Leading director and exceptional animator, not into acting (5)
I believe the answer is:
drama
'acting' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'leading director and exceptional animator not into' is the wordplay.
'leading director' becomes 'd' (I am not sure about the 'leading' bit.).
'and' says to put letters next to each other.
'exceptional' indicates anagramming the letters.
'not' suggests deleting specific letters.
'animator' with 'into' taken out is 'amar'.
'amar' with letters rearranged gives 'rama'.
'd'+'rama'='DRAMA'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for drama that I've seen before include "Plays as branch of literature" , "Stage production" , "High emotion" , "Highly emotional episode" , "theatre show" .)