Drama Queens - Work in Progress: Natalie Portman

Episode Date: July 25, 2024

Academy Award-winning actress Natalie Portman has displayed her versatility on the big screen, tackling a wide range of roles in films like May December, Thor, Black Swan, and the Star Wars franchise. Now, she is taking her talents to the small screen! Natalie joins Sophia to discuss her role in the Apple TV+ miniseries "Lady in the Lake," including why now was the right time to make her TV debut, admitting one of her biggest fears, using 'dream work' as a preparation tool for the project, her role behind the scenes and the impetus for starting her own production company. Natalie and Sophia also chat about the importance of celebrating other people's accomplishments, their 'work in progress,' and the exciting projects on the horizon!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Hey, everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome to Work in Progress. Hello, friends. Welcome back to Work in Progress. Today, we are joined by someone who has been on the podcast before, who I absolutely adore, who you know, from enormous films like Thor and Black Swan and Jackie.

She has won an Academy Award, a Golden Globe, a Screen Actors Guild Award, a BAFTA Award. She's won the Critics Choice Award. This woman literally has done it all. And now she is conquering television. Today's guest is none other than the inimitable Natalie Portman, and she is here today to talk with us about her new Apple TV Plus series, Lady in the Lake. She helped to produce it with her company, Mountain A. And today, I can't wait to

talk about what made her decide to jump into television about some of the incredible films she's made recently, including May December, directed by Todd Haynes, which I'm sure you all saw. Natalie stars opposite Julianne Moore, and it is a wild ride. And of course, we have to talk about our very favorite Angel City FC. Natalie and I have a lot to get into, so with no further ado, let's get to it. when we were tech checking, we realized that we're actually both in the same city today, which never happens. So we could have absolutely done this not on Zoom. I know.

It's very ridiculous. We could have been hanging out in person. But, you know, this is second. I know. This isn't so bad, though. I'm just so excited to talk all the things. Normally, I like to ask, you know, people who come on if they see like a through line to their career today and their childhood. But I feel like you've answered that question already

since you've been on the show before. I guess I would ask for a tweak in that since we last spoke, do you feel any sort of different connection to that question or like a different connection to your younger self from the place we sit today? I think I don't know. I always feel like there's repeating themes that I'm not necessarily conscious of that I go back to a lot. But I feel like the big, you know, thing that I'm always trying to get toward is finding, like, my own pleasure and my own joy as opposed to, like, please, others. I think that starting out as a kid, a kid actor was very much like, you know, looking to the grownups and being like, did I do a good job, you know? And now the goal is

always be like, you know, is this making me happy? Not just, you know, is this making everyone else happy? Yeah. God, that's so interesting. I was just out in Utah in the spring working on a movie. And I set a challenge for myself to, sure, be in with all the departments and see what the department heads need and do the technical stuff I like at work. But to act for me. Like to actually just go to work and see if I could remember what it felt like as a kid doing theater to feel like it was my after school thing, like I was playing. Instead of it being so serious and nobody tells you that you might wake up one day working and go wait have i how long has it been since i did something for me yes and and also like you're saying i mean as a kid

it's such play and we're so lucky to have jobs that are essentially play and so to not treat it like that is is crazy i mean it's just like the most uh extreme form of play you can have I think if you tap into it and you don't let the pressure get to you and the desire to be good for everyone and the, you know, the privilege of it and whatever. It's like I, I realized I sort of got so in the weeds on making sure it was running smoothly that I was forgetting to have a good time. Yeah, it's good to center joy. Oh my God, to find joy at work is so cool. And play. Yeah, the joy and the play. I like that. Did the desire to cultivate that kind of play, to find that sort of joy for yourself, do you think there's

a nugget of that, even in that little seedling when you decided we needed a soccer team in LA, when you helped create and, you know, brew this idea for Angel City? Like, do you think maybe as a mom looking at your family, you wanted more play? Yeah, I mean, well, it is a Of course, you know, emblematic that it's literally a game. Like it's, you know, it's supporting, again, what other profession do people play at their work? It's athletes, you know, alongside actors. And of course, it's such a joyful, fun thing for spectators as well.

