3.5 I enjoyed this book enough and it would've gotten a 4 star review if it didn't take SO long for Val to tell Maeve her good news. There wasn't a good enough reason to me why she would've held in the secret for so long. The relationship between the two mains was sweet and believable. Cute story!

This was a really solid book from Carlin Greenwald. The Hollywood romance (celeb x regular person) was fun, there were great pieces of LA scattered throughout, and the characters were well developed.

I especially appreciated the diversity in this book, and the abundance of queer rep across the LGBTQ+ spectrum. This book had several spicy scenes, and showed different dynamics in queer sex that many similar books skip over in favor of more ’standard’ WW relations.

My only complaint was that the book felt a bit long at times. Sometimes it skipped around and was hard to follow a specific tangent, and other sections dragged out without any exciting elements.

I had also read Sizzle Reel by the same author, and enjoyed this book a lot more. I would encourage anyone who loves queer Hollywood romances to give this a shot, regardless of how you felt about Greenwald’s previous books.

**I was provided this book as an e-ARC. Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for giving me the opportunity to read this story and provide my honest opinion on it.**

I just really really loved this book.

I think we all go through times where we think we need to fully change careers or even just take a fully different direction in our lives because something isn’t meshing. Valeria experiences this after working to break into directing once she comes out and becomes pigeonholed in particular acting roles. Folks struggle to see her as anything beyond her sexuality though she tries to sway the focus to her professional endeavors.

While this seems futile, she leans into the world of academia and teaching - a space she became familiar with and invested in during pursuit of her PhD. Enter her co-professor, Maeve.

What unfolds is full of attempts to find your place, developing new passions, and making connections with those you wouldn’t have expected.

The writing of this story was witty, creative, and drew you into the characters. I was sad to see it end and would absolutely recommend it to my friends.

At twenty-nine, Valeria Sullivan is a celebrated, award-winning actress. But when her acting options start to decline and her attempt to transition to directing is complicated by a bad interview on a late night show, Val decides she’s had enough of Hollywood. Intent on pursuing a neglected passion, she pours herself into a guest professorship at USC, hoping to transition to academia fulltime. Standing in her way is her co-professor, Maeve Arko, whose brilliance and beauty is matched only by her contempt for Val. As Val rises to the challenges that teaching throws at her, though, Maeve starts to soften, and soon sparks are flying.

Now with a job and a girlfriend she adores, Val should be happy. But Hollywood isn’t done with Val quite yet. Her directorial debut, Oakley in Flames, starts getting attention, and soon Val has to choose between her obligations to her class—and Maeve—and the burgeoning dream Hollywood career she may not be ready to leave behind.

I love books set in academia, so I thought I'd give this one a shot. Overall, I enjoyed the changing dynamics between Maeve and Val. The romance itself fell a little flat for me (not exactly sure why), but overall I did enjoy it. I don't know much about the film industry, but this book felt like it was authentic. I haven't read this author before but want to check out her other books after this one!

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the advanced digital reader's copy (ARC) in exchange for an honest review!

I don't have many thoughts on this book. The writing was great and I don't know much about the topic that Val and Maeve's class was about, but the scenes with a lot of information about it were easy to read and didn't feel excruciating to get through.

I liked Maeve and I would've loved it if her neurodivergence was developed more than the one or two mentions relating to it. I didn't connect much with Val's character outside of her representation of anxiety, but that could have been because I'm a bit younger than her, so there is a bit of a disconnect. I lost a little interest in some of the parts where Val was dwelling over her choices and whether she should be honest with Maeve, but overall the book was good.

I mostly enjoyed myself with this one, which is a huge improvement from my last couple of reads. This is definitely the palate cleanser I needed. With that said, I really wished I enjoyed this even more. There were some really great moments, especially when it came down to Val’s anxiety and her mental health, but ultimately, a big chunk of this story was me dreading the third act conflict, since it was so predictable.

Ok, let’s go back to the beginning. I did love the whole plotline of Val doing a teaching gig while taking a break in between her acting and directing debut. I especially loved the whole tension and antagonistic relationship she had with Maeve when she started working. It was so interesting during the moments when Val lectured to the class on filmography. However, once Val and Maeve stopped clashing and actually became friends, their tension kind of fizzled out, and once that happened, their emotional buildup just didn’t feel gradual at all. Not only that, but the “I love you’s” felt so sudden, which is probably because of all the time jumps.

