Kevin Feige, President of Marvel Studios

Potentially nothing has changed film over the past decade-plus quite like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and Kevin Feige is the man behind the mission that has led them to so much success. He sat down with NYFA to discuss how he did it.

Tova Laiter: Hi and welcome to the backlot. I’m Tova Laiter moderator and director of the New York Film Academy Guest Lecture series. In this episode, we will take an in-depth look at one of my great guests and hear about his experience in the entertainment industry. And now Eric Conner will take you through the highlights of this Q&A.

Eric Conner: Hi, I’m Eric Conner senior instructor at New York Film Academy. And in this episode, we bring you a producer who could be identified by only three letters: MCU. Oscar-nominated producer of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Kevin Feige. Growing up as an avid Marvel reader, I waited for years to get a Marvel movie worthy of the name. Fortunately over at Shuler Donner Productions, a young assistant shared that dream. And he was in the right place to make it happen.

Kevin Feige: It’s all stuff that I dreamed of doing when I was a kid growing up and when I was an intern losing 40 bucks a day because I would take a super shuttle to my internship because there was no Uber back then to go to a building. Right on the other side of this building where I started with Lauren Shuler Donner, Richard Donner. So this lot means a lot to me. I was in attendance at USC Film School and they had postings for internships and I thought, I’ll work for free, but it’ll be great to do it for somebody, you know, respect. And I walked in and saw Donner Shuler, Donner Productions, Richard Donner of course did Superman, Lethal Weapon, Goonies. And I just like the room got dark and a spotlight was on that and I literally like toward the number off and. And sent in my resume. It was to this day, it’s the only resume I’ve ever I ever put together and filled out was for that internship right over there. And then many years later, this theater. Believe it or not, has a little MCU history in it. This was where my partner, Nate Moore and I watched Creed for the first time and said, hey, that Ryan Coogler is pretty good. It was a press screening in this theater. And I don’t usually go to press screenings that you think it’s. I like to see movies with real audiences. The place went crazy for Creed. They were cheering. They were standing. It was you’d never know it was a press screening. But that was as I just walked in. It’s like I’ve been in this theater. Isn’t that a fascinating story. Guys, come on. That’s trivia. That’s trivia you didn’t know.

Tova Laiter: Well it means a lot to you so it means a lot to us.

Kevin Feige: That’s a kind way of saying not that interesting.

Eric Conner: Let’s take a moment and appreciate that it only took Kevin Feige one resumé to get where he did. One. But before he could build an entire Marvel universe, he first had to learn how to get some of its planets spinning.

Kevin Feige: We came about as a studio in an interesting way. We were tasked with making two movies in 2008. I had been a part of Marvel up to that point for about five or six years. The X-Men films, the early Fantastic Four films, the first Daredevil film, the Sam Raimi Spidey films, which were definitely the high point, but it was really an amazing opportunity. I got to go from film school into an amazing five year film school where I got to see how each different studio worked at the highest levels and the inner workings. Marvel didn’t have a lot of control or power back then. Those characters were licensed to those studios and those studios paid for them and had almost all the control. You know, there were certain things, you know, Wolverine couldn’t have eight claws on one hand, you know, there was something that would never happen anyway or Spider-Man’s costume couldn’t be green or something. Maybe we’ll do now. But. But I learned that just by sort of ingratiate yourself with the filmmakers and having them realize I was just excited to be there. I just excited to be near movie and near a group of people making a movie. So I got to learn what to do, what not to do. So by the time we became our own studio and got financing to make Iron Man, I got to use everything I had learned good and bad to try to focus our own vision on what we wanted.

Eric Conner: Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man films and the X-Men movies took Marvel from the dark days of its low budget early 90s fare to blockbuster status. But it was a little over 10 years ago that Kevin Fagin and his team at Marvel decided to venture into uncharted territories and make their own studio a journey which started with a single film.

Kevin Feige: We said we’re making Iron Man. It’s coming out this day. And then we had to do it no matter what because we wouldn’t have had a studio. Marvel didn’t have any money on the line, but they had the film rights to 10 characters, which are most of The Avengers now. And we had to make that movie. So our development ratio is 1 to 1. We choose a movie we’re gonna make. We choose the date. We’re gonna release it and then come hell or high water, we’re gonna make it and we’re gonna make it great.

Eric Conner: You still have to get a good script, though. And that’s one of the hardest things.

Kevin Feige: It is. But it also we never stop. So we. We work on the script during production. We work on the script in post. And we work on the script throughout the entire process. So what you need are the pieces and the concepts and yes, the script. And we’ve gone into production on movies that have had great scripts and still needed a lot of work. We’ve gone into production on movies that had solid structures and really great scenes, but we had to keep figuring it out. And as you say, you know, keep making the plane as it’s going down the runway. And in order to do that, you need a couple of things. You need an amazing team around you and you need to trust that team around you. You need that team to trust you. And we’ve been very lucky with all the filmmakers we’ve worked with because, number one, they’ve all wanted to work with us. They’ve wanted to make a big crowd pleasing, fun, meaningful movie. And they won’t stop no matter what. I mean, it’s easy to it’s easy to stop and it’s easy to settle. And we don’t do that. Sometimes frustratingly late in the process.

Eric Conner: The work put into the production of these films doesn’t just stop at principal photography. In the case of The Avengers, it even continued after its premiere.

Kevin Feige: We talk famously about the tag on Avengers, where all the characters are eating shawarma and how we shot that the day after the premiere and it did not get on the international prints, but it still got on the domestic prints because we had an idea late in the cutting room because we’d always talk about The Avengers. What’s great about The Avengers is not just big action and throwing ships around and punching leviathans, but just those characters who have no business being in the same room, much less the same movie together. And we used to talk about just them on a bus because there’s a famous comic panel of all of them just riding a bus. And we were in post well on our way to finishing. And I was like, you know, we never did that bus scene. We never had them sit just sitting around. We were working on the scene where Tony Stark falls from the sky. Hulk catches him and he goes, shawarma, you ever had shawarma. I don’t know what it is but I want to try it.

Tony Stark: All right. Good job, guys. Let’s just not come in tomorrow. Let’s just take a day. You ever tried shawarma? There’s a shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don’t know what it is, but I want to try it.

Kevin Feige: Joss Whedon goes, You know, if this movie ended with all them sitting around eating shawarma it’d be the best film of all time. I went, I went. That’s a great idea. But we moved on and I went to my then assistant, Jonathan Schwartz, who’s now in Australia producing Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings that goes into production goes into production in a few months. I said go take a picture of every shawarma restaurant within a two mile radius of, I think the Four Seasons where the junket was gonna be. And then he put a beautiful packet together and the next day I handed it to Joss and he goes, What’s this? Then he goes, You kidding? I said, we’re going to do it after the only time all the actors are back together is at the junket. And we shot it and we were cutting it on the film truck. Right that second right after we shot it to get it going. And to add insult to injury, there was a billboard for The Avengers right above us. There’s a picture that somewhere. So it’s about we will not have a studio anymore if this movie isn’t the best movie it can possibly be. I mean, you don’t have competing forces or people who want to make different movies or when you have a shared vision, which we’ve been very lucky to have on most of our films. The tide can sweep that way when you have the trust of the people paying the bills and the trust of the studio paying the checks. You could do a lot. There used to be stories of reshoots in the press. It literally was the dawn of the Internet and the dawn of film blogging and ain’t it cool news and people talking back. And now it’s we live in the hell pit we live in today. But at the time it was like, wow, people have opinions on on movies and on X-Men 1. They didn’t like anything about it. And there was the quote, well it’s a Marvel movie. So, you know, it’s going to be bad because of the movies that were referenced upfront. There were not great Marvel movies in the 90s. And I learned a couple of things then too. Don’t listen to them. And the proof will be when most people, regardless of what they read or what they hear about or what the rumor is, if they buy a ticket and the lights go down, it’s a clean slate and you can win them back right from the start. That’s what happened on X-Men. But reshoots. It was a bad word. Oh, this movie’s in reshoots. There must be a problem. Reshoots are key to our films, starting with Iron Man 1 because it’s great. And we always say, you know, we’re smart filmmakers at Marvel, but we’re not geniuses. And the best way to give notes on a movie is to watch the movie. So we make the movie and then watch it and go, oh yeah. No, that’s not that’s not right. That doesn’t work. And have a system now that can be quite precise and quite efficient to go in and continue to make the movie the best it can be. When we schedule our films, we schedule the production period and then we schedule the additional photography period for, say, two or three months after the director’s cuts delivered. People don’t ask us any more because they know it’s the system, but they would go, Oh, what will you be reshooting then? And we go. We don’t know if we knew we wouldn’t do it. Yeah, but we know they’ll be something and we need everyone to be together so we can do it on whatever dates.

