The Watch - Catching Up on ‘Slow Horses,’ ‘The Lowdown,’ and ‘The Chair Company.’ Plus, the ‘Black Rabbit’ Creators!

Episode Date: October 23, 2025

Chris and Andy talk about the news that Adam Driver and Steven Soderbergh pitched a Kylo Ren ‘Star Wars’ standalone movie that Disney passed on (5:17), before checking in on ‘Slow Horses,’ (9:21) ‘The Lowdown,’ (26:38) and ‘The Chair Company’ (40:22). Later, Chris is joined by ‘Black Rabbit’ series creators Zach Baylin and Kate Susman to discuss how they balanced the dueling tones of the show, working with Jason Bateman and Jude Law, why it was important to make it feel so authentic to New York City, and more (51:48). Subscribe to the Ringer TV YouTube channel here for full episodes of ‘The Watch’ and so much more! Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Guests: Zach Baylin and Kate Susman Producers: Kaya McMullen and Kai Grady Video Producer: Jon Jones Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Stand up and walk now. Hello, and welcome to the watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at the ringer.com and joining me on the other line worth approximately $24 a share. It's Andy Greenwald. I regret to inform you. The footsie's already closed here and my market cap has decreased. Is your stock upside down, brother?

It's not where I want it to be. Is Rishi kind of going long on you, but only to short other things? Yeah, but it's also like late season three. Rishi. It's not early days Rishi. Right. It's white Christmas Rishi. Andy, it's just really, really important to see you today. Today on the watch, we're going to take a spin through some of the TV that we possibly neglected while we were diving deep on TASC.

We did our task finale pod. Came out Sunday night. There was an interview with Brad Ingallsby, the creator of TASC in that podcast. I really enjoyed that chat. Thanks to everybody who rode with us through the green forests of Delco. Sad to see that show over. but there's a lot of good TV on right now and a lot of good TV coming, so I'm excited to hit Slow Horses, do a check-in there,

do a check-in on the lowdown, and then get into the chair company, which has aired its first two episodes on HBO Max. I also have my interview with Zach Balin and Kate Sussman, who are the writers and creators of Black Rabbit, which is a show I really enjoyed on Netflix from a couple of weeks ago. It aired, still airing, but it debuted a couple of weeks ago on Netflix, and was one that I just really enjoyed top-to-bottom.

I found it very, very entertaining, so it's really fun. conversation with Zach and Kate. I also do want to, I know you love it when I do this, I do directly want to address the rumors that have been swirling out there that I was on some sort of, you know, because I've only talked to ask. Yeah, I also do want to, I know you love when I do this. I do directly want to address the rumors that have been swirling out there that I was on some sort of, you know, because I've only talked to ask with you in the last like 10 days since I've been in London. Oh, that you were like only, max only for me. Yeah, yeah. And to those of you who thought it was because there was an episode of the rewatchables devoted to my favorite film

sneakers to which I was not a party. The answer is yes. That was my quiet quitting. So your way of doing this is you're just going to talk about HBO Max Sunday night shows, and you think that's different how from what you... Listen, there's a soft power at work here that maybe you can't see right now, but between that and my Act Blue donations, I think that I'm really accomplishing a lot. Can I tell you about last night I got home from work and I was tucking into a bowl of chopped salad

and... That's not where I thought that was going. And I was like... That really had big chunky soup energy. No, no, no, no. And I'm not a big soup guy, but put that aside. I... You're not?

Watched the inaugural evening of NBA on NBC. Yeah, it's back. Right. Which came back with very nice production values. and just a feeling of like, hey, this is an event, not just like slop that we're putting on four nights a week. Now, that will probably change after four nights.

But the feeling was like actually, like there was a lot of anticipation. Round ball rock gets played. They have kind of like the vintage NBA on NBC logo and vibe. And you're just like, who gets you going. What do they say online? Return, you know? Like I'm getting into this. And I was kind of sitting around thinking,

boy, it would be cool. Yeah. Okay. What would happen if one week NBC was just like, we're just going to run shit from the 80s.

Dude. Like, we're just going to pretend it's 1988 for the entire week or 1989 and then like run and like everything is vintage.

And then I got as far as what about Cosby? Not funny. But I was like, we're going to skip that part. That's fine. I think that you, first of all,

you do your best thinking when you're exhausted clearly. Yeah. And when John Tesh is ringing around in there, I appreciate that. When the harvest bowl comes in, that's when it really comes together. Here's the thing. We are involved in the entertainment industry, you know, in different ways.

We exist due to its good grace. It's dwindling good graces. So we shouldn't be giving away existentially ruinous ideas for free. That said, if you wanted to end all of this, NBC, would just have to do what you suggested, but for 2005. If NBC just ran medium and the supersized episodes of the office, its ratings would be unchanged, A, it would be eventized, people would tune in to see it, and all of this would come crumbling down.

So much of what we cover is based on the idea, this glimmering golden city on a hill, that we can bring it back. I know. I honestly, we can bring it back. I think there should be a week where, like, Fox runs 24, ABC runs lost. Let's just go back. Let's just go back to when it was simple and true. Do it like Jack.

Do it like Jack. Say, we have to go back. It's right there for you. Bob Eiger. Hey, speaking of Bob Eiger, I, um, yeah, man. I wanted to know if you saw the story where Adam Driver and Steven Soderberg and Scott Burns pitched a Ben Solo Star Wars sequel and that even Faloni was like, this is pretty sick.

Like this is a pretty cool idea. And they were like, yes, yes, yes. And then they got to Bob Eiger. And Bob Eiger was like, you got to be fucking kidding me, guys. A couple of things here. Did I see it? Do you understand that my existence for these weeks is that I have like eight hours of just silence in which you and everyone I love is asleep and I can't talk to them about the news

that Steven Soderberg and Adam Driver pitched a Star Wars movie? So, yeah, I'm pretty aware. Yeah. I'm pretty aware. Two, it's fucking nuts that that's Bob Eiger's bright line that can't be crossed. You shall not cross. Like, do you think that there is any way we can do kind of like cross tabs reporting on what else was going on the day that that came across his transom? Because like, was that the day that his wife will obey called and was like, Bob, Bob, L-A-F-C is too woke.

Like, we have to focus on women's soccer. And he's like, right, right, just clear everything off today. They're like, but sir, Stephen and Adam, no, no. We can't focus on that today. No, it sounds like he actually engaged with the idea and was like, we, Ben Solo's dead, though, as if that has ever stopped anything in Star Wars before. Willow owns Angel City. I'm sorry, not L-A-F-C.

It's the sister club, which it's a great time out at the old ball yard. Anyway, yeah, I mean, well, first of all, we do want creative executives. I think that's spiritually not a bad thing, but of all the fucking things to get worried about. Also, you've talked to Soderberg on the podcast before, right? I need a little more context to the actual, tangible dream work product that exists. Because there are, there's Soderberg and Tony G.

We're going to do. Yes. Right. Or like he and Tony were going to do Bond. Or they were going to do Star Wars. There's so many dream projects of ours that exist. And every time they leak and it gets to the press, it's always like, oh, a draft was written. Like, is it a, is it a draft?

Is it a final draft? Is it a note? Is it a note app? Yeah. Was it a fever dream? It's so, it's so bizarre. Did you see what it was called? The Hunt for Ben Solo? Yo, that's the kind of name I came up.

That's what my next pod is going to be called. That's my solo pod. I told you about how I told you. I've also said this on the podcast that like in... It's the same thing. It's true. This is our time together. This is our me time.

In, I want to say like 1983, like after Return of the Jedi came out, I was on the playground in, I guess, first grade. And my best friend was like, I'm in the Star Wars fan club. And I was like, that's so cool. And he's like, I get a magazine. And I was like, I want a magazine. That's awesome. He's like, also, they're making a fourth film.

It's called Revenge of the Jedi. And I get to be in it. You can be in it too. What color of lightsaber do you want? And I was like, this is the greatest day of my life. How fortuitous that I'm friends with you. And I came home with the same open-hearted spirit with which I love Tass. Uh-huh.

And said to my parents, great news. I will be in revenge of the Jedi. Yes. And my parents were like, Jedi's don't seek revenge. They are wise, wise tax collectors. No, what's no. They were like, maybe you should find other friends. Like, maybe this friend.

is a bit of a fabulous, as they say later. Anyway, I bring this up only to say that the hunt for Ben Solo is not that different than Revenge of the Jedi is coming and you could pick your lightsaber. And Soderberg's doing it. That's fucking crushing. Where of these shows, would you like to start with the show that we haven't spoken about with the chair company? Would you like to check in on slow horses or would you like to check in on lowdown?

