Steph Green

Samara chats with the television and film director about what leadership on set looks and sounds like, how to use your voice to make decisions that will not please everyone, the secret to good pitching, and who Hollywood actually *is* these days.

 

****What’s going on with YOUR voice? Send Samara a question for our upcoming MAILBAG episode at PermissiontoSpeakPod.com or on Instagram @permissiontospeakpod****

 

Host: Samara Bay

Executive producers: Catherine Burt Cantin & Mark Cantin, Double Vision doublevisionprojects.com

Producers: Samara Bay, Sophie Lichterman and the iHeart team

Theme music: Mark Cantin

 

For Steph Green on social: @stephanngreen

For Maya Angelou in conversation: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/world-book-club/id263658343?i=1000353657039

For Maya Angelou’s Still I Rise performance: youtube.com/watch?v=qviM_GnJbOM

For more on Rebecca Solnit: rebeccasolnit.net/book/the-mother-of-all-questions/

For more on Lindy West: lindywest.net/the-witches-are-coming-1

For more info on honoring native lands: usdac.us/nativeland

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Rebecca Soulnett talking about hashtag me too, if
the right to speak, if having credibility, if being heard,
is a kind of wealth. That wealth is now being redistributed.
There has long been an elite with audibility and credibility
and underclass of the voiceless. As the wealth is redistributed,
the stunned incomprehension of the elites erupts over and over again,

(00:25):
a fury and disbelief that this woman or child dared
to speak up, that people deigned to believe her, that
her voice counts for something. Our voice is a reflection
of our life experience, where we've been and who we've

(00:47):
listened to. But we can also own it and even
change it if we want. This is the podcast that's
all about the voice, but it's also all about power,
Who has it, how we get it, and how we
sound when we have it. I'm Samrve. I'm a dialect
coach for actors in Hollywood on projects like the upcoming
Wonder Woman's sequel, and I'm also a speech coach for entrepreneurs, politicians, creatives,

(01:12):
and women everywhere who need to use their voice to
get what they want. Welcome to permission, to speak. Let's
do this. Today's guest is Steph Green. She is a
director for television and film. In fact, one of her

(01:33):
first films, Short in two thousand and seven, got an
Oscar nomination right out of the gate, and she's gone
on to direct film and many many episodes of television.
She did Billions, she did the Americans Man in the
High Castle, an episode of Watchmen, the L Word, which
we talked about in this interview. So she's had to

(01:54):
use her voice to lead, and this is why I
really wanted to have her on. The culture that she's
doing it in is totally unique, you know, hashtag set life,
but there's lessons for all of us. What's crazy about
the Hollywood aspect of it is that when you're directing
on set, things move super fast. There are no walls

(02:18):
to your office, there's a massive amount of money on
the line and hundreds of people's jobs. You often have
to decide things on the fly based on gut instinct,
and there's a real but often unlabeled and like completely
nebulous hierarchy of power players whose interests you have to
juggle or everyone will mutiny. HR isn't a thing, and

(02:39):
it's also deeply male dominated, and within that you have
to make decisions and make art anyway. I have gotten
to see her work firsthand because I dialect coached on
a show that she directed, and I am very excited
to be able to bring the magic I saw then
to you guys. Now Here's stuff staff. It's such a

(03:09):
pleasant here pleasure to be. I remember when I was
had the honor of being a dialect coach on a
Steph Green set for the TV show Preacher, like two
years ago in New Orleans. Was great, and you called
me part of the mind meld tear. It was such
I mean, you know, obviously were I've been in a

(03:31):
lot of sets. I mean every director deals with the
dynamic of collaboration on a set differently. I have noticed,
almost exclusively, the women are the ones who are most
open to like turning around to the people who sit
behind them in video Village and actually using those resources.
That's interesting. Your position of that close observation of the

(03:52):
director is very I mean it's really producers, script supervisor
and a very select few that are sitting that close
to the director on set. That's a really interesting person
for anybody listening. Video Village is where the video monitors
are set up that we're watching the action happen for
every single take. And yeah, the front row is usually
the director and the script supervisor who keeps track of continuity,

(04:14):
you know, take if by take by take, and then
hovering around there is often a writer of from a producer,
and then the strange other person who somehow gets gets
her way in is the dialect coach. Because really we
are working pretty intimately with the actors and with everybody,
trying to make sure that the story is being told
with both the sounds and also literally the words. And

(04:34):
I find that that's a sacred space. That's my office,
that's all of our offices on set. And though many
different crew members may come up to you as a
director and ask a question, or you may need something
and go talk to them, of the hundred people on set,
there are generally four or five people in that little
office looking at that screen. And what I loved about
having you there, and what I love about having that

(04:56):
coach there is they are scrutinizing what's happening on screen
with performances the same way I am. You know, I'm
looking at other things too, but I like the partnership
of someone else squinting, you know, in this focused way
at that screen, that little monitor that's that's giving us everything,
all the results of all the hard work that's happening
on that set. You know, that capturing Ultimately in the

(05:18):
editing room, that's what you got. So I really appreciate that,
and I appreciate all the levels of collaboration. You wanted
to talk about communication, Maybe we start with set and
we can kind of talk out from there. But that's
what I was thinking about on the way here. I
was thinking about communication on set and sort of energetically

(05:39):
how you are balancing your very careful position of power
and leadership with the fact that you need every single
individual on that set to be helping you at one time,
you know, and you're looking at them there, You're with them,
You're in contact with them. I can imagine in other
industries someone from down in another department maybe doing something

(06:00):
for you, but you may never interact with that. I
mean literally, you just referenced video village as your office,
but it has no walls exactly exactly. So you are
learning daily and for me, attempting to improve communication with
such a diverse and constantly fluid group of people, a
lot of people, So how do you create a shorthand?

