, let alone a 4x4 towing a trailer with a 500 kg generator sitting on it.

Somehow, they had convinced him... But the worst part… Because prod wanted to save some money, they had refused to pay highway tolls! This had forced this entire bunch of left driving Brits onto small, sinuous local roads, with no lights, some fog, no GPS… Nobody had roaming, so they had printed out some shoddy A4 paper maps for them… There was enough budget for the cast and Cacia to be in a different, more luxurious hotel, kilometres away, while everyone else shared rooms, but not for highway tolls.

Eventually, good news trickled in. The driver was okay, albeit with a broken arm. He was receiving care at the hospital. The car and generator were smashed. Out of sheer luck, our gaffer and his boys had stumbled upon the crash site. I recall him describing us the scene… In the darkness and fog he first saw debris, and then the remains of our generator scattered all over the road… Before finding the car itself with a PA waving in panic, trying to speak French to them. None of the crew had met, so she didn’t realise who he was, and despite him speaking English back to her, she kept trying to explain in French what had happened. That must have felt like a nightmare.

Thankfully that guy had a lot of experience, he took charge and got them the help they needed, cleared out the guy etc…

Reflecting on that incident, we were so dumb to not all drop out. But I’ll tell you the craziest thing of all… That still photographer eventually turned up at the hotel, broken arm in a cast, scratches and bandages over his face, and declared… That he wanted to do the film. He was adamant: he was not going back to the UK, he was fine.

This became a recurrent theme on that shoot: amazing, passionate people, always ready to help, utterly exploited by some egotistical individuals.

That gaffer by the way, the man who found the car accident and sorted it out; he never got paid on that miserable film. I’m still seething.

But anyway, at that point, with the crash victim insisting on continuing, we stayed. Of course, we should have left… I think the isolation contributed to this. You have to visualize a village in the middle of nowhere in France to understand this shoot. Isolation does something to people. It was very disorientating for everyone, especially the Brits, and this sense of being in the back of beyond contributed significantly to people staying until the bitter end.

That film would have collapsed within a week in London.

The Confrontation

The following day, we woke up with a big hangover as we all drank too much that night. But my headache was to be something rather special: it was time to speak to Cacia.

I opened my heart to her, explaining how I would much rather have her speak frankly than undermine me in front of the crew, that I wasn’t trying to steal her ideas. Honest, I said everything, said that it was time we made peace and worked together and so on—especially with all that happened the day before.

Pretty reasonable stuff. She let me talk for a while, not uttering a word, just staring at me. Eventually, I finished and she remained silent for a while. Then her eyes moistened, she looked away and muttered to herself for long seconds, ‘This isn’t happening, this isn’t happening’.

You see, this wasn’t in her dreamt scenario. In her head, everything would happen a certain way, everything was lined up perfectly, the film, the discrete co-director, Cannes... A car crash, for instance, sucked, because it was spoiling the momentum of the love project… As a co-director, she only wanted me to roll the camera and make her face pretty.

I can’t remember what was said, but nothing good came off it. It was as if it had only calcified that me and her would barely see eye to eye for the rest of the shoot.

Co-directing is the worst idea in the world to start with… But co-directing with someone who is in such disagreement with you about everything… This woman was full of contradiction. She resented the fact that I knew more than she did about directing, but she still needed me to make the dream cut.

I think maybe my pride did me a disservice back then. A part of me just refused to flee or back down to Cacia. It became personal somehow. I had never had such a negative experience before and everyone loved working with me—I think I was determined to turn it around, still.

Next

In the next part, you’ll discover the unfolding drama of the shoot itself. The fights with Cacia. Rage and frustrations, talks of killing rats, dead foxes, actors not knowing their lines and stuntmen almost killing themselves!

Stay tuned and let me know what you think in the comments!

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Lingo Breakdown

Before we dive any deeper, here’s a quick glossary of terms to keep you from getting lost in film jargon.

First AD: First assistant director. The link between the director and the rest of the crew - the guardian of time. My right-hand man.

DOP: Director of photography, cinematographer.

Production Designer: Responsible for props, location design, and the like.

Production: The people supposed to run the shoot from an organizational point of view (Spoiler: they didn’t.)

Gaffer: Head of the lighting crew. His assistants are called ‘sparks’.

PM: Production manager, an inextinguishable source of energy and work, keeping the clock ticking.

Grip: Someone responsible for hanging stuff, the dolly, laying down rails, etc.

Every aspiring director dreams of directing their first, deeply personal feature film. To be given the chance to create something long-form, to nurture a passion project from inception to completion. A true work of art, a piece of one’s soul…

This series of posts is not about this.

Fortunately, this wasn’t a passion project, dear reader. Had it been, the impact might have been even more profound, and believe me, it was significant.

Recovering from the debacle this film brought into my life was a months-long ordeal. I often contemplated removing my name from the credits. Despite co-directing, I was never sent the final cut or invited to any screenings.

To this day, I still harbor the idealist goal of ‘cleansing’ myself from this experience by creating my own feature film, though raising the funds remains a dream—for now.

Ultimately, I think it’s time for me to laugh about all this, to go through my own catharsis and let go. This is why I’ve decided to share it. It’s definitely not something I’m proud of, but it’s part of me now, and I hope it will make me stronger when I one day, finally manage to do my own project 🙏

You might have heard of the expression ‘vanity project’. Well, today, I shall present you the saint patron of vanity projects, not a unique case, but in the context, and retrospectively, a pretty extraordinary one.

In this series, I’ll take you on a deep dive into this project, an absolute car crash in every sense (both literally and figuratively, as you’ll see). And also how I learned a lot about directing and my friends’ loyalty as I struggled on against all odds.

So welcome in my personal hell: a disaster directing experience!

I will use placeholder names to avoid any blushes. I will also do my utmost to not sound too bitter about the whole thing, but I can’t promise I’ll manage.

In post 1, we’ll delve into my reasons for accepting the film and the prep weeks before shooting, which already reveal much about the forthcoming challenges during production.

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Why, oh why, did I do this to myself?

Ten years ago, I was working in a bar for 9 quid an hour, fresh out of a very prestigious film school and coming to terms with... Well, reality.

In particular, my level of connection to the UK film industry. After two years of being treated like a prince among a select group of eight directors chosen from 800 applicants, I was back to making mojitos (yum!) and paying off my student debt (yikes!) After two years making film after film; I felt pretty down and disorientated, and the bar work was draining.

That’s the context you need, dear reader, to understand why I took this directing job despite knowing the script was mediocre at best.

