Catriona McKenzie On Marvel's Echo and Directing Action-Packed Television
Director and writer Catriona McKenzie has taken on an exciting path of a career filled with action-packed television shows. Starting her career in Australia, Catriona McKenzie wrote and directed the independent film, Satellite Boy and while also taking on American television including How To Get Away With Murder, Riverdale, Shadowhunters, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Supernatural, Alaska Daily, and Echo. Catriona McKenzie discusses what goes into directing different types of projects and how she worked out the epic roller rink fight sequence in Echo's third episode.
Culturess: What is the difference between directing a movie where you wrote the script, such as Satellite Boy, versus being handed the script for a project such as Echo?
Catriona McKenzie: I started off as a writer. I actually have about six degrees in Australia because education is free in Australia; I've only been in America about four years. So I know what it is to write and academically as well as creatively now. It's a different form of filmmaking. I suppose when it comes to Echo, one of the things that happened was there was an existing script and the writers hadn't seen the location. So one of the cool things with episode 3 was that I actually walked into the space and the way it was written it just didn't work in the space, just because of the physicality of it, and so I was able to, a lot of it was a big stunt sequence, so I was able to storyboard it, and then I gave the storyboards to the writers who went, 'oh, that's cool,' and then it goes up the chain to Marvel executives and then in a way, I kind of made it my own. That's one of the things that, coming from that writing background, and I'm also very eclectic as a human being. I'm a beekeeper. I restore old cars. I know how to take an engine apart and put it back together. So I take something that's existing, and I work out how to make it better. My dad was a mechanical engineer, so I'm very comfortable playing with stuff and pulling it apart and making it better. So, in terms of the script for Echo, that was actually really great background because I basically just storyboarded the whole episode, and we just gave it to Alaqua, who is awesome. She did a lot of her own stunts. So, in a weird way, having that background as a writer, it wasn't my show, but I certainly took ownership of it for that episode because we had to because it didn't quite work in the space. When I walked into that existing space it had this mural that was there that said, "Make America Skate Again," and I was like, it's a solid wall, and I was like, Maya Lopez has to burst through that wall. Like she has to break that wall down. Everyone was like, 'Oh, you want to put her through the wall?' That was never in the script. All of those video games, that was never in the script. All of those disco balls, none of that was in the script. So, I was like yeah, let's just have her smash down that "Make America Skate Again." So they had to go in there and structurally reinforce the wall and put in those stunt panels so she could sort of bust through. It was a big deal. So, I'm comfortable. When you do episodic television, which since I've only been in America four years, I've done a lot of episodic TV and I was trying to find my tribe creatively, you have to understand the project and understand how to make it better. No fault on anyone but that's my job as a director is to make it as good as it can be. Like, on The Cleaning Lady, which is a show that I just did, they had a script stunt set piece...I don't wanna give it away. I probably shouldn't talk about that. But, that's sort of my job is to, yes I'm very technical as a director too. I work with actors. But, it's interesting. Like, I did The Boys, which is a very technical big show with stunts and VFX, and I do half-hour comedies where I did this show called Kiki and Kitty, and that's about an average normal woman whose vagina comes to life and basically says you need help. It went to the LA Film Festival. This girl, she is an average normal woman and she's working in a law office and she's kinda drowning in that world even though she's a lawyer and she's super smart, and her vagina comes to life and says you need help, so they go on this buddy adventure and it's comedy. It's very funny. So, I can do Echo, I can do The Boys, I'm doing some Gen V this year, which is another fun one, you know. Menstrual blood that kills, all that stuff is really awesome. So I don't think it matters whether or not it's comedy or drama or genre, just being able to bring that writer's mentality to the directing process is incredibly useful.
Culturess: You just referenced Kiki and Kitty. How did you get involved with a project like that?
Catriona McKenzie: This is an Australian project and so I only moved to America four years ago and so, it was probably about eight years ago now. They just asked me to do it. In Australia, I've done Satellite Boy, I've done lots of television, I've won awards, all that sort of blah blah. All that stuff. They just asked me to do it. And again, there was a lot of improvisation because it was like, 'What would a vagina do?' She's outrageous because she's sort of like a child because she's on a different level, so every person has their own genitalia, so this vagina falls in love with this man, and this human man has his own penis that's an actor. So, it's a very interesting way to look at race and sexuality, so we improvised a lot. I gave the genitalia actors a lot of freedom to play which was good. I like to improvise with actors, and that was through ABC TV in Australia, which was great that they're willing to take a risk like that and be willing to something that is a little bit left of center.
Culturess: What makes you lean toward action-packed TV shows?