I was going to say slow horses first. You're close to Ground Zero there. You're close to like the epicenter. What are the streets of London saying about this? season of slow horses. My colleague at work here who lives at the barbican said that she and her son were catching a bus outside the barbican relatively recently. And the bus came and then they started to get on it and then realized that everyone else on the bus was an extra because they were filming Slow Horses Season 6. And because it was such a quiet morning, they hadn't even like shut

down the street. That's how in the streets that show is. Okay, yeah, I want to have a conversation with you about this. And I'm glad we're having it after the penultimate episode. Yes, episode five. So we'll do spoilers for season five through episode five, through circus. I have to confess to you and to our loyal listeners that I was dangerously wavering on my commitment to this show after episode four. I was more out than I've ever been on a show that I am just essentially consistently in on. And I was shaken because, you, you know, you came out hot. You were like, I've seen the season

to the best since the first one. That's what I think, yes. So I, let's chop it up. Okay. Because, and here's what I'll say. And I'll also foreground this by saying episode five was much better, I thought, and

brought me back into the fold. So I'm not saying this from outside of Slai House. I'm saying it from within. Sure. Yeah. You've come back into the cold of spies dozen. One of, I thought that there are two issues at play here. Neither of them are

problematic for a long-running successful TV show that's a good hang. So let's all understand that, okay? But at the end of episode four, when Co. descends a rickety painter scaffolding, causing a Rube Goldberg-like

hijinks event when a paint pot. And by the way, everyone's like, oh, in England, they drive on the left and they say flat. The weirdest thing is their devotion to the word pot.

Like you can go to bread and get a protein pot. Get a granola pot. Could I have a pot of sauce with that? As opposed to bowl. Or cup. Or a side of. So paint pot. I was like, I'm in my bag.

I know what they're saying, even though it sounds weird. Falls on the fascist head, killing him instantly. And then River and co. We're like, right, I guess we should be going then. Goodness. I was like, this plus the hoe stuff has pushed the show so far into comic absurdity

that it's attempts to create a different feeling of stakesiness or real politic or real life anything as it did in the actually quite harrowing mass shooting event that opened the season. It rendered that completely moot to me. I thought that was just tonally too far. Which when I went back to this episode, I was like, okay, re-scramble my brain.

Why do I always want it to be a little bit more than it is, this is a reliable comedy program. And when I tuned in last night's episode as a reliable comedy program, I had a fine time. But I want to know where you are with it, because every season it teases us with inching a little bit towards the grittier or at least a little bit more lived in plausible espionage show that I think you and I would like. And then it is ultimately quite silly. Yeah, well, we're talking about something that's obviously going to be a very long-running experience once it's all said and done. We've got at least seven seasons coming.

I wouldn't be surprised if they get to 10. You could even make the argument that Will Smith is going to come back and do secret hours, which is the 90s Berlin set sort of prequel spin-off. There's all sorts of stuff like Gary Oldman loves playing the part. It's a hit. It's doing very well for Apple. I think everybody is like in loose agreement that this show can run for basically as long as it wants.

So accepting that and accepting that there are certain pillars of this show that. that I think they're going to want to keep not only in place, but static in their presentation, i.e., I don't think Lamb is going on Ozympic anytime soon. You have to sort of accept, like, what you're saying. Those situational comedy tropes that are going to keep characters exactly where they are because the jokes and the, you know, the outcomes are very familiar.

That being said, the reason why I reacted so positively towards this season was exactly because of the Rube Goldberg stuff. Because if you were really going to be out there in the world, kicking shit over and jumping through windows and chasing people onto trains and all this stuff that happens, I like the idea of, albeit for comic purposes, something that nobody could control happening.

Okay. And the idea of something where this guy dying, which is something I think many people within the show were like fine with, this mayoral candidate Gimbel who's running against Nick Muhammad's character was a sort of very

very lightly dressed up Sadiq Khan character who's the current London mayor that character Gimble like is such a buffoon but it is interesting that he would not die because of an assassination or because

Slow Warses have caught him in an act of espionage but just over something stupid and stupid things do happen in the world. Now, maybe not as... We're seeing it daily. Not as much of a naked gun-esque psych gag as what happened, but I liked the idea that there was still some unpredictability to the show. The whole thing is different.

I think I would have been fine, and I generally am with the character arc for him this season, had it not been kind of presented as a whole new side of Roddy Ho. It's essentially the same guy at a different room with some different characters. And I think it's too much. Like, again, if the comp for the show is Frazier, then it seems churlish to complain about how Niles is Prissy all the time,

no matter where he goes. And the best moments of the show, moments that I was praising effusively in episodes one and two of the season, are just incredibly sharp, rewarding instances of pure situational comedy. The writers, in this case, Will Smith, knows these characters so well, you put them in any circumstance and you just let them write themselves almost. They bounce off each other. It's sparkling. It's funny. It's familiar. It's comforting. It's good. I think this sort of shocking thing is, and again, like, it's a comedy and it's broad and it has its own tone.

And these are things that I celebrate. But like, it is, there's a moment in, I think, in this episode, where they're like, I don't know, just river is like, well, we're going to be fired from MI5. And I'm like, it's fucking insane that MI5 is paying Ho and Ho. Like, you're paying these people. Yes. And Ho is acting like someone who's not even on Earth. Ho is acting like someone who is beamed in from an episode of Family Guy next to Kristen Scott Thomas.

It's just, it's loving his thing so much that I think the larger project starts to wobble. And then similarly, there are just some odd choices that I think, maybe they're not odd. I think they're telling us more about the show. You mentioned Nick Muhammad, who is, I think, he's a comedian, comedic actor. He's on Ted Lassau, I believe. He's well known here in comedy scene. All due respect to him.

He is not a plausible political figure on an hour-long television drama. He's just, he's not, he does not have the charisma or the way. If they would call it an hour-long television drama. Okay, sure. Yeah. So that's telling us something else. And then that's telling us something that doesn't jive with the opening of the season. I think the reason I'm bumping on the season

is because it laid down an interesting marker and one of the things I love about the show and we've commented on the past is that every season it tries on a new pair of clothes and that in and of itself is great. So next season, new book, different vibes, possibly different cast, super into it. Last thing I want to bring up,

that is kind of a criticism that I'm curious your take on. Gary Oldman's performance of this is timeless. It is a classic television character brought to life by one of the best actors of his generation. I don't have any problems with it. That said, I do feel... No, more, in fact. Let's lean more into it.

I was glad this season, at least he actually started using the toilet. And then that became a plot point, you know? Like, don't tease me. I think the issue that I'm bumping against, and I'm curious how you feel about it, is that this is season five. of Jackson Lamb, not just being flatulent and amusing, being absolutely omniscient and never being flapped and knowing everything that's going on 30 seconds to 30 hours before every single other person on the show.

He is the omniscient reader. He is the omniscient reader of this series, yeah. And ultimately, five seasons in, I find that limiting. Now, I'm not saying I want a Jackson Lamb trauma arc where we learn what broke him. I don't care. But it would be nice to see him wobble. It would be nice to see him on his back foot once, you know,

because the story, just servicing the actor, eating jaffa cakes and doing the job that the, one of the Five Eyes Nations Secret Service cannot even be bothered to begin to do properly. This is a cumulative nitpick, but it is a five seasons into it nitpick. So my favorite, moment of this season

so far happens in episode three where Oldman gets three minutes to absolutely cook and he does the Burland anecdote where he seemingly makes up a story about a Stasi

the Stasi in East Germany torturing one of his spies and then torturing that spy's girlfriend in front of him and the guy the spy gets the end of this experience and is like I just I would have given the name, I just don't even know it. And there is a moment after this story is, you know, it's used as a signal to the other slow

horses of how to get themselves out of this being held captive situation. And it's very ingenious, but Oldman plays that story straight, delivers it in the like, holy shit, this is Gary Oldman way. Unbelievable. And then he gets outside and Standish is like, that was you, wasn't it? you know, were you the spy in who got tortured? And he was like, I made it up. You know, don't be daft, you know.

And but as he turns around and starts walking up the sidewalk, we get one last look at Oldman's facial expression. And there is a suggestion that it might have been real, right? Yes. And that it might have been, if it, if he wasn't the one who was tortured, you know, that it was a real story. Mm-hmm. And it's so good.

And there is obviously this connective tissue between, Standish, her old boss, the Jackson Lamb character. Jonathan Price's character. And River's grandfather, David. And it goes back to Berlin. And it goes back to a mole hunt and trying to flesh out Charles,

who was Standish's boss. And we see flashbacks of that, and we see moments of that, and especially earlier in the series itself. And I do feel like that stuff is so good. Yeah. that you kind of want just a little bit more.

You just want like a little bit more, not necessarily of my trauma arc or black and white flashback, but why is Lamb so cruel to standish? Why is Lamb? Yes. So have such a complicated relationship with River where he seems so dead set on punishing him

but also acknowledges his... Keeping him close. He keeps him close. And I think that one of the first, reasons why the show kind of took off immediately for me was its willingness to kill its starlings, you know, quite literally in the first season. And it's not that I just want a higher body count on slow horses, but I do want a higher narrative body count. So I agree with you on that part. The thing I think that the show gets right this season is the compression of both time and space.

It is a London thriller. This is taking place over a matter of days. And it really does feel like these people are racing against a clock and paired up in these very interesting ways this season that I think is just so repeatedly entertaining over the course of the series. What is Flight's deputy named? Devon. Devin. Devin got out to Heathrow pretty fast. And I don't know if you took the Lizzie line or what, but like I did bump a little bit on

that. This is me watching this show is us watching collateral anytime in the last six years, you know, a little bit of that. You know, I asked Michael Mann about collateral traffic. He was like, no, it's possible. I did it. LAX to downtown 20 minutes. Rush hour? Come on.

