The Watch - Hollywood’s Troubled State (Ep. 205)

Episode Date: November 20, 2017

The Ringer’s Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald discuss Jeffrey Tambor’s sudden departure from the cast of ‘Transparent’ and the current state of Hollywood amid the ongoing allegations of sexual harassment and assault (2:00). They also discuss ‘Justice League’ and its opening weekend as well as the trailer for ‘A Wrinkle in Time’ (21:30) before chatting with screenwriter Scott Frank about his new Netflix show, 'Godless' (33:00). 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'm editor at the rigor.com and joining me in the studio, the only Steppenwolfy acknowledges is the theater in Chicago. It's Andy Greenwald! Hey, man. What's up? Happy birthday.

Thank you. You turned an age since we last spoken from. on microphones. I flipped it. You're looking well. I flipped it for real. You are looking better than Warner Brothers box office reports this morning, which is all we're going to say. Timely. Is that all we're going to say? Well, we might touch on it, but guys, we're not here to dance on the graves.

We're not here to really like bust up your mother boxes. We're here. It's weird that we know all this stuff and we didn't see the movie. True. It would be weirder if I saw the movie. Yeah. Considering my brand. Yeah, man. We'll touch a little bit on Justice League's box office returns. We're also

to talk about The Rinkle in Time trailer. Later in the show, really excited for this. We're going to be joined by one of our favorite screenwriter, Scott Frank, who has a new show coming out on Netflix at the end of the week called Godless, a very cool Western starring Jeff Daniels, Jack O'Connell, Michelle Dockery, Merritt Weaver out here. Sam Waterston? The Riflewoman, Sam Watersston, Scoot McNary. What else you know about Scott Frank?

What do you know about Out of Sight? What do you know about Get Shorty? Walk Among the Tombstones. Logan. We could do this. Minority Report. The author of the novel Shaker, which is really good. The writer and director of an underrated classic called The Lookout with Joseph Gordon Levitt.

So we're really excited to talk to Scott in a little bit. Andy, I wanted to, we would be remiss if we did not talk about what is now, I think, arguably the biggest scandal that it may be ever hit Hollywood in terms of the reverberations coming out of these sexual assault and sexual harassment and sexual misconduct allegations. and investigations and the way it is affecting the industry at large. And it's difficult to talk about because each case and each situation is very specific unto itself. So it's hard to talk about it generally without painting it with broad strokes and thus not really doing justice to each of the stories. But we wanted to talk a little bit about the Jeffrey Tambor situation

just because, again, we're looking at not only, a moment of obviously having to take a step back and the folks who work on Transparent and Amazon and Joel Solow are going to have to figure out what they're going to do with the show moving forward, but the extent to which it affects the legacy impact of that show, which has been profound, I think it's fair to say.

Yeah. It's truly fascinating. For people who have not been following, there was an accusation levied against the Star of Transparent, Jeffrey Tambor a week or two ago by his former assistant on the show. And then that was joined in the past week. Yeah, that was Van Barnes.

Yes, by Van Barnes. An accusation against him by the trans actress who plays the part of Shea on the show. Trace Lassette, yeah. Trace Lassette, that he was also, he also behaved in an inappropriate way. And got physical, yeah. And became physical in some ways towards her. He vociferously denied the allegations. There were rumors last week that transparent was the writers were under a mandate to break two versions of season five, one with the star of the show, one without.

And then over the weekend, news broke that Tambor has removed himself from that situation by saying he is leaving the show. He cannot work under these circumstances. Yeah, quote, I've already made it made clear my deep regret if any action of mine was ever misinterpreted by anyone as being aggressive. But the idea that I would deliberately harass anyone is simply and utterly untrue, given the politicized atmosphere that seems. to afflict at our set, I don't see how I can return to transparent. It's incredibly difficult to talk about any of these cases, I think, but important to do so, and we will try our best. One interesting thing here is that he refers to in his comedy, talks about a politicized atmosphere on the set.

Transparent is itself a political act. The show always has been. And one of the more interesting aspects of the show, not necessarily equal to the wonderful writing and performing that has marked its first few seasons, is the fact that it has felt like this sort of radical transforming, evolving piece of art that has become more than art. Jill Salloway, the creator, has talked very openly about how the inspiration for the show came from her own transparent. She herself has gone on a transformation of her own during the four seasons of the show. One that I just actually disrespected in some ways because I said her transformation.

She is now gendered. They are now gender neutral. That's something I spoke about with Transparent star Amy Landecker when she was on the podcast. Everything about the show is political and intentionally so. More so, I mean, harassment and misconduct, these things need to be dealt with seriously and swiftly and fairly in any workplace, whether it's in Hollywood or not. Transparent does seem to me to be a almost unique test case for this, because it's just, it's somehow, I don't even know how to express this.