By the time the third act conflict came around, I was just peeved at Val instead of invested in their romance. For the last 25% of the book, Val just gradually got worse with her self-sabotaging-as pointed out by Charlie-and I was just waiting for the other shoe to drop. I wouldn’t even call it miscommunication, it was just Val refusing to be honest with her girlfriend about her career. I’m happy she sees her therapist on page, and we get to see her try to work out her anxiety with, but honestly, I wished the conflict between them was just not this in particular.

I think this book would have really benefited from Maeve’s perspective, especially for the first 30% of the book. I would have loved to see her during their back-and-forth, during the emotional wrought moments when talking about her ex, and towards the end of the book when she shows up in Canes.

My favorite part of the book was Charlie, Val’s best friend. He was always so supportive, and honestly a breath of fresh air. I also liked Val and Maeve together and how realistic they were as people, but I just think I would have enjoyed this more if we weren’t stewing in Val’s mind about keeping her film acceptance as a secret from Maeve for a pretty huge chunk of the book. That said, there were a lot of scenes that stood out, like the date at the museum (animal museum?), or the dinner with Val’s parents, and when they professed their first “I love you’s” to each other.

I honestly had a hard time getting through this one. And I was so excited when I saw it on NetGalley! It's a sapphic romance between an actor/director and an academic! It's set at USC! I go to USC! I'm an academic (in training?)! I love reading about academics and I love reading about actors/directors and I love sapphic romance, and it's set somewhere I spend a frankingly disgusting amount of time! So this should be perfect for me. And yet...

There's nothing offensively bad or distasteful about <i>Director's Cut</i>, it's just a bit too boring in a way that makes me wonder if I am perhaps a toxic person. Valeria is a 29-year old A-list actress who also has a PhD in popular music or something along those lines and is teaching a class at USC because she thinks she needs to pivot her career because her foray into directing has not been going well, and the roles she's been getting since coming out have not been to her liking. Her co-professor Maeve is a bit tetchy at first, but they work out their issues pretty quickly and then embark on a romance. The timeline also didn't sit right with me - the actual on-page events occur in a fairly truncated amount of time so everything develops a bit too quickly to have any particular weight. Valeria and Maeve are cute together - it's the kind of relationship I'd be rooting for if they were my friends - but they're ultimately boring once the slight animosity between them is resolved (not that they were super interesting before) and I honestly had a hard time caring about them or their relationship.

What made it harder to enjoy the book was Valeria's character and issues. Look, I get it - acting and academia are both careers that are loaded with insecurity and impostor syndrome and just crushing depression and self doubt. Here's a story: on the first day of my PhD at USC, we had a presentation about impostor syndrome. My cohort was a group of ~15 people where most already had a couple of publications, or they had won awards, or they had done some very impressive community work. In all honesty, I was probably the least impressive person there by any scholarly metric (I got in off a waitlist, so that tracks). When the PsyD giving us the presentation on impostor syndrome asked "who here feels like they don't deserve to be here?", <i>everyone</i> except me raised their hands. So I'm not saying that Valeria's borderline constant stream of self doubt and insecurity is unrealistic, but I am saying it's pretty tedious. This woman had her first dissertation rejected at age 24, quit academia to go into acting and became an A-list actor who was able to pivot into directing her own feature film and finish her PhD by age 29. This is an immensely successful career by any metric - even if she had taken an extra year to rework her initial dissertation, getting a PhD at 25 is, while no unheard of, pretty impressive (and she pretty much would have had to progress to her final year with absolutely no lost time to get there, even in the less time intensive UK system). It took her all of 5 years to pivot into acting, become very successful, and then pivot again into directing and get a feature film made. I swear I have sympathy for her and her issues, but I mostly just wanted to give her a good shake and tell her to snap out of it and stop being such a loser. I'm not a mean person, but Valeria really took me there.

Overall, a boring relationship, a boring plot, and a mind numbingly frustrating main character.

