DAN ATTIAS has worked as a television director since 1984.As a director of series television, he has received the Director's Guild of America award for outstanding director of dramatic television for THE WIRE and has been nominated for episodes of THE SOPRANOS, SIX FEET UNDER, HOMELAND, and THE MARVELOUS MRS. MAISEL His new book DIRECTING GREAT TELEVISION: INSIDE TV'S NEW GOLDEN AGE is brand new from Michael Wiese Productions. We spoke recently about directing television, why the golden age is upon us, and his classic favorite cinematic moment.
Order Dan's book here.
Dave Watson: How did this book come about? It’s a very provocative read and very personal journey directing many episodes of television.
Dan Attias: You know, it culminated from a process that started several years ago when I realized how unprepared young directors can be. There’s a huge gap between film school and what happens on a professional set. I was very mindful of that in the writing of my book. Beginnings can be very bumpy, and I thought I might ease the transition. Several young directors had approached me in the past and I particularly liked three or four who met the criteria of having made a good film and having a commitment to their careers. I thought I could help them, so I began being their mentor.
In directing you go from having none of the responsibilities to having all of them. There’s no in-between, you’re not asked just to direct a couple of scenes. So I started a mentoring this group to teach them how to prepare for their first day on the set, how to come in with a sense of command and collaboration, and how generally to deal with the sorts of real challenges that arise. I also emphasized to them the importance of understanding the story you’re telling and how every creative decision ideally should serve advancing that story. This involved my having to deconstruct my own process in order to communicate it.
This led to my wanting to share in book form how great television actually comes about, what goes into creating it. And not just for other young directors but for anyone (I hope)who might be interested in television generally or the creative process. I brought a vantage that might interest others, having worked on some of what have become some of the more iconic shows of our new “Golden Age.” I hope to create the sense of what it’s actually like to sit in the director’s chair by relaying stories that actually happened to me.
DW: You’ve directed TV for decades, and some of the shows you’ve directed have stood the test of time, such as Beauty and the Beast.
DA: Oh, that’s early. (laughs)
DW: You also did Miami Vice.
DA: Yes, I’ve been fortunate that my career has a long span. After Miami Vice, I directed The Sopranos, The Wire, Six Feet Under, among others, and more recently shows like Homeland, The Americans, and The Boys. I feel very privileged and have, hopefully, picked up a few pointers along the way.
DW: A lot of your lessons resonate today.
DA: Directing is directing. Storytelling will always be storytelling. The responsibilities are: Immerse yourself in the material, find the things you want to emphasize and then determine how best to communicate them; how best to immerse the audience in the experience and stay mindful yourself of what you are communicating. In the case of series television directing (and in feature film directing as well,) you have the added challenge of working with hundreds of others whose creative contributions you depend on. Getting the best from them is an important skill to cultivate.
DW: Would you call the TV Director the consummate middleman/person? You’re working with writers, with actors...
DA: Yeah, I might choose a few other words like collaborator and facilitator. Directing series television is interesting because the director has to bring his or her own instincts into service of the vision of the showrunner, or head writer of the series. That person is kind of king of the hill, but it doesn’t mean the director isn’t crucial to making the show come alive. The director has to take responsibility for the storytelling and assess, moment-to-moment, how each creative choice or moment of a performance is advancing the story. But if that isn’t done in concert with the showrunner’s own vision for the show, you’re working at cross purposes. And it is the showrunner who will have final say in how the show gets edited. It’s not simply that the director is a middleman. I’d say he or she is more an interpreter, translator, and facilitator.
DW: The script also seems tied directly to performances in TV. Would you agree?
DA: Expand on that question a little bit.
DW: You talked about going over the script and then working with actors to get their lines.
DA: Well one thing I hope people might learn from my book is that everything that happens on screen — every performance or camera angle — is the result of a choice. Scenes can be played in an infinite number of ways, and the meaning and impact can be completely altered depending on what the actors’ intentions are for their characters The lines are really the surface. The real richness. — the real meaning -- is often referred to as the subtext. What are the characters’ deeper intentions? The lines, or dialogue, are often strategies. In life, we don’t express our subtext. Like, here with you now, I really want to make a good impression on you and your audience. But I don’t necessarily reveal that. The fact that I want the listener or reader to emerge with some understanding of what’s its like to direct television affects how I choose to communicate. When you get into an emotionally charged scene, well, how many of us are perfectly honest? If you’re attracted to someone, you might not come right out and say that, but instead consider, “How do I get this person interested in me? Or, if you’re afraid and don’t want to reveal that you are afraid, how might you behave? Those are the kinds of questions directors and actors have to suss out. What is the story being told?
