Musicbed Podcast #006 with Director Lloyd Lee Choi on the Creative Power of Uncertainty

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Show Notes

Lloyd Lee Choi — https://www.lloydleechoi.com/

Same Old — https://www.imdb.com/title/tt16226770/

Norm Li — http://norm-li.com/

Division7 — https://www.divisionseven.com/

Atlanta — https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4288182/

Tár — https://www.imdb.com/title/tt14444726/

City of God — https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0317248/

Hirokazu Koreeda — https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0466153/

Musicbed Podcast — https://linktr.ee/musicbed

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Episode #006 Transcript

Lloyd

You did that a lot on your feature film, your low-budget feature.

Christian

Well, no, we had the luxury of being timecoded.

Lloyd

Fancy, fancy.

Christian

What are you working on at the moment?

Lloyd

Oh, man, I mean, commercial wise, it’s funny because I haven’t done a commercial since last November. I took a very conscious break for this year. I mean, now I need to work because I need to make a living and pay rent in Brooklyn. But you know, I took a very conscious effort to step away. 2021 was my busiest year by far. And, I’m like, I need to step away and really commit to the next step for me. And that’s the unknown of features and TV. And so I did a couple short films, one in 2021 called ‘Same Old’ and that’s had a surprising run in the festivals. What was it like going to Cannes with that? Did you did you actually get to go?  I did. Yeah, it was a trip. It was, you know, it was my first film festival. My first film festival ever. It was a trip.

Christian

It’s all downhill from there.

Lloyd

You know, I think it was an affirming process because and a joyful one, you know, a lot of my friends from Canada came and the people I really started out with and some of the cast and crew. It was like a celebration over a week.

Christian

It’s a daunting place to be, at Cannes. There’s so much reverence there for films in general.

Lloyd

It’s cool. You know, they really do love movies, and you feel this energy. Every festival, there’s definitely an energy, which just kind of keeps you going in some ways. You know, it’s such a hard, lonely process. And sometimes you need to experience that energy.

Christian

And it’s French. So it feels more important. 

Lloyd

Yeah, I mean, but it is like a lottery too, right? With a lot of the festivals, it’s really cool to get in, but [there are] so many rejections as well. You’ve got to think of the process of how they choose your film. It’s through thousands of applicants. It’s the lighting at the time they watch your film, how are they feeling personally—there are so many aspects to your film being chosen. When I got the call for Cannes I thought, ‘this is a scam. There’s no way. The odds of getting in… there’s no way we actually got in.’ 

Christian

 So, they call you? They don’t try to email you?

Lloyd

Yeah, they actually had to email me. Funny story: I was actually filming my second short film this past May, and I kept getting this call on set from this random number—this +33 number. I’m thinking, ‘oh, it’s just another scam caller.’ I kept declining it, like four or five times over three days. They probably know, too, that they have to keep at it. And then he emailed saying, ‘Hey, why aren’t you answering your phone call? I want to talk to you.’ And then I called him back and he said, ‘we’d love to accept you into the program,’ and I’m like, ‘Oh, wow, incredible.’ But in the back of my head, I’m thinking this is still a sca—a really elaborate scam to get my social security number and to take all the money that I’m bleeding through not having worked for so long. And so the producer and I did like a little background check. We googled him to make sure it wasn’t a very well orchestrated scam. The chances of getting in are so small and we feel so lucky to get in. It opens so many doors, but we were rejected by so many festivals before that point to get into Canada.

Christian

Isn’t that crazy? Because you would think ‘if I get into Cannes, that it should be sort of a shoe-in.’ But it just goes to show the craziness of the festival world.

Lloyd

It is so, so subjective.

Christian

What did you think that they saw in your short that made it stand out?

Lloyd

I think they did a really good job. When you watch all nine films together in the program, it’s a really well-orchestrated encapsulation and portrait of stories around the world. It really felt like a global screening in a really beautiful way. That was actually probably one of the best creations that I saw, having toured the festivals a bit.

Christian

So you said that you’re moving into maybe trying to make it a feature, right? 

