FBI: MOST WANTED: Milena Govich on Her Directing Career and Stepping Behind the Camera for ‘Do You Realize??’

February 11, 2025 by Marisa Roffman

“Do You Realize??” – The Fugitive Task Force is sent on a hunt in Philadelphia to investigate a double homicide and the abduction of a 14 -year-old girl in the foster care system. Meanwhile, Ray’s father is hospitalized after an accident while helping out around the house, on FBI: MOST WANTED, Tuesday, Feb. 11 (10:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network, and streaming on Paramount+ (live and on demand for Paramount+ with SHOWTIME subscribers, or on demand for Paramount+ Essential subscribers the day after the episode airs).
Pictured (L-R): Roxy Sternberg as Special Agent Sheryll Barnes and Director Milena Govich.
Photo: Mark Schafer/CBS ©2024 CBS Broadcasting, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The Fugitive Task Force is called to the scene of a double homicide on the Tuesday, February 11 episode of FBI: MOST WANTED, but the stakes aren’t just to find whoever committed the murder—the team also has to find the couple’s 14-year-old foster daughter, who was abducted after the attack.

Stepping behind the camera on “Do You Realize??” is Milena Govich, who has established herself as one of FBI: MOST WANTED’s go-to directors. (This marks her eighth time helming an episode, putting her second only behind directing producer Ken Girotti; she recently wrapped her ninth episode, which will air later this season.)

Here, the actress-director—who has now directed over thirty episodes of television in the past seven years—talks with Give Me My Remote about her path to directing, shooting “Do You Realize??” and more.

Obviously, you had a working relationship with Wolf Entertainment on the acting side, but how did you come to direct for them?
Well, I hadn’t been in touch with them in a number of years. After working with them as an actor—first on a show called CONVICTION that only went one season, sadly, and then on LAW & ORDER—I went off and did a bunch of other TV work.

When I started directing, I had made several short films; I went to the AFI Directing Workshop for Women to train. My short from that program made it into South by Southwest and was nominated for an award there. So I revisited my connections at Wolf when I decided I really wanted to pursue directing professionally. They watched my short films, and heard about everything that I’ve been doing, and gave me a shot on CHICAGO MED, which I’m supremely grateful for.

LLAW & ORDER: ORGANIZED CRIME — “Sins Of Our Father” Episode 408 — Pictured: (l-r) Christopher Meloni as Det. Elliot Stabler; Director Milena Govich; Dann Florek as Donald Cragen — (Photo by: Virginia Sherwood/NBC)

There are a lot of actor-directors in the Wolf Entertainment steady group of directors. What conversations, if any, do you have with your fellow actor-directors?
You know, the nice thing that I find on all these shows is that there’s a shorthand when I come in to work with the actors. There’s a common understanding. It’s always nice when they know I’ve done their job before. So I understand what they’re going through in the most intimate way, right? And I find it thrilling. I find it thrilling to be able to collaborate with them.

I’ve leaned on my other fellow actor-directors more in areas beyond performance: How did you learn the more technical aspects? And how do you deal with producers or executives? I come from a similar background as a lot of the other actor-directors, and so hearing how they navigated the things that are more challenging that I didn’t have as much experience with starting out, that’s really helpful.

FBI: MOST WANTED is one of the shows you’ve directed the most at this point. What is the process for how they approach you about an episode?
Well, our episodes are more assigned to us based on where they fall on the schedule. So when they book me as a director, they basically say, “Would you come and do [this]?” This season I did episode 11, and I just wrapped episode 15, so I’m slotted for those episodes. I don’t necessarily know which script is going to get assigned to me, so I get the script somewhat late in the process.

But that said, the writers are so wonderful at hearing feedback and ideas. The showrunner, David Hudgins, is just a phenomenal collaborator. Wendy [West] and Bryce [Cracknell], who wrote this episode, were so wonderful. And they’re very open. They’re looking for that objective eye, that fresh perspective, because they’ve been sitting with it for a long time. They’ve been getting notes from their showrunner and their executives. So I think they appreciate a fresh perspective, and we work on it together from there.

