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Changing Direction
The approach presented in this book, honed after years of on-set experience and from teaching at UCLA, NYU, and Columbia, and endorsed by many in the industry, including director Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) and producer/actor Edward Asner, aims to provide a helpful reference and resource for directors and actors alike. It combines underlying theory with dozens of exercises designed to reveal the actor's craft. There is material on constructing the throughline, analyzing the script, character needs; the casting and rehearsal processes, film vs. theater procedures as well as the actor and the camera.
Distilling difficult concepts and a complex task to their simplest form, the author explains how to accurately capture and portray human behavior. The author's discussion of creative problems she has encountered or anticipated after years of experience, and her suggested solutions and exercises, are immediately useful. Additionally, hear what the actors have to say in excerpts from interviews with acclaimed actors such as Meryl Streep, Denzel Washington, Glenn Close, Robert Redford, Christopher Walken, Julianne Moore, and Michael Douglas (to name a few) who discuss their work with directors, what inspires them, and what they really want from the director.
Distilling difficult concepts and a complex task to their simplest form, the author explains how to accurately capture and portray human behavior. The author's discussion of creative problems she has encountered or anticipated after years of experience, and her suggested solutions and exercises, are immediately useful. Additionally, hear what the actors have to say in excerpts from interviews with acclaimed actors such as Meryl Streep, Denzel Washington, Glenn Close, Robert Redford, Christopher Walken, Julianne Moore, and Michael Douglas (to name a few) who discuss their work with directors, what inspires them, and what they really want from the director.
193 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2006
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 21, 2013
Very practical and hands-on instructions. Useful to know even if you choose not to follow them - so that it would be a matter of choice.
March 2, 2018
A great book for an introduction to directing. She gives great exercises, and the lists are a great tool to print out and keep for reference. I really liked the quotes from other actors/directors as well. It's a great inside perspective into the world of directing.
March 5, 2017
Clear and concise. Not modern ideas, but practical.
February 26, 2015
This is a practical book. In fact, it's so practical that I could only get through a couple chapters before I started putting what DeKoven says into practice.
For me, the most helpful thing about the book was how much time DeKoven spent talking about preparation. Both cast and crew want a director who is prepared, in filmmaking and in theater. This means that the director needs to spend time thinking about the throughline, character bios, and structure of the script, in addition to planning the blocking (and camera). DeKoven also gives tons of practical advice on working with actors and with crewmembers. "To get what you want, don't say it that way, say it this way." "Respect the actors." "Keep everyone well fed."
DeKoven sometimes gets a little over-analytical with her methods. She is constantly referring to the actor's brain as the actor's "computer," and telling the director he or she only needs to know which buttons to push to get the desired result. Her writing style is also repetitive and flat, presumably because it's a compilation of roughly edited teaching notes.
Perhaps in years to come I'll come back to this book and find it less insightful than I thought, but for now, it met me exactly where I needed it to be.
For me, the most helpful thing about the book was how much time DeKoven spent talking about preparation. Both cast and crew want a director who is prepared, in filmmaking and in theater. This means that the director needs to spend time thinking about the throughline, character bios, and structure of the script, in addition to planning the blocking (and camera). DeKoven also gives tons of practical advice on working with actors and with crewmembers. "To get what you want, don't say it that way, say it this way." "Respect the actors." "Keep everyone well fed."
DeKoven sometimes gets a little over-analytical with her methods. She is constantly referring to the actor's brain as the actor's "computer," and telling the director he or she only needs to know which buttons to push to get the desired result. Her writing style is also repetitive and flat, presumably because it's a compilation of roughly edited teaching notes.
Perhaps in years to come I'll come back to this book and find it less insightful than I thought, but for now, it met me exactly where I needed it to be.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews