The Press Box - ‘The Big Picture’—Female-Powered Comedy With ‘Rough Night’ Creators Lucia Aniello and Paul W. Downs

Episode Date: June 16, 2017

Ringer editor-in-chief Sean Fennessey and staff writer Lindsay Zoladz discuss the dearth of female filmmakers in the R-rated comedy space (2:00) before Sean chats with the ‘Rough Night’ writing and directing team of Lucia Aniello and Paul W. Downs about meeting at the UCB Theatre, developing ‘Broad City,’ and making a studio comedy starring big names like Scarlett Johansson, Kate McKinnon, and Zoë Kravitz (17:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The big picture is brought to you by Dolby Voice. Today's offices need work spaces that allow small teams to collaborate effectively. Enter the huddle room. Small conference areas designed for meeting. For effective collaboration, huddle rooms need capabilities like video conferencing. Even with great video capabilities in place, though, a lousy audio experience can derail otherwise productive huddle meetings. I know this from working at the ringer. Dolby Voice and Dolby Conference phones solve that problem. Dolby Voice and Dolby Conference run to deliver stunning audio clarity and 360-degree audio capture that allows everyone to be heard and makes meetings easy to follow and participate in.

The result is conversations that flow naturally. When conversations flow, decisions get made, innovation increases, and even widely dispersed teams become more effective. Additionally, Dolby Voice and Dolby Conference Phone are now integrated with leading video conferencing solutions, like Blue Jeans Huddle. Visit Dolby.com backslash the ringer to try a Dolby Voice demo today. Hello and welcome to The Big Picture. Hey, Channel 33 movies podcast. My name is Sean Fennacy.

I'm the editor-in-chief of The Ringer. I'm very excited today for a couple of reasons. One, we've got a great conversation coming with Lucia on Yellow. and Paul W. Downs, the writer and director and partners behind Rough Night, a new comedy. Two, I've got Ringer staff writer Lindsay Zolads who profiled Lucia coming on to talk to me. And three, as you may have heard, we have a new theme song on this podcast. That song is Orange Shirt by a band called Discovery, led by Rostom, who you may know from Vampire Weekend, who's a solo artist now. So I just want to say thanks to Rostom, thanks to Beggar's Group, for making that happen for us, and hope you enjoyed it.

now we're going to chat with Lindsay Zolads. Lindsay, thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for having me. So, Lindsay, you spent some time with Lucia on Yellow, and she has a pretty interesting backstory before she was a film director. She got her start as a comedy person. Can you tell me a little bit about kind of where she came from? Yeah, so along with the other co-creators of Broad City, Alana Gleaser, Abby Jacobson

and Paul Downs, who's a writer and who is her partner. He also plays Trey on Broad City slash Kirksteel, the infamous porn alter ego of Trey. Anyway, so they all met at UCB, the U.S. Citizens Brigade Theater in New York City, which a lot of other comics, maybe like a generation before them, kind of came through there. Amy Poehler is one of the founders. So there is a real tradition and a community of that. They took improv classes there and sketch classes about a decade ago now, and they all met in various ways. And Lucia was a performer before she was ever really thinking of directing

and was like writing and performing sketch in a duo with Paul. So when I talked to several people for the piece, they kind of pointed out that that's part of what makes her so good at directing comedy is she's coming at it from a performer's standpoint, rather than just purely thinking on cinematic terms, which I do think you kind of, you know, I think that's a strength when doing a movie like this or doing a show like Broad City that kind of, you know, she's asking her actresses in particular to kind of go to some extremes that I think if she can kind of ground it in showing them how it's done or kind of like riffing on an idea herself, which just seems like she did a lot on the set of

this film. I think that just creates a level of comfort on set that seemed like she really pulled off for this. Yeah, it's an interesting thing, right? Because a lot of times you hear actors say mostly off the record that they don't like it when filmmakers do. line readings for them or that they like tell them how to give the line but you know in talking to alana for your story alana told you that she liked when lucia essentially performed the moment to kind of show her to put herself in it and to show her like what she saw in the joke in the line and the reading and i feel like there's a fine line between comedy and drama there where there's a collaborative quality that lucia comes back to over and over again yeah and i think the fact that

she's still working with you know her friends that paul downs is also in the movie and he's hilarious in it. It plays a very long scene in an adult diaper and no pants, which is really the breakout moment. Yeah. So I think that the fact that she's, at least in the past, has been working mostly with friends and people she knows outside of a professional sphere. Like I don't think they see that kind of relationship is overstepping at all.

But, you know, a lot of what the piece is about, but also what she's going through right now is this transition from the more indie kind of like DIY comedy scene and you know even Broad City being on Comedy Central had kind of a scrappy energy to it translating that voice to a giant studio comedy is no easy feat and I think just working with the star power that she is on this film Scarlett Johansson, Demi Moore is in it. you know, that's a whole different ballgame. So I think it was interesting to talk to her in that moment of transition and her career and see how she's navigating it.

Yeah, she talked to you a little bit about some of her forebearers, and it's notable that this is her first, this is the first female directed studio comedy since 1998, which sounds insane to sail out loud. The first R-rated, actually. R-rated, there you go. Yes, which is interesting in and of itself, too. Like, yeah, the pitch perfect franchise, which Elizabeth Banks, I think she directed both of those, right? Yes.