Eric Conner: A producer who’s comfortable with heck even embraces the process of reshoots. That’s pretty brave. And this fearlessness to go against the grain might be why Mr. Feige connects so well with the character of Tony Stark. Even if he is hesitant to call Tony his favorite.

Eric Conner: It is said that every person has a spirit animal. But I believe that the biggest fan of Marvel should have a Marvel spirit character. What would be your Marvel spirit character and why?

Kevin Feige: Well, first, let me compliment you on a new spin on the question. Who’s your favorite marvel hero? And of course, I’ve always equate that, of course, to. I have two kids. People go oh which one’s your favorite? That doesn’t work. But I will say that usually the answer to that question is whatever I’m working on now and whatever is is encompassing the majority of my time or brain space. But because I’m still nostalgic off of endgame and still can’t believe literally can’t believe I’m sitting here talking to you in an era where I’ve finished the Infinity saga and have done our 22 23 counting far from home movies in Infinity saga and and brought that to a close. I’m nostalgic for for Iron Man for where it started and where it finished. And the character that we very purposely all of our instincts went into that choosing that character from all of the. It’s true. We didn’t have the marquee characters, meaning the characters that either already had a movie or already had a TV show or an animated series. The other studios had the X-Men, Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, Hulk. We had everything else. But Iron Man seemed very unique and very special. I remember saying to a marketing department at Paramount because Paramount released that, that if we do our job right, Tony Stark will be as famous as Iron Man. That Tony Stark will be as well known a household name as his Iron Man, because that’s how interesting the character has to be. And of course, the very first decision, literally the first decision I made as the and was allowed to make and allowed to try to pursue as president of Marvel Studios was casting Robert Downey Junior. And it felt fun to do that because we knew it’d either be great or the biggest dumpster fire ever. And there’s very little wiggle room and it ended up being great and he ended up. I always say no RDJ. No MCU.

Eric Conner: When Michael Keaton was cast as Batman in the 80s, there was almost a revolt. Two films later, he left the franchise and all the converted fans were heartbroken to see him go. Same went with Heath Ledger’s joker and he won an Oscar. But when word got out that Robert Downey Jr. was going to be Tony Stark, you could almost hear a collective sigh of relief. He was the perfect actor to build a universe around. Though Kevin Feige credits a few other talented men for the franchise’s massive success.

Kevin Feige: The key to the success was Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko and dozens of writers and artists that created an amazing world over the course of 40 plus years, 50 plus years in the case of Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, who did the Captain America 80 years in publishing. It’s it’s amazing. And, you know, I think one of the unfair things that the universe is that Jack Kirby died before he got to see any of this happen. And I’m so happy that Stan Lee got to do 22 MCU cameos for us and was there every step of the way with us, which was which was amazing. But I do think it’s a testament to the work they did. And not just them, by the way, the tradition that publishing had that we have in films of changing the storytellers of the new artists and new storytellers, putting their own imprints on the characters. That’s how these characters can last for decades and decades in publishing and I’m hoping can last decades and decades in the cinematic arts because you continue to change and then look at Thor, look where Thor started with Ken Branagh. Look, where Thor is going with Taika and that’s a testament to the way these characters can evolve. And in that case, a testament to Chris Hemsworth and his acting abilities. So there’s too many people that’s responsible for it. I also think from the comics and the movies, there is a sense of escapism, of course, which is a fun reason to go to the movies, but also a sense which ultimately The Avengers is about. The Avengers are a bunch of people who don’t look like one another, who don’t always like one another, who put aside those differences to fight for the greater good. I think. I should say I hope that’s one of the reasons it resonates around the globe like that.

Eric Conner: So informing his own team, Mr. Feige takes inspiration from The Avengers and welcomes the differences a new filmmaker can bring even if they’ve never helmed a ship that large.

Kevin Feige: The criteria usually comes down to two things. Do something that gets on our radar and it doesn’t have to be a big giant movie. It can be a clever show, as in the case of Russos. It can be a smaller film in the case of cop car that John Watts, who did the Spidey films for us directed, or The Rider which Chloé Zhao, who’s doing the Eternals, do something that showcases who you are and the potential of what you could do. Then we have a lot of meetings and see if we’re on the same page creatively. See if you know that this is somebody we can spend day in and day out with for the next three years, which is important. But it really comes down to do something that that makes a mark regardless of the scope of the size. And that seems to showcase how clever you can be. We have an amazing team in place and we’ll hire great artists and great artisans and great technicians. A terrible analogy I use because I don’t know much about it, is a movie is a big giant ship. And we want the captain to take us to a new place, take us somewhere we haven’t been before. If you have the same captain every time they have their favorite routes, they have their tricks, they have it. But a new captain can guide us somewhere. And we’ve got the people in the boiler room that can keep the engine going and the sails and choose your metaphors. We’ve got all those people who can do that. And that’s how you go to interesting places. And yes, we’re there if it’s like, oh, head right to the iceberg. Well that could be neat. Let’s see how close we can get. That’s close. Okay. And we move away. But that’s truly what it’s about. It’s about people who we think have the the energy and the stamina and the desire to captain the ship that large and an interest and a passion in taking it to places it hasn’t been before.

Eric Conner: Part of the risk of trying new paths and new voices is facing the potential backlash from some of those fans, which Kevin Feige is all too aware of.

Kevin Feige: If we thought too much about it, if we thought too much about pleasing everybody about everything, we would collapse into a fetal position and never do anything. So we don’t do that. We think mainly about what we think would be interesting, what we think would be cool, what we think would fulfill a promise we’d set up what we think would grow the MCU in an unexpected way that people aren’t anticipating killing half of your heroes, for instance. But it is true that we always make the films with the intention of them working for people who’ve watched every other film we’ve made and for people who’ve never seen one of our movies. And yes, with Infinity War and Endgame, it gets tougher at that point. But we test screen all of our movies like additional photography, test screening. I don’t know why. Never become too arrogant that you think you don’t have something to learn from an audience would be one piece of advice I would give you. Test screenings are horrible. They’re painful. They’re terrible. All these people who aren’t making movies, I’ll give I’ll give you my opinion and I sit in the back and pull my hat down. But I stay there and I listen because there are things you don’t see. There are things you can’t not just does a joke work or not, but but does a bit of logic work or not. Is there a reference that’s just too deep. And you’re like you know what that reference just for the three of us, not worth it. And on that in those test screenings there are questionnaires and you know, from probably Avengers 1, we’ve had the question, you know, which of these movies have you seen? And now it’s just come down to have you seen other MCU movies before? And the next question is, do you think you have to have seen the other movies to enjoy this movie? And here’s what happens. Almost every time the people who write, yes, I’ve seen everyone then go. Do you have to see them to enjoy the movie? Absolutely. But for the people who go no this is the first time I go number one. Who is this person and where we find them? But they go, no, you know how many if you seen zero. Do you think you have to see the other movies? No, I loved it. I enjoyed it. And I always default to my experience watching Harry Potter movies. I never read the Harry Potter books. My kids aren’t old enough, aren’t into it yet. And I didn’t read them when they first came out. But I went to see every Harry Potter movie opening weekend. And I saw it and I enjoyed it. And then I forgot all about it and didn’t think about it again until the next Harry Potter movie came out. And those movies were so well made because I could follow it all. I could follow it. I could track it. Occasionally I have to go. Who is that oh right, that was, oh right. But for the most part, I could totally track it. Now, if I had watched every movie ten times, if I had read every book, I bet there are dozens of other things in there that I would see and appreciate. But they never got in the way of me just experiencing it as a pure story. So that’s kind of what we try to navigate is if an Easter egg or a reference or something is so prevalent that it gets in the way of the story you’re telling so that people who aren’t aware of it go what is this? What’s happening then we usually pull back on it.

