The Archies: Zoya Akhtar on directing a musical world
Zoya Akhtar joined Kingdom of Dreams to talk about directing Netflix's The Archies, a musical that has to build a complete stylized world while still behaving like a story about young people figuring out who they are. The craft question is how much artifice a scene can carry before the feeling drops out.
Musical worlds invite decoration. Directing them well means deciding which flourishes serve character and which are only production value passing through the frame.
Akhtar's conversation sits usefully beside Superboys of Malegaon: one film looks at homemade cinema, the other at a designed pop universe. Both require a director who knows what the scene is actually about.
Go deeper on Kingdom of Dreams
- → EP 82: Zoya Akhtar on directing The Archies
- → EP 210: Zoya Akhtar and Reema Kagti on Superboys of Malegaon
- → EP 101: John Stevenson and Mark Osborne on Kung Fu Panda
Browse more director conversations in the Kingdom of Dreams archive.
Original Kingdom of Dreams craft take based on our conversation with director Zoya Akhtar (EP 82).