It's more intolerable. It's more impossible. This is the place that was created specifically. Yes. To be progressive. And to be free of these kinds of predations or behaviors, which makes all of this particularly shocking and difficult to process on the level of Jeffrey Tambour

has long talked about how this role changed and affected him. Yeah. Surface level, reputation of a gentle, and in many ways liberal. I don't even mean political person and performer and shocking and difficult to process because this is a beloved and important show in this current age of television

that appear to be driving smoothly into its fifth season. And that show that we all, and many people, I don't need to say we, admired and liked and love so much is irrevocably different now. It's changed. Yes.

And I think that, you know, you mentioned that there's rumors that Salloway has been asking Amazon for time to thoughtfully write the more a Pfefferman character out of the show. So it'll be fascinating to see how this plays out. Not in a morbid way. I think that you're right. If anyone is sort of uniquely qualified to address this in a progressive way,

it's probably Jill Salloway. It's really interesting that Joe Salloway will be. is in the forefront of this or has to be the forefront of this, has to respond, has to adapt politics into art at this point in their career. One other note about this. Obviously, we don't have any inside information about this.

Our opinion has been, as we've talked about these things, as they've come up, and when it's been appropriate for us to talk about them, our opinion is pretty much the same, which is believe people when they speak up, believe people's bravery and respect it and let people, let situations play out as they need to be, as they need to do so, you know, within a professional environment. But one thing that this did make me think of that I think is worth noting is the different levels

of behavior that this scandal is affecting, and I think hopefully in a positive way. Because going back to all the way back to Harvey Weinstein, people say everyone knew. Well, no one knew that he was a four-decade. long serial rapist and predator. Maybe some people did. The majority of people, quote, unquote, in Hollywood did not seem to know that. What people, even on a casual,

people who only have a casual relationship to Hollywood did know, was that he was a monster and an asshole and a bully and vicious and someone you do not want to work with. And yet, because it was Hollywood or because we thought that the world worked in a better way than it did and we had the privilege to believe so,

we shrugged it off. You and I, I don't say we, like you and I had a say in it, But everyone's like, well, that's what you do in the business, and you're used to it, and you adjust yourself accordingly if you want to work in the arena that is Hollywood. There were echoes of that in Tambor's first statement where he said that I can be a volatile person. I can be difficult to work with. Now, there is no question that to make art and to be a creative person taxes individuals in a very specific way that can cause them to flare up or express themselves. It's also the holding pen for a lot of very difficult personalities in general. I mean, a lot of people who gravitate towards the creative arts do so.

They have demons. Yeah, I do so because they, I mean, they want to live in a certain, not live in a certain way, like outside of the boundaries of legality and propriety. I mean, they, they want to express themselves. And that doesn't always mean joyful artistic creation. That can be, that can be really being and have some dark clouds over you at times. And that can also maintain an element of extended adolescence. When people talk about, oh, let's chase the, being on a movie set is like being at summer camp. It's just a short amount of time and everyone's intense and in their feelings and nothing that happens.

There's matters. It doesn't go past that. You know, there's an element of that when just as a layperson, you can hear that and be like, oh, how fun. Or as someone, and I'll use eye statements who was in high school and college productions of plays, be like, I kind of miss that. Putting on a show with your friends and then you go out to the cast party and you drink and you've all shared this experience. But there's also slippery lines of behavior and intimate. see that happen in productions like that. And it is clearly possible. And this is the case with, musicians, too. People in bands or, you know, rock singers or whatever, the persona takes over

your life because you think you have to behave a certain way, where this attitude can become pervasive in your life and an excuse to say, like, I'm an impossible person when I'm doing my art. And then you are monstrous to people, and then it can be forgiven. And what's interesting to me, when and if smoke clears, if there can be a real honest description, about that, that this idea of the troubled genius, you don't have to be an asshole of people that you work with. You don't have to be involved. The people who wrote that narrative are the people who were never in a situation where

they were out of, they were facing someone in power. Right, where they were threatened. And that's, I think, the most important thing to sort of draw from this maybe, because it's so hard to find something to definitively say about any of this. other than it's horrifying, but one thing that you're hinting at is this awareness that people like Harvey Weinstein were, you know, it was just that Harvey Weinstein was a bully. And you heard, like, John Bernthal went on that Jim Norton show and talked about working with Kevin Spacey briefly on baby driver. It was just like the guy was a bully. And, you know, this sort of recognition that these people are using their positions of power and then being lionized for their, their, their, peccadillos or their, you know,

their tantrums or their moodiness or their willingness to bully other people. And frankly, that's come up in the Matthew Weiner discussions too in terms of him and Cater Gordon and the situation there. And basically Marty Knoxon wrote a Twitter thread that was just like Matthew Weiner was incredibly difficult to work with and was prone to tantrums and manipulated. She called him an emotional terrorist. And this is Marty Noxan who has done great work on her own but also worked as a writer-producer on Mad Men for a number of years. Right. That's another example that I was chasing in my mind, which is people know that he was impossible and egotistical and demanding. And we sort of gave it a pass.

