‘What is the truth?' Directors Lesli Linka Glatter and Mimi Leder on the thrill of making ‘Zero Day' and ‘The Morning Show'

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It should come as a little surprise that they're the closest of friends.
Lesli Linka Glatter and Mimi Leder — two of the most accomplished female directors working today — each have a string of credits of TV's most successful series and Emmy nominations, dating back to the days when Leder first hired Glatter on ER.
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'When we were coming of age, there were not a lot of women directing, and we were able to find a dear friendship in each other, to talk about the joys and the difficulties and how you move through things,' says Glatter, who's now also the president of the Directors Guild of America. 'And that really has been and continues to be incredibly important to me.'
Glatter — who was recently nominated for an Emmy (her ninth) for her work on helming all six episodes of Netflix's limited series Zero Day — reunited with Leder, the woman Glatter calls her touchstone, who has just finished filming Season 4 of Apple TV+'s The Morning Show, to talk about their shared experiences behind the camera. The two opened up to Gold Derby about what it means to them to be "directing showrunners," what they've learned since the days of 24-episode seasons of ER — and the power of a fresh coat of lipstick.
Gold Derby: Mimi, what made you hire Lesli back then?
Mimi Leder: I had seen her work — she had directed a film called A State of Emergency — and I went, 'Oh, my God, this director is incredible. Let's get her on the show. Let's let her fly!' And she did, and we became fast friends. I hired Lesli because she's a great director, not because she was a woman. But, of course, we try and bring women up. On The Morning Show, I mostly hire women — it's all women. It's very different now. Then, we used to go into the bathroom and cry and we were by ourselves.
Lesli Linka Glatter: The bathroom was the safe space, if there was one! I can tell you my first day of shooting on my first project, Amazing Stories, there were 200 guys storming a beach in World War II, and there were no women's bathrooms! I have to say the joyful thing is, in TV, the statistics are somewhere around 37 percent is being directed by women and people of color. I think everyone deserves a seat at the table. And if the table isn't big enough, build a bigger table, because all voices should be heard — as well as white Caucasian males. Mimi and I were definitely mentored by wonderful, supportive men. This is not about them and us. This is about different voices, and distinctive voices need to be heard.
Leder: Absolutely. There are so many different stories and point of views and it's important to get it all out there.
What makes you say yes to a project when something lands in your in box? What sparks for you?
Glatter: For me, when I read something, I either start to see it and feel it in my gut and heart and connect to it in a profound way, and go, I have to tell this story. I can read something that I really like, that I think is smart and interesting, and I would absolutely be there to turn it on and watch it, but I might not be the right person to direct it. So if I don't have that intuitive, profound connection, I'm not the right person to do it. Someone else who has that connection should do it.
Leder: Absolutely, it's so interesting. When The Basis of Sex was offered to me [about late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg], I immediately related to her, even though I'm not a Supreme Court justice, but I'm a mother, and she was a mother, and we both work, and we both had kids, and we both had partners that love us. I don't compare myself in the amazing things that she did to change the world. I'm just a filmmaker, and hopefully I'll make people cry and laugh a little bit and feel something. I just have to feel a connection to the material deeply.
Glatter: It's also very important to me the environment that you build on a set, because we spend so much time with our work family. We tell stories in this very unique way, with a huge group of incredible artists and craftsmen. We're not sitting alone writing our poetry, we're with this huge canvas, and we move an army every day. And that's kind of extraordinary.
Leder: You always know if you're getting it right, when you're watching a take, and you turn your head, and the dolly grip is sobbing over there, and he's completely invested. There's nothing more exciting.
Both of your shows are so topical. Is that what appeals to you both as directors?
Glatter: I love the fact that in The Morning Show and in Zero Day, we're asking a lot of questions that are really essential right now. Zero Day very much deals with what is truth in a post-truth world when we can't agree about what is fact and what is opinion.
Leder: Beautifully designed, beautifully shot, beautifully directed. It was kind of breathless.