Lloyd

Yeah. Give me the gap between going to Cannes, TIFF, and all these other festivals. Did somebody approach you? How did that all work? After we did the short film, I immediately started thinking about the feature adaptation and the possibilities of the story. I felt we didn’t really fully dig into this character in this world. And I was craving a little more time. After Canada, it became more of a reality like, ‘oh, I think this is a great proof of concept.’ I think producers and production companies can see the possibilities of this feature. So that’s when I really kicked it into overdrive to write the script. And it took a few months to write it. But yeah, it’s still a process, having made your first film. It’s a many year long journey.

Christian

I don’t think you ever stop writing. 

Lloyd

Yeah, true. I mean, the script is interesting. I really do treat it like a blueprint. I don’t get too precious about some of the dialogue. As long as like the framework is there, the overall story and structure is there as a blueprint, and you can schedule properly. I think that’s all I care about.

Christian

Did you know there was a chance it could be a feature?

Lloyd

I think the film came from just being pent up from the pandemic and quarantine and having shot so many commercials in a row. I needed just to make something for myself. And I never really imagined it as a feature. When we made the short initially, in the process of pre-pro and production, I wanted to just get this done—I just wanted to get this out of me first. When we finally wrapped and released the film and got the reaction, it gave me the extra juice to keep going with this and to expand the story a little more. For me, it just started with me messaging a good friend of mine—Norm Li, the DP—and saying, ‘Let’s just shoot a movie. We’re both here in New York, and we have nothing to do. You have a camera, you have a tripod, let’s just go make something. Let’s not wait around and be precious about it.’

Christian

I feel like that’s probably an issue with a lot of people, where it needs to be this scale.

Lloyd

You really just have to do it. I was almost too precious about trying to get perfect past projects, and they never get made. I’m sort of kicking myself not making something sooner. I think a lot of people  look down on short films a little bit. It’s like either make big budget commercials or music videos or feature films, and the short films are to the side. But for me, it’s really such a beautiful exercise—honing your craft and making mistakes.

Christian

Do you get upset when you see people spending $100,000 on a short?

Lloyd

If you have the money, go for it.

Christian

When I hear that, I think ‘why don’t you just make a feature? You don’t think you can make a movie for $100,000? Go make a feature.’ I don’t know. To each their own.

Lloyd

Yeah. I mean, it’s tough. Even the idea of making a feature for $100,000 grand right now seems pretty daunting. 

Christian

When you look at the feature, what is your ideal situation? 

Lloyd

Probably 100 days, about $10 million. Maybe half a scene a day. That’s that’s the dream. Like those Nolan movies—they got 100+ days.

Christian

They’re probably doing a scene every two days.

Lloyd

Yeah. They talk about some scenes taking like a week to shoot, which are huge orchestrations and stunts. And so I get that. But I don’t know, it’s funny. When you go from commercials and short form to features, there’s a lot of uncertainty on how your body can take it.

Christian

Let me pick your brain on the commercial side a little bit. Who are you signed with?

Lloyd

Division7. 

Christian

What do you think was the turning point in your work versus getting the boards you want to see? 

Lloyd

It comes in waves. There’s always cycles and chapters where you have a ton of work coming in. And then there’s periods where you’re losing everything. I imagine every director goes through that. I think the turning point was when I took more chances on the PSAs. The work that really moved my reel, and the needle for me was the really low-budget stuff that I didn’t get paid for. It just gave you a little more creative freedom, and I think it showed my chops and what I can do as a storyteller and what I wanted to do in the commercial world. When you go to a much higher budget level, there’s a lot more voices, and there’s a lot less freedom. What the agency pitches to the client is what’s expected. You’re coming in so late to the process. You’re really there just to execute a vision and really do as much as you can to make it the best it can be. But it’s really their project, you know?

Christian

How do you feel about the idea about getting paid for treatments? Can this happen in our lifetime?

Lloyd

Yeah. This needs to be a thing. Commercial directors, we get compensated if we win a job. But there are periods where I’ve lost 6 to 8, 10 jobs in a row. And that’s like 10 weeks of my life that is unpaid. It’s a lot of work that goes into treatment. It’s a lot of writing and feedback and building the treatment, image selection…

Christian

Getting on calls, which is the most daunting stuff. 

