Very occasional quote of the day: relationships for leaders

“The only thing that is really important in your relationship with actors is that they must know that you admire them, that you admire their work, and there’s no way to fake that. You must really admire them or you shouldn’t use them. If they know that you admire their work, which they can sense in a thousand different ways, it doesn’t really matter what you think of each other or what you say to them, or whether you are terribly friendly or not. The thing they care about is their work. 

Some actors are very amusing and pleasant and always cheerful. They are, of course, more pleasant to have around than those who are morose, vacant, or enigmatic. But how they behave when you're not shooting has very little to do with what happens when the camera turns over.” 

- Stanley Kubrick, Sight And Sound interview, 1972

Alec Guinness and I were making a film called Tunes of Glory several years ago. At the end of about the first week he was very sulky. He was very low and miserable and grumpy and irritable. I said, “Alec, what’s the matter? We’re all trying very hard and you seem so miserable and depressed and it’s getting us all down. We feel as though we’re not getting a good picture and that you don’t like any of us. Is there anything I can do?” 

He said, “You know, Ronnie, I have been working on this picture for nearly two weeks and not once has anybody ever said to me, ‘'Alec, you are really very, very good. We think you are marvelous.’ 

I said, “Well, good gracious, Alec, we think that you are marvelous. What we are trying to do is live up to you. We have taken it for granted that you know we think you are marvelous.” 

He said, “Ronnie, I have to tell you something about actors.”

- Director Ronald Neame, in Directing The Film, by Eric Sherman