Eric Conner: One ace that Kevin Feige and Marvel have up their sleeves is a massive slate of comic book characters who have yet to make it to the big screen. But with decades of characters to choose from. The problem becomes who do you bring out next?

Kevin Feige: Sometimes you’re choosing the title hero or you’re choosing which main character or main team you want to bring to the screen. And oftentimes it’s as you’re making and developing the movie, who will come into it? Who’ll fit into it? The next doctor strange film, for instance, features some new MCU characters that will be making their debut in that movie that you won’t expect or won’t guess who it is. But we found a cool way to make it work because we needed a particular. We will want to make a particular type of movie there. And there was a character we always wanted to do something with who we think will fit really well there. You mentioned Spider-Man in Civil War. You’ve heard the stories that it was always touch and go. Were we going to be able to make the deal with Sony or not? That happened again recently. But that was happening the first time while we were writing and making civil war. So while Joe and Anthony Russo and Chris Marcus, Steve McFeely, and Nate Moore on that movie, were in the room developing it. I’d be running in and out, being like, I think it’s gonna be Spidey. And then I go, forget it. Not going to work. And by the way, also even Downey, we didn’t have a deal with Downey. So it’s like looking good on Downey. Okay. It’s versus it’s versus it’s Cap versus Iron Man. I don’t know. Might not. Might not be Downey. All right. It’s gonna be Cap versus who. So we started developing not writing full versions, but being prepared to make a shift if we had to. Because I said before we choose a movie. We announce a movie. It’s coming out. And we’ve been very lucky that usually it’s worked out. It was during those conversations that Nate said, what about Black Panther? What about bringing T’Challa into this civil war as a third party who didn’t have an allegiance to either side, who had his own issue? And if we don’t have Spider-Man and God forbid if we didn’t get Robert, there’d be another element, a new, fresh element to make the movie worthwhile. We ended up getting it all and it ended up being great. But it can it can vary the choice of sometimes like Shang-Chi we’ve wanted to make that movie for a long time. We want to make a movie with a 98 percent Asian cast. And then you talk about as you develop the movie, what other heroes can you can you bring into it if you need them? And in the case of Black Panther was the greatest thing to ever happen.

Eric Conner: With the success of Black Panther and Captain Marvel. Along with the upcoming adaptations of the Eternals and Shang-Chi, the Marvel lineup has become all the more reflective of the audience who goes to see these movies

Kevin Feige: Every time we do a movie, we hope it’s going to succeed so that we can make another movie. That’s always that’s always the idea. And with those two films in particular, Black Panther and Captain Marvel, we wanted to keep showcasing heroes from the comics that represent the world that goes to see our movies. So our intention was always to continue to do that. What’s exciting is that both those movies were such big hits that it squashed any sort of question otherwise. And I hope and I think have inspired other companies around the world to do the same thing and tell those different types of stories and behind the scenes as well. I mean, both films we have coming out in 2020, are directed by women, two of the three Disney plus shows that I just mentioned, directed by women. We’ve got three other shows that we’ve announced, but we haven’t announced the players. Spoiler alert 2 out of 3 of them are women and it makes for better stories. I say when you when you’re sitting at a table and if everybody looks like you, you’re in trouble, you’re not going to get the best the best story out of that.

Eric Conner: Even after 20 plus films, the MCU continues to produce emotional, character driven stories that are truly cinematic, thanks in no small part to this variety of directors, characters, worlds and styles.

Kevin Feige: It’s sometimes too simplistic to just call it Shang-Chi’s going to be so much more than a kung fu movie, but it has elements of that, which is we’re excited about. Multiverse of Madness is the greatest title we’ve ever come up with, by the way, which is one thing that’s exciting about it. And I wouldn’t necessarily say that’s a horror film, but it is Scott Derrickson our director has pitched it. It’ll be a big MCU film with scary sequences in it. The way when I was kid in the 80s, Spielberg did an amazing job. I mean, there are horrifying sequences in Raiders that I would see it as a little kid and do this when their faces melted or Temple of Doom, of course, or Gremlins or poltergeist. These are the movies that invented the P.G. 13 rating, by the way. They were P.G. And then they were like, we need another. But that’s fun. It’s fun to be scared in that way. And not a, you know, horrific, torturous way, but in a way that is legitimately scary because Scott Derrickson’s quite good at that, but scary in the service of an exhilarating emotion. And there are lots of other ones that I don’t want to say too much, because it then will indicate, you know, future things we’re doing. But I always say, I don’t believe in the comic book genre any more than I believe in a genre based on novels. You wouldn’t say, you know, I make movies based on novels. You go. What is it? What’s the novel? People who don’t read comic books, perhaps see the colors and the powers and link it all is one thing, but people read them know they’re all totally different. And that’s certainly true of all the marvel. So there are places we haven’t explored in the comics, that I still think it would be fun to to go to.

Eric Conner: And there’s one place the MCU is about to explore even more television.

Kevin Feige: Disney Plus is the big one, right? Continuing the movies and and as we’ve announced, we’ll be doing four movies starting in 2021. But Disney Plus has been amazing because for the first time we’ve been able to do sort of this long form narrative storytelling. We’ve been doing that over 10 years and 23 movies. But to do it in our six hour epic mega series, whatever we want to call it for Falcon and Winter Soldier, for WandaVision, for Loki, which are all about to go into production, has been amazing to flex a new storytelling muscle and expand the MCU because those tie directly right from Endgame and then go directly into our next few movies. So I think expanding that MCU experience truly from the streaming platform to the screen is a fun challenge for us. And again, 23 movies in ten years of Marvel Studios for me, almost 20 years at Marvel. For me to have a new way of storytelling is great and keeps everybody most of us at Marvel Studios have been around 10, 10 plus years at least. And it’s been amazing to be able to have this new way of telling stories. But the scripts are great. The stories are great. And again, we have the trust of people paying the bills to do some some very interesting things with those shows.

Eric Conner: Despite the staggering success of Marvel, there’s always that lingering question which faces each new movie or show. What if this one doesn’t work? What if audiences hate it? What if this is the project that ends Hollywood’s longest winning streak?

Student: Were there any times where you really felt like this wasn’t going to work? Things are going to go bad. And how did you manage to get through those times?

