Happy Sad Confused - Danny Boyle

Episode Date: October 25, 2015

Director Danny Boyle is as charming as he is talented. Danny joins Josh this week to talk about the world of Steve Jobs, how the best stuff coms from not knowing what you're doing, working with Ewan McGregor once again after having a falling out in the past, and the long awaited sequel to Trainspotting. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Hun, wouldn't these be perfect for guests? Did you say Crystal? Who do you think is coming over? Well, they're only $20. $20? For a whole set. Forget the guests. Our anniversary is coming up.

We can use these. Deal so good, everyone approves. Only at HomeSense. Hey, guys, welcome to another edition of Happy, Sad, Confused. I'm Josh Horowitz. This is my podcast. This is where I talk to super insanely talented and charismatic people, which leads me to this week's guest, Mr. Danny Boyle. Certainly one of my favorite filmmakers working today.

If you haven't seen it yet, Steve Jobs is in theaters. It is now everywhere. It was at limited release, but now it's gone wide. I spoke to him just after this film premiered at the New York Film Festival, and he is as charming and personable as he is talented, and I simply adore this movie. So it was a real, it was really exciting for me to catch up with him for a good period of time. We talk about a lot of different things.

But before we get into more Danny Boyle-ness, let me introduce you to a couple folks that you, if you've heard the podcast before, you know them well. Sammy, Joel. Hey, how's it going, guys? Hi. Welcome back, Joel. Thanks, Sammy.

Joel was at a wedding last week. So he missed our introduction. That's as much information. No personal information. It wasn't your wedding, right? No, not that I know of, but hard to tell. Did you make a speech? Have you ever made a speech at a wedding?

I've never given a speech at a wedding. Have you ever given a speech in public? Yeah, all the time. When I'm on the subway platform, but I'm yelling at people. No, actually, I don't know. I mean, outside like work. like at a function no or like a yeah I've never given a public speech what about you Sammy have you given a speech at a wedding yeah I have I bet you give good speeches

listen everyone's good at something I'm pretty good at giving speeches yeah like I mean I'm a maid of honor in a wedding in a couple weeks everyone's like are you nervous about this speech and I'm like no I'm gonna kill it if and when I get married again um you guys I have nothing to say for you There's nothing for you. The worst thing I could have possibly said because my wife is now listening to this and is about to hit me in the face.

I would side with your wife. Yeah. Over you. That's probably right. Yeah. Part of the best. So as I said, this week's guest is Danny Boyle.

Very excited about this guy who obviously won the Academy Award for Sumbdog Millionaire. We talk about great many things, including train spotting. He's about to go off and direct finally the long-awaited sequel to train spotting.

Amazing. It's crazy. I can't wait. We get into, if you guys, No or don't know. I mean, there was that period of time where Danny, you know, was working

with Ewan McGregor a lot, and then the beach came and they kind of had like a falling out. So we even talk about that sort of rift that happened and how they've come together again and worked it all out. Danny accepts some blame. Basically, long story short, he abandoned you for like the biggest movie star on the planet

at the time to star in his film. Leo. You live, you learn. So he's back with his old mates on this film. So I'm really excited about that. And as I said, he's one of these guys that if you see him to deliver a Q&A in public or something or just interviewed on television or in a podcast like this, you fall in love with him because he's like so enthusiastic and effusive, much like recent podcast guest, Guillermo de Toro, kind of peas

in a pod. It's amazing that these guys who direct these really sort of intense, and sometimes dark movies are these like jolly, lovely gentlemen. Yeah, they're just exercising their demons for us. I feel like Frank Darabond is also in that because he's like a very jolly, sweet man, and then he directs things like, The Mist is like the darkest movie everywhere. The Mist is great.

You should see the Miss Sammy. It's kind of like how you guys. I think it's how you guys will end up. It's just so you know Sammy, that's not good. I don't like that. You don't like that. What else to mention? We're going to mention it again because it's out there.

We're going to mention Tom Hiddleston. Oh, boy. Because we debuted this sketch that we're all very proud of called The Party with Tom Hiddleston and Jessica Chastain, if you haven't seen it, please check it out on MTV News' YouTube page. We're very, very proud of it and very proud of not surprised at all by the performances that Jessica and Tom given this. They went for broke. They did our crazy shit and went the extra mile. Those kisses were in there. I warned everyone about those kisses, and they were in there. So to address, for many of you have been tweeting me about this, have been asking questions.

If you're not interested in this, fast forward three or four minutes to the podcast, but I will address some of the Tom Hiddleston questions here. People ask and say, oh, Josh wrote the kisses into the script, because in the sketch, Tom and Jessica kiss me approximately eight to ten times each, I would say. And that's all that was used. There was like 150 more kisses that weren't even filmed. For the record, Joel, who was a co-writer of the sketch, was there any direction or directive in the script for Tom or Jessica to kiss me?

Not on the face, no. Not helpful. No, it was not in the script. As far as I can tell, I was not on set. But from all accounts, it was improvised. No, I'm kidding. It was not in the script. It was not in the script.

There were a couple really great moments of improvisation. There's that. There's a couple of flourishes that, like Tom gives after the Port-a-Pottie speech. What about naughty sausage? Mottie sausage is improvised? That was loved the naughty sausage. No, truly. It reminds me a lot of

Tom was talking to me and the whole gang before the shoot about remembering when we shot Loki, which was kind of the first big sketch we did. And he was remembering so fondly because it was the end of that press tour for Avengers. It was literally like the last thing he did and he just got to like not turn his brain off

but certainly go to a different place. And I think similarly for this, this was kind of the end of the Crimson Peak press cycle for both Jessica and Tom. So they got to explore a different inside of themselves were a couple hours and it was a blast of shoot and CJ our editor killed it and Michael and Joel and everybody involved really did a great job so very proud of it

if you haven't seen it look and check it out well one more thing were the tears real that was amazing wasn't it tears were like very powerful my faith probably my I have a few favorite moments but certainly the monologue is something I loved it was even a little longer on the page I think Joel and I had the same kind of thought initially we kind of wanted it to play out as like a single take, like just like one unbroken take of Tom delivering it. And we certainly could have run it as that, but for a variety of reasons, it worked better with some cutting. But to answer your question about the tier, it was real. He said, basically, I don't think he told me in advance he was going to do it, but he, he, afterwards, I saw that

he had done it and was certainly amazed and excited that he had conjured that up. You can cry on command. I think he did in Loki, he, I don't think we used it, but There were some tears he forced when Steve was injured. Steve gets, yeah, not murdered, but he breaks his back. No, he's fine. There's a pizza bone sticking here, if I remember, correct? Yeah, it's touching the floor. Yeah.

