How to Direct Nicolas Cage: 9 Pieces of Advice

Saban Films allowed ComingSoon.net the chance to chat with writer/director Maria Pulera (Falsely Accused) about her new supernatural thriller Between Worlds, which stars the legendary Nicolas Cage (National Treasure, Ghost Rider). We got Pulera to open up about her experience with the Oscar-winning actor and give us 9 Pieces of Advice for Directing Nicolas Cage. Check out the list in the gallery below, and check out the movie now in select theaters and on VOD!

Click here to rent Between Worlds on Digital HD!

Between Worlds co-stars Penelope Mitchell (The Vampire Diaries, Hemlock Grove), Franka Potente (The Conjuring 2, The Bourne Supremacy) and Hopper Penn (War Machine, The Last Face). Eric Banoun and David Hillary produced alongside Pulera via their company Rise Up, LLC.

The film follows Joe (Cage), a down-on-his-luck truck driver haunted by the memory of his deceased wife and child. He meets Julie (Potente) a spiritually gifted woman who enlists Joe in a desperate effort to find the lost soul of her comatose daughter, Billie (Mitchell). But the spirit of Joe’s dead wife Mary proves stronger, possessing the young woman’s body and determined to settle her unfinished business with the living.

What would you do if got the chance to direct Nicolas Cage? Let us know in the comments below!

How to Direct Nicolas Cage

Let Cage be Cage.

Maria Pulera: My advice for directing Nicolas Cage is let him be Nicolas Cage, you know? He has an amazing creative energy. I think he’s a very seasoned professional and deserves that kind of allowance. I’m one that’s very open to actors going with what they feel within their character. I enjoy that. So that’s really the main thing that I could say is to have trust in it. You've got to trust your actors because as a director you’re casting them for a reason. It’s because you trust them with your story and with the collaboration.
Allow Cage freedom to improv crazy sh*t.

Maria Pulera: He’s very creative in the different things he can come up with. We did a lot of improvisation during rehearsal time. He’s just brilliant off the cuff. During our rehearsal I made it clear we’re doing improvisation here. But in terms of the film, he realized that as a director I’m very open to that and that I really like his intuitive style. So I think you just allow that freedom with your actors.
Your producer may not like what Cage is doing. Ignore them.

Maria Pulera: You can’t control it. You don’t try to stop it. That kind of creative freedom within a project where the energy has a certain tone to it is amazing. I like it. Maybe my producer might not like it as much, but hey, I love it. It was fun. I got some great moments. He does a lot of really cool improv lines like, “Does the Tin Man have a sheet metal cock?” I mean, come on. That’s awesome. And he spanks himself out of a scene. "Giddy up."
Let Nicolas Cage read a book by Nicolas Cage during a sex scene.

Maria Pulera: We have all these sex scenes, right? I'm like, "How do we build in the fact that Joe knows that’s really his wife?" He said, “Listen, he reads to her," and it was his idea. When I talked to my producers, I said, “Oh, by the way, Nicolas has written this book. He’s reading this during the sex scene,” my producer thought it was a big joke, so he came over like, “Okay, prank’s up.” And I’m like, “No, no, for real. For real.” This is his poetry, too. “The Inuit” and ‘The Peach Juice” and all that jazz, that’s his poetry.
Keep other non-Cage actors as grounded as possible.

Maria Pulera: So he does a lot of very fun stuff, and because the other actors stay really into character on a very grounded level it works really well. It’s whacky and it works, so I loved it. A very interesting juxtaposition.
Embrace FULL CAGE.

Maria Pulera: He’s very aware of the choices he makes. He is probably one of the most fearless people I’ve ever met, but his choices in "Between Worlds" are very unique. I’ve not seen quite the same choices in other films. The definition of "Full Cage" has a full spectrum here. We got a unique little part on that spectrum because his character, in the outrageousness that he did it, was very unique. It’s like a wackiness, you know? It’s not necessarily anything extreme other than just extreme weird, which was awesome.
There's no such thing as too much Cage.

Maria Pulera: No, nothing is too far. No. I initially had an assembly editor who assembled the film in a very literal way and took out all the fun parts of Nicolas Cage and I was horrified. I was so upset. I couldn’t even be in the room. I thought I was going to throw-up. I said, “I can’t watch this. Get me out of here.” Other than that it was completely gonzo. The more the merrier, you know?
Hire an editor that understands Cage.

Maria Pulera: After the assembly I said, I’ve got to bring in my editor, Tim Silano. He's done a lot of Cage movies. He was Paul Schrader’s editor for a long time. Tim rocks my fucking world, okay? Tim loves Cage. He actually acted in a scene with Cage in one of Schrader’s movies, so he knew what I wanted and he loves all the same things about Mr. Cage that I do. He made me happy, I felt relieved. I couldn’t deal with the other thing of horror.
Put Nicolas Cage in every movie.

Maria Pulera: I’d love to put Nicolas Cage in every single movie, you know? I think he’s awesome. I think he’s awesome. I haven’t approached his team about it, but I have a very interesting idea for a movie that is a very different type of character for Nicolas Cage to play. I think he’s one of the world’s best actors.