And I definitely also just loved gathering with other women in times up. And I feel like it was kind of an unconscious way to continue that gathering. You know, we are, again, a group of women, you know, in our investor group, alongside the team, even though I could never be an athlete, this is a way to be part of a group with a a bunch of athletes. And so, yes, it's absolutely, again, celebrating joy and celebrating play. I love that. I got asked about it recently, and I was laughing, thinking about growing up in L.A.,

playing AYSO soccer, and very quickly realizing, you know, oh, yeah, for an asthmatic, soccer might not be my best sport. But we figured it out. Like the theater kids who couldn't keep up with the ones that run, we still figured it out. And we did. We essentially created. We weren't their way in. Yeah.

It's like it's a grown-up clubhouse of all the most fun humans we know. Totally. I really loved that. Was, do you think there's something interesting to harnessing that energy of times up like you were talking about? Being able to gather as women to have safe space. to talk about our experience is good and bad, you know, to not just have to perform and smile all the time, I think is so healing and clearly created such a salient point that you see these groups happening, you know, around the country, around the world. You see people

getting more frank about what it means to live in community and have better community. And to build a sports team feels like some of the best aspects of community. I love that there was a flip from gathering to figure out what to do with pain to sort of like flipping the pancake over and saying, okay, if this is the gathering, how do we move forward in pleasure, in play, in pay equity, and in all of these things that you know, we know our industry agnostic, but that we can certainly relate to. Do you ever sort of sit back and go, holy shit, we really did it. We really flipped the whole script on this? Well, I really think that the athletes led the way. You know, they, the athletes showed us

where to go. And I wouldn't want to, you know, take any of that credit away from them, you know, watching Megan Rapino and Alex Morgan and all of their teammates, you know, lead the way for the pay equity conversation for the U.S. women's soccer team and Beckeroo, who was their incredible representative who got them and pay equity, I mean, they were the ones who showed us like this is both joyful and virtuosic and changing, you know, changing the game for women and really inspired everything. And it's also just so great. I think with times up, I realized how rarely we celebrate each other.

Women in our group who said, you know, I remember like winning an award and it feeling so lonely walking into the room after that no one said like congrats or gave me a hug. And so we started this, we started this ritual of celebrating someone every time we met that we would like celebrate someone's achievement. And soccer is inherently that. Like, you celebrate when one person scores, the whole team scores. So, you know, we all jump on top of each other when that happens, you know. And it's such a great model for how we should be all the time as women. Totally. And I love that analogy because it's, it requires the entire team to make that goal.

It requires the entire team to win a match. And I think it's so cool, you know, loving that sport, loving the WMBA, like even seeing the professional women's hockey league start to take off and knowing that, I think the stat, I can't remember if it's 84 or 94% of women in the C-suite in their adult professional careers played either through high school or into collegiate sports. I didn't know that. And it's like, well, of course, it tracks. You can be a team leader. you can go and run a movie studio or a, you know, massive corporation because you know how to manage teams and support people, demand better of them, certainly, but also celebrate their wins as a, as a unit. And it's so cool. Yeah. It's a good reminder always now. I'm always

like, like, it's, it has to be conscious a little bit because I don't think it's been socialized into me. But like when I see someone do something great to like reach out and be like, like, that was amazing. I am so, like, inspired by you. Thank you for, thank you for doing what you're doing, you know, and I think it's, we all should be conscious of a little bit more celebrating each other's wins. I totally agree. I heard a good thing the other day. Someone was saying that I was meeting with this lovely guy who helps run a family restaurant. And he was like, if you guys liked the food, it would really mean a lot to us, you know, if you'd go on and leave a review. And I was like, oh, yeah, I guess I don't really think about that too often.

And he was like, well, yeah, most of the time when people are giving you feedback, it's a critique or criticism. And I thought about that. And we do, like even on social media, we hear from all these negative voices. And to just go out and be verbally and publicly supportive and kind to people feels so nice tendency towards bitching yeah i mean i i don't say it about other people i feel like i'm subject to it myself like it's important to say when you love something as much as when you're like annoyed by something totally totally and to be like loud and out front about it feels so special Yeah, rare. Yeah.

