The Daily Show: Ears Edition - TDS Time Machine | Filmmakers Pt. 2

Episode Date: August 8, 2025

What says summer movies more than a sequel?! Here's part two of The Daily Show's interviews with filmmakers. JJ Abrams joins Jon Stewart to talk his personal blockbuster, Super 8. Spike Lee sits down with Trevor Noah to discuss the wild true story BlacKkKlansman. Ben Affleck tells Jon to Argo f*ck himself. Ava DuVernay digs into the real person behind the legend of Martin Luthor King for her film Selma. Judd Apatow talks taking comedy seriously with Jon for Funny People. Ryan Coogler and Trevor talk legacy and family for his movie Creed. Kathryn Bigelow visits to talk truth, tragedy and modern relevance in her film Detroit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to Comedy Central. Please welcome JJ Abrams! Sid, six. Thanks. Congratulations. The number one film, not just in this nation, this great nation of ours, but in the entire of the Americas as well as, I'm going to go with Indonesia and parts of Brazil. Thank you very much.

It's exciting. Thank you. Thank you very much. Is it difficult, you know, we do this show every day, and some days it can suck. But when it does, we come back in the next day and we do it. But again, a film you invested, how much time did you put into making just this film Super 8? The movie was, I took about a year or so from the idea to actually start shooting. And then we started shooting last September.

So it was a very quick. That is for filmmaking. That's awfully quick. It was a very quick production and post-production schedule, insanely tight post-production schedule. But even within that, how difficult is it to lay something like that out and wait for that one weekend? What do you do on that one weekend when all this effort, all this creative energy, all this writing goes into the opening. Yeah, you know, you're a nervous wreck

because the idea that it's actually out there. It's a weird thing, you know, in post-production, it's like eight people. It's the editors. It's like the assistant editors. And they're all just, like, working together for months in this cave. And then in an instant, it's just out there. And you're meeting strangers who are like, you know, you know that scene where you're like, how do you know? Like, it's

weird. The idea that's suddenly not just the eight of you, you know? Have you thought about not being in a cave? Because And again, I don't I don't know, I don't, I don't know Hollywood and I don't know how things work out there, but a man of your, you could do this from, let's say, a grotto. Not a cave. Next time I'm going to try not editing in a cave.

I think that would be the smart idea. That would be the choice there. Do people feel that they can speak to you like that? Do they, like, people just come up to you on the street and be like, that one scene. Yeah. I didn't care for it. Like that kind of. Dad?

No. No, I think what happened. You too, huh? Yeah. No, no, no. I think, my dad liked this movie. Oh. I think, you know, it's hard sometimes because people just don't tell you the truth.

And they'll, of course, say things, oh, hey, that was great. And you kind of see the shallowness, and you're like, ah, you know. And so the key is finding people like, I don't know, my wife, who will just, you know, just kick your ass if there's something that's not right. And to be totally honest with you, because then when they love it and they say, I love it, you know it's real. And it means something. It means something. It means something.

Can I have your wife? No. Because she sounds like... No. No. It's critical. You trust their opinion because they have the ability to say to you, wow, that was terrible. Thank you.

Yeah. No. And how do you work? Do you work backwards? Do you know, your movies and your television shows are so layered and there's so much going on? Do you start with a destination and work your way back? and work your way back or, uh, uh, you know, it all depends. I mean, obviously, uh, TV is, you know, linear, narrative drama shows are, are very different

than doing a movie because it's, you know, beginning, middle, and end on a movie. And then a TV show, it's always a leap of faith. Always. So you can have big ideas, you go, I think I know where this is going. So like when Damon Lindelof and I wrote the pilot for Lost, we had a ton of big ideas. But there were fundamental characters, like if anyone who knows the show, like Ben, Linus was not in the pilot. He wasn't in the first year. We had no idea.

And Damon and Carlton, who ran lost, Carlton Hughes, those guys came up with everything that followed. I went off and did a movie. Those guys were busting their house on that show for six years. So my point is that you can have ideas. But it's like driving in the fog. Like the closer you get to the destination,

the more detail you see, and the more you realize, oh, you know, let's take this road that you couldn't even seen back there. So it kind of evolves as you go. So in that fog, as you're pulling up closer, and then the fog clears, and you go, oh my God, Kerry Russell, cut her. hair. You know, is that?