And again, I think this is maybe this is the work of our podcast in some ways always to sort of try and disentangle the art from the artist if and when it's possible or appropriate to do so. Because I knew that he was demanding that he was like yelling at people for the wrong period ashtray on the set. but I think the show is a masterpiece. And so I was like, well, maybe that's the price you pay for that. I was fortunate to be in a position on my couch where I did not have to actually have skin in that game. Come on, I mean, difficult otors are one of the sort of... We love that stuff as fans and as critics. The other thing I think that is important, especially now,

and we are not going to attempt to litigate this, nor should we, is to put things in different boxes. This was terrible. This was pretty bad. You know, this is not the time for that by any stretch. But I do think it's worth noting that the people who are, you know, we're talking about like the Weinstein's, like, you know, pretty like monsters, like criminals and monsters. There is a running thread through all the other ones, all the other examples that have come up that I think some people have said, oh, maybe that's not as bad or they put them differently on the sliding scale, which is a reminder that people in power and all of them are men. who are in power to various degrees, almost never think about the people in their orbit who are not in power.

There's never a moment given to think about that. And that is cultural and systemic, and people don't think about that. But I'm thinking about even the smaller, I'm doing it again. I'm not trying to measure it. But we read about, you know, reading today about,

there's a New York Times reporter, Glenn Thrush, and he's been suspended by the Times for behavior that is documented in a Vox story. And you read through the story, And my feeling about this is that sounds like people that I've worked with or circumstances that I can understand doesn't appear anything in there is, quote unquote, illegal.

It's just a series of terrible decision-making, terrible behavior. And you're seeing the concept of mentorship as a bully pulpit. And feeling, and there's a great piece online that we could link to, I think it was in the Atlantic, about the myth of the bumbler by being forgiven for not really considering the situation that you put someone else in. That's the through line, right? It's just you're with people,

you're not aware of the power imbalance because men who have achieved a certain amount of power were never taught or never took a moment to think that there is that imbalance and that is a common threat here so regardless of what happened on the set of transparent um who are we talking about in the allegations it's the star of the show who's won emmy's his personal assistant and a trans actress who has been a guest star occasionally on the show sure there's a huge imbalance yeah and and and that's something that I think in this whole and even if you look and say I mean I I wouldn't necessarily recommend this for your mental health. But even if you look in the comment section in blog posts about Tambor's exit from the show,

I would say the overriding sentiment among people who are commenting on stories, again, not an accurate representation of what people actually think is there's no show without Tamboor. You know what I mean? The star, the idea of this sort of star figure, whether it's a star creator, whether it's a star creator, whether it's a writer, you know, this idea that the world will stop spinning without them. Yeah. If you're number one on the call sheet. Yeah. Which is a feeling I remember from Talk the Thrones this summer when I realized that I was number one on the call sheet and it was a burden, you know, that I carried, hopefully with dignity.

You had all the answers. I mean, that was the thing. You know, I didn't know what happened my game of Thrones. But, but yeah, I feel like this is not, this is not the podcast for this. This is not the moment for, like, teachable moments. But if at the moment, if there's anything to take from these sort of affairs that are continuing to, these sort of affairs that are continuing to, unfold, think about systemic imbalances in every part of your life. There is no, there is no respite from this in the news, but there really shouldn't be because this speaks to something that is baked into our culture. The most important thing that's happening here is it's making us confront what the price we're willing to pay for stuff that we like. And I think that it's easier to look back decades ago at, say, a piece of music that you know is made by a

disgusting person. Yeah. And just be like, yeah, but it was the 70s. Mm-hmm. Everyone was disgusting. Well, it's now now. Yeah. It's now.

You don't have to have a 20 years later we find out that, you know, the person who starred in House of Cards was a deeply troubling human being. And that's going to force us to confront, you know, our relationship to these things. And that is a confrontation that many people turn to entertainment to avoid. And we are certainly. Same thing with sports. The mantra you hear it but stick to sports. I wouldn't be surprised if sooner or later you hear stick to TV. And I, and I, and I, and I, you know, and I, you know, and I, and I, and I,

I'm guilty of it as much as anyone, you know, and this is supposedly my professional purview to think about this stuff, but I love the ignition remix. I've always loved the ignition remix. And we've known about the allegations and then more so against R. Kelly for over a decade. And it's the kind of thing where just think about,

everyone has one piece of art like that. And I'm not telling you how to wrestle with your own relationship to that art, but maybe think of, maybe don't wrestle, even if you're not going to wrestle with it, just go back, run your own piece of art. back pages and think about how you've done that in the past, you know, how you have negotiated that. And for me, it was just like, what guy, this song exists and I love it. Gosh, I love it, you know.