Kevin Feige: Well, happens a lot. It happens a lot and it kind of happens all the time. You know, I applied to film school, but I got rejected from the film school I wanted to go to five times before I got in. I got in at the very last moment you could get in. I was like, what is another major to do? Working in that building right on the other side, I’d be like, am I a moron? Am I not good enough? Can I not? Do I belong in this business? So that sort of doubt and failure and along the way, certainly with with Iron Man, even on X-Men 1, you know, finding yourself in a room with the 4 or 5 decision makers making that movie. And I’ve got thoughts and I’ve got point of views. Should I say it? Should I not? Am I going to give them this idea are they gonna kick me of the room for being not good enough or not smart enough? They didn’t, thankfully. They might have thought it, but they didn’t. You know even what we were just talking about in civil war. The deals, it happened the other day with an actor. If there’s an actor we want for something, they come in, you give a big pitch and you can sort of tell they’re not they’re not into it. I guess I’m a failure. I’ll show them. We’ll cast somebody even better. So you just, it’s just part of it. And don’t linger on them is what I usually try to do. Don’t don’t think too much about it. Don’t stew in it. Move on quickly. When you’re producing a movie, you have no choice. I found the perfect location. This is gonna be the greatest. It just fell through. You’re never going to have it. Oh no. Well, gotta make the movie find another location. And then it either really is better or you convince yourself it’s better, but it’s constant. So get used to it and plow through.

Eric Conner: Kevin Feige is proud of all the risks Marvel has taken and how the audience has come along for the ride.

Student: Is there a specific moment that is kind of the highlight that you would consider your personal career achievement?

Kevin Feige: You know, every year at Marvel Studios, if you ask me that question, there’d be something because there’s been such an amazing. Obviously, Iron Man and the success and the audience embracing Iron Man and audiences embracing, although at a much lower level than you remember, a World War Two superhero movie, which we really wanted to do, or Ken Branagh directed Space Viking movie, which when I would pitch both of those movies, they’d go what? You’re doing a World War Two movie about a guy wrapped in an American flag? Well, no, his name’s Steve Rogers. It’s more than that. Avengers was a big roll of the dice and that that really worked was something special. And then saying, I’m sort of going through the phases. I mean, then then saying, OK, are audience is going to find these characters once they’re by themselves again, as interesting as they did when they were together? And doing things like hiring Shane Black for Iron Man 3. And then Guardians of the Galaxy and choosing these characters that a lot of people have never even heard of. But I would have to say right now that we delivered on a promise that we set out five years ago to do with end game and the way the world received that movie. It might not ever get any better than that for me. That was pretty amazing.

Eric Conner: Kevin Feige will soon be adding a new Star Wars film to his already full development slate. So it seems only fair to quote Han Solo here. Never tell me the odds and don’t get cocky.

Kevin Feige: Well, you don’t think you’re producing hit after hit. You think you’re barely scraping by and finishing on time. And yes, the team is the real answer to that question. And having the team in Australia right now, in London, right now, in Atlanta, right now in the cutting room at Disney right now, that allows it to happen. I’ve always just thought that way. I’ve always been able to have a very in-depth conversation about a particular part of something in one room and then go into the next room and talk about a totally different project and segment the day like that. And I always say, if I wasn’t making these movies for real, I’d just be, you know, sitting on a street corner somewhere thinking of them and drawing them on a sidewalk. It’s just always going. So having an outlet to hand them off to other people to then bring to life is pretty is pretty fun. And I love the idea that that our movies can inspire the next generation of storytellers the way my favorite movies inspired me. I hope that’s how it has the effect. I also like the effect that it still brings people to the movie theaters and reminds people of that communal experience of going to the movies. I sat in the middle of a theater in Westwood opening night of end game, which I’d not done in years and watched the whole movie and it was maybe the most amazing experience of my entire life. Mainly because they liked it and we worked hard on it. But being amongst the people on that experience is something only movies can do.

Eric Conner: I would quote one of the mighty Avengers here. But I don’t think any of them could top that sentiment. So I’m not going to even try. I for one, though, I’m looking forward to the next two dozen Marvel titles, as are my sons and millions of other fans. So thank you, Kevin Feige, for bringing these wonderful adventures to the big screen. And thank you for sharing your own stories with our students. And of course, thanks to all of you for listening. This episode was based on the Q&A moderated by producer Tova Laiter to watch the full interview or to see our other Q&A’s. Check out our YouTube channel at YouTube.com/NewYorkFilmAcademy. This episode was written by me, Eric Conner. Edited and mixed by Kristian Heydon. Our creative director is David Andrew Nelson, who also produced this episode with Kristian Heydon and myself executive produced by Tova Laiter, Jean Sherlock and Dan Mackler. A special thanks to our Events Department Sajja Johnson. Melissa Enright and the staff and crew who made this possible. To learn more about our programs, check us out at nyfa.edu. Be sure to subscribe on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen. See you next time.

Actor Sir Ben Kingsley

Sir Ben Kingsley has played some of the most powerful roles in film, from his Oscar-winning performance in "Gandhi" to his character in "Schindler's List." Listen here to when he joined us to discuss his career.

Eric: Hi, I’m Eric Conner senior instructor at New York Film Academy.

Aerial: And I’m Aerial Segard acting alum. And in this episode, we bring you a knighted performer who’s portrayed everyone from Vladimir Lenin to Moses to Gandhi,.

Eric: From infamous Nazi Adolf Eichmann to you, to Itzhak Stern from Schindler’s List to legendary Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal.

Aerial: From a chess master to gangster to cinema visionary George Mellies The Oscar winning Sir Ben Kingsley.

Ben: The camera. The lens is allergic to acting. It flies off the lens like fried egg off Teflon. However, if you can present the camera with the behavior of your character, then the story you’re trying to tell will communicate to your audience.

Clips: I am the pale horse of death and hell follows me, boy.

Clips: One hundred thousand Englishmen simply cannot control 350 million Indians if those Indians refuse to cooperate.

Clips: You have to have contempt for your opponents. You have to hate them.

Clips: As far as the actual jobs concerned it’s a piece of piss monkey could do it. That’s why I thought of you.

Clips:  Happy endings only happen in the movies.

Clips:  I’m trying to do something that people, yourself included, don’t understand, and I’m not going to give up without a fight.

Clips: And you’ll never see me coming.

Eric: He’s also brought fictional characters to equally riveting life, the intense and intensely profane Don in Sexy Beast, or his Oscar nominated turn as the tragic owner of the House of Sand and Fog.

Aerial:  And he’s now brought his steely intensity to TV as Pastor Byron Brown in Perpetual Grace. All of these amazing performances can be traced back to being a young boy who just wanted to be noticed.

Ben: I had an absolute compulsion. As a child. And then as an adolescent, however motivated and whatever caused this obsession is debatable, but I’m sure you can draw your own conclusions when I tell you that my absolute desire. Was to be seen and heard. Clearly, there are some negative implications to what I just said because the unheard child and the unseen child is in a sense unacknowledged and can’t feel his or her own. Perimeters. Space. Feet on the ground. Belonging. And it became clear to me that I was best at being seen and heard. When I was perhaps impersonating the person who had just left the room or I was able to impersonate very accurately to my school colleagues in the classroom the teacher who just left the room. In other words, I found that because of the to a certain extent, vacuums in myself. And this is either a good thing or a bad thing. Nature abhors a vacuum. It will be filled. Impersonation gave me great comfort in that I could for a fleeting moment. Acquire an identity and a voice and by the accuracy of that impersonation, entertain and connect with people. And this became empowering to me, certainly as a schoolboy and certainly as an adolescent. And then eventually it was clear to me that I could, in fact, turn what one could call an itch, a wound, an urge to be seen and heard into a craft. But without the urge to connect, one isn’t really an artist. You have to have. And it’s very, very easy for me to say this one has to be blessed with a sense of urgency and sometimes a sense of urgency can come out of loss, a sense of urgency can come out of indignation, a sense of urgency can come out of some clumsy act in one’s childhood. However buried that sense of urgency may become over your career, over your life. It is that sense of urgency that drives you rather like the oyster who cannot build a pearl unless there is a grain of sand that’s irritating it so my grain of sand was to be seen and heard. The oyster, the pearl, I mean, is sitting here now. So unless you do feel that compulsion, that urgency. I don’t think you’ll find your self propelled very far. But if you do feel that, then you’ll have a wonderful career. Of course you’ll have disappointments, but you’ll have triumphs. The main thing is that you’ll be seen and heard.