But it is, you know, it's... Unbelievable, John. The creative synergy of that, it's very difficult to trust that collaborative process. It is. To create something that complex, hand it over and say, I trust that you will take this, especially with science fiction, which has so many boundaries and rules of engagement that

occur within the universes that you create. Well, I don't know what you're talking about, but the thing is that... Is that... Here's what I'm talking about. So yesterday on the show, I said that Jewish pubicare is similar to the planet Endor. You would...

I walked back there, they're like, Endor's a moon, you know, and I'm like... Oh, I know. Did I say planet? I'm sorry, I said, planet. It's a moon. But that's my point.

You hand this over and people are going to pour over it. It is... But in television, what's interesting about it is is that people start to find connections that you didn't even know existed. So it's a weird thing.

You'll start to, you'll have an idea and you start to do something. When we did alias, it was unbelievable in that first season, the connections that people who were watching the show were making to things that we didn't really even know there were connections to. So we would decide sometimes to follow something and someone would say, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I read that online.

Someone wrote, you're like, what? And they would show me this thing where someone had already made a connection. So it's this weird thing where when you're doing a show, you have to listen to it as much as it listens to you. But the viewers are so smart, and some have a lot of time. And they will literally extract. based on where you are, oh, they must be related, you know, and you're like, you know, so you're in the writer's room, you're like, what if it's, it's her father? And someone else is like, oh, you mean like, you know, Ailius Fenn Seventh's Road.

Damn it! And you just hope that they prove you to be brilliant as opposed to, you know, making sense. Thank you, Alias Fence, 7. Exactly. That'd go through there. Well, it's so nice to see it. It's so nice to have you on the show. Thank you.

Great work, as always. Please welcome, Spike Lee. Welcome back to the show. Glad to be here. Is Brooklyn in the house? Great to see you again. And let me stop by saying this. I have been in many a movie theater.

I have watched many movies, Spike Lee, and I will tell you this. I have never experienced what I experienced watching this movie. I watched this movie in Connecticut this weekend, and the cinema was completely filled with old white people, the area I was in. It was Mystic Lake or something like that, right? And the movie plays end-to-end, I think, two hours and eight minutes,

and we sit there, and nobody gets up. Like, credits start rolling, nobody moves. And then I stood up, and we're like in the movie. middle, and then all the white people around me were just like, yeah, yeah, you're just cute. And then, like, even when we were walking out, people were just like, yeah, no, you first, you first. Like, everyone, it's, it's a, it's a powerful film. Are you feeling that in the responses you get from people? I'm on Instagram, man. I got several people telling me that they were, you know, not one or two black people in the theater. And then after the film,

when the lights finally go up, the white people who love the film, they were still hugging them. They're hugging the black folks in theater saying, I'm sorry, I apologize, I apologize. I never heard anything like that for my life. It's a beautiful film, and just to those who don't know anything about the story,

Black Klansman is inspired by the true story of Ron Stallworth, right? He's an African-American detective in the 1970s. The first. In the 1970s, the first police officer in Colorado Springs. Right. And this is a black man who gets into a police department. And I mean, from the get-go, let's start with that part of the story. You lay out how difficult it is to play that role of being a black man and a police officer.

And this is in the 1970s, but in some ways it feels like it hasn't changed. Well, what we try to do was even though it takes place in the 70s, I still wanted to be contemporary. So there are many things that my co-writer, Kevin Wilma, and I, We put in so people, it would click, like, you know, this stuff is still happening today. And then it, I know, I'm not trying to spoil anything because it's out already. Right.

But the ending that really hammers home where we are in this world today. It's a story that connects with you on so many levels. So Ron Stallworth is a black man who goes undercover as a clan member, which is, I mean, the premise sounds ridiculous. If you don't tell me that it's based on a true story, I'd be like, this is the wildest thing from the imagination. Yes, I thought when Jordan Peele called me. And he said, so he says to you, this is the story, and...

Six words, black men infiltrates Clue Clugs Clown. High concepts. You can't get more of a higher than that. So when Jordan Pills said, I said, it sounded... Automatically, I thought that David Chappelle's skit. Right, right, right. But he said, it's true. And then I read the book, and it was a great opportunity for me.

