The job of the assistant director is to work in concert with the director and the D.P. to get everything done on a movie set. As a 1st A.D., Adam Somner was described as a one-man film school and was the gold standard by the industry’s top directors to anticipate their needs, motivate the crew, figure out the schedule, and drive the entire production forward to finish each day on time. He finds the best way to keep everything moving smoothly on set is though humor, high energy and uniting everyone as a group, persuading people to do things on the schedule and timeline needed to complete the job.
Under Somner, you fully learn the importance of coordination : a key function of the A.D. Department, especially on high budget films. He saw assistant directors teams as a big family that will always be stronger if they stick together, and effectively defend requests for enough prep time.
Somner hadn’t intended on “escaping” his nearly-decade-long run as a 2nd A.D., where he often teamed up with Ridley Scott and Scott’s 1st A.D., Terry Needham.
“I was one of the few U.K.-based 2nd ADs who had been able to join the Guild, and I actually turned down offers to become a 1st AD to remain loyal to Ridley and Terry. Gladiator, which had all of these huge, amazing crowd sequences, was my last film as a 2nd, before Ridley gave me the chance to move up to 1st on Black Hawk Down. I worked second unit, which was trial by fire to be sure, but what an experience.”
In the years following Black Hawk Down, Adam embarked on an exceptional career as an assistant director, becoming 1st AD for Steven Spielberg (12 films), Paul Thomas Anderson (6 films), Martin Scorsese (3 films), Alejandro Inarritu (3 films), Ridley Scott, Tony Scott, James Mangold, Steve McQueen and many others. Spielberg called him a mind reader. Somner cites Munich as the most challenging project of his career.
“Re-creating the airfield shootout, where all the Israeli athletes died, was an incredibly intense and emotional sequence. Technically, and logistically, it was so difficult because we only had one chance to get it right: one helicopter to blow up, one night to shoot it. My assistants and I learned, by rote, the names of the 40-plus Arab and Israeli actors in order to just help pull it off.”
Somner says the way 1st A.D.s interface between a director’s vision and the practical requirements of a film crew is akin to being “the cartilage between the bones and joints.” He believes his best weapon, on any given day, is a sense of humor. “The ability to defuse tension in tough situations is key to doing this job.”
Adam’s ability to work on big sets with lots of action, extras and special effects led director Paul Thomas Anderson to hire him for There Will Be Blood, and Anderson has since become a personal friend. Adam found Anderson’s on-set approach to be very thoughtful and measured. Unlike the action-heavy films Adam has worked on, he knew it was important to keep the crew and background actors quiet and subdued on Anderson’s films with heavy dialog, such as The Master and Phantom Thread.
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