The saddest thing is Joel and I quoting old after hours as well as things to each other, which we do endlessly. So, yeah, so there's some really cool after hours cooking. Nothing that we've shot yet, so I don't want to jinx any of them, but there are at least a couple that are going to be shot in the next few weeks that are super bananas and fun. There's at least two that I probably shouldn't even be present for because I would just embarrass myself in front of the people.

Daniel Day Lewis. Oh, no, no, you spoiled my DDL obsession. Everyone crossed your fingers. That one still happens. Am and Gene Hackman were really helping through. They were on the list. Let's see. I guess that's about it to cover.

Anything else guys on your end that we need to cover in your lives to bring them up to speed? No, we're really happy to be here. I asked Josh the other day if, like, he thought that, like, I was his Robin Quivers now that I've been doing these intros. And he told me I was more like his artie than his Robin. I'm going to have substance abuse issues. That's basically what I'm talking about. All that Coke Zero with vanilla syrup.

You're, oh, I don't know the whole Howard Stern crew, well, I'm just to say what you're in our job. But I. You certainly have some kind of malady. Yeah, definitely, like one of the sick ones. Yeah, I will say, I really like. like Sunshine, bringing it back to Danny Boyle, underrated movie, I feel like. And wait, and quick question, was it Christian Bell was supposed to be Chief Jobs? Is that true?

Yes, yes, that's the derivation of this project for background is it was going to be a David Fincher movie, Christian Bail was starring in it, and it kind of all of this got exposed if you really want to go on the interwebs and find out about it in that Sony hack. The Sony had dropped the movie, it went over to Universal, Aaron Sorkin's script was still alive, Seth Rogen had already been cast, they got Fastbender. The great Danny Boyle came in, the rest of this history. This is one of my top two or three favorite movies of the year. It might end up being my favorite.

So check out the movie. You can see it before this or you can see it afterwards, but regardless, this is a super interesting fun chat for anyone that's a big movie geek like myself. Enjoy Mr. Danny Boyle. Thanks, Anna. A real extra love for Dee Danny Boyle. Nothing.

You could have clapped on something. Are you going to use this? Yeah. So here's your list of New York folks So the other side of my life Outside of normal studious conversations Are sketches So I have this wall of New Yorkers

I'm always like, okay If I need somebody for a sketch Here's who I know, here's who's around I know they're around and get them Getting them is another story Yeah, no, of course I saw him, Paul Dayno, I saw him in the... Love and Mercy.

Oh, my God. He was so good. He did the podcast too, actually. Yeah, he's astounding. Fantastic. So good. Do you want to dive right in or do you want to... Yeah, no, whatever you want.

Is that okay? This is super casual. There's no official introduction because it would take too long to introduce your credits, sir, and to explain how much I appreciate and love your work. But no, this is a thrill for me because I'm a huge fan of yours, and I got a chance to be at New York. film festival this past week and saw Steve Jobs. And it's an amazing piece of work, man. Oh, cool.

You should feel very proud. Um, I guess one thing that I, I've, you know, I've, I've talked to you over the years. I've listened to a lot of interviews you've done. One thing that struck me is you've talked about how like generally speaking, your first film is the one that you consider your best in general, that you're trying, is it that you're always trying to get back to something in a way? And what are you trying to get back to? Yeah, I think I do, I do, I do believe that actually. Your first film is always your best one. It probably won't be almost successful. And you know, you learn a lot more as you go on, obviously, unless you're an idiot. You're kind of learning as you go along. But actually, the first time you get to do it is the best because you don't know what you're doing. And if you make it through, you know, then there's something there that contains the essence of you beginning to just see what's possible really. And you never can get that back again. You're always. was, you've lost the innocence then straight away and it's all, and then it's, and also you've been through the process of how to sell it and all that kind of side of stuff.

And the clouds a little bit, they're, yeah, and then you start to meet the business people who are involved in it and they're kind of, and it's, you're never quite getting, and I always quote, I mean, the Cohen brothers who are geniuses have never been better than Blood Simple, you know, and they are just brilliant. Yeah. They make brilliant films, but I love Blood Simple, you know, because it's just like, it's got that innocence and naivety in it that's, and yet it's an incredibly thrilling and deliberate film, you know, so you can put together all sorts of weird adjectives that don't really make sense side by side, like naive and cunning at the same time. They can all exist in your first one, I think, in a way.

Are there bad habits that even you, as this amazing filmmaker, feel like you have to avoid when you're on set that you're cognizant of, like, okay, this is a trap that I tend to or could fall into, let me be aware of this, or do you have others to call you out on stuff? Do you know what I mean? Are there things that you think of? I am always I have a lazy side of me which is I know how to do this

which is I probably shouldn't tell you where I exhibited it but in a couple of films I've had I'll leave that to me I know how to do that I've done that before I can make that work and it never works the second time

you kind of think oh I know how to do that and it never quite works the second time because you should be you should be always in a place where you don't know you really don't know and it's weird for people

especially financiers, you can't be saying to them, I want to get to this state where I really don't know what I'm doing. They're spending millions of dollars employing you to kind of, because they think you know what you're doing. And actually, the reality is the best stuff comes when you really don't know. So when a script like this comes around, and we all know the storied history of this project by now, but I mean, how often does a script like this come around where it feels fully formed and it feels presumably ready to roll for you? Yeah, well, it's very particular this because I've never, we've never, ever done somebody else's project. This is Scott Rudin's project, you know, because he was, he's developed a script with

Sorkin and they, they'd done a film previously, social network, brilliantly, with Fincher. I don't know what happened, Fincher dropped out, but the script was there and it was dazzling, like nothing I'd ever done before. And I, and I've always resisted making very particular kinds of films in America because I didn't grow up here. I love the place, but I don't know anything about it, really, if I'm honest. You give me something about growing up in Britain, I'm on it. Right.

