A Quote by Zal Batmanglij
I went to graduate school for directing at AFI in L.A., and I wanted to be a director.
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I never went to school for directing. I studied theater with a director. I followed plays to see how a director would talk to the actors. I tried to make my own school.
Directing is something I always wanted to do. I started when I was 13 directing scenes in high school and then plays in college with my theatre company.
If I wanted to be Rimbaud, what was I doing in graduate school? Trying to stay out of the army, of course. Graduate study gave me a draft deferment. But I also knew I lacked erudition and polish and was often sunk in forlorn reveries.
I always wanted to live in L.A. The other thing that always inspired me was movies; that's why I'm here. I always wanted to be a part of the movie business and make movies. That's why I went to AFI grad school for filmmaking.
I didn't act in college, per se, because I didn't want an acting degree. I don't know what you do with that degree. When I was 16, I saw 'Usual Suspects,' and I wanted to be a director as well. So I thought I should go to school for directing and producing, something I knew nothing about.
I loved theater and went to Circle in the Square's post-graduate program for two years and studied acting and directing and I loved it. I loved acting and directing - I really like directing a lot. Some days I think maybe someday I'll go back and direct something.
I realized that I wanted a Rhodes Scholarship, not because I wanted to go to graduate school but because I wanted to win a famous award. Quitting forced me to realize I was on the wrong track and that I had lost touch with who I was and what I cared about.
When I was in college at Carnegie Mellon, I wanted to be a chemist. So I became one. I worked in a laboratory and went to graduate school at the University of Pittsburgh. Then I taught science at a private girls' school. I had three children and waited until all three were in school before I started writing.
Stepping out of the director's chair completely and into a scene as an actor was weird. It was more excitement about directing than anything, but I was on a high from being a director and enjoying that process so much that going back to being an actor was almost secondary because I really was loving directing.
I was really desperate. I don't know if you can remember back that far, but when I went to graduate school they didn't want females in graduate school. They were very open about it. They didn't mince their words. But then I got in and I got my degree.
I'd studied English literature and American history, but the English literature, which I thought was going to be helpful to me in an immediate way, was the opposite. So I had to un-think a lot of things and move out of my own head, and I learned a lot. It was like graduate school, but an un-graduate school or an un-school.
I graduated college in 2010, I thought I'd go to grad school then and I was accepted under a different program and I ended up moving away and pursuing fighting instead of graduate school, but I knew I always wanted to do it.
I was very smart in school. I had straight As and was going to graduate high school at 16 and start college. My dad wanted me to be a lawyer because I was very opinionated.
Directing was easy for me because I was a writer director and did all my directing when I wrote the screenplay.
At school, I decided I wanted to be a director and then I went out and spent the rest of my adult life trying to be a director. It was really clear to me. So in that sense I was very lucky.
I went to NYU undergrad, then went to AFI for grad school.
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