Can I ask you a different question? Jason Jones said something at the Vulture Festival this week, and they asked him about his comedy heroes. And I think it was something like who inspired the detourts that TBS sitcom. Which we like. Yeah. Good sitcom. And he was basically like don't have heroes. I think if anything we've learned right now is that there isn't, I'm obviously paraphrasing here, but basically there is not a overwhelming amount of heroes in Hollywood. These are very, you know, a lot of people who work out here are very troubled. If you want heroes, choose a fireman or a school teacher or a first responder. And I think that part of, there's been a residual effect of social media and the way the internet industrial complex works around pop culture is the lionization

or the heroization of actors, of directors, of writers, into huge figures, you know, these, and these agents for world views. You know, you're like, this person is the manifestation of what I think sure shouldn't be happening in the world. And we're finding out that, I mean, it's not ironic. It's quite tragic, actually, that several of these people, whether it's Louis,

whether it's Tambor, that we may be held up as these paragons of progressive, inclusive, they think they speak for us in some way, are in fact double agents of some sort of real dark evil in this world. You know? Yeah. And I think I wonder whether it will force a reevaluation of even just the level of importance we place on people in Hollywood.

As you're saying this, and I agree with it, And I wonder what happens when, I don't want to say when, I would say if. I don't even want to, but when you're talking about this, I think of two things. I think about a movie we're about to talk about, which is The Rinkle in Time, the people involved with whom are heroes. And I mean, say that intentionally after what you just said. They are avatars for a lot of people's good faith, right? I mean, Ava DuVernay, Oprah, Mindy Kaling, people see them worthy. women, all, obviously, and important women,

see them as vessels for a lot of their hopes and dreams. Artistically and politically and creatively, and creatively, if someone involved in this enterprise who's another person who's a good guy or a good gal is revealed, you know, and I think also about the conversations we're now having in reckonings with artists, something that has happened

more in politics, but kind of hasn't. Because Ted Kennedy. I think we had a lower opinion of politics. True, but like this Chappaquittic movie coming that for people who don't know about it, it's apparently quite a good film that reminds people that Ted Kennedy...

Chappaquiddick is the ignition remix of politics. I mean to be glib. It's this horrific thing that definitely happened. So did his career in the Senate. Look at Al Franken, who I think is a fantastic comedy writer and performer. And politically, I support quite a bit.

I think he's done good work. But then you see, you hear these allegations, it's just this thoughtlessness and this arrogance, this hubris, that now in a very real way, and perhaps it should, threatens to undercut the good works that have been done. Yeah. And it is, yeah, I keep caging what I'm saying, so I was about to say it's tough, but who's it really tough for?

It's tough for people who are victims of this. Yeah, it's not tough for us. It's not tough. It's challenging to try to unpack this and articulate this, but that's on us, and that is a responsibility as fans, and arbiters and critics and whatever we are. Let's talk a little bit about Rinkled and Time and Justice League just because we have to go talk to Scott in a second.

Obviously, I don't want to make these films a binary, but we just did a superhero movie rankings on the ringer. I think a lot of, Sean wrote, you know, Sean has been talking very thoughtfully about with Jason and David on the big picture and has written some stuff where we're just talking about the state of the superhero union. but I think you could even go wider and talk about Hollywood blockbuster filmmaking, which in lots of ways is synonymous with the superhero sort of universe. And I think it's just like the franchise universe,

this idea of like hitting whether it's a preexisting intellectual property or finding a new piece of content to expand and push forward and happy. And I think A Rinkle in Time obviously has an eye on this towards being an epic. It's a Disney movie. Yeah, and it's a Disney movie. you can't help I don't think that there was any plan to put this out the weekend Justice League

came out necessarily but the Disney it probably was the juxtaposition of the two is quite striking between the clarity and colorfulness of the images imagery you see and you know with Justice League I'm not even talking about

what is in the film because I haven't seen it and I'm not in a huge rush to do so frankly the the expense of the movie is very interesting. I don't really personally, it's not my money, so I don't really care how much they spend, whether it's a 250 million budget before they get into marketing it for what they've been doing it for the last 18 months. So that could...

It's over half a billy. Yeah. And I saw a couple of things this weekend that was just like, well, maybe movies shouldn't cost this much money. Yeah. What a radical idea. If your expectation is that this movie needs to make half a billion dollars to start getting into the black, that just seems like bad math to me. And I'm sure that I could be proven wrong, and I'm sure once foreign box office comes in and they do all the other accounting that they can do, that this will be a profitable movie in some regard. Well, they'll be able to spin it as such, but I don't think it will be.

Yeah, but if a $94 million opening weekend is a total and utter failure, then I think you're doing, I think you need better accountants, and I think you need a better business model. One thing that I've noticed in meetings here, creative meetings, is that the most instructive or most inspiring trend in movies is not, at this moment, in 2017, is not the shared DC universe or even what Marvel is doing. A lot of people feel like, well, not only is that ship sailed, but that's Disney and Warner Brothers beating each other into submission. It's the same way that a lot of people look at Netflix or Amazon, and some of these other networks are like, what? to how to even compete with this. The thing that really is resonating is Blumhouse.