Aerial: I think it’s really cool how he put it, I don’t think I’ve ever heard it that way before. Grain of sand, a pearl of being irritated to perfection. Basically, I thought that was very beautiful.

Eric: It’s like when you’re an artist like him, it’s like an itch you’ve got to scratch. And when you’re a kid, you don’t have the wherewithal, you don’t have the skills yet or the channel to do it. And then he found it

Aerial: And you don’t even think of it that way. You just think, oh, I want to play. Oh, this is fun.

Eric: Math is boring. Science is boring. But imitating my math teacher is not boring. And for him then to become an actor of his magnitude with his body of work. So much of it was about playing so many different roles so quickly, one after the other. And that’s what put him on the road to doing a hundred and forty plus of these parts since then.

Aerial: And let’s have him do a hundred and forty more.

Eric: At least.

Ben: Fortunately, I entered this beautiful craft. When England was populated with repertory companies, the finest of them was, and thank heaven it still is the Royal Shakespeare Company. And when you’re a member of that company and I was on and off for about, well, gosh, 15 years, let me give you one particular week out of season at the RSC. We call it Bertolt Brecht Baal. Iachimo in Cymbeline. Brutus, in Julius Caesar. Those three rolls. One played twice a week, two nights a week, so every six day week we worked. We did three different plays, so we alternated them. They are radically different, the characters. And eventually, very soon, in fact, as a matter of survival, you learned you had to get off that horse and get on another one. And, you know, the horses are very different. It simply is practice. But unless you have that that muscle practiced in you that can switch from one role to another, it’s going to be very difficult after a nine month grind, as you say, in one character. However, I think it’s even more specific than that. I have learned through my work on stage and through my work in the great rehearsal room with giants like Peter Brook, Peter Hall, Trevor Nunn, Bosco Buddy, these amazing people, John Barton. I learned that after each take on the film set, I let go. So it’s not even after nine months. I’m constantly letting go so that I can take the arrow out of my quiver. I can load it into my bow and I can literally let go. And in the meantime, I’m refreshing myself. I’m thinking nothing. I’m thinking blank. But there are molecules lining up inside of me that are preparing for the next take. But I have learned honestly to let go. I do not stay in character between takes and I do not stay in character when I go home. Therefore, even after a long shoot, I let go quite quickly. Physically, sometimes you don’t realize how exhausted you are at the end of a marathon. So physically it takes time. But then again, if I had to go from film to film as I do sometimes I have an airplane flight between films. Sometimes the adrenaline of the next challenge actually kicks in and your body responds. It is remarkable what the human body can do when those demands are made on it. But I think the answer to your question is I learnt very early on how to let go and how to just completely wipe the slate and start afresh on the word action. The loading of the bow can take a very, very long time, although that’s a wonderfully swift gesture and it’s emblematic of what we do for a living. The loading of the bow can take months. It is studying the script. It is finding that connection, not necessarily empathy, but that connection or that urgency to inhabit that person and tell that story. And I suppose the first step towards the loading of the bow is, am I compelled to be this character or not? It’s a very, very tough business. None of us want to be unemployed. We are given a role and we accept it sometimes out of starvation, not out of motivation. But if you are fortunate enough to be offered a role with which you can connect in as much as you can pour your energy into it, then I think the loading of the bow. Can be a very laborious process. But then the arrow flying through the air makes everything worth it, especially if it hits the target or gets very close. So I would say the loading of the bow is the appreciation of the other actors with you. How you learn to work as a group. Perhaps you can think of it this way. I remember. Oh, dear. It was so sad. I was working with somebody and the actor said to the director, What do I do while he’s talking? And what should be happening and indeed, for the most part is, is that you are listening and poised to react as your character and you’re listening to how the other words and actions coming towards you can impact and mold and shape your response. That also is part of loading the arrow is listening, listening to the other. My dear chap, I’ve worked with some actors. And I think you know what? If I tiptoed quietly backwards out of this scene, you’d carry on without me. You just carry on. This is not a duet, but it must be a duet or a trio or a great ensemble. It must be. So listening to the other is very much part of loading your bow.

Aerial: I love hearing someone who is so successful. Talk about listening to other people.

Eric: Right. You would imagine Sir Ben Kingsley would be so kind of zoned in, so focused, so intense, like he’s kind of in the space. But that is the space. Space is everyone around you and not being a solo archer, right.

Aerial: And knowing and paying attention to the other people on stage with you really helps inform you of your next move.

Eric: And part of that, too, for me is like if ever there was an actor you might think was method.

Aerial: Right.

Eric: You would potentially make the assumption that Sir Ben Kingsley was that guy. He’s always so tuned in.

Aerial: So good.

Eric [00:12:07] But in fact, he said quite the opposite. This is something he cautions about, is the archer who is only worried about themselves.

Aerial: Right, where you can quietly tip toe backwards and the other person might not be paying attention.

Eric: Right. The danger of method. It’s like I’m so worried about my arrows and that one bullseye that I might be noticing all the other archers around me. There is the potential of being too invested in your performance at the expense of the whole part of his metaphor of archery is you’ve got to know when to put the arrow in and when to let the arrow go and when to move on to the next arrow so that you’re not stuck in that. And you’re also making sure you are connected with the other people in this show, in this play, because otherwise you’re just out there alone.

Ben: There is a danger that one can disappear so much into one’s own solipsistic bubble that it ceases to be collaborative and it must be collaborative. If you’re not reaching your fellow actor, you sure as hell aren’t reaching the audience. If it’s not going that far, it’s not going to travel. Look let me be honest. I don’t know what method acting is. I don’t quite know what it is because I came into the business without any training whatsoever, and I have created my own system of approaching a character, my own metaphors, my own terms of reference. Look, everyone has a different way of approaching a task. But I did say earlier that I consider myself a portrait artist. So let me give you a classic example. Having just played Adolf Eichmann.

Clips: My name is Adolf Eichmann.The architect. Of the final solution.

Ben: My canvas was blank. I started to create his portrait with my brush and my paints and I put my brush down. I washed the paint off my hands and I went home. And the next morning I picked up the brush. I was never him, not for one tiny second. I have to say only because I know my craft well enough to say this amongst company that I totally respect, my performance was good.

Clips: My job was simple. Save the country. I love being destroyed.

Ben: But I was never him and I would say in peril of your sanity and your sleep, do not approach Adolf Eichmann as a method exercise. If you do not have to be a Nazi to paint the portrait of a Nazi.

Aerial: As an actor, you’re always told, don’t judge your characters. Now you could be that character, but sometimes your you know, obviously it’s a good thing that you’re working, but sometimes your character is an awful real life human that you have to find a justification on how not to judge them so much so where you don’t do any disservice to the art. You know, in order to become this horrible, horrible character, he chose to focus on all the victims and survivors and really honor them. And I mean, he had a point about he was a real man.

Eric: They all were.

Aerial: They all were real.

Eric: Every last one of them.

Aerial: They kissed their puppies; their kids. And he was able to put all of that together because he wanted to honor the survivors. I’m getting emotional right now.

