• The Voice
  • Suzanne Smith
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2020 Penny Dreadful City of Angels Daniel Zovatto
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2020 Better Call Saul
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2020 Jay Sandrich
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2020 Succession
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2020 Known Unknowns
  • Empire
  • DGA Quarterly Winter 2020 Patriot Act
  • DGA Quarterly Winter 2020 Late Scripts
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2019 Director Kim Gehrig
  • DGA Quarterly Spring 2019 The Good Place
  • DGA Quarterly Spring 2019 Apple Ad Director Rupert Sanders
  • DGA Quarterly Winter 2019 CBS News
  • DGA Quarterly Winter 2019 Glenn Weiss
  • DGA Quarterly Fall 2018 Chefs Table David Gelb Jeong Kwan
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Fall 2018 So You Think You Can Dance
  • DGA Quarterly Summer 2018 Silicon Valley Alec Berg
  • DGA Quarterly Summer 2018 Justin Simien Dear White People
  • DGA Quarterly Summer 2018 Late Night Jimmy Kimmel
  •  DGA Quarterly Spring 2018 Six Second Commercials
  • DGA Quarterly Spring 2018 Director Alma Har'el Love Over Bias P&G Commercial
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2018 Pamela Fryman
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2018 Stand Up Comedy Sarah Silverman
  • DGA Quarterly Spring 2018 True Crime Anthony Hemingway
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Winter 2018 Stage Managers
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine The Looming Tower
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2017
  • DGA Quarterly Spring 2017 Craig Gillespie
  • DGA Quarterly Spring 2017 Thirtysomething
  • DGA Quarterly Spring 2017 Cooking Shows
  • DGAQ Fresh Off The Boat
  • DGA Quarterly Magazine Pilot Directors
  • DGAQ Documentary Now
  • Bold Strokes
  • Tricia Brock
  • DGAQ Close Up Zetna Fuentes
  • DGA Quarterly Pamela Fryman Pilot Directors
  • DGA Quarterly Jimmy Kimmel Directors Team
  • DGA Quarterly Rosemary Rodriguez
  • DGA The Walking Dead Greg Nicotero
  • DGA The Americans Daniel Sackheim
  • DGAQ TV Series The New Girl Fred Goss
  • DGAQ Saturday Night Live
  • DGA NCIS New Orleans Leslie Libman
  • DGAQ TV Series Jane the Virgin Briesewitz
  • DGA Quarterly Karen Gaviola
  • DGA Quarterly Elementary
  • DGA Quarterly Marco Polo
  • DGA Quarterly Fall 2014 Brooklyn Nine Nine
  • DGA Quarterly Fall 2014 Orange is the New Black
  • NewsRoom
Television

Feature stories about the craft and challenges of directors and their teams in episodic television, movies for television, daytime drama, reality, sports, news, variety, childrens, commercials and other television genres.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2020 Better Call Saul
Summer 2020
Directing Better Call Saul

Although it's a prequel, the directors of Better Call Saul treat the series like its own animal, with no detail too small, and no situation too outrageous.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2020 Jay Sandrich
Spring 2020

Recent TV Hall of Fame inductee Jay Sandrich emerged as a pioneering sitcom director, and he was generous in paying his knowledge forward.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2020 Succession
Spring 2020

In search of authenticity, the directors behind Succession jettison the glitz by deglamorizing its rarified settings and capturing performances on the fly.

Empire
Spring 2020

Empire's directors discuss how they used music to enhance the show's mix of dynastic drama and a fanciful take on the recording biz.

Lesli Linka Glatter directing Damian Lewis in HOMELAND
Summer 2019

As the Showtime series enters its final season, Lesli Linka Glatter and her directing team reflect on Homeland's global reach and the prescience of its storylines.

Jenee LeMarque, Chelsea Rendon, Ser Anzoategui
Summer 2019

For the Starz series set in L.A.'s Boyle Heights, directors and producers keep it real.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2019 Game of Thrones
Summer 2019

Directors behind the battle sequences in Game of Thrones talk tactics, scale and the escalating stakes of television's most epic water-cooler series.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2019 Producer Director Pars Barclay directing Station 19
Summer 2019

Producer/directors seek a unifying vision without sacrificing artistic integrity.

DGA Quarterly Spring 2019 The Good Place
Spring 2019

Director Morgan Sackett used a combination of in-camera and VFX techniques to bring multiple personalities within the same character to life.

DGA Quarterly Summer 2018 Silicon Valley Alec Berg
Summer 2018

No detail is too small for directors Alec Berg and Jamie Babbit in Silicon Valley's quest for authenticity.

DGA Quarterly Summer 2018 Justin Simien Dear White People
Summer 2018

Justin Simien uses cinematic language on Dear White People, which series directors find liberating.

DGA Quarterly Summer 2018 Better Call Saul Minkie Spiro
Summer 2018

Directors discuss finding the tricky balance between desperate drama and absurd humor on TV's latest wave of crime comedies .