Oh, people just like certain kinds of stories, and what if we told a good version of them? So, weirdly, the movie, the sweet spot that people are looking for is the $5 to $15 million movie, and I think good things can come from that. It will be interesting to see if that trickles into the kind of franchise storytelling.

One example I would point to is what Fox is doing with its slate of X-Men properties. Basically looking at it and being like, none of this makes sense on its own. And so what can we do to get creative? And we're going to talk to Scott Frank. Logan was essentially a Western. Deadpool is its own thing. New Mutants is a horror movie. Kind of a cool idea.

Horror movie. Also, savvy. Cheaper cast, smaller setting, haunted house, horror movies are successful. And you would know better than me, but I would have to imagine that Fox is probably thinking we need to do a reset on the X-Men movies. Soon. Soon. Yeah. And we'll kind of take a little bit of a breath in that.

I find it fascinating to see how Pot-committed Warner Brothers is to this. And whether or not they think they can get out of this by doing Flashpoint and coming up with an alternative timeline and keeping the parts they like and getting rid of the parts they don't. Or whether or not they're going to say, you know what, screw continuity. Matt Reeves has his DC and maybe Joss comes back. They've said, they've sort of started to publicly nudge in that direction. Right, that there could be multiple Batman's in multiple movies, and we're not going to get into this Sinai Affleck up for nine films thing. And it's worth noting that Marvel and Disney have been pretty silent about what happens with the Avengers movies after Infinity War and what comes after that. Yeah, we talked about that a little bit.

Both for recasting the parts, but also have they, can they spin this that they've basically conned Warner Brothers, one of their biggest rivals into committing billion dollars of folly? Are they going to pull back from the big movies, which, as we talked about last week, don't really work? That would be kind of interesting to see. Marvel, I think, it can't be overstated how much farther ahead Marvel is than DC right now in this regard. Because Marvel can make movies about characters

nobody's ever heard of, like Guardians or Ant Man, and they're successful. They can take characters that were thought of as kind of a little bit of dead weight, like Thor, and make them very successful. They can introduce new characters, like Captain Marvel and Black Panther are already hotly anticipated. You know, Justice League was treated and greeted with such a sense of dread.

And derision. Yeah. By me, obviously, but by people you should listen to. There's an eight-month drumbeat for Black Panther. I mean, it's just like it couldn't be more night and day. Yeah, and the way they play the public expectations game. They play Twitter right. They hire well.

They have people who seem like they're having a good time. You know, we make fun of like the Atlanta studios hang, but they seem to be fairly genuine, and that vibe does communicate in today's social media era. One other thing that might cause Warner Brothers to be less pot committed is Brett Ratner's Rat Pack has a stake in some of this, that his company was on Wonder Woman. Kevin Sujihara, who, when taking over Warner Brothers,

laid out this strategy. Basically, people made a lot of fun of this that showed his release schedule, and it was like 2020, Untitled DC Movie 6, Untitled DC, He had 10 years of these things planned out for the shareholders. Sure. He's the one who gave Brett Ratner a $400 million deal. He's under the hot seat no matter what because of his handling of some of these properties,

but there was a story in the Hollywood Reporter that was linking him in Ratner, and you don't want to be linked to someone like Ratner. You shouldn't, both for business savvy, but obviously for now his pretty appalling record of what appears to be serial predation. So that's all a mess. Rinkle in time stuff, the other point about it that's worth making is, this is such weird source material. If you're going to be scraping, I don't want to say dregs because I love those books.

I'm a big langlehead. All I remember is just how reading them as a kid, their covers were weird, the vibe was weird, the names were weird. Their character's name is Murray, it was just RR.R. Y. I'm like, did you forget a vowel? Everything about it was so trippy and strange. It looks pretty psychedelic, man. Yeah. I love that. And if you're down to the stuff that people weren't sure how to adapt, the first time, they had their pick of the trough of IP. And your choice is this heady, interesting book

about a smart girl saving her father or a not at all remembered 1984 arcade game about a giant ape, wolf, and lizard attacking Chicago. I know which side I'm on. Now, obviously people are like, hey, the trailer for Rampage is out. How funny. And maybe they tongue-in-cheeked it correctly

and it's the rock fighting a giant ape. Okay. But that's IP that they bought and groomed. How weird is that? I remember that game. Yeah. But there's a reason that Duffer Brothers aren't putting that in Stranger Things season three. Like that was not iconic.

You know what I mean? Yeah. So, okay, so take this thing that worked for some people and then let's run with it. And let's cast it interestingly and let's imagine it differently. And it seems like Ava DuVernay, who walked away from Black Panther, was given the same opportunities here that Kugler ultimately seems to have been given, perhaps more freedom because she didn't have to tie it into a larger. universe. The universe that she's tying into is one of Roe Creation. Exactly.