Coming from a modest background, I couldn’t afford to be choosy about work. As an actor, I accepted nearly every offer, needing the income, though many roles did little to enhance my résumé.

Looking back, I should have never said yes to this film. But it’s not every day that someone calls you out of nowhere, two weeks before a feature film shoot, and asks you to co-direct an indie film with a £350k budget.

The caller? One of my best friends, the first AD on the film. He was pretty honest about the script not being so great, but I remember us genuinely thinking we could re-improvise stuff and the casting was stunning for the level of the budget. Besides, the shoot was in France and we were both French; we’d share a room there, it sounded like a fun experience.

Me and him, let’s call him ‘Medium’, we’re going way back. He had been involved in almost every film I had ever made, and we had this amazing work/friendship bromance, so the temptation was too strong. I also saw this as a valuable experience for my eluding, real, ‘first feature’ if it came to it.

Thinking back, perhaps the fact that the original director had just dropped out of the film should have been a warning! But renowned for wise career choices, I dove in headfirst.

The Prep Phase

So to ‘co-directing’ then.

Why did I think this would work, I wonder? The ‘main’ director of the film, let’s call her ‘Cacia’ was also… The writer, the exec producer and the main actress. What could go wrong, right?

As such, and being in every single shot of the movie, she still seemed to have enough wisdom to realise that she wouldn’t be able to direct herself. Perhaps also because she knew nothing about directing—but somehow, she still wanted the directing credit as well.

This was just as well. Being co-director and letting her take ownership of the film actually worked for me. I knew the film wouldn’t be so good, so I was more than happy to let her front it as a Renaissance woman.

Initially, I lacked a complete understanding of Cacia, yet I was resolved to enhance her material to its utmost, striving to remain emotionally detached—after all, this wasn’t my film. But I’d never done such a job before. All I had ever directed were my own films, written by myself and as you’ll see, detaching myself is not instinctive for me.

So during prep, let’s just say that while me, Medium and the DOP created a nice chemistry and geeked around about camera movements and schedules, I somewhat struggled to nudge Cacia away from considerations such as ‘we should pick this actor as it will be good for the Cannes film festival’ to ‘this scene makes no sense’. This was the chasm of perception between us. She was worried of who would help her festival triumph, while I was worried about the film even cutting together...

The obsession Cacia had for success, the constant visualisation of herself on the red carpet in Cannes, was her principal driving force. I can understand ambition, but there was something reckless about her pursuit of fame. She had that particular ability of surrounding herself with weak people who submitted to her will, and squeezing them of all their juice and then discarding them. I know some people never got paid on that film.

She was from New York, very well off and her boyfriend was some pretty rich banker who was would you believe, bank rolling the film with his friends. Yet, in the script, the character played by Cacia… Also came from New York, and had… a boring banker boyfriend, who her character started cheating on with a French hunk from a village....

I must spoil it entirely for you at this moment dear reader, as I think it sheds a light on Cacia—she did end up sleeping with the actor who played that French hunk, and she did indeed leave her boyfriend (who was bankrolling the film) for the actor in question.

I felt sorry for her boyfriend, honestly. He was literally still processing everybody’s invoices, even after she left him... It’s one of those things… If I was writing this in a script, people would find it hard to believe.

By the way, anyone familiar with cinema knows a rom-com is unlikely to ‘go to Cannes’—excellence notwithstanding, let alone mediocrity. This was common knowledge among us, from the DOP to the most junior spark.

It was the sort of topic with Cacia, that I just tried to avoid, as I’m a pretty bad liar. I think she started feeling fairly early on my skepticism and puzzlement. Tension rose fast between the two of us during that prep time…

Directing hinges on decision-making. Daily, you face 10,000 small decisions, many instinctual—hence, the need for a strong vision that guides these instincts. Assertiveness is key; perceived weakness or uncertainty can lead to others taking over.

My work relationship with Cacia was horrible because instead of speaking her mind when she disagreed with me, she would just make a face—making it clear that she hated whatever I was suggesting to everyone in the room, without ever actually saying it. This would force me, being the ‘co-director’ to ask her what was wrong, and then she would say nothing so I would insist. It was like this nightmare old couple routine, in front of 50 people. This happened at every minute, at every hour, during every single day of the shoot and my nerves quickly ran thin.

The crew patiently waited for me and her to have our run-ins, and we would carry on in the foulest of moods. People are not stupid. Film crews especially. They can tell when someone doesn’t have a clue what they’re doing, so at least I had the consistent support of the entire shooting crew. The ‘us versus them’ tension between the crew and production escalated, becoming even more toxic.

At that point during prep, it wasn’t the entire crew yet anyway. But it must have been apparent to both Medium and the DOP that I would be a dulled weapon on this project. A powerless dictator… I couldn’t make the calls. I had to argue and negotiate constantly with someone who had never heard no in her entire life, and who had dreamed this form a to z.

But I’m a fighter. I’d had tough experiences before on shoots with people, and I wasn’t shy of imposing myself, so I just kept going at it. I really thought it was just a matter of time until she gave in, let go and let me do my job.

Prep is also a busy time for a director, so I had none of the luxury of all this wisdom back then. I was working hard to make sense of that script… A convoluted story involuntarily switching tones and genre, with tons of characters. The script started out as a classic fish out of the water rom-com. Some journalist (speak about clichés) from NY, goes to a French village for an article on some murders, and then she meets love and uncovers the murderers.

On paper, it doesn’t sound that bad, if not very original. But that script switched from that rom-com tone to horror, then slapstick comedy, then heartfelt drama, then pseudo intellectualism, then back to romance—sometimes several times in the same scene....

I urged her to concentrate, pointing out the script’s disjointedness, but she guarded each line as if it were Shakespearean. Each word sparked conflict. We faced the problem head-on during shooting, and only when things fell apart did she relent, often too late—precious hours lost on doomed setups.

Reflecting a decade later, my chief memories of the prep phase are escalating tension, frustration, and a nagging anxiety: was I compromising my integrity? Should I abandon the project? What was the courageous, honorable choice? To persist or throw in the towel? For the first time in my life, I found myself approving terrible scenes on set—an agony.

My answer to all of this back then was: I will make it better. I know I will.

How foolish I was.

Next!

In the next post, we will go through our arrival in France and the already dramatic disasters that started falling on the crew. There will be also my very first proper confrontation with Cacia and its consequences.

I hope you enjoyed this rather long essay. Let me know in the comments!

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This email is pretty long as it contains a 60-page screenplay. So it will be clipped by your email client. Click “View the entire message” to read!

