TV directors roundtable: ‘American Primeval,' ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power,' ‘Paradise'
Gold Derby recently hosted a group discussion with four of the industry's leading television directors and producers. They each opened up about when the directing bug originally bit them, what potential dream projects they are hoping to make happen, and which directors they personally look up to. Joining our Meet the Experts: TV Directors roundtable panel are Peter Berg for American Primeval, Charlotte Brändström for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, and John Requa and Glenn Ficarra for Paradise.
Watch the full group panel above. Click each person's name to watch an individual interview.
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'Paradise' directors John Requa and Glenn Ficarra on the 'chaos' of crafting 'the world coming to an end'
'The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power' director Charlotte Brändström on Gandalf's 'big reveal' and which scene required 'the most prep'
"I started off with documentaries, specifically wildlife," Brändström explains about her industry beginnings. "I studied anthropology and then I went through AFI [the American Film Institute] in L.A. I started to do short films and got more and more interested in directing. I wrote and directed my first feature, [titled Stormy Summer]. It was a French drama set during the second World War, a love and betrayal story in the French residence. After I finished that, I got a prize for it and decided I didn't want to do anything else for the rest of my life."
She also mentions how she's directed projects in three different languages — French, Swedish, and English. Berg has "so much respect" for Brändström for being able to "speak and direct in three languages, because you speak better English than I do," he jokes.
Berg started out by directing plays in high school, but the "key moment" happened when he was acting on Chicago Hope. "The great David E. Kelley did that show back in the day, and we were doing 28 episodes a season ... I was becoming kind of TV-famous as a doctor, Billy Kronk, and people would come up to me and start talking to me like I was that character." When a stranger on an airplane showed him a "horrible, oozing rash" on her elbow, he realized his "legacy" was about to be cemented as a TV doctor. He recalls, "And that, more than anything else, motivated me to take my interest in directing to the next gear." His first movie was Very Bad Things (1998), which Kelley let him out to write and direct.
"Meanwhile, Glenn and I have been spending three years on a spec," Requa laughs. "A friend of ours who's an actor is baiting us, will you please just finish the script?!"
Ficarra can't get his "mind around" producing so many episodes and shows simultaneously in today's landscape, noting, "We wrote, produced, and directed [Rabbit Hole] on Paramount a couple years ago, and that is the hardest f--king job. It almost killed me. I can't imagine doing more than one show."
After making Super 8 movies separately as kids, the duo "met in film school in the '80s," with Ficarra explaining, "I wanted to be a director, and John helped me become a writer."
Requa chimes in, "I read Akira Kurosawa's autobiography, and on the back of the book there are 12 hints for young filmmakers, and one of them is 'read the great screenplays, master the craft of screenwriting.' I was like, 'Oh, really? I have to do that?' So, I put down my director pants and I put on my writer pants and I decided I'm gonna figure this out. It took me 20 years! And I still don't think we figured it out."
Ficarra recalls, "I don't remember who said it to us. It was like, 'You guys get tired of directors f--king up your scripts. Why don't you go f--k them up on your own?' And so, OK, we did it."
This article and video are presented by Netflix, Prime Video, and Disney/Hulu.
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Best of GoldDerby
'Paradise' directors John Requa and Glenn Ficarra on the 'chaos' of crafting 'the world coming to an end'
'The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power' director Charlotte Brändström on Gandalf's 'big reveal' and which scene required 'the most prep'
'American Primeval' director Peter Berg on crafting an 'adventure story' with a 'dysfunctional family' in the wild west
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