And what's truly exciting about both those films, not just the fact that these are terrific filmmakers who deserve the biggest canvas possible, but they seem to have understood, and maybe this ties into their social media stuff, they've understood their moment and played it so well. Yeah, they talked about that over the weekend. They were at Vulture Fest together, right? I think they both said that,

like, I really wish I had movies like this when I was 10. And that can't be overstated. It's pretty cool that in this trailer, a character who, I don't remember these characters at all. The characters played by Reese Witherspoon, Oprah, and Mindy Kaling. But when Oprah Winfrey's like, you need to be a warrior, it's like, this is Oprah Winfrey telling you this, this is a natural treasure and resource. Why isn't she this part in all of the movies?

Like, why did it take Ava DuVernay to be like, you know, who's an actress and also the most inspiring voice in American culture? Sure, let's let her be a wizard or God or whatever she may happen to be. So it's cool. I don't know about the movie, but, you know, I think America's also all in on rescuing Chris Pine. Yeah. Like, I just feel like we've, we've, we've really come around on Chris Pine. He's real, what a journey he's had the last year. I think he's, is, is stepping to the side of the Chris Wars has been the best thing for him. You know what was lokey, a great move for Chris Pine? His commitment to the Wet Hot American Summer franchise. He has now shown up for two totally marginal but very funny sequels to a barely remembered

called classic film, just shows up, hangs out. He's a cool Chris. All right. So Chris Pine, we're counting on you, man. I'm fine. I'm glad we ended up in a comfortable place of agreement. We're going to take a quick break to hear from our sponsors and we'll be back with godless writer and director, Scott Frank. Today's episode of The Watch is brought to you by Zell. Zell is a new way to send money to your friends and family from your banking app. Cash is easy to lose, and checks take a while to clear. But with Zell, once you're enrolled,

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That's Z-E-L-L-L-E-P-A-Y.com. Zell. This is how money moves. Today's episode of The Watch is also brought to you by three billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri, written and directed by Academy Award winner and watch favorite Martin McDonough. Three Billboard stars an impressive ensemble cast, including Francis McDormon, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell, Peter Dingledge, and Abby Cornish. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri has been a hit with critics and festival audiences. It's the winner of the Best Screenplay Award at Venice Film Festival Audience Award at the Toronto International Film Festival and at the San Diego. Film Festival. The darkly comedic film is a uniquely entertaining tale of revenge and redemption

and is certified fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. Three billboards outside Ebbing Missouri, now in select theaters. Andy, we're back. We're going to be talking in just a moment with Scott Frank, the writer and director of the new Netflix. I want to say show, but we're going to get into the terminology here because it's almost more of a miniseries. It's called Godless. It's a Western starring Michelle Dockery, Jack O'Connell, Jeff Daniels, Sam Watterson, Scoot McNary, Merritt Weaver, a bunch of people. Scott Frank is probably collectively one of our favorite screenwriters between the two of us. He is responsible for one of our favorite movies out of sight, who he wrote and Steven Soderberg directed. Soderberg is also the executive producer of Godless.

Scott also has screenwriting credits on like a litany of masterpieces. I mean, anything from Logan to get Shorty to Minority Report, Minority Report, Malice. Here's the other thing why we're going to talk to him about this, but just to set it up, why he's so important to us. This is the guy, he is the pulp whisperer. This is the guy who Hollywood turns to because he understands some of the best crime writers enough to translate their work. He's adapted James Lee Burke. He's adapted Charles Williford. He's adapted Elmore Leonard, Lawrence Block with a Walk Among the Tombstone.

Yeah, which he also directed. So this guy has great taste and works on really good projects. And Godless, which premieres on the 29th, I believe. I think it comes out Friday. So this week. I think so, yeah. Godless premieres this week, it's good. I mean, there's very little else you need to say about this.

Weirdly, it is a classic Western. It's got people who can ride horses look good with a rifle. And a really kind of sneaky, there's a sneaky politics to it that sort of unfolds as the show goes on that I appreciate. But it is well-timed, I think, for Netflix, particularly right around the holidays. Like, sink into this when you're home. It is a good thing. It's an incredible act of writing because, you know, I think you tend to think of things when you say, oh, it's novelistic. It's you think of the wire and you think of this sort of expansion of themes throughout seasons that take in, you know, the idea of institutions and there were war on the individual or whatever you think that the wire was about.

Godless feels more novelistic in the way episode after episode adds layer after layered to character. And that watching different character combinations interact somehow illuminate. It illuminates motivation and illuminates backstory. It illuminates what these people desire and what these people want from life. It's a fascinating story. We'll talk to Scott about Godless and some of his other work right now. So Andy and I are now joined by, we couldn't be happy to be joined by Scott Frank. The writer and director of Netflix's Godless.

Scott, you know, I heard you talk to Brian Coppillman a little earlier in the year about this before even the trailers were coming out. And you kind of referred to this as a mini-series. I know terminology is kind of up in the air these days in Hollywood in terms of what is, what's a mini-series, what's a limited series, what's long-form storytelling really mean on television right now. But do you stick by that assessment of Godless after you've sort of finished it and it's about to be released? Difference between a mini-few definition. Can you talk to us a little bit about the origins of the project? Because I believe I've seen you in interviews talking about this for a number of years and maybe even saying that it's one of, if not the favorite scripts you'd ever written, that initially it was meant to be a film. And that here we are now with this terrific miniseries out of the same source material.