Dear reader, I’ve thought long and hard about how to go about sharing my actual work/writing, bearing in mind the screenplays or ideas are works in progress and I am currently revising them.

I don’t feel comfortable sharing my work-in-progress without a paywall, because that would make it available to the whole internet. As much as I trust my subscribers, you never know, and some of the competitions or applications I make require the script to not be online/released in any way. Besides, this is rather intimate as I will share the processes of my journey, the feedback I receive from professionals, the rejections, the successes. (+ this is literally hundreds of hours of work).

I will also be interested in feedback and ideas from readers, so in a sense, it will turn more into a private club focused on filmmaking & writing in general.

For all these reasons, I will put a paywall on this post and the future posts related to actual career stuff BUT I really do not want to stop anyone who doesn’t have enough money to subscribe to participate. I’ve been broke before; I know what it feels like, so if you feel like you are in this situation, you would really like to be able to see this stuff, but lack the means to become a paid subscriber, please drop me an email here and I’ll give you a free comp sub for as long as you want: remy.bazerque@gmail.com DO NOT HESITATE!

So to start with, here is a full work in progress pilot screenplay for a TV show. It’s a comedy set in the world of football (real football) with the following pitch:

A tech billionaire's takeover of an English second division football club sparks a riot of misadventures among an ensemble cast of clueless characters.

This script is not currently in development with any prod, I wrote it in order to apply to competition/opportunities, so it’s early days & early draft. I however have just received the first feedback from a script competition called Blue Cat Screenplay competition

The feedback is quite positive and constructive, so I’m planning to experiment with the screenplay based on it. (You will find the feedback email at the end of the essay)

In the next few months, I will post more of my screenplay drafts, ideas and will share the ups and downs of my submitting processes.

I’m of course interested in your two pence so feel free to chime in.

So now and without further ado let me share the pilot. Bear in mind that the substack editor doesn’t let me keep a ‘normal’ screenplay mise en page, and since I do not want to share a PDF I had to reformat it to this weird everything on the left style. It sucks but I can’t do much about it.

NOTE: A paywall is coming at about a third of the script. Once again if you want a free paid subscription email me at: remy.bazerque@gmail.com and I’ll sort you out.

Hope you enjoy it!

TO THE MOON F.C

A TV pilot screenplay by Remy Bazerque

WGA reg no: 2240601

INT. CLAYFORD CITY FC - OPEN OFFICE - DAY

CLAIRE
A what?!

ELLA
A hunting falcon...

CLAIRE KERR, 27, cuts through the busy open space with a no-nonsense sharpness, her business chic slightly softened by signs of fatigue. 

CLAIRE
What the fuck?

ELLA
No instruction, nothing, it's in a cage, howling in the entrance...

ELLA, 23, tries to keep up. She stands out with her pale skin and dark attire, her wide, apprehensive eyes betraying a deer-in-headlights unease. 

CLAIRE
Move it away, anywhere!

Ella starts texting instructions with a trembling hand. Claire calls on her phone while trying to print a bunch of stuff. 

CLAIRE
Thomas? Can you hear me? Hello??

THOMAS (OFF)
I'm sorry Claire, we're [indistinct]--

CLAIRE
What? Thomas? I can't hear you? Come again?

THOMAS (OFF)
Late! We're late!

CLAIRE
(rolling her eyes)
Yes, I’ve noticed! Thomas, we have a falcon here.

THOMAS (OFF)
Ah, yes yes! Did I not mention? [Indistinct]

CLAIRE 
NO! Everyone is arriving! What do I do with it?

THOMAS (OFF)
It's the owner's! Wait... Here’s the translator [Indistinct]

TRANSLATOR (OFF)
(thick accent)
Big gloves! Take falcon out of cage! Now! [Indistinct]

CLAIRE
Take it out?

TRANSLATOR (OFF)
YES! On perch. Food. [Indistinct] Food. Quick.

CLAIRE
Food? What food?

TRANSLATOR (OFF)
No silence! Important-- Never silence! Otherwise [Indistinct]

The line cuts, Claire spins towards Ella.

CLAIRE
Otherwise what? Ella, I hope you heard all this...

ELLA
Claire... No, I can't--

CLAIRE
Yes, you can.

ELLA
I'm a flutist.

CLAIRE
Ella, I have 300 journalists outside, I have zero Thomas, zero Gufinho, zero Donatelli--zero--can you please take care of one thing for me. One falcon?

Ella scampers off, shaking her head. A nearby door slams open on Matias 'El Mago' Donatelli, a grizzled and charismatic, unshaved man in his mid-fifties. He stands in the room like he owns it, contemplating Claire like a poet who has weathered many a storm. 

CLAIRE
Mr. Donatelli! I'm so sorry for not receiving you myself, I've just had the most crazy morning.

DONATELLI
(Spanish accent)
Hi, yes. Is there coffee somewhere in this building? 

Donatelli glances around the décor with a critical eye. 

CLAIRE
Yes... Coffee! I'd like one too! Right this way please. 

They start walking down the corridor.

CLAIRE
Did you have a good flight? 

DONATELLI
(Spanish accent)
Horrendous.

CLAIRE
Oh no! I'm sorry to hear that. Such a long trek from Argentina as well! Well, the café  is just around the corner here...

As they turn a corner and enter the wide cafe, Donatelli stops and stares at it, in disarray. Claire observes him, sheepish.

CLAIRE
Is everything OK, coach?

He turns to her, his eyes burning with intensity. 

DONATELLI
(Spanish accent)
No not OK. Not OK at all. Look... The color, the carpet... The plants... What do you think a player feels when he walks in here? Does he feel victory?

Claire fumbles, laughing nervously as she glances around. 

CLAIRE
Well... I mean... Perhaps it's more like... a draw? 

DONATELLI
NO! Defeat! Decay! CANCER OF THE EYE!

NATALIE BROOKS, the stern cafe manager, looks up from her work station, her expression heated. 

NATALIE
(Scottish accent)
What's this about an eye cancer?

CLAIRE
Coach, why don't you wait in the conference room, I'll order you a nice coffee...
She gently steers Donatelli away from Natalie. 

DONATELLI
Necrosis... A festering wound... 

NATALIE
(Scottish accent)
Your chat's gonna land you with more than a festering wound, I'm warning ye.

DONATELLI
Is that English? Where’s she from?

CLAIRE
This way please--

ELLA [OFF]
--AAAAAAGH!