DW: TV shows unfold over hours. Why has TV emerged into the current golden age.
DA: To me you’ve hit on what is the most significant development in television and what has been responsible for so many wonderful shows being created. When I was growing up, shows were rarely serialized. They were self-contained, “one-off” episodes. Each episode was a stand-alone story, with a clear beginning, middle and end. There are still the Law & Orders and those are fun. But now shows tend to unspool over several hours.
The Sopranos was one of the first shows that changed all that. You have to remember that HBO wasn’t HBO back then, it was a cable outlet trying to find an identity. Not having to attract millions and millions of viewers right away, cable had the opportunity to tell a more nuanced story. Seasons were reduced from 22 to 12 episodes, but stories carried over throughout the whole season. It became more like the experience of a novel, single chapters of a bigger story, and it allowed a lot more complexity and nuance that led to a deepening of characters and audience involvement. That to me is the big reason for this golden age of television.
The advantage novels always had was the amount of time they took to spend with characters, like Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina at eight or nine hundred pages. You can get really deep into it, and television shows didn’t afford that. You had a few characters who would behave predictably and reprise a few, favorite character bits. With the hours people spend now, you can get really deep into the characters.
DW: What TV shows that you've directed are you most proud of? Maybe very daunting to start?
DA: That’s an interesting question. I’ve been very privileged and fortunate to work on some great, great stories and great, great shows. They’re great because they offer such opportunity to tell rich, complex, nuanced and exciting stories. I would point to The Wire which is such a deep exploration of a culture. I did Six Feet Under, and Homeland, I did a lot of The Americans, another one I loved.
Sometimes the most daunting show is one that doesn’t yield up its riches. I have to really dive deep to try to make it compelling. It’s really the director’s job to keep it driving, keep it moving. That’s what can be most daunting to me. I often have to work overtime to find something that I care about, because my feeling about directing is if I don’t care about it, I can’t make anybody else care about it. And not only that, If I’m not curious and interested in how this story is evolving, then I’m not going to learn anything. The best results can often involve being open to all your creative collaborators, because as a director you’re birthing something, you’re making something, you’re hoping to usher in something that’s alive. The great shows offer you more to work with. Then it becomes your responsibility to meet the challenge.
DW: What TV writers and directors do you most admire? Why?
DA: Yeah, there are a lot of really wonderful writers and directors, creators of those shows I mentioned, like Alan Ball who wrote American Beauty.
DW: He won the Oscar for it.
DA: Yeah, he created Six Feet Under. I think he’s sublime. I’ve also worked with David Chase, who created not just The Sopranos, but also The Rockford Files. Another one he didn’t create but ran the show for several seasons was Northern Exposure.
Alex Gansa and Howard Gordon, they created 24, and I think Alex was credited as the sole creator of Homeland, which was adapted from an Israeli show. David Milch is another one I think is amazing. He created NYPD Blue, and David Simon who created The Wire. They were the writers early in my career.
With directors, there are several I respect: Thomas Schlamme who’s president of the Director’s Guild has done brilliant work over the years on shows like The West Wing and Sports Night.
Lesli Linka Glatter is a woman director who is great. Marc Mylod and I worked on Entourage for many years. He does brilliant work and is a producer-director on Succession, which is a fantastic show. Tim Van Patten, another wonderful director who directed many of The Sopranos and the pilot of Game of Thrones. I’m a fan of a lot of people!
DW: What separates them as the cream of the crop. Are they loyal or faithful to the story?
DA: I think that’s it. I think being a storyteller, a smart and adventurous storyteller, and part audience yourself is important, which I address in the book. As the director, you’re ahead of the audience in the sense that you know much more about the story than they do. You have to be smart and mindful of just what the audience is learning at each moment of the storytelling, so you can guide them to the best possible experience.
DW: You’re still learning
DA: I’ve read or heard that Alfred Hitchcock is famous for saying, “Well the shooting is the least interesting thing because I’ve figured everything else out.” I couldn’t be more different. I’m certainly as prepared as I can possibly be, but I might be in the position on the set where the actor has an idea and solves a problem in a way I didn’t see before.
DW: John Badham, who wrote a great book on directing.
DA: Yes, great book.
DW: He quoted his friend John Frankenheimer for saying, “I never did not learn anything by not directing.”
DA: I’ve heard variations on that quote, too. You don’t become a great director by not directing. Which is to say, as I like to tell the young directors in film school, go try to tell a story with the camera. That’s the best teacher because you get to try out ideas and see how they work. We call that the language of the camera--how does the audience experience it? I always return to the question, how does that make me feel? You are your own barometer. You bring your unique self to the work, and how things affect you are likely how they’ll affect the audience.