Those have been very lucrative. But it's all sort of been towards this PG-13 audience where there's certain lines you don't cross. And I think the reason it's been so long since a woman is directed in our rated film feels really ground to these old stereotypes about like that women can. handle certain kinds of gross out humor or something like that, or that there's a more delicate sensibility. And I do think shows like Broad City and what Amy Schumer is doing to have kind of dispelled that myth for this generation. So it really feels like time for not just one, but many more are rated comedies directed by women.

But yeah, Lucia was so the last, actually the last, Our rated studio comedy directed by a woman was half-baked, which is not about women at all, but Tamara Davis, who also did CB4 and a bunch of other, like, music videos and stuff like that in the 90s. She directed half-baked in 1998, and then there has been a total dry spell since then. But Lucia pointed her out as a really big influence on her and noted how she, those movies have a real edge to them, and they're really funny and goofy and about stoners and stuff, but there is kind of an inherent, like, social commentary running through, you know, they're not dumb movies. And I think that she aspires to make comedy just, like, on a similar tone of that,

where it's a little bit smarter maybe than the people in the film. Yeah, and you guys talked a little bit about that, right? Obviously, the movie is very silly. You noted the adult diaper thing. There is a lot of gross out humor, I guess you could say. But there is this subtextual, sometimes purely textual discussion of police brutality and drug use and the police state. And especially Alana Glazer's character is like very woke, for lack of a better word. And she kind of like subverts some of the notions of what it means to be an activist and a feminist.

You and Lucia talked about that too, right? Yeah, we, I was impressed. that she was very open to talking about sort of the quote-unquote internet controversies that may or may not have translated into the outside world in thinking about this film. But there was a little bit of a backlash. I know when the trailer first came out that, so the premise of the movie is basically a bachelor's party gone awry and a male stripper accidentally ends up dead. And there were some blog post to people saying, you know, I'm going to boycott.

this film because it's not presenting sex work in a responsible way and all this other stuff, which I see those concerns. But I also think, you know, if you're going to pick apart like every single comedy that comes down the line, it's going to be hard to find one that does check all those boxes. And I do think personally, there's a lot worse things to boycott in the world than the first are rated comedy directed by a woman. 20 years, so that's just my two cents. But I was impressed that, you know, I was very curious to talk to a filmmaker like her in this age of kind of internet outrage and where there's kind of a reaction culture just from seeing the trailer, which tells you, you know, not that much about the

movie as I think, I know you've seen it, so you would agree. There's like a lot, there's a lot that I didn't get from the kind of traditional beats of the trailer. Yeah, I don't want to necessarily like overcomplicate what the movie's about, but it is not strictly about the outrage blog posts that were written after somebody, after people saw two and a half minutes. Exactly. And I would be curious to read criticism if people have it of like after they've seen the whole film, but she was really open to talking about, you know, what it's like to make a studio movie in this time. and there's just so much judgment and tweets and so many voices out there being critical of something before you even put it out. And I did think she was, she seemed really like not, she was really like unflappable about it.

And I was impressed at how directly she kind of wanted to engage in those conversations. And she was really curious about what I thought of the movie and if it was like over the line in certain ways. but I do think just coming back to like the director she was citing from the 90s who inspired her. She also mentioned Amy Heckerling, who I've interviewed and profiled as well. When I told her that she wanted me to tell her like every detail about Amy is like. You had a lot of details about Amy in your piece. Yeah, I told her that when I met Amy Heckerling, she was wearing a bucket hat that she cut the top out of so that her crazy hair could like spill at the top. And Uchia was very pleased by that detail.

And she also really admires Penelope Spiris, who kind of came out of the punk underground doing like decline of Western civilization, those two documentaries and then got to do Wayne's World in 1992. And, you know, that is not like, that feels like a very 90s trajectory to me now. Like I think the fact that she has to look that far back for these role models, like working within the, um, the studio comedy system of just like women that were making big movies but did have an edge to them and weren't just, weren't afraid to cross certain lines. You know, I think she's a throwback to that time in a way for the purely practical reason of there just weren't other women making these films in the past 20 years. Yeah, there's also something that she notes in your piece about being obsessed with MTV,

noting who the filmmakers were behind certain music videos. One thing that's kind of lost, as MTV has transitioned in the last 10 years or so, into a different kind of network, maybe the last 20 years or so, is you also lose this kind of on-ramp to directing careers for a lot of people, and a lot of women came out of that experience, obviously. And I wonder if that's also a factor in some women not quite getting the chance to do hard-ar comedy like this, or even just have... You and I have talked many times, and you've written a lot about the lack of

opportunity for female filmmakers. And I wonder if the erosion of some of that stuff has made an issue too. Yeah, well, I wonder if it's more, I think this was a larger conversation that I had talking to Lucia, too. I think those things that we once considered on ramps are now kind of like ends in and of themselves, because I think you could say that you could have said the same thing about TV, that you could have about music videos. And now, you know, I was very curious to know why in 2017 did she still want to make the big studio comedy when it doesn't necessarily feel like that's the be all and end all and that that's like the end goal anymore. And I think especially for female comedians, like if you think of Tina Faye and Amy Polar and how they're, you know,

they had sisters come out last year, which was like fine and funny, but it felt like a small part of their stardom. It didn't feel like the sort of like Will Ferrell vehicle that it's all kind of leading up to that. It was, it almost felt weird that they were doing that movie for something. Like it felt like kind of a throwback to want to do that kind of a film. So I think the cool thing about someone like Lucia and the moment that she is coming into her talent is that there are so many ways to get your story out there. And you don't, I think it's amazing that she will have this movie under her belt and it's proving to studios that she can handle a big budget film like this. But, you know, she's when I was talking to her, she said I, she would go back to TV and do something. She would do

a web series again. Like I think filmmakers now are having this freedom to determine like what is the best format for telling a story and it's not always the big movie anymore. It will be very interesting to see what she does next. Lindsay, thank you for chatting with me about this today. And please go read Lindsay's story on the ringer.com. Okay, thanks to Lindsay. Before my conversation with Lucia Aniello and Paul W. Downs, first a word from our sponsor. The Big Picture is brought to you by Dolby Voice.

