Anna Kendrick Explains Why Directing and Starring in Woman of the Hour Felt Like Working ‘with a Blindfold On’ (Exclusive).Linh

The ‘Pitch Perfect’ star pulled double duty on the movie about serial killer Rodney Alcala, who appeared on ‘The Dating Game’ in 1978

Anna Kendrick pulled double duty on Woman of the Hour, directing the film while also acting in a lead role.

But the balancing act, she tells PEOPLE, “was a little bit like directing with a blindfold on.”

When she’d finish performing in a scene, “I could basically run to the monitor, ask to see 30 seconds from the middle of that take and be like, ‘Okay, fingers crossed that there’s no surprises when I get into the edit,’” Kendrick continues.

“And there were some surprises, but we just had to keep it pushing. We had 24 days [to shoot] and we had the resources that we had and we had to just keep trucking.”

The Pitch Perfect star is proud of herself for taking on the project — the chilling true story of serial killer and rapist Rodney Alcala (Daniel Zovatto), who appeared as a bachelor on The Dating Game in 1978 and won a date with contestant Cheryl Bradshaw (Kendrick) — even though she says she felt lost at times.

“There was a day in preproduction where everything was falling apart,” remembers Kendrick, 39. “It truly felt like, ‘I don’t know if the train’s going to fall off the tracks.’”

She went to her car, played a Weezer album and thought of how proud her younger self would be that she’s directing a film. “No matter how stressed I was, I was like, ‘Fifteen-year-old you would be beside herself with glee.’ So it helped me keep pushing through the roadblocks.”

When she got to set, the doubts lingered for the Portland, Maine, native who started acting on Broadway at age 12 before moving into films like the Twilight franchise. “Is there a secret director thing that I’m forgetting to do that everybody knows that I should be doing, besides wearing a beret and having a megaphone?” she remembers thinking.

But Kendrick only gets rave reviews from the cast. Autumn Best, who made her film debut as one of Alcala’s would-be victims, says the director was a total pro and made her feel welcome.

“She was super willing to have conversations about my disability,” recalls Best, who was born with just a thumb on her left hand. “She was like, ‘It’s really important that we showcase you in a way that makes you feel confident.’ ”

Kendrick has yet to line up her next directing project since it will be hard to top her first experience.

“I’ve been reading scripts and there’s some incredible material out there, but I also think that I really hit the jackpot [with Woman of the Hour]. The script was so great, the cast and crew, I don’t know what I did to deserve them,” she says.

“And so there’s definitely that sense of I would want to care as much about the next thing as I did with this,” continues Kendrick. “And I think it’s a tall order because I think I got incredibly lucky.”