DW: What's next? Are you still working on Billions?
DA: Yes, Billions has turned into a year-long endeavor for me because there was a tragedy involved. The lead actor, a marvelous actor, Damien Lewis, lost his wife Helen McCrory who was in several wonderful films, including the Harry Potter movies.
DW: Recently in Roadkill.
DA: You’re right, with Hugh Laurie, she played the Prime Minister. Damien had to go back as she was failing. Around the release of my book I’ll be in the world of Billions, and that’s a lot of fun.
DW: That’s a timely TV show as well, in reaction to the Occupy movement, wealth disparity. You’re seeing the one percent, what they care about and we have to care about them.
DA: You have to find yourself in these characters, because we’re all human beings, and that’s an interesting point about directing. You have to be able to get inside your characters, which means you need to suspend judgment if you are to fully understand them. Like an actor playing any part, you have to see their humanity if you hope to give your audience a deep and truthful experience.
DW: What's your favorite cinematic moment?
DA: That’s a fun challenge to think about! There are so many I love and so many I’m sure I’m forgetting. If I were to pick one, I think I’d go with a moment from the first film of Francois Truffaut, The 400 Blows. It was autobiographical. He found a young actor, Jean-Pierre Leaud, who is growing up in a very dysfunctional household with little money. His father is kind of hapless, and the mother is cheating on the dad. The nine-year-old boy is seen as a juvenile delinquent and at the end of the film is sent away to a reform school in a beach town. The film ends with a long, long tracking shot of the boy running on the beach towards the ocean. We have previously seen his natural joy and exuberance, but he just has been thwarted his whole, short life. He runs with exuberance but also with the sadness that in his life he’s not met by anyone, no one has really seen his value. He runs right up to the water’s edge, then turns to the camera with the water behind him and it’s a freeze-frame, and it’s so poignant, and it’s a saving grace for the viewers that he grows up to be Francois Truffaut.
DW: And it starts with him in the school or…
DA: Yeah, it starts in the school and it’s a long shot.
DW: And in the freeze frame at the end he has an expression on his face, and to many viewers and me, we don’t know what he’s thinking, but it’s an image that’s stayed with me decades later.
DA: I think of that, he’s trapped so long in that nine year-old body with no support from his parents or anybody, and the only thing that’s going to save him is his own inner development and maturity. And all these things that created problems are going to be strengths for him.
DW: That’s a wonderful interpretation.
Clip: The 400 Blows
Founder and editor of Movies Matter, Dave Watson is a writer and educator in Madison, WI.
Order Dan's book here.
Dave Watson: How did this book come about? It’s a very provocative read and very personal journey directing many episodes of television.
Dan Attias: You know, it culminated from a process that started several years ago when I realized how unprepared young directors can be. There’s a huge gap between film school and what happens on a professional set. I was very mindful of that in the writing of my book. Beginnings can be very bumpy, and I thought I might ease the transition. Several young directors had approached me in the past and I particularly liked three or four who met the criteria of having made a good film and having a commitment to their careers. I thought I could help them, so I began being their mentor.
In directing you go from having none of the responsibilities to having all of them. There’s no in-between, you’re not asked just to direct a couple of scenes. So I started a mentoring this group to teach them how to prepare for their first day on the set, how to come in with a sense of command and collaboration, and how generally to deal with the sorts of real challenges that arise. I also emphasized to them the importance of understanding the story you’re telling and how every creative decision ideally should serve advancing that story. This involved my having to deconstruct my own process in order to communicate it.
This led to my wanting to share in book form how great television actually comes about, what goes into creating it. And not just for other young directors but for anyone (I hope)who might be interested in television generally or the creative process. I brought a vantage that might interest others, having worked on some of what have become some of the more iconic shows of our new “Golden Age.” I hope to create the sense of what it’s actually like to sit in the director’s chair by relaying stories that actually happened to me.
DW: You’ve directed TV for decades, and some of the shows you’ve directed have stood the test of time, such as Beauty and the Beast.
DA: Oh, that’s early. (laughs)
DW: You also did Miami Vice.
DA: Yes, I’ve been fortunate that my career has a long span. After Miami Vice, I directed The Sopranos, The Wire, Six Feet Under, among others, and more recently shows like Homeland, The Americans, and The Boys. I feel very privileged and have, hopefully, picked up a few pointers along the way.
DW: A lot of your lessons resonate today.