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Visit Dolby.com backslash the ringer for a free demo. That's Dolby.com backslash the ringer. Lucia, Paul, thank you so much for being here. Thanks for having us. So, guys, you made a film together, but you've done a lot of other things before that. And I want people to kind of understand the origin, you know, where you came from. how you met, how you became partners, creatively, maybe, other ways? 100% spiritually, yeah.

First and foremost spiritually. I'd say so. So you met at UCB in New York? The church of UCB. The church of comedy, UCB. When was that? I don't remember the year. I think I want to say 2005.

Okay. Or six. And were you guys students at the school? Yes, we were level one. Yeah, we were level one grad students. Yes, doing our graduate degree in improv comedy. and mix them ups and zip zabs ups, you know. Wow.

Was the idea to be comedy professionals or was it something you guys are doing as a lark? No, I think we were both pretty serious about it independently and then we met and we're like, oh, okay, we can do this together. Truly was like grad school for me. I mean, I was like, oh, I'll just do classes and do this. When I first moved was like, oh, maybe I'll be a comedic actor because I had done sketched and improv in college. And then I was like, no, I miss it. How do you guys figure out you're going to be comedy partners? I'm always interested to figure out, like, what is the chemistry?

It was a slow burn. Amy Poehler put us together. She said, you two are together. That's not true. Yeah, well, we met in a level one, and then we were on an improv team together. At the magnet theater. Yes, at the magnet theater. And I guess we started making videos.

Yeah, I mean, essentially what happened is we were both, you know, taking class. and doing improv and Paul got put on like teams a lot more frequently than I did. And so I was like, hey, you know, I don't think that's fulfilling for you. And let's go and make some videos because at the time that, you know, people were starting to make videos, but it really was like the beginning of the bubble. And I had made some videos in college that were not actually even that comedic, to be honest. But I felt that it was the right time, the right place to be to be making. videos. And so I, and also we were spending so much time together at that point that we'd start

to just like have ideas for stuff. We'd start making things. And then all of a sudden, you know, even if it was just like a thousand views, it made so much more sense to make one video for a thousand views than try to fill, you know, 100 seat theater 10 times. So it just kind of made more sense on a number, you know, scale. And so we just started making more and more videos. It was able to get some representation, which was so important to us at the time. And yeah, we just kind of went from there. And that is also where you guys met Alana, right, from Broughtson. That's right.

And Abby, yeah. And Abby as well. Yeah, we were in, okay. I was in class with Abby separately from you. And I also was. Yeah. Abby and I actually auditioned for our first Herald team together. Oh, God, this story.

It is so funny because Abby and I somehow reminisce about it a lot. Yeah, constantly. And then Alana and Lichia will be like, oh, geez. And they like leave the room. It's like, it's like as if they were like, anointed by God in this Harold audition they talk about it. We were, you know, budding. comedians and we decided to get a drink before.

And it was like midday. It was wild. We had wine. It was fine. We went to a place on 21st Street, had a glass of wine, audition, and then did it seem together and both got a callback. It was a big day for both of us. That's a wild story.

You guys are crazy. Yeah, it was wild. He's on our team. Yeah. So did you and Alana have a similar meet cute and soar into the Harold stars? Well, Abby and Alana and I never got on Herald team. So we, I mean, we're actually in the same boat. But you did have a meet queue.

We did have a meet queue where we met at a party and we were wearing the same outfits. But we, but Alana and Abby and I actually, you know, we became friends. We actually worked at the same day job, which was kind of like a group on kind of place, which is what deals is based on on Broad City. So we kind of had a little world outside of comedy, but they were making the web series at the time. And so we were kind of just like, you know, friends, but, you know, collaborators at times. And we just, you know, it kind of just felt like we were two duos that were like running at the same pace kind of in terms of being like hyper dedicated to it and really being passionate about it and wanting to just really figure out a way to be professional comedians. And being in love, you know.

Well, yeah, sure. And so, yeah, that's how we kind of all became friends. How exactly did you end up working specifically on Broad City? Did Abbeenalana ask, were you guys always sort of plotting something together? So when they first came to L.A. to pitch the show, because they had done the web series, and Lucia had directed an episode or two. And I was in an episode. And, you know, we were living in New York at the time that that was going on. We had moved to L.A. and then they came out to pitch the show. And Alana actually crashed with us for a while. Maybe like a month or two. For like a month. She was our Dobby the House elf, self-titled. And they sold the show. And Lucia directed the pilot.

That was kind of the first, like, you know, the foray into. our collaborating with them. I directed the pilot, and then when it got picked up to series, they asked us both to write on the show. And then we wrote Paul's character, Trey, not necessarily for Paul, but he started like reading it at table reads, and it just kind of made sense, and then he ended up getting it,

but it wasn't initially developed for him. But then, yeah, so then we started working on the show, and we've been there every season since. For the past 25 years. 25 years. Congratulations on your quarter century. Thank you. Century.