Even though it took place... Even though the story took place to seven, I still thought it was a great opportunity to comment on... I'm in the world we live today with Agent Orange in the White House. Let me ask you this. I don't say his name. Shout out to Buster Rhymes.

That's why I got it for him. Buster! Let me ask you this. Why do you think a story about the 1970s and the Klan and a black man in the police force comments on what's happening today in America? Because I like to say, I think one of the mistakes people are making, I feel, is that. they're saying this is just an American phenomenon the rise of the right this is this is happening globally and with this guy in the White House he's made it okay for these

supremacist white spreads to come out in the open didn't it they're they come up from the rocks and he's legitimized them and and I wouldn't even call it dog whistles he's like on a bullhorn the film ends and I won't I won't spoil the ending of the film for you but the film and go ahead beep it's been well nothing not the ending because I still want people to enjoy that this is a magical ending. It's a beautiful film. But what happens post the movie part is we get thrust into modern day. We go from the 1970s to 2017. We go to a Charlottesville. A year ago happened a year ago yesterday. Right. And again, I could feel an audience that was taken from a world

of make-believe, which was real, to like very much what you don't want to believe is real. Right. When you are putting that on screen, when did you make that decision? Because this movie, had been creating. When did you make the decision to put current-day Charlottesville into a 1970s film about the Klan? Well, we didn't start shooting to the fall.

So I was in my summer home of Morrow's Vineyard, and it hit me just like that. This has to be the ending. But I got Susan Broll's number, the mother of Heather Hare, who was murdered, and I got her blessing, so she gave me the permission to use her daughter's photo

at the end. So that was a year ago yesterday. She was murdered, and it was nothing but Trevor. It was nothing but American homegrown act of terrorism. When that car drove down, that's crowded street and it murdered her.

That's a fact. And the President of the United States had an opportunity to tell the world that we are not for hate and he did not denounce the clan

the alt-right the K-KKK, he didn't do it and a lot of times for me I found like, you know, he'll say something and then they pull him in the back and say you got to change it then he says you know he

but what I feel whatever comes out of his mouth the first time that's the truth and that's what's in his heart I just want to say thank you for making it another amazing soul. Thank you so much for being on the show. Please welcome back to the show. Ben Affleck!

Thank you very much. Despite the whiz-bang nature of this. The whiz-bang nature of that clip. There's a lot of excitement in the movie. It's a very special, okay, and I'm going to say this now. It seems like a bureaucracy movie. It's not a bureaucracy movie at all. I have a lot of actors on the program.

Not a ton. A few. But enough. Sure. And I oftentimes will lie to their faces. We'll say to them, well, this is a tremendous work you've done and excellent. The actor Hugh Grant comes to mind. I watch this film today.

phenomenal. Thank you. Phenomenal. Suspensful. Interesting. Well, research, well acted, well direct. I mean, the energy of it, the kinetic energy. Do you know when you're in the middle of this?

I'm done. Thank you very much. No, no, no, no. This thing is, I was incredibly impressed. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. And I think the actors only rarely lie to your face. What?

Yes. Had a great time. Thanks. Good to see. I'll see you later. It's terrible. Yes. Where did this, did you spend time, you know, to do a film about Iran in 1979, where did this

story even come from? I've lived in this country a long time. I'd never heard of it. Yeah, it's true story. It happened, obviously, around the hostage era, you know, during the larger hostage crisis. Six people got out. They escaped. They hid out with the Canadians.

They were rescued by a CIA exfiltration officer who teamed up with some folks in Hollywood. They pretended to be a, like, B, C.S. science fiction movie crew to go back and get them out of Tehran. It sounds, it's like a horrible movie if it wasn't true. You know what I mean? But it's tense and it's funny and it's exciting. And I just got this, a guy read the, a name Josh Bierman, found the declassified material, Clinton Declassified in 97, a guy named a brilliant writer named Chris Terrio then wrote a script from it.

They sent it to me, and it seemed clear that even just with the most, you know, feeble execution, I could do something special with the movie. But this is no, this is not feeble. You clearly had worked out. There was a scene in the movie. There's a shirt off. It's, uh, it's, uh, it's, uh, that's kind of a trademark. I don't know if.

