A Black and White Comedy Lit the Fuse for Elizaveta Dyachkova — Now She Keeps Productions Moving in Color

Elizaveta Dyachkova still remembers the moment a film rewired her attention.

It was not a new release or a trendy recommendation. It was Some Like It Hot, a black-and-white comedy from 1959. She was 16, stuck at home in a cast after breaking her leg, and wrestling with the sudden silence that follows a life built on constant training.

She had always been a visual kid, she says. At ten, she became fascinated by what a professional camera could do. At twelve, she saved enough money to buy her own and started organizing small photoshoots with friends. Later, she earned money photographing acrobatic Rock’n’Roll competitions, capturing the movement of the sport she lived inside.

“It makes sense now,” she says. “I was always chasing images. I just did not know it would lead me to film.”

That obsession with images became more focused once she saw filmmaking up close. After her injury, she attended a two-week summer film school in London, where she watched how movies are made and fell in love with the process immediately. She describes it as the first time she understood that cinema is not magic. It is work. It is coordination. It is a team building one moment at a time.

Not long after, she made a decision that startled people around her. At 17, she moved alone to Boca Raton, Florida, to finish the last two years of high school in the United States.

“I did not move because I felt ready,” she says. “I moved because I knew I would regret it if I did not try. I had to build a new life from scratch, and I did it anyway.”

She spent those years learning everything she could about filmmaking while applying to film schools across the country. In December 2020, she learned she had been accepted into NYU Tisch School of the Arts for Film and TV.

When she arrived, she felt behind in a way she could not fake.

“I had never even read a script before,” she says. “Everything felt new and confusing, but it was also fascinating. I treated it like training. You show up. You learn the fundamentals. You repeat until it holds.”

At Tisch, she discovered her strengths not only as a director and writer, but also as a First Assistant Director, a role that sits between creative vision and practical execution. She talks about it like someone who enjoys responsibility, not attention.

“Directors are building a world,” she says. “Producers are protecting the budget and schedule. As a First AD, I am standing in the middle translating, planning, and protecting the day. If the set runs smoothly, everybody can do their job.”

Dyachkova credits her athletic background for that steadiness. Years in elite sport trained her to stay composed under pressure, to communicate quickly, and to build trust with partners whose safety depended on her discipline.

“In my sport, you cannot be sloppy,” she says. “You are responsible for another person. That changes how you think. On set, I bring that same seriousness. A well-run set is a safe set.”

Today, she works in New York across narrative and commercial productions as a director, writer, producer, and First Assistant Director. She is also a Creative Executive at the New York based production company 5th Sense Creative.

One of the highlight credits in her work as a First AD so far is the SAG-AFTRA feature film All You Have, directed by Erika Lynn Jolie and currently in post-production. The film stars Ashley Brooke, Lilian Rebelo, and Ian Brownhill.

Dyachkova speaks about that experience with the blunt realism of someone who understands what a feature demands.

“A feature is endurance,” she says. “It is many days where you have to stay consistent. You cannot lead based on mood. You have to lead based on preparation.”

With momentum from that first feature, she is attached as First Assistant Director on another SAG-AFTRA feature, The Phone Booth, currently in pre-production and set to shoot next fall. The cast list includes Gordon Clapp, Naheem Garcia, Lilian Rebelo, Ian Brownhill, Anthony Carvello, and Michelle Dunker-Arkin. It is written and will be directed by Trevor Siegel.

Alongside her AD work, Dyachkova directs her own films and commercials. She directed three short narratives, including White Nights, shot on 16mm and currently on the festival circuit after an official selection at the New York International Film Festival. She also co-directed La Fleur Pousse with Luca Csathy in August 2025; it is now in post-production and preparing for its festival run. And through her role at 5th Sense Creative, she was hired to co-write and co-direct a commercial for the legendary NYC restaurant Pommes Frites.

Her relationship with filmmaking, she says, is grounded in people. She loves the camera, but she discovered her real strength is directing, shaping performances, and seeing the bigger picture of a story.

“I like working with people,” she says. “I like building a space where they can do their best work. Leadership is not about being the loudest. It is about being reliable.”

If Dyachkova’s story has a hinge, it is that black-and-white film and the stillness forced by injury. But the real through line is not the inspiration. It is what she did after. She rebuilt her life, learned a new craft, and moved from elite sport to professional film sets without losing the discipline that made her a champion.

“I did not grow up dreaming about cinema,” she says. “I found it when everything stopped. And then I chose it on purpose.”

For more information, please visit Elizaveta Dyachkova’s Instagram.