(06:21):
I mean that is where where prep is so important,
because prep is where you are working with heads of department,
which would be like costume design, production designer, makeup and hair,
and you are establishing the shared vision ahead of time,
you know, getting onto the same page as all your
heads of department. That's your like board meeting. I guess

(06:41):
that you're in for prep and then I find like
really learning who their departments are, who are their key people,
who are they being supported by? And knowing those names.
I mean that's a huge thing and that names are
really hard for me, and it's something I'm really working on.
You know, being able to look at someone in the
eyes say a name and then of course they thank

(07:01):
you or ask your question or listen to their contribution,
like step one and learning a hundred names quickly is
a thing. And you know, we talked about it. Some
of the producers I work with you always are like
should we put name tags on the first couple of
weeks of working together? But and I'm for it because
I think we're moving so quickly. That's the other thing.
We're moving so fast. So I think about communication, but

(07:24):
I was also sort of driving here thinking I think
about how I listen, and then how it is a
demand of the job to be decisive and supportive, because
that's what I'm information. You're you're listening, but you're also
not just saying yes to everybody. You can't. You can't
because they have conflicting ideas. Sometimes you know, one department
thinks one way, in one department, you're not moderating as well. Yeah,
and you have your own vision eating that you're trying

(07:46):
to bring to the table, elevating, shaping the show, shaping
the storytelling. So can you talk about a moment when
you actually have to be decisive and it's going to
make somebody frustrated? Right? You know? It's it's interesting because
you have to understand and anticipate and know them well
enough to understand how that disappointment works for them, and

(08:10):
because it is such compressed time. I do feel that
it's incredibly important to acknowledge what they are bringing, what
they have done, how they are guiding the decision making,
and that in fact there contribution, even though I may
not see it that way. Has helped me clarify how
I do see it, and I think that making sure
that you're you're gracious about that, and you're acknowledging of

(08:32):
that that that idea is really valuable. Here where people
start to collapse is when they feel their ideas aren't valuable.
And it's a really fine line because you need to
make those decisions quickly. I just snapped at the microphone. Sorry, microphone.
You need to make those decisions so quickly that people
can get it can get very personal very quickly, and

(08:53):
then you know, you find yourself going, I think somebody
might be offended there, and then I and then I'm
trying to fix that, but we don't. We don't always
have time, you know. So it's it's that's why it's
a tough industry, totally tough to create trust, tough to
not take things personally. And everybody in every department, from
you know, the set to the makeup to the dialect
coach like, we're there because we're obsessed with the thing

(09:15):
that we're there for and ideally also have a sense
of the whole, but not always, you know, Well, it's
kind of to be weirdly obsessed with the one thing
that we're there for. Absolutely and then I think the
director's job in many situations is the inclusivity of all, right,
so bringing your particular passion to the whole. And I

(09:37):
enjoy that. I like that because I'm surrounded by creative
artists who are passionate. What you're painting the picture of
is leadership, right, I mean, that's what we're really talking
about here, And leadership in I don't know, I guess
a more stereotypically female way entails that there is a
sense of empowering other people, that they're making them feel appreciated,
that you're making sure that they feel like they have

(09:58):
a voice. And then ultimately decisions have to be made.
And so you know, you can't obviously make everybody happy
in every moment, but hopefully you're making them happy overall
because they feel like they're part of something bigger, exactly.
And I've I've been fortunate to work for men who
operated exactly that way too, you know, and those have
been guides for me as well. And you know, I've
been working in television for four years straight. That is

(10:21):
crazy because it seems like longer, and also because you're
doing amazing or thank you the majority of of who
I've worked for and with our men and on great
projects the Americans, Watchmen, Billions, I mean, just robust, fantastic
storytelling of late There are more women to work for
in drama, which is exciting, And these last two pilots
were with women, with Jana Fattory Megan Abbott on Deremy

(10:45):
and then Marja Lewis Ryan on Hellwards. So it's very
exciting and it is interesting to be working with women
who I think do have in general, and I towards
hiring more women and diversifying and then working with you know,
tradition really or I'm generalizing, but you know, more feminine traits. Sure,
I think they do show up. What do you mean, well,

(11:07):
nurturing and I think there's all sides to that that
can mean. You know, like you said, ultimately, you can't
make everyone happy, right, and women have to really I
think stick to our guns in a way that in
a way that's still challenging because we we haven't always
been given the opportunity to be the final word on things,
the absolutely final word. The buck stops here. This woman

(11:29):
is fully in charge of this project. So I feel
like a lot of skills that we've by, We like
the ancestors of us. Yeah, have developed our persuasion skills
because we're not the final say that's right, and you know,
and maybe and I'm still working with all of these ideas.
This is all just part of, you know, kind of

(11:51):
a learning curve. And you know, I guess watching how
women work with emotion differently because it's been a different
kind of tool for us. I guess you could say
the way you're saying persuasion is different. Really it's about power.
Where do we find our power in a landscape that
has not doesn't entitle us too much power? In certain environments,

(12:12):
there's no assumption that we're going to have power, So
how do we sit in our power? So how do
you sit in your power? Stuff? Well, I'm working on that,
you know, I'm watching women around me and I'm getting
inspired and I'm what do you notice? Ease to be
at ease with oneself and one's level of knowledge and experience,
accepting there's of course room to grow, but sort of

(12:34):
owning the hard work that one has done up until
this point. And you know, really, I guess it's a
it's a cliche less fear of failure, you know, sort
of like this is who I am, Take me or
leave me. I think that's been a scary thing for
me because you know also that I mean, I guess

(12:55):
this town can make you feel like, well, what do
you need me to be right now? Albeit give me
this up tunity, I'll be what you need me to be,
you know. And I'm just getting older and working more
you start to think, well, you know, what can this
do for me as an experience, and what can I
do for them? And like it's not just what projects
are looking that I can fit myself into, but also