And so I didn't want to put myself in the circumstance where you're on set. And because you don't have that infinity of knowledge, you have to turn to someone and say, if he was taking his girlfriend on a date, would he use his dad's car? Right. You know, because it's kind of the culture is slightly different. Yep. So I never wanted to be in that circumstance. So I've done a couple of American films.

one about a guy trapped in a canyon when all I really needed to know about what was it like in that canyon and I could get my head around that and this one which is because of the brilliant concept of it that it's three launches and the 40 minutes behind each of those launches before he goes on stage

you can kind of it's manageable you can get a grip on it on the other hand it's so dense this dialogue and it's soaking at his kind of most ferocious 185 pages of dialogue, no indication of how to do it.

Three acts, six characters, interior day continuous. And at first you think, wow, you'd run a mile from that. But then the other, you realize Finch has done it before. You think he made a pretty amazing job of that. If I can do something half as good, it will be okay. And you realize Sorkin is a provocateur. He's basically going, can you make a film out of it? You've made a career of like, you know, you've been notable.

that you've avoided, you know, working in other people's franchises over the years. My theory is that this is kind of like your first dip into a, into a franchise in a way. Because as you allude to, this, it does feel of a sort with, it fits with social network. It fits on that shelf with it. Did it feel strange to kind of like, it certainly feels like your work. But it also, as I said, kind of calls back to that one. Was there anything odd about sort of calling back to another film in a way or feeling like you had, you were indebted to another film in a way? I know. I think people were, you can feel everybody's tiptoeing around at first saying, oh, don't mention social network. Don't mention David Fincher. And I was going, well, actually, I really like the guys work like enormously. He's one of my favorite directors. That is actually one of my favorite films. Let's look at it. And they were going, oh, no, no, why don't you look at West Wing instead? And I said, no, because, and it was amazing looking at it. It was incredibly helpful because what they did in that film is this, it's a sitting down film. Really unusual for any major motion picture, where everything.

Everybody sat down all the time. And if they get out of a chair, there's usually highly significant reasons why they have done so. And I thought that's wonderful because this, and you could feel it even in the reading of it, is the standing up film. I mean, he did not. He was not. He wanted to walk and talk. And that feeling, especially 40 minutes before a launch, you can feel this restlessness, physical restlessness. And it's the restlessness of mind as well.

You know, he has a restless mind. He's forever forging forward. So that was a huge help to have social network there And it feels like it's in a lineage on it And progressive from it, you know And you're right, I think that I think There's other stuff to write about these people These people are us

This is our world There's nobody laying down Not politicians, you know, not armies There's nobody laying down the world The path of the world like these guys have done Yeah, it's a sea change I mean we're literally, it's not just kids We're I'm wedded to that phone

Six hours of my day I feel like, if not more, it's insane. It's insane. And you take it to bed. Yeah. Last thing you look at, first thing you get after sleep, you wake up with it. In fact, people use them in their sleep to monitor how their sleep's going with the apps and stuff like that.

So it's like, and he saw that. And of course, it's impossible to describe to people what it was like before that vision of his. And we start our film with a bit of Arthur C. Clarke, who was a great science fiction writer, Cole wrote 2001, the movie. And he begins in this, and we do it because he begins in this room, which is surrounded by walls of computers. And these are intimidating, ominous looking things in steel and blinking lights. And it comes from a time, the early 70s then, were everything that happened with computers as they progressed was seen as a threat to us.

We were scared, big blue. You know, it was like, whoa, what they're going to do next? And they didn't, whereas Jobs was actually saying, no, they're part of you. they're an extension of you and eventually with biotech now they're going to become literally part of you and he saw that that's what we wanted

now is it a good thing we wanted that there's obviously great stuff come out of it there's also damages as well and the human costs and he showed that in social network as well and this film continues to explore that is what's the human cost of doing this stuff I mean one thing that's certainly not a surprise

given your previous work in watching this film is how much energy there is, how much, how it plays in a way to me, I said to my wife afterwards, like it felt like they were action set pieces in it. There was, there was like a crescendo. Like I talk about the Jeff Daniels showdown in the middle of the film is just, is so powerful and feels as as gripping and thrilling as any action sequence I've seen this year. Do you think about it in those terms in terms of like we crescendo here, we build up to this and we have a few of kind of these moments and then we go quiet. And you know what I mean?

Yeah. I mean, you do. I guess. You need a great editor. We had this guy who edited Milk, actually. I remember seeing Milk thinking, this is a wonderful film about time and place.

It's really beautifully done. And he doesn't work all the time. He's a young guy, a lot younger than me. And he called Elliot Graham. And he's like, brilliant at it. So yeah, we were aware of that

trying to build crescendos and the thrill of it. And also, Steve, he has this reputation of coming out of the hippie era, which he did, and there was a Zen thing. But the ferocity of his focus and he's destroyed all sense of ease. There's no ease around him. It's just the pursuit of the future. And if you want to see the future, you've got to invent it, okay, and he did it.

And the restlessness of his mind and his behavior is a gift for a filmmaker. Yeah. You know, even though it's represented through dialogue mostly, you can literally illustrate it almost physically sometimes. And it becomes the speed of mind is so fast, the film better be fast as well. Right. Because this... You're keeping up with him. You are, you know?

