“Growing up, I was very, very passionate about watching television shows,” says Nina Lopez-Corrado. “就像，这一直是我的事情. 我喜欢这个故事的长度... 当时每季只有24集, 所以我一季花了24小时和这些角色在一起, 我对他们有很深的感情. And so when I decided I wanted to go to film school, I wanted to do TV.”

The 满帆 grad 和 名人堂 inductee is living her dream: She’s served as a producing director 和 guest director on shows like 那算命者, 超自然的, S的代理人.H.I.E.L.D., 一百万件小事和HBO的 佩里梅森 和 的纳韦尔. She’s also on deck to direct an episode of HBO’s Emmy-winning hit, 最后生还者. Nina credits her current success to hard work, supportive mentors, 和 a bit of luck.

Nina grew up in a mobile home “literally on the wrong side of the tracks.” Her family was supportive of her creativity 和 her love of television. When it came time for college, Nina visited 满帆 with her mom 和 fell in love with the campus.

在她学习期间 电影和电视, she stretched her creative wings by producing her classmates’ film projects 和 learning as much as she could from her instructors. The day after graduation, Nina hit the road with her closest friends 和 moved to Hollywood. She spent her first year in Los Angeles living with seven roommates 和 interviewing for jobs as a production assistant. Nina was eventually hired as the assistant to producing director Chris Long. 她在FX的节目上协助他 污垢 when serendipity struck: The 2007 Writers Guild of America strike gave Nina new on-set opportunities.

“When the writers went on strike, obviously all the producers left 和 went to the picket line. Chris was essentially the last person st和ing 和 I was kind of thrown into the fire as a green assistant,尼娜回忆道.

“Whenever Chris was directing, I was tasked to keep production going,” she continues. “So I started going to all of the department meetings 和 going on all the [location] scouts, 我和编辑们一起在岗位上做剪辑, 当我在剪辑的时候, 我们在寻找所有我们缺失的部分, 不管是开车路过还是插入还是别的什么.”

Nina’s willingness to jump into production tasks 和 go the extra mile paid off. 当克里斯被邀请参加一个名为 那算命者他让尼娜和他一起去. The show was life-changing for Nina; she says that it was her “grad school.”

“我得从头开始学电视 那算命者]. I did it for over 150 episodes over [the course of] seven years… Whenever our day was over 和 I was done doing whatever I needed to do as Chris's assistant, I would go to set 和 I would sit behind the directors 和 I would just soak in everything. And it was huge for me because I got to learn what not to do 和 what to do. I got to see how the directors interacted with actors, how they interacted with crew,” she says.

Nina did everything from editing to overseeing color timing to checking out the final mix on every episode of 那算命者. 到第四季时，她已经是制片人了, 在第七季中，她执导了自己的第一集电视剧, “拜占庭.”

During her time on the show, Nina also directed a short film 和 was accepted into the Warner Bros. 电视导演工作坊. 她继续客串执导了几集 超自然的 -她是第一批执导该剧的女性之一, 和 she was the first female director to be asked back to direct multiple episodes. 从那以后，尼娜执导了几集 S的代理人.H.I.E.L.D.他成为了美国广播公司的制片导演 一百万件小事并执导了HBO的科幻剧， 的纳韦尔. 为HBO工作是Nina很长一段时间的目标.

“我的整个职业生涯，我的目标一直是在HBO工作. 这就像电视上的cr de la cr, 你知道, 在我成长的过程中，他们总是有最好的节目,尼娜说。.

当她在导演她的剧集 的纳韦尔, HBO executives noticed Nina’s talents 和 brought her on to direct a couple episodes of their crime drama 佩里梅森. Those experiences set Nina up for her next big opportunity: directing an episode of 最后生还者.

“我和制片人见了面 最后生还者] 和 it seemed like a really good meeting, but everyone wanted to do 最后生还者所以我没有抱太大希望. 几个星期过去了. 我接受了它. 这是不可能发生的. Then out of the blue, I get a call from my managers, 和 they're like, ‘最后生还者 just called 和 they want you to do an episode for them,’” Nina shares.

“所以现在我要在六月去那里导演一集, 就像梦想成真一样, 你知道? It's just this groundbreaking video game that's been turned into a really amazing television show with really great actors. 我要成为其中的一员. 这是我职业生涯中又一个里程碑式的成功.”

Nina’s accomplished many of the professional goals she’s set for herself, but she’s not stopping yet – she’d like to direct an entire television series 和 make a feature film. 但不管她在做什么, Nina makes sure that she’s giving audiences the same emotional connections that attracted her to television in the first place.

“每当我去(一个新项目), I just want to be able to find that thing in the actors’ performance, 或者是我们拍摄的方式, that's going to really connect with people who maybe don't have anything else other than their Thursday night 实习医生格蕾. And so that's a huge thing that I bring to every project… It’s taking a little piece of everyone I meet in life 和 somehow weaving that into something that will help somebody grow, 或者让他们开心, 或者让他们有片刻的感觉. 我认为这是一件非常强大的事情.”