Claire rushes around the corner. Through the glass wall of a conference room, she sees Ella, frantically chasing the escaped falcon with a kitchen mitten on one hand and a bag of crisps in the other. 

ELLA
It won’t eat!

INT. CONFERENCE ROOM - DAY

Claire and Donatelli burst into the room just as the falcon flies past, screeching. 

CLAIRE
It's the silence! He said no silence. Talk, sing! Anything! La la la la la.

DONATELLI
Do you have an ashtray?

CLAIRE 
An ash--? NO! Ella, give me that! La la la!

Ella hands over the mitten. Claire starts her own pursuit, out of breath. 

ELLA
I'm talking! Just talking! Here, talking... talking... 

CLAIRE
It's not working... LOUDER! LOUDER!

Ella, in her dark flowing dress, spins and dashes to her rucksack. She pulls out her piccolo flute, and plays a brisk sonata. 

DONATELLI
Ah! Mozart... Bravo.

Donatelli casually lights up a cigarillo, sitting back to enjoy the show. 
Claire tries to corner the agitated falcon. The conference room door opens, revealing aging football superstar GUFINHO, flanked by two companions. He's in a baggy outfit and wears a big gold chain, slightly overweight for an athlete.
 
GUFINHO
El Misterrrr!! El Magoooooo! Hermanooooo! 

DONATELLI
Ah! Genio! Hermanito!! ¿Cómo estás, bien? ¿Bien? 

Donatelli opens his arms wide, and the two share a hearty, emotional hug. Ella continues her flute performance. Claire, glancing over her shoulder, is momentarily relieved to see things seemingly under control. She then refocuses on the falcon. 

CLAIRE
(clenched teeth)
Come. Back. HERE.

SIGRID [OFF]
(German accent)
May I help you?

Claire sins and discovers SIGRID HARTMANN, a woman in her late fifties with pale skin and deep grey eyes. Calm and slightly aristocratic, she has just entered the room. 

CLAIRE
(giving the mitten)
By all means... Please...

Sigrid, with the confidence of a hypnotist, approaches the falcon. 

SIGRID
(German accent)
Who are you today, majestic creature? Shhhhhhhh... 

Claire lifts an eyebrow.

SIGRID
(whisper)
Above the chaos, you rise. Peaceful. Powerful. Shhhhhhhhh...

Miraculously, the falcon hops onto her mitten. Sigrid, now resembling a Greek statue, stands composed. Claire is astonished. 

CLAIRE
Wow. Who are you?

SIGRID
(German accent)
Your new Head of Neuro-Cognitive Development and Mindset Optimisation. 

CLAIRE
Miss Hartmann! Of course! I didn't recognise you!

SIGRID
New haircut. Do you like it?

Claire nods politely. 

SIGRID
Claire... You must learn to stay into your adult ego state. The trick is to recognise when you start sliding into your child.

CLAIRE
Yes, I see.

SIGRID
Sometimes, all you need is to take a slight step sideways to see things differently and calm down-- 

The door swings open, revealing NATALIE BROOKS with a cup of coffee. 

NATALIE
(above the hubbub)
--COFFEE?!

Startled, the falcon screeches, flapping away through the open door. Sigrid spins around, furious. 

SIGRID
YOU IDIOT!

NATALIE
Ye what?!

Sigrid quickly regains her composure 

SIGRID
I'm so sorry...

NATALIE
Well it's my bloody day today!

Natalie slams the coffee on the table next to Donatelli, who looks at her, bewildered. 

CLAIRE
Ella! Falcon!

Ella abruptly stops playing and rushes after the falcon, almost forgetting the mitten. Donatelli tastes his coffee, retches, and drops his cigarillo into it. Natalie, noticing, exits the room with a sly smile. 

DONATELLI
When can I see my players?

Claire looks through him for a moment, then nods. 

EXT. CLAYFORD CITY FC'S RECEPTION DESKS - DAY

Ben Moss, 24, small and rounded in a cheap suit, approaches a group heading to the reception desk, his eyes darting nervously but with a determined air.  

BEN
I'm terribly sorry, may I just ask a quick question?

The group attempts to ignore him as he tags along.

BEN
It seems like my invitation got mixed up... Could you perhaps share the contact of the organizer...? 

The group fully ignores him and reaches one of the desks. Ben turns and sees another person entering through the revolving doors: LEO AKAMBI, 28, a charismatic man with short dreads, smoothly swept back.  

Ben, going 'all in,' literally stands right in front of Leo, blocking his path. 

BEN
Excuse me sir--I'm terribly sorry, but I need a bit of help-- 

LEO
What the-- 

Leo, taken aback, tries to sidestep Ben. 

BEN
--I'm so sorry for having to do this but--

LEO
(hushed tones)
Jesus Christ, mate, can you not? Move! 

Leo slips past and looks around anxiously, resembling a spy in a movie. Ben cocks an eyebrow but Leo is already at a reception desk, talking to the receptionist in hushed tones and checking on Ben suspiciously. 

The receptionist shakes his head, eliciting a look of shock from Leo. Meanwhile, Ben inches closer, keen to overhear their conversation. 

LEO
(fake French accent)
Euh... You realize that... I'm here from Qatar for the signature? 

Leo attempts to block the view between Ben and the receptionist. 

RECEPTIONIST
I'm sorry sir, but your name isn't on the list... 

LEO
(fake French accent)
Four hours till my flight! This deal will collapse without me! 

RECEPTIONIST
I-- Err... 

LEO
(fake French accent)
This is a disaster. Real Madrid are on the player as well, you know?

RECEPTIONIST
Umm. Wait a second sir...

Sweat beads on the receptionist forehead as Leo, maintaining his act, pretends to make a call. 

LEO
Thomas will hear about this!

The receptionist, now pale, tries to call his superiors one more time. As Ben grasps Leo's stratagem, Leo flashes threatening eyes towards him, but too late: Ben is already in action. 

BEN
(fake French accent)
Ah, mon cher collègue! Catastrophe strikes! The Spaniards just made an offer! I have the contract here – voilà – ready for a miracle! Let's go quick! 

Leo, incredulous, stares at Ben, then quickly gathers himself, embracing the unexpected intervention. 

LEO
(fake French accent)
Yes but... 'Le Transfert' is doomed mon ami...

BEN
(fake French accent)
What?! Why? How? Oh la la!! Mon dieu!

The receptionist clacks the phone down and looks around. No one is watching.

RECEPTIONIST
(whisper)
Listen... I'll issue temporary badges, but you must find Claire Kerr immediately. Names, please... 