I mean, they say in the 80s there was less traffic. Not that the movie was set then. Yeah, I think that's well said. And I think I miss some of that flavor from these most recent seasons. I think that, you know, for me and my taste, the like, Rivers Dad is a super villain storyline was not the version of a secret history looming overall. this that I was interested in so much. I just think there were small things like James Callis,

who plays Claude Weillan, the Smarmy First Desk, is just cooking. He's great. He embodies this part. It's a great part. It's been great seeing him do more. Yeah, he's so amazing in Battlestar, so it's really great to see him pop up here. Oh, right. That's one of your favorite shows.

You love Battlestar and you don't like soup. These are just the things that you just toss. It's don't need a hot, wet food. Yeah. If I could have soup for every meal, I would every day. Okay. And I could have my blue lightsaber for revenge of the Jedi, and I would just be a different, I'd be a happier guy. Anyway, the Claude thing that I wanted to say is, it's, I know it's just churlish to be like, I wish this, I wish that.

But like, he was front-footed for so much of this week's episode, you know, and sort of like putting himself into the fray, running Terra as an agent. Yeah. All of that. That was nice to see. And I just wish it wasn't out of the realm of possibility for this show, for him to have a shred of capability. That it wasn't, like, his involvement in it was the tell that they were just getting cooked. You know, and I just wish the show wasn't so committed to lamb good at everything,

Wheeland Bad at everything, Tavernur's Cross about everything. And like those are the three. It's almost more helpful to view this as like an extension of Ionucci that it is an extension of La Cerey. I totally agree. And so what else says. In VEP or in the thick of it, it's like there's Malcolm who's better at everything than everybody. And then there is a bunch of twits around him. And you're like, how is this the British government?

But it is, you know? And the same thing for VIP, you know? So let me then just extend the EANucci analogy, the EANALIG, just slightly, to say, that Ian Uchi left his own creation, V, after the first few seasons, and it is one of, if not the only successful showrunner transitions. You know, whenever this comes up, I say West Wing actually was pretty good when John Wells took over. So there are very few of these. Now, it is not the same because it is not someone completely different. I don't, I forget the name of the guy who's taking over, but he has worked on the show. I think he probably comes from roughly the same

coaching tree. But I'm just going to, I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to double. devil's advocate, I mean, the devil's advocate, it maybe it's good to have a different voice in. I know that we're adapting books by McHarran, and so it's not going to deviate, but maybe new showrunner will have slightly different take on something or a different interest in something, and it might just be a different flavoring in the stew for season six. Yeah. Not to change it, but I wouldn't mind. I wouldn't mind. It's really interesting that you're having this reaction to this season. I thought, I mean, I know that the Rube Goldberg thing in four is really not your bag or it needs to be a different show for that to be your bag you know like that that idea of like isn't this isn't this a bit funny let's just trot

off now it's just it's just the same emotional beats for me for them to to stumble out not knowing what they're doing fuck up and then have Gary Olden be like you fucking donkeys but I've also been coordinating this so that I protect you the entire time just give me a different rhythm Speaking of rhythms, let's talk about lowdown. Yeah, hell yeah. Because this is a rhythm that I can dance to. That I am pretty locked in. And I think that, so are you current with this show through last night's episode?

One of my favorite shows of the year. And I think is getting to that point where I'm thrilled every time I turn it on because I have no idea what I'm going to get, even though I know I'm going to get a reliable feeling. So it almost becomes an album by a great, by a band that you've got a long-term relationship with and you're just like, I know it's going to sound awesome and I'm going to like it,

but I have no idea where they're going on this one. And so you have an episode like five, I believe it was, I can't remember the name of it, maybe it was this land or something like that, the Dinklage, where Dinklage shows up and plays. Right, we didn't really talk about that. And just gives a tour to force for like, 45 minutes.

And then the episode itself ends with the most harrowing, bracing, dangerous, scary, possible, like scene, which is Lee being led through, being arrested, driven out into the middle of nowhere, and then led through the world's scariest house party full of cops, grilling, shooting guns, setting off bombs. And he's being guided all the way up to this, like,

gazebo area where a shadowy figure is standing watching over all of his Tulsa police officers partying and blowing stuff up. And it turns out to be Donald Washberg, Kyle McLaughlin's character. And Kyle McLaughlin has been playing this character slightly like, you know, like, oh, I'm just a political operator buffoon kind of guy. I love to, love to sleep with my brother's wife and just kind to try to make as much money. And he gets this new evil coat of paint at the end of this episode. Yeah. It was fucking thrilling to watch that sequence. It's like a water and it has the energy, if not the firepower of the Boogie Knights

Firecracker scene, except this is the rural outdoor version of it. Well, it's also confirmation of everything Lee fears and thinks, right? That there is a grand conspiracy between the political apparatus and law enforcement and that this is sort of the manifestation of his nightmares, of his writing, of his work, these guys all out here, way too heavily armed, militarized. And it's this just incredible end note to an episode. And I am here for both sides of lowdown. I'm here for the JJ Kale shuffling along Tulsa guitar part of it.

And I'm here for the operatic peek into the American Abyss part. And I got to say, that's a really hard two-step to pull off. Hell yeah. One of the hardest things about making a mystery television show, he said, with some 2020 hindsight, is making every step of the mystery feel urgent and feel like there's a clock and there's a necessity to solve it or that someone is in danger or there's a sense of, you know, gathering storm clouds. while also taking time to digress, taking time to see the sights, taking time to slow down or drive into a cul-de-sac.

I've found the way Sterling Hardjo has unspooled that energy this season to be pretty masterful because it snuck up on you. There was this undercurrent of some kind of generic evil of white men in half-zips. the card turn of this episode that we're talking about from this week, which is episode six, it's called Old Indian Trick. It's written by Jason Sack, directed by Dennis Goulet. And by the way, I'm sure not the only one of us who noticed that next week's episode

is written by Walter fucking Mosley. I can't believe it. The next week is the penultimate episode, and then Harjo is back for the finale sensitive kind on November 4th. The fact that this is, to your point, it is a conspiracy theorist discovering that there is a conspiracy. But a conspiracy theory is discovering that there's not a conspiracy, there's a historical obscenity. The fact that, and I almost don't feel prepared to talk about this specific detail generally, culturally, but then also without the full view of the series. But this was the episode

when the Indian culture of Oklahoma that was the backbone of Reservation Dogs, Sterling's previous show, bubbled up. It was always there. It's always there. It's always there. It's who. who he is. It's what he knows. It's part of the life and it's part of the lifeblood of the Tulsa that he has shown us in everything that he's ever done. So it's not like this was a deviation from that. But this episode put Ethan Hawke as the, what does

Keith David call him early on? Like the white boy who has a white man who cares too much. Yeah. Yes. puts him into the hall, the store, the fucking you know, centuries of torment and

blood and pillage. And he, and puts him right in the middle of it. And it gives this show a sense of weight that I think people who may have tapped out after, well, they didn't tap out after Peter Denglish punched Ethan Hawking the balls and then they wrestled around on a gravestone. But, you know, maybe people who were like, I get that this is a cool hangout show, but I'm not necessarily, that's not my space right now. It is a cool hangout show on the surface. Like, and then you realize that what they're rolling around in is a graveyard. Yeah. And I found that really emotionally affecting.

You never feel like you're at a lecture. You never feel like you are doing doing the truth by watching this show. And I love how the series itself is basically following the same ethos as Lee's truth story in journalism where it's digging deeper and scratching and clawing. And now the series in this most recent episode, an Old Indian trick, introduces us to what I guess is, I would only imagine is the actual heavy of the show, which is Paul Sparks's Pastor Mark, who runs an Aryan nationalist evangelical church

out in the middle of nowhere. But is there some group chat where people just post Nate? Because this episode alone, right, has Keith David and Kyle McLaughlin just fucking cooking. And then it also, over the course of these past few episodes, he swaps out Scott Shepard for Paul Sparks.

He got all those dudes. Yeah. Like all the dudes who are the best at being dudes and are actually incredible actors and like to work. Paul Sparks leading Tracy Letts into the middle of nowhere to be greeted by like 15 automatic weapon bearing bikers. And there's something about like, I don't know, I don't feel like I'm alone in saying this,

but like there is a palpable energy exchange when you watch actors who just really fucking love acting, act. And so I was watching that scene of those two guys, and I'm watching it because I'm very much into the show, and I really liked the way that I'm sure this was Sterlin and his editors in post, like, chop that scene up. So we have Tracy's character saying, I was threatened.

And then, you know, we're backfilling that story. We're seeing it after he's already announced it, after he's made it out of there alive. So I'm watching it. I'm hanging on it. But I'm also looking at Paul Sparks being like, I wonder what Paul Sparks said when he came out of his trailer.