Glatter: That means so much coming from you, because all I can say is, "Right back at you, my friend." I always watch your work and I'm like, "Wow, she told that story so well." And at the end of the day, it's about characters. Whatever the plot is, you need to connect in that way.
Leder: Absolutely. We deal with the truth. What is the truth? Our journalists this season are faced with telling the truth and AI and political protests and polarizing viewpoints, and it's the journalist's responsibility to deliver the facts, and when they do, there are consequences, and especially today, as the country has changed. The world has changed, and there's truth versus lies, and that is one of our main themes this season.
How do you strike that balance? How do you make sure that when you're trying to tackle these very timely issues, that they're still feel relevant when the show airs?
Leder: It's very difficult, because the news cycle will always be ahead of us. You're always behind. So we pick a time frame to tell our story. And a lot of the things we tell haven't actually happened, but then they do happen.
Glatter: That's exactly what happened on Zero Day. We did a huge amount of research on zero day events — they've been going on since 2014. It's the most powerful tool, cyber weapon, that the intelligence services has. The one thing that has not happened is a zero day event that affects every industry simultaneously. But you can't chase the news. There was the fact that we hired Angela Bassett as the president of the United States, and then a few months later, Kamala Harris was running for president. She obviously did not win, but that was like, "Oh, wow." That, of course, was not in our zeitgeist at all, but a lot of the questions we were asking have become more relevant by the time the series actually aired, which is fascinating, even issues of acuity in a leader which was not being talked about at all when we started filming.
Lesli, why did you take on all six hours of ? Do you prefer that versus just setting the tone with the pilot?
Glatter: It's not necessarily a preference. It depends on the material and who's involved. This was a closed-end story, and with Robert De Niro, who was a wonderful collaborator, besides being a legend and a brilliant actor, he is an extraordinary human being, and was great to work with on all levels. But he was very involved with the development. He had never done anything for television, so the idea of multiple directors was just not something he could wrap his mind around. And we definitely approached this like one big movie. That's what was needed to tell that story.
Leder. I love doing a pilot and letting it go. Yes, I did stay on The Morning Show to produce and direct as many as I could and can and still do. But it's something that you create. You create the look, the sound, the color palette, the narrative with the writer. And in developing those characters, they're stepping into their shoes for the first time, and seeing who they are, trying to figure out who that character is. It's been really a journey on The Morning Show, to see where they began to where they are now, in terms of who their characters have become, working in the world, power, and deceit and misinformation and the news. It's a real character study, our show.
Glatter: I was just thinking of the good old, bad old days of doing a 22-episode show! I mean, I think about that, and I'm just … [gasps].
Leder: On ER we sometimes did 24! We'd shoot them in eight days. The scripts used to be 53 pages and then with the Steadicam, we started going faster and faster, and our scripts started to become 83 pages.
Glatter: I'll never forget that! How is that even possible?
As directors, how much do you inject yourself into the writers' room, into the showrunning process?
Glatter: I feel like the writer is my partner in crime. We're partners trying to tell the best possible story, and for me personally, that's the best it gets. We have different skills, but the intention is to tell the story in the best possible way,
Leder: Absolutely. And I have had that experience with Damon Lindelof [on The Leftovers], and he would always call me the directing showrunner. Charlotte Stoudt, who I work with now, we equally as partners create this show and this world together.
Glatter: I feel that that is the best situation you can get. I certainly had that with Alex Gansa on Homeland, which was a dream job, for all those years of traveling the world together. When you find the right partners in that way, it's not about anything, but telling the story in the best possible way, and that you are partners and can argue and hopefully what comes out of that is something even better.
Leder: You give your entire self to the process in order for it to come alive, as you would nurture a child inside your body.
You've both had a front-row seat to the evolution of television.
Glatter: Audiences now have that expectation when we watch a Morning Show or a Zero Day or a Homeland, that it looks like a film. We are visual storytellers, so this idea of TV being 'a lesser medium' — that is from another era.
