Hey, she has Martin Scorsese’s endorsement

Jess Manafort jokes that she was born with a “put-on-a-production” gene because, at age 4, she was already directing her parents while they were taking home movies of her.

“You can see in the actual home movies, I am, like, stamping my foot, ordering them to turn my Cinderella record up loudly and telling them to move closer.”

And now, 21 years later, she’s directing young actors -- including Amber Heard and Alexa Vega -- in her first feature film, “Remember the Daze,” which opens Friday.

The ensemble comedy, which Manafort also wrote, revolves on the last day of high school in a typical surban town in 1999.

“Definitely in terms of the idea of structuring it all in one day, that was inspired by [the 1993 film] ‘Dazed and Confused,’ ” says Manafort, who grew up in Alexandria, Va. “In terms of the story, almost all of the characters and a lot of the tone were personal to me from my own high school experience.”

Manafort went from directing her parents to directing her own movies before the age of 10. “Before that, I was performing plays and shows for my parents, grandparents and the neighbors. I used to sing the musical ‘Chess’ at age 5 and 6 and would stand in front of my parents every night after dinner, performing.”

During a summer vacation in the Hamptons, she was inspired by the blooming sunflower fields to make a musical video, “Vincent,” which starred her uncle as artist Vincent Van Gogh and was set to the Don McLean song.

“It ended up showing a depiction of him sort of going crazy,” she says.

Manafort included “Vincent” in a portfolio she sent to family, friends and people in the art circuit in New York to see if they would write her a letter of recommendation for early admission to New York University’s film school. One day she received a letter from Martin Scorsese telling her he had seen the film and was recommending her.

“I don’t know who got it to him,” says Manafort. “I met him one time after I was out of NYU. I went up to him. He said, ‘I played Van Gogh in a short film and you directed your actor better than I played Van Gogh, so I had to recommend you!’ ”

-- Susan King