(13:18):
what type of projects do I want to be exactly.
That's a constant conversation internally and with with my peers.
I think we're all figuring that out. And also, like
the times continue to change absolutely, and it's so inspiring.
I see things changing rapidly, you know, the type of
artists that are being appreciated, the women coming into their

(13:38):
power and starting to lead and support other women artists.
And you know, I think of Lena Wave like immediately,
that's who's producing the show that I'm on right now?
Really yeah, right, I mean, she took her success and
now she is really making things happen. It's just incredibly
inspiring and I get really buzzed about that. Yeah. Yeah,

(14:00):
it feels like we're like, oh, there's a paradigm that
could be shifting. Let's just um, not just to shift,
let's shift it. Let's just do it, and let's do
it consciously. And there's still a real problem. But I
will say on the L word, Marjah was incredibly adamant
about diversity hiring the show runner and showrunner for people
listening means the person who's in charge of the writer's room,

(14:21):
yes and more, and really the overall kind of boss
of the series at large. And I'd be coming up
with and we can talk about prep and you know
what we're doing in prep, but I'd be coming up
with sort of the visual you know, participation in casting,
participation in everything that launches the world that we're gonna
put this show in. But we were so interested in

(14:42):
diversity as we were hiring, and we really confronted the
lack everywhere, just of lists that would come to us
from different you know, it's that internal kind of Hollywood
conversation like where and then we but we found people
and I saw it at work, you know, truly sifting
the balance. And uh, I'm starting to see that more

(15:03):
and more. I was reading from Lyndy West's new book
called The Witches Are Coming, and she has an essay
about sort of the responsibility that Hollywood might or might
not have after Weinstein, And what I love about it
is that she's not actually just talking about in terms
of hiring, but she's actually talking about the stories that
we tell. Yes, um, and so I'm going to read

(15:23):
this quote of hers and maybe we can talk about it.
She says. To make that reckoning stick, the reckoning of
the me too movement, we have to look ahead and
ask ourselves what we want of this new Hollywood, and
look back to avoid repeating the past. Show Business could
very well help us get out of this mess, but
not if we fail to examine how it helped us
get into it. Hollywood is both a perfect and a

(15:43):
bizarre vanguard in the war for culture change. Perfect because
its reaches so vast, it's influenced so potent. Bizarre because
television movies are how a great many toxic ideas embed
themselves inside us in the first place, No matter how
much lips are as we pay tweet quality and progress,
how many mantras about loving ourselves and one another. How

(16:05):
many inspirational memes we churn out to counteract the message.
The basist culture, the culture that sells, the culture we're
used to, is still there on screen, showing us how
people are supposed to look and talk and fuck. Mm hmm.
That's great, right. And I thought of you when I
was reading that, because of the projects that you're working

(16:26):
on now. I mean, you just did watch Man, you
just did the L word. It feels like this is
the new vanguard. I mean, this is the attempt to
say we can't just tell the same stories and make
hiring different. I hope and must believe that that's the case,
and I am choosing projects with that in mind. What
are we really saying here? And when I write somewhat

(16:49):
and when I think about what I want to write,
I think about that I've always thought about message And
this denial that we do internalize these messages is is
like denying climate change. We do internalize what we see
on these screens. This is our campfire now, this is
the wisdom that has passed to us from these screens.

(17:09):
And I do feel responsibility. I also feel like when
I give, I give a d and of myself I
want to believe that I'm putting something into the world
that is good for humanity, is for positive growth in
some way. You're not always right. You do your best
to feel that out, you know, but um, yeah, I
really hope. So I hope that's right. And I mean,

(17:31):
we still have a long way to go to kind
of recognize our shadow as a race, as a as humans.
Watchman is really asking questions, and l Ward is really
looking at shame, and you know, Daremy is looking at
you know, sort of. I mean, Megan Abbot is brilliant
in so many ways. But the feminism isn't just about

(17:52):
heroic women. It's about all women. It's about flaw, it's
about intent, it's about friendship and the flip side of friendship,
how women treat each other, and you know, it's it's everything.
And also, like, what even is female heroism? Like it
doesn't require that it's sort of that masculine sense of
heroism where like one person is in charge of some revolution.

(18:13):
That's right, that's right. What is female power? What does
it look like? So? What does it look like? Stuff?
Obviously it's sort of it's it's comically too big of
a question, but it is also literally the point of
this podcast is what does female power look and sound like?
I feel like we don't have um, it's not that there.

(18:34):
It isn't there, right we we we all have people
in our own lives and people certainly that we can
look at in Congress right now who are who are
lighting the way, but we don't necessarily have like the
language to sort of talk about it in the place
to collect the stories. And there is this sort of
modern notion. And I would love to ask that question

(18:54):
to a twenty year old you know, really speak it please,
because I know from me there was a there was
a notion of I guess the powerful woman that was
kind of the having it all, like a little bit
of the capitalist dream that we had with men in

(19:14):
the fifties, right that you would kind of come back
from the war and get a house and get a
wife and get two kids and have a great job
and you know, great vacations and for my generations, like
you as a woman can have all that too. You
can have the kids and the job and the and
as I've worked in a career that is fourteen hours
a day, and I know you know the same. You know,
you just start to go, well, actually it's not all

(19:37):
quite possible in the way I idealized it, and I
actually feel exhausted and depleted and I feel less empowered
by all these things I'm trying to accomplish. So in
a way, for me, it's self realization, whatever that looks
like for you, and getting away from a sort of
social pressure normalized, you know, heteronormal ideal that we have

(20:01):
to realize we kind of inherited it was you can
have it too, what's it for you? And what was
a response to, like sort of elbowing our way in
so that we could have the same dream the men
were sold right, Although you know, having a family and
having a good job is sort of a general desire

(20:22):
of course, but I think, I think, I think a
lot about that, and women I admire are sort of
seem to be structuring all that for themselves, truly, for
themselves to self realize what they really want, which could
be not having it all or what or total definition
of what it all is. There's a woman I grew
up with who you know, I think she volunteered abroad,