Eric: And then how he also part of that journey as a performer is also being able to let it go.

Aerial: Right.

Eric: Like if you’re playing some of these and he’s played some some real SOBs over the course of his career. You take that home with you. It doesn’t help the art. It only messes up your life. And I think that comes with a maturity as a performer. You know, he’s been obviously at this for many decades now, but the ability to, like, not push harder than you need to to instead of acting or trying just sort of inhabiting that space.

Aerial: Right. Finding that balance of being able to give enough, but also to be able to let go.

Ben: There is a very famous Japanese painter called Haiku, and he said that when I was a younger artist, I painted the mountain and the lake and the fishermen and the birds. Many, many strokes. But when I’m 100. I shall paint the fishermen, the mountain, the birds and the clouds with one stroke of my brush and put it down. And I think as one is blessed to progress through a craft. And it’s not an easy word to translate. Accuracy Economy. Sharpness of target. Become the key things, what are the key elements in this scene? What are the key elements in this man’s voice? Where is the most important word in this sentence? Simple as that. But of course, these wonderful challenges, as you so rightly put it, only emerge. After you realized that when one was younger, one did an awful lot of acting. And as one matures into the craft, paradoxically, you do less and less and less acting and you hopefully, especially for the camera, embark on a process of being. The camera, the lens. To my mind, is allergic to acting. It flies off the lens like fried egg off Teflon. Remember that phrase. However, if you can present the camera with behavior, the behavior of your character, then there is a very good chance that the story you’re trying to tell will communicate to your audience and you’ve unblocked it by over translating him or her into your acting. But it really does take a lot of practice, and the challenge is to do less and less and less.

Eric: It’s funny you wouldn’t necessarily think doing less and less is a sign of improving as an artist. But in fact, it’s like when you are first acting or directing or writing, doing any of this, the tendency is almost to try too hard. I know when I directed plays and I was a lot younger and like I’d come to rehearsal with like everything spelled out. Beat it out. Like you go there across left at that. And then after a while I realized, well, these actors know what they’re doing too I gotta sort of trust the process a little bit. Knowing that I had a goal.

Aerial: Right.

Eric: But realizing we’re all kind of going together.

Aerial: Right. And every director, every actor, everyone in this business has their own way of going about doing things and finding that Zen that trust is ultimately when, you know, you have a good partnership.

Eric: And when someone doesn’t have that that same attitude, how it can be incredibly difficult even for even for a Ben Kingsley.

Ben: Another challenge, of course, is with whom you work. And are they listening to you or not? Are you being seen and heard by this director or is this director slapping an image onto you that they are insisting they see? I’m really fortunate sometimes in working. With a director who appreciates my preparation. And also appreciates that. I’m allowing my character to behave. Rather than cluttering him with my acting. Therefore, Chris Conrad, our wonderful director, printed the first take every time. Possibly the second. Because he filmed the behavior of Pa, take one print it. I was astonished. Print it. Move on. Print it. Move on. Print it. Move on. Another director I worked with and here one has to learn as students how to communicate and how to drop the arrogance and listen to the other. I was working with a director. We were discussing takes. And to be honest, I am take one or take two. Honestly, I I said quite casually, not arrogantly to this director who fortunately will be nameless today. I think I’m take one or two. Seven. That’s what he said. Unbelievably rude. Clearly, clearly not watching or listening to what I was doing. Seven. He thought that he’d appropriated a pattern of my behavior. Tucked it into his little bag and thought, Kingsley 7. So what about six? What about 5? Not watching? Does he want to prove a point? Seven? Then he went on to say. Now you did something on take 2 I really liked this too, this is we’re about take five. Now, if I were a total narcissist, I might remember how clever I was on take 2. But as I’ve just at great pains explained to you, I haven’t got a clue what I did on take 2. I have let go. I’m drawing out another arrow for the director, putting it in my bow. You did something really good on take two. Well, print it, then put it in the movie.

Aerial: So if I ever have the amazing opportunity to cast Sir Ben Kingsley and anything I do, I will never ask him for a seventh take.

Eric: And you all heard it. All right. We’re going to hold you to that.

Aerial: I mean, if I’m doing my job, he’s gonna be doing his. And I should trust that. And I know he’s gonna give it to me first time, maybe second time, but definitely not seven.

Eric: Yeah I don’t know how he would have worked with Stanley Kubrick, but that would have been an amazing film to see.

Aerial: Right.

Eric: Stanley Kubrick famously would go 60, 70, 80 takes. But I think more times than not, when you have an actor of this caliber. If you’re asking for that seventh take means maybe you didn’t do the homework you needed to do and you better do your homework when you have an actor like him because he’s gonna come ready to rock. He’s not intimidated by any challenge. That means you as a director can’t be either. You have to be ready because he knows what he needs to do.

Ben: I have to be honest, I don’t find acting challenging. I find other people challenging. Like Mr. Take Seven. But if I am left alone metaphorically with my brushes and my canvas, I can paint a wonderful portrait and be tremendously happy and hopefully communicate that portrait accurately. I do like to talk as a portrait painter. When I was in the theater, I was very much a landscape artist because as a theater actor, you have to bring onto the stage the hills, the mountains, the Royal Court, the army. You know Shakespeare’s great soliloquies populate the stage with thousands of people and there is a painted back cloth. You have to bring the whole world, the whole landscape of the story onto the stage with you. Whereas in film, thanks to the extraordinary capacity for the camera to capture nature, one can be a portrait artist all you have to do is behave as the person you are portraying. I think my starting point. Has to be related to my work with the Royal Shakespeare Company. I’m afraid Shakespeare was my first writer. He’s a very tough act to follow. And when you realize how empowering it is to decipher. A marvelous line of Shakespeare’s. And communicate it over 400 years to an audience who gasp. In astonishment at that mighty line. It’s thrilling. It’s thrilling because the line, the writing is engineered and architectured to really penetrate the audience. And look how long it’s lasted. It’s extraordinary. And in a strange way, I grew to love Shakespeare as if he was my friend. It’s very strange. There’s a wonderful book by Howard Bloom called. The invention of the human being, and he credits Shakespeare with being one of the first people ever to dramatically. Describe and dramatize pure patterns of human behavior. A long time before Freud, a long time before Jung. Pure patterns of human behavior that can withstand to this day all the modern pressures of psychology and psycho analysis. They’re absolutely pure. Patterns of behavior. Iago, Othello, Desdemona. Rosalind Jaques so that feeling the magnificent gift he gave to his actors. And he was an actor. He wrote with actors. Of giving them these beautiful lines, these beautiful ideas, this wonderful, multilayered language. He therefore empowered me and it stayed in my DNA and I have a hunger for that kind of language that expresses patterns of human behavior purely. So it’s very hard. It’s very hard. Page one. Page two nope. Nope. Never going to get there. Never going to get there. That is a copy of a copy of a copy that is very lazy writing. It may well be made, may well be watched. It won’t move anybody an inch or an ounce. It’s just a copy. But when I read something original. I know the tricks, I’m with him. I recognize him on the first page and stay with him until the curtain drops. Writing is my starting point and I build a character from how the author has so brilliantly constructed the way he speaks. He thinks. What is the most important word in his line? What is the most important word in all these sentences? If it’s good writing, you’ll find it. Is it anger? Is it love? Is it loss? Is it envy? What’s driving him? Ah there it is. It’s in The writing it’s in the writing, all the clues are there. If it’s weak writing literally, you don’t have a clue. Not given you one, he or she is not writing for his or her actors saying this will make a few bucks.

Eric: Yeah. Shakespeare’s Shakespeare. But I mean, did he ever write a movie featuring a tornado and a shark? No.