INT. CLAYFORD CITY FC CAFE - DAY

LEO, with a mix of confidence and pretense, enters the cafe, followed by BEN. The cafe buzzes with badged individuals mingling. 

LEO
Jean-Pierre Baguette? Jean-Pierre Baguette?

Well, We made it through, didn't we?

LEO
We? 

Read more

Before anything, I’ll invite you to just watch the entire scene with no context and simply ask yourself how this scene makes you feel. Don’t analyse it for now.

This is an extract from the film A Prophet by Jacques Audiard. Sorry about the lack of subtitles, but I don’t think it matters in this scene.

Personally, when I watch this scene, I feel a great sense of disorientation, of loss and apprehension and somehow yearning. Let’s look at what happens exactly to generate this strong mood and emotions.

The scene starts on our protagonist carefully folding this little bank note, giving the item a lot of importance somehow. It’s the first thing we see. The camera is positioned exactly where the character’s eyes would be, with a lens choice that creates a narrow focus, simulating human vision.

We are literally dropped into someone’s POV. It couldn’t be more realistic. The camera is also handheld, shaking with the vehicle. The juxtaposition of handcuffs with the dirty shoes and floor paints a strong sense of the type of person we are connecting with.

The music is yearning and emotional as he stuffs this bank note into his rotten shoes, while sound design is rough, loud.

Despite our guy being injured, scruffy, and clearly in big trouble, there’s an air of control about him. The low angle of the camera and the music reinforces this.

The composition gets really unbalanced, emphasising the cage. He literally looks ahead, and all there is ahead of him, is a rusty grey cage. Quite a metaphor. But still, he seems determined. We know nothing about this man, but we empathise.

Then we switch to his strict POV, through the fence, with jump cuts, giving a sense of time ellipsis, this is a long journey.

Cages everywhere, darkening men’s faces. Tough-looking men. This is a world of unknown, a grim world. Shadowy, smileless, all we get are glimpses—nothing more.

After another ellipsis we experience the outside world. Framing is tight, on a long lens. Barely visible, covered with shadows.

Literally to the point where we can’t see it at all. The music emphasises the yearning for freedom already, the sensation of something lost.

This is contrasted by having these sudden shots, right over the protagonist’s shoulder. As if he is, breathing the light itself one last time… Looking for redemption maybe?

And the camera moves in, emphasising his emotion and we somehow feel for him, we are invited in. The music and the way the director gently introduces us, makes this guy sympathetic somehow.

The contemplation continues, still hacked and jarred by jump cuts, still un-comfy and suffocating.

The appearance of the French flag imparts a strong sense of identity and symbolism to the film. This symbolism might be more nuanced for non-French audiences, but the character, a beur (a French person of Maghreb origin), instantly evokes a myriad of questions about identity and the uniquely French issues at play.

We then cut into what looks like a prison. It’s bare, it’s unglamorous. The colour palette is cold, and highly uncomfortable. The protagonist is off the ‘points of interest’ in photographic composition (see below)

Dead centre, on a visual point of weakness. The cop if anything is more powerful visually, covering him slightly, dressed, taller, brighter. Our hero is also standing on a cross, like a target, while the men wear gloves. The room is bare, dehumanised, but the music keeps our connection tight.

All these framings are unusual and uncomfortable. We can never quite see people’s faces clearly, discover them. It’s a world of strangers, barked orders…

A dehumanised, powerless world. The hero obeys without making a fuss though.

This type of framing on the cop gives him an enormous sense of power, yet we can’t see his face, his eyes, his humanity. It’s just a guard amongst others, another tough guy. It doesn’t matter anymore.

The hero is asked to cough so they can check his anus, this shot puts a lot of emphasis on the idea of violation. As always through the scene, the framing emphasises the hero’s POV, although here his entire head is cropped. He is just a naked body now.

Behind, his miserable shoes, the only remain of his previous identity.

We get the ‘payment’ for the banknote from the start of the scene. His precious little secret. Nothing gets past these men, and while our hero might have been a tough guy outside (…)

(…) Now, he is nothing but another naked body.

The actor’s emotion is nice here. Just enough to make us feel for him, while retaining some sort of mysterious strength, despite everything.

The scene finishes with the cop casually throwing away his rotten shoes, all that remained of his previous identity.

***

At first glance, this scene might seem uneventful, yet it’s highly evocative. Music is crucial, shaping our perception of the character’s yearning and resilience. As the world turns increasingly oppressive, stripping him of humanity, the music creates a connection, instilling a sense of enigma and dignified tension. We’re left longing to discover his fate.

I like how all is conveyed visually, almost no dialogue. The camera work is handheld, delicate, it looks very realistic and yet, the compositions are cleverly jarring. The colour palettes are consistent, the mood is set. Nothing is there by chance, this is very meticulous.

It’s one of those scenes that looks extremely simple but is painterly in its elegance. If you looked at the script, you could shoot it in many many ways. It’s just a guy traveling to the prison and getting checked in, but it takes almost 90 seconds and works powerfully on our subconscious.

***

As always, share your thoughts on the scene and suggest films for review!

To check out the film: A Prophet by Jacques Audiard.

This scene unfolds after a bride, during her wedding party, discovers her new husband's infidelity.

After dramatically hurling her husband's secret lover into a mirror, the bride vanishes, prompting the groom to fear she might leap off the roof

What follows is a truly memorable scene, that despite its simplicity, hits like an uppercut. Let’s look more closely at why.

The scene begins from the groom's perspective (contrasting with the short film's focus on the bride's POV). We see him and his friend immediately rush to the railing, as if half expecting to find her shattered at the building's base.

Notice how the mood is established through the framing and colour palette. The cinematographer skilfully keeps the friend in subtle shadows, drawing our attention to the protagonist. Half-hidden in darkness, with just one eye visible, our hero exudes an air of gloom, amplified by the palette of black, sickly yellow, and reds.

As he turns, we're jolted by the sight of his bride with a random chef. The shot is kept ‘dirty’ meaning we see a little of the protagonist on the left. This is meant to reinforce the experience of seeing through his eyes.

The choice of a bulky, unsightly AC unit for the liaison is hilariously incongruous. The bride's elegant lingerie starkly contrasts with the setting, emphasising the sacrilegious nature of the act.

A simple yet effective technique employed throughout the scene is the presence of a third-party witness. Here, it's the groom's friend, who, despite his lack of screen time throughout the film, plays a pivotal role in this scene alone. This heightens the conflict, transforming a personal catastrophe into a public humiliation.