And now for our sponsors. How do you start to practice those things as you're finding, you know, more either capacity or regularity for your own joy? How do you start to make more of it? How to make more joy or more? Yeah, like any of it, I think all of it feels sort of generative to me. the way you're talking about it, I sort of, like the vision I'm having in my head is of this, you know, snowball gaining size. So if you're trying to shift a practice like that to be more vocal about what's great or to lean more into the things that make you feel great,

like how do you do that? How do you grab those things out of the air around you? Yeah, I think it's been very meaningful, absolutely, to be more conscious about telling people when I think that they're doing something amazing, talking about it publicly. I think, you know, like in a friend group to like call out someone's achievement to the friend group and be like, let's all celebrate this person's achievement today or this person's greatness today is so wonderful. And I think is such a great way to cultivate that appreciation. And also for me, just giving myself the permission to do something because it's fun and not necessarily, you know, some of the other things that we put on ourselves.

Like for me, doing things that I love doing that I'm not very good at because I think so much of my life has been about like being good and achieving and all this stuff. and, you know, like painting for me, I'm not very good at it, but I really enjoy it. And, like, that's become a really important practice to, like, do something just because I like it, not because anyone would be like, wow, that's amazing, Natalie. You know, like, no one will say that to me about my painting, but it brings me happiness. And so, you know, following those lines has been important for me. I love that. And I think it's tricky, too, when particularly when your job is to make an art form

because then any art can be work. So to sort of separate these, you know, buckets, if you will, to give yourself a space, yeah, to be not great at something or to just do it for fun and purposefully not try to judge the quality of its art feels it feels like something you have to cultivate, but probably something that makes you feel more free, I would imagine. Yeah, I think to free yourself from, again, having to like please others or perform for others or get accolades from others is, you know, is definitely freeing. Yeah. How does it apply then when you decide to go from this stage in your career and make a movie. I mean, you know, it's funny when I look back over like

the first bio from your first visit and I think about, you know, how young you were. You were 12 when Leon the professional happened and you took a break from acting to go through Harvard and talked, I remember then, about what you felt like you had to prove because people love to give us those joyful monikers as actresses in the world, you know, to go on and win at the academy and to have these, you know, enormous career moments. Again, it's so amazing. You're a wonder kind at what, you know, you do at the art

we all get to participate in. And yet it's always measured. So now to find that balance, in your life, how does that balance maybe shift the way you go to work? Like when you go to make a project, like Lady in the Lake, do you intentionally try to carry more play space with you or is work for work and like play for painting at home? No. I mean, my work is all play and it's actually, I think what people remark to me most when I'm working is that they're shocked by like how unsurious I am.

Like, I'm very serious and like being prepared and being professional. Like I do my research. I do my prep. I show up knowing my lines. I'm like on time. But like all I want to do between takes is like joke around. Like I don't, I'm not one of those people. It's like everyone needs to be quiet so I can focus.

You know, I'm like laughing and joking and, you know, messing around. because for me, that's how everything stays loose and stays in that spirit of play that I think it's so important to acting for me. But, yeah, it is something that I think people don't necessarily expect for me before they work with me. I love that. I absolutely love that. I think it's definitely related to starting as a kid because people really

actively tried to make work like a play space for me as a kid, which was great. And I think it's like, you know, for me, that's what acting is, is, you know, playing, pretend. That's so cool. I wouldn't have thought about that. I guess the sort of motivation for the grownups around you when you were young to gamify work because, of course, they want to make it fun for you because you're just a little thing running around the set. Yeah. And also, like, my first movie had things like my parents dying in front of me and things that could be quite scary if you weren't conscious of it being like pretend. So I think everyone was constantly just like, it's make believe we're playing. Yeah. We're just playing this game.

you know, so that it's not as dramatic, I guess, as it would be. Yeah. You somehow felt it was serious. Such an insane thing that, you know, this job sort of asks you to do is suspend disbelief and basically just psychologically torture yourself for the hours that you're at work. Yep. What drew you to the project, you know, to make your debut in a leading, television role. You're, you know, it's, it's out now on Apple TV. It's so good for the friends at home. Oh,

my God. Like, how, how did you decide you wanted to lean into a series? Was it the team? Was it the script? Was it kind of a mix of both? Well, I've been so impressed by how series have been kind of like the leading art form and exploring characters. It's such an incredible luxury to have that kind of time to go into the detail and nuance of a character. And Alma is an artist I really admire and adore and it was incredible to get to be led by her. She's a true visionary and also an incredible human. And it was just extraordinary to be led by someone so strong, so inspiring so creative every day with positivity and real inspiration um and then these characters

are just to have these two women who are so complex who are so interesting and beautifully drawn and have them have such uh similar obstacles but yet to have my character kind of be blind to this woman's obstacles beside her. They're in these kind of parallel worlds is maybe one of my greatest fears, you know, that you can be so caught up in your own struggle that you don't see someone else is right next to you. Yeah, to have to sit with that. I would imagine prepping it, you know, you have to create that dissonance for this character, but how painful to essentially just not see someone else at work every day. Was it a surreal thing, you know, to film the series?