Catriona McKenzie: I'm adopted, and as a little girl I was always curious about what it is to be human. You have a fantasy when you're adopted, 'Oh, I guarantee my mother was like this. She was a princess, and my dad was a prince, and something happened, and I had to be adopted.' But then I met them, and the reality was very different, and so that was a very humbling process. But, also, I feel like it was very integral to me being a filmmaker because suddenly it was character-based. It allowed me to see this whole scenario of my life from all the different players' point of view, which is very much like making a movie. So it made me curious about the human condition. What is it to be human? I interned at Ridley Scott's company when I left NYU. You can intern at any company, and I had gone over to Ridley Scott, and I did that because when he made Blade Runner, it was like oh my God, Blade Runner is this quintessential, iconic movie about what is it to be human, which is, with AI and everything it seems incredibly relevant. Like, it just never not relevant. We don't really do that sort of stuff in Australia. We do lots of things like Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, but we don't really do genre. So about five or six years ago, Ridley Scott had done Alien Covenant at FOX Studios in Sydney and ten thousand people wanted to shadow him. I guess because I've interned with him back in the day out of NYU. He had taken a look at Satellite Boy, and I had shadowed Ridley Scott, which was so cool seeing someone like that work and so he said if I wanted to, I'd have to get a green card and move to the States, so I got a green card and I moved to the States. It was because genre can hold big ideas. I mean I've done comedy. I did Shining Vale. There's all sorts of things. I did drama, Alaska Daily with Hilary Swank. But I just think genre can just explore in a higher concept idea, the material. The Boys is about what is it to be human in a particular context, and I'm not scared because I restore old cars. I'm not scared of that big action stuff. I'm a beekeeper, I've got bees, so I'm used to being around a swarm of activity. I'm not scared about being stung. I'm very comfortable setting up a stunt sequence where there's a huge techno crane on tracks, and I don't know. I'm just not afraid of stuff. Like this house that I'm living in, I bought this house unseen. I was in Montreal, and I just did my research, and I just bought it. So I kind of, maybe I don't have the fear gene or something. But, I'm more curious about things than fearful. I guess because I restore cars, I like car stunts, and I used to box, so I've thrown some punches, and it's a good question, like, it's entertaining. It's always, it's gotta be fun, and I think we do love to see a character thrown into an obstacle course, and that becomes a stunt.
Culturess: Have you noticed any differences on working on an Australian project versus an American one?
Catriona McKenzie: We have amazing crews in Australia, and for example, Ridley Scott did Alien Covenant, and the crews there are top-notch. I think for me, it's budget. For just about every show I've worked on, there's been an Australian actor, and they've been absolutely spectacular in the American context as well. I think it's in terms of the toys that I get to play with. It's not even the time, we don't get more that much more time in America. Sometimes we get less time. But if I have a creative idea, if I have a vision for something, I'm just given more opportunity to elevate the material because I can bring drones and techno cranes and expensive equipment. I have a nicer trailer. I didn't even have a trailer in Australia. But it's similar. I just have more toys.
Culturess: There was a lot of moving parts to that big fight scene in Echo. What went into creating all of that?
Catriona McKenzie: Well, I storyboarded the whole sequence, and then we stunt-visited, which means I went to the stunt team and they were like, okay, so we broke it up. Those guys took the space of the skate rink, and they basically built this with cardboard boxes built the world and practiced and practiced and practiced with the stunt people as well as with Alaqua, who was playing Maya and it was weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks of rehearsal making sure that this is how this would work and there was also lighting because it was it was an unusual lighting sequence for part of it. It was probably a couple of months of really working out how to do it. In consultation, they got the storyboards to learn the sequence, and then Alaqua was brought into it, and then we just shot the shit out of it on the day.
Culturess: What makes directing television different from directing an independent film?
Catriona McKenzie: I love doing television. I think because I'm a writer first and then a director second and that's the next step for me is really getting into writing my own projects, in America anyway because I've already done that in Australia. But, there's always logistical, financial, you know you get your coupons, you get your bit of string, you never have enough money, it doesn't matter. But, I think in television, it's way more, it's a team sport. There's many more people and opinions, whereas when I do a movie, it's kind of a more distilled court. It's a pure form. There's still logistics and money, and it's still a group of people, but it's a singular vision, and there's beautiful things to be said about both. It's awesome to be able to collaborate with people on television like The Boys. It's so much stunt. My episode, the second to last episode of season four that's coming out, like it's such a huge, it's the biggest thing I've ever done. There were so many moving pieces, and that was really fun working with the writer, with the showrunner, with the stunt guys, Koyama, he just wanted to, he's working season three, he's an amazing stunt coordinator. So it's really fun to do that with such a big team of people. And then with a movie, it's really in my brain. I'm the tuning fork for every decision, and so there's a different pleasure in that, you know. It's like when you're in your kitchen cooking, and you're the one who's kind of going off the recipe and starting to experiment. It's on you, and you get to eat the cake. I guess that's making a movie, like every decision that I make is like is it good, is it gonna resonate, like the but stops here. So they're both fantastic, but it's just different.