I want to go see a gladiator movie together. Let's talk a little bit about what Godless is actually about. And I was curious, something for such a long gestation period was the initial idea. So the story is about this, essentially the town of LaBelle, which is largely populated by women who were widows or the people left behind from this terrible mine explosion that happens sort of as the, I guess, off screen in the beginning. of the series. And then there is this sort of parallel narrative of Jeff Daniels' outlaw figure who is rampaging through the frontier, looking for this guy, Roy, played by Jack O'Connell, who has betrayed him, and then everything sort of comes to a head in LaBelle. Was it Label? Was it a historical fact that you would come across in reading that was the germ of the story

back when you first started to break it? About, I didn't want to do that. Out of the mining towns, the Southwest are really fascinating. I'm not talking about the guys. Yeah. She said, horrible mining accidents where all the men would die and be stranded in these towns. And they would either, and it's fascinating. And she furthered at the Gen Autry Museum and brought me all of these great,

I began to get a sense of never seen in the Old West right there. That's when I knew. What was your favorite of the Western novels that she assigned you? Yeah, we all wish we had a Mimi Munson in our life right now. She sounds terrific. We all need. I'll tell you, the one novel I deliberately did not read was Lonesome Duff. It's just going to ask about it.

I've been always putting, and for some reason I'd been saying, one, believe it or not, is I would. Yeah. I can look it up. That's right. That's right. Who's written in interesting. So all of those are me. And I stole mercilessly from all of them.

I want to ask you specifically about the appeal of the Western, because one of the things about your career that I admire so much, and I know Chris does as well, is your ability to translate and almost make the case for some of the most iconic American crime writers who work so well on the page and sort of make the case for them on. on the big screen. And we're going to ask specifically about some of those in a moment. But you've done this, you know, I wonder about the challenge doing that for Westerns. Because as you said, in Hollywood, they were generally considered to be dead. I know that there are people who are passionate partisans of the form. People, you know, my father, who's almost 80, loves Westerns, but I know Chris sitting here across from me, loves Westerns too. For people who might not be sure.

Getting perilous close to 80 myself. That's true. That's true. You're approaching. We all are in a way. But I'm curious if you could make the case why this, why, why, why the format excites you so much still, why there is that the possibility within it to both pay homage, you know, play the hits, but then also find something new in the sort of the dusty saddles of a genre that a lot of people may be reticent to reinvestigate. Creatures, and I'd always wanted to write about them.

Has Stephen seen that episode? Yes, he has. When we were shooting all the horror stuff, he said, I don't know how you're doing this. I could never do that. It just seemed to be some narrative that you could spin. I wanted to sort of take that question and pivot forward to the crime writers I was talking about, because one of the things that Chris and I love to do on the show is make the case for the iconic American crime novel, the importance of it and the importance of it to our lives and get more people reading some of these authors.

Just to go through the list, you have adapted the greatest of the greats. You've adapted Elmore Leonard. You've adapted James Lee Burke, Charles Williford, Lawrence Block, and then hopefully someday, I think you've done the work, Dundee McDonald in the Travis McGee books. All of these writers, I think, are geniuses. All of them have very specific voices, and many ways that voice is the appeal. It's our way into the books and why we keep reading them, you know, dozens and dozens of them in some cases.

How do you take on that mantle? How do you find that balance between honoring the voice and sort of taking on the voice and then also finding way to basically blow it out to a wider screen to potentially a wider audience? fraud like me, it's very easy to adapt someone else's voice and to sort of take her frequently on page and think that they can drama. You know, what is it a sense? Yeah, I mean, by that same token, you're directing a Western, which is, you know, one of the, that's one of the sort of real, the golden goosees of filmmaking in America is when you get to join people like Howard Hawks and John Ford and Clinton Eastwood and even Quentin Tarantino and people who have sort of. have become modern masters. Godless to me, really, I watch it and it recalls some of the sort of Josie Wales-era

Eastwood stuff in terms of its visual palette, the way you shoot New Mexico. And I was wondering if, obviously, you're taking on something that has this huge rich tradition in movies in this genre, but you're also working in it in a way that is pretty rare. You don't often get this much time to tell a story visually. I was wondering what kind of things you had to do to prepare to direct. something like this, both kind of intellectually and physically, something of this long, and if there were any touchstones that you were like, I really, I'm going to this as an influence,

or I want to directly avoid this as an influence? Sort of, what was your cinematic Lonesome Dove? Huge. I love the way he does it again in this all-cook. And I think he rides into town and basic shot. I love the way that. And Butch Cass light, you can, you don't have to have as much light. And Godless, you know, we just shot with the available light, and it was gorgeous.