Was it much longer than, you know, a movie is normally for you? Yeah, it was really intense. I think that was the shock of it was the kind of stamina, both physically and emotionally, to make something that's seven hours long instead of two hours. and it was, you know, so extreme what we went through every day scene-wise. I mean, incredibly fulfilling and interesting. But yes, it was very sad, too, that I didn't get to work with Moses Ingram that much,

who I think is just so brilliant. She's really like just the most jaw-dropping talent. And because our characters have this kind of tragedy of, you know, not seeing each other, though they're so close physically, you know, we didn't get that much together, but I got to see her work in the series, and it's just one of the best performances I've ever seen. Yeah. I mean, it's just so, it's, the whole thing is quite breathtaking. Thank you. How did it feel, you know, when you talk about that in the edit, winding up with seven hours versus two, how did you have to prepare for this show differently

than you might prepare for a film? It was very similar to how I would prepare for a film, although there was something that was my first time doing that Alma introduced me to, which is so interesting. And now I've taken it into every project I've done since, which is dream work, where she's, put me together with a coach who you talk to her about your dreams. You start, you know, writing down your dreams and you talk to her about your dreams. And she takes you through, like, how it's connected to your character and how it's connected to you and brings you and your character together and really gets you into kind of subconscious, really interesting stuff. So that was

something new for me that was a complete revelation. I had never really paid attention to my dreams at all and then you start going like I can't believe I'm ignoring half of my life you know I spent half dreaming and I'm just not even paying attention to what's going on most of the time wow so how long did you do that before starting to work um I did it throughout like I did it I did it before we started and then also while we were while we were working And, yeah, it's incredible. I think Alma also really welcomed our dreams into the story. So she really incorporated all of our subconsciouses, subconsciousnesses.

I don't know what that word. Subconchai into the story where she was just kind of, it was a beautiful thing to like kind of welcome everyone's dreams that is so special i've never heard of anyone doing that and now i'm going to go down a rabbit hole it's it's a pretty it's a pretty revelatory tool i bet so will you tell our friends at home who you know didn't get lucky enough to get an advanced screening link um about the show and and what yeah maybe a little bit about it and what drew you to it So Lady in the Lake is a series that centers on two women. One is Cleo, played by Moses Ingram, who is a young mother in Baltimore trying to make ends meet for her children and working in many different jobs, including some that are dubious.

to make ends meet. And she ends up the subject of a murder, unfortunately, that my character, Maddie investigates. Maddie is also a wife and mother in Baltimore during the 1960s and kind of breaks out of her life, to go back to her early love of journalism and ends up investigating this murder and looking into Cleo's life to kind of understand what led her to be the lady in the lake. And I love that, well, A, I love an amazing story that's based on a book because I feel like it's such a rich world to mine for details. And as you said, character complexity for two women like this. And Laura Littman, the author, has this quote that I can't stop thinking about. She said

that she set out to write a novel about a woman who wanted to matter. Oh, and it just, it like, sucker punched me in the best way in my emotional core, because I thought, generationally, we have had so many of these stories passed down. You know, this is set in the 60s, but it feels incredibly modern in that way. And when we talk about where we all come from, when we talk about these, you know, reckonings like we were discussing with times up where people say, this has gone on for so long, it has to change. We are sitting in a moment today where because of what's happening in the world and the rollback of our rights and, you know, people saying, me too, went too far. All of these things that feel so insane. I know the feeling of being in rooms like the ones we were

referencing before where women are looking around going, but we matter. Don't we get to matter? And so it feels so modern to be exploring that desire to be a full human with permission to live a life. Did it feel really resonant for you today to look back in on this in the 60s and say, oh, the times are different, but I know the struggle. Yeah, I think, you know, that's the joy of historical pieces is that with the distance, you have a little bit more clarity. Like, you can't see the cloud. When you're in the cloud, you know, you can't. you can have more perspective on it and yeah so many things have changed like you know my character in the show can't sell her car without her husband's permission and that's you know only what