Reviewer's Note: I recevied a digital ARC of this book via Netgalley. The book is not set to be published until later in 2024 and I am posting this review in April of 2024.

Caryln Greenwald's "Director's Cut" was an excellent read for anyone who identifies as a theater kid: past, present, or future. Though I have not read Greenwald's novel, "Sizzle Reel," This book made sense without the context of the other and can be read as a stand alone. Now that I've decided I like the writing style and characters, I do plan to read the accompanying novel. Still, I enjoyed "Director's Cut" on its own.

Overall, I think Greenwald does a great job with character development. I really enjoyed both Val and Maeve's storylines and how they merged together. Valeria's mental health journey is incredibly relatable, and watching her manage her mental health was a very realistic despite her being an Oscar-award winning actress. The depicition of this queer relationship was also really healthy. The couple have a few very difficult conversations both about sex and their relationship apart from it. They unpack trauma together and don't have a traditional third act break up. I really like Greenwald's take on these familar tropes.

This novel is also very well researched when it comes to theater/musicals, film industry, etc. Greenwald could probably teach the course that Maeve and Val teach just based on the classroom scenes and light amounts of lecturing we get to read. If you told me that Greenwald has a cache of self-made college course syllabi and movie pitches, I would believe it. It is risky for an author to reference so many popular and well-known works, but Greenwald has definitely familiarized herself with the likes of popular musicals like Little Shop, Les Mis, etc. enough to include them in this novel.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and fell in love with the characters. I will reccomend it to my theater and queer friends.

This was a good book. I really love the world building and the characters. The pacing was really good and it was an interesting story to read

I'll be honest, I struggled a lot with the style of writing in this novel. It took me 3-4 different tries to be able to get through it. That being said, it's a fun novel if you're into the world of Hollywood glamour!

"Director's Cut" does a great job of intersecting Hollywood glamour with the less glamourous academic world, This was certainly a fresh and engaging Sapphic love story.

At the heart of the book is Valeria Sullivan, a celebrated actress at the cusp of her career transition, finds herself in an unexpected romance with her co-professor, Maeve Arko. Their journey from professional rivalry to romantic involvement was very interesting, especially when set against Val's struggles with her identity and career in the public eye.

This was a great story and a super authentic look at the love, mental health, authenticity, growth, and Fame!

Thank you so much to NetGalley, Carlyn Greenwald, and Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you for the opportunity to read the eARC for Directors Cut. Unfortunately, it ended up being a dnf for me. The character Gwyn was not a good friend and reminded me of an ableist (ex) friend who found my disabilities exhausting and I couldn't read that right now. I also didn't enjoy Sizzle Reel because of how the characters were written, so this author just might not be for me.

I really enjoyed reading this book, mainly because I'm so into celebrity romances, which in this specific book is different from the typical ones.
The book has important topics to me, such as coming out and mental health (separate and together)
I'll read more books by the author in the future 🥰

Such a sweet and easy sapphic novel! I really enjoyed watching both characters develope and their love story unfold!

Thank you Knopf for inviting me to review Director's Cut by Carlyn Greenwald.
Director's Cut is a big win, a great romance but also mostly just a great book, strong writing, great characters, and a surprisingly in depth more than a romance plot. I think it's a win even for readers less into a romance read because it has a lot of strong themes.

This was a big surprise win for me! I knew I would like it, academics meets Hollywood, yes please, but this book is a lot more than that, it is smart, it is loving, and it is full of strong secondary characters, strong notes on mental health and life not just in Hollywood but also life feeling pigeonholed by sexuality and identity. Greenwald's writing drew me in and I was fully engaged with Val's story, with the world building, and with her struggles. I also really loved that this book leaned into the teaching plot so in depth, I got so much out of that part of the story, the genuine appreciation for ideas, for teaching, for intellectual conversations, and the behind the scenes knowledge about movies/musicals and theory. The other standout was the details about fears, anxiety, physical health, and past harmful relationships, the importance of a safe therapeutic space, and mostly about being honest with oneself and with loved ones.

