Three filmmakers reflect on early career struggles

The Business

KCRW

Tv & Film

4.6 • 676 Ratings

🗓️ 10 January 2020

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week, some very tasty leftovers from three filmmakers reflecting on the early, not-so-easy days of their careers. "Star Wars" second unit director Victoria Mahoney, "Little Women" filmmaker Greta Gerwig and Nanfu Wang, director of "One Child Nation" share some of the ups and downs from when they were first starting out.

Transcript

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0:00.0	From KCRW, I'm Kim Masters, and this is the business. This week, you know you love them.
0:06.9	Delicious leftovers. In recent weeks, we've heard from a bunch of filmmakers who have made it in the
0:12.1	movie business, but hitting those career highs didn't come without some serious lows. We didn't have
0:17.9	time to fit all their interesting stories into the show, but we bring them to you now.
0:22.7	Little Women Director Greta Gerwig told us that she was initially set on becoming an actress,
0:27.4	but the universe seemed to be sending her a clear message.
0:30.8	I auditioned for UCLA. I auditioned for NYU. I auditioned for Juilliard.
0:35.5	I think I auditioned for USC. Then I got rejected from all of them.
0:40.0	Documentary filmmaker Nan Fu Wang had made her family very happy by landing a stable office job in Shanghai.
0:46.8	But Wong looked around and saw that all her co-workers were miserable. And when I asked them,
0:51.5	why don't you quit if you like hated her so much and everybody would come up with excuses? I was like, oh my God, why don't you quit if you hated her so much and everybody
0:54.8	would come up with excuses? I was like, oh my God, I don't want to become like that. And before
0:59.9	Victoria Mahoney became the first woman and the first person of color to direct on a Star Wars film,
1:05.4	she spent years trying to break into TV directing by watching other directors work.
1:10.1	I never learned a goddamn thing shadowing.
1:12.6	I never learned, in 12 years, never learned one single thing shadowing about directing.
1:17.6	This week, delicious leftovers from three filmmakers reflecting on the early, not-so-easy days of their careers.
1:24.4	Stick around, it's the business from KCRW. I am joined by my partner in banter,
1:35.6	Matt Bellany of the Hollywood Reporter. Hello, Matt. Hello. So you know this past week,
1:40.2	as you well know, I wrote with my colleague, Tatiana Sie Siegel a piece about MGM, Mike DeLuca,
1:45.7	who had been an executive at New Line and then worked at Sony and produced movies like the
1:50.9	Social Network and 50 Shades of Grey for Universal. Long, long history in the entertainment business.
	...

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