And if it's too leisurely, you're not doing your job, really. Do you consider yourself a perfectionist? I mean, I think it's safe to say that would be something to call Steve, among other adjectives, is that he was a perfectionist. Yeah. You kind of try and... I mean, it depends how much you're going to sacrifice. in pursuit of that perfectionism. I mean, you literally can go the whole hog

and literally destroy people while you do it. I'm not, I'm not, I would not be party to that. I believe in, I actually believe, I'm not saying I'm successful at it, but I believe in what was says, and it's a big thing in the film that runs through the film that you can be decent

and gifted at the same time. It's not binary. It's not a separate thing. It is possible to do that. And I love, and it said myself, Rogen, who plays Woz, he isn't like Was at all, except he is Was. Yeah. Because Was is an engineering genius and a lovely man. Seth is a comic genius.

And I know that having worked with him now and done stuff with him. It's just like, and he's also a very, very decent man. So when he says that, he has a resonance that's like, I really believe that. Yeah. It's possible. And Seth's an example of it, you know. And how wonderful to be able to get a guy like that to say it for you as part of. as part of the characters, you know.

Is that kind of balance something that took a while for you to figure out? I mean, it's something we're all figuring out, right, is the cliche of the work, personal life balance, right? And like, in your profession, filmmaking is so all-consuming. The schedule is so bizarre in that, like, when you're shooting, you're, I would think everything else kind of moves to the side. How did you figure out how to kind of, like, navigate that and figure out how to maintain a life amidst the work, or have you, or is it a work in progress?

I think one of the reasons I did the film is it's about fathers and daughters, actually. She's got this amazing girl playing the 19-year-old Lisa who ends up kind of pinning him to the wall. And I have two daughters, and I know there's been costs involved in me pursuing this career, and you've got to hold your hand up. You hope it wasn't quite as acute and uncomfortable as Steve's journey through that was at times, But there have been moments, yeah. So we've all got stuff to work on. So, yeah, you're working on it the whole time.

I remember hearing about a guy, no, I have two heroes, actually. A guy who passed away, Alan Clark, a film director, and another guy, Nick Rogg, who's still alive, very elderly now. And I always heard stories about how decent they were on the set to everyone. And I remember thinking that's really important because I think when you walk on a set, everybody expects you to start shouting. You can see people just like their tents waiting to be shouting. you don't have to do it that way you can kind of I mean it's slightly cunning because you're

trying to get the best out of them and it's just another way of going about it whereby you make them believe in you as a decent guy and go that extra mile for you as a decent guy so you could say it's deliberate and cunning and how truthful it is I don't know but I like to believe it's possible yeah from from a film geek's perspective when I heard what you were doing in terms of mixing formats in this that was it was it seemed like of course that's genius and it works And it's amazing. I mean, I always think back to, you know, when I was a kid, like one of the first films that kind of like blew my mind I remember seeing was like JFK and to see what like Oliver Stone did, which felt like it blew the roof off like what you could do and how it could work. Is that something, I don't know if you've, I mean, I guess 28 days later maybe you, did you, was it all digital?

I don't know if you used different formats on that one. Very proud of 28 days later. 28 days later was apparently was the first widely distributed. commercial film shot on digital. Amazing. Which, if that's true, it's like, wow. You didn't know at the time you didn't feel like you were. They can't change that.

Nobody can go back and answer that, can me? Right. But we shot on very, on consumer cameras, yeah, that were kind of just beginning to really become on stream then. So, yeah, so we used three formats and we had an idea that it was, it would help you feel the progression of the time, but also his mind. because we so we shoot the first part in 16 mill and it's a good rough home

especially these days where it looks so soft it looks homemade it's kind of like they've made it in the garage that they're working in and kind of it feels like that and then you move to the second part which is a cunning act of revenge of kind of hidden intention and 35's great for that especially in an ornate place like the opera house

in San Francisco which is very gilded and red velvet and all that kind of stuff and it feels very kind of like neat for that and then you move it's 1998 when the digital cameras weren't available but we used them for the 1998 section

because we wanted to suggest his mind the infinite possibilities now of digital resolution you know and it's like and but of course he'd already done it because in 96 he'd release Toy Story

a company that he funded virtually himself. And I remember seeing Toy Story. I took my kids to see it on a Sunday morning. And it's one of those rare moments in cinema where you were. You just think the world has changed. Yeah. This has changed everything.

And it had changed everything in animation from there on in. So he deserves that resolution at that time. Yeah. And it's tough on actors because it's like everything's visible. There's nothing hidden though. It's all there and clean lines and it's beautiful and pristine and perfect. What are you going to do with it? And, of course, he's got a hole in his heart, really,

or a hole in him that he needs to address, whereas everything else seems to be going perfectly. I'm curious, like, what, for you, some of those other, you know, blow your head off moments as a film goer have been. You know, I mentioned JFK. You mentioned seeing Toy Story. I mean, I find that it's so inspiring to see something like what you've done here, which is both from Aaron's approach in the screenplay form

and in terms of what you've done from a filmmaking standpoint, inspiring. And then to see, you know, last year we all talked about, Birdman and Boyhood and these are films that are still pushing the the form you know we're only a hundred years in or whatever into filmmaking so it's still evolving um what are the what are the films that kind of like resonate with you in that way where it's like this is a sea change and and do you get off on that from a filmmaking and from a fan perspective when you see someone pushing in that way I love it I mean I loved we were talking before we started about

Paul Dano and yeah love and mercy I love that yeah I just thought it was so you know they were so free about the way they went about it trying to do something which is impossible which is like tell his story and the beach boys i just love the way that was done so but i mean the big one for me is apocalypse now just because i suppose that has a bigger part in my life than any movie did you see that as a child like what what age did it hit you sadly i wasn't a child it was in 1979 when I was 22 years old. Already.

Still forming. It's not very formative. Yes. I was very immature. Very immature, 22 year old. No, I, I, it's hard to speak about that film. I could watch that film

in all its formats, in all its versions. Plantation sequence or not, whatever, you'll take it, however. You know, I'll, you know, I just thought that, I just think that he is, to take, You know, war makes for good movies, pretty much.

