'Tár' director Todd Field says he wouldn't have written the Oscar-nominated movie if not for the pandemic

• "Tár" director Todd Field told Insider his screenplay wouldn't exist without the COVID-19 pandemic.
• The pandemic allowed the Oscar-nominated director to "disappear" into his writing.

There's no disputing the pandemic was difficult for many people, but for "Tár" director Todd Field, it enabled him to "disappear" into writing the movie's screenplay.

Focus Features chairman Peter Kujawski had approached Field before the pandemic struck to write a screenplay about a classical music conductor, but Field "kind of forgot about it."

Then a week before the pandemic forced Americans to shelter in place in early 2020, Kujawski approached Field again about the project.

"I certainly wasn't going anywhere," Field told Insider at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival in February. "So it was a real opportunity and certainly, a piece of salvation, to be able to disappear into a piece of writing, where I was given total freedom and the respect to write what I wanted to and I think probably, to write something that I felt like I had to write without any notion that it would ever get made."

"Because at that time, it didn't seem like we were ever going to go back outside or go to the cinema. So, I really dealt with it like it was a piece of fiction," he continued.

"Tár" has proved to be more than just a piece of fiction, though. Thanks to Field's writing and direction, "Tár" is up for six Oscars this year, including best motion picture, best original screenplay, and best directing.

Cate Blanchett's nuanced portrayal of classical music conductor Lydia Tár is also widely viewed as the actor's best performance yet.

Through the actor, audiences experience the painful, incremental (then precipitous) downfall of a revered conductor due to her own flaws and mistakes.

It's a 2-hour, 38-minute masterclass in acting that has earned Blanchett a Golden Globe and BAFTA, and positions her as a favorite to win the Oscar for best actress.

"There's a reason that when she walks into a room, the temperature changes, and there's a reason that when she practices her art, the temperature changes," said Field, who commended Blanchett's intellect as an actor. "I think what's striking about her, leaving the intellectual side behind, is that she is incredibly present. She's a wonderful, caring person to spend time with."

Field added: "I'll look at how she's able to go from being on set and really looking after herself and everyone else and then being able to go in and just boom, in a snap become this character, which is extraordinary. She's not somebody that walks around, wearing her homework or her efforts on her sleeves. It's all invisible. She makes it look easy, and we all know it's impossible."

It helps that Field also has a knack for drawing powerful performances out of his actors, proven out in films like "Little Children," with Kate Winslet and Patrick Wilson, and "In the Bedroom," which starred Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek.

But the modest director chalks up most of his success to casting.

"There's an old saw that says, 90% of directing is casting, and that's very true," Field explained. "If you invite people to come and collaborate with you, it's like having a perfect dinner party."

"We've all been to really wonderful dinner parties, and we've all been to so-so dinner parties." he continued. "It's basically like trying to throw a fantastic dinner party where it turns out that somebody who's coming to eat ends up coming into the kitchen and actually can make the main course better than you can."