DGA Quarterly Magazine Spring 2018 Pamela Fryman
Spring 2018
Pamela Fryman

Director Pamela Fryman was tasked with directing no less than six comedy pilots by the time the broadcasters’ upfronts start in May. Here's how she did it.

DGA Quarterly Spring 2018 True Crime Anthony Hemingway
Spring 2018

Directors Anthony Hemingway, Daniel J. Minahan and Lesli Linka Glatter walk the tightrope between reality and dramatic license with fact-based murder dramas.

DGAQ Magazine Summer 2017 Handmaids Tale
Summer 2017

Event series directors Reed Morano, Ron Howard, Ryan Murphy, Gus Van Sant, and Jean-Marc Vallée discuss their creative visions.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2017
Summer 2017

In this Age of Anxiety, directors Alec Berg, Mark Cendrowski, Jonathan Krisel, Steve Levitan, Beth McCarthy-Miller, Melina Matsoukas and Ken Whittingham talk about the current state of TV comedy, which ranges from blatantly slapstick to uncomfortably anxious.

DGAQ Magazine Summer 2017 Waterworks This is Us
Summer 2017

For This is Us, directors Glenn Ficarra and John Requa aim for emotional catharsis while reining in the 'schmaltz'.

DGA Quarterly Spring 2017 Gina Prince-Bythewood Shots Fired
Spring 2017

The new series from Gina Prince-Bythewood and Reggie Rock Bythewood, reflects the racial strife prevalent in today’s headlines.

DGA Quarterly Spring 2017 Thirtysomething
Spring 2017
A thirtysomething Reunion

Four thirtysomething cast members—Timothy Busfield, Peter Horton, Melanie Mayron and Ken Olin—discuss how the landmark series shaped their careers as directors.

DGAQ Fresh Off The Boat
Fall/Winter 2016-17

Fresh Off the Boat directors relate to their characters' need to belong.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Pilot Directors
Fall/Winter 2016-17

In the cover story of our newly redesigned DGA Quarterly, Directors Ava DuVernay, Hiro Murai, Steven Zaillian, Christine Gernon, Peter O'Fallon and Marcos Siega sound off on forging a series template for some of the most buzzed-about shows in the Platinum Age of Television, and why sometimes rules are meant for breaking.

DGAQ Documentary Now
Fall/Winter 2016-17
Documentary Now!

It’s a thin line between reverence and parody for the directors of Documentary Now!

DGA Quarterly Rosemary Rodriguez
Summer 2015

Director Rosemary Rodriguez has excelled in directing all sorts of dramatic television, but where she really feels at home is on the set of her own films.

DGAQ First Time Episodic Directors
Spring 2015
First-Time Directors

Breaking in as a first-time director in episodic television is never easy. It takes talent, persistence, and a helping hand. We interviewed some recent newcomers to see how they got started.

DGA Quarterly Karen Gaviola
Winter 2015
Karen Gaviola

Karen Gaviola learned her craft as an AD and has now directed almost 100 TV episodes. For her, it’s all about exercising different muscles.

NewsRoom
Summer 2014
The Newsroom

With rapid-fire dialogue and complex visual schemes, The Newsroom was no easy assignment for director-producer Alan Poul and his team of directors. But no matter how big the stories, it's always about the characters.

Spring 2014
Chicago Fire

Director-producer Joe Chappelle and a fine-tuned directorial team balance some of the biggest, most daring visual effects on TV with everyday human drama on Chicago Fire — and all this in the dead of winter.

Winter 2014
The Following

As characters drop like flies in the hit TV series The Following, director-producer Marcos Siega and his team create an authentically tense and scary atmosphere. Even the blood is directed.

Boardwalk Empire
Fall 2013
Boardwalk Empire

In an extraordinarily creative environment, director-producer Tim Van Patten and a team of highly skilled veteran directors recreate the glamorous, seedy and seductive world of Prohibition-era America in Boardwalk Empire.

Summer 2013
Mark Cendrowski

In sitcoms as in science, timing is everything. On The Big Bang Theory, director Mark Cendrowski carefully calculates how to make the jokes work—and has fun doing it.

Good Wife
Spring 2013
The Good Wife

Executive producer-director Brooke Kennedy and her team of directors smoothly manage to find the sly humor and elegant look of The Good Wife. That’s what makes it more than just another legal drama.

Sandrich
Spring 2013
Jay Sandrich

Jay Sandrich modestly credits quality scripts and talented casts for the success of such beloved TV series as The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Cosby Show and Soap. But it took a great director to put all the pieces together.

Winter 2013
House of Cards

House of Cards is Netflix's first original series. But the real difference is that David Fincher and a team of five directors are calling the shots.

Winter 2013
Women Directors on TV

Most people in the industry agree the number of female directors in episodic TV is appalling. We asked showrunners, network executives and DGA members to weigh in on how to solve the problem.

Winter 2013
Law & Order: SVU

Jean de Segonzac and a host of directors have kept Law & Order: Special Victims Unit fresh, fast-paced and inventive for 14 seasons. It may be familiar but it’s never routine.

