We take a look at the past to shape our future.

In 1993, Sidney Lumet sat down with Charlie Rose to discuss receiving the Directors Guild's highest honor, the D.W. Griffith Award, and to reflect on a career spanning six decades and dozens of films.

On what makes a great director: "There are two parts. There's an enormous technical end that you must know thoroughly. But then it comes down to the same thing that's true in your work or anybody's: What do you care about? What are you about? What's your life about? Without what's in you being up there, it doesn't much matter who did it."

On working with actors: "All good work is self-revelation. The job is to get them confident enough in you, your taste, your judgment, so that they can trust themselves to reveal themselves. When he's good, he knows he's revealing chunks of himself. He's giving up a piece of himself in every part he plays. That is extremely painful."

On Paul Newman and The Verdict: "I said, 'There's an element in this guy that you've got to let us see, and that means letting us see that element in you. If you decide to let us see that, it's going to be magnificent. If you decide you can't, we're going to have a good picture, but not what we should have.' Monday, he came in like a tiger."

On why good actors are shy: "When Paul Newman refuses to sign autographs or when Pacino doesn't come to a party, that's real. They're giving up enough of themselves in performance. Most of the good ones are shy. Fairly reclusive. Don't socialize much. Dinner for four or six. Very little nightclubbing."

On Brando: "Is he the best American actor of the last 40 years? Yes and no. Yes because the talent is there. No because he never took on the parts that could ask that talent to be as magnificent as it could be. He's got a contempt for acting and therefore contempt for himself for doing it."

On failure: "The failures are a part of it. I don't think you've got a career without failures. On the second day of shooting one film, I knew this was a fantasy on my part, that nothing I had seen was ever going to show up. But I'm the director. I can't let anybody else know."

GUEST: Sidney Lumet, Director

Interview from 1993

0:00 Introduction: D.W. Griffith Award
1:01 "Well, why not?"
1:45 The film list read aloud
2:33 Seeing the names: Bergman, Fellini, Kazan
2:55 What makes a great director
3:35 "What do you care about?"
4:15 Choosing actors: "Like your right arm"
4:59 Pacino hired me for Serpico
5:40 "Good acting is self-revelation"
6:37 Why good actors are shy
7:20 Paul Newman and The Verdict
8:08 "Not quite, Paul"
8:55 What Newman had to reveal
9:16 Has your style evolved?
10:03 From television to 60-foot screens
10:31 Subject matter changes
11:12 When one doesn't work
12:06 Knowing on the second day
13:11 King Vidor and Carl Dreyer
14:09 Sheer luck becoming a director
14:47 You Are There with Walter Cronkite
15:08 Lost desire to act at 28
15:52 Final cut battles
16:32 Directors company failures
17:14 New York filmmaker identity
17:54 Fight with Local 52
19:18 Writing for the first time
20:14 Greatest playwrights were actors
20:29 Which films for the capsule?
21:27 The Hill with Sean Connery
22:24 Is Brando the best?
23:05 Brando's contempt for acting
23:50 D.W. Griffith Award March 6th

This interview captures one of America's great directors explaining why the job is getting actors to trust you enough to reveal themselves. History offers the clearest roadmap for our future.

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