Lloyd

Exactly. And pitching and everything. It’d be amazing to change that system and process where the director and production company gets compensated even just a little bit. It doesn’t have to be much.

Christian

It’s not like you’re asking for $10,000. Just like, a couple grand. 

Lloyd

Even $1,000 would be amazing. I think that shows a level of respect for work and for idea generation. You’re definitely helping the agency as well, to finetune their own concept.

Christian

Can you mention what you were talking about earlier, when you saw something that was very clearly from your treatment? Without naming names? 

Lloyd

Sure. Every director goes through this, where you pitch an idea. And you’re offering a lot of different ideas, whether it’s music, location, casting story beats, whatever it is. And sometimes you see those little details in the final spot—the song choice that you put in there, or that that very exciting story element you add into the into the script. And then it suddenly appears in the final spot that you don’t win. It’s always interesting.

Christian

It’s not like they’re taking the idea of whip pans or something. It’s specific—very specific.

Lloyd

This is probably happened to me half a dozen times over the last six or seven years. Sometimes maybe it’s not even intentional. Maybe they already had that idea and then me saying that scene idea was affirmation for them. I’m not saying they’re actively stealing, No one’s actually stealing—maybe subconsciously—but I’m sure there are instances where they love the song that I offered up and they’re going with that.

Christian

I’ve also experienced this where they bring three directors into pitch, and then it just goes away all of a sudden for everybody. It’s sometimes it feels llike the idea isn’t cooked enough and they’re going out for idea without maybe the intention of completing the whole thing. It’s a little bit unfair for the production companies as well.

Lloyd

It’s a lot of free work put in from the producers. They’re bidding, they’re going back and forth with the agency producer, trying to get the budget under their level as well. And at the same time in tandem, you have the co creative team, the designers, the director, everyone working together to make this thing, offering all these ideas and all of this time and effort. And you know, they may never even show the client your treatment. It’s a weird, funny game that I hope evolves to where the agencies or clients can compensate a little bit to every production company pitching, so everyone is paid a little bit out of their giant budgets.

Christian

It could just be a line item, as long as it’s a simple line. I’m sure they’re paying for people to cost consult. You have the budget within your budget—put $10,000 aside for three pitches.

Lloyd

Which is miniscule—it’s nothing for a million dollar budget.

Christian

It’s like a tip. 

Lloyd

It’s less than a tip actually. 

Christian

It’s a nice gesture, I’ll say that. I do wonder if at the end of losing 8-10 pitches in a row, you start to wonder if you want to work as hard the next time.

Lloyd

I find that the ones where you go in and the work they want is clearly on your reel and you expect to maybe have a better chance at those, I don’t win. Actually the ones I tend to win are the ones where I’m a little more uncertain. I’m offering some unique ideas or different angles to this concept that they’ve been living with for so long. I think they’re just refreshed by this new take. I find that’s often the case. It obviously depends on the agency and what they want in the end. But I always try to sus out how open they are to a little bit of a change, or my ideas coming in, or how much freedom there is in this concept. Sometimes on the call when it’s like, ‘Nope, this is it. The storyboard has been tested. We can’t change anything’—even then I’ll offer some ideas, but I won’t lean as heavily on those new ideas. But it’s music to my ears when I hear the agency say, ‘we want your take, we want to see what else is out there, adifferent point of view into the story.’ And that’s where I shine as a director: the new ideas and the ideation process. I’ll probably care more about it if I can bring in my own vision and ideas into what they’ve been working on for so long. But in terms of winning, it’s a crapshoot. You have no idea. Sometimes I feel like I do an amazing pitch and it doesn’t go our way. Sometimes I feel like I do a terrible pitch and we happen to win it. 

Christian

Are you pretty high-anxiety person?

Lloyd

I just learned I have ADHD, which is funny. I can never focus on anything. That has been my biggest issue for so long—my wandering brain. It just kind of goes everywhere all at once. And I learned that so much later in life. My brain doesn’t function normally.

