I learned about making films by going into advertising, making commercials.
Ridley Scott's company makes great work in whatever arena, whether it's movies or commercials or television. They just do really quality stuff, so you know it's going to be quality.
The first interview I went on I got at age 5. It was a commercial for First Federal Bank.
I flew to New York to do a commercial back in the day when people could meet you at the gate, and the little agent when I came off the plane said, 'Oh, Miss Carr, we are so happy to have you here.' I went, 'Oh, for goodness sakes.'
The more I learn and grow, the more I feel fulfilled, and even if I'm shooting a commercial for a car or a computer, I try to deliver a filmmaker's point of view where I can learn from the experience. Then I really enjoy it.
A year after winning the Oscar, almost to the day, I was directing a dog food commercial.
I always admire people who do commercials because they have to put together a beginning, a middle, and an end in 30 seconds.
Every few years when it's been another five years that have passed and I haven't made a film and the depression starts taking over totally, I allow myself to do a commercial. And then I feel really dirty and get to work promptly.
I work in film, TV, commercials and do live PR stunts for companies. A lot of my time is spent reading scripts and looking at designing sequences, speaking to directors and producers about how they want the sequences to look, how they will work and budgeting those stunts.
The first job I did was Volkswagen, we shot it in Long Beach, and it was like they won multiple awards with it and they were super excited about it and that kind of launched me into the world of commercials. Still most of what I do is car-related stuff.
I was painting sets, working in editorial as an assistant, driving their trucks, lying that I knew how to drive a truck, and doing commercials and documentaries.
I'm uncomfortable doing commercials.
I walked in thinking, 'I have ten movies under my belt and now they want me to go back to making commercials?' I said, if I do that, I want it to be funny.
I didn't really like doing commercials.
I think I did a couple of test commercials that didn't even make it on the air. That's how little I had really done. I knew almost nothing about the camera. In fact, I actually did know nothing about the camera.
My first flight was in my early 20s, from New York City to Los Angeles, to shoot a Cherry 7-UP commercial.
One of the reasons why I agreed to do commercials is that they gave me complete freedom. I just had to have the car in it and write a story around it. I wanted to do something serious set in a Latin American country, but again, it was an exercise in style for me.
I made a living for 10 years making very typical TV commercials. But I always wanted to reach beyond that and do stuff that people might relate to in the way they relate to my nonbranded content.
We aspire to make artisanal tortillas on an industrial scale.
I made commercials for corporations like Volkswagen and Coca-Cola, but I was always the one to write them, too, which was a very good exercise, because I learned to tell little stories.
I would just as likely be doing soccer practice as filming commercials.
I loved cutting together simple commercials about margarine or soft drinks - all kinds of silly products - but I tried to make the commercials different.
You have always had individual directors who begin in the advertising or commercial world, but they are probably exceptions rather than the traditional pattern.
I gotta tell, that's one of the things in Hollywood that has not been a barrier. I've gotten lots of offers, and I did try my hand at it, I directed two commercials. I won best commercial of ad week [laughs] on my first try.
A lot of the commercials that I was doing were very slice-of-life, emotional, documentary-style, not big and cinematic and ultimately like the kind of movie I wanted to make.