He takes war and he takes filmmaking and he takes the time. And he puts them together in a way that's so imaginative. The whole film is about this movement, which is ultimately what movies are. They're moving, the fact that things can move left to right and right to left across the screen in front of you. And so he creates this journey of movement. And every time it stops, there's an apocalypse of something or other.

which is either war or it's the playboy bunnies or you know and that's how he tells his story and then you end up you arrive at this figure who is to cinema in a way i don't know whether we've ever got another figure quite like him marlon brando you know he arrives at this point which is a fusion of war the insanity of war the insanity of acting and then the insanity of movies and he just fuses them all together in this effort at the start you don't need to know any of that shit you can just enjoy it as a war movie and you think about where we are now and what the threat in the world at the moment

and you see some of the stuff you see going down and you think about that scene of Brando in that that film was made 40 years ago and yet it's absolutely current and it's not like watching a classic it's like watching a film that they just finished and brought back you know

his films are unique in that there are at least half a dozen that that stand up to repeated viewing something, Godfather, of course. But like I was talking, actually, Winona Ryder yesterday, she said, hello. She, uh, we were talking about Bramstoke's Dracula, which I feel like was like another kind of operatic take on something we've seen a thousand times, yet felt so unique given his approach. Happy said, confused listener, listen to my voice because Nathan for you continues its new season

on Comedy Central. Nathan Fielder, the comedian who brought you dumb Starbucks, and Pig Saves Goat, is back with more outlandish ideas to help real small businesses, and this is his most ambitious season yet. You have to see it to believe it. Nathan, for you, airs on Comedy Central Thursdays at 10, 9 Central, or any time on the Comedy Central app. Check it out. I mean, when did filmmaking enter into the picture? Because you spent some time directing some TV before you did your first feature.

Yes, I did. But I had, I mean, I come from a, I'm a twin. I have a twin sister. And when we were seven, we went to the movies for our seventh birthday. But I had a very traditional upbringing. So my dad took me to see Battle of the Bulge. And my mom took my sister to see sound of music

in separate cinemas in this. town that we lived near and that was kind of like that's my first kind of moment of it and and it's interesting of course because actually one of the things you learn as you get wisdom rather than experience i realized what a great director robert wise was you know who directed sona music and one of my best moments ever is we were hit we were in america and we showed and it must have been at a dGA thing i think we showed shallow grave so it's like the first film I remember walking out after the Q&A I walked up the aisle

and there was this old man stopped me and he said very good film young man very good good stuff like that and I walked past him and they said that's Robert Wise when I got outside they said that was Robert Wise he's passed away now God bless him

but that was a wonderful moment for me because he also had a career where he tried to touch so many different tones and registers in the work that he did so that was a yeah so that was a yeah But yeah, and I did television. I learned a lot from working on television and theater in Britain

where you can move pretty much easier and you think about lots of British directors in Gallo's passed away. Sure. But Doldry, Sam Mendes. You know, there's lots of British directors who move between the different formats. So by the time you got to Shao O'Gray in your late 30s, did it feel like

I have, I'm ready for this? I am like, this is my time. I'm going to leave it all out on the table. I'm equipped to do this Or did it feel like There was some uncertainty at that point for you No, we were pretty, we were pretty It was deliciously reckless

Because you would just kind of There was no guarantee It's not a very stable profession The British film industry as such I think if you want a career You've got to say go to America Because it's a proper industry Or go to India

Which is a huge industry as well Or maybe France Sure You know But in Britain It's not that constant in industry you know so you're not it's not something that you think right i'm going to really invest in this and make sure i stick at it for 25 years right stuff like that because it's just literally

one at a time and we decided to stay there and to make the films finance there and you know and to keep a grip on the films and so um it meant that you could be quite reckless in the way you approach them and that was a and that was shaped early on by we made lots of our own choices some good some not so good as it turned out but they were our choices about the stuff we did and the way we're going about it. And like I said, the only worry I've grown to recognize is when I'm too confident, really, about not reckless. When I think I've got a grip on it, I know what I'm doing.

Yeah, I'm curious. Like, is success in some ways as dangerous as failure? I mean, like coming off of something like train spotting where you probably felt like you could do anything. Yeah, and it doesn't matter what kind of how sorted out you think you are. It does affect you. You know, all the bullshit that you get of people does affect you. It can't help but do telling you you're a genius.

Yeah, you were anointed. You were the one. Of course it affects you. You know, you try and give me the impression. Of course it doesn't. But of course, yeah, it's bound to. And it does affect decisions that you make after them and stuff like that. Because that was the one period where we've talked about this.

I know you've talked at length about this in the past. But like when you almost did Alien, for instance, was after, I think, train spotting, right? And that must have been the time where, you know, you know, everything was, or a lot of very intriguing, interesting things were dangling in front of you. And you clearly had a path that you were like already like on, but there was temptation, just like in apocalypse now where the sirens were over there. And you were like, oh, alien movie. That sounds pretty cool.

What was it just happenstance and luck that you avoided some of those trapped? I mean, you, you fell into some of them like we all do. But like that alien, do you feel like that was a trap that you were lucky to avoid in a way? No, I'd love to have an alien, actually. Yeah. It's the honest truth of it. because I love that stuff. I saw recently again the Ridley Scott original.

Again, it's like, you know, and then you think, wow, you could have made a film where you followed Ridley Scott, James Cameron, David Fincher. Not better company, yeah. Even if you made a lousy job of it, it's pretty good lineage to be in there, you know? So, no, I'd love to have done that. I just backed out of that because I was like,

I really didn't feel I had the expertise to handle where CG was at that time. I've got a bit more confident about that now. Maybe it's not a good idea, confidence. But as I said, but then I thought, I don't know enough about it. You've got to hold your hand up and say, I'm not really a technical director. I don't relish the technical side of it that much. I love recklessly using it and kind of driving in on it.