I got to tell you, it was, at the time, I was thinking, eh, it's a little gratuitous. I cut that thing down. I showed that to some of the producers, and it was me getting out of the shower and toweling off and the whole thing. And we got, you know, I don't have any notes except, do you want to tell them or should I? You know the shower scene, maybe, uh.

Close it down. a little bit there. Trimmed a little bit, yeah. Did you meet the foreign service workers, the people that were in the embassy in Iran? Did you meet with them? Are they alive? I did. There were five of the six, what we called the house guests who were there, who were the

family members of Chambers, the guy who Alan Arkin played. Obviously my character I worked with very closely. So we had this whole nucleus of people who worked with us and helped us keep it real and also who landed to me the fact that this really is in part a tribute to the dangers that Our diplomats face, our foreign service people face, our clandestine service face, without any, you know, hope for recognition. I mean, obviously in Benghazi, you saw tragic results there, and that this is really something that, you know, in addition to your family, being away from your wife, being away from your kids, all this tough stuff. And so when I saw that stuff happening, this silver lining for me about this movie was, you know, we were paying honor to these folks. What's amazing to me, and it always has struck me, is no matter how the situation is in any country, how chaotic.

how volatile, Canadians can travel freely. It really is, it's very, you know, this is, honestly, like there's guys in the streets with machine guns, they're blowing each other way, there's all kinds of things, chaos, people getting shot in the streets, and all of a sudden the car pulls in with just two Canadian flags and just drives right there. Go ahead, go on, go on, go on.

I didn't realize, we're in the middle of a violent revolution, but you're Canadian, you're good people, go on. It's remarkable. They're peaceful people, and there are known peaceful people. And this was a big, you know, we worked together with them. They housed our folks, saved our lives. It was international cooperation. All the good things that we like to see for the sake of peace

and hiding under the shelter of Canadians, which is, you know, that's us, that's America. Hiding behind the Canadians. You know what? I think they will enjoy that interpretation, very much so, from what I can understand. I'll tell you, this directing thing, though. I would continue to do this. Caputzky or no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I'm telling you, you're doing a night, I'm beautiful. Thank you very much.

Just a beautiful thing. I appreciate it. You're very glad. Argo, it's in the theaters on Friday. You've got to go see this thing. Ben Affleck, everybody. He's welcome, David DeVernak. Hello!

Hey. First of all, congratulations. Thank you. This is such a beautiful film. Thank you. And so well done. I'm glad you think so. Oh, absolutely.

I was incredibly moved. The lead performance, David Oyololo. It's just yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Oh, yellow, oh. Yeah, yellow with two O's. Yellow with two O's.

Remarkable. He's amazing. He's amazing. We've got to know the name because this guy. the name because this guy is going places. We've got to learn it now. He's already gone places in this film. How does it feel to present a story like this now that racism is over?

Is it to be able to present it as a part of our learned and shared history that we no longer deal with? That's right. That's right. Well, it's interesting because, you know, we opened the film with King accepting Nobel Prize at a time when he was at the height of his powers. And at that time, if you read, you know, a commentary and columnists at that time, we're talking about how we had gotten past racism because he had gotten the Nobel Prize. I mean, this is this post-racial thing is not new.

The idea that that one achievement, you know, just kind of cleans the slate for everything else. So it's interesting. And these events took place 50 years ago. I thought it was very interesting the way that you portrayed his pragmatism because it humanizes him to a large extent. in that he chose certain moments for their cinematic quality at times. He had to be careful and cautious about what moments could represent his highest aspiration. And you show him suffering as he watches individuals be punished for that choice.

Yeah, I mean, during the Selma marches were really the first time that people died under King's Watch. I mean, you know, you have three people who lost their lives during the Selma can. campaigns. And so that was a great weight upon him, a great guilt that he was carrying, you know, nonviolent theory resulting in violent death. And so that's why this time in his history is just so ripe, so robust for exploration. You know, the big controversy is that Lyndon Baines Johnson is not enough of a hero in this. Does it surprise you? Because in the film, I mean, to be honest with you, when I read the controversy, I expected the film, for him to be villainous.

