Interview with Guernslye Honorés
“Don’t obsess about the goal, enjoy the journey”. For many years I didn’t appreciate what I had been blessed with, the things I had in life and what I had achieved. On your way up the mountain, once in a while it’s important to stop and enjoy the view.
As a part of our series called “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Became A Filmmaker”, I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing George Siougas.
Writer and Director George C. Siougas is originally from Greece and studied at the London Film School. His debut feature, Burning Heads, was nominated for eleven Hellenic Film Academy awards, and in 2022 his episode of BBC’s Casualty was one of four nominated for a BAFTA. George is currently developing a feature-length version of THE ONE NOTE MAN.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. Can you tell us a bit of the ‘backstory’ of how you grew up?
I grew up in Athens Greece. My parents divorced when I was very young and my mother, a doctor, remarried a prolific film and theatre director. So I grew up on movie sets surrounded by left wing actors, musicians, playwrights, poets and all sorts of Bohemian types. I hated it! I loved America, Coca-Cola, Hollywood and Michael Jackson! I grew up in the late 70’s and 80’s on Spielberg, Lucas, Zemeckis, James Cameron and MTV. Later of course I learned to appreciate European and rest-of-the-world cinema, but when I was growing up it was always about escapism, movie magic and entertainment. Also, I loved soundtracks. John Williams had a lot to do with this of course, but when I was a teenager I sought out film composers like Vangelis, John Barry, Zbigniew Preisner, Maurice Jarre, Ennio Morricone, Alan Silvestri, Danny Elfman, Nino Rota, Howard Shore and bought their soundtracks. I still listen to them. I realised early on that you can listen to the music without watching the film, but you cannot watch the film without listening to the music. Music is really important to me in the whole cinematic experience, it’s directly wired to my heart-strings. The director can put the tear in the audience’s eyes but the composer will make it drop.
Can you share a story with us about what brought you to this specific career path?
By the time I was 18 I was completely lost. I hated home and was desperate to get out but I had also declared I would not go down my step father’s path. I was watching 12 movies a week, writing my own short stories, but I was NOT going down that path! I also love airplanes and so I was going to pursue that and become a pilot — it’s to this day the only other profession I can see myself in. To become a pilot you can either go the University route and study Aeronautical Engineering or something like that and then hope to be recruited by an airline or you could go to flying school which costs a hundred grand. We didn’t have that kind of money so attending a UK University was the only option. But I was terrible at school, hated everything we were taught, was good at nothing, was bored out of my mind in class, was hopeless in Physics and Maths and had no motivation to study so, predictably, I failed my A-Levels and was kinda stuck. One night my mom entered my room and said to me “Are you sure you want to pursue this pilot thing, because to me it seems you really want to be a director”. I kicked her out of the room shouting “You don’t know what you’re talking about!” but the minute the door shut it hit me she was right. Within two months I had packed a suitcase and, armed with my love for cinema, I moved to London age 19 and applied to the London International Film School (now called The London Film School) in Covent Garden. As soon as I joined, I found my people and my bliss and for the first time ever I was good at something.
Can you share the funniest or most interesting story that occurred to you in the course of your filmmaking career?
That has to be the time I met Martin Scorsese. I had just made my feature film BURNING HEADS which legendary director Costa Gavras, whose work I adore, had seen and liked. My producer at the time Christos V. Costandakopoulos knew Scorsese’s Line Producer, the lovely Georgia Kacandes and Georgia very kindly invited me to spend the day on Scorsese’s HUGO set filming at Shepperton Studios in the UK. I spent the day observing the shoot and I felt like a kid at Disneyland! It was shot in 3D and the technology was just mind-blowing. I got to hang out with iconic DoP Robert Richardson and Scorsese’s amazing crew and after wrap I spent some time with Scorsese in his trailer. I was so nervous but after five minutes we were chatting away about films and what we like and it was like speaking to just another film enthusiast. He made me feel right at home, he was so warm and incredibly knowledgeable of Greek cinema. He mentioned that Gavras had spoken to him about me and my film and asked if he could see it and about a year later he messaged he had watched it and that he enjoyed it. It’s the stuff of dreams. Scorsese became a huge influence during my film school years and his impressionistic language continues to amaze me every time.
Who are some of the most interesting people you have interacted with? What was that like? Do you have any stories?