Was it just, yeah, I got this. Yeah. I think most of these guys seem like, they're all, first of all, it's like Tracy Lutz's scene partner for most of the last couple of episodes has been Tom McCarthy. So it's like, these guys are just like,

that's fucking Tom McCarthy. Yeah. What? And they're just like, I can do this. And then I think that there must be something where like when a white man of a. certain age, tucks his cowboy shirt into Levi's or Wranglers, and puts that belt on, he's like, I know how to walk. I know how to talk. Do you know what I mean? Because like Paul Sparks is just like

leading Kyle McLaughlin up to that ridge and telling him this biblical story, but also a historical story about Oklahoma land rush. And it's just so good, man. It's not, I was talking to a writer here last night about this that like the really really good showrunners, writer, directors, whatever, it's not just about casting. It's about knowing and loving the actors you're casting so that you just, it's like being a, it's like being a coach or a manager, right? You put them in the position to succeed. You put them in the best possible light so they will show out on game day.

And like, it's just a murderers, murderers row. And that's not even mentioning that we may have just also been gifted the actor Graham Green's last appearance. Yes. He passed away earlier this year. This episode was dedicated to him. He is playing the street artist's grandfather who developed a relationship with Dale Washburn. Dale Washberg. And the character is not well.

And we have no, I don't know what Graham Green's health was, but he is very compelling in this part. because he brings his gravitas and his humor, much like he did in Reservation Dogs. And you're like, I don't know, I don't know why I'm, I'm extremely sentimental in a weird way about the show because I'm like, it just must have been a sick day on set. Yeah.

Because Hawk loves this shit. Graham Green knows how to do this shit. It's cool to watch. And I asked Sterling at the event that we did a few weeks ago about the challenges of going from something that I think he probably really has to be. had his arms wrapped around, which was reservation dogs, to doing something where it's like,

okay, man, now, like, we all love mysteries. We all fancy ourselves, like, sleuths and crime writers in the making. But I've tried, like, I've tried to think through stories, like, that's fucking hard, bro. Like, do you be like, here is a three-level conspiracy, here's 12 characters, here's what they're saying to each other at any given point, and most importantly, is here is how you move the story along in a way that makes sense to the audience,

but remains compelling and mysterious enough that they're like, I haven't quite figured this out yet. And, you know, there's a lot of scenes of people driving and doing expository dialogue, but when you do it with the level of, I don't know, vulnerability and presence and versimilitude, but also just like care and love that they're doing it.

And curiosity, too, I think. Yeah, if Keith David and Kyle McLaughlin want to sit in Akia and tell me what I just watched a scene ago because they have to also explain, I'm like, I don't give a shit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't give a shit. Kyle McLaughlin be like,

that's why you get a broker because you don't have to deal with crazy guys like this. He is great on the show. And as a long time, Kyle fan, like seeing him just get to play the heavy. Yeah, when Keith David's like, what did he do to you? Like, what did this guy?

He's like, he's prying. But also, he's playing a heavy without quotes around it. Do you know what I mean? He's not like camping it up. He's not like Wing King. Yeah. Did you ask Sterlin about his decision, his some would say radical decision to cast himself as guys sitting on a picnic table outside of a food hall?

I had not seen that episode when we did the interview, so I had no idea. But yeah, nice jacket. It was cool. That's also not him. I want to get to the bottom of that. Maybe we'll talk to him at the end of the season, which is like I get showrunners who don't do cameos. I get showrunners who do cameos. Like I feel like when our friend Sam Esmail cameoed in the last season of Mr. Robot, like I think he said. like the show's catchphrase or something. Like he was interrogating Elliot. Like he's like, I am the creator. Thus I will manipulate the... But Sterling was just like, I'm the guy next to the guy

who says something in one of the episodes. I want to know more about that decision. It's cool. I just feel like it's like... It has that link later feel of like everything in Tulsa is like alive. And there's 10 different movies and TV shows at once. And that's just a scene from a different one, you know?

I really love that. Also, T. O'Horn, who played the dear lady in Reservation Dogs. She plays Samantha, who's, I'm sorry, Lee's X. She's great on the show. Yeah. She's great on the show. And again, it's a tribute, I think, to the vibe that Sterling creates, but also probably, I'd like to think, whatever Ethan does on set, that, like, he's like, okay, it's another day, new dance partner.

let's go. And every one of these scenes he does with people, whether it was Gene Triplehorn in that great episode a couple weeks ago, or whether it was Dinklage last week, or whether it was her this week, or Graham Green this week, you never get the sense that other actors or characters.

Or Siena used to Deirdre, who's really fun, the bookstore. You never get the sense that they, or Ryan Keir Armstrong plays Frances's daughter. You never get the sense that they are just, for the purposes of the scene, they are satellites orbiting around the sun, the star of the show.

It's like, okay, here we go. It's another two-hander. Another two-hander. What are they bringing to this? What is the dance? I'm just, it's exciting when there's a new episode to watch. This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Ever have a plan come together out of nowhere

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Fast, reliable internet means everything for your business. And even this podcast, that's why I trust Spectrum Business. It keep companies of all sizes connected with internet, advanced Wi-Fi, phone, TV, mobile, services plus 24-7 U.S.-based support, millions of business owners already trust Spectrum business. So visit Spectrum.com slash business to learn more. Restrictions apply. Services not available in all areas. Let's hit your company. I kind of want to lay out for you here because I am on the receiving end of a lot of very intense texts about Tim Robinson from you,

where you're just like, for me, yeah. Yeah, where you're like, this fucking rips. This is so genius. This is so funny. And I get it. And I do think he's funny. I will say there is nothing funnier in the world to me right now than watching Tim Robinson and Connor O'Malley do anything together. Have you watched the full 13-minute cut of them on the set of friendship?

In fact, it's starting to approach. It's not quite, fill it in the plums. It's close. But it's getting there. Him being like, give me a reason to call my lawyer. When he says he got the hat at the Vietnam War store, because he's a fan, he's just a fan. All right, so share company, which I will describe for people,

I mean, obviously most people listening to this have probably watched some amount of, I think you should leave or familiar with Tim Robinson's comedy at this point. Yeah, he did Detroiters. He's done a couple of seasons of I think you should leave on Netflix and now is doing this show, Chair Company on HBO. You also made a film called Friendship that came out. earlier this year with Paul Rudd. I think Friendship is a very useful movie to watch in relationship to Chair Company.

It's just worth watching in general. There are some ideas. They also comes from a similar creative axis where it's Andrew D. Young, who directed Friendship directed the first, at least episode, or first two of Chair Company. I think first, definitely. And then Zach Canaan who's frequently collaborated with Tim Robinson in the script writing part, created this show with Tim Robinson. I will describe this show as the parallax view meets the office.

Good job. Good job by you. It's a 70s conspiracy thriller about nothing about a guy who works in an office. But I have been kind of surprised that, yes, every time, every episode I laugh really hard like three times. Usually it's just like a facial expression he makes or the way that they will tease out a joke for five extra seconds

like Jamie's screaming in the intersection in her car in this show but tell me what it is about Robinson that you think you're reacting to because I don't think of you as cringe comedy bro I don't think of it as cringe comedy so there's a couple things like one

I love this show and full disclosure I very unlike me I was so excited to watch this show I watched a bunch of them I slow horses I watched a couple of them a couple weeks ago before I left for London so I'm certainly have seen the two episodes that have aired.

I did not watch them this week. I love the show. I love Detroiters. I love, I think you should leave. I loved friendship. I think that he is the patron saint of a certain type of 2020's American masculinity. I think that there is a frustration and a desire for a, exceptionalism and specialness

that just seethes from that swollen vein in his neck and that everything he does, like, like Will Ferrell or Danny McBride in their peaks, and you could argue they're still in their peaks, I just find everything he does funny. What I also find interesting is that

every one of those people, every one of those two other guys that I mentioned similarly have had a character that they play. And they have a tempted over projects and time to stretch that character and see, see how malleable that character is. And Tim's doing the Upper Peninsula version of this guy.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's not mean-spirited either. So when you say it's cringe, I mean, there's awkwardness, but like, there's a weird sweetness sometimes to it as well. A friendship had some darker overtones, which were fun and welcome. But like Detroiters, the way he and Sam Richardson interact with each other and their business and the city is actually kind of sweet, even if it is also idiotic at times.

But I think that the way that he's stretching the character and the curiosity with which he's stretching the possibilities and the horizons for the character, I find just very fascinating and compelling on an artistic level because he's like, okay, it works at sketch comedy. Does it work in a movie? Yes and no. Does it work in a half-hour conspiracy thriller? Which is not a question I would have asked. And I certainly wouldn't have expected the answer to be a definitive yes.

Like, I loved this instantly, and I could feel it in my bones. Like, he's playing the same guy. But is it Kate Mara or is it Lake Bell playing his wife that's out of his league? Sure. Okay. I get it. It's just, you know, it's slightly different, but kind of the same. There is something, here's what I wanted to say about it.