Director’s Cut is the latest sapphic romance from Carlyn Greenwald. What a gorgeous cover! I loved her debut, The Sizzle Reel, so I was excited to read this. Director’s Cut follows Val, an actress and director in Hollywood who also happens to have a PhD. When Val gets an opportunity to teach students at USC, she leaps at it. Val isn’t sure what she’ll do if her film doesn’t succeed and is eager to explore other options. Her co-teacher is the unimpressed Maeve, who believes Val hasn’t really earned the position. Yet as Val proves she deserves to be there, Maeve and Val grow closer. What happens when Hollywood intrudes on their classroom?

Val and Maeve have a lot of sizzling tension between them, which I loved. I enjoyed how it took Val some time to prove to Maeve that she was truly invested in the class and not just as a gimmick for her career. There is fantastic LGBTQ+ rep throughout, including side characters. I loved Charlie and his friendship with Val. Val has some mental health challenges to work through before she is ready to be in a true relationship, especially relating to anxiety. The lack of communication at the end frustrated me, yet I understood why Val did it. Greenwald’s writing is witty and relatable. I’m looking forward to seeing what she writes next! Readers looking for sapphic romance, a celebrity MC, mental health rep, and sizzling tension should check this book out.

Thank you to Carlyn Greenwald, Vintage, and Netgalley for a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

For publisher: My review will be posted on Goodreads, Instagram, Storygraph, Amazon, Barnes & Noble etc.

Thank you to the publishers for the ARC!

I want to start by saying I found this to be a pretty well-rounded book. It finished with no questions left to be answered. What I did find rather difficult about it structure-wise was how we are rather thrown into the world making it confusing to keep up with who was who, etc., but it did eventually mellow out rather well.

Character-wise, I loved Maeve and Val. Going into the book, I assumed it would just be a "care-free" romance, but Val ended up being such a complex character.I loved seeing her delve into her mental health and seeing anxiety talked about in a way that was so open and free of judgment. I especially loved Maeve's character as I could see parts of myself in her having her sexuality belittled in a sense. I loved seeing their relationship develop naturally. Reading it felt like their relationship wasn't really rushed and I really liked how the intimate scenes didn't seem like they were there just to spice up the book; it felt natural and you could see their relationship develop even then. One of my only complaints was about the miscommunication. Without giving any spoilers, I just feel like the miscommunication lasted too long on Val's end and made it rather aggravating to see her put it off for so long.

Overall however, I really loved this book and am glad to have had the chance to read it. The theatre lesbians are going to go crazy for this.

This has been AMAZING. I loved every second of it. Seeing how passionate were both Maeve and Val about their careers and how neither had to give it up for the other was fantastic.
I really liked the pace of the book and it's writing.
I could fully understand how Val's brain worked so even though I would have acted different in certain situations I never got upset with her or her way of handling things.
I love found family stories and even if we couldn't see how this chosen family became what it is, it still felt precious.
The only thing is that I would've loved a little bit more spice, but that's just my preference.

It took a little longer than I'd like to really get into this book, but eventually I did, and for the most part after that, I enjoyed it, with the occasional taken out moments, but overall, as far as the romance went, I did enjoy myself by the end, and believe if you can wait it out, you would also come to enjoy it.

Not gonna lie it took me a bit to fully get into this book, but after finishing it I am glad I didn't give up. Even with the book being from Valerias POV you see still see a lot of who her friends, family and Maeve are. Carlyn does a beautiful job of showcasing high anxiety, and the benefits of getting help isn't a bad thing. Valeria struggles with not portraying the traumas from her ex onto Maeve, and its a lot of inner dialogue of Valeria trying to figure out who she wants to be. Watching her accept asking for the help she needs, and finding what makes her truly happy is a beautiful story. Its a book that as someone with high anxiety its nice to relate to in a sense, and can't help but fall in love with everyone in the book. Read as an arc from netgalley

This book was cute, the romance was swoony at times, and the setting was fun and summery. It is safe to say that I enjoyed my time reading the book because there were definitely a lot of aspects I liked. However, I don’t see this lasting as a favorite. There was a lot of miscommunication between Val and Maeve which is my least favorite trope, and I felt that for majority of the book the story felt a little rushed. I would definitely be interested to read more from this author later on though, because of the parts of this book that I did enjoy!