That's great. Four seasons only. It takes a long time. So when you were in school, were you studying to be a filmmaker? Was that your expectation? Yeah, I was a film studies major. So it was a history and criticism more so than production. So I didn't really have a ton of experience making stuff.

And at the time, I was like, oh, this is not really useful to me. But now that I actually am making movies, I do find myself sometimes thinking about more pretentious things. Sure. But it is still a comedy, so you kind of can't go. overboard, but I, but I, but I am very grateful for that. Like, education was definitely helpful and I, I dig it. And, you know, sometimes when people referencing things and I can say, I saw, I've seen it, that makes me feel good. What's, what's the most pretentious name drop you have for Rough Night? Oh, God. Wow. That's a great question. I guess I was, I would at times reference

Busby Berkeley musicals for that section where the girls were doing their dancing. So I would sometimes refer to that. That's a great one. That's perfect. Thank you. And Paul, you were always going to be an actor. Was the plan also to be a writer as well? In high school and college, I did sketch and I did improv. So, yeah, I was writing. I wish I had realized that earlier. And in school, just wrote screenplays and did that more seriously.

Because I always planned to do it. But in school, I kind of had more fun. Good for you. It was like, I was like, I'll get to it. When you guys are writing, tell me about that process being you're together and you're together. So is that exciting? Is it easy to collaborate?

Is it difficult? Well, first of all, it's fully nude. So in that way, it's different than I think a lot of it. It's the most honest way to do it. Truly, vulnerable. Actually, sometimes it's in the complete darkness. We do often brainstorming complete darkness. Because that way you're not like looking at the other person's face or you're not

distracted by like eye rolling or also you're not distracted by phones. The perils of having beautiful partners. Oh. We did a couple times when we had deadlines for certain things do that, and it was really useful. Yeah, I highly recommend word vomiting to each other in the dark. It really actually helps. There's, yeah. Things do come from that.

You're forced to visualize things in a way that you don't, you might not necessarily, if you're looking at like a plant that you're like, oh, I have to water that. It's dying. You know, you don't get easily distracted. We were asked to do a take on a franchise, and we had like two days to do it. And so we had to basically come up with a movie in two days. Obviously, it would change if we got the job. But we were like, yikes, how the hell are we going to do this? Okay, let's just turn off the lights.

Yeah. And we just sat in the dark for two days. And it worked. So that was good. Wow. Yeah. But beyond that, our process is generally that we outline everything together. And so, you know, sometimes we'll have some pieces of dialogue and sometimes we'll improvise

as the characters to kind of bring that dialogue, you know, about. But then what we do is we each go off and write the exact same scene. And then we switch. I read his. He reads mine. We highlight our favorite parts of the other person's script. And then one of us combines the scene. But weirdly, usually like, you know, one of us,

first of all, we usually have like the same jokes. And then. For better or worse, yeah. Yeah, for better or worse. And then. It's like, great. That must be a good joke if we both wrote it. Or is it a hack joke because it's too obvious.

Or, yeah. Is it just in our vocabulary? Yeah. And then, but, you know, that way, really, then once you combine it, it really feels like you have a third draft and not necessarily. second draft. So that's a really extremely collaborative process, and commonly so. Well, we used to write more like linearly. We'd sit next to each other and like, you know, argue over a line and it

just became. It was slow and not helpful. And yeah. And the thing that's fun is because we get to surprise the other person, I get to try and make Lucia laugh and she gets to try and make me laugh. And so I'm writing for my favorite audience, you know, the smartest audience. Wow, thanks. Yeah. And in doing that, it does make you, I'm like, oh, well, Sometimes I write things that are just for her, but oftentimes those are the best jokes. Things that I'm like, oh, this is just for her. This is just a surprise. This is an Easter egg for Lucia that we'll never see the light of day because it's only like a thing that we'll get.

And oftentimes because of the specificity, we've found those things are really, people respond to that. And it also forces you to just write the draft quickly because you know that like the other person's writing it and you can't seem like a slacker. So it's kind of like time chess, you know, like you have to just just. get it out and you can't like overthink it and it forces you to just be a little bit sharper I think yeah I mean in a way it's like we get a third draft in our first because we've both written something but we get to like just vomit it out and we both know it's like the other person will pick up the slack yeah you're not as precious about it is that true for broad city and for the web series stuff and also for the movies yeah I mean it's how we write everything how we write

everything how we write our episodes are both city it's how we write everything and it's faster than just sitting next to each other and we've been trying to tell people to do this and no I believe not one person has adapted our process. Yeah, we are always asking other comedy duos or partners what they do. And no one's ever done this. No one we're like, well, we have a good way. People are like, that sounds like it's too much work. And no one has ever said this to me before.

You guys seem like aliens. So what is the difference then between writing for Broad City and writing a feature? Page length. A feature is about 100 pages. Was it that? Was it truly similar, though? I mean, the tone, obviously, of the movie recalls Broad City in some ways. In some ways.

Yeah. And a lot of our favorite episodes of Broad City have a lot of story. They have plot. And so that is something that in a movie you do want to have turns and you do want to have plot that you don't always need for television. And a lot of times today, television doesn't have it. I think in drama, it happens a lot more. I think we often, in the movie, we did our best to really have things pay off and climax

acts in a really big way in the third act, which was, I guess, I'd say just something we've never really spent a lot of time doing before, making sure that all the stories kind of come together at the end, things that, like, kind of seem like one-liners that you're, you know, maybe it was a joke, but you didn't really see what the point was. Now, all of a sudden, it really makes sense. And so we've really tried to make the story have that kind of snowball effect, where by the end, everything kind of fits together. And holy shit, wow, what an amazing movie. Yes. And I think the other thing we've learned, is that writing a movie,

the biggest difference is because you're watching it with a bunch of people, you do need those big pants down moments because it's so much more fun to watch a comedy, especially with a group of people. You know, when you're at home watching TV, and I've said this before, but I don't really laugh out loud often.

