Because Twilight had a bunch of fight scenes, Joey put the male lead, Henry, through some pretty intense closed-door training before cameras rolled.
Henry was hitting the gym five days a week: strength training, plus pro-level stunt and fight choreography. They brought in real experts for flips, rolls, and combat moves. The guy was already walking testosterone with muscles that could make any woman weak in the knees, so the physical stuff was honestly a breeze for him.
As for Emma Watson, Joey felt she was missing a little... spice. Totally understandable; she was still basically a college kid. So Joey hired specialists to lock her away for some private "charm school." Speech, expressions, body language: everything had to hit the exact vibe Joey wanted.
The big one? Sex appeal. Yeah, Bella Swan's supposed to be a high schooler, but if a vampire's losing his mind just from the way she smells, she's gotta have something magnetic going on. Regular cute-teen energy wasn't gonna cut it.
Emma wasn't the most malleable actress in the world, but Joey figured they'd get her as far as they could.
Meanwhile, Joey basically turned her hotel room into a monk's cave. Every night she'd meditate for hours, then rewrite her director's statement from scratch.
That document was pure gold: the whole movie's tone, location strategies, character arcs, world-building: everything lived in there.
She'd already drawn every storyboard panel, but now she was tearing them apart. What was missing? What was extra? How could she crank the atmosphere up to eleven? All of that got reworked.
Location scouting especially. Actors are unpredictable; locations she could control.
Her goal was to milk every set for maximum mood and audience manipulation, all while keeping costs low.
She was dead-set on nailing every shot in three takes max. No way was she turning into one of those Hollywood perfectionists who shoot fifty or sixty takes of the same thing.
She swore that by the third or fourth take, any director watching dailies has already forgotten what the first one looked like. If you're on take ten, you've lost the plot and you're just panicking because you never knew what you wanted in the first place.
So she made damn sure she knew exactly what feeling each shot needed to serve before anyone yelled "action." That's how you avoid endless takes.
In her past projects, she rarely went past three anyway.
All that prep paid off big time, at least as far as the cast and crew were concerned.
This director's brain was scary-clear.
She never gave confusing instructions. Whatever she needed from actors or crew came out simple and direct; no cryptic artsy nonsense.
A director who really knows how to work with actors doesn't talk their ear off. Emma was shocked at how little Joey actually said.
Joey would just tell her and Henry, "Look, keep it stupid-simple. Henry, for this scene you walk to the door, open it, sit on the floor. That's it. Don't try to 'act' all the little micro-emotions."
Henry blinked. "That's really it? Nothing else?"
Joey grinned into the megaphone. "Nope. Just do exactly what the script says. The simpler, the better. The second you start trying to 'show meaning' through tiny gestures, you're gonna tank the scene."
New actors don't always get it; they think the more the director talks, the better they need to "disappear into the role." Total myth.
Emma, being the pro she was, got it instantly. Less is more, especially since these shots aren't even in sequence.
Her exchanges with Joey were short and sweet.
Emma: "What am I doing in this scene?"
Joey: "Walk down the hallway."
Emma: "How?"
Joey: "Slow. Determined."
Boom. That's veteran-director language: strong verbs, simple adverbs. Joey was clearly no rookie.
Henry, though; poor newbie Henry was a nervous wreck and kept asking questions.
"Director, what should I be thinking during this move?"
"What kind of face should I make here?"
Joey would just shake her head. "Doesn't matter. Don't worry about it."
Because she never needed her actors to deliver deep, profound inner monologues. She just wanted clean, basic physical actions.
Like when she shot Meg Ryan in Source Code; all she had to do was stand there looking sexy as hell.
Every director has their own style: some ramble, some scream like dictators…
Emma quickly clocked Joey's: the simpler the performance, the better.
The less the actors do, the more room the director has to work magic in the edit.
Joey never said, "Walk to the end of the hall and discover the door is locked."
She'd just say, "Walk to the end of the hall and try the door."
She refused to load complex ideas onto the actor, because movies are built from a thousand super-simple fragments.
But rookie Henry kept trying to "find new layers" in his character, and one day Joey finally snapped.
She pulled him aside, trying to be patient: "Listen, I don't need you showing grand passion or inner turmoil on set. Save that for acting class. If you ever study montage theory, you'll get it: the emotion isn't the actor's job. It's created in the edit, in the cut, in the music, in my hands."
Then she gave him a playful punch on the shoulder. "Just trust me, kid. Stick with me and do what I say; I'll make you a massive star. But you gotta listen."
Shooting wasn't flying by, though. It was actually kinda slow, because Joey kept getting inspiration on the spot and scrapping whole chunks of the shot list.
She improvised more than the actors did, which just proved how fast her brain worked. That kind of flexibility is pure gold in a director.
At least a quarter of the storyboards got tossed the second the camera rolled and a better idea hit her.
That said, she was obsessed with this script. There's an old Hollywood saying: "A great script carries the actor, and a great actor carries the script." A killer screenplay gives everyone room to shine and ooze charisma.
Joey thought the rom-com queen she'd sweet-talked into writing this thing had seriously delivered. Thank God she'd spent a whole month begging and charming her until she said yes.
Zero regrets about that month of groveling. Only a script this good could let a director pour real heart into the film.
Heart, soul, "feels"; whatever you want to call it. Sure, Joey was making this movie with a ton of passion, but not every audience member picks up on a director's personal vibe. What they do notice is style.
She hadn't made enough hits yet for people to pin down her signature style, but everyone on set already knew it loud and clear: clean, sharp, no wasted motion. Get to the point fast and skip the fluff.
And honestly? The crew and cast loved working with her. She wasn't a tyrant, wasn't nitpicky, wasn't a diva, didn't blab forever. Just hit her (super clear) marks and you were golden.
Henry, though, was still confused. He'd pull Emma aside and whisper, "Don't you think Director Joey's making this almost… too simple? I've never had a director say so little."
Emma would pat his back. "Relax. That just means you haven't worked much yet. Every director's different. Trust me; you lucked out. Joey's the most chill, actor-friendly director out there. If you ever worked with James Cameron…" She rolled her eyes dramatically and smirked.
"Plus," she added, "the better the director, the less they bug the actors and the more they ride the crew. Joey's tough on the DP and props, easy on us."
Henry nodded slowly. "Yeah… you're right."
Emma grinned. "The more I work with her, the more I trust her. She's legit. And when she says we follow her lead and we'll blow up huge? I'm starting to believe we actually might."
Henry gave a shy little nod, still looking a bit dazed.
Emma suddenly cracked up and teased him. "No wonder Joey picked you; you really are the most adorably earnest guy ever."
Henry shrugged, helpless. "I still have no idea what she saw in me. I've got zero experience. I just remember her eyes lighting up that day, smiling like crazy, saying my manners impressed her."
Emma laughed. "Exactly. So she's handing you the keys to stardom, dummy."
Stardom, huh?
Would he and Emma actually blow up? Like Bradley Cooper and Meg Ryan did after Source Code?
Or… maybe even bigger? Like, break-the-entire-Hollywood-ceiling, super-mega-star big?