Trishtan Williams On Directing Netflix’s ‘Starting 5’ And Humanizing The NBA’s Biggest Stars – Essence

Trishtan Williams, a rising force in the world of filmmaking, brings her passion for sports to the forefront in the highly anticipated Netflix docuseries Starting 5. Known for her previous work on projects like Why Not Us: Howard Golf with Stephen Curry and Warriors of Liberty City, she has developed a reputation for crafting deeply human stories about athletes. In Starting 5, she takes viewers behind the scenes of the NBA, offering an unprecedented look at the personal and professional lives of some of the league’s most prominent players.

“As a woman who loves sports, this was the perfect opportunity to marry my passions for storytelling and athletics,” Williams says of her involvement with the series. “So when Netflix, SpringHill, and Uninterrupted brought this to my attention, it was a no-brainer. I had just finished a project and was grateful the timing worked out perfectly.”

The docuseries promises to humanize the athletes, showing the challenges they face both on and off the court. Williams’ approach to capturing this vulnerability stems from her ability to build trust with her subjects. “What I’ve learned is to be upfront, honest, and vulnerable myself, and that allows them to feel comfortable,” she explains. This trust has resulted in intimate portrayals that go beyond the surface, offering fans a deeper understanding of the players they idolize.

Starting 5 also represents a significant moment in sports documentaries, as Williams notes that “the NBA has never given this kind of access before.” With her thoughtful direction and a keen focus on the human element behind the athletes’ fame, the award-winning producer is set to deliver a docuseries that resonates with both sports fans and those looking for compelling, heartfelt stories.

ESSENCE: Starting 5 gives viewers an in-depth behind-the-scenes look at the lives of some notable NBA players—talk to me about what inspired you to take on this particular project.

Trishtan Williams: Well, what inspired me to take on this project, one, as a woman, I love sports, so I love doing sports content as a documentarian. It’s no-brainer when your agent calls and says, “Hey, Netflix has a new project and it’s paired with SpringHill, and Uninterrupted, and Omaha, and Higher Ground. It’s with some of the bigger NBA celebs that play in our current time. Would this be something you wanna direct?” And I’m like, “Of course.” And it is one of those things, we’re always so busy, so a lot of great projects come across your desk every day, but if you’re already in the midst of a project, of course you have to turn things down. So I was actually thankful that I was free in that window. I literally just finished up a project and then jumped right onto this. So, that’s what inspired me. I love, love, love sports content.

You’ve done previous sports projects; how did those previous experiences influence how you approached this project?

I did Why Not Us: Howard Golf with Stephen Curry. And of course, he’s an amazing person. And then prior to that I did Warriors of Liberty City: All-Stars with Uncle Luke, 2 Live Crew, and all of the NFL players. But for me, sports has always been a staple in my household. I’m a girl of five. Five girls, no boys. And in our household you would think we had boys. My father passed away when I was six months, so you would think we had men and boys in our house, but it was all girls, and we all love sports.

And so that’s what lures me into sports right now is just being able to identify what’s really happening. A lot of times women are so lost and don’t care about what’s happening, but I care. And when I was in high school, I was a cheerleader. So of course for basketball, you’re up close and personal. I was one of the captains, you have to know if you’re offense or defense. And then for football, the same thing. And so it’s exciting, it’s intriguing. The world loves sports, and then to be able to tell sports content in the story space, it’s just like the best space to be in my opinion.

There are some huge names in this particular docu-series too, which makes it even more intriguing. But, one, how did you build trust with these athletes to ensure that they felt comfortable being so vulnerable? And then how did you even approach capturing these particular moments in their lives?

So they call me “your favorite producer.” I am known for that, whether it is sports, whatever genre is, I am your favorite producer. And I think that’s a part of my secret sauce of getting people to get comfortable immediately. And how I do that is just being honest and vulnerable about myself, and being upfront about the process and how we’re going to shoot it. And then that gives them a clear identity of what we’re going to do throughout the process.