Wow. Scott, you referenced Dead Again, which is a terrific movie from 91, but that also speaks to the fact that you've been writing movies for a good amount of time. A long fucking time. I was being polite. But you've also seen a lot of changes in the industry. And one thing that I find really inspiring and great to hear just from what you're saying at the moment is when you're talking about all the things you had to learn and appreciating classics, appreciating specific shots in classic films, talking about the individual voices of these great writers who are. who were great when they wrote these books in the 70s and 80s and 60s

and great when they're adapted today. I feel like, and I might be straining here, but I feel like there's some lesson to be learned here just in Hollywood in general about sort of worshipping the right things and not just slavishly worshipping IP. And I think one way to sort of put a bow on this sprawling, maybe even not a question, is your work on Logan, which Chris and I both liked so much. And one of the reasons why we liked it is because, yes, it is, quote, unquote, a superhero movie. there, Wolverine is in it, but really it's playing with these classic bones and doing justice

to them. You can tell that there is some history there that isn't just, there wasn't stapled together and published by Marvel Comics in 1985. Well, very, very conscious of not worrying about it, that he loved that be like, if you know. Professor X, yeah. You got it. Professor X.

Like, and that was really shit to Jim as, let's write, you know, there's this girl, too, who's a little version of him. We girl in the claws out of her hands. I thought, that's spectacular. So why don't we do an old bunch? And I've never seen one because they're cheating. What do you mean by cheating? I just want to stop you because I think that's interesting.

Nobody can, nobody dies. They're defying gravity. There's nothing to do about what with water rights. People make is they make the superhero movies actually about, oh, it's a gifted writer. That's what we did. And it was a ball. Forgetting all the other Marvel bullshit.

It's hard to sort of draw the, maybe to see the line at first. But if you take, there is a line that connects the character, like Logan in the way that you wrote him and Michelle Dockery's character in Godless, and the way you write, oh, God, see, now I've inherited it. I was going to say Liam Neeson's character, but, of course, it's the great... In a Walk Among the Tombstones, it's Scudder, Matthew Scudder, the great Matthew Scudder. The way you wrote Scudder in a walk among the tombstones, which side note is just a terrific,

terrific film that you wrote and directed. Oh, thank you. Also, just on the side note, thank you for keeping the Boyd-Hulbrook train going, because I... Yes. He is one of my favorite actors right now. Two of my favorite performances are in Logan and Tombstones. But in these movies that I'm mentioning and also, potentially in other projects, the Hoke pilot who did for FX based on the Williford books,

and then if the Travis McGee movie ever gets made, these are all characters who are interesting because of the bruises they carry and because of how close they came to death moving forward. That seems to be a fertile spot for you as a writer. Well, it's a fertile spot for anyone as a writer. It's just a great thing to write. about in what you're broke. Can you tell how badly I want the Travis McGee

movie to happen? I keep subtly challenging it. You know, I too. Here's my issue with that, and I think Boyd Holbrook would make a tremendous Travis McGee right now, by the way. From your lips to Hollywood's ears. But I think there's a problem. I wonder if Travis it now. Yeah. I... A really good

period. Particularly as he goes forward, because he becomes 60s, and he watches the 70s, and he watches the 80s, and you see it happen to the world. Yes. Yes, Hay. I like to see what happened to him and interesting character to explore. I feel like you have your next few Netflix shows planned out.

That's pretty good. Scott, we have to wrap it up there. It was a pleasure talking to you. I hope we can do it again sometime. Everybody should check out godless. Yes. And check out Scott's novel Shaker, too, because we have a book club. We haven't done it for the book club yet.

Maybe we will, but it's a great, great crime read. Do it for the book club. If you'll come back and talk to us, we will. Happily any time. Thanks, Scott. Take care. Thank you, Scott. Bye-bye.

Today's episode of The Watch was brought to you by Zell. Cash is easy to lose, and checks take a while to clear. Thankfully, there's Zell, a new way to send money to your friends and family from your banking app. Once you're enrolled, the money moves right between almost any U.S. bank accounts and typically arrives in minutes. Plus, it's backed by major banks, which means you can send money confidently. Just go to Zell Pay, Z-E-L-L-E-P-A-Y.com to learn more Z-L-E-L-E. This is how money moves. Today's episode of The Watch was brought to you by Mac Weldon. With a smart design premium fabrics and a simple shopping experience,

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Go to MacWeldon.com and get 20% off your purchase. using promo code watch. Finally, today's episode of The Watch was brought to you by three billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri, the new film from Academy Award winner and watch favorite Martin McDonough, if you've seen in Bruges, if you've seen Seven Psychopaths, you know this is our guy. Three billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri is a uniquely entertaining tale of revenge and redemption starring Academy Award winner Francis McDormon, Academy Award nominee Woody Harrelson, and acclaimed actors Sam Rockwell and Peter Dinklage, three billboards outside Ebbing,

playing in select theaters.