You meet so many interesting people in this job. It’s the part I love the most about what I do and why I love the process so much. I can single out three key people, three mentors. The first was Mirella Papaeconomou who is a really prolific, much respected and hugely successful TV writer in Greece. She wrote a high-end mini-series I directed called SUDDENLY back in 2003 and she taught me to seek economy in dialogue. She also tuned my ears to recognise musicality in dialogue. It may read well but does it sound right when spoken by the actor? The second mentor was a highly experienced director called John Vasiliades who is a good 15 years older than me. John was the lead director on a continuing drama I directed in Greece for three seasons. John could shoot TITANIC in a teaspoon. He taught me storytelling economy, taught me to shoot fast and efficiently and taught me to always keep lighting in mind, especially when scouting locations. To this day I utilise his pearls of wisdom. The third mentor was an editor called Yiannis Tsitsopoulos. When we first worked together he was already a veteran with 150 films under his belt — he started in his 20s throughout Greece’s Golden Age of Cinema in the 60’s. He was 60 and I was 30 so it was a father/son relationship. John taught me a story may be shot on set but it’s completed in the editing room. He taught me that above all, the edit is there to protect the actors and to put their best performance on the screen. He was so meticulous with this, he would go through every single take over and over again and single out this look from here, that little moment from there and make it all work beautifully. He was the master of the “invisible cut” with extraordinary instincts. I am the director I am thanks to all three, I owe them a lot and we remain good friends.
There are so many stories. Back in Greece, I was working with a lovely actor who was so grateful he was on the show and because of that, he took it all way too seriously. He would come on set two hours before his call time and agonise over the script and analyse everything and question this and that and he was full of insecurity despite being brilliant. This was his big break and he was not going to mess it up. I like pranks so this guy was an obvious target. One day we were filming on the edge of a cliff overlooking the sea, waiting for the sun to set. Conditions were perfect. I’ve set the cameras, and the script calls for this actor to stand at the edge of the cliff looking at the sea. He’s depressed and is contemplating his life. I tell him where to stand and explain that no matter what, he must not move unless he hears “cut”. This is a one-take shot, I’ve got three cameras rolling, we must get this today, we don’t have the time to come back etc. so please no matter what don’t move until I say so. Just keep looking at the sea please until you hear “cut”. What he doesn’t know is that I’ve wrapped the crew so everyone quietly backtracks and goes home, except me, the DoP and my 1st AD. We hide behind some rocks and watch this poor actor stand there, contemplating his life, way after the sun has set and darkness has started to fall! That alone was hilarious but what made us piss our pants was that after half an hour, he was looking for ways to incorporate his look towards us into his performance. He started building it gradually by rubbing his chin and looking sideways and it was just the funniest thing ever. The look on his face when he finally turned and saw three cameras on sticks and no one around was priceless!
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
Mirella Papaeconomou who I mentioned above gave me my first big break in Greek TV. She believed in me, convinced the network and took a huge risk by doing so because at that point I had only directed short films and co-directed another high-end mini-series. I’ll owe her forever. In the UK a man called Paul Wroblowski gave me my first break on HOLLYOAKS. When Greece’s economy went in the toilet, my family and I relocated to the UK in order to survive. We lost everything in the process and I had to essentially start over in another country. No contacts, nothing. Paul took one look at my CV, we had a chat and he hired me just two months after I set food on British soil. In my eight years in the UK I have not stopped working so my family and I owe Paul more than I can express.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“Never Give Up” This is relevant to me in so many ways and goes hand-in-hand with what failure and success means to me. Showbiz is filled with rejection and the word “no”. Determination and tenacity runs strong in my character but even so, not being able to see all my dreams come true is tough to handle. So I’ve trained myself to look at failure as the path to success. To see it in a positive light and to not let it beat you down. Everything we know we learn from our failures. Success teaches you nothing. Not all dreams come true, but many do. Everything I’ve achieved in life I’ve achieved because I never stopped trying, I never gave up. It’s a mindset I love which forces me to look forward and not to dwell on the past. It is those who persevere that get there which is what THE ONE NOTE MAN is about. Never giving up feeds hope which fuels life itself.
I am very interested in diversity in the entertainment industry. Can you share three reasons with our readers about why you think it’s important to have diversity represented in film and television? How can that potentially affect our culture?
We tell life-stories and diversity is an accurate portrayal of our society. Under-representation is inaccurate. I was lucky to grow up in a diverse environment and to watch my parents embrace every aspect of diversity but not everyone is so lucky. We storytellers yield a lot of power though the stories we tell and how we tell them and have an enormous responsibly to be as accurate as possible. An accurate portrayal of society affects both the under-represented and the over-represented groups so celebrating the diversity of culture, sexuality and lifestyle is vitally important. Stories are so much more interesting with diversity.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now?