When I watched one battle after another, I was like, I bet PTA fucking loves Tim Robinson. Because there is a real commonality, I think. in the almost aggressive absurdity of their humor and of their feelings about the role anger plays in American society. And I think that they are related as a project, like both of what they're doing right now. And there are elements of one battle after another, at least tonally, I'm not saying they're both masterpieces or whatever,

but like tonally, there's something that is similar to me. Like Christmas Adventures is, I think you should leave. Yeah. Christmas Adventures in the service of a Thomas Pynchon adaptation that's also about the rise of fascism and being a girl dad maybe that's not

maybe Tim's not there yet you know what I mean but there's something something that is similar and I'm just really excited to see where it goes because as you said the baseline is this is going to be really fucking funny yeah the moment that the show really like kind of left earth

for me was when uh the Ron Trosper the character that Tim is playing Tim Robinson is playing, has finally hunted down Mike Santini, the guy who he seemed to think was hired by Tech of Chairs to warn him off of going too far down the rabbit hole. And like, you know, he confronts Mike Santini who fakes a heart attack. We didn't even say this. He's seeking justice because he had an embarrassing thing happen to him at work. Yes, I guess we should have set to show itself up. Yeah. So it's basically a guy who's working at a mall, a shopping mall design firm. He seems to be some sort of.

of project manager or something. He gets a big opportunity to oversee the opening of a new shopping mall, even though nobody goes to shopping balls anymore. He gives this big presentation, and as he's going to sit down after giving his speech in front of Lou Diamond Phillips and everyone else, sits down in this chair, the chair collapses, thus setting off a chain of events where he is pursuing the corporate ownership, the ultimate responsibility. He wants to find out who did this to him at the biggest.

moment of his life. So he starts emailing, calling one night he has mysteriously attacked in the parking lot of his business by a not very intimidating Italian man named Mike Santini. He turns out to just be kind of a

near-do-well private investigator who has been hired by an unknown third party. But when they're having this confrontation, this older man, Mike Santini, throws boxes of trash at him and Jim Robinson is like, these are my work clothes

and then start screaming about how like there's something going on that could hurt a lot of people and I'm the only one who knows about it and it is kind of like, okay, this is pretty much the 2020s completely summed up. Yes.

It is going not small, someone throws garbage at you. Well, you're just trying to get to your day job where they will maybe have cookies at break time. Yeah. Yeah, that's where we're at. I also like perversely as a, you know, we are commentators on not just the shows, but on the larger industry. Like I would I would pay money.

I would subscribe to a 19th streaming service if it could offer me in split screen the pitch for this show and the pitch for, I don't know, like silo. Like the pitch for this show is Tim Robinson being like, I sit on a chair, it breaks what the fuck happens next? and then Casey and everyone and Amy and Frannie at HBO were like, here's a bag of money. Like a fucking Scrooge McDuck comic. Whereas with Silo, it's just like, okay, so this guy, but he lives underground. But Rebecca Ferguson, you know, she's like, she's working on the, the years.

Like years ago. But I remember it was like the most, all I remember is the most far-fetched aspect of it was that like David O'Yowalo and Rashida Jones were like deeply in love, is that right? I found that very, very, but Rebecca Ferguson was just like maintenance. Yeah. And then she came to the fore when it came time to find out why they were really in the silo. You know, we should do. I think this would be, I don't know if this would be a releaseable episode, but I do think I would enjoy it is that if we had one episode where we let, I don't know who among the ringer family, extended family of artists, uh, keep up on this stuff. But like someone

comes in and just talks at us and tells us about seasons two through five. of foundation, and then they cycle out and someone comes in and tells us about season two, three, three, and four of silo. Do we talk, or is this just a recap pod that we're present for? I think it would be compelling if we're just like, oh, we need you to, to, do you guys, I've seen season three of silo.

Fucking, Kaya, you've been here the whole time. I can't do it. This pod cannot be a Tim Robinson show where it's just you and I listening. Then we kind of obviate the need for us. Kaya, what's up with the silo? No spoilers. Are they still in the silo?

No. So you want me to tell you what's up with the silo but not spoil it for you? Off air, I 100% do. I guess I just want you to, in a non-spoilery way, just vibe check on silo season three. Like, what are our hopes and dreams? I'll tell you this. There's not just one silo.

What the fuck? I knew that. Did they rename the show silos? No. These ideas are free. Greenwald, it's been great seeing you, man. Let's get into my interview with Zach Balin and Kate Sussman. They are the creators and writers of Black Rabbit.

Black Rabbit premiered on Netflix a couple of weeks ago. It stars Jude Law, Jason Bateman, as brothers involved in basically the explosion of their own lives as they tried to run a restaurant in New York City. It features some great performances. I thought it was like incredibly dark and compelling in that Ozark way and utterly watchable. Zach and Kate were really awesome. We talked a lot about the writing of the show, working with Jason Bateman and Jude Law on these characters. And also just the restaurant scene, New York City and how that inspired the show and how it plays such an amazing role in the show itself.

So let's get into my interview with Zach and Kate. Andy, I'll talk to you on Monday, buddy. Zach and Kate, thank you so much for joining me. Yeah, thanks for having us. This is kind of how I would like to be doing Netflix shows, which is like a couple weeks after they come out. You know, and people get to like watch them a little bit. It's always frustrating when it's like Black Rabbit comes out. And then the first piece on Vulture is explaining that crazy Black Rabbit ending.

I'm like, guys, it's one hour. Like, I haven't even alive here. I want to talk to you first about the tone of the show because despite I wrote down some of this, gun violence, robbery, dismemberment, drug abuse, sexual violence, financial skullduggery and suicide. I find this show to be like one of the most fun shows I've watched this year. And how do you guys, when you're writing this balance, like for the lack of better term, entertainment value, but just like this like almost compulsive watchability of the show with all the heavy material that's in it? We started first with like those two guys.

And that relationship of what Jake and Vince or Jason and Jude were going to go through and what that arc was going to be was like, very cemented from the conception of the show, I think. And so I think that we wanted to try and see if we could make this sort of operatic family story. But then also, you know, we talked a lot about things like uncut gems or State of Grace or Before the Devil Knows You're Dead was a huge reference for the show. And just like, could you tell a really emotional story like that, but then also just like keep your foot on the gas? of the kind of like knives that are again thrown at the guys the whole time. And so in the writer's room, I know that was like a constant challenge that we were like talking to everyone as about as sort of just how can we maintain the balance of the like emotion and groundedness

of that relationship while at the same time trying to just like get a sense of like inescapable both propulsion and like trauma for these guys. And we weren't trying like just like hearing. all those things. I was like, yeah, this sounds terrible. So it was a restaurant. There's love. Yeah. There's tenderness. Tarranthood. Yeah.

No, I think we didn't set out to like want to see or make anything really violent. And I think wanted something that felt very grounded, but also kind of imperative. Like what are real world stakes that could feel dangerous enough, but like in, you know, the realm of possibility. We talk so much about Michael Clayton, which, you know, in that movie, Michael Clayton, was $70,000 and like that's a real number that you can like so we kind of started with that premise like you know how much does a restaurant make every night and so what would be a reach for Jake to have to make what how much could you know Vince's character have lost in a bet like really sort of making making sure it seemed believable but also heightened just enough that

you know kind of chaos ensues from what's what they've done it's got like the you know it's got basically the narrative rhythm of what addiction kind of feels like where you're like I'm always just about to get my head above water and then I get swamped again like that kind of feeling especially for the Vince character where he's

just like always like salvation or like getting out of it is right there and he can't help but like either his past comes back to get him or he does something that swamps him like that it's like very very perceptible so here the actual numbers

and that that was something you guys were thinking about is really interesting. Well, we talked a lot about when we were finding Jude's apartment in the show was a build, but it's a replication of an actual apartment that we had in our location, this guy Paul Escanazi, who was a Succession's location guy, who was amazing, who found in, like, Soho Tribeca area. And then we were like, okay, what does this place actually cost? How could someone like Jake potentially afford it? You know, what would that rent mean for, you know, his earnings at the rest?

I mean, we got really deep and tried to, like, really be quite accurate about just the financial, like, challenges and hurdles of living in New York and trying to put on the kind of face that he is putting on. And so I remember early on we were like, I had ridden in that Jude was going to drive this, like, an 86 beat up Targa or something. and we just spent a lot of time we're like that car is actually even a shitty one you know that's like a like you're gonna spend 60,000 bucks on that car

and we're just like this guy can't afford that. Right. And that jaguar that he drives it like it looks great but that's like that's a $6,000 car. Right, right. He stays fixed off or whatever. Yeah.

Yeah. So it's like I think we wanted to sort of make sure that we felt like all that stuff was both plausible and that you had the sense of like reaching for something that was unattainable but that these guys could at least manifest the, like, some of it, you know.

And that idea, like, you lived in New York. I wonder if you felt like this. We were, like, started out our career there. So we were always like, how much does that guy's apartment cost? And, like, how does this person always have a new, like, outfit? And, like, really being, like, super interested in, like, the face that people were showing. And, like, what's the, you know, like, Anna, the bartender? Like, what's her, like, apartment look like compared to Mel, the hostess, who's, like,

parent supporter and just, like, kind of thinking about who are these different people in the city who, you know, like where do they live? How do they present themselves? Because we had been totally obsessed, you know, with that idea. I mean, I remember my job, like, when I moved there, I was working at Kim's on St. Marks. Yeah. And we would get paid, I mean, sorry, Mr. Kim, if I'm revealing your financial secrets,

I don't think so. But like, it was, we would get paid minimum wage in a check. And then we would get paid cash under the table for the additional amount that we were owed. But like on Fridays, you were like, I have some money, in my pocket. You know, like the idea of that, and I'm sure that's the same thing for the restaurant business where it's like I'm cash rich tonight, you know, and like, so that I can have a different kind of New York experience for 48 hours.