(20:46):
like she stayed abroad, she still works in like, you know,
just defining success for yourself and power. This feels like
it's really about giving ourselves permission to look at what
the rules are that we were handed down and say, like,
who you to these rules? What if we break them? A?
What do we want? But be can we get it
by like putting a critical eye on those things that

(21:07):
seemed like they were hard and fast rules. I mean
from the vast like you're talking about in terms of
how we structure our lives and whether or not we
go for you know, trying to buy a house in
this amazing l a climate um and having children and
all these massive questions, but also just the tiny, the
tiny things like literally how much emotion are we allowed
to bring into work? I was just gonna say, I

(21:29):
think we got kind of macro there, but ultimately, yeah,
it's like there's almost like I feel like sometimes we
feel trip wires, right, Like I can be powerful in
this way, but I can't be powerful in this way.
For example, anger like anger just we don't really get
to be angry, or at least that's again I don't
give myself permission to be angry. That cuts off a

(21:50):
whole range of feelings and then we're sort of we're
just perpetuating that a woman can be a great leader,
but if she gets angry once, she's crazy. But I
think using anger for focus, for fire, for passion, directing
different emotional range to your purpose. You know, we were

(22:10):
encouraged in some ways and we're discouraged. And we've been
discouraged in so many ways from young ages. I mean
from a young ageoshold, I'll be a great mom, so
straight to nurturing, and you know, certain kinds of outbursts
just did not look good on me, did not look
good on a girl, right, And I just I think
they're seen as power. They can be seen as power

(22:32):
in young boys and as really disturbing in young girls. Okay,
we're going to talk more about this coming up. Yes, Okay,
so we're bad. We were just talking during a little
break about the reality of how impossible this is. I mean,

(22:54):
the quote unquote double bind of like you have to
be strong, but you have to be likable. It shows
up in these ways where we can all say, as
women who are finding our way into power late thirties,
early forties, whatever, where maybe moms for the first time,
where maybe leaders for the first time, and we're saying like, oh, funck,
now my version of leadership. What's it going to sound like?

(23:15):
What rules can I truly break? Because I'm in the
position where like I could fucking break them and I
and I won't, you know, there won't be repercussions. And
then there are people get fired in this town all
the time. And I have found and my question to you,
I guess is here's a way that a stereotype tends
to show up for female directors. There's a lot of

(23:35):
middle aged I'm just gonna say, schlubby white men who
hang out on sets because they have their whole lives
and it's an entire department of say three or four
people who are all the description I just gave and
who have never, by the women in their lives or
by their work context, been asked to become more evolved

(23:55):
as time moves forward. And then female directors end up
on their shows, right, and they have really basic level
like she's going to mess it up opinions, and then
they're just looking for the confirmation that their worldview doesn't
need to evolve. Yeah. I mean, the only thing I'll
say is I that is going to change, and that

(24:17):
is changing. And I now go to interviews or pitches
or you know, think about how I would hire and
I think we are thinking about where will I find
as a female director a great deal of support for
the whole me, you know, the meat that has the vision,
the collaborator me, the meat that's going to get frustrated,

(24:37):
the meat that's gonna but god, am I gonna do
my best at every turn? But can I also do
that while taking care of myself? And I think they're
more and more of us getting in, and there are
more and more of us looking for that environment and
then looking to create that environment. It's like it's really
the new Hollywood is less about hiring individuals who look
or define themselves a certain way, and more about hiring

(25:00):
people regardless of how they look or who they are,
who are going to enter into it with the sense
of good faith and who want to bring like their
masculine and feminine energies in easily, who are interested in
like not cutting off parts of themselves. That's right, and
I think that is generationally just the you know, the
sort of stereotypical you know, teamster dude. I mean, I

(25:24):
love teamsters, but and they're all actually many of them
are very evolved. But as you say, that that guy
with all those sexist views, who's gonna, you know, set
set himself up to believe that the female director that
comes on set is going to fail. He's aging out
right now. So we can only hope trying to not
like have a celebratory look at the face, because they

(25:44):
are humans too, and they are products of their They
are products that we cannot make it personal about anybody
because everyone is a product of how they've been, you know,
socialized by the industry. So speaking of what a segue,
tell me about your socialization, Now tell me about your
upbringing in arms of finding your voice. You decided pretty

(26:04):
early on to be a director. You went to film
school in your twenties. What did that look like in
terms of knowing what you wanted to do and how
you wanted to lead. I was always bossy. I was
a big sister, I'm alio, you know all those ingredients, right,
But I don't think I saw a lot of women

(26:24):
leaders early on. It's like the you know, the typical story.
I was in the drama program at high school. My
teacher was female. She saw something in me and my
ability to to sort of block and plan short plays.
So I entered Northwestern as a theater major, to maybe direct,
maybe stage manage. I didn't know what what exactly I

(26:44):
wanted to do, and I didn't even realize you could
study film and television. And then I studied film. I
transferred over and I first I produced and I killed
myself raising money for a music video that a guy
to direct, and I watched him direct, and I watched
the choices he was making with, you know, kind of

(27:06):
the hard earned, backbreaking support we had all given him,
and I just felt kind of bummed out and I
felt a little bit betrayed by the process. You know,
I felt like, gosh, you know, I worked so hard.
I don't feel like he cares at all about what
I have to say. And I don't know if I
believe in this vision that we're what moment, I mean,

(27:27):
what a shitty moment in the moment, Yeah, it was
in a way that that's why the worst things I
mean not that that was the worst thing that got
but you know, the things you realize you don't want
to do are very valuable, especially as a young person.
So then I decided I wanted to be a director,
but I was always apprehensive about the industry, the Hollywood industry,
and it's part of why I really developed this independent

(27:48):
film maker career. And I stayed in Ireland for so
long I just felt more support, autonomy, kind of intimacy
and trust with the people I was working with, and
so I kept making work over there. I'm really interesting
because I also feel like I've felt a very strong
pull with this podcast to specifically, at least for now,

(28:08):
focus on American culture. And you know, a solution for
handling the you know, flaws of American culture is certainly
to be LIKEE, see you later. And I also would
come back here and kind of and I would get discouraged.
Even after the Oscar nomination in two thousand eight, I
came to l A and had meetings. They were all
with men producers, and I mean it wasn't even gendered.