“Footsteps” – The Fugitive Task Force launches into full gear after multiple bombings appear to be targeting retired NYPD officers. Also, Ray decides he’s ready to take the next step in his relationship with Cora, on FBI: MOST WANTED, Tuesday, Feb. 20 (10:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network, and streaming on Paramount+ (live and on demand for Paramount+ with SHOWTIME subscribers, or on demand for Paramount+ Essential subscribers the day after the episode airs).
Pictured (L-R): Director Milena Govich, Edwin Hodge as Special Agent Ray Cannon, and Dylan McDermott as Supervisory Special Agent Remy Scott. Photo: Mark Schafer/CBS ©2023 CBS Broadcasting, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Going into this episode, what excited you the most about this script?
Two things were really exciting to me. The first is basically the subject matter. It’s revealed early on that our perpetrator that we’re chasing is from the foster care system, and he has presumably kidnapped a girl who was in his foster home with him. And Bryce Cracknell, one of the writers of the episode, worked on a documentary called FOSTER that was on HBO; this episode is very much inspired by that documentary. And it was so eye-opening to me to do the research ahead of this episode and really find out about this system and these kids and what they go through and what they’re subjected to. I thought Bryce and Wendy just did a fantastic job of exploring those really important themes in this episode. So while it was exciting, it was also heartbreaking. It’s a very emotional episode.

The other more fun aspect that I was looking forward to is that the young girl who was kidnapped is a competitive ice skater, and in the story, she’s competitive at the level that she could have qualified for the Olympics. So we got to do a whole sequence of ice skating, almost like a dream sequence. And we had a skating double named Hope Alexander, who had just come off of the Disney tour of playing Princess Tiana on Disney on Ice. And she was gorgeous. She was gorgeous. So creatively that really stretched me; I’d never shot anything on ice before. [Laughs.] So to learn how to do that and figure that out and make it something emotional and absorbing was a real treat.

“Do You Realize??” – The Fugitive Task Force is sent on a hunt in Philadelphia to investigate a double homicide and the abduction of a 14 -year-old girl in the foster care system. Meanwhile, Ray’s father is hospitalized after an accident while helping out around the house, on FBI: MOST WANTED, Tuesday, Feb. 11 (10:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network, and streaming on Paramount+ (live and on demand for Paramount+ with SHOWTIME subscribers, or on demand for Paramount+ Essential subscribers the day after the episode airs). Pictured: Dylan McDermott as Supervisory Special Agent Remy Scott Photo: Mark Schafer/CBS ©2024 CBS Broadcasting, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

It’s a really gorgeous sequence, too. What can you share about actually filming that and trying to direct a sequence that’s so centered on ice?
Yeah, well, as you may suspect, we have a very tight timeline on these shooting schedules. So I only had half a day to shoot all the ice skating stuff [and] the act out—spoiler—where there’s an incident. [Laughs.] All of that with stunts, special effects, ice skating, we shot in six hours. So we had to be very efficient.

Now, that said, when you have a whole crew going out on the ice, you’ve got to move slowly. But there’s something called an ice dolly, which I didn’t know about—it’s basically just the dolly on skis. And everybody had these, like, clamp-on things on their shoes, so that they could walk on the ice. My first assistant director, Craig Langus, is actually a really good ice skater. So my first AD had skates on, going around, checking in with anybody. I did not get on the ice because I am not an ice skater, and I was like, “The last thing I need is to wipe out during the middle of my directing day.” So I didn’t even chance it. But the crew had a ton of fun that day. It was very cool.

And the other great thing is our A camera focus puller, it turned out was a competitive hockey player all his life. So he rigged up a small camera with a backpack with the receivers and the batteries and everything, and went out on the ice with Hope. So a lot of those shots that you saw that are very close to her, that push in and pull back and are falling, that’s all John Fitzpatrick. God bless him. [Laughs.]

You really have directed most of the Wolf Entertainment shows, stepping behind the camera at seven of their ten current shows. Of the ones you haven’t done yet, what show are you most hoping to direct at some point?
I have really enjoyed their new show ON CALL, on Amazon. I think the look of it is so interesting and absorbing. The two lead actors on it [Troian Bellisario and Brandon Larracuente] are phenomenal. So, I think it’s a fun, yet logical, departure for Wolf, going into the streaming world. So I’d be really excited to do something like that.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

FBI: MOST WANTED, Tuesdays, 10/9c, CBS

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FBI: MOST WANTED: Milena Govich on Her Directing Career and Stepping Behind the Camera for ‘Do You Realize??’

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