Now that might not mean I can get a better apartment or get a better, you know, car or something like that. But I can go out, you know, and I can have a good time tonight. Yeah. And I think we were talking about that like sort of edge with addiction and with Vince. I think that he's someone who is constantly like, you know, on the edge of winning. and it's either he's always blaming other people for the mistakes that he makes

or the situation that he's in. I mean, when he, in that first scene in Reno, where he runs over, he takes the guy's keys and he's like, you know, this is your fault. And then later, his father says that same thing. But there's like, I think we talked a lot about with Jason, is this guy someone who is self-sabotaging all the time and doesn't actually feel like he is entitled

to any sort of success? And so anytime he gets close, is he like, is he the, like the atom bomb of himself? And I don't know. I mean, I think a lot of people are sort of right on that edge of like, sure. Yeah. Yeah. In terms of like you mentioned the sort of having that uncut gems, devil knows you're dead feel to it. How hard is that to pace?

How hard is that to stretch out over the course of eight hours and probably more? And then figure out like, here are the beats that we have to have like a breath. here's where we really want to ramp it up in the last act of an episode and going into the first act of another and you have these flashback scenes that I think are really effective and really kind of deep in your relationship

to the character where sometimes flashbacks can be like, okay, but like this is like you're really seeing these pivotal, amazing moments in these guys' life together and it, those were really rich. So how do you guys go about constructing any given episode? I mean, I could grab one at random.

Like one of the, the Laura Linney block in the middle of where was actually my favorite part of the season. I think just also because that's where you're kind of like midair with the characters and really like anything could happen. So just tell me a little bit about putting together an episode in terms of pace and tempo and kind of like what you're going to do to a viewer. Maybe I'll talk broad strokes and you can talk more specifically.

But we always knew like, you know, Uncut Gems was this big like inspiration for us. But we knew you couldn't have eight hours of that experience. there'd just be too much to kind of withstand and kind of too much. You felt like you were locked in that in that vestibule for eight hours. You're turning that off after like, so we knew we kind of wanted to build up, you know, that idea of the robbery and that being like the first episode of the show and something that we're building up to. We knew that we wanted to climb up to that point and kind of earn the buy-in for the characters

and establish this relationship. And then we kind of knew that we wanted the final two episodes to be just an all-out. like kind of chase movie and we knew that those were going to be like the most intense and like where the wheels have fully come off so we started to think about like you know if that's like the third act or like the adventure the like stomach churning part of the show how are we going to construct the six episodes that lead up to that that both hopefully tell the audience that we're like getting towards that that it's going to start like the wheels are going to come off bit by bit by bit across every show, but then how do you still keep, you know, you got to when one episode

ends, there's a be a reason to, like, stick around for the final episode. So we worked, like, really hard to, and like you were saying, Laura, like, with each of the directors, had such a different take on it. But I think Laura's block is really interesting because, like, you said, that's where we, like, get to know the characters and, like, see them come into their ways a little bit, but had to, like, work hard to still make, you know, the stakes have to, like, keep growing and growing and growing. And I think we just kept, like, focused on building, earning, like, stress and interest enough up to six, knowing that after that it was going to be kind of... Yeah. I mean, I think that we looked at it in a couple different ways. I mean, you know,

like that block you're talking on in particular, I think that is a block where if you've come into the first act of the show and you've, and at least that Vince's character on the surface is the sort of chaos engine of it. But then in three and four, we begin to understand that Jake, you know, has made a lot of... It's just as underwater. Yeah, and the difference between them is that, like, Vince wears his fuck-ups on his sleeve and he owns them,

and Jake is always putting this mask on. And so for, like, an emotional sort of character reveal, three and four were really kind of about understanding that part of Jake, having that, what's that like for Jake when that gets exposed? And so we knew that there was going to be, like, that would be sort of the emotional turmoil of those episodes. And, I mean, I think that, honestly, it was something that we were trying to, the pace and all that stuff was things we were trying to figure out the whole time. And Jason had a huge hand in sort of, you know, how the tension would continue to be wrapping up, like, throughout the edit. Jason was, like, was very hands-on.

And, but, I mean, things like those flashbacks were things that we had always talked about in the writer's room, but weren't even scenes. And when we got to, when we were in production, we were constantly writing and evolving things. And, you know, we knew what the end was. We knew the form of it all. But, like, we worked really closely with Justin Curzel, who directed the last two episodes, and we had done The Order with. And he's just this, like, incredibly collaborative, like, you know, I remember there's this one scene. Sorry, this is going well. No.

But in episode seven, things have all sort of fallen apart. and Jude character Jake like has this really frantic phone call with Vince you know we're after the robbery and we were shooting that it was like late at night we were underneath the Brooklyn Bridge under there

and Jude's just like pouring his heart out I mean that guy will just like he gives everything and he's been doing it for like an hour and then Justin goes up to him one take and he's like what mate why don't you after you've done this one take your shoes off and just throwing the trap it and Jude just looks at him and he's like

all right cool let's do it And it was this amazing, like, it didn't end up in the show, but it, like, I think the whole production sort of had this feeling of, like, if someone has a good idea, let's just run with it, and let's try and see if you can, you know, if it's additive. And so even those flashbacks, those are things that Kate and I wrote, like, pretty late in the production. And we came to, like, the idea that the band came from this Playboy magazine. And that was, like, you know, that was something that we had sort of were kicking around. around and we're like, how can we get this in the show in the series? And we had gone to Erica Kay, who's our line producer, was asking us, where does the name come

from? And we sort of told her this story and we're like, oh, what if, do you think we could build the kid's bedroom from, you know, do you think we could have like Vince watching Robin Bird late at night? And it was just, it was a constantly sort of like additive process, which was really exciting. Which you can't really, in a movie, you can't really get a chance to do. Well, I like the flashbacks also give the Vince character this different shade because that's a point in his life where he still has a little bit more confidence and a little bit more maybe his like, it's starting to fall apart, but I was rewatching the scene where Jake buys him out. And that's a really good example of what I wanted, one of the things I wanted to ask you is like,

what's on the page versus what happens once Bateman or Law get involved, where the gesture he makes or like the line he has when the lawyer comes in with the papers and he's like and how did I fucking know you were going to be here? You know what I mean? Like or I'm not surprised you're here and I'm like well it's such a Jason Bateman line delivery but also this is still a guy who thinks he's got control because he's just like I founded this place like he's still kind of holding on to these these semblances of ideas about himself so the flashbacks wind up being really really effective in that way. Yeah. Yeah we're like so interesting. it and we both have siblings and like that dynamic that you kind of establish a relationship with

your sibling or like, you know, us and a lot of people we know that you can't break even like as you grow older and and grow into like your different careers and life and stuff. So this like, this like reverence that that Jake has for Vince has, he's probably had it since they're eight years old and he can't shake it like whatever Vince does. Like Jake just, he's cool. He's cool. And Jake, like even when other people are like, what are you still doing with? this loser, this guy is bringing you down, he's an anchor, Jake just has so much, he holds him with so much reverence. So, like, in that scene, you can, like, Jake's heart is breaking to do this to his brother, and his brother is kind of like, come on, man, like, this is my place.

You couldn't throw me out. And then, and then, you know, you see that he can. And, like, I think in terms of, like, both Jason and Jude brought, like, so much to their characters and took them, like. They're so fast, both of them. Yeah. On the day and, like. That we had written, Vince was like on the page at first. Vince was a little bit more like, um, depressive. Not pathetic,

but yeah, like low, like really depressed and like, I remember there was like a few scenes that he cried, you know, that we had him like, you know, come and clean about stuff.

And Jason was like, no, this guy doesn't cry. Yeah. And, and, and so we saw, you know,

the first day that we shot was the day of Vince's opening in, in Reno in the parking lot. And like, Jason brought such a, like, indignant, like, attitude to, like, this, that scene. And we're like, okay, this is, this is actually more interesting in a way that, like, this guy who is, like, who. He's like, I can't believe I have to ask for a Coke here or whatever.

Like, he's getting it. Yeah. Or, like, that guy puts a gun to his head and you're immediately like, oh, this guy's had a gun to his head before. And he's not scared. It's a Wednesday. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And so, and then we really, then we did a lot of rewriting as we saw kind of how particularly Jason was embodying him. And I think that scene in particular, that that was written by Andrew, who was this amazing writer who was with us. And I remember that line that he's like, I can't think of it exactly, but basically he's like,

what happened to your finger? And, like, Andrew wrote that. But then Jason just has this ability to sort of jump in and add a little something on top of it that makes it either incredibly disarming or incredibly insulting. I mean, in that scene, I know it's not scripted

when he like yells at Jude and he's like hey like that on the day in the room that was like it was frightening and everyone and so I think that that there was a lot of flexibility on set of like

we want this thing to feel natural and I think there's a lot of times where one is a writer like you put something down and you're like you get really beholden to or that's how I was going to ask about to like a line or phrasing and this happened to me

like early on in my career, like when we did King, when I was working on King Richard, like I had written that script and I was like, I love, no line in this thing can change. And then I got on set. I'm William Goldman. Step off. And then I got on set. And I was like, you know, you know, I got really lucky. And I was very good friends with Ray, the director.