You know, I like smile to myself, wistfully, and touch the screen and, yeah, I hug myself. But when you're on a movie and other people are laughing, you just want to get in on it. And it's more like, it's just really, it's a theatrical experience. Yeah, I was going to say a theatrical. experience, but yeah, spiritual.

Well, theater can be spiritual. Again, back to church, UCB. It's physical, though, too, right? You hear somebody responding and your body sort of responds to it. That's the thing. You should say your thing. Oh, God. Yeah, I know.

I'm sorry, I'm pimping you into this. She was saying it's the physical expression of pleasure, which is a lot like, there's a awkward theme happening. Yeah. It has more external expressions of it, more so than drama, where drama, somebody could be stoked and sitting there the whole time. They're like, I liked that. I had pleasure from that, but you don't really see that pleasure.

from comedies, you actually see somebody riving about in a way. Did you like it? You're like, oh, I saw what you were doing. You know somebody liked it. Right. Yeah. Was that good for you? Was that good for you?

Yeah, that was good. Okay, great. But I do know what you mean about TV. So you guys should see Rough Night if you want Money Shots. I tell you what you're saying. That's exactly right. If you want to have a laughter orgasm, yeah, come and see Rough Night in the theater. Yeah.

I do understand what you mean though by TV, which is when you're amused by something, you just seem amused and you're not, you don't have that physical reaction. But so when you guys are trying to write these. Pants Down moments, as you say. Is it hard? Is it hard to do like a comedy set piece? The construction of it is a little bit different. And I think that that's something that we knew that, you know, like you have to be able to have somebody who, you know, is a very well-read MBA-having person has to have the same

response to a big physical joke as somebody who doesn't speak English very well or whatever. And so you want to be able to say like, well, what's the most universal thing? and oftentimes it is physical humor, but you don't want it just to be a movie of people falling down and hurting themselves. So it is like a balance of being like, well, everybody does react to this. Everybody does enjoy this. But how do you craft it in a way that is important to the story? And the fun thing we've been able to do with testing the movie and showing it to, you know,

400, 500 seat theaters is see the things that everyone does respond to. And sometimes it's actually really small things. Like, Zoe Kravitz has a joke about Zillow. It's a good joke. And it always does well. And it's like we did not expect that joke to do so well. We were like, oh, this is kind of like, it's like a niche joke. It's like, are you looking for a house?

You might know what Zillow is. But everybody seems to respond to that. Well, her timing is so impeccable. And of course, and then it's also character-based. Like her character is the kind of person who would have judgment over somebody else's Zillow listing. And I think you've established that enough so that like you already are like, oh, that's so Blair. And I think the other big thing is when we were writing it,

even though initially we didn't know it was going to be a big studio movie, we did know that we might have room to do things that in TV, it moves so quickly and the budget is such that you don't get to do a car crash or an explode. You know, you don't get to do kind of the bigger stuff that you can in movies. And so that was also kind of exciting. For sure. It did open up the sort of scope of scope of what we were able to do. Yeah.

Was the script just written? non-spec to just to show people what you could do essentially, or did you hope that it would become something? We were pretty committed to making it happen. We weren't sure what the scale was. We were like, maybe we'll kickstart it. Maybe we'll make it a small indie thing. But that was kind of why parts of it or a fair amount of it is in a house.

It's because we figured that we could figure out a way to seduce somebody into letting us use their house. Even if we did an iPhone though, we were like, we are going to try and do this because, you know, we write for women a lot and we were like, oh, this is a really funny thing for a group of funny women and we know a lot of them to do. And so I think we really hoped that we would find a way. We didn't know it was going to be something that a lot of people would be interested in making. Credits to my producer, he noticed, though, that he was like a lot of this movie takes place in a house.

I feel like this is a screenwriting trick to get this script sold because studios know. You know, it wasn't to sell it. It was really so we could make it. Yes. So we could manage it if we had to kickstart it and do it in the summer with just friends of ours, you know. Was there any part of you that wanted to change it after it's sold to a studio? We did change it a little to be dead. Yeah.

Some of it were like, okay. Make that car explode. We were like, we can do it. We can do it. Actually, one thing that we cut that we never put back in because it was very expensive still was they're walking around Miami and they're having fun and they're taking selfies

and they're drunk. And we were going to have Jillian Bell's character get on a motorcycle and pretend to be on a motorcycle and get off and knock down a row of motorcycles and just like destroy all these Dukadis in Miami. And the studio was like, do you need to? And we're like, no, we don't need to. We don't need to.

It's like a Pee-Herman homage. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Okay, so the script hits the blacklist and it's people want to buy it? It was already purchased. Okay. Yeah, we sold it before the blacklist.

What does it like to be in a bidding war clamored after? Is that exciting? Or is that just trumped up deadline.com stuff? I don't just say that to word. No, it was a really fun night. It was crazy because we did not know what would happen that way, but it was sort of like, we got a call that was like, here's all these offers, here's all these things. You need to decide now what you're going to do.

