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!

Valeria is an award winning actress and director, but her career isn't where she wants it to be. She takes the opportunity to be a guest professor at USC, but she clashes with her co-professor. Maeve is getting closer to achieving tenure, and she doesn't want to let a Hollywood actress like Valeria get in her way.

Both women want to do the best at their job, but they have more of an animosity, at first, than a partnership. They are teaching a class about movie musicals, and it made me so happy! All of the references to songs and musicals was so much fun. I love musicals, and it made me want to sign up for their class!

As they start to work together, Val and Maeve spend more time together outside of the classroom, and sparks start to fly. I love a steamy, office romance, and this book delivers!

The book has steamy, open door scenes, sapphic romance, workplace romance, Jewish rep., and anxiety rep. There are discussions of biphobia and homophobia, and these topics were handled with care.

Overall, I enjoyed how Val and Maeve worked together, and they supported each other. One thing I didn't like was the miscommunication. As I was reading, I felt myself wanting to yell at Val to just talk to Maeve more and tell her how she was feeling.

This can be read as a standalone, but I recommend reading Sizzle Reel before Director's Cut because it gives you more about Val's backstory.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was cute! While not the typical style of writing I tend to gravitate to in romance, I still enjoyed the story and characters, and would absolutely recommend grabbing this as you head to the pool or beach this summer.

This was such a sweet and thoughtful read! Fans of Emily Henry and Abby Jiménez would also like this story and romance. I was rooting for the couple in this book, and appreciated the sections related to anxiety and mental health issues. I wish there were more details about the movie Valeria directed, but overall I loved this story and tore right through it!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Confession time: Greenwald’s debut novel Sizzle Reel, which is set in the same universe as this one, didn’t really do it for me. I enjoyed the author’s narrative voice and the Hollywood setting, and thought it had some important things to say, but the romance plot left me cold and felt ultimately underdeveloped. I didn’t think I’d pick up one of her books again…but, I mean, c’mon. Look at that cover! And I was excited to see Valeria, a character I really liked from Sizzle Reel, finally get her own HEA.

I was SO pleasantly surprised by how much I ended up absolutely LOVING this book. Greenwald’s strong narrative voice is consistent throughout, and the way she writes Hollywood through the eyes of a big-time star (as opposed to a production assistant in the previous book) was really good and felt incredibly authentic. I loved Valeria even more in this book—her passion for both film and academia, her relationship to her gay-best-friend-slash-former-beard Charlie, her candor about the difficulties of being an openly lesbian woman in Hollywood, and her passion for better queer representation in general. One of the things I really liked about Sizzle Reel was the way it wove in discussions of biphobia and the unique challenges that come along with being a bisexual woman; Director’s Cut does this just as deftly with the topic of how Hollywood handles queerness.

And the romance. The romance was SO good. Greenwald writes the intensely simmering chemistry of the early days of a relationship as proficiently as she navigates the more lived-in and conflict-prone waters of an established relationship. Valeria and Maeve were SO good together. I can’t remember ever getting this attached to a couple in a romance novel before. I loved how realistically the author wrote the transition from Maeve being totally unimpressed with her to gradually softening to…well, no spoilers (but you can probably guess). Also, while not the spiciest romance novel I’ve ever read per say, the sheer chemistry between these two characters had me literally sweating. I will not elaborate except to say don’t be like me and mainline this on an airplane where you’re crammed close to other people…who could ostensibly look over your shoulder at any point and see the screen of your Kindle. The only reason I didn’t give this book five stars is that my old nemesis, the third act conflict, frustrated me quite a bit; but, credit where it’s due, I felt that, unlike a lot of other third act conflicts that have frustrated me, this one felt authentic, realistic, and actually had what I felt was a good reason behind it.

Consider me a convert. I hope Greenwald writes more in this universe; I want more of these characters!

This was so good! Women in suits? Yes, please!

I had just finished a queer Hollywood romance story when I started reading this one, and oh man, it did not disappoint. The chemistry between Val and Maeve felt authentic and as someone who lives in LA, I recognized some of the setting which is always fun. I also enjoyed the discussion on work, sexuality, and the miscommunication trope. Did I mention the suits? Anyway, definitely would recommend!

I really enjoyed this book as it provided a nice light break from the type of books I usually read. It had a good plot and I enjoyed each of the characters in it. It definitely had some steamy parts to it but it was also balanced out with sweet romance parts. I even learned a few things about film along the way! I would recommend.