ABSTRACT
Karen Gaviola begins her interview by talking about her background studying documentary filmmaking and how she broke into the business via the Directors Guild’s training program. She explains how her work as an assistant director prepared her for directing, and talks about the preparation she did to make the transition. She explains how she got her big break on NYPD Blue, and why that environment was more supportive and successful than what she faced on the second show she directed, Providence. She talks about how she gets crews and actors to trust her, and explains the process she goes through every time she gets a job on a new show. She discusses how useful it can be to get information from other directors who have worked on the show before, and moves on to discuss her experiences as a producer-director on Lucifer, Magnum PI, and Hawaii Five-0. She explains why she wanted to prove she was more versatile than being simply a “queen of procedurals,” and explains how she plans out complex action sequences on shows such as The Blacklist and Magnum. She goes into detail about a fight scene in a car that she staged on Magnum, and says what’s different about directing actors on a new show versus a long-running one. She concludes by talking about what she looks for in the directors she hires as a producer, and what will keep someone from being asked back.