50 50 years ago um 60 years ago um and so so much has changed but also so much has not changed and um i think it's really beautiful what alma does there's there's a kind of gambling ring in the show where they bet on their dreams. They have these dream books, again, the dreams, and they have a dream, and depending on what dream they have, there's a number, and then they bet on that number, and they're literally betting on their dreams. And I think two women are betting on their dreams, and it's something beautiful on something we can recognize now, you know, how much courage it takes to bet on your dream. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, at any sort of stage, I think about it now, you know, even when you're

talking about that, I think, well, yeah, for you as a young woman, you know, to say, I want to do this. I'm going to pick a career, you know, before junior high. And from, again, this vantage point, think about, you know, you and your producing partner, Sophie, you founded Mountain A in 2021, right? So why did you decide to bet on that dream? Why did you decide to start a production company? How has that changed your experience at this stage in your career? I felt very ready to kind of step into my adulthood, which maybe is a little late. But I think that as a, as an actor, you're often infantilized in a way where everyone takes care of everything for you and makes all the problems go away. And there's a big moment when you're like, I want to take care of the

problems myself. Like I am ready to be the person people look to when something goes wrong and I'll fix it. You know, that's when you're a grown-up. And I was ready to do that. And especially because I, Sophie, who had been my friend for many, many years, was ready to start her own company at the same time. So we joined forces. And it's been so incredible to get to work with someone I love and respect so much and who's so good at what she does. And it's been incredible to get to tell the stories we want to tell and work with the artists we admire and, you know, help realize their visions that they have. Yeah. We'll be back in just a minute after a few words from our favorite sponsors.

Well, so for anyone at home who wants to work, you know, perhaps in film or television, but is looking around going, but what is a production company? Can you give some folks a little inside baseball on what a production company like yours does, how you get off the ground, how you even begin finding, as you said, the projects you're excited to make? Yeah, it's a great question because producers can do a lot of different things. I mean, you can get the material and then develop the material, meaning like maybe you find an article from the news or maybe you find a book that you think is interesting. And then developing it might be finding a writer or a director who will then turn the book or the article into a script and then you help. find financing for it so that the project can get made or, you know, talk to studios

or networks about making it. That's another way. And then once something starts, then you are involved in every aspect of, you know, hiring people, finding locations, supporting the director and figuring out how to make the vision they have for the project. Then after it's filmed, you work on the edits and you give feedback. You find distribution if you don't have it already, get it into festivals. I mean, it's really like you have a lot to do at every aspect on the way. And then if anything goes wrong, you're also like the fixer of the project. problems. Yeah. Yeah. It's a really all-encompassing job. And I'm...

You can choose too, right? Yeah. And I really enjoy it. And I also think to myself, like, there's just not enough time in the day for all of the things that I want to do and have a hand in and see. And, you know, I want to go down to wardrobe and pick the right blue sweater for that character. And And it's hard sometimes to, you know, make it to whatever your version of the sort of mountain top is on the project and then realize like, oh, I still can't quite do it all. Yeah. It's, I mean, it's incredible and it's incredible to have partners to share it with also. I think that that's been something really lucky with Sophie and Michaela, who also works

with us to, you know, be able to share those kinds of responsibilities because it is, it is a lot. yeah and i think i don't know i think maybe for me because i enjoy learning i want to see all of it see everything to make sure i really know uh what i'm doing and it yeah it it only gets done because there's the ability to sort of run it as a relay race it's it's definitely not an individual sport yes absolutely again teamwork yeah and yeah and that that i think is why you know artists and athletes have always had such an interesting overlap is because these are either metaphorically or literally team sports that were a part of. I'm curious, you know, for the production company, your first project was May December, which I just thought was so incredible.

