Director Says Keira Knightley Can't Act

The director of one of Keira Knightley's recent projects has very few kind words for the actress. In fact, the director's experience with Knightley has led him to make an ultimatum, saying that he'll never work with a "supermodel" again.

John Carney, who directed the film Begin Again in which Knightley stars, says that the actress was not up to the role in which she was cast.

"It’s hard being a film actor and it requires a certain level of honesty and self-analysis that I don’t think she’s ready for yet and I certainly don’t think she was ready for on that film," he said to the Independent.

Carney complained about Knightley's entourage getting in the way on the set. It also didn't help, he said, that Knightley, who isn't a musician, played one in the film.

"I think the real problem was that Keira wasn’t a singer and wasn’t a guitar player and it’s very hard to make music seem real if it’s not with musicians," Carney said.

Other directors who have worked with Knightley, including Lorene Scafaria of Seeking a Friend for the End of the World and Mark Romanek of Never Let Me Go, spoke up to defend Knightley after Carney's comments.

There is a large discrepancy between the experience levels of Carney and Knightley. Knightley has been working as an actress since 1995 and was nominated for Academy Awards for her roles in 2006's Pride and Prejudice and 2015's The Imitation Game. Begin Again was just Carney's sixth film as a director, and only one of his other projects, 2007's Once, has received significant attention.