Despite the scene's gravity, the director skilfully incorporates distinct visual elements of farce. This approach ensures that the audience understands laughter is welcome. It's vital in comedy to convey this message clearly and early. If such cues are delayed, there's a risk of insufficient build-up, which is essential for effective humour.

Here, the filmmaker uses an absolutely obvious effect to punctuate the scene, with rumbling thunder and lightning flashes. It’s cliché, and yet, it works. It doesn’t feel cheesy, I’d even argue that the fact that it’s such an obvious trick almost feels like a quirky comment somehow.

The actress then goes in with an absolutely amazing performance. Before I go into detail about what I like about it, notice how once again a third character (the chef) is kept in the frame, adding to the visual sensation of the groom being cornered.

It doesn't stop there, and here's where it hits peak hilarity. The cook starts to flee, but the bride's outlandish threats freeze him in his tracks. He shifts from embarrassment to… pitying the groom! It's an emotional rollercoaster, and the actor nails it.

The chef is perfectly cast – just an ordinary guy who somehow ends up part of the madness and already regrets it. He knew what he was doing with the bride, but he can't help feeling sorry for the groom, which only deepens the humiliation.

After this, the bride goes into her wild monologue. The writing is great, but it’s truly the actress who carries it. She displays immense power, with her deep voice, relentless output, and crazy eyes. There is nothing for the director to do but just cut tighter and let us stare in horror.

I like how the performance is kept brisk and breathless; it’s clear the director has pushed her to go almost as fast as she could, as if, despite the length of the monologue, this is all entirely just one long sentence. One idea. It gives the sensation of a dam breaking, of a sudden tsunami ravaging everything. It completely avoids pathos.

Every once in a while, the angle changes, to show us our embarrassed chef fidgeting in the background. The many lights behind the actress, with their fiery orange colours, greatly contribute to making her look insane, almost possessed.

Also notice how ‘dirty’ this answering shot is. The bride is taking a good third of the screen on the left, which is unusual. That, plus the friend and the unusual central position of the groom, give a sense of suffocation to this shot. It’s extremely uncomfortable, and really puts us into his head.

The actress gets to tears, but there is nothing earnest about them, these are tears of rage. It’s remarkable how she manages to bring out the character’s genuine pain along with the farce. Just raw energy bombarding us.

There is no music whatsoever, just the sound of the wind, some sirens here and there adding to the realism and grounding the scene.

Once the bride is done, there is an awkward beat. The cook gets his last shot, looking straight at the groom. As if, he, just like us, is holding his breath and hoping the poor sod will be OK.

When the groom vomits, we witness the first and only camera movement in the entire scene. The camera tilts down brutally, emphasising his loss of control, like a punctuation mark.

I love this scene very much because the director does some very very simple but efficient stuff. He is focusing on the essentials, performance, mood, lighting, and cleverly uses the secondary characters to bring conflict both thematically and visually. It looks effortless and yet, it packs a big punch, it’s a rush of raw energy.

It’s very difficult to do tragicomedy. Comedy is extremely hard, mixing it with drama is amazing. This is what I aim for in my own work, the mix of comedy and drama, of absurd and emotion. A juxtaposition of tones.

***

If you want to check the movie it’s called ‘Wild Tales’ (Relatos Salvajes) by Damián Szifron. It’s amazing all throughout.

Please do send me your interesting/cool scenes on Youtube. I’d love to watch them!

What I like about the opening of this masterpiece by Alain Corneau is how we learn so much about the main character without a single word being spoken. Not only without a word, but so effortlessly, without the director spelling anything out.

This is the equivalent in film of ‘show don’t tell.’

The first shot sets the tone, the composition and colour palette, instantly drawing us into the world of this man. A lonely world, a grim world. In the distance, the rumbling of a storm, a sense of danger but our character couldn’t care less. He doesn’t care about the rain, or the mud. He is, in fact, having fun, play-acting the gangster next to his shitty car.

I love the juxtaposition, the way the camera just refuses to cut away, for maximum awkwardness. The performance, one of Patrick Dewaere’s1 best, is spot on and sharp. He is bonkers and fragile enough to drag us in.

At some point, he is about to draw a gun, but instead… he draws an old cassette player and starts playing some lousy music. He then starts pretending to play the saxophone and even dances with a woman, enthralled in his game. That’s when the mood switches. The sense of tragicomedy surfaces, delicate, like a drop of cream in black coffee. Here is a man-child, a lonely guy whom we already like, a Don Quixote of the industrial zone, a loser with a huge heart.

This is definitely a bold opening. There are only 6 cuts in total over a 2m30 scene, it’s slow. It’s very slow, yet it’s totally mesmerising.

In the space of these 2m30, the director has managed to:

• Deeply characterise his hero.

• Make us care for him.

• Create a sense of threat, a conflict (Dreams vs reality).

• Establish the tone and codes of the movie.

• Get the opening credits out of the way

Pretty good, eh? And these things are achieved without any attempt by the director to put himself forward or wave his skills in our faces. He is cheeky and commenting of course, but it’s as light a touch as the rain in that muddy puddle.

The performance is of course key. Patrick Dewaere pulls off what is truly a remarkable scene. It’s hard to bring across such a bizarre moment without being either too goofy or creepy. He somehow manages to tell himself that story; he is so real, so earnest. We buy it.

This scene is a model for me of how sometimes everything comes together nicely on screen. It just clicks, easy and effortless, just the way it should be.

The film is nice—although very dark, be warned. It's based on a novel by Jim Thompson called 'The Nothing Man'.

This is a new type of post I’m experimenting with. I’m thinking of going through a lot of old stuff. Old films, old music, I’ve always been someone drawn to non contemporary stuff somehow. Some people have even told me that my films remind them of old films. In other words don’t expect me to talk about the latest Netflix films.

If you have some cool scenes you’d like me to have a look, please share in the comments. I would love to see them.

During my time as a director, it has always puzzled me how fearful most of my fellow filmmakers are of actors.

Directors, often control freaks by nature, like to plan out most aspects of their work, but working with actors is a different story. For a start, unless you’re a big name director you always want to aim higher than yourself when you cast, to get the film some exposure. This means that you come to actors from a position of relative weakness. You must offer the film to the ‘big name’ on show reel only and wait for an answer, then go down your pick list until someone says yes. This process already installs a clear power dynamic. It’s also a gamble, as apart from the intel you get from your casting director, you really do not know what you’re signing up for in terms of personalities. Rehearsals are a luxury these days; usually, you’ll meet with actors on day one. This makes directors uneasy, and their anxiety is further compounded in directing workshops and books, where they are misguidedly told that actors are over sensitive beings that need constant positive reinforcements. As you might have gathered, I don’t believe in this soft approach.

