Transition from
AD to Director
Part TWO
“No one is responsible for your success or failure except yourself. So please don’t walk down this road of expectation because I can tell you with certainty, it will not work out.”
CHANGING DYNAMICS
I had gone to register my script at the Indian Film Writers Association and they had then this manual process where your script is registered and a member of the association signs off on every page of it.
Anyway, you give your script to one person at the desk and then that person takes the fees, then it goes to another person who stamps it, then it finally goes to another person who signs it.
You’re asked to join the last person who is signing off on every page and speed things along by turning the page of your precious script for them. When I joined the person on the table, I met this very elderly, senior man in his 70’s perhaps with a kind and gentle face.
As I told him excitedly that this was my first feature that I would write and direct, he told me his life story. He said ‘I was an assistant director to an iconic filmmaker (whose name I’m withholding). Needless to say this filmmaker is considered one of the most legendary filmmakers of Indian cinema, before he passed away. He said he assisted him for seven years but he (the Director) never helped him become a Director. He begged and requested for his assistance but the Director simply wasn’t someone who helped. He concluded his story by saying that Director was the reason he never became a Director and why he finds himself in the shelves of the Indian Film Writer Association, signing away at pages. That story really stayed with me.
As I stared into the eyes of this 70 plus senior man, with such gentle eyes I believed three things. One, he genuinely believed this was his story. And two, I genuinely believed he could have been a Director if he really wanted to. And third and most important for me then; this would never NEVER be my story.
There is a huge lesson here for young filmmakers and a life lesson if you are not a filmmaker. The relationship between an Assistant Director and Director is pretty intimate; so this relationship will have a very profound impact on you. You could have a fantastic relationship or a fairly complicated one. No matter what kind of relationship, breaking up with your director can be complicated process for both parties. Over the years, I’ve seen the awkwardness of transition in every team, every department. My friends in costume, in production design, in editing; each describe a period of awkwardness between them and their mentor as they tried to renegotiate their position as equals in the world.
No one is responsible for your success or failure except yourself. So please don’t walk down this road of expectation because I can tell you with certainty, it will not work out.
BIGGEST LEARNING OF
BEING AN AD
This is the single biggest lesson I learnt. If you’re lucky enough to be assisting someone that is willing to nurture you than you have hit the jackpot. The biggest favor you can do is build an incredible mentor relationship with a filmmaker that believes in you. If you don’t necessarily believe the director you work with will be a mentor to you (good hint is to see if they have a history of mentoring) move to another project with another director as soon as possible. It would be wise to work with 2-3 directors in that case. That way more people will know you and your work and you have a larger surface area of getting lucky. Some people assist different directors within the same production house. That may work too if the production house nurtures talent like often Dharma and YRF seem to do. Of course none of this works without being an incredible AD so make sure you do a brilliant job everywhere you go.