Culturess: How familiar were you with the Marvel Cinematic Universe or with Marvel Comics in general before you started working on Echo?
Catriona McKenzie: When I was a little girl in Australia, I learned to read on these hand-me-down old 1950s comic books, graphic novels, and they weren't always Marvel. They were DC but they were even more obscure. They were crazy but very interesting ideas they working with, like if there was a nuclear event, the cockroaches would be the ones to survive. All of these really interesting ideas were in these 1950s black-and-white comic books, so I've always been into comics, and Guardians of the Galaxy is just awesome. It's just such an irreverent, fresh take on telling a story. I have a fifteen-year-old son who was ten when we moved to the States. We're very eclectic as a family. But I was familiar with it. It wasn't a stretch. We learned American Sign Language, which was really awesome, and I was able to work with Alaqua to really pepper in moments from the ASL community that don't translate. Like there's a moment in the stunt sequence where she's beating all these guys, and she turns around and goes, 'Pa!' And pa is a word in the ASL language which doesn't really translate to English, but I tried to sort of bring those moments into it. It was really great working with Doug Ridloff, and I've worked with his wife, Lauren Ridloff, on The Walking Dead, I directed some of that so it was nice to come back with him as well.
Culturess: Does your approach on directing change based on what type of project it is?
Catriona McKenzie: I mean, I always just read the script, does it make sense? What's the story? Is it as good as it can be? Sometimes, the thing is, different projects have different budgets and different expectations. I think the thing that's different for me is, I always like, it's the actors, on Shining Vale, I work with Greg Kinnear, Courtney Cox, Mira Sorvino, three spectacular actors and they each have different processes so it's really for me, I like to really understand how the actors like to work and meet them where they're at, rather than coming with all these assumptions about this is how we do it. This doesn't seem to be the wisest way in my experience because the best results, it's that x-y axis. High support, high achievement. If you feel safe, if I can create an environment where we all feel safe to take big creative swings, to do something that feels outlandish but actually could be genius like I want to create an environment where everyone, the actors, the cinematographer, the grips and the gaffers of oh, 'if we did this we can do that.' When people are fearful they lock up and I don't know if it's as a woman or if I have a kid but when people feel safe they just do better work. But really with the actors, I want them to feel that they can try something and they can do it in a number of different ways and we can explore and play together, rather than having to get the "correct" answer it's like, 'oh, let's explore' within the context of, we always have a timeline, we have to make our days. But that's something that I really like to do just in general. Create an environment where people feel free enough and safe enough to hit exceptional rather than good. How do you get from good to exceptional? Sometimes it's like one percent, but I think that safety net, that sense of collaborative fun that can be had, is important for me anyway. I don't think people are motivated by fear. I think they shut down, and so that's how I like to operate. I bring my best two-year-old to set, and we play, and that seems to work for me, anyway.
Culturess: How does it feel to be directing an action niche type of show(s) that traditionally tend to be a male-dominated field?
Catriona McKenzie: I mean, I don't have that fear gene, so I feel like, I mean, maybe with my taxes I go, 'Oh my God.' But I forget, look, there's no doubt that there's a glass ceiling, and we're sort of chipping away at it, and we've sort of broken through it, and there's no doubt that I do big action sequences as a director, and I love it. It's interesting, and I know that you have to ask that question because, of course, you know, but I always feel I forget that I'm a woman. I kind of forget in the moment because I'm all about the work. But, friends of mine have said, 'If you can be an action, big action female filmmaker, they will you out of the grave to call action and cut.' So it must be a rare thing. But I don't understand why, but it feels great. I love it. To be able to have an idea and to have all these people come around and help it happen like it's the most fun in the world. I just don't get nervous. I'm just focused on the script and the work in the moment that it just doesn't occur to me to be nervous about it. Maybe I should be a bit more nervous about it.
Culturess: Is there any type of show or movie that you would love to direct in the future that you haven't gotten the opportunity to do yet?
Catriona McKenzie: I wanna tell a big sci-fi action thriller about what it is to be human and I have a TV series that I'm developing and then, because I do comedy and drama, I have a TV series that is a half-hour comedy which is based on my time on Fire Island and that's called, "The Island" and it's basically Best In Show meets The White Lotus. That is a completely different dark comedy about saving humanity one pit at a time. So there's two shows, you know, that I'm working on that I'm writing and I would love to make.
Catch Catriona McKenzie's episode of The Boys on Thursday, July 11th on Amazon Prime Video.
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