CAREERS
have found success and continued to succeed in the industry, frankly, just never gave up. It’s hard, and you’re going to go through a lot of ups and downs. It’s never going to happen as fast as you want it to happen either. So if it’s really the thing you want to do, you will persevere. Be kind to yourself, and remind yourself it’s going to take time. You’re going to see some people go places faster than you, and that’s going to be hard, and it’s going to feel unfair – but you stay on your path. Your journey is going to be your own journey, and you need to be as patient as you can with yourself. I also believe that enthusiasm and attitude will beat skill every time. As long as you can stay positive and be a good source of energy on set, you’ll find people to work with and you’re going to find opportunities. Def: Looking back on your career so far, what are you most proud of? LS: It changes. It sometimes follows the success of the movies, because those movies become the things that get you other opportunities. Garden State was the first film that got me a bit of attention,
and that allowed me to get into different types of projects. I was really proud of that movie; I’m from New Jersey, so it felt very personal – and I just really enjoyed working on it. After that, there was the success of the first Hangover movie, which was the most important movie of my career at that point. I was obviously very happy with the way it turned out, and when you have a movie that’s very successful like that, it definitely gets you more opportunities. And then there’s Joker – just to be working on that was a dream come true, even without the awards and everything else. Then of course, there are movies that didn’t do well, but were still some of my greatest experiences. I made a movie called The Big Year – nobody really saw it, but was one of the best experiences making a movie that I’ve had in my career. Def: What have been the biggest challenges you’ve experienced in your career and how did you overcome them? LS: Every movie is a series of challenges, and that’s one of the things I love about the movie business. The crews are basically the greatest problem solvers in the world – and not only that, but they love having problems to solve! They relish in the process of figuring things out. In terms of specific challenges I’ve faced… I once directed a movie that didn’t do great, and got beaten up by the critics. That served me because I stood back and thought, what am I supposed to learn from that, that I can take forward
HEAVY HITTER Sher first found acclaim with 2004’s Garden State, and received an Oscar nomination for 2019’s Joker
THE PEOPLE I KNOW THAT HAVE FOUND SUCCESS IN THE INDUSTRY, FRANKLY, just never gave up ”
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