Christian

Did they try to get you on medication immediately?

Lloyd

No, I gotta do testing. But you know, I feel like doing a lot of reading, too. And also my aunt telling me, like 10 years ago that I do have ADHD. She’s a pharmacist. Before pitch calls, weirdly, it’s about just trying to focus on that specific thing that I want to get across. Just sitting like half an hour before the call, reading the treatment again. Then just almost rehearsing the first, like, minute of the call, just like what I’m going to open with.

Christian

Because once you get in your flow, you’re good.

Lloyd

Exactly. Then it just comes naturally. But it’s usually the first minute that I really try to rehearse a little bit and just get that conversation going. That’s really what I try to focus on. 

Christian

I can imagine that there’s one central nugget in the treatment. That is probably your take that you feel is different from everybody else—what you find important to what they brought you.

Lloyd

That’s something I’ve learned over the years—going with a very specific angle, like one, two or maybe three things that they’ll remember about you and that pitch. It could be visual. It could be the way that sound is prevalent and how the sound is going to support the story. Or the camera work specifically: wide-angle, up close, or long lens, further away, observational look. How do you make them remember you and those key points immediately? That’s helped me a lot in terms of pitching. 

Christian

What would you say is the most frustrating part of pitching?

Lloyd

I feel like all of it is hard in a lot of ways. It’s all surprising. It’s always different, which is what I love about the job. I’m way more confident than five years ago in terms going on set, talking to agencies, and really having that deeper collaboration. Sometimes you deal with big egos and that’s always tough for me. I have a very chill set. I like to have everyone on the same level—there’s no distinct power dynamic. Obviously, there’s a hierarchy and that has to be there. But I like a very chill, no yelling set, and sometimes you will have that personality coming in. I find that’s sometimes challenging.

Christian

Do you do anything on set in terms of setting that mood?

Lloyd

I like keeping the crew happy. That’s a big thing for me—keeping everyone from the PA to the first AD happy and joyful. I mean, we’re making commercials—we should be having fun doing this. You’re pushing the creative, you’re trying to make the best thing possible. Sometimes people forget the joy of this job and how much fun it can be. It’s the little things: crafty has to be good, catering has to be good…

Christian

I’ve been on a lot of sets, and I can remember my favorite because of the crafty. It was on a Cole Webley set in Utah. He had me come to like, second-unit stuff for this Christmas spot. There was this crafty service that would walk around with platters. They come into set and whisper in your ear: ‘Would you like some fruit? We have strawberries and apples.’ 

Lloyd

And you whisper back as well. There’s an energy to the whisper—I feel like it’s so powerful.

Christian 

It’s weird how hospitality goes so far.

Lloyd  23:06

It’s a hard job. You’re on your feet all day, grinding for five, six days a week. If budget allows, I love to have that extra snack at the end of the day, like an ice cream truck or coffee cart. One time I ordered dumplings for everyone. I like to bring in the Asian culture as much as I can and give people something they may never have had before. This is all budget dependent but if I can do it, I’ll do it. Just that little thing of appreciation goes a long way. 

Christian

Do you have trouble coming down off of jobs?

Lloyd

Definitely. It’s such a high. The commercial grind is like dopamine hits all the time. You’re just pitching, losing, winning, going on set, flying around. It was hard for me to take a step back from commercials, and take a very conscious effort to just write and be alone and live life a little bit. I think that grind can almost make you forget about time, in a weird way. I think like 2021 I just blitzed by. I don’t even remember most of it because I was just working. So this year, I got to appreciate time a little more and a little more peace. And it was a bit more soul fulfilling for me to write and develop my own things. 

Christian

Yeah, it’s hard for me to get home and not immediately just start working on something.

Lloyd

Yeah, yeah, for sure. I mean, that’s why that beer after long shoot days is the best thing in the world. 

Christian

Totally. You’re about to move to L.A., right? How long have you lived here?