But I'm not an absolute technical director, which you needed to be, I think, for that particular project. Do they still come to you with franchises, having been on record so much over the past of saying, like, you want to keep your budgets manageable, you want to, you know, I mean, you, yeah, no, you're very sensible. They, they cross you off the list at some point. You don't get very many scripts. No Marvel meeting. No, no, absolutely not. You just don't. And to give them their credit, when you start off, everybody sends you stuff. I mean, they're really like, it's open house. You know, if somebody's got, appears to know what they're doing and not so to make it work, they send you stuff. And but the fact that you don't buy. at anything after a while, they're not stupid. They just go, okay, we'll save the postage. And they don't send them anymore. So this was unusual, this one. When Rudin rang up, and obviously, Rudin is a, you know, they call him the mean guy who does great stuff.

That's somebody else's description of him, not mine. I mean, he's extraordinary figure. And for Christian and I, my producer, Christian Coulson and I, to work with him has been a blast because he's really top draw. Absolutely top draw So for a producing standpoint What does that mean to you? What do you need from a producer?

What are you looking for? Well, you get, you get And it's a crucial relationship And I've been really lucky I've had a couple of really good ones To have had relationships with What you get is you get script, concept first

And just this extraordinary ability To influence writing Which can be prescriptive Write that like that Or it can be just influential Like maybe, you know, it's more blue skies Thinking or it can be personal stuff

where you're kind of freezing them out saying we're not doing the film because it's not good enough and they come back with something so there's all sorts of techniques they can use he's that casting fabulous taste in actors I mean I think he was a casting director for a bit

or something of it I mean you've had very close associations with some impeccable writers over the year some that you've repeated over time are you someone that generally speaking once like was Aaron on set at all is that something that gets in you way? Do you feel like, are you open to that in the right circumstance? Or what's your

philosophy? Like, once you get to set, should the script be 110% locked? Or do you leave any room for? We tend, because we work with a pretty disciplined budget, we kind of have a philosophy really that you do a lot of work on the script and lock it. It's not absolutely a lot, but you lock it. And you can get lost, I think, on set. Because you are, when you're in the set, when you're in the moment, you can follow a blind alley just as just as easily as you can follow something extraordinary that opens up in front of you. Sure. I mean, and you can waste a lot of time and money and you can think all sorts of things.

You get it back in the cutting room. So we tend to be very disciplined about the script. Salkin loves to be around. I love writers to be around. They generally don't want to be very much because it is very boring. Right. You know what it's like. Watching filmmaking is like, oh my God.

What's his name? Martin Amis went to, he was a great British writer, novelist. He went an essayist, occasional essayist. And he went to, this is a long time ago. He went to the set of Robocop 2, which was shooting in Toronto or somewhere like that. And he said, watching a film we made is like, you're basically watching a series of delays interrupted by repetitions.

And I thought that is just, that's exactly right. Because you take people on the set who don't really know what's, and they go, why are they doing that again? Right. You just did that. And everybody said it was really great. Why are you doing it again? It's baffling, really.

To be fair, that was Robocop 2, though. Yeah, with all due respect. to the great Irvin Kirshner, I think who directed that one, actually. It was, that's right. Yeah. But the point is that you write is pretty much thing, oh, my God, it's just, I've done the work.

It's brilliant my writing. Why is it taking them so long to achieve it? They just say it, don't they? And it's that, anyway. So they generally back away. But I'm quite keen to have them there. I like to cast them in the film. Didn't cast Sorkin in this,

even though he was cast in, he played a part in Social Network, didn't he? He did play that lawyer, didn't he? Oh, yeah, yeah. And we didn't cast him in this. But he likes to be around. And the way it manifested on this is that we would, because we had a lot of rehearsal for each section,

he would be there for the whole rehearsal process. So there was anything came up with the actors. He would, he was very flexible. He's got a reputation as being very anal about punctuation and all that. Not at all. Very flexible. I think if he can, if he hears that you've got the rhythm of it, right,

which is what he's interested in more than anything. Yeah. His rhythm. Weird. Musical thing. It's the rhythm of it. And it does reveal itself to you. It's not like Shakespeare.

Shakespeare, you read it, it doesn't make any sense. But said out loud, there it is. But you say it out loud, listen to it a few times. You think, oh, yeah, I get what that going on about. It's weird. Does it limit you in the edit room in a way, though? And that, like, that dialogue is so specific and so melodic and has a flow that, I don't know, like, are you able as much to cut around or cut down on scenes if it's,

part of a flow for it's part of an ebb and a flow you can do a bit it's quite difficult to cut because he builds meaning incrementally you know he's very clever like that and i think it's partly a technique to stop people just hacking his stuff to bits smart my smart man he just overlapsed stuff all the time you know talking over each other and they mention something that they're going to come on to in a page right but you can and we did some of that but you we shot we let the actors have their head in the way that we shot and then I just made sure I did rather than do too many takes

of the one setup I would do many many different setups of the whole thing so you have this freedom in the editing then you could and of course they're great actors they give you different performances they're varying things the whole time they never want to repeat themselves which is annoying sometimes

but actually you benefit from it in the end because they give you variation and you find yourself in the editing and you can have a different version of a scene a completely different version of it the whole scene, which is lovely for rhythm, for overall rhythm. Is it useful for you? Have you found over the years to go? We were talking about, you know, her name is going on set of Robocop.

It was going on another filmmaker's set to see how they do it. Do you ever, have you ever picked up anything from another person's technique on set? Or is it odd to be somewhere and say, oh, like, that must be an odd feeling for both the director and for you. Yeah, so, self-conscious, all that. You can't do that. So you pick your knowledge up, actually, from actors who tell you, you know, they, you know, what's What does he do? What does he do? What does he do? And so you pick it up from them more than anything, because they're the ones who experience maybe three or four directors a year, you know,

whereas you do one film every two years. So, and then you never meet the directors other than when you're up for prizes together. Then you suddenly bump into each other. By the way, what do you do? What's the lesson learned you're going over, kind of skipping around filmography, for the beach, which is something that, you know, had had some travails. There were some issues with that one. What's the biggest takeaway in retrospect from that for you? Oh, we took too much money. And we took, and consequently, as a result of doing that, you take too many crew. We took all this crew to Thailand. We took like 100 kind of British crew to Thailand. And I remember thinking, I did a little, I mean, most of this is retrospective, but I did, I did feel uneasy about elements

of it, because it was a bit, it belongs to a different era. And this also in a bit, might and a bit dry, but that's how David Lean made films and that is a different era of filmmaking. Right. It's very close to the colonial era of filmmaking where the expertise lay in the West.