He is in no way that. He's a politician. I know. I'm a little baffled now. I'm doing the same things as you are. I mean, literally people cheer in the theater for LBJ at the end of it. I'm a little baffled as to what the challenges are,

but everyone has the right to their opinion. I mean, the bottom line is we don't paint anyone as a saint in this. We don't paint anyone as a sinner. Tell me about your esteem for Dr. King after going through this process. Does it enhance it in any way? Were there sobering moments to it?

Ultimately, what's your feeling through that? I think, you know, my feeling before was that I thought I knew him, and I was comfortable with what that was. It was very compartmentalized. A brave man, a courageous man, but not really a man, you know, really an idea. You know, he believed in nonviolence. He had a dream. He believed in peace.

He died. Those are the broad strokes of what I think people understand about him. He was a radical. He was a charismatic. He was a dynamic. He was a strategist. He was a tactician. He was a prankster.

He was guilty. He had ego. He was like me. He was like you. And I gained so much, you don't have ego? No, I just, when you say like Martin Luther King, he was like you, you're like, no, I don't. But no, I mean, I would argue. I'll say like, yeah, I'll give you a prankster.

I would argue that he is because he was just a brother from Atlanta who got swept up in history and was able to step into that goal. to step into that greatness. But truly, he was a human being, and that's what we try to paint. I think that's so interesting, too, when you talk about, you know, when it starts out where he's stepping onto the stage of the Nobel ceremony,

and he's uncomfortable with the trappings of this newfound and worried how it will make him appear. And you never sort of think of that aspect of him in the third person going, hey, I represent this. I can no longer be this. It's as though he came to see himself. as a mythological feature, a figure as well.

Right, right. Well, he knew what he meant to people on both sides of it, you know, for folks that were not, you know, steeped in the culture of people of color. He was a safety to him. Right. Some of them saw him as safe. Some of them saw him as dangerous, but not as dangerous as Malcolm X. Right. You know, so he was the safer.

Very interesting how that's portrayed with Linda Bay Johnson as well. That's correct. You know, if we don't let Dr. King work. And what's our option? There's some interesting ideas in there. And I would just invite people not to dismiss it based on the challenges that a few people who are supposed to be the custodians of one man

are riling up. I think there's a lot of good stuff. I hope they don't. It's moving and complex and the narrative. The Linda B. Johnson is the least interesting. It's the people that did that March and Summit. It's about their courage and struggle. It's so beautiful.

And I congratulate you to the high heavens for it. Really lovely work. Thank you. Hey, so what did you want to talk about? Well, I want to tell you about Wagovi. Wagovi? Yeah, Wagovi. What about it?

On second thought, I might not be the right person to tell you. Oh, you're not? No, just ask your doctor. About Wagoe. Yeah, ask for it by name. Okay. So why did you bring me to the circus? Oh, I'm really into lion tamers.

You know, with the chair and everything. Ask your doctor for Wagoe by name. Visit Wagoe.com for savings. Exclusions may apply. Searchlight Pictures presents The Roses, only in theaters, August 29th. From the director of Meet the Parents and the writer of Poor Things

Comes The Roses, starring Academy Award winner Olivia Coleman, Academy Award nominee Benedict Cumberbatch, Andy Samburg, Kate McKinnon, and Allison Janney. A hilarious new comedy, filled with drama, excitement, and a little bit of hatred, proving that marriage isn't always a bed of roses.

See The Roses, only in theaters, August 29th. Well, welcome back to the show, John Appetal. What's up, baby? Oh, I thought I saw like fluorescent green in there or something. I don't know what the hell was going on. How are you? I'm doing great.

Great to be here. Very nice to have you here. Congratulations on the, this is the trilogy. This is the trilogy. It is the trilogy. of sex, marriage, and death. This is death? This is, well, not really.

It's a funny mortality play that stars funny people. I don't know why you're not in it now that I think about it. Are you suggesting that I have the same neurotic obsessions? I think, well, have you seen it? Wait, what? Knocked up? It was hilarious. I love that.

No, this new movie, 40-year-old virgin, was great. No, because we send you an invite to see funny people and they said that you were going to go and you're really into it. I thought knocked up was phenomenal. And what was the other one? You did, 40-year-old Virgin was like, that Steve Carell is going places.

