Judith Weston, Coach, Teacher and Author: I know you lied! I know you did!
You've been lying all along, you've been lying every day of your life. Do not lie to me!
Film Courage: What is result direction?
Judith: Result direction is telling directing the actor by telling them how you want,
what effect you want them to have on the audience. I started out, here's my book,
this is the 25th anniversary edition of the my original book Directing Actors which came out
in 1996 and I the first chapter I started out I called it result direction and quick fixes and I
started out with a list of at the time 10 things that that I called result direction that were
ineffective ways to give direction to actors and I did it on purpose I did it to get people's
attention it backfired a little bit because people would come to my workshops afterwards
and they'd be terrified that they're going to say the wrong thing but it's one of the reasons why I
was so thrilled to get the chance to do this book and to kind of correct that impression
that when I talk about result direction it's a quick way to bring up the subject of subtext
that that because what I call the quick fixes which are the verbs
the facts or emotional history imagery and physical life and event that that they
they're not always they're not always that quick they're quick when how to use them
but I but I wanted to have that first chapter be a way that people would not lose hope I wanted
them to say okay these are these are the list of don'ts but there's hope there are things you can
do instead and but but it did f it did turn out people would come into my workshops and
I say I read that list of things not to do and I do every one of them and so I'm terrified of
saying the wrong thing now I never wanted people to be terrified I never wanted people to think of
result direction as the language police I always wanted it to be a way to introduce the idea
that there's more to story and more to characters than just what you see
on a on a flat screen that there's there's underneath that the people so the characters
people's emotional history affects what they do now that the images in their memory and
in their dreams that that affects what they do now that the that their their intention
their verb or their intention or their need or their objective that's that's where their behavior
comes comes from and I wanted directors to know more about that to understand it and not because
they always have to fix tell the actor well don't play that objective play this one instead I never
meant that that's what I wanted them to do but I wanted them to understand the tool of objective
of what the character wants what the character needs because it's such a helpful way to talk
to actors to ask but to ask them first what what what is your objective what do you want here and
so and also that these tools about subtext will lead you toward an understanding of emotional
event which is the most important thing for a director to know is what is the emotional event
of a scene what is the scene about the simplest example of result direction is a line reading
so if a director says to an actor let's say the line is don't lie to me
the if director says you're saying the line wrong don't say don't lie to me say don't lie to me
that that's a line reading and that that's the simple example the simplest example
of of result direction and I think by now most directors know they're not supposed to use that
but but but it's still it it often gets hard for them to understand why
and if they don't understand why it's not a good idea to give line readings or to
just to tell them I want you to be angrier or I want you to be sadder
that's another way to give result direction to say you need to be angrier and
if they don't understand the why of it it's easy for them to to feel like
oh gosh I'm going to say something wrong and i'd better not say anything
or and and directors in my workshops they used to come up to me and say
well is it okay if I say this I say well it's not the language police you can say anything you want
but ask them what they understand by it that's that's a helpful way to do it and ask them
what they're working on create a dialogue with them so but let me give you an example of of how
result direction versus understanding what the emotional event of a scene is
so the the scene might be an argument and and the and the if the director says to the actors
this is an argument between best friends that could result in the end of the friendship
that creates the emotional stakes and and and it's very specific direction of where this director
wants the the scene to go and to say something like that instead of I want you to be angrier okay
so that's that's that's what I that's the real reason for studying result direction and the
alternatives to it is so that you can get to an understanding of the emotional event which is the
which I think the director is responsible for and should communicate to the actors
although side note you should always be ready to change your mind sometimes a different emotional
event works great or works better and then you can still move on even if it's not the
one you thought was going to work but that's that's kind of the the difference between
between result directing I want you to get angrier here I want you to be more
disappointed there versus talking about the the the emotional events of the story that
that this and to think about the differences in different kinds of arguments so if you say this is
instead of saying this is an argument between best friends that could result in the end of
the friendship a different kind of emotional event a different kind of argument could be
these people argue all the time they have had the same argument many times
this their their there's they're arguing this time there's something new about this argument I
want us to find out what it is but I'm thinking it is unlikely to lead to the end of the friendship
now I also use the terms of saying it's unlikely to or it could instead of it will lead to the end
of the relation friendship or won't lead to the end of the friendship so that whatever does happen
whatever emotional event does happen happens in the moment while the camera is running
so that it's not all oh expect expected it's not all pat and sort of paint by the numbers
so if I were in a scene and I'm an actor and I'm delivering a line very flat and it's don't lie
to me so you're the director you you're saying with result direction and using that it would be
to correct me on my tone maybe but if you came at it from another angle you'd be explaining
why I'm saying this line and through that I would know how to put more emotion to it well
it might be or a real quick verb I might say what's your intention on this line
okay so then I'm saying well this is a friendship and she doesn't understand me and
I’ve told her repeatedly don't lie to me I would say let that come into the line
because that sounds very good to me what you just said sounds like a very good way to play
it so i'd say let that come into the line I think that would give it would give it more
spark obviously so the way you said it first right so I'm developing it so yeah yeah but
but let me talk to talk about action verbs a little bit active verbs because if you I did
think of an example to do this if the if the line is don't lie to me I thought of three different
intentions that we could have it could be I'm going to pick too convinced to accuse and to beg
very different from each other right so just to give you an example of how that would be I’ll do
a little a little improvisation of convincing you of of something and the kind of the the subtext
underneath convincing is telling somebody what you think they should do so so I'm gonna say
I think you should never lie I don't think you or anybody else should ever lie
don't lie to me okay so that would be to convince if it's accused then it's
I know you lied I know you did you've been lying all along you've been lying every day of your life
do not lie to me okay oh or if it's bae then it's I don't know what I'm gonna do
if nobody will tell me the truth I need I need to be told the truth don't lie to me
okay so it comes out different and there could be different reasons as you were asking talking
about the reasons why a person might be begging or a person might be accused and
accusing or a person might be convincing but of course sometimes sometimes characters do
the wrong thing sometimes they want somebody to be open and honest with them but they do the
wrong thing to get it if they demand that they be honest might not work right so so the verbs can be
you can play opposites you can do lots of things with them but there is always a reason for them.