What I learned alone time ago, these people are extremely rich, their schedules are extremely busy, so they don’t need you to be in their face every single second. If you could be very direct and clear about what the goal is for the day, what the goal is for the month, what the goal is for the year, and you stick to that, then you get that trust because you’re not there and then you’re overshooting. It’s like, “Nope, we got it.” And you have to trust yourself as a director to say, “We got the scene and we’re done,” so they don’t feel overwhelmed. And so that’s how you gain trust. You be honest, and then they just love you. They would say, “We didn’t even know you were here, Trish. We forget that you’re here. You’re like family.” So it’s a part, in the pre-production process, of talking it out and really being clear what the expectations are, and sticking to your expectations.

With you having a kind of first hand account and you being so hands on, were there any moments when learning about these players that stood out to you?

There were multiple. One, when we are looking at them being drafted, and we’re hearing about the amount of money they’re making, and oh, my goodness, it’s crazy. We could only dream of making that amount of money. But how many games are there in a season?

82.

82 games, right? It is busy. I mean, you are really watching them on a plane every other day, and we’re just as tired. So imagine getting off the plane, you gotta go to practice, and after practice you gotta go to therapy, then you have to go to a workout, then you have to go to this viewing to look over footage, and then you’re dealing with your families. It is a lot. And I don’t think we really humanize them because when the media looks at them and we scrutinize every single little thing, and then you have to turn around and live up to those expectations, it’s a lot. And I think what I’ve learned is that they do a great job holding themselves together, going out there every single night, playing at the highest level that you could play at, dealing with the scrutiny, good or bad, and dealing with their families, dealing with their teammates. It’s a lot. And so I have a newfound respect for them, and I think the world will have a newfound respect for them as well.

The series gives a good balance of the players’ professional and personal lives. With their lives being so busy and so much going on, how do you and the directing team decide which aspects of their lives to highlight in the series?

So, as your driving story, you can identify what’s happening in their world in that year and what’s the focal point. And so you try to stick to that because it’s not a thing to just cover everything, because from a story perspective it becomes messy. It’s all over the place and it’s not a clinging story that the audience can convey. So once you identify what’s going on in their lives and what they’re having to follow up on, that’s kind of like their story base.

When you came onto the project, you collaborated with companies like SpringHill, Netflix and several others. What was it like collaborating with such a diverse and influential team?

Amazing. I mean, you’re dealing with the best of the best. You’re dealing with a lot of chiefs because these are big bosses out here, and everybody wants to see this project win. But ultimately it was peaceful. This was literally a seamless, smooth production, I think, from beginning to end. It was one of the easiest productions that I’ve been on. And I like to say that I run a good production all the time, but I think it was seamless, honestly, with all of the big parties attached.

Being a Black female director and producer in the industry, how has your perspective shaped the way you told the story in Starting 5?

I say lead. I’m a beautiful woman, right? You’re in a space that’s male dominant. So for me, lead with respect and lead with grace, and that’s gonna get you so far. Literally, that’s like the first thing when you’re in a space of this magnitude, just to be a lady at all times, understand why you got into this business, and keep your focus, especially when you’re in sports. I think my approach when you’re dealing with male athletes, is to deal with their wives. My approach is to deal with their female counterparts, and that’s my ally first. That’s my best friend. This is the person that gives me access to the house. I know all the scheduling because 9 times out of 10, their wife or girlfriend has their schedule, and that’s your best friend. So, as a female director, that has always been my candy to go to in every show that I’ve ever done. I deal with women first, and then I let the women give me the access to their counterpart, because it’s a respect level for me.

You spoke on it a little earlier, about humanizing the players. Outside of that, what do you hope that viewers would take from this docuseries?

You have to understand, the NBA has never given access like this before. So we’re actually watching something extremely historic. From hearing the players on the court during gameplay, being in their homes, being on the planes, being with them, you’ve never seen it before. So the audience are going to walk away, like I said earlier, with a new-found respect for these players and to actually have a little bit more grace as we’re looking at these players and we’re scrutinizing them, because, again, people like to say, “Oh, they’re making millions of dollars. They better be doing this, they should be doing this.” And it’s like, yes, we all have jobs and we all have expectations in how we should be handling our job, but we’re human.

And so I think the media is hard out there, and I think this is going to allow the world to just soften up a little bit and be like, “Oh, LeBron goes the real things too. Anthony has a real life. Oh, Sabonis, oh, Jimmy.” You’re going to learn so much and you’re going to end up having so much compassion for them, and love them even more. It’s going to make people love the NBA more than what they already do.