DA: Directing is directing. Storytelling will always be storytelling. The responsibilities are: Immerse yourself in the material, find the things you want to emphasize and then determine how best to communicate them; how best to immerse the audience in the experience and stay mindful yourself of what you are communicating. In the case of series television directing (and in feature film directing as well,) you have the added challenge of working with hundreds of others whose creative contributions you depend on. Getting the best from them is an important skill to cultivate.
DW: Would you call the TV Director the consummate middleman/person? You’re working with writers, with actors...
DA: Yeah, I might choose a few other words like collaborator and facilitator. Directing series television is interesting because the director has to bring his or her own instincts into service of the vision of the showrunner, or head writer of the series. That person is kind of king of the hill, but it doesn’t mean the director isn’t crucial to making the show come alive. The director has to take responsibility for the storytelling and assess, moment-to-moment, how each creative choice or moment of a performance is advancing the story. But if that isn’t done in concert with the showrunner’s own vision for the show, you’re working at cross purposes. And it is the showrunner who will have final say in how the show gets edited. It’s not simply that the director is a middleman. I’d say he or she is more an interpreter, translator, and facilitator.
DW: The script also seems tied directly to performances in TV. Would you agree?
DA: Expand on that question a little bit.
DW: You talked about going over the script and then working with actors to get their lines.
DA: Well one thing I hope people might learn from my book is that everything that happens on screen — every performance or camera angle — is the result of a choice. Scenes can be played in an infinite number of ways, and the meaning and impact can be completely altered depending on what the actors’ intentions are for their characters The lines are really the surface. The real richness. — the real meaning -- is often referred to as the subtext. What are the characters’ deeper intentions? The lines, or dialogue, are often strategies. In life, we don’t express our subtext. Like, here with you now, I really want to make a good impression on you and your audience. But I don’t necessarily reveal that. The fact that I want the listener or reader to emerge with some understanding of what’s its like to direct television affects how I choose to communicate. When you get into an emotionally charged scene, well, how many of us are perfectly honest? If you’re attracted to someone, you might not come right out and say that, but instead consider, “How do I get this person interested in me? Or, if you’re afraid and don’t want to reveal that you are afraid, how might you behave? Those are the kinds of questions directors and actors have to suss out. What is the story being told?
DW: TV shows unfold over hours. Why has TV emerged into the current golden age.
DA: To me you’ve hit on what is the most significant development in television and what has been responsible for so many wonderful shows being created. When I was growing up, shows were rarely serialized. They were self-contained, “one-off” episodes. Each episode was a stand-alone story, with a clear beginning, middle and end. There are still the Law & Orders and those are fun. But now shows tend to unspool over several hours.
The Sopranos was one of the first shows that changed all that. You have to remember that HBO wasn’t HBO back then, it was a cable outlet trying to find an identity. Not having to attract millions and millions of viewers right away, cable had the opportunity to tell a more nuanced story. Seasons were reduced from 22 to 12 episodes, but stories carried over throughout the whole season. It became more like the experience of a novel, single chapters of a bigger story, and it allowed a lot more complexity and nuance that led to a deepening of characters and audience involvement. That to me is the big reason for this golden age of television.
The advantage novels always had was the amount of time they took to spend with characters, like Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina at eight or nine hundred pages. You can get really deep into it, and television shows didn’t afford that. You had a few characters who would behave predictably and reprise a few, favorite character bits. With the hours people spend now, you can get really deep into the characters.
DW: What TV shows that you've directed are you most proud of? Maybe very daunting to start?
DA: That’s an interesting question. I’ve been very privileged and fortunate to work on some great, great stories and great, great shows. They’re great because they offer such opportunity to tell rich, complex, nuanced and exciting stories. I would point to The Wire which is such a deep exploration of a culture. I did Six Feet Under, and Homeland, I did a lot of The Americans, another one I loved.
Sometimes the most daunting show is one that doesn’t yield up its riches. I have to really dive deep to try to make it compelling. It’s really the director’s job to keep it driving, keep it moving. That’s what can be most daunting to me. I often have to work overtime to find something that I care about, because my feeling about directing is if I don’t care about it, I can’t make anybody else care about it. And not only that, If I’m not curious and interested in how this story is evolving, then I’m not going to learn anything. The best results can often involve being open to all your creative collaborators, because as a director you’re birthing something, you’re making something, you’re hoping to usher in something that’s alive. The great shows offer you more to work with. Then it becomes your responsibility to meet the challenge.
DW: What TV writers and directors do you most admire? Why?
DA: Yeah, there are a lot of really wonderful writers and directors, creators of those shows I mentioned, like Alan Ball who wrote American Beauty.
DW: He won the Oscar for it.
DA: Yeah, he created Six Feet Under. I think he’s sublime. I’ve also worked with David Chase, who created not just The Sopranos, but also The Rockford Files. Another one he didn’t create but ran the show for several seasons was Northern Exposure.
