In the early 1980s, Morrissey developed a filmmaking craft at the Rathbone Theatre Workshop, a Youth Opportunities Programme that taught school-leavers skills for a year. With the workshop, Morrissey shot short silent films on Super 8, where he was taught by Bert Byron, who introduced him to US Independent and foreign films for the first time. Although the scheme paid £23.50 a week and took young people off unemployment benefits, Morrissey reflected in 2009 that many of the participants were just used as lackeys. After his acting career escalated, he started directing because he was aware that, as an actor, he was coming into a project quite late into development and then leaving before post-production, and he wanted to see a film through to the end. Morrissey has said that he prefers to keep acting and directing separate, and would not direct anything he is acting in.