We were like to watch. We were sent out on a Thursday and we sold it Friday. Wow. And they were essentially a lot of places imposed, this is DL info, but a lot of places. Just definitely say it on a public forum. So I'm going to say it. Don't, three, two, one. Don't release this.

Three, two, one. A lot of places impose a deadline. They're like, you have one hour to decide. So it's kind of insane. Yeah. It was like we have your child. We were about to go to dinner and we were like, we were really hungry. We were really hungry.

We have to eat. We're doing all these phone calls. Anyway, three, two, one, back. Hey, thank you so much. Great save. So it was exciting. It was. And it was successful.

It was a cool. And so right away, where you're like, this is the next thing we're going to do. We're going to die right into this. Yeah. So how does the cast come together? It's a genuinely amazing group of comedians and a man as well.

Thank you. Thank you so much. He agrees. I agree. I am a man. We are in love with our cast. They are so great. So dope.

And, you know, we work on a show that exploits the natural chemistry between two real-life best friends. And so we got spoiled in that way that we, like, feel like, oh, well, we can write for groups of friends and it feels authentic. But we've had the crutch of writing for two women who really are best friends. So we were, of course, like, oh, my God. It's so important to us that their friendship feels authentic and it feels real and you feel like these would really be friends. And so we were, you know, of course, nervous putting. together the cast that like would these people really get along would they read real on screen but they really genuinely jelled and bonded so quickly in such an incredible way that it was just like

oh let's just turn on the camera man like they made they made our job so much easier just because they genuinely just did like each other so much and they had so much fun to get so much fun and so it was really like heaven sent if you believe in heaven that's for another podcast to determine Did you do any tricks to have them bond? Did you all get wasted one night? Yeah, we did. Spin the bottle day one. Spin the bottle.

Nice. That's effective. It went really well. For you. Yeah, for me. No, actually what we did is we did like us only read at a hotel in New York. And it was so blistering hot out. It was one of the hottest days of the year.

It was like 100 degrees. And the air conditioning in this, we were like on the top floor. And so the room had baked. and the air conditioning went out. And so everyone was like, drenched in this. We were like, this is a beautiful hotel room and it is disgusting.

It stinks. We are all taking off the house. So it was actually just like melting together. Our brains were smushed. And we were all together was like a sopping scene. We were like, oh, we can stay here as late as we want. We can have dinner.

And we were like, not bye. Yeah. After the read, we were like, we'll hang out for 10 more minutes, but then we have to go. That's sort of suitable for some of the tone and the panic and the distress in the movie. It is.

It's set the set the same. You know? Yeah. Was it scary once filming started or means, did you guys feel ready being a big studio comedy, having a budget? Was it different significantly from Broad City? It was not, in many ways, it was not different from Broad City or from time-traveling bong or web series or anything we'd ever done in some ways.

Like, honestly, when it came down to it, we had about the same amount of time per scene for page count as anything, which was kind of shocking. But I think it was because, you know, with five women, that's a lot of coverage. You don't want to just get singles. You don't want to just do wide. It's like you want to get a variation of coverage. So like, especially because you're just in a house that it feels like it's dynamic no matter where you are. And so like, you know, that kind of coverage really does take a lot of time.

So, you know, it was quick. And, you know, sometimes we had a little bit more time. Sometimes we had less. We had, you know. But on the other side, like the flip side, everybody in the cast was so good that if I really had only gotten one take and I did get more than that. I still would have been able to cut this movie. So it really was like, after the first take was like, okay, great, now let's have fun because

you guys nailed it. There's movie stars in this movie. Is that at all different for you guys to be working with a higher wattage person? I know it's different, but did it feel different? Well, I think we're really spoiled that we get to work with such talented comedians all the time on Broad City, not only Abby and Alana, but also the guest stars we're able to have, We've been very, very fortunate. And then we work with someone like Scarlett Johansson,

who's not only super funny. I mean, she is so funny and so good and improvises. I feel like people get when they watch SNL. Yeah, if you've seen her, she's done it five times now, you know she can do it. She gets the joke, she's funny. But to be in the presence of somebody like that who can act dramatically like that

and who is such an incredibly gifted actor was unbelievable. Yeah. The range is like mind-blowing. And you get it. you're like, oh, movie star. I understand what, I get that. I get what a movie star is. Gillian, we've had a comedy crush on for years.

We've written other things with her in mind. And to see her do those vulnerable moments, she has so much heart and is so good. She's such a good actor. Honestly, they're like, they're all movie stars. That's the thing. We have five movie stars. They're so incredible.

Also, you got to me more. Ty Borella, we got them all. I mean, you have Kate McKinnon. I don't know if I was supposed to say to me more. Yeah. Her and Ty Borella are secret weapons in the movie. Aren't they so great? Really funny.

And really down to clown. It seemed like it. Yeah. And everything that happens with those two and Zoe is among the funniest stuff in the movie. Yeah, I don't want to spoil it for people, but there is some physical experiences that happen. That's exactly right. Well said. I tell you what, everyone was really game.

It was truly collaborative. Yeah. What about the chemistry between you two guys on set? Fighting, screaming, yelling, clawing. I mean, do you have a different way of communicating? Is there a lot of, like, just eye contact that clarifies what I need you to do? We have a shorthand that's like, you know, we can do. That was a quick eye, what was it, eye bulge?

I do an eye bulge to be like, stop, you know? Yes, I know what that means. It's a kind of like also like, watch out. You know, that's like a, yeah. But there's plenty of shorthand we have, yeah. Which I could never tell you about. Just kidding. Just kidding.

