Director Hanelle M. Culpepper Has Shot ‘Star Wars’ and ‘Star Trek’ TV Shows and Harnessed the Force in Both

Disney’s “ The Acolyte ” has just finished up its season, with Season 5 of “ Star Trek: Discovery ” not that far behind it, and there’s more “ Strange New Worlds ,” “ Starfleet Academy ,” “ Andor ,” and “ Ahsoka ” on the horizon. What a time to be a sci-fi nerd. But it’s an even better time, maybe, to be Hanelle M. Culpepper, the director who holds the distinction of being the only filmmaker (yet) to have worked across both the “Star Wars” and “Star Trek” TV franchises.

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Culpepper has helmed three episodes “Star Trek: Discovery” and the very first three episodes of “Picard,” as well as Episode 6 and Episode 8 of “The Acolyte.” Going into the Disney+ series, she already had honed a lot of sci-fi muscles, as well as the skill of shooting double coverage to create twins out of one actor (Amandla Stenberg plays both fated force sisters Osha and Mae). She already knew that making a shooting day with those kinds of logistics requires a level of planning not dissimilar to an FTL jump.

“One of the biggest decisions is to decide which character Amandla is going to play first that day. Usually you want it to be the one who is the more powerful character in that scene, or the one’s who is probably doing the most moving around,” Culpepper told IndieWire. Once the actor sets the first twin’s performance down and jumps into the second one, there are certain things that can still be changed or masaged, but a lot of the blocking and physicality will get locked in.

“If the acting double sat down in a moment, Amandla is going to have to sit down, even if she feels like she would rather be standing. So figuring out who she’s going to play first is key ,” Culpepper said. “She was really good about watching [her acting double] as well. She could be fully in her own space but still pay enough attention to say, ‘I really think Osha would move faster in this case,’ or whatever.”

Movement and intention are two of the places where Culpepper has found “Star Wars” and “Star Trek” to be the most different. Most of the director’s work is the same, but the tone and the perspective that the camera has is what’s different. “‘Star Wars’ has these light touches,” Culpepper said. “One show’s a soap opera, a space opera, and one is a more science-factual kind of a thing — it’s not as though ‘Star Trek’ doesn’t have fun and ‘Star Wars’ doesn’t deal with serious issues as well, but you have [their approach] in mind when you’re doing the scenes.”

Culpepper gets to place her camera in “The Acolyte” to cover the “Star Wars” gamut, from epic duels to weird little guys. With the delightful droid Pip and the fuzzy tracker Bazil, Culpepper said that she could inject a little bit more mischief and energy and perspective into her framing and blocking choices. “You’re thinking [about] what would a creature do in this moment. Bazil, you know, if he kind of trips here, that’s funny and in ‘Star Wars,’ that’s OK,” Culpepper said.

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The eternal battle between the light and dark side of the Force, of course, doesn’t have as much room for funny bits (or medium-close shots). But it does allow for a kind of staging that lets Culpepper as a director play with the tortured relationships between the characters. For the scenes in the cave between Osha and The Stranger (Manny Jacinto) on the unknown planet where he (and at least one other dark lord) is hiding out, the set wasn’t built until towards the end of the shooting block, making it one of the last things that Culpepper shot. But even just with blueprints for the space, Culpepper tried to block out those moments in a way that made sense for the shifting power dynamics between would-be teacher and insubordinate student, alternating who appeared taller and more in control of the frame.

“The nice thing about that cave, once I was able to go on set, I could see how it had a natural incline; so it worked very well that Manny [could start] higher up than her, but then ends up coming down to be on her level,” Culpepper said.

It’s maybe the creatures and the lighter side of the force that feel like the most quintessential “Star Wars” moments, though — at least behind the scenes. Culpepper told us that after she’d come onto “The Acolyte” she got a tour of the creature workshop and to ‘meet’ R2D2. “And then BB-8 came rolling out to me to say hi. I was trying to be so professional, but it didn’t last after that,” Culpepper said. “And then when we shot Yoda [the final shot], they came out with Yoda in a trunk; but then when the puppeteer made his eyes and his ears move, all of sudden he came to life. You’re just like, ‘Oh my God, there’s Yoda!”

“The Acolyte” is now streaming on Disney+.