I was a theatre actor for four years, and you learn a lot on the receiving end of directions. In fact, I believe that most directors would be better off doing some acting workshops, rather than learning all the theory and keep treating actors as otherworldly beings.

The fundamental reason I disagree with the ‘sugar-coating’ method, is because it misunderstands the profound motivation of actors. While they might have big egos and bombastic personas, actors have little objectivity over their work. They hide it well, but they are nervous, and their primary fear is to give a weak performance. That’s the number one obsession—not their ego. In this industry, your reputation hinges on your latest project, so actors need to excel.

For this reason, blind positive reinforcement is a bad idea. Actors aren’t foolish; if they sense dishonesty, they will switch to self-directing. They won’t do it consciously, but they will assume that you are not genuinely protecting their performance and will, at best, do it themselves, and, at worst, ask their co-actors—which is another bad idea because of egos.

So whatever the level of the actor, whatever their age, how imposing and tremendously more successful they are compared to you, you must grab your courage and tell them the truth from the get go. First impressions are key. This happened to me with a strong actress once, she was nervous and it was her first scene, on day one. I had to tell her in front of her co-star and the entire crew she had over-acted. It was a make or break moment. Her frustration was obvious, but in the end she did the scene better. You might not make friends doing this (or lose existing ones!), but eventually something will click. You will notice in the actors’ eyes that they are listening to you and have stopped self-directing. They can now confidently take more risks because they know you won’t sugar-coat them.

Of course this requires diplomacy, and sometimes an argument. Just be honest and constructive, and avoid power games.

Directing Tips

So, let’s assume you have now successfully clicked (and perhaps pissed off) your cast, what methods can you use to direct them?

Film professionals commonly follow methods like ‘Directing Actors,’ a Hollywood staple by Judith Weston. It offers practical techniques for evoking emotion through actors’ imagination, like the ‘as if’ method. Say you want an actor to play anxiety during a scene; instead of mentioning the emotion itself, you say, ‘Do it as if there is a bomb ticking next door’. The actor then focuses on that concrete situation, rather than the emotion itself, which prevents ‘demonstrating’ and create a truthful emotion. It’s a wonderful system, and I use it a lot. My only criticism is that it’s often presented as gospel and filled with a lot of ‘musts’ and ‘shoulds’. But I have seen actors become truly confused with ‘as ifs’ and similar tricks. I once worked with an up-and-coming actress, now a Hollywood star. She was unreadable, and it was early shoot, so I was probing. ‘As ifs’ didn’t seem to click, so I was trying a more ‘arty’ method, talking theatre, characters, letting my enthusiasm flow, talking way too much. I asked her if it confused her which she admitted, so I did what is considered the absolute sin against good directing (According to J. Weston); I told her: ‘More sadness. Faster.’ I saw great relief on her face, she nodded and gave a brilliant performance.

People are different. The director’s goal is to be a good psychologist and figure them out. You are like a musician tuning your instruments before playing them, and tuning a guitar requires a different tool than tuning a piano. Having therefore a kit, with radically different tools, is a healthy approach.

Here are a few more: I briefly mentioned above the ‘arty’ stuff method above. This works well with a minority of cerebral actors. They like highbrow references, to talk characters, myth, novels. It’s more about letting their enthusiasm fly off, rather than the discussion itself to be fair. They seek meaningful work, feeling part of a mission. I would advise to only attempt this you if you know what you’re talking about! Also get ready to suffer the building frustration of your producer as you pontificate about Brecht while getting behind schedule!

Another thing that works well with the non-nonsense actors, is the ‘rating system’. You can say ‘right now, you are 8/10 in terms of energy and emotion, but you can go 10/10’. Comforting for actors, this approach allows for concise direction like ‘This one is a 6,’ which they quickly understand.

A little trick I enjoy using for specific scenes, is to talk throughout the scene, almost like a hypnotist. It doesn’t work on dialogue scenes of course, but, for instance, scenes where someone is supposed to experience powerful changes of emotions and sound doesn’t matter. Not everyone likes this, but when it works, it can bring out fantastic results. Then it’s really like playing a musical instrument. The actor, tuned in, absorbs the words you feed them, reacting live, and somehow if things line up well, your tone, your storytelling, their imagination, you can bring out powerful moments. This method suits ‘as-if’ types better than ‘no-nonsense’ individuals.

Sometimes you find a scene is just stuck. No matter what you do, it simply isn’t working. In that case, it’s best to let actors ignore the script and improvise. There is often a sigh of relief and they start speaking the scene ‘normally’ again—even if it’s nonsense. Though it may require a reshoot, improvisation resets their minds to the present.

If you ever get into a situation where actors get the giggles, give them a 15 minutes break. There is truly no point carrying on, as it will spread to the crew.

I’m missing some minor tips, but remember, your role isn’t to socialize. As a director, you’re often isolated. You will run around, and everyone will treat you like a prince (for this short period lol). Needless to say, that everyone will also think you’re an idiot and that they should be directing instead. This comes with the territory. The three favourite topics of conversation on a shoot are 1/ the food sucks, 2/ production sucks, 3/ the director sucks. It’s not always like this thankfully, I’ve made films where I could taste the crew’s togetherness, but you have to confront people a lot, and accept losing friends. Directing can be lonely.

This by the way, makes the rapport with the actors rather singular. You’ll be too busy for small talk; makeup artists will know the cast far better, gossip included.

Despite not knowing the actors, however, you will share something much more intimate than the makeup artists. You will play them, like a musician plays an instrument. If they let you, that is. There is a paradox in directing: 99% of the time, you must be tough, confident, decisive (with the crew) and for the remaining 1% (with the cast) you become intimate, fragile—honest. This happens right before the takes when everyone is staring and that’s when using your own emotions and vulnerabilities is helpful. Remember: actors are nervous, no matter how long they’ve been around and how well they hide it. This reminds me of a saying attributed to Jean Rochefort, the celebrated French actor, who reportedly advised a young actress boasting about her lack of stage fright, ‘Don’t worry dear, it will come with talent.’

To help actors with nerves, you want to stand in the bubble of vulnerability with them. This creates this vertigo feeling where you must be able to switch from one second to the other from ‘crew mode’ to ‘actors mode’. It’s a bit of Jekyll and Hyde process, and it can sometimes lead camera guys to roll their eyes!