I mean, you and Julian Moore and Todd Haynes, it's such a world that you gave to us. And it was fascinating to me seeing the movie based on that Mary Kayla Tarnow case because I remember the case and the the way in having an actor come to meet the family. I was like, oh my God, oh my God, because it allowed for such inspection through your eyes for us as the audience that you would normally never get with a, you know, national case like that. What state did you see the script at? Was it an idea? Was it fully fleshed out? It was fully fleshed out. And Sammy Byrd who wrote it and it's her first produced screenplay, which is unbelievable. I mean, she's just such an incredible writer. But she also, I mean, her kernel of the idea, she said,

came thinking like, what happens to that couple 20 years after the scandal when the spotlight has kind of gone away. And then they have adult kids who go away and they're like empty nesters. And she just imagined them like alone in their house in a kind of like haunted way. And I thought that was such an interesting starting, you know, launching pad for all of this complicated human stuff that happens. Yeah. What an absolute trip. I mean, I'm just thinking about it, even thinking about the music. Oh, the music. Todd was so. brilliant in his choice, I mean, in every choice he made, but the music just gave it such like specific tone that I don't think anything else would have signified, you know, that

it was like okay to laugh. It was okay to feel sad. It was okay to feel uncomfortable that like all of those things could coexist. Oh, yeah. It just added, it made my skin crawl every time the chords would hit and I was like they're they've done it they've really done it what do you want to do next you know having that come out be such an incredible film people are loving lady in the lake you know now you've got a a series ticked off the list what motivates you makes you feel excited whether it's with mountain A or even in your life you know moving forward from today um yeah there's a lot more at Mountain A that we're working on. We're working on an animated film.

We're working on a musical. We're working on lots more films and series. So I think that there's, yeah, we have a lot of exciting projects coming up. And then personally, I think that it's really, yeah, a moment of finding purpose and, you know, and service, like trying to really focus on that and how I can do that more in my community with my loved ones, you know, really being present for that. You know, I think there's such a shift after 40 of like, you know, doing all this stuff for yourself and then realizing what you can do for others.

I don't know, feels like the main focus. Yeah. Does that sort of central focus on service and on community, do you think that's something that helps you feel like, that helps you feel grounded and sort of rooted in our industry that often means you have to move somewhere at the drop of a hat, relocate for six months? it's very uprooting. So do you think the community gives you that? Yes. I mean, there's

absolutely like the selfish aspect to service, which is, you know, how grounding purposes and how grounding community is. So absolutely like I completely copped to that. It's not just purely altruistic like i i get so much out of out of that i don't know i don't think it's i hear you but i don't i don't think you need to say that that's you know a selfish thing like it's okay like it's okay great that i get something out of it you know that would be my flip for you is like hey what a cool thing that you're getting so much out of community and out of giving rather than just out of taking, like, I don't know. I think, to your point, whether it's 40 or, or what aha moment, I think such a big life hack, such a beautiful revelation is, oh, I'm always going to

have more joy if I'm outward with others than I will be if I'm insular with myself. I think that's deeply chic, ma'am. Thank you. Yes, I think you deserve that. When we think about this really sort of yummy space to be where you're making incredible work. You have incredible purpose in your life. You have incredible kids. You're looking ahead at what brings you joy. You're finding play. It sounds like such a well-deserved nice place to have your feet in the ground. What feels like your work in progress? Oh, so much. So much. I think to cultivate that service, to cultivate joy, I don't think those are, like, well practiced enough for me. I have to be conscious of them.

And so, yes, those are, you know, my conscious, like, what I'm working at. What about you? Me? Oh, gosh. You know, I think similarly to what you were saying earlier, figuring out how to live at my core for myself, it might sound so silly to people listening, but it really was a shock going from being raised, you know, to be like a good daughter of immigrants and a good girl and a good girl on set and a good soldier at work and someone who could smile through anything that was happening to keep the ship moving for everyone on it, you know, to actually ask yourself, what do I want? Where do I find joy and wait long enough until your inner self can talk back to you is pretty,

it's a seismic kind of shift. And so for me, figuring out how to maintain that relationship with myself, with my highest self, my inner knowing, higher calling, whatever you want to call it, to maintain that sort of communication while being the person who does like to, you know, research nerdy data science and wants to know what's going on and wants to figure out what we're going to do about, you know, fighting for women and fighting for disadvantaged peoples and et cetera, et cetera. Like, I think my work in progress is really beginning to sort of toddler stomp my way into learning to show up for myself in the way that I tend to show up just for other people.

That is very, very eloquently put. That is beautiful. Thanks. It's a work in progress for sure. but we're getting there. You're getting there. And certainly more to come on that. Well, thank you for today. You are always such a joy. I like a follow-up interview

so I can just really get in the weeds of what's in the moment with you and we don't have to do the full overview despite it being a lovely overview. Thank you so much for taking a time and for having me back Yeah. And I'll talk to you soon.

That's happening. I would love it.