Maybe off mic. I mean, that's the thing. Yeah. one. When you guys are working together as writers on set, is it much easier for you to kind of communicate specifically what you want? Do you get very in there with, say, an actor who's not always in comedies and say, like, it needs to be like this, or do you let people run free?

How does that work? Well, I mean, they're usually so honed in on the character that they have, they, like, are making choices that are within the lane of what we need. So I haven't, at least in this movie, I didn't really need to steer anybody in a vastly different direction that they were already in. And every once in a while, you know, we would have very specific interpretations of stuff. But it was never like, here's a line read.

You know, it was like still like, you know, throw it away a little or whatever. I'm comfortable with one. So Lucia, when I'm acting, can give me a line read. Yes, I will give him. As a writer slash producer on set, I'm just there to pitch a joke or two. I mean, really, Lucia is the one who is directing the movie. So I have the easy job. I just get to sit around and say, what about this fart joke?

And she gets to say, no. So I'm there. I'm there for support for me. Got it. Yeah. Here's a very specific question. I love it. Why is Kate McKinnon's character Australian?

Great question. Kate plays a character named Pippa, who is loosely based on our real friend Pippa, who's an Australian genius. I see. Pippel Lord. An homage. We wanted to have a friend from Study Abroad. We wanted to, like, bring that element in.

Kate's character is much different. She really helped develop the character, and it became kind of this almost, Stevie Nicks like free spirit, which is not like our friend. And then Kate, we've known for a long time, we knew we wanted to work with and we're basically like, please be in the movie in any way. And she was like, well, I really want to be the Australian character. And we were like half at it, you know. Because she does a few of those on SNL and they're very funny.

They're very different. Yeah. And we've also, but she was also, and so were we also like very mindful of not making her like a different, like she was in a different movie. Like she still, I believe you saw a movie. you tell the audience. She's still like a grounded, fully formed person. And I think to me, the most grounded I've ever really seen her.

And she has some serious moments, too. Comedy that we like to watch the most is the stuff that is super grounded and super real, especially in terms of character and point of view, but also has really big pants down moments. There's even some subtle, sometimes not so subtle political humor in the movie around. Here we go. Yes. I assume that was always there.

There's a Hillary Clinton haircut in some ways in the movie. Obviously, you guys have some experience with Hillary in that. I cut our hair once. Oh, God. Just kidding. Can you tell me about that? Sure. I mean, I think that's also just something that we naturally gravitate towards.

And I mean, Alana's character is very politically charged. And, you know, it's somewhat interesting that this movie was written in an Obama era and is released in a Trump era. And that we didn't really have to adapt it too much. I think we were kind of already living ourselves. And we were experiencing a climate that was already feeling pretty divided. And so I think that is reflected in the movie. And, you know, for those people who haven't seen the movie,

Scarlett Johansson's character plays a woman running for state senate. She was kind of a party girl in college, but she really wants to make a difference. So she's kind of cleaned up her act. and she's, you know, become a little bit more straight-lace as she tries to run for office and do the things that she thinks are the right things to do. But what was interesting was we had a lot more history about her campaign and about her desire to help the people of her community and why she wanted to do that.

But kind of weirdly, in November, when we were editing the movie, it was like, oh, we don't need a lot of exposition. We don't need to tell people why it's important for a woman to run for office or what it might mean to her. People got it. You know, regardless of who you voted for, you were like, I get it, there's a woman running for office and she cares a lot. People get it, you know, so in a good way, we were able to cut out a lot of that.

So thank goodness for Donald Trump. I was going to say any regrets about the opportunity to maybe reiterate that fact? I mean, we wanted the movie to also exist beyond the Trump era. So there were even a couple literal Trump references that we were like, we don't need to do Trump references because they do actually, in a way, date the movie. So, no, I don't think we have regret. And I think that the characters would exist now in the same way, no matter what. And hopefully in 10 or 20 years, we still have those people who, I mean, care about their communities or whatever.

And I think, you know, there's a lot of, there's a fair amount of commentary on police brutality. But it's not anti-police. It's anti-police brutality, which to me is very different. And that's also something that I think is pretty evergreen. Yeah. So, you know, the movie is about a bachelor and a bachelorette party, primarily a bachelor's party. but Paul, you're a member of a very amusing bachelor party as well. Was a lot of this born of experiences at these parties?

You know, mine was. We've never killed a person, Lucci and I. Really? No, no. This has been a huge disappointment in this podcast. But I have a buddy Greg who is kind of a foodie and was like, we can go to Vegas and spend 800 bucks on booze at a bar or, you know, go to a club. Or you guys can buy me a dinner at French Laundry.

And so we did that. And so I kind of had this bachelor party. I mean, obviously we blew it out, and it's much more extreme, and it's more absurd than what I experienced. But it's loosely based on a friend of mine and what he had for his bachelor party. Yeah, the wine tasting is, that's a very resonant. I've been there for that. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, in fact. Did you like it? It was fine. Okay. I don't need the other extreme, but it was a little too mild. Okay. Well, my experience wasn't as mild. There was also, you know, other things.

What else? Nothing else. Okay, moving on. Three to one. Oh, our editor also went to a wine-tasting bachelor party during the making of the movie. He's like, I'm doing this this weekend. Weirdly, it was in Mexico. He's like, I'm going to Mexico for a bachelor party.