Aerial: Anyway, Shakespeare is amazing. And.

Eric: Yes he is amazing. I admit it too.

Aerial: It’s great to to hear an artist at his caliber. Talk about how he respects the text so much.

Eric: And what’s great to hear, especially as a writer. It’s like sometimes actors feel like it’s their job to make the text better. You know.

Aerial: Let me just rewrite this.

Eric: Yeah. No, I don’t think it needs to be those words. But here’s an actor who could do that and I’d be perfectly okay with it. But he has such appreciation when text is good.

Aerial: He respects the text.

Eric: Right. It’s like it gives him his starting point as a performer. He has such a love of text and the possibility of language, even though he was not actually formally trained or educated, though he does have a lot of honorary degrees, including a very well-deserved one from this very school.

Ben: I have an M.A.. From this establishment. But I never went to school. I never I went I never went to drama school and never went to film school I never went to university. I have an honorary M.A. From here an honorary M.A. from Stanford. A D. Lit. From Sussex and a D. Lit. From Hull. All of that. For which I’m eternally grateful. Comes from my experience of life. The grain of sand that I talked of earlier. Around which we labor to build our pearl to smooth things out and to glitter. So if I cannot recognize a decent pattern of human behavior in the writing, I’m afraid I can’t do it and I can never truly bring life to it. But once I have found that pattern of human behavior, the rhythm and timbre. Of, in my case, the man. And why he. Is what he is. The dialog starts to go in, and so perhaps I don’t learn, I study I study like an archaeologist brushing away layers and layers and layers of dust and dirt until I find the bones. And when I find the bones, then I can assemble the man. But you’re not gonna find any bones if the writing’s weak. So the writer and the actor have to meet halfway. Sometimes as an expedient. But then again, it is in addition to or it complements what I’ve just said. I will record the script and listen to it as I fall asleep to familiarize myself with the music of the writing and of the character. Always try and work on good material. I know it’s hard, but you must say no to bad material. The material that is, let us say, tone deaf. And you must work on material in which you personally can recognize a genuine pattern of human behavior. Ah I know him. Or if I don’t know him, I want to know him. And then the dialog will go in so sufficiently and so confidently that when you are totally surprised by the fact that yipes there’s another actor in this scene I’d forgotten about that I thought it was all about me. The other actor in the scene will throw lines at you, and you will respond from that perfect pattern of human behavior that you yourself have worked out. You can keep it secret sometimes. Don’t tell the director. Just say I have a pattern of human behavior. I know this guy’s pattern because you might tell the director and he might say seven. He’ll rob you, you know. Or she. So it’s a private process. But my starting point is let’s hope you are blessed with good material. So if you do have a musical ear will help you enormously. Sexy Beast was written beautifully so well that it reads like a Jacobin tragedy could have been written in the seventeen hundreds.

Clips: You’re the problem, you’re the f**king problem. You f**king Doctor White honking jam rag arcane spunk bubble. I’m telling you Aitch you keep looking at me. I’m gonna put you enough in the f**king ground, I promise you.

Ben: And the patterns of human behavior, the characterizations are so specific and so individuated that I could discern from the page and then from inhabiting Don on set for maybe one or two days, I realized regretfully. But also it gave me power to communicate him. He was a dreadfully abused child and he would spend the rest of his life abusing others because he was unhealed. And as soon as I recognized that and it became embedded in my performance and his pattern of human behavior, he poured out of me.

Eric: When I find the bones, I can assemble the man. Man he is really killing it with those metaphors. And for a writer, I think it’s all the more important that you put enough in there that you give the actors something to expand upon. But if it’s not there at all.

Aerial: The actors will have to make it up. And that might not be what you intended.

Eric: Yeah, there’ll be no bones.

Aerial: No bones. I mean, it’s nice to be able to see the difference it makes when the writer really puts the work to really lay down the groundwork for the actor.

Eric: Right it’s that happy marriage where writer meets actor.

Aerial: Oh I like that.

Eric: And thus character.

Ben: My starting point with the craft of acting is transformation. Transformation gives off a certain kind of energy that the audience recognize and thrilled to, I promise you. Transformation I sometimes attempt to describe it quite simplistically. The audience at the circus and they’re watching a trapeze artist. And she’s swinging on one trapeze and there’s another one impossibly far away from her and she will swing triple somersault in the air and grasp the handle of the other trapeze. And then the audience start breathing again. Her holding onto one trapeze is her. Her transformation is the spinning in the air that is utterly thrilling to the audience who say to themselves, I didn’t realize a human being could do this. I’m a human being. She’s a human being. We can we can do it even a part of me, my DNA, my molecules can do it. So, my dear, I would say retain your original self and thrill people by how much you can transform that original self. And then when you want to go right back to it. So you will always be you. But you will find extraordinary means of telling stories where you transform to tell the story. You transform to communicate the truth when it’s appropriate. If you find and this is quite difficult for an actor that the only way you can communicate a certain set of truths is not by wearing a mask. Because we all know the old saying, give a man a mask and he’ll tell the truth. But not wearing a mask makes you very, very vulnerable. And sometimes I know that the actor has chosen that craft to wear a mask and therefore not be seen and heard as his or her original self. But the starting point of the craft, I think in all modesty, should be the original self. So it is the spinning in the air. You have that trapeze. That’s you. You have the other trapeze. That’s your character. But the transformation into it is what will thrill audiences and what will get their attention. The energy, the urgency, the accuracy, the risk of you letting go of that with nothing. Actors have nothing. What do they have? Nothing. And then onto the other side. Wonderful. So however you wish to translate that, I hope you can. But the original self do not stretch yourself beyond your point of elasticity it’s the law of physics. If you stretch something beyond its point of elasticity and let it go, it will not shrink back to its original self. And you must. It’s very frightening sometimes when actors feel that they must transform so much and never between takes let go and always take the character home. They are distorted and it can be very dangerous. You must be able to always shrink back to your original self and then leap from that into your story.

Eric: Years back when I was but a wee lad in college, I did act some and when I would try to do a role, I felt like I had to change everything. I had to change my voice, change how I walk. It took a while for me to realize instead of coming at this from an angle of how is this character different for me? How is this character similar to me? You know, you don’t have to change everything about you to make character work.

Aerial: It helps when you have directors. You trust you enough to allow you to be real, and allow you to find that character as an actor going in, you know, you’ve auditioned, you’ve done your homework then you go to set and you feel like you have to prove yourself every single time that wastes a lot of energy. And as an actor, it’s nice to be trusted. And then you can truly find your character easier because now you’re confident. And I think that’s what Sir Ben Kingsley does so well.