And I think that he, what's the name of this one? I did see it. Yeah. Who's in it? Are you scared to see it? What? You might feel something in here. In your heart.

You know that wouldn't happen. Is this a film that lays open your deepest fears about mortality and these types of situations? Well, I thought talking about mortality through the eyes of comedians would be a way to talk about a serious subject with an enormous amount of jokes.

Because the truth is, there's no limit to how much a comedian will talk about his penis. And people say there's so many jokes in the movie, and I'm like, in real life, it would be 300 times more penis jokes. Because they're endlessly

funny, I think. In your offices, how many penis jokes per day. There's quite a few penis jokes in our office. I have to say that oftentimes, some of them can be incredibly erudite. Yes. And some of them actually can just be drawings on note cards. So, but I do admit there is quite a lot of that.

Not a lot of death talk, though. So I think it's a good conduit. It is. It is. And it's about a young comedian played by Seth Rogen, and he plays this guy, Ira Wright. Oh, someone recognized that name. One guy.

Wait, what, who? And he plays Ira Wright. And Ira Wright, his real name is Ira Weiner. What's he running away from? Apparently there are some people who have Jewish names, and they change them so they don't sound Jewish. Well, that's ridiculous. Whoever does something like that should stand up, because the only thing that matters in this world is that what you do personally is okayed by other people. of your same ethnic persuasion.

I think that you think that you're passing for non-Jew and you're not. What? Do you think people think I'm one of you? Well, wait till they hear about this at the club. I mean, Marge is going to have a real in her gin gimlet. Do you know, I'm such a big fan of this. I'm such a big fan of the show, and something weird happened the other night, and I thought I would admit it on the show because it just seemed interesting to me, which is I was watching William Crystal, and Bill Crystal, I call it William, but he's the editor of the Weekly Standard, and I was home, and I thought, you know, it's late, and I'm going to masturbate, and I thought. To the interview?

Well, here's the thing. What I thought was, I wonder if I could pull it off while the interview was going on with Bill Crystal, and... Would you turn the sound down, or would you leave it on? No, I left the sound up. And I thought you had some great jokes. You had some really funny jokes. Thank you. And it is possible. Did you look at the screen?

Let me ask you a question. And this is important. Yeah. Who did you focus on? I have to admit, I looked into Bill's cold dead eyes. So that's what you get off on. How long was the interview? It was kind of a long interview, so not that impressive a fee.

It'd be one thing if, in a shorter interview, you could pull it up. I mean, eight minutes, I could pull it off three times. I mean, for God's sakes. It gave me four minutes to cuddle with Bill afterwards. Now, I don't know if you guys heard about this, but I became, I was this close, this week, to being on the cover of Time Magazine. Really? Yes.

Well, basically, they said, if there's a big story, you're going to get bumped, but for entertainment, we think you're going to make it. And then at the last second, it changed to something. I'd like to show you the cover because they let me see what it was. There it is. Wow. And that is not fake. And I look how handsome I look.

Yeah. And you can't see my bald head. You can't see that. It looks like you went down to the Jersey Shore and won that on the boardwalk. Exactly. And that, that is it. And it looks bad, but that is it. And then they switched it.

I just want you to know that they thought this was more important than me. How much publicity does this guy need is what I want to know? He doesn't have a movie coming out at this point. Can I tell you something? Time Magazine is like O Magazine. Like Obama has to be on the cover. It's like, it is like Oprah Magazine. I think he's been on like 30 times this year.

Well, it was a heartbreaker for me. Well, let me tell you something. You're on the cover of your heart. Mench magazine. Yes. Thank you. You're a good man. Thank you, sir.

Funny People! It's in the theaters on Friday. John Appetal! Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. This is great for so many people to see the face behind the films.

Congratulations, by the way. Oh, thank you. So much. It really is. No. It really is. I'd like to take a moment and go back on this. On this, first of all, let's start with the fact that you are just 29 years old.

Yeah, 29 years old and already there's Oscar talk around the film. Is that, does that make you nervous? Does that, or is that just a, is that a humbling experience? What's that like for you? It's humbling, man. Like with filmmaking, it's an art form that you don't do on your own. You know, I saw several collaborators come and go. I wrote the script with a buddy of mine, Aaron Cunnington.

