![]() ![]() And then, I was an actor when I was young. And so, we figured out roughly where the interesting camera blocking opportunities were. I'd love to share some of the rules we came up with for the visual language. So I went to the space with my DP before we even invited actors and just said, "Where do we want to set these tables that they're at? Where do we want the judges? Do we want observers in the room? Where are the good angles? And how can we use the space?" And by putting them where we put them, we were able to allow Neera to have this opportunity that became our cinematic language of when she pushes the camera versus when the camera's retreating from her. The way we overcame the challenges of that was, I rehearsed it like a play. And tracking, "Okay, where are we in the story? Where are we emotionally?" I think for the most part, we got to shoot it in sequence, which I really like to do, because it's just better for the actors, better for performance. That's a really long time to be in one location, where everyone's wearing the same costume every single day. Any courtroom episode is challenging because there's so much coverage in one location that you have to keep it interesting and moving, despite being a very talky episode, right? And so, we were in our courtroom, I feel like we were in there seven days, six or seven days. Valerie Weiss: Yeah, I think it's always challenging. You have an amazing cast, you have a great script by Dana Horgan, as you said, Take me through a little bit of the process of putting the episode together. I would love to know what challenges you faced directing this episode. Because I want to, and I care about you in this franchise. I think I just felt like I have a job to do, and I'm going to knock it out of the park for you guys. And Henry and Akiva and Dana, who wrote the episode, and Chris Fisher, who hired me, they were so supportive the whole time, and accessible, and available for questions or to talk about what was really important in this episode that I don't know that I felt nervous. And so, I don't know that I felt pressure other than the pressure I always feel as a director to do my best. ![]() So it was just the perfect match of what I love to do. I was like, "Oh, my God, I get to do this?" I was so excited.Īnd for me, as a director, I feel like something I love doing is taking idea and theme and marrying it with character, and dramatizing it that way. But then to watch "Measure of a Man" and "The Menagerie" and see how deep they go into ethics and morality, and should be judging who. And so I was familiar with that style of storytelling. ![]() Suits, and Bull, and For The People, and How to Get Away with Murder. And I learned in my interview, and when I got this episode, that this was a canonical subgenre of Star Trek, which excited me. To be totally honest, I wasn't very familiar with Star Trek before doing it. When you got the Una trial episode, were you like, "Whoa!" Did you feel pressure to live up to that? There aren't that many, but they're always so highly regarded. The courtroom drama is a pretty revered subgenre within Star Trek. I'm just so honored and thrilled that I got to do this episode. And not just to be compared favorably to them but, like you said, many people have said what you said, which is 'best episode since the 90s.' I mean, it's just icing on the cake, right? You don't even think about that. Like, you know, you're going to be compared to the other episodes, which are phenomenal, some of the best Trek work out there. It was just a blast to make it and then have it come out and get that kind of response. I did two shows before this, and he's the one who recommended me for the job. Getting to do that, work with this phenomenal crew, work with Benji Bakshi, who's a collaborator, the DP. ![]() And so, for me, getting to tell a story that can reach so many people through such an epic franchise that is about something so essential to being human, ironically, because it's about whether you're human or not, but this idea of how we connect and how we treat each other. We live in a world that has so much repair we need to do that I feel like you're taking up space on this Earth if you're not trying to make it a better place. And so, part of why I left science to direct film and television was I felt like I had something to say. I mean, literally, one of my most fun experiences. I was so excited to be hired, and then had so much fun making it. ![]()
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