I was like, wow, it sounds wild. He's like, it's a wine tasting. He sent us photos of himself drinking some limbrosco, which is a reference for the movie. So go see the movie. Come back. Unpause. Listen to the rest of the podcast. Boom.

All the jokes will work. Yes. Listen twice. See it twice. I tell you what, this is really grease in the runway. So one last thing. You're a female. filmmaker. Everybody's always like, have more female filmmakers on this show. Talk to more

female filmmakers. Cool. Hey. Finally. You did it. I did it. I did it. I did it. I mean, you did it obviously. And so, but that's being said, I suspect you were going to be asked these questions a lot. You know, a lot of people are going to be comparing this movie, I think, to a lot of male-centric movies of its kind. You know, how do you respond to being like, it's like the hangover meets this thing, you know? Yeah, I mean, it certainly wasn't based on anything to us. It was just like this, we try to just be like, these are based on kind of people we know or experiences we've had. So to us, it's just like, we're not like, we're just doing the girl version. To us, it's like, this is, this is born out of our experience in our lives. So, you know, if somebody's like, oh, it's a rip

off of this or that, it's like, it's really not. And I think that it's so easy to just say those things and not like see the movie and decide how you feel about it. But not, there aren't a lot of R-rated comedies about women. There aren't a lot of R-rated comedies made by women. And so for me, I'm just like excited that people get to see like, hey, here's a point of view of a woman of a hard art comedy that stars the people who she thinks are like some of the funniest people in the world, male or female. And so, you know, like that in and of itself, like sad that that hasn't happened a lot. Great that is happening now. And I hope people go and see it. And I don't know.

I don't really. What was the question exactly? There wasn't really a question. It was sort of ill handled. No, it was not. No, it was not. No, I think I'm more interested in sort of like the burden. is placed upon somebody in your position, you know, where you're expected to sort of respond

to, to sort of clarify the state of comedy for some reason. The similar thing that happened, say, when bridesmaids came out. Sure. And there was a lot of expectation around the stars and the writer of those movies. But you were more elegant than the question that I asked. Well, I'm wearing a bald ball gown. So, you know, I better be elegant. But yeah, I think you're right.

It's, it is weird how it is, things are compared to the male version. And, you know, whereas I don't think we would compare. you know, two movies that star men to each other necessarily if they were comedies. It's like, yeah, they're both comedies. You're never like, hey, Will Ferrell, Adam Sandler has a movie coming out. How do you feel about that? Exactly. And that's partly because there aren't enough and there aren't enough stories either about or by women. And there's not, there's even less, both about and by women. And even fewer comedies at that. Yeah, that's the thing. And comedy's really, it is a male-dominated area. And I say that not as a woman. So, you know, it's like, it's a really

interesting thing that, yeah, I feel for, because to me, the women in this movie are some of the funniest people on the planet, male or female. I mean, there is nobody funnier than the women in our movie to me. And I love a lot of male comedians, and I try to be like them and hope that I have careers like male comedians or female comedians, but, but it's so crazy to me that women have a steeper mountain to climb and that to find Kate McKinn or Jillian Bell finding is a harder thing for some people, male or female, because that's true of men. I'm not saying, men don't think women are funny. Women often are like, ah, I'm not that into female cast, you know, and that's crazy

to me because, I don't know, I can't not watch Ilana or Gillian or even Scarlet in this movie and not be like, God damn, they're so good, they're so funny. Conversely, you have thrived in largely female casts. What is, is that just happenstance? Is that just easier for you somehow? I think it is happenstance. I mean, this movie we wrote because I find women funny, and we wrote because it was based on both friendships that Luci and I have from our past where we're, because in essence, the movie is about, especially when you put your career first and you work a lot and you work hard, we often find ourselves feeling guilty and being like, oh, you know, I didn't make that thing because I was shooting late and I didn't want to go the next day. And it's like, that sucks, you know? And so in the end, the movie really is about people from your past who aren't necessarily around you every day and making sure. that you take time to appreciate or prioritize your friends.

But I don't know why it's happened. I think you just genuinely enjoy collaborating with women. I do. And man men, but like... I mean, my writing partner is a woman, so that's one reason. And your other two writing partners usually are women. Exactly. I mean, Broad City is Broad City.

And then with this movie, I think it's because we were like, oh, it's more fun for me to write for the women in our movie, you know? What are you guys going to do next that's going to lead to you ignoring your friends? Great question. We are working on... Ignoring our friends is sad. No, we're working on like another movie that, again, we're writing on spec

just because I think we feel very comfortable keeping stuff as close to us, ourselves as possible until we are needing money to make it. I think we're also not necessarily like behold into one platform. I think we're like, hey, let's make another web series or a TV show or a small TV show or a network thing.

Like I think it's based on like whatever, like, naturally is exciting to us. It's like, let's just figure out the best way to release this. So, I don't know. I mean, you know, Paul's going to be in a superhero movie. We don't know which one yet. Yeah, it's very excited about it. Congratulations.

Thank you so much. Very excited. I mean, I feel like people on Twitter are demanding it. So, you know, not necessarily Paul Downs, but Trey from Broad City should play. I do hear a lot. So we got to figure that out. So if you're out there writing one, casting one. I'm tech avail.

And we're working on stuff with some of the women in our movie. Yes. As well. And if it was more further down the road, we would let you know. But I feel like it would be premature. This was more than enough. Okay. And the fourth season of Broad City.

Comes out in August. August 19th, I think. How exciting. We're exciting. Lucia Paul. Thank you for coming. Thanks for having us. Thanks, guys.