I can’t finish without at least mentioning, one last and sadly genuine risk: that you’d end up working with a saboteur-actor. Some people just like power games. It just happens. I’ve also seen actors who were boozing before coming on set, others falling out while having to do daily scenes together. I’ve seen decent level actors having not learned their lines at all. When disruption occurs, prioritize genuine actors over troublemakers. With them, you must be merciless. They are like bullies, they can smell blood. If you show your frustration, you’ll get pulled into the power games. You need to ignore the barbs, and squeeze them for all you can. Do as many takes as you need, make them swim in the cold water or roll on the floor if the script requires so. No quarters. This is important, first, because it’s your job, and second because the crew will lose respect for you if you don’t.

It was strange for me to write this essay somehow. I have the unpleasant feeling of stating the most obvious things! But maybe it’s because I’ve been around actors most of my life. I’m really wondering whether making this sort of guides would be an interesting read, so leave feedback in the comments. Also, if you have questions about specific situations or anecdotes, I’d love to discuss them.

I will soon write a series of essays about an excruciating experience of mine. A disastrous feature film that I co-directed and which turned out to be a complete car crash. It wasn’t so funny back then… In fact; I was mortified about it, but I think now with hindsight, it might make for an amusing and insightful read.

Panopticism: Because 'We're All Watching Each Other' Didn’t Sound Fancy Enough

I studied acting seriously for about two years and worked as a professional actor for another. All things considered, looking back, since I was actually getting paid and working for a first year out of acting school, things were going well. But I was the most miserable wretched soul you could imagine. As an actor, you are quite literally always watching each other. It’s also an art form where you have the least objective perspective on what you are creating. You are constantly at the mercy of other people’s gaze. You create with your own body, voice, soul. Some actors manage to watch their own takes while on a film set. In fact, I have done this myself; I have actually acted in a short film that I directed called Happy Hour, but that was long after I had switched to directing, and it wasn’t what I would call comfortable.

Seduction Mode: The Actor's Full-Time Job

To work as an actor, you must be in 'seduction mode' all the time, and I don’t mean romantic seduction—although some are also—I mean your wit, charisma, self-confidence, humour, etc. Everything you do is a calling card for your instrument and its player: you. I often hear film folks say that actors are exhausting as they are eccentric, demonstrative, always loud, but there is a reason for it: they cannot be ordinary, can they? It’s territorial. It’s a brand; you can rarely let it down.

I don’t think I ever thought of this when I was acting; I wasn’t really strategizing much, as usual. Thinking back, I think my niche could have been the rather unsettling charismatic villain, I suppose, which ironically is what I cast myself as in my own film! But I think, back then, being so young, so taken by Shakespeare, so obsessed with getting the title role, I dreamt of Romeo, not of Iago—even though Iago is so much more interesting!

This is a very typical problem for all actors, by the way. A number of extremely successful actors have made tremendous careers by brutally accepting that they would never play neither Romeo nor Juliet—but it’s hard to be wise when you are 18.

Anyway, on the whole, for me, this lack of external view on my art was soul-breaking. I’m a rather introverted person. Being on stage was okay because I was protected by the author’s genius, but the whole carnival around it... Running castings, being constantly on display, watching and being watched. Being watched while you're watching people being watched… I have literally seen drama teachers, handsomely paid by their students' tuition, say the most ignoble things about a student while they couldn’t hear it. Actors are the most ultra-sensitive, injured, strong, weak, disoriented beings. But they like to look like they are on some kind of magic drug all the time and nothing can reach them. I love them, though; I think I understand them better because I have been one. In some way, I am still one.

The Casting Lottery: From Burgers to Shakespeare

For a year or so, I participated in some nice and not-so-nice projects, from the well-paid big audience play to the most obscure unpaid film project. I did casting for burger ads, where actors go in in groups of threes and you are told within five seconds of walking in: 'You are Spiderman, you jump from building to building. Action!' Or the most highbrow casting where you are being asked to be fire, or water, or a laser to the moon… I sang Disney songs for kids in gymnasiums, played teenagers in educational interactive plays about domestic violence. Eventually, I didn’t question anything anymore. I had to work. Well, at least I had to. Of course, there are always people who don’t have to work. They can be picky because the rent is not really a problem for them, so they’d rather wait for the beautiful part and keep their CVs 'clean'. Well, I wasn’t one of them. If it wasn’t acting, it would be selling oysters, or clothing, or doing God knows what, so for me, money mattered. This is, by the way, a recurring theme in my path, but I’ll get back to this in my directing career.

But what about my original goal in all this? What about that elusive meaningful contribution to humanity that art represents to me? Maybe, probably, had I been more patient, things would have improved; I would have climbed higher and gotten some more interesting stuff to sink my teeth into, but there was something fundamentally wrong. I was deeply unhappy.

The Lion King Meltdown: Hakuna Ma-ta-taaaAaAaAAAAAAAAGH!!!

So I actually realised I couldn’t carry on like this during a casting for the musical The Lion King. An incredible female singer with the voice of Whitney Houston had just gone into the casting room right before me for the main role, and I was already sweating buckets. I wasn’t auditioning for the main part, but some minor singing part. I could sing, but I was still just an actor. The stage was immense; the director and musicians looked busy and stressed out already. I came in and handed my printed little score for a Jungle Book song I liked. The Louis Armstrong one, 'I want to be like you'. The pianist started, played the first verse, and I sang and clowned and did my best. Then the chorus came… and the pianist played the first verse again. What? How? Why? It sounded awful; I stopped and said that it was time for the chorus. He snapped and waved the score at me. 'I’m just playing what’s in front of me, OK?' I explained that after the first verse, the chorus came 'Whoop-dee-doo…' Had he never seen the goddamn film? What was wrong with the score... 'OK, let's try again,' the director said, already looking like I was wasting his time. I made sure to explain again, first, one verse, then, one chorus, ok? Fine. Here we go again. First verse, singing and clowning, then chorus—First verse again… Exactly the same thing. Mind blown. The director was like 'OK, thanks a lot.' I took my score, left the building and sat on the outside; this was in Paris in summer, real hot. I felt so angry and frustrated. Did I even care about singing this role in this Disney musical? No, I didn’t at all. Would it be good for my career and bank account? Sure. I was so confused. Why did I put myself through this? Because I had to work. I wanted to be Hamlet, to live many lives, to go on adventures. There must be another way, and thankfully another way I found.

In my next post, we’ll look into my transition into writing and directing and how that completely transformed my life.