Anna Kendrick Recalls 'Icky' Move by Director

Asked about the worst note ever given to her by a director, Anna Kendrick did not hold back. "I remember a director once in a room full of 100 extras or something being like, 'Hey, on this next one just try something. Just make something up. Just improv something,'" Kendrick said on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, as reported by Variety and Deadline. "And [I did it] and then the director called cut and came over and, once again in front of 100 extras, was like, 'Oof, let's go back to the script!'"

"It really felt like a very specific power move thing to embarrass me, to gain dominance. It was very icky," she said. But in the end, she got the last laugh: The line she improvised "ended up in the trailer. So f--- you!" she finished. She did not name the movie or the director involved. Kendrick was on the podcast to talk about her own directorial debut: Woman of the Hour, which debuted on Netflix earlier this month.

On the idea of directing and why she waited so long to move on it, she recently told Deadline, "I think it was a thought that I was actively shoving down, and I guess it would no longer be silent. Looking back, it's very obviously a protective measure on my part to ignore that desire, because it's vulnerable to want something and know that you might not get it or that you might get it and fail." (More Anna Kendrick stories.)