I am writing the feature version of THE ONE NOTE MAN and developing a heist movie to be shot in 2025 in London. I am a working director so I look forward to directing all the shows that usually come my way but especially a certain high-end TV show I’ll be directing soon (I can’t be more specific than that right now).
Which aspect of your work makes you most proud? Can you explain or give a story?
For me, the definition of success is when people want to work with you over and over again. So the fact I’ve managed to be in constant work for the past 22 years, still doing what I set out to do when I was 19 and blessed to be practicing a profession I love so much, is what I’m most proud of. And I’m very grateful for it too.
Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why?
“This is going to take longer than you think!” I was way too impatient when I was younger and it caused me a lot of frustration and unhappiness.
“Don’t obsess about the goal, enjoy the journey”. For many years I didn’t appreciate what I had been blessed with, the things I had in life and what I had achieved. On your way up the mountain, once in a while it’s important to stop and enjoy the view.
“Be grateful for what you have and for what really counts in life”. For so many years I placed my happiness in my career achievements taking the real blessings in my life, my family, for granted. I was not a present father when the kids where young and I wish I had been. The fact that my wife actually told me this at the time is testament to my bottomless stupidity.
“Never reveal your insecurities on set” I made that mistake on my first TV job I co-directed and paid for it. I lost the crew and subsequently some of the actors. Talk about a baptism of fire!
“Fight for your vision!” Again on that first job I was too afraid to fight for my vision. Subsequently, the end result did not reflect my sensibilities and I was not happy with it.
When you create a film, which stakeholders have the greatest impact on the artistic and cinematic choices you make? Is it the viewers, the critics, the financiers, or your own personal artistic vision? Can you share a story with us or give an example about what you mean?
It always starts with what story excites me. It’s a physical thing actually, I can feel it in my stomach. I strive to tell stories I would like to watch but of course, that’s not always possible. With cinema it’s different. I’ve made 8 short films and one feature film and in all of those cases it was all about what excites me, it was about what I want to say and why I want to say it, and yes it was also about the vision. Financiers, networks, showrunners, execs and producers are all part of the equation and the way I see it, it is my duty to do my best to satisfy their needs too, as long as we’re making the same movie. In most cases though I’ve been lucky that the money people trust me and they usually like what I have in mind. The audience is always on my mind. We tell stories because we want them to be seen, we want to communicate them to the audience and hopefully start a dialogue or a debate. But you can’t use the audience as your compass. Your north star must always be what you believe will work and what you want to say and then hope for the best. One of the moments I’ll never forget was when I bought a ticket to see my own film at the cinema. It was packed and I sat in the back and watched the audience for two hours. Then I heard people sniffing and you could hear a pin drop in all the right places. At the end a young girl with her mother sat there and didn’t get up until after the lights came on. The mother was emotional and speaking to her daughter about her brother and how the main character in the film brought back so much about him, The fact she connected with the character on a personal level was a huge moment for me. It was mission accomplished.
You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
It would be the Eat Healthy Keep Active Movement! I eat pretty clean and I’m into martial arts so I know what a massive difference healthy eating and active lifestyle has made not only to my physical health but also to my mental health and mindset. It is the key to a happier, full of energy life of feeling great!
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might see this. 🙂
I would love to meet Steven Spielberg who is the reason why I became a director. In my opinion, he is the greatest storyteller of all time and he’s been directing films for my entire life. I reference all the milestones in my life against the releases of his movies! I got married when A.I. came out, MUNICH was when my daughter was born and my son was born when CRYSTAL SKULL was released! Through his work, he has been a constant inspiration in my life. I owe him so much and it would be nice to say thank you in person.
How can our readers further follow you online?
My Insta is @gsiougas, my webpage is https://gsiougas.wixsite.com/website and you can always search me on IMDb!
This was very meaningful, thank you so much! We wish you continued success!
About the interviewer: Guernslye Honoré, affectionately known as “Gee-Gee”, is an amalgamation of creativity, vision, and endless enthusiasm. She has elegantly twined the worlds of writing, acting, and digital marketing into an inspiring tapestry of achievement. As the creative genius at the heart of Esma Marketing & Publishing, she leads her team to unprecedented heights with her comprehensive understanding of the industry and her innate flair for innovation. Her boundless passion and sense of purpose radiate from every endeavor she undertakes, turning ideas into reality and creating a realm of infinite possibilities. A true dynamo, Gee-Gee’s name has become synonymous with inspirational leadership and the art of creating success.
George Siougas: 5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Became A Filmmaker was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.