Lloyd

For six years. Yeah, I think it’s just a change of pace. The weather. Obviously the industry is there. The thing that scares me a little bit about L.A. is everyone’s in the industry, which is a little nerve wracking. I think I appreciate New York City for its diversity in that aspect. But you know, I have a lot of great friends there. I would love to get a dog. As I transition into film and TV, it just feels like it makes sense, even if it’s a temporary move for three to six months, a year, two years, whatever it is. I never had a chance to live there and never had a chance to really explore and network and meet the right people over there. 

Christian

Do you have a TV show—could be already done with, canceled, whatever—that you would like to direct? 

Lloyd

I think everyone says ‘Atlanta.’

Christian

Of course. Yeah. Do you know Hiro [Murai]?

Lloyd

I don’t. I admire him a lot—he’s an incredible director. ‘Severance’ I thought was brilliant. It’s funny, with TV it’s really what’s top of mind. I don’t remember anything anymore. How do you feel about this? I feel like I forget everything after a day. 

Christian

With TV?

Lloyd

With eveything. I feel like with the pace everything’s going, everyone’s just going to forget.

Christian

You were talking telling me about ‘Tár’ that you saw recently. And there’s movies like that, that for some reason can imprint on your brain immediately. Like, really deeply. You know what I mean? Like the first time I saw ‘Y tu mamá también.’ Or even ‘The Square,’ which is a more recent movie. I’ll never forget that.

Lloyd

With a movie, you have more of like a finite emotional journey. Begin, middle, end, and then you finish it and you remember that feeling. People who take swings and are just originally creating something a little more daring—those are the ones that I remember more, even it doesn’t fully hit at that moment. ‘Tár’ is a great example. I think it’s a masterpiece. People may not like it, people will love it, but it’s such a distinct film—something I’ve never seen before, and I remember those. And ‘The Square,’ and ‘Triangle of Sadness.’ It just goes in very unexpected ways. 

Christian

I love that you said ‘Atlanta’ because I feel like there are some episodes of ‘Atlanta’ that give me that same feeling. Especially in the last season. The first season felt more like TV show-ish. I think they were still maybe getting their bearings. But this last season and it felt like everything was so singular. Even shows like ‘The Bear’ with one-tick episodes, where one is going to not be the restaurant at all. It’s like you can attach almost like a movie does.  And how many one-shot episodes they’re going to be after ‘The Bear?’ Everyone’s going to try to do episode seven of ‘The Bear.’ Well, didn’t they get it from ‘True Detective?’ 

Lloyd

Oh, that one sequence in a season? Yeah. That felt like a movie to me—’The Bear,’ specifically. It felt like a four-hour movie. I think a lot of shows will probably try to emulate that more finite feeling.

Christian

Why do you think there’s a lot of TV shows that are typically 55 minutes now going for 30 minutes? Shows like ‘The Patient’ on FX.

Lloyd

It’s like 20 minutes an episode.

Christian

It’s like a short film. 

Lloyd

Yeah, they’re like little episode short films.

Christian

Sometimes I feel like that can be frustrating for the audience. Sometimes it is frustrating for me. Sometimes I’m like, ‘that took you 22 minutes?’

Lloyd

There are some episodes they just stretch it out over 60 minutes. I appreciate the shorter, tighter storytelling, but you’re right. 

Christian

Which is why I love ‘The Bear.’ It was just in your face from the first second.

Lloyd

I appreciate that show so much because they jump so far into the action. They don’t explain anything until way later—you’re just right in it. And the information is slowly trickled out and I appreciate that. I don’t want to be told everything. I think audience members are so smart now, having watched so much TV, so much film. I think everyone in the world knows story structure—even if they don’t know it—on a very conscious level. Subconsciously, they know the storybeat, the midpoint, the inciting incident, all that stuff. So how do you subvert that a little bit? How do you change that? How do you surprise people? 

Christian

Do you have a canon of directors that you find yourself emulating?