(28:32):
In my mind, I just did not feel a great
deal of hope or inspiration when I would kind of
drop into l A and look around. What are those
meetings entail? I mean, what was your experience? My experience
of them was the feeling of it's not enough, You're
not enough yet kind of thing. Come back when you

(28:52):
have your Sundance film, Come back when you had the
next Oscar nomination. Yeah, well it was a short, which
I told myself also, it was before this moment. You know,
where where now? I think if you you know, if
you were here trying to be a female director for
the past fifteen years, you get to talk a lot
more than I do about the real struggle. You know,

(29:15):
the real the real struggle that nobody would address, that
you knocked on doors, that you kept coming at it,
and if you're working now, that is so correct and
keep going, you know. And I want for those women
to really get what they've been waiting for and deserve
because I sort of was not. I didn't expose myself
to it. I wasn't sounds like you kind of saw

(29:36):
the writing on the wall when you had those meetings
and like, this doesn't seem like a path. Yeah. I
loved the country I was in. I felt supported, and
you know, I came when I was ready, and I
came at a time where television is just exploding, and
I found my place in it. I mean, television is
a great place to cultivate your leadership because you are
suddenly working with new people every couple of months, potentially

(30:00):
with incredible scope, budget and responsibility. So yeah, you snap
into let's do this right. You know, whether you're dealing
with difficult personalities or you're just having to be decisive
and you don't know the decision yet. What's your personal
way of sort of shutting out the noise and figuring
out what you want. I guess there's two ways my

(30:24):
process works. One is intuitive decision making, like you just
got to feel it and go because you are you
literally have two minutes to make the decision right. And
that means literally listening to something that isn't your brain.
Yes exactly, you just sort of feel something and it
probably is your brain. It's your it's your you know,

(30:46):
it's your synapses that like know what to do. And
I think I love directing in part because I like
that um flow, that creative flow where things just feel
like they're just coming. You don't know where from, but
they're coming. And then the other side, I plan and
visualize and research a lot so that when i'm a

(31:06):
lot of new ideas are coming at me, I sort
of have my my firm center and I can sort
of weigh those ideas against what I'm thinking or with
what I'm thinking, and do they support do they confuse.
I mean a lot of um, A lot of storytelling
for me is whose perspective is this? Even though that's
a really cool shot idea. You know, dps are famously

(31:27):
will pitch you these like Okay, we come up over
the building and we swoop down and you know, and
it's kind of I feel like my job to go
whose perspective are we and what are we feeling while
that's happening? Or are we just feeling the exhilaration of
the shot, which sometimes is great, But it's that it's
that emotional mind, it's the storytelling mine. It's continually taking
it back to those questions, which which is I'm sure

(31:48):
a lot of what you do and that an actor
may obsess over saying a syllable or avowal correctly, and
you may take them back to a story place and
ultimately everyone kind of wants to be in that story place,
character place. My favorite example of that is that, especially
English is the second language. Actors which I work with
a lot, will have will have noticed that, like, for example,

(32:10):
the word what do we have? Do we use it? T?
Or don't we write? We Americans quote unquote right? What what? Right?
They're both options, and they'll say, do I put a
T on that or don't tie? And I'm like, depends
what do you want? What do you want? What do
you want? What's at stake? And I think it is
also the argument for an idea that you can't debate.

(32:31):
So let's say everyone's people are coming at you with ideas.
If you say, no, I don't want that, that's not
what I want. Okay, that doesn't add anything to the conversation.
It doesn't. People just feel denied, and that's where disappointment
sets in. Like we were talking about earlier, if I
say I love that idea, but I feel like the
character would be coming actually, because they'd be coming from

(32:53):
the outside in. Let's have that first action be this
taking out the jet whatever you know. It's like you
you ground back to character and story, also showing your
work when you're thinking that out loud, yes, and so
they there's trust that's built. And then and then they
when they do the same thing, like I love nothing
more than a props person coming to me and saying,
I know this is what's in the script, but I

(33:14):
did all this research and this is actually the item
you know, and that's there contribute you know, And I
think if I expect to be listened to for the
depth of my research, knowledge, intuition, instincts, I have to
do the same. When there's time in prep, you know,

(33:34):
and we can we can really weigh things up. But
I I do notice. I'm just gonna bring it back
to I know what your your expertise, which is that
I have. I will stop breathing, I can. I will
notice that I haven't taken a deep breath in like
four hours on set. My voice will get high if
I'm emotional, you know, And and then but then in

(33:54):
trying to control that, you get more tight. So I
think all these things are fast dating in relationship to power,
articulation and communication, because these things only work when I
have a somewhat even keel emotionally. I have to stay
in that emotionally balanced place to be able to communicate

(34:17):
authentically like that. And part of the depletion and fatigue
is when I'm doing all that but I'm actually feeling
so much more. And also, how do you listen to
I'm going back to thing number one, right, how do
you listen to your instincts when you've sort of cut
yourself off from them? Totally either because fourteen now or
days do do a number on you in terms of

(34:37):
sleep and all of that stuff, but also literally in
the moment, if the stakes feel too high in your
body is responding to the stakes and not to the content.
That's right, and where is the effort. The effort should be,
you know, in the creativity piece and the story piece,
and you know it's thoughtful planning, but the effort sometimes
it's just in holding back the slew of true emotion

(34:58):
that you're feeling or I guess, passion, fire, all these things.
You know that balance is part of the dance. In
this sort of advice place that we're at right now,
tell me about how you prepare a pitch, because whether
it's for a pilot of a TV show, or it's
for a product, or it's for an idea to your boss.

