I mean, if you are directing actors to do one thing and then directing them to do something else entirely because the one thing you wanted them to do may not work, then you are just shattering their confidence in the project.

Egoyan has won four awards each at the Cannes Film Festival and the Toronto International Film Festival. Atom Egoyan OC (Armenian: Աթոմ Եղոյեան; born July 19 1960) is a critically acclaimed Canadian stage director and film director. Egoyan is now based in Toronto where he lives with his wife Arsinée Khanjian a trilingual (English French and Armenian) Armenian-Canadian actress who appears in many of Egoyan's films and their son Arshile (named after the Armenian-American painter Arshile Gorky) who attends the Toronto French School.

His most critically acclaimed film is The Sweet Hereafter (1997) and his biggest commercial success is Chloe (2009). Egoyan's films often follow non-linear plot-structures in which events are placed out of sequence in order to elicit specific emotional reactions from the audience by withholding key information. Egoyan has been nominated for two Academy Awards: Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay both for The Sweet Hereafter.