I got to work with one of my best friends, Michael B. Jordan. And it really feels like, it's just a blessing to be able to do this job. You know what I mean? So I have people talk about, you know, your movies at the end of it for awards and things like that. It's just icing on the cake to be interesting. My barber literally said to me, he was like, he was cutting my hand. He's like, yo, man, you've seen, you've seen Creed? You seen Creed?

And I was like, no, he's like, yo, that's the Black Rocky, man. He's like, that's Black Rocky for this generation. Is that what you were setting out to do when you wrote to? Because you, I read a fascinating story. You wrote this film. You were inspired by your father. Yeah, absolutely. My dad was a huge Rocky fan.

Whenever you put these Rocky movies on, he would cry. You know what I'm saying? So I knew these movies had a special power over my dad, and I came to like him because my dad liked him. You know, I wanted to be just like him. And then when I finished up film school, my dad got sick, you know, and he started to develop a neuromuscular condition when he was losing his skeletal muscles.

He basically was becoming weaker. Right. You know, and had to help him from the car to the house sometimes, and all of a sudden this dude who was always so strong became weak. and it really did a number on my psyche. You know, but then I came up with this idea that maybe if his hero, you know, went through something similar,

you know, and there was a young man who formed a relationship with him, you know, maybe it could be something that my dad would be into. Maybe it would be cheering him up, maybe it would motivate him to fight through it. That's beautiful, man. And how does a young black man

from a rough neighborhood, like you said, go into making films? I mean, you said your dad was an ex-football player. You were going to get into, football. Yeah. What changed? I mean, school, and I always had great teachers. And then I got a football scholarship to a school called St. Mary's College. And I had a teacher there, you know, during my first year of school, read something that I wrote and called me into her office

and basically suggested that I get into writing, writing movies, because my writing was real visual. No, no, I'm sorry. Just the image for me, because I watch a lot of movies, just the image that a football player gets called in and the teacher goes, you need to write more. You should quit football and you should write more. So you went straight into that? I laughed at a bit in the class. You know, while we were sitting in her office, I thought she was crazy at first.

I thought I was in trouble when she called me into her office. Yeah, I would think that too. That's what I would think. Yeah, I never forget she called. And she was like, hey, she called me my dorm room. I was in the dorm room with my friends. She was like, hey, are you busy right now? And I'm like, I couldn't lie because I'm in the dorm room.

You know, so I was like. There's no lies in dorm rooms. I didn't lie because I was in the door room. No, but she knew where I was. You know what I mean? She could, like, walk down from her office and knock on the door if she wanted to. So she said, I want you to come by my office halls right now.

So I had to kick all my partners out the room. Like, man, I got to go. Maybe the teacher, like, I can't remember what I wrote about to be easy. The story was actually about my dad crazy enough, you know. And I thought maybe, because it was something that crazy that happened, I thought maybe she was like, hey, you know, you need to see a psychiatrist

what she's writing about or something, you know. Or like, we're like, you know, Where I'm going to get to her office, it's going to be like the dean of school, like the police there waiting for me. Like, hey, man, you know, truth's all, you know what I mean, you're out of here. But, you know, I went in there, her name was Rosemary Graham, and it was just her, you know, and she, you know, she sat me down and asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, you know, and I had no idea really at the time.

And, you know, she suggested that I get into, you know, writing screenplays. Doing amazing things. Thank you so much. I appreciate it, bro. Creed is amazing. Fruitvale is amazing. You are amazing, my friend. Oh, thank you so much.

Get to Toronto's main venues like Budweiser State. and the new Roger Stadium with Go Transit. Thanks to Go Transit's special online e-ticket fairs, a $10 one-day weekend pass offers unlimited travel on any weekend day or holiday anywhere along the Go Network. And the weekday group passes offer the same weekday travel flexibility across the network, starting at $30 for two people and up to $60 for a group of five.