(35:20):
You know, a lot of us find ourselves in positions
where we have to do that um where we have
to say, like, here's my take on a thing, take
me seriously, and also I'm flexible, and also you know,
I'm a yeah, I'm just thinking of this. But dancing
is a good metaphor in a way or a visual

(35:42):
because are you dancing for you or them. You know
you have to first, I think, really really read the script,
look at the project, look at your if you're selling
a project, watch it in your mind totally for you, like, truly,
what are you what are you going to do with this?
What are you want to do with this? What do
you want to see? How would you want to make it?

(36:04):
Before you even start thinking about what they want to
hear or what they need to hear, or how you
need to present. And that is a tricky balance. I
think I often am jumping back and forth to Okay,
well I see I see it this way, but they
would maybe want to hear it this way. But this
is so valuable because I often think about how sometimes
what stops us from really finding sort of the joy

(36:25):
and the fire is that we are thinking too much
how what do they think of me? And use It's
useful to think what do they really need? And what
how am I bringing what they need? But you're reminding
me that there's this first part, which is also what
is the pleasure that this is for me? You absolutely
have to think about all that what do they need
to hear? How do they need to hear it? But
that's not the first step, and it's really easy to forget.

(36:46):
I'm saying it because I'm constantly reminding myself of that.
And I think also any writer will say, you know,
they first have to go to a very safe space
for themselves to really create the material in relationship with themselves.
You know, that is just the first step. So you know,
giving yourself the kind of gift of your own very

(37:06):
internal process first, creatively first and foremost. Then then yes,
it's like, okay, how do I And it's once you
have that and that feels very firm and strong, it's
it's so much easier to think about how to present it, right,
because if you were doing a book report and you
had the book already, you could start to figure out
how to present that book report because the book is there, right.

(37:28):
I mean, the whole point of communication is that there's
another person, or there's another mass of people or something.
So to say that, wait, the first step of communication
is actually our relationship with ourself. That's pretty valuable. I think.
So I want to go into a room and I
want to communicate back that I that I really feel
and see the story, and here's what I either. If

(37:49):
I'm reading a script. Here's what, here's how it starts.
It feels like this, then it goes to here I'm
talking about the arc. I'm basically just feeding back that
I read the script you actually sent me and I
felt deeply for it, right, and here's why. And then
and then you want to go into all these times.
You can read a million things online that coach you
on like ways to talk about tone and ways to

(38:11):
talk about comparisons, and but ultimately, I think I guess
deeper than that, what you're doing is is sort of saying,
I really know how I would make this, and you're
finding clear ways to communicate that so that they can go,
oh wow, I really really see her version. I really
see her movie? Is it the movie I want to make?

(38:33):
In finance? And you can't control, you know, because what
I think otherwise the risk is I sold a vision
of a movie that I don't really deeply feel, and
they bought it, and now I have to make it
and I'm actually kind of disconnected. Now maybe you could
then like pour yourself into that version, but you're sort
of reverse engineering if it happens that way, if you

(38:54):
sell the thing you thought they wanted, and now you're
responsible for delivering it, you know. So that's the broad strokes.
I mean, you know, tone are all the pieces of
a pitch lucky position of getting to hang out with
you right before you pitched the L word and um
and reflected back some of the things I was hearing,
which was honestly a gift for me. It's great for me.

(39:17):
What stands out is you were struggling with how to
sort of find your way into talking about this version
compared to the last version of the L word, which
had had an impact on you, but you weren't sure
how to talk about it except to say that it
was great basically. Yeah. The personal piece, it's hard actually
to take right without kind of going off on some

(39:39):
personal we tell our story is something that comes up,
especially when I'm working with politicians. How do we put
the eye into it without feeling like we're a bragging
or be boring people with our personal lives. I sometimes
would say, I don't know where to stop or start,
like there's so much there feels like too much, right,
And I asked you one pointed question that was like, really,

(40:00):
where were you when you watched the first version of
the L word, and you you're one sentence response brought
in that you were abroad, brought in that you were
in film school, and brought in that you didn't know
you were gay yet, but that you saw something on
that screen that made you think I want that life.

(40:21):
So it ended up being I mean, you're you know,
sort of quick response to me ended up being the story.
That's right, that's true, and you helped me see that
I didn't know how to talk about all that stuff.
And it also felt, you know, the personal has to
be part of our our pitch and our story as
an artist. It just is you have to find a
way of weaving it in for yourself. Two. And that's

(40:45):
a hard place for me. Definitely, Definitely. I I can
default to like, well, I'm just going to do a
good job and you're not going to know I have feelings. Yep, yeah,
you're not going to know. I'm a person. I'm a robot.
I'm really creative. I'm a creative robot. But you can
turn on and turn me off. That's right, that's right.
And I will not emotionally because I'm so afraid of

(41:06):
being emotionally burdensome to someone. I think you know what
I mean, I think that's that's uh a fear women
have sometimes of just being that that that that won't
help them to bring those into the room, and they don't.
They often don't help them, I know from being the

(41:27):
boss and receiving interesting Yeah, I mean you have to
be so careful I think when you when you bring
in personal stuff to your work environment. You know, I
think that especially in film, it's such an intimate it's
such an intimate setting. You know, they're just they're do
have to be boundaries. So it's learning how to use

(41:47):
your story and your which contains emotion, you know, but
direct channel and channel it into your work in a
way that remains professional and powerful. Speak King of personal
What did it feel like to work on the l
words specifically? I mean, I think we're it's just we're
talking about representation, and we're talking about the screen as

(42:11):
a mirror, and we're talking about how when we see
ourselves represented, we like ourselves better, we can respect ourselves more. So.
I think the push to represent as many types of

(42:31):
people as possible, and I think this is happening at
every you know, people who aren't size six, people of color,
people who identify as in a range of gender identities.
I mean, I think it is a push for representation
that we're all talking about, and and that representation used

(42:54):
to mean, like in the nineties, representation meant literally one
person who looks that way, check great. And now we're
talking about the nuance of actual lived experience for me,
and for me that's perspective. And who makes that show,
Whose voice is that show, whose voice is the story,
who's telling that story? Is that story authentically from the

(43:15):
person who should be telling that story and representing that character?
And did you have any stuff during l word, specifically
when you were like, well, that doesn't ring true or
that doesn't feel right. I was. I had more moments
of like, oh my god, that's so true, you know,
holy sh it, oh god. I felt like that, like
I've I'm not. I felt like all the ways that
culture had never shown me back some things that I felt.