Sure. And so, and we were constantly rewriting on set. And like, and Will is like quite a talented improv. Yeah. And you're like, if you want the thing. to feel like real life and not a movie, then I think you have to be available to see where it's going and to allow an actor to have some flexibility

unless you're like, you know, I mean, I think there are amazing writers who probably can put it on the page. But I feel like that the actors who we've had the best experiences with, like, John Bernthal, Will, Jude, who worked with a couple times, Jason, And, like, you know, they add a lot. And if you're available to be there with them and be like, okay, what, what, what, what, what, what, how can this be better? How can this be more naturalistic? Can you say it with less?

Mm-hmm. Like. And also if you, when you realize pretty quickly that they're, you know, obviously all of your scenes have like an intention or like, you know, there's a point to every scene. And so as long as you, as soon as you start seeing people do it and they're changing stuff but are adhering to like, you know, what's the point of the scene or what's like the change. or what's like the change that's going to happen in the scene? What's like the fuck up they're setting up now? As long as you're like, this person still gets that that's the intention of the scene, that they're still going to hit that,

then we can like have fun with everything else as long as we like this one point or this one idea is going to get across. Let's do it in any way that it feels natural. And once like we started seeing Jude and Jason, obviously, like, they're so smart about, you know, storytelling and that. You're like, okay, so you know what we're supposed to do here. So if these lines don't totally match it with what we said, that's great. I think people generally

when they hear about even just the word might not be appropriate for this but the idea of improv they think of like Will Ferrell movies and they think of like Judd Apatow or Adam McKay yelling like alt lines from behind

the camera and it's just like we're just like trying to find the funniest thing but like what you're saying makes a lot of sense that this this show feels so alive from one character down to the 14th character which is another thing I want to ask about but like you can tell like there is still

the sort of connective tissue between original intent screenwriting and maybe these people being like these are nightlife guys like these guys are talking for a living and like making deals and trying to get out of trouble so like it's got to feel like kind of as it goes forward

like Kate was saying like a lot of things wanted to dismantle you know so that like by five and six the camera begins to move in a different way than it was early on and by the time you get to Justin's episodes in seven's eight, then it's like, it's handheld and we're on the street and there's

very minimal lighting. Camera's like behind the action. Yeah, and trying to catch up. I mean, Justin was like, you know, to the frustration of our, of our like operators sometimes would be like, you know. Point the camera over there. Yeah, you'd be like, start looking this way. And Ari would be like, what's the blocking?

He's like, you don't get to see the blocking, you know? Who is Ari? Ari was one of our, like, amazing camera. God, that sucks. And I remember the first day with him, but we were in the, like in a subway in New York, which is always just a dream, like, we're going to get to shoot in a subway. And we're

like, it was just like a simple thing of like Jason running in there. And it was so funny. Justin's like, we're going to go over to this. Like you look over there and he's like. Actually, the first time that he was shooting, we were on like. Is this a subway towards in, in the last time of the last phone call he made to the subway?

Okay. And before that, we actually were like on Essex Street, which was where we shot where Anna has her. scene with Roxy on the bench and then we come back to that at the end of the show and like Justin's first thing like these guys were like wheeling out this huge light and he's like this kind of big

imposing Australian guy and he's like put that shit away and immediately everyone's like okay this is going to be a different this is going to be a different block does that allow you to be a little bit more running gun when you're out in New York City like what was the sort of challenges

of because you know like it's it's been a minute since there's been such an authentically New York show like this that also isn't you know i mean SVU aside and and the great law and orders aside but like it's just like you're going into every nook and cranny and and shooting in these extraordinary places i imagine it's helpful to actually not have a ton of stuff that you're bringing with you we got like really lucky i mean we there was never a world in which we didn't this show wasn't going to shoot in new york it's like so much about the city and you know our experience there and and and like

the the rich tapestry of our city but um I think we got lucky that our Black Rabbit was one of the earliest shows to come back up after the writer's strike and the SAG strike. So I think not only did we get like an incredible crew because a lot of people had been, you know, didn't have, weren't working. And we kind of got our pick of department heads and everything. But I think the city like really opened itself, was like glad to have production happening again. I will say like to the credit of Eric Arline producer and our locations, we had adjourned. like we heard no like zero times. Like we want to shoot on the Brooklyn Bridge.

Like sure. 10th Street best. Sure. Like all these places that were kind of like bucket list. Yeah. Places we had been and hung out. We were like, we want to shoot there. And we like never really heard no, which was incredible.

And then. Is that on the, when the, when the, in one of the Lorellini episodes, there's the, uh, the zoom out and Bateman's on the phone. Is that against the, is that against like Peter Cooper, but it's on the East River or something? Like he's in like a kind of walking. Oh. That's episode Over the FDR.

Yeah. So that's like, yeah, that's like on, I think it's on 6th Street. Oh, okay. Going across the FDR to like where those tennis works. I was like, this is incredible. It was so funny. That was, we were supposed to get coverage of that shot. And Ben Semenoff, that was his episode.

And he, you know, he like shot that whole thing. And he was like, well, let's not, we don't have to cover this. This is great. Yeah. Looks amazing. But I mean, that was, I think sometimes like that's, it seems very simple when it's one shot. But like that took a tremendous amount of it. infrastructure. But then there are things like getting to shoot at the pool room, you know,

like those were enormous logistical like operations. But then some of the stuff like, you know, at the end, there's a lot of driving things in New York, which is very challenging to do, especially on a TV. I can't even imagine. Like, you know, driving across the Brooklyn Bridge or the Jake sort of race out to Coney Island, which in some ways we just kind of, of times to just put a camera in the back of a car and had it with Jason and Jude in there. And we got like one take and the car broke down. And so in some ways there was a very independent spirit of making this show. And then in other times, Netflix was honestly incredibly terrific.

And we just like, you know, we built that entire restaurant on a stage. And it was like down, it was so meticulous. And, you know, I don't think the resources that we were given to do, some of the, that stuff were spent there and then it allowed us to like you know a lot of the stuff at the end where Jason is in the diamond district like we shot all that stuff in like a day yeah which was moving incredibly quickly yes for how complicated some of that stuff was okay you mentioned the restaurant so I want to ask was there I think I think I remember reading it was like 2022 when you guys were like sold this or like we're like basically it was right before the writer's strikes okay

whatever that was, yeah. And then can you think of like, this is probably too convenient, but was there like a night or a day after and you were like, you know what would make an interesting story, if not a feature or a series is something about the place we were last night or something about this, like, was there like a kind of inciting colonel? Yeah, I would say there were two. I'll talk about one, and you can talk about the other.

But there was a restaurant in Williamsburg called the Dressler, which was the first, I believe it was the first measurement. and Star restaurant in Williamsburg. And to us, like that, we had moved

to Brooklyn at that point and like, and that restaurant was sort of like a pillar of that community and that it had sort of taken

what was this artistic neighborhood and I think in some ways like was part of the group that sort of said this is like a serious place

in a way. And then that restaurant had a really tragic fall and the guy who created that restaurant, like got embroiled and dead, and ended up committed suicide. And so there was,

there were a handful of articles that had been written in the aftermath of that. Like, what happened was this, did this, in some ways, did this dream or did this neighborhood almost that they were a big part of creating, like, cannibalize itself. And so that, you know, was something that was in, we had been, like, wrestling with that for a long time. And, like, there's something really interesting here.

about the places that we lived and about the kind of ambition that I think New York, like, can instill in people and then also, like, can sort of, you know, topple them. And that was a big part of it. And then I lived across the street from the Spod Pig in the West Village and was there when it opened. And that place had, like, a huge, you know, like, figured pretty large. And, like, my, like, kind of idea of what New York was about, this, like, cool, down. downtown like hang and it was not like banker bros it was like already like downtown types and so we were we spent a lot of time there we didn't have a ton of money but we you know when we could we'd get

drinks there and um have meals and and sometimes get lucky enough to get up to the third floor but um but and a handful of other places like that beatrice in and um you know like odion or like you know the number of places of it meneta tavern and places that we went and we were just really like kind of captivated by how sexy and alluring and cool like what we imagined was going on there. But then when, you know, the spotted pig had like this huge scandal that was going on, that like we became aware of like through the news, like, you know, sexual harassment that was happening there. And there was like this major like fall from grace for the guy that owned in. A number of restaurants had like, you know, found out that was going on. And like, it was

really interesting to see how like voraciously that was covered by the media and how people were like so interested in like the that like downfall and it was like shot in Freud around yeah it was and I think people were like you know

seemed more shocked than maybe you might have been had you spent time there because you could have maybe pieced together that this was like you know that something was up there but just really liked the idea that like what the show that happens every night there that's so alluring and intoxicating

is often so different than what is actually happening at that place. And so I thought that was a really rich place to just as like a background or as like a place to set a big story of like somewhere where what the presentation is and what the show is is not

what's actually happening. And it reflects a lot about the brothers. One of my favorite recurring images in the series is Jake in his tank top getting like, you know, getting up on, like he has like a cot in the office or whatever. And it's like, this is essentially his life.

