Anna Kendrick says actors are treated like 'insane divas'

Anna Kendrick worries all actors are treated like "insane divas" so she took a very different approach when directing her first film.

The 'Up In The Air' star steps behind the lens for the first time to helm 'The Dating Game' for Netflix and she's revealed other members of the crew were worried by her direct style because she refused to treat the castmembers like "delicate little eggshells".

In a chat with Collider.com, she explained: "I think a lot of the producers were surprised by the amount of stuff that I was doing with the actors in the film, where I think a lot of filmmakers, I don't know whether it was in a program they went to or whatever, but I think there's a lot of bad rumours going around about what you can and can't say to actors.

"So there was a lot of stuff that I would just talk about with actors that people were like, ‘I didn't know you were allowed to do that!’ Or, ‘I thought that was something you weren't supposed to do.’ It's weird. We're sort of treated like both insane divas and as these delicate little eggshells."

Anna went on to insist she wasn't afraid to give the actors candid direction and made sure she allowed them enough "space" to get each take right.

She went on: "That was a really fascinating thing to me that so many people were like, ‘Oh, I didn't know you were allowed to talk to actors like that,’ because I do think that there's a rumour going around that we are basically crazy children, which is not not true. We're barely people. I thought that was interesting."

Anna stars in the film as Cheryl Bradshaw - a real life contestant on 1970s TV show 'The Dating Game' who inadvertently chose serial killer Rodney Alcala to take her out.

The rest of the cast includes Tony Hale, Kelley Jakle and Kathryn Gallagher.