(43:36):
I feel a real sense of gratitude for being involved,
for exposing me to myself more two parts of myself
I may have hidden from myself, And I do wonder
I think, like, what would it have been like to
see that as a thirteen year old, fifteen year old? Okay,
we're gonna be back in just a minute with the
person stuff is brought in for us to hear. Okay,

(44:01):
we are back with stuff, and we're going to find
out whose voice she brought in for us. Steph, who
have you been thinking about when you asked this question?
I immediately thought of my Angelo. I cannot think of
a voice I'd rather listen to. Yeah, yeah, I have
a beautiful clip from her I could have chosen earlier

(44:24):
in her life. She has this absolutely stunning performance on
YouTube of her still I Rise poem, which everybody should
check out all link to it. But you specifically pointed
me towards an interview she did later in her life. Uh,
and we're gonna listen to a little tiny bit of
it right now. I learned by the time I was

(44:45):
eight that I loved the human voice. I loved it,
the actual sound of the voice speaking words. It just
means the earth to me, still does singing spoken. They
help us to distinguish ourselves from each other and with

(45:09):
each other, and help us to know where we really
are on this wayward floating motive matter in the universe.
I'm gonna cry like every time. I mean, she's absolutely stunning.
When I listened to Dr Maya Angelo. I found out

(45:32):
it's called She. She pronounced Angelo in this thank you,
this piece, I mean think it's a lesson for all
of us. Um, when I think about her, I think
about this thing. I've said for years that your voice
reflects your life experience, which you know, I say because
it's true. But we when we listen to somebody, especially
in the later part of their life, talking like this,

(45:54):
you know what we hear in her voice, everything from
her accent, which surely shifted throughout her life and is
surely a collection of everywhere that she's lived, including you know,
she spent some time in Egypt and Ghana, and that
doesn't necessarily even mean that you pick up the accent
of those places as much as you go through the
experience of needing to be understood in a foreign land.

(46:16):
And what that is to realize that the words that
you're saying require, you know, a heightened level of communication
and makes make sure that you're not misunderstood, Um when
the culture is so different. And then obviously there's this
pace that she has that we can all learn from
that not only suggests a lack of arms and a

(46:37):
general appreciation of language, which I'm going to talk about
as well, but also a real sense that I'm trying
to do it myself now. I'm noticing a real sense
that the way that her authority comes out is in
knowing that she has the floor, and that is something
that most of us are still grappling with. And part

(47:00):
of the reason I was looking back actually at the
still I Rise poem is it's from a lot longer
ago that performance of hers, and I wanted to find
it's hard to find on YouTube, but I wanted to
find something from her even much much much earlier. But
you know, she she's a PhD. She's she's been in
positions of power for a very long time, or she

(47:20):
was rather by the time she died, And so I
wonder what, you know, the experience was of getting there.
But but when we all got to know her internationally,
she already was at the point where you know, clearly
in every example we have, she doesn't use ums. And
and the reason we do ums is because we're saying,
I'm still collecting my thought and please let me keep

(47:40):
the floor. And so then the other half of it,
which you know, you and I were talking about in
the break, is the content of what she's saying here
is her love of language, but that also comes out
in the form and the fact that every single word
feels like it's unwated and is done justice right. And
for someone to have come up through, you know, the

(48:03):
levels of trauma that she did and to have gotten
to that point, I think it is part of what
people respond to in her. So just the act of
like opening her mouth and talking. Besides what's coming out,
the act of the way that she talks makes people say,
maybe I can do that too, maybe I can get
to that point. And we hear all of that in
her voice. What do you think is that why it

(48:26):
sounds It's like it feels like every time she speaks,
it's it's speech, it's a poem, it's a song, it's
has rhythm, it has power. I think paces it's so true,
there's a confidence. Yeah yeah, and I'm trying not to
use yeah yeah and just let myself pause at the stuff.

(48:52):
But yeah, I mean, the word aspirational doesn't even cover
this completely. It's it's an interesting lesson because you know,
it is earned for her, and prior to that, I'm
sure it didn't feel that way. I mean, I'm god
I wish I could ask her about She talks a
lot about publicly, or to put in past tense, which
is very depressing. She spoke publicly a lot about the

(49:15):
fact that she didn't talk for five years in her
youth and then read voraciously throughout. But but and what
that was to come out of her self imposed silence,
and what version of her you know, was was alive
then compared to this version of her that we that
we you know, have captured much more. And that makes

(49:38):
me think about listening as how she partially how she
learned to speak, you know, because reading constantly and listening
constantly for five years, you know, completely. And yeah, I
said in an earlier podcast, the other half of permission
to speak is permission to listen her permission to be quiet, right,

(50:00):
permission to be quiet, because I guess there's a feeling
that I think you're so right that please let me
keep the floor, please please hear me, please see me.
There can be a desperation in that that actually drains
your power. And she talks all about I mean, courage
comes up, courage to not talk all the time. I
mean also in public speaking, like in a in a

(50:22):
more technical way. This comes up as the power of
the pause, which is also another way of saying, don't
use them so much. But the power of the pause
is something that it's hard. You have to practice, and
you have to practice knowing that that one thing you
just said is going to land well enough that you
don't have to fill in the pause that's about to
ensue with a try again, and to try again and

