061: The Director-AD Relationship (with filmmaker America Young)

How can you have the best communication with your AD? We dive deep into the AD - Director - Crew relationship in this episode of The Working Director with film & TV director American Young.

(Episode 61)

Hosted by Director/Producer⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Jenn Page.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

If you want to be notified when the next accelerator goes live and other fun events fill out the form on our website at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TheWorkingDirector.Pro.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

You can also go there to join our private FB group for directors so you can attend these live conversations and get your questions answered; as well as, to learn about The Working Director course that helps emerging filmmakers become working directors faster.

ABOUT AMERICA YOUNG

America Young was awarded the 2020 Humanitarian award by UCSD for her work promoting women in the film industry.

America Young is currently working in Film, TV, Animation and Video Games, as a Director, stunt coordinator and stunt woman.  To date, she has directed for Network TV, two features, a season of an animated show, a video game and four digital series.

She has stunt coordinated on projects for Warner Bros, Netflix, Lifetime and Cannal Plus.  And worked on 65 video games.

Having stunt coordinated for years, America transitioned to directing seven years ago. While having a solid foundation in action, she is also known for her ability to bring out the best performances in actors, both drama and comedy, while translating subtle and rich story points visually on screen.  The projects she has helmed have a wide range from a drag queen comedy to sci-fi action to fantasy action to coming of age drama to exploring domestic violence in a superhero universe.

Her first feature, “The Concessionaires Must Die!!” executive produced by Stan Lee, (www.cmdthemovie.com) is now available on Itunes, Amazon and other VOD platforms. Her most recent digital series, “Whatta Lark”, that pairs a quiet, introverted woman with the fiercest and loveliest of Drag Queens can be watched on Amazon. “Protectress”, a Xena-inspired fantasy, winner of several awards including Best Action, Best Director and Best Fantasy on the festival circuit, is being developed into a feature.  She has several features she is attached to in deveoplment.  She also directed the cinematics for Resident Evil: Shadows of Rose which was name #8 video game of the year by Time Magazine.

America was pivotal in the rebranding of Barbie with the Barbie Vlog in 2015 and directed the critically acclaimed season of the Barbie motion capture animated series for Mattel which was featured on VICE, Vogue, Glamour and Newsweek among other publications.  It has been viewed on youtube over 150 million times and went from 500k subscribers to nearly 11.6 million in the time she has been working on the Brand.

Her second feature, “Back to Lyla” which is Alice in Wonderland meets Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind inspired, was acquired by 1091 and released June 2022.  Upon completion of the Warner Bros directing program, she successfully entered the TV world, directing an episode of Blindspot (aired May, 2020) and Legacies (aired 1/23/20) with glowing feedback from both teams.  She has now directed 17 episodes of TV since for Netflix, Amazon, Blumhouse, Warner Bros, CBS, BET+ and at the end of 2021 she directed the pilot of Surfside Girls for Apple TV which got a full season order and released in 2022.

She is a proud founder of The Chimaera Project, a nonprofit that gives opportunities to women in the film & media arts (www.chimaeraproject.org).

When America’s not kicking the crap out of Super-Heroes that support the Superhuman Registration Act, jumping off buildings, teaching actors how to fight or setting herself on fire, she enjoys telling stories, sipping herbal tea and sharpening her pair of Sai.

https://americayoung.com/