Lloyd

The film that got me into filmmaking was ‘City of God,’ which is like the most immersive, insane experience I’ve had watching a movie. I was younger when I saw it, and that really made me love movies. It just opened up a whole world that sort of surprised me, and I knew nothing about. And so I really got into foreign films after that—just really started soaking in all the Asian cinema, French, Italian, everything. I definitely gravitate towards those filmmakers. I love Hirokazu Koreeda. He’s like, a fucking master. Just like the way he can let scenes play out and you’re just watching humanity unfold in such unexpected but really nuanced, simple ways. I hope to get there one day. That’s my North Star—that level of storytelling where it doesn’t have to be big and brash all the time. It’s just so simple and finite and small, which is really hard to do. I’m realizing where you don’t show as much information and leave it open to interpretation—that’s the hardest filmmaking. That’s master-level filmmaking. ‘Tár’ is a great example of that.

Christian

To be the ambiguous and loose, and to know that the audience is also connecting with it, that it’s not just getting lost in some, that’s very difficult. There’s a lot of faith to that.

Lloyd

Yeah. But then I want to make a ‘Boogie Nights.’ I want to do a ‘There Will Be Blood,’ which is like big, bold filmmaking as well. So I think maybe there’s a there’s a middle ground there. 

Christian

I get so jealous of directors who have committed to period pieces. God, that’s so much funding.

Lloyd

I just imagine trying to build an oil rig. And literally having in an inpractical way, this black sludge shooting out. You write that, and then as a director, how do you shoot this? How do you do that? 

Christian

That’s a good point. How did he do that? You don’t even think about it!

Lloyd

How do you, as a writer and a director, direct your own stuff? It’s a funny process, because I write something and I don’t think about it. It’s like, ‘oh, this is right for the story.’ But then when you’re shooting it, and you’re directing it, and you’re trying to make it and you’re like, ‘Why did I write this? Like, this is such a dumb, hard idea. Who is this dumb writer?’

Christian

I just got through with a short film that takes place underneath the bed. Probably 90% of it is from the perspective of someone underneath the bed. There’s a scene where you never see these people, but they’re in the room and you see their feet. And we’re shooting like 360 underneath this bed, and had very little money, just enough to pay people to come and do it. And I thought when I was writing that, that it would be very easy, because we’re just this other one perspective. As long as I can figure out how to do that, then I could shoot a lot because we’re just right here. But as soon as my DP Steve Condrey came in, he was like, ‘you got to cut it in half. You gotta let me get a camera underneath there.’ So what we did figure out—which I’m sure after I say this, people are going to rip it because it’s like right there in front of everybody—but we ended up just going to Bed Bath & Beyond, buying a lazy Susan, and stripping the Alexa. Everything’s on its sides, there’s a top handle. Make it as short as possible, then put on the Lazy Susan. And then you can go 360 just doing this, and it’s very smooth. Especially if you get a marble one, not the wood.

Lloyd

That’s when you know you have money.

Christian

But you’re right, you’re writing this stuff. And you’re like, ‘this is gonna be so easy.’ I feel like the more simple things are the harder things.

Lloyd

 I agree. 

Christian

Which is annoying, because they should be simple.

Lloyd

But weirdly enough, when it’s hard, just go to Bed Bath & Beyond. I feel like the solution to all problems in film is Bed Bath & Beyond. Do you find that sometimes the equipment and gadgets are too much?

Christian

Of course.

Lloyd

All you need is a camera and a tripod or whatever, or a dolly. But do you really need some of the toys for everything?

Christian

Exactly. I mean, because there was a way to do it, you know, but it was cutting the bed in half. You could put a dolly underneath there and whatever, but I couldn’t cut a bed in half. That is the more expensive version of the thing. You have a bed cut this way, you have bed cut long ways, and you have a bed cut the other long ways, and then you could like just flag off everything else. But that’s too expensive.

Lloyd

And it limits you quite a bit too, in terms of your point of view. 

Christian

Even if I had the money, I would have still done the lazy Susan. Or maybe build one that’s motorized. That’s maybe what I’d spend the money on. 

Lloyd

And then you could sit in the chair and then just control it.

Christian

Go left, go right.

Lloyd

That’s the dream, man.

Christian

Alright, thank you so much for being here.

Lloyd

Thank you for having me. I appreciate your beanie, by the way. Beanie brothers.

Christian

I should have said that at the beginning.

Lloyd

Beanie brothers.