(50:43):
to try again. That's hard, and also part of what's
hard about it is the courage part of it. The
other part is that it may not be the case.
You may actually need to rephrase what you just said
because it didn't land, and you may be actually picking
up with like your spidy set that the audience isn't
with you. So it's not like the pause is always

(51:05):
the right answer. But if we never use it, we'll
never know. How do I how do if I said
I want to you know, there's my you know, I
want to just cultivate stronger qualities in my speaking, pausing, listening.
How do I be like my not um you know,

(51:25):
have her life experience. No, what you're really what what
we're really saying? What I'm what I My real answer
is you must sound like staff? You must sound like
the strongest and most love yourself version of Staff and
that is for all of us obviously, um, but my
other aunts, because there really wasn't to mya before my
you know there there's no there's no one even close. No.

(51:48):
But also but also that she probably didn't have the
perfect uh you know, archetype to emulate, and that just
wasn't the point. And she said, you, I'm going to
probably butcher this, but you can't do better till you
know better, right right about her own evolution and change,

(52:08):
which has now become like an Oprah is m because
I think she said it too Oprah and over was like, well,
that's a good one. She's a huge inspiration to Oprah.
Who is you know, such an inspiration to so many. Yeah,
but there you go, I mean, And and also really,
you know, um, I'm sure that there were there. There
clearly were people in Maya's life who were those you know,

(52:31):
archetypes of power to her. She talks about her grandmother's
talks about her uncle Willie. I imagine it was not
in a way where where what she thought was I
want to sound like them. I think it was really
I want to sound like the most like profound version
of myself exactly. And the other half of your question

(52:51):
is for people who do want to work on what
it would be like to umless or fill in the blank.
I mean, it doesn't have to be UM. It can
be you know, or it can be uh, not just
a tick of phrase, but like a way that we
continue to fill in silence. I think the best thing
there is two things. One acknowledge that there's going to

(53:12):
be an element of self consciousness going into this. You
cannot avoid that. And self consciousness does not have to
equal paralyze paralyzation A. So just just know that for yourself,
be um, record yourself and listen back. And no one
likes to look you know, disclaimer, no one likes to
listen to the sound of their voice. And that's like
a culturally agreed to pump thing. I'd love to change it.
I'd love everyone to just decide. Maybe I do. Maybe

(53:35):
it's just a learning tool, Maybe it's just you know,
it's one of the things, like the way my hands work,
that is a communication unit, and I should and I
should embrace it. But I just want to say that
when we listen back to ourselves, we can start to
notice what those things are and maybe even say the
same phrase that we said when we were making that
recording for ourselves telling you know, some story or telling
something about our past, and try saying the same thing

(53:57):
but without the in between sounds and just feel that discomfort,
because getting better at not saying um is about getting
better with feeling that discomfort and not doing anything about it.
That is such good advice and we all can do
that now with our iPhone. Voice Memo is like that
the app that shows up on everybody's Apple phone, regardless

(54:17):
of if you want it, because how often do you
speak to people say do they know what they sound like?
And then it's like, do I know what I sound like?
It's really good? Well, And the other thing is, you know,
talk to friends, get reflections from people, work with a
voice coach, whatever. But the stuff that that we can
feel empowered to do on our own, there is just
that little hurdle over the top of the self consciousness

(54:39):
aspect of it and the you know, opinions that are
going to come up about your own voice. But if
you're serious about you know, wanting to evolve your voice
in some way, like let's be honest, those are things
we can handle, they will feel icky. Light a candle,
trust yourself. Know that, like you know, we all this
is like such a universal that our voice feels different,

(54:59):
our voice, it sounds different on the outside than it
sounds in our own head. That is anatomy, you know.
I mean, how many people listen to their own voicemail message,
you know, twelve times before they stick with one yeah,
and then end up with one that doesn't sound anything
like us, because we're like this one sounds the most
like somebody that I would want to hear. Hello, you've
reached Steph Green. I don't know what business you are promoting, right,

(55:23):
Sometimes you hear people's voicemail and you that sounds nothing
like that. I might be guilty of that. Now that
we're saying this, I should go back and listen and
record like the most authentic version of my voice, the
most profound quote unquote tomorrows end up for yourself version
of your voice. It is. It is a thing. It
is a thing. Steph. Thank you for bringing in Dr
Maya Angelo. Thank you for teaching me more about her

(55:44):
incredible voice. Oh my god, I'm always happy to think
about her. Thank you. Thank you to Steph Green for
coming in. You can find out more about her in
the show notes or on our website Formission to Speak
pot dot com, where you can also go right now
and send me any questions you have about your own voice,
any feedback from these episodes, anything that doesn't make sense

(56:06):
or doesn't feel like it fits for you, anything that's
coming up during this bizarro quarantine time in terms of
using zoom or you know, Instagram Live, or any any
sources that you're using for getting your own voice out there.
Let's talk. We're gonna do a mail bag episode coming

(56:27):
right up, and I want to answer as many questions
as I can about what's really going on with you,
with your voice, with your sense of power, and how
all those things interconnect, because we need good people in
power now. Guys like right now. Also feel free to
send d M s or voice memos to our Instagram
a Permission to Speak pod, where we're posting a bunch

(56:49):
of content and please join the community. Thanks as well
to Sophie Lichterman and the team at I Heart Radio,
to Megan Read, to my family and cohort, and to
all of you. We're recording this podcast in the I
Heart Radio studios in Hollywood on land that used to
belong to the Tongva indigenous tribe, and you can visit

(57:09):
U S d A C dot us to learn more
about honoring native land. Permission to Speak is a production
of I Heart Radio and Double Vision Executive produced by
Katherine Burke Canton and Mark Canton. For more podcasts from
my Heart Radio, listen on the ihart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your favorite shows.