Filmmaker/partner
Superlounge
1) Three things. One: Be the leader through clear communication and embracing collaboration. Everyone on your crew and at the agency wants you to succeed, but they cannot read your mind. Two: stay relevant by studying ads and enrolling in Commercial Directing Bootcamp. Three: Keep your sense of humor. You get to shoot a commercial.
2) Protect the director from the crap she doesn’t need to worry about during the shoot. Never consider muffins and pastries as breakfast.
3) I am a huge believer in shooting tests or finding the lens on the scout. Having done dozens of forced-perspective gags (a 100 year old technology) I got cocky and thought we could quickly find camera placement “on the day”. Well that was a huge time suck that I could have avoided by having a finder on the tech scout. Rookie move on my part.
4) Our highly successful Toyota “Built To Amaze” campaign with Saatchi & Saatchi LA has amassed several million views, and effectively driven sales, which is the point. The combination of digital wizardry and old school camera trickery leaves civilians and industry folk scratching their heads as to just how these spots are done. Our entire team of creatives, producers, editorial and sorcerers (thank you Arsenal Creative) collaborate from prep through post.
Rom-Com Mainstay Hugh Grant Shifts To The Dark Side and He’s Never Been Happier
After some difficulties connecting to a Zoom, Hugh Grant eventually opts to just phone instead.
"Sorry about that," he apologizes. "Tech hell." Grant is no lover of technology. Smart phones, for example, he calls the "devil's tinderbox."
"I think they're killing us. I hate them," he says. "I go on long holidays from them, three or four days at at time. Marvelous."
Hell, and our proximity to it, is a not unrelated topic to Grant's new film, "Heretic." In it, two young Mormon missionaries (Chloe East, Sophie Thatcher) come knocking on a door they'll soon regret visiting. They're welcomed in by Mr. Reed (Grant), an initially charming man who tests their faith in theological debate, and then, in much worse things.
After decades in romantic comedies, Grant has spent the last few years playing narcissists, weirdos and murders, often to the greatest acclaim of his career. But in "Heretic," a horror thriller from A24, Grant's turn to the dark side reaches a new extreme. The actor who once charmingly stammered in "Four Weddings and a Funeral" and who danced to the Pointer Sisters in "Love Actually" is now doing heinous things to young people in a basement.
"It was a challenge," Grant says. "I think human beings need challenges. It makes your beer taste better in the evening if you've climbed a mountain. He was just so wonderfully (expletive)-up."
"Heretic," which opens in theaters Friday, is directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, co-writers of "A Quiet Place." In Grant's hands, Mr. Reed is a divinely good baddie — a scholarly creep whose wry monologues pull from a wide range of references, including, fittingly, Radiohead's "Creep."
In an interview, Grant spoke about these and other facets of his character, his journey... Read More