Alex Gansa and Howard Gordon, they created 24, and I think Alex was credited as the sole creator of Homeland, which was adapted from an Israeli show. David Milch is another one I think is amazing. He created NYPD Blue, and David Simon who created The Wire. They were the writers early in my career.
With directors, there are several I respect: Thomas Schlamme who’s president of the Director’s Guild has done brilliant work over the years on shows like The West Wing and Sports Night.
Lesli Linka Glatter is a woman director who is great. Marc Mylod and I worked on Entourage for many years. He does brilliant work and is a producer-director on Succession, which is a fantastic show. Tim Van Patten, another wonderful director who directed many of The Sopranos and the pilot of Game of Thrones. I’m a fan of a lot of people!
DW: What separates them as the cream of the crop. Are they loyal or faithful to the story?
DA: I think that’s it. I think being a storyteller, a smart and adventurous storyteller, and part audience yourself is important, which I address in the book. As the director, you’re ahead of the audience in the sense that you know much more about the story than they do. You have to be smart and mindful of just what the audience is learning at each moment of the storytelling, so you can guide them to the best possible experience.
DW: You’re still learning
DA: I’ve read or heard that Alfred Hitchcock is famous for saying, “Well the shooting is the least interesting thing because I’ve figured everything else out.” I couldn’t be more different. I’m certainly as prepared as I can possibly be, but I might be in the position on the set where the actor has an idea and solves a problem in a way I didn’t see before.
DW: John Badham, who wrote a great book on directing.
DA: Yes, great book.
DW: He quoted his friend John Frankenheimer for saying, “I never did not learn anything by not directing.”
DA: I’ve heard variations on that quote, too. You don’t become a great director by not directing. Which is to say, as I like to tell the young directors in film school, go try to tell a story with the camera. That’s the best teacher because you get to try out ideas and see how they work. We call that the language of the camera--how does the audience experience it? I always return to the question, how does that make me feel? You are your own barometer. You bring your unique self to the work, and how things affect you are likely how they’ll affect the audience.
DW: What's next? Are you still working on Billions?
DA: Yes, Billions has turned into a year-long endeavor for me because there was a tragedy involved. The lead actor, a marvelous actor, Damien Lewis, lost his wife Helen McCrory who was in several wonderful films, including the Harry Potter movies.
DW: Recently in Roadkill.
DA: You’re right, with Hugh Laurie, she played the Prime Minister. Damien had to go back as she was failing. Around the release of my book I’ll be in the world of Billions, and that’s a lot of fun.
DW: That’s a timely TV show as well, in reaction to the Occupy movement, wealth disparity. You’re seeing the one percent, what they care about and we have to care about them.
DA: You have to find yourself in these characters, because we’re all human beings, and that’s an interesting point about directing. You have to be able to get inside your characters, which means you need to suspend judgment if you are to fully understand them. Like an actor playing any part, you have to see their humanity if you hope to give your audience a deep and truthful experience.
DW: What's your favorite cinematic moment?
DA: That’s a fun challenge to think about! There are so many I love and so many I’m sure I’m forgetting. If I were to pick one, I think I’d go with a moment from the first film of Francois Truffaut, The 400 Blows. It was autobiographical. He found a young actor, Jean-Pierre Leaud, who is growing up in a very dysfunctional household with little money. His father is kind of hapless, and the mother is cheating on the dad. The nine-year-old boy is seen as a juvenile delinquent and at the end of the film is sent away to a reform school in a beach town. The film ends with a long, long tracking shot of the boy running on the beach towards the ocean. We have previously seen his natural joy and exuberance, but he just has been thwarted his whole, short life. He runs with exuberance but also with the sadness that in his life he’s not met by anyone, no one has really seen his value. He runs right up to the water’s edge, then turns to the camera with the water behind him and it’s a freeze-frame, and it’s so poignant, and it’s a saving grace for the viewers that he grows up to be Francois Truffaut.
DW: And it starts with him in the school or…
DA: Yeah, it starts in the school and it’s a long shot.
DW: And in the freeze frame at the end he has an expression on his face, and to many viewers and me, we don’t know what he’s thinking, but it’s an image that’s stayed with me decades later.
DA: I think of that, he’s trapped so long in that nine year-old body with no support from his parents or anybody, and the only thing that’s going to save him is his own inner development and maturity. And all these things that created problems are going to be strengths for him.
DW: That’s a wonderful interpretation.
Clip: The 400 Blows
Founder and editor of Movies Matter, Dave Watson is a writer and educator in Madison, WI.
