Trust

trust   /trʌst/ Show Spelled[truhst] noun 1. reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., of a person or thing; confidence. 2. confident expectation of something; hope. 3. confidence in the certainty of future payment for property or goods received; credit: to sell merchandise on trust. 4. a person on whom or thing on which one relies: God is my trust. 5. the condition of one to whom something has been entrusted.

This Sunday will most likely be the first production meeting for our crew before we film our trailer on Wednesday. The first time I am meeting with our cinematographer, production designer and sound person, three of the most critical people on a film crew. And here I am, Mr. First-Time Director. Yikes. One of the items on our school's checklist of considerations to apply to an acting scene is "Trust." You've got to trust that your work is solid, that you've investigated every possible alternative for your character and his relationship to the other person(s) in the scene, that you will remember your lines and hit your blocking when the time comes (and that your scene partner will do the same.) Stage and film are collaborative mediums. A one-man army cannot win a battle in this business. Not only do I have to trust myself going into this--that my script is solid, that I've cast the right actors, that my own acting and directing skills will be up to the challenge--but I now must put myself in the hands of people with whom I've never worked, people who will in turn have to trust me to know what I'm doing. Or at least come off like I do. Again, yikes. So, why am I writing all of this? What seems to be a collection of nagging anxieties from a rookie director spilling his id onto a blog post for who-knows-who to read? Because I have trust. In my excellent producer, Rachael Meyers, without whom this project would still be just a bunch of words on a page. She has helped me to select most of our crew thus far, many of whom she has worked with or were personally recommended to us by people she trusts. And I have trust in our impeccable cast: Michael Perl, Ursula Mills, Luke Cook and Ali Bayless, all of whom we selected from hundreds of very capable and experienced actors here in Los Angeles. The great director John Huston once said that 75% of a director's job was to cast the right actors for the parts. Once that was done, he could sit back and trust that they would do a good job for him. Part of our casting process consisted of me actually acting with each of them in scenes from the script, getting a feel for them as collaborators, of the ineffable energies that flow from them as people and that cannot necessarily be discerned from just looking at a headshot on a computer screen. I trust that each of them will bring their characters to life in exactly the way I need them to. Once Wednesday rolls around and we're all there on the set, all of the trust that I've placed in these people and that they've placed in me will pay off. I have absolutely no doubt about that.