Fall 2012
Homeland's Michael Cuesta

With handheld cameras and a subjective style that gets under your skin, Michael Cuesta has turned Homeland’s cat and mouse game into a suspense-filled ride. Voyeurism never looked so good.

Fall 2012
The Colbert Report's
Jim Hoskinson

Even in an election year, with more details, graphics and odd characters to worry about, The Colbert Report's director Jim Hoskinson never misses a beat.

DGA Quarterly Summer 2012 Norberto Barba
Summer 2012
Grimm Director Norberto Barba

Battling "wesen" and solving mysteries in the wilds of Portland, may not be for everyone. But in Grimm, director/producer Norberto Barba makes it look easy.

DGA Quarterly Summer 2012 Breaking Bad
Summer 2012
Breaking Bad

With a distinctive visual style and lots of locations, Breaking Bad is a challenging show for directors. Fortunately, a great team is in place to help them.

Modern Family
Spring 2012
Directing Modern Family

Working at a breakneck pace and with creative solutions, directors have made the everyday humor and documentary style of Modern Family seem like real life—only funnier.

Blue Bloods
Spring 2012
Blue Bloods

With hundreds of extras, elaborate stunts, and numerous locations, the directorial team on the cop show Blue Bloods has plenty to think about. Making sure the subway is running on time is the easy part.

DGA Quarterly Fall 2011
Fall 2011
Directing Seinfeld

Two directors--Tom Cherones and Andy Ackerman--helped make Seinfeld one of the most influential shows of time.

Winter Quarterly
Winter 2012
Directing House

Greg Yaitanes has directed 30 episodes of House, M.D., more than anyone else. Along the way he has streamlined shooting and coming up with creative solutions to production problems--right up until what might be his last show.

DGA Quarterly Summer 2011 Hill Street Blues
Summer 2011
Hill Street Blues

Before Hill Street Blues arrived in 1981, cop shows were tame by comparison. Using a realistic, in-your-face style, the directors helped pioneer a look and feel that has inspired countless crime series.

Fall 2010
Entourage 1st AD

Gary Goldman has been the 1st AD on Entourage since the TV series started. We asked him to keep a diary for the last show of season seven.

Summer 2010
Directing True Blood

How do you incinerate a vampire at sunrise, and twist a head 180 degrees? These and more otherworldly challenges are met head on by directors on the gothic TV series True Blood.

Spring 2010
Pamela Fryman

With its single-camera sensibility on a multi-camera show, How I Met Your Mother has tons of moving parts. Director Pamela Fryman relies on her talented team to help her put all the pieces together.

DGAQ Television - Friday Night Lights
Winter 2010
Friday Nights Lights

Directors and their teams on Friday Night Lights find some novel solutions for shooting at a breakneck pace.

Fall 2009
Locations for Law & Order

UPMs and location managers cover the waterfront—and every other part of New York City—to find unique sites for the three long-running Law & Order series. The trick is keeping it fresh and not tripping over each other.

Summer 2009
AD's and Child Actors

Child actors working on TV comedies just want to have fun. It's the 1st and 2nd ADs who make sure they get the job done.

Summer 2009
Sitcom Roundtable

The Quarterly brings together six of the most accomplished sitcom directors to discuss the creative and commercial side of making funny shows.

Spring 2009
Directing In Treatment

Capturing the intense emotion but limited movement of therapy sessions in HBO's In Treatment presents a challenge to the show's directors. Here's how they solve it.

DGA Quarterly Fall 2007 Director Producers
Fall 2007
Directors/Producers

With the demand for higher quality programming, more and more TV directors are becoming producer/directors. And the studios like what they see.

DGA Quarterly Spring 2007 Shooting the Sapranos
Spring 2007
The Sopranos

As David Chase's 80-hour tale of crime and punishment comes to its grand finale, we look at the contribution of its unsung heroes-the directors.

DGA Quarterly Magazine Summer 2006 TV Pilots
Summer 2006
Directing Television Pilots

With TV getting bigger, better and more competitive, pilot directors have a lot at stake.

DGA Quarterly Spring 2006 UPMs
Spring 2006
UPMs on Episodics

It's not just about balancing books. UPMs on one-hour episodic television have to be nimble balancing a multitude of duties. And the job's not getting easier.

DGA Magazine May 2004

Few television shows enter the public awareness as brazenly as HBO's The Sopranos. Directors Timothy M. Van Patten, Henry Bronchtein and John Patterson discuss their experiences on the show.

DGA Magazine January 2004

The directors of Sex and the City, in its sixth and final season, bare all.

DGA Magazine September 2003

The verdict is in on Judging Amy, and the show is guilty — of being a television show that treats the issue of on-time script delivery as a serious mandate.

DGA Magazine July 2003

Many cinematographers said it was impossible to film multi-camera before a live audience. It just couldn't be done. But that was not a phrase in Desi Arnaz' vocabulary.

DGA Magazine July 2003

This HBO hit has brought the concept of working without a script into the TV mainstream, transforming its creator and star Larry David from the man behind the genius of Seinfeld to the butt of every self-inflicted joke on camera in Curb.