Monday, April 05, 2010

Shekhar Kapur: We are the stories we tell ourselves | Video on TED.com

Okay. You are getting the idea that I think TED is great. A rich store of short films offering ideas, inspiration, observation--wonderful! Here is a talk by Shekhar Kapur on the creation of stories.

Where does creative inspiration spring from? At TEDIndia, Hollywood/Bollywood director Shekhar Kapur ("Elizabeth," "Mr. India") pinpoints his source of creativity: sheer, utter panic. He shares a powerful way to unleash your inner storyteller.

'...When I go out to direct a film, every day we prepare too much, we think too much. Knowledge becomes a weight upon wisdom. You know, simple words lost in the quicksand of experience. So I come up, and I say, "What am I going to do today?" I'm not going to do what I planned to do, and I put myself into absolute panic. It's my one way of getting rid of my mind, getting rid of this mind that says, "Hey, you know what you're doing. You know exactly what you're doing. You're a director, you've done it for years." So I've got to get there and be in complete panic. So it's a symbolic gesture. I tear up the script. I go on [unclear]. I panic myself. I get scared. I'm doing it right now. You can watch me. I'm getting nervous. I don't know what to say. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't want to go there. 

And as I go there, of course, my AD says, "You know what you're going to do, sir." I say, "Of course, I do..."'

"He was completely and utterly unusual, and deeply unafraid."
Cate Blanchett, in Time

Shekhar Kapur: We are the stories we tell ourselves | Video on TED.com

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