Buy your online go pass ahead of the show at go-transit.com slash tickets. Please welcome Catherine Bigelow. Welcome to The Daily Show. I am such a huge fan of your work. You have directed some of the most gripping films we have had the pleasure of experiencing. You were an awarded an Academy Award for your directing. Looking at this film, Detroit,

would you say that this was one of the more difficult films that you have worked on? I would definitely say yes. Emotionally, it was very, very difficult. Not only for the cast, but the crew. I mean, everybody, everybody was, you could not be immune to the emotionality of this piece. And I would oftentimes, I'd say cut,

I'd go out to the porch whenever you see it, you'll know that all takes place in this one house and there's this porch, and I'd find the cast, you know, sometimes with their head, buried in their hands, you know, and just... I tried to just move it along as quickly as I could because it's a very tragic story. Why did you choose to tell this story

about what was happening in Detroit? Well, I think the thinking going in was the canvas is huge. I mean, you're looking at a rebellion that took place over five days in 1967, and that was only one of almost 300 in the year of 1967. So there was a tremendous amount of social unrest, understandably. And so you have this beginning of it starts with the riot, and then it begins to telescope down to several characters,

and then it telescopes down even further to this one character. So it's an opportunity for me to humanize what I think is somewhat unthinkable, which is the degree of police brutality and racial injustice that took place in those few hours in the Algeria's motel. Is it ever strange for you telling a story that is set in a time many decades ago, and yet it still seems timely? It still seems like the story could have been of a few days ago? Well, that was exactly my entry point.

When it was first presented to me by Mark Bull, the writer, that I work with, Hurt Locker, and Zero Doc 30. I was just around the time of Ferguson, Missouri, and I was thinking, this sounds like today. I mean, this is 50 years ago, yet it's today. Right. And if it's today, could it be tomorrow? And so my hope was that the film could possibly be part of a larger conversation

and encourage a conversation about racial injustice in this country. And I think that, or perhaps other stories coming forward, you know, I think it's a really meaningful conversation for this country to have at this point. What you cannot escape, though, when you're tackling any subject like this, is because you're dealing with police brutality, because you are dealing with racial injustice, there is an element of people always questioning, people asking the whys.

And I know one of the toughest whys that came to you was, why are you telling the story? You are a white woman telling a story of black people in Detroit. Why would you do that? Well, I think that, I mean, I certainly had to do some soul searching in order to answer that and then go forward with it.

But I found the story so moving, and I felt that it was an important, story to tell. And so compelling that, and I had the opportunity to tell it. So I thought perhaps that mitigated the negative aspects of the fact. You know, I thought, am I the right person to tell this story? Absolutely not. But does the story need telling? Yes. And that's what was my motivation. When you worked on the story as well, I noticed that you worked with some key figures within the African American community, people who could lend credence to the story, make it factually It was based specifically on the Algea's motel incident.

Why that incident in particular, and why did you feel was so important to get prominent African Americans who were steeped in history involved in the project? Well, we're very lucky to have people like Michael Dyson and Henry Lewis Gates help us with this project. And what was so important was to base it on actual events. You know, that the research, it was extremely well research. researched. And it was very important that we get it right. You know, that it be accurate, that it be authentic, and that we were true to the events that took place. We also had

eyewitness accounts. Right. Now, when you're a director, we understand there's the commercial aspect. You're trying to make money from the film. It is a business. At the same time, you're trying to tell stories. You're trying to move people. If there was one thing you would hope would move after people watch this movie, what would you hope that thing would be? Well, I would hope that it encourages a conversation, you know, invites a conversation about the racial injustice in this country. I mean, for instance, you're from South Africa, and there's a meaningful conversation about truth and reconciliation, but here I feel like there's just silence. Right. And, you know, young African-American men are afraid to drive in their own car.

And, you know, there's just, who knows what will happen. And I just think this is, you know, there's a, there's a situation out there that has. has neat in my humble, I'm just a filmmaker, but in my humble opinion needs to be addressed. And I hope this can certainly encourage that to happen. I mean, we had a screening the other night in Capitol Hill hosted by Representative John Conyers. Oh, wow.

And he has a bill to end racial profiling. And he's encouraging people to see the movie in gender conversation. Well, you call yourself a humble filmmaker, but we think you're exceptional. Thank you so much for being on the show. show. Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by searching The Daily Show, wherever you

get your podcasts. Watch the Daily Show weeknights at 11, 10 Central on Comedy Central, and stream full episodes anytime on Paramount Plus. This has been a Comedy Central podcast.