Right. And we went to locations to make very, sometimes very important films, you know, but they were our version of that. Right. And I learned from that because we tried

to shift the film to be more about how the title was responding to these Westerners arriving because it's a gift as a metaphor in a way. They'd set up this Paradise Island and they had no interest in Thai culture, really. But we couldn't shift the film. It was just too unmanageable to change the film enough.

That's clearly a lesson you apply to something like Sun Dog where you go into that environment. So we took eight people. And it's easier to do in India, of course, because they have a huge movie industry. But it's also meant that you were literally making the films through their eyes as well at times, especially if you trust them, and we did get some key crew who were wonderful to us and, you know, not explain the country

because you can't explain the country. It's unfathomable, but let you appreciate the unfathomability of it all. Yeah. Part of the legend also, obviously, as you will know, around the beach was the choice to use Leonardo and then Ewan was supposedly in the mix at the time. And you're going to be working with you. And again, next year, which is thrilling news. It is. Yeah. We're very excited. Did it take a while to kind of get past that? Was there a one conversation in particular or was a series of? It was a series, really. And we didn't, I've acknowledged in the past, we didn't behave very well to him.

He deserved a lot better from us, a lot, lot better. And I regret that very much. But it wasn't Leo's fault, who is a very decent man as well. Right. I mean, you'll hear all sorts of stories about Leo. All I can tell you have him worked with him, he's a, he's like, funnily enough, weirdly, I don't know whether they got this from each other. he's like Winsler they're an absolute she's like this when you they're an absolute partner on

the set they're a filmmaking partner right you understand filmmaking and telling stories and they want to do it for you it's like for the director right i mean it's like and they're both like that it's very kind of maybe it's very european i don't know but um she's very like him like that and so he was he was wonderful and i wish i'd made a better film for him for him you know, with him. Maybe it will one day, you know. And the prospect of working with not just you and but the rest of the guys on T2,

as we'll call it for now, until James Cameron files a lawsuit or something. Incoming. He's been put on notice. What made now the time and what makes it so intriguing? Because, I mean, you know, you've obviously never done a sequel to one of your works.

Like the comparisons will of course be made. You're going to be living in your own shadow in a way, is that daunting or exciting? Yeah, it's very, again, it's kind of the ideal. You could take two options to it. You could think you know what you're doing because you've already done it, which I think would be disastrous.

And I think it's much more about what will we do with this? Right. Because it's just truly is the unknown. What we do know is that obviously they're 20 years older. And that felt really fascinating because it was a story of such hedonism, gritty but hedonism and something we all remember or

recognize that when you're in your early mid-twenties you can get away with stuff you get older you can't you can push it and you get away with it if you're lucky maybe one of your friends doesn't but most you get away with it in their case one of their friends didn't so there's that there's also this weird

thing about the film that people remember the characters and they remember their names which never happens on movies apart from Jack and Rolls maybe but you literally can't remember the names of the people, you say it was Al Pacino or it was, you ID the actor playing the par. People come up in the street, this is 20 years later and they're talking about Begby and Wrensen and Sickball, like they know them. So for us, I don't know what its impact will be

around the world, but for us at home, that's a kind of national conversation that we can kind of, that's a very kind of political way of describe, politicians kind of expression, but it's kind of a way, it will occupy that. People will turn up to hear what they're going to say know and hodge john hodge has done an amazing it's a really good script and it wouldn't we wouldn't have got it back together if it wasn't because the actors are all wary of they didn't want to spoil it by doing something very secondary to the original but it feels like a really interesting prospect have you all been in a room together yet yeah we had a little read through a couple of months ago in london when most of us were there for the only one we missed was johnny johnning couldn't get

there um but yeah i've met them all i met them all um amazing And it's surreal and amazing. Send them the script, met them all. And they're like, wow. Because the thing I feared, because there's four of them, I always worried that there wouldn't be enough for one of them to do. And there'd be the pressure on them to make up the numbers. But actually, they've all got four great stories in it.

Really, interesting stories in it. Is there one script in particular that you've labored on over the years that you haven't been able to crack for whatever reason? Oh, yeah, there's a couple. There's a couple we've been working on. Wait, did I, I, I thought I heard something about a David Bowie project. Yes, it was a wonderful script. What is that?

What is that? I found Frank Cotterall Boyce. That's intriguing. And it's a kind of, it's a sort of musical, kind of ish. But we couldn't get the music rights. So I didn't want to, I didn't want it to go down the route of Velvet Gold Mine, which, you know, couldn't use the music and use different music and fictionalized it and stuff like that. So we had to put it away for the moment. Just trying to wear down David one of these days, get him at a different moment in time.

Yeah, I mean, it's a, it's a beautiful piece written by Frank, who, and I hope we'll be able to return to it. So that's one, for instance, yeah. I mean, one would think, I feel like you're asked often about musicals. It seems like a no-brainer that at some point that has to happen, whatever your unique take on a musical would be. I'd love to do this film. It's such a, it's, it's, it's not really a musical, but it is, as well. And it would be, yeah, anyway, so we'll see. Talking about a couple genre films, one of it, which we've referred to already and became a phenomenon and still is reveres to the stage, 28 days later.