But it's like you get to see the wizard behind, you know, behind everything. And he's like, yeah, like every night I put on this show. But then at the end of the night, like, I'm basically like. It's not glamorous. Pretty lonely guy, you know, who's, I think somebody, I know somebody in a restaurant business who once told me it's like taking out a mortgage every single night. And, you know, you think about like, oh, you take a mortgage out on a house. Like, that's one thing to do five.

times in your life. Like, imagine every night you're like, this is either going to be great or I'm going to be in jail. That's like someone said when we took on like about show running that it's like being beaten to death by your dreams. And I think that's sort of like how like what we spoke to a lot of restaurant tours, that sort of same idea of just like, you know, it's kind of like why everybody goes to New York though. Yeah. Right? It's like to have that feeling. I love the way the restaurant that Black Rabbit is conceived of because

like Spotted Pig both the allure and also like the frustration of the city is like there's always that other room you know and there is always like the thing that you can't do and it's so fun to be like I can't believe I'm just like hanging out and

Jay Z just walked by like this is weird but then you're like but I'm not up there you know what I mean and I don't even know if it really used to bother me because I was in my 20s and early 30s but it was definitely something you're always aware of in New York is like, you know, the people who cut the line. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's always like a rope that you can't get through. Yeah. And I mean, I think for like those guys, they like, you know, wanted to create the place so that they could be inside of it.

And that's just like, I think is a way which a lot of New Yorkers like try to circumnavigate that is like, well, if I can't get in your party, I'm going to create my own. Yeah. You know. And, and I think like, you know, there's a scene in episode two where like, like, Jason, character, like, there's a flashback where he walks him through the, like, bowels of what that, of the restaurant before, you know, and he's, like, talking a lot about, like, Mars Bar, which was a place that we spent, like, a lot of time. Sure. And then...

He's got a library t-shirt on at some point. Was that for library for the bar? Yeah. Okay. And then upstairs in the third floor of the restaurant. I can't remember if we really ever see it, but if you ever went to Mars Bar, you know, in the bathroom at Mars Bar, it was, like, this... It's disgusting, but it was, like, all graffiti.

And then... So they, like, replicated that. wall up in the third floor. And I think that idea that you could like try and like, I mean the false idea that you can try and replicate something from your youth in that way and that it's going to, it's going to turn out well. Yeah. I think it's a lot of like what the, you know, what the show is about.

I think I read in an interview you guys did with, I believe it was a creative screenwriting or something. It was a screenwriting site talking about taking nightlife and shooting. during the day and showing what it's like during the day. And some of my favorite moments are those guys walking around. Like, I think there's one scene that looked like it was in the Meatpacking District, but maybe it was down by Essex or something like that. But like these like daytime shots of what it's like to get ready for a life that happens

entirely at night. And I was wondering if you could talk to me a little bit about whether that was entirely creative or is there also like a production solve there? Because it's like, I don't have to do as many night shoots if we're having a lot of stuff happening during the day and that these guys are all running around the city trying to get their life together. I think part of like the stress we wanted to show for Jake is it is like it's kind of like a 24 hour thing, right? You have your job is at night, but then just wanting to set up like how much work it is to run a restaurant. He's like, you know, sleeping there a lot of the time.

Roxy's at the market. Yeah. So I think we were sort of interesting. And then like not to mention like throwing a kid in the mix. It's like kind of a, um, something that you like, can't do forever. And so we were interested in that. Like what is like how do you how do you grow up and still have that job when you're 20 and 30 maybe that's okay and you can just kind of like grind like that and it's okay. But we liked, you know, for someone like Jake and someone like Vince, 50, like the wear and tear of that really, really starts to get you. So I think we wanted to, we wanted to sort of separate those different like times of the day and how they're operating. And then also just like, you know, at night when you see Jake, he's got his jacket on, his shirt on, and he looks great.

And during the day, it's like, this guy, like, does not look great. He's barely keeping it together. He's, like, he's crumbling. And I mean, I'm sure there were some production considerations. But a lot of times, like, you know, when you're writing, like, night stuff just seems so exciting. Sure. And especially, like, this show, the world of the show is so much about night. And then when you have to ask the whole crew to do it.

and you have to like get pavement out there. No, then it's 3 a.m. And you're like, can I switch the other night scenes to daytime scenes? He's like, we run across the bridge during the day? But I mean, I think also, like, I worked in production for a really long time and it was like, you know, in the art department and PAing. And I remember just like there's something about being in New York where you're, like, either you're working the graveyard shift and you're ending your day.

And like the sun's coming up. And like the next shift is coming in. And like people are opening the. shutters on their stores and there's just like this you know it's just a constant handover of like whose city it is throughout the course of like any day and i think that like that was really interesting to sort of to try and show a little bit of you know yeah i always loved the subtle shift changes of the city like even even those like moments like where there's like brief traffic lulls like even over the course of the day where you're like ah yes the like the like the

at a.m. to 1.30 p.m. break between like this whole thing being covered in ubers and cabs or whatever, you know. Obviously the show ends with a degree of finality. I wanted to ask about next stuff to the extent that you're able to talk about it. I mean, I personally would love to see, you know, Jake's continuing adventures as an up-and-coming bartender, but what else is kind of, were you guys thinking about right now, even if it's not like an explicit project? This TV experience has been really exciting. I think that most of my career so far has been in film. And I've been really lucky in that a lot of the directors I've worked with,

I've gotten to stay on through production. But, you know, it's different in TV, like to really get to have our hands in that, like, all those choices. So I think we have a couple TV things that I'm not sure. Too early to talk about. Too early to talk about. But I think things that are in. in the same sort of kind of world

or yeah as Black Rabbit a little bit and I mean I think sorry I'm monopolizing this but this show was really personal and it was like you know not to get too far into it but like I have a brother and it's like we poured a lot of our life into this thing and and it was a different sort of creative experience than I've had on some of the other things that are a lot of I've done a lot of stuff that is like true story base but not

sort of my story. And so I think that, one, it was incredibly exciting to get to sort of pour things out like that. It's also made me want to do sort of more of that with Kate. And so I think we're looking at projects a little differently now in that way. Do you feel like the, not even the change, but like this feels like a good bucket for the kind of stuff you want to write, like this, whether it's limited or not. like this kind of around seven or eight hours, around this kind of feel, being able to write for like adults to watch, you know? Yeah, definitely.

I mean, I think we like talk about this a lot as like an exercise. It's like, you know, what are the things that are, you know, we know when we get sent a lot of stuff and we're constantly reading articles and we're like, what is the through line of the things that when we read or when we see we're like, oh, that's the kind of thing, you know, that I want to get involved in. I mean, I think, like, you know, true stories to some extent, but really, like, identifying, like, real emotions and real drama, but being able to portray it in this kind of, like, theatrical way. So, like, you know, a family drama that feels like a blockbuster, like that the emotions and the stakes are so high and so, not heightened, but so dramatic and so life or depth that they get to be. be portrayed, you know, in this, like, kind of big way and working with great filmmakers and

great actors to, to portray real identifiable people, making identifiable choices. I'm like the worst days of their life. Yeah, yeah, just like, you know, and I like watching, you know, heightened stuff too and find that interesting, but I think where we thrive and where we're most, like, invested in characters is seeing things that you can identify with emotions and identify with people's choices that they make. Or the bad choices they make. Yeah. And I would just add to that. I think it's like we really, what I think was very excited about making this was like how dense you could make the story. And I think that that can be challenging for the audience because you're actually asking

like this is, we did not want to make like second screen like TV show where it's like you could fold your laundry while you're watching this. Like we wanted it. We wanted it. it to be like if you if you're willing to pay attention like there's like there are going to be a lot of reveals and there's going to be a lot of sort of the the denseness of storytelling was really exciting and I think that that's something we want to continue doing but I also think that's like challenging I don't think there's that many places that want to are willing to like invest sure in in that and we had tremendous resources on this and I don't know that we'll get that again in this kind of way but I think wanting to make that kind of like

Labyrinthth story is... It's just really cool. I mean, I don't want to keep you guys, but it's just, it is one of those shows where the actual physical setting and the environment that the show is placed in perfectly reflects the plotting and also like the character's interiority.

So that was like always like, the thing that I love the most about this show is that these people felt like New Yorkers, but it felt like something that was like a lot of the things that happened in the, show can only happen in New York. Like there's only a subway system like that in this city that works this way or there's like the traffic is like this or like all these things that kind of like really impact how these people behave. So I just really really enjoyed the show a lot. I loved it.

Thank you. Kate, Zach, thanks for so much for coming by the watch. Thank you so much. This is a real pleasure, man. We're huge fans. Awesome. Thanks so much.