Leder: It used to be where people in film would not touch television, and television people wanted to get into film. People often ask, "What do you prefer television or film?" I don't see any real difference in television and film, except for when you have to pick your format. My approach is exactly the same for both mediums. Either in your living room, where the lights go down, or in a big theater, when the lights go down, it's magic, and there's nothing like it. I think Lesli and I both love what we do. I think you have to love telling stories to do it well.
Glatter: And telling them in this crazy way. We do it with a team of 200, 250 people. I agree with you. I don't ever think about, "Oh, what is the delivery system for this story?" You tell the story in the best and most visual way for that story. Way back in the Dark Ages, when I was just becoming a director, from being a modern dancer and a choreographer, my first actual series was Twin Peaks. And Twin Peaks obviously broke every rule of what one imagined TV to be, but that's what I was raised in. We would mix it as if we were mixing a film, and then David Lynch would make us listen to the playback on the worst possible television set ever. He would say something like, 'Les, keep your eye on the donut and not the hole.'
What do you think of the current trend of oners? I know they've been around forever.
Leder: We invented the oner!
Glatter: Listen, I think if the material lends itself to that, fantastic and you don't feel like you're missing something, or the emotion or the story, it's great. I have to say, Adolescence — I thought it was jaw-dropping, because it worked so perfectly on every level. And I was never thinking, "Oh my God, this is a oner." I'm so moved by the story and the storytelling. So to me to do it, just to be showy, why?
Leder: I would say Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen, the oner episode on The Studio, was brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. Those two are incredible. I have only praise and admiration for them.
Glatter: And it made fun of the oner along the way. It was genius!
And what do you think of the success of , given your roots in ?
Leder: I think it's incredible. I love The Pitt. I think it's an extraordinary show. It's so incredible to watch. Noah Wyle who I worked with when he was 24 years old, and now he's a 53-year-old grown-up man, sexy as f--k, and just incredible human and what a performance.
Glatter: I think we were at dinner at John [Wells'] house when he was talking about this. I love the fact that he took this tried-and-true genre, rediscovered it for this time and place, and put Noah as a leading man. His performance moves my heart. It makes me so happy to see this, so happy that people I love and respect are doing such extraordinary work.
What have you learned over the course of your careers? What advice would you give to somebody trying to break into filmmaking now?
Glatter: Tell the stories you want to tell, and that it only takes one yes. You will get dozens of nos, but it only takes one yes, and you can't give up. So you have to be incredibly tenacious, and you can't forget the joy, because if you become hard and bitter about how difficult the climb is, once you get there, you won't be there to enjoy the process. So it's this tricky balance. It takes a lot of opposing things. You have to have strength and clarity, but you also need a lot of compassion. You need to be a great planner and know exactly what you want, but you need to be completely open to possibility. So embrace all the contrary aspects of this, and don't stop now, because things are really difficult now, but we need all kinds of stories. Oh, and remember to reapply lipstick. Mimi and I are firm believers in a fresh coat of lipstick.
Leder: I very much agree with everything Lesli said. You have to remain open. Your heart has to be open to change. You have to be able to lose your location, or you lose a piece of equipment, you're out in the desert and you don't have an arm to dolly into the window. Well, build an arm. You have to be tenacious. You gotta be willing to jump off the cliff with your actors and go into the deep end. You have to love every single moment, even if it hurts. Even when negative stuff comes at you turn it into a positive and just make it work. You have to just find the truth in every story and every character in every moment. And as Lesli said, find the joy. If you don't have the passion, you shouldn't be doing it. And change your shoes at lunch.
Glatter: We have to be grateful that we're on this journey, because not everyone gets to be on it. Be fearless. And for me personally, if I don't feel that fear and passion, it would be time to move on. But thank God, every time I read something that I get so excited about, I'm like the fires burn that bright. I'm not done, not hardly at all.
Leder: No, me neither. I'm not done. They're going to throw me out.
Glatter: I'm going to be rolling to set with my walker and my oxygen tank. We can roll together.
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