And the other is, too, it wasn't a phenomenon at the time, but has become like, I just, I was talking to, to name drop first thing. I talked to Tom Hiddleston the other day and I was asking, you know, like, what's that movie that is your barometer for, like, whether you're friends with a person or not. he named Sunshine, and I would agree, Sunshine's one of those for me. How do you rationalize when one is a peak and one is a valley in terms of reception, not critically, but just commercially? Are you at this point in your career

able to kind of reconcile that a little better or is it sort of still sting when something that must have been beloved like Sunshine doesn't resonate with a commercial audience? No, it didn't, did it? And it's weird the way that it's kind of built her kind of reputation subsequently, really. I suppose that's because it is in the sci-fi genre,

you tend to the the people out the guardians out there of geek culture right would embrace especially that which had been ignored you know they tended they have a they have a tendency to want to cherish that which has not been appreciated totally yeah and i and and you one loves them for that you know and um so i'm always really i'm always really i'm always really yeah it's really lovely that that happens at the time what happens at the time yeah it's tough but you kind of You know, you're in a very privileged position, and you realize that some things you have control of, and there's a film director you need it, and other things you don't, and you better learn you haven't got control of it because you don't and you have to accept that sometimes. You don't have control of it.

I feel like Copel has said this when people have asked, like, him, what his favorite of his films are. He tends to name the ones that have been ignored. Do you tend to have the same kind of thing? Yeah, yeah, you do, because the other ones, everybody's sort of not, I mean, people know more about train spotting than I do. I'm having to catch up now to do the sequel. It's like they, yeah, so you do. You tend to go for the ones that people have ignored, you know, or didn't get a release or didn't do the runs or all that kind of stuff, you know.

What's your comfort food as a film goer as a film lover in terms of genre or film, like to put you in a good headspace? Like what are the films that you keep coming back to year after year? Movies or types of movies. Either way, you want to take it. whether it's a genre or whether it's well first like what what what are the two or three movies you think you've seen more than

any other which ones hold up to repeated viewing and do you still get something out of whether it's enjoyment or or knowledge well it would be the ones we've talked about really it would be the couple of a lot of the couple of stuff and and and and stuff like alien and

you know I mean Titanic please you know it's like I mean I cry every time I watched it. God does it every time. I'm not just saying that because we're trying to get the rights to the title T2. But good work, James. Fine work. On your goal. Um, uh, he's a very nice man, actually. I met him. Yeah. Very, very nice guy has a formidable reputation. But I've found him a very, I think he's mellowed a little bit in recent years from my all accounts. Yeah. He's a very, I thought, very, um, very good, seemed like a good man. Um, so yeah, it would be those kind of things, I guess, really. There's, there's, There's other stuff that you kind of, there are other sort of turning points that you kind of, you think about the Nick Rogg stuff for me is, there's one I'd, oh, no, let me talk about Eureka. Okay, I've never seen it. Yeah, nobody knows that.

Gene Hackman's, one of Gene Hackman's greatest performances. I'm sold already. Eureka. It's the story of a man who has everything. He discovers literally liquid gold in Alaska, or in the wilderness anyway. and he's one of these guys who just has then everything he has the world at his fingertips it's weirdly actually it would be dated now because of course that's a tech world now right you know the jobs the Zuckerbergs those kind of the tech giants the Googles Elon Musk all those kind of guy

but this guy is that it's from the oil gold kind of resources mineral resources that you wrench from the earth yourself and it's the story of him and his family and holy shit The first half of the movie, Hackman, I didn't, you've never, and he's one of the great actors. He's probably my favorite actor, and yet I've never seen that. That's amazing. And it's never been ever been better. And it's an amazing film. And it was buried by the studio at the time.

I don't know why. I remember going to see it on the day of release because I was a big Nick Rogue fan. And I saw it on the day of release in Hampstead in London. And I went back, that was like the Friday. I went back on the Wednesday to see it again and it had gone. And you couldn't find it why, because there was no internet then. But it was like, but it had gone. Did it even happen?

Was it just in my brain? I know. And there's a couple of sequences. Anyway, so that's a big one. There's nothing else. I've come away with a great pick for my film, arguing my favorite actor of all time, too. Amazing. Is this an enjoyable time for you right now to be on the circuit?

You've done this over the years many, many times. At least you get to spread the wealth with some great cast and Aaron's out there. But, I mean, it's a fun film to talk about, I would think, for you. Yeah, it's a difficult one to talk about. It's very difficult to talk about until people had seen. it because of course it's impossible for people not to realize it is in the biopic you just default to that and then that amazingly makes you think of a sequence of events you know like that and especially with a figure that's passed away you know because you expect it oh yeah it's going to be

from the beginning to the end and stuff like that so but once people have seen it and kind of got the structure and the idea of the structure and how innovative that idea is then they can kind of you can have good conversations with them yeah well i found honestly, thrilling and touching and beautiful, like pretty much all of your work over the year. So congratulations on it, Danny. And thank you honestly so much for stopping by today. This has been a real pleasure. It's a pleasure.

Thank you. Thanks, man. I appreciate it. No, it's good. That was nice. Thank you, sir. Yeah, very good. Attention, humans. Before you turn your podcast application off, why not listen to the best podcast in the universe? Impro for humans with Matt Besser.

Oh, welcome to Improper Humans with Matt Besser. That's me! Improf legend Matt Besser and his friends. Take your suggestions. Three of the best improvisers in the world will be improvising off your suggestions given to me at Twitter, newspaper. I'm going to crap on YouTube. And turn them into long form of comedy. But I wasn't referring to the lion when I said lion. I was referring to your tube. What?

That's what I call teeth now. Oh, I see. Lions. Right now we're going to knock that crown right out in one. Fast shot. What do you know? Swift shot. Can I be honest with you?

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Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. This has been a Wolf Pop production. Executive produced by Paul Shear, Adam Sacks, Chris Bannon and Matt Gourley. For more information and content, visit wolfpop.com. I'm Amy Nicholson, the film critic for the LA Times. And I'm Paul Shear, an actor, writer,

and director. You might know me from the league, Veep, or my non-eligible for Academy Award role in Twisters. We love movies, and we come at them from different perspectives. Yeah, like Amy thinks that, you know, Joe Pesci was miscast in Goodfellas, and I don't. He's too old. Let's not forget that Paul thinks that dude too is overrated. It is. Anyway, despite this, we come together to host Unspooled, a podcast where we talk about good movies, critical hits. Fan favorites, must-season, and case you miss them.

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