Ben: The greatest experience I’ve had with directors and certainly the material you saw this afternoon is a prime example of this, is that once the directors cast you in the role confidently, you have that feeling. Absolute appreciation of the fact. That you have been given that role to portray to the best of your ability that you never for a second in the best cases feel that this person is auditioning you every day. Because once you feel that you’re being auditioned. The whole of your performance alters, it is no longer behavior. It is watch these tricks and there is a terrible difference in a huge difference, so the director, who has the capacity and the bravery to come to the film set and think to his or herself. What is going to happen today? What is my camera going to capture today? The camera has to capture behavior. And the wonderful thing about all the great films that we love and the great scenes that we love. Thinking of the trapeze artist in midair is also when the actors in the scene are discovering one another while the camera is turning. And for a director to give the actors that space. In which to discover one another through the character of their behaviors is a very, very good director indeed. So the most paramount. Aside from rigorous preparation and masterly casting, I would say the ability to have an open heart and an open mind. Knowing your story so well. And then allowing the camera to film behavior, behavior from confident actors who are in an absolute state of grace between action and cut. Because you put them in a perfect place. And I have given examples of control freaks who think that they know to the number. What take to print even before you’ve walked onto the set. It’s terrible. They’re not listening. So listening, listening, listening and alertness and also, as I say, preparation, casting and listening to that artistic Geiger counter in oneself and not be cluttered by people who say, oh, those actors, they really rub each other in the wrong way. I think they’d be great if we put them together. But it’s all about trust. It isn’t about an irritant. It’s about trust. And that willingness to learn and listen to the other actor in a space given to you by that director. So preparation is important and the ability to listen so clearly in an uncluttered way. Martin Scorsese is a master at this as well as dear Steve Conrad, with whom I’ve just worked. Martin watches the action from a black tent on a monitor with his assistant and one or two other of his lieutenants and generals and he’ll say cut after a take. He’d be led out of his tent because you come out of the tent into a dark film set. You’re blind as a bat. And the cables all over the floor. So his assistant leads him across the floor it’s quite dramatic, leads him across the floor. And then your face to face of the maestro. And the maestro says. Should we do another one. That’s all he says. That’s all he says. And of course, you are delighted to do another one for him because, you know, he’s watching. And putting on the screen. Every single thing that you’re offering to him on the floor of the set on that day. He will always capture the most important word in the line, if you know what I mean. He’ll get it. He’ll put the camera in the right place.

Aerial: I really enjoy listening to him talk about being on set and working with a great director. You know one who doesn’t make you feel like you’re auditioning every day. He’s worked with some of our greatest directors, you know, from Spellberg to Scorsese. And you can really see him come alive when you have the right collaboration or a really great dance partner. If you want to do another metaphor.

Eric: But also to use one of his metaphors. This idea of painting with one stroke of the brush, you know that he’s gotten to a point as a performer. He can do that. He doesn’t need a lot of strokes to get it. When you’re working on a lower budget film, an independent film, which he has done many times, you don’t have the luxury of multiple takes. You don’t have the luxury of a lot of money to throw at the screen. So you got to make every stroke count. You’ve got to be really precise with your storytelling. You want it to look like that was a choice. Yeah. No, no. We only needed the one take.

Ben: To be taking your first steps when the purse is almost empty is a very privileged position because it’s going to force you to be absolutely essential. When you discover through your limited resources what the most important word in your story is, what the most important gesture is. What’s the essential message? If you’ve got a few dollars, you have to be accurate. And then if you learn how to do this with great accuracy. You’ll never fall into the trap of throwing money at it. Because that won’t work. It will not work. The only thing that will work is your commitment to that essential gesture of the character and the essential word at the heart of the story. Often when I’m working on a complex character and they usually are quite complex. I try and reduce the mandate into one tiny sentence that I can hold in my pocket. And hold on to that mandate and it becomes irrespective of the budget and the size of the film or one’s responsibilities financially. I remember when I had the great privilege of playing Otto Frank Anne Frank’s father.

Clips: Good people and bad people have one thing in common they both make mistakes. Only good people can admit their mistakes and learn from them.

Ben: I had this perfect image in my head that I reduced it to one sentence. That Anne is at school. School is over. She’s in the yard with her friends chatting. Her father arrives at the school gates. She looks at her dad. Then she turns back to her friends. And she says her friends see that man over there? That’s my dad. That gesture. That’s my dad pushed me through the film. He was not there for her. He couldn’t be. He was separated from her by Adolf Eichmann. But early on in that film, I knew that the diamond in the center of that very, very big budget mini series was. That’s my dad. Hang on to that, little diamond.

Aerial: And with that we have gone from pearls to diamonds, an important element to starting out in this business is to connect with yourself and make sure you are taking care of your most important asset.

Eric: Your car?

Aerial: No, you.

Ben: I think that gaining strength through disappointment, which will inevitably come because of what we do, is perhaps the best we can do. Gain strength from the disappointment to learn physically and mentally how we cope with it. And certainly on the film set I’m a hermit, quite anti-social, partly because I love my own company, partly because I know that I need to conserve my energies and my strengths for the task in hand. The task in hand is Dame Maggie Smith. She’s a wonderful, wonderful performer in Downton Abbey, as you will probably know, she said to a colleague of mine. You can’t be a star in the dressing room, dear. I mean, just before I came on with dear Chris and had this conversation, I was pacing up and down by myself, all by myself in the room. I could have been entirely alone. I wanted to be find space where you must and can be your original self. There are many, many distractions that always connect with. Your original self. Because I think the quest for the original, uninterrupted, untarnished, undistorted self is our greatest quest. And if we can find that it’s a wellspring of energy and joy and is wonderful to be with the original self. So take time for yourself. Try not to compromise. Be very careful of the company you keep. Because there are amongst us, those of us through either bitterness, disappointment, laziness, will rob you of your energy and you leave the evening feeling. Why do I feel so soiled? Why do I feel so compromised? We had fun. We had drinks. We laughed a lot. Why do I feel so weary? So be very careful of the company you keep and how much you spread yourself. We are creative people. We’re blessed to lead creative lives. And it’s alarming how much that cloying of other people’s appetites can debilitate you. So aside from whatever wonderful classes you do, I have my own physical regime I eat. Well, aside from all that, take care of the original self. Cause basically, that’s all you have.

Eric: That’s a good note to end on, you know guys. Take care of yourself. You can’t do your best work or even good work if you’re not taking care of you. And Sir Ben Kingsley at 75 looks like he’s got another hundred forty performances in him, which I’m fine with.

Aerial: Me too, and I hope he does. You know considering he did not get a formal acting education. He is so fabulous and he’s wonderful to listen to. He’s got great advice. He’s a great teacher and our students really benefited from listening to him.

Eric: And hopefully you guys did, too. I feel like listening to him talk about his craft is like a bit of a master’s education just by listening to him speak.

Aerial: We want to think, Sir Ben Kingsley, for his talent, his art, and for speaking with our students. You can watch his new show, Perpetual Grace on Epix.

Eric: And thanks to all of you for listening. She is Aerial Segard and she is leaving us going to Japan. I will have to say that anytime Aeriel was in this booth, it was an episode that was so much fun to record. And really, hopefully for you guys showed the excitement. We both feel in talking about this, but mostly it was just nice having a friend in the room. So, Aeriel, thank you so much for doing this. And I don’t know we’ll have to fly you back from Japan for every episode. We can’t afford that, right?

Aerial: Okay yeah we can afford that ticket.

Eric: We’re starting Kickstarter right now for that to happen. So thank you. One last time to the fabulous Aerial Segard round of applause.

Eric: We will be missing her very much.

Aerial: Thank you so much and I’m gonna miss this. It’s been a pleasure and an honor to be able to be a part of this.

Eric: She’s Aerial Segard.

Aerial: And that’s Eric Conner.

Eric: And this episode was based on the Q&A moderated by Chris Devane. Chris, thank you again for bringing in Sir Ben Kingsley to our school to watch a full interview or to see our other Q&As check out our YouTube channel at YouTube.com/NewYorkFilmAcademy.

Aerial: This episode was written by Eric Conner edited and mixed by Kristian Hayden. Our creative director is David Andrew Nelson, who also produced this episode with Kristian Hayden and Eric Conner.

Eric: Executive produced by Jean Sherlock and Dan Mackler a special things to our Events Department Sajja Johnson. And the staff and crew who made this possible, including Drew Hughes for always finding the perfect place to take a picture.

Aerial: To learn more about our programs, check us out at NYFA.edu. Be sure to subscribe on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen.

Eric: We won’t see you next time.

Aerial: I won’t see you next time.

Eric: But I’ll see you next time.

Aerial: Have fun.

Eric: Bye Aerial.