The Watch - In the Streaming World, How Do We Decide When It’s Time for a TV Show to End? Plus, ‘Betty’ Director Crystal Moselle

Episode Date: July 7, 2020

Netflix announced this week that both ‘Dead to Me’ and ‘Ozark’ will be airing their final seasons. It begs the question of how streaming services make the decision of when to end TV shows that could seemingly go on forever (11:06). Plus, ‘Hamilton’ is finally widely available on Disney+ (26:23) and Andy talks to the director of ‘Betty,’ Crystal Moselle (35:24). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Guest: Crystal Moselle Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I need sports to have to clear the room. 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, he was a skater boy. It's Andy Greenwald! Should we really, how much behind the curtain should we let people?

Because by the way, happy Monday. Always breaks to talk to you. Mondays are awesome. Monday's always awesome. Big Garfield vibes over here. But. Chris has been foundering a little bit on the intros, and I worry about that. It's been tough.

I think that, you know what it is? If I have to say, it's indicative of the intensity of the television that we're watching. And also the quickness with which we're moving through it. So it's hard to make up like a clever wordplay on, I don't know, I may destroy you. Like, it's like, there's nothing there's nothing there for me to introduce you, you know? I thought it was because, you know, it's just more emotional. seeing each other. And so because we are basically like the Sistine Chapel reaching out fingers to one another across the heavenly void that you don't want to, you know, belittle it. You just want to

be like, that's my guy. And I want to show my guy the mustache that's back on my face. So what do you think of that? The mustache? Yeah. Look how you wanted to talk about it. You wanted to talk about it so badly. That's so sweet. I'm not really hiding anything. It's like I think everybody's got project. Some people bake. I just showed you and Kaya my new scented candle. Some people become candle collectors. I'm seeing where we go with this

mustache. That's my journey. Here's the thing about you. You know what it is? It's free. It's like PBS. It's just part of the package. Yeah. I think that you need to just commit. Like that's the thing.

This is committing. I know. For fairer people, such as yourself. It's tough. You either got to go all the way in for weeks or months at a time or why bother. And I think that you're committing

and I think that it's good because I think that what you're doing on your face is foreshadowing the amount of cowboy content that may be lurking for fans of the watch just around the corner. Let's do the table of contents because you make a good point, Andy.

So today, Andy did an interview with the director of Betty, Crystal Moselle. The creator and director, Crystal Mosell. People on this podcast know how much I love it. I hope people have been catching up on it, judging by Twitter, it seems like some of you have. Great show.

Very cool to talk to Crystal from the Betty, the Betty Capital of the world in New York City. So Andy has that interview in the second half of the show. Today we're going to be talking a little bit about some of the, I don't know if you would call them like,

I guess they're not cancellations, the endings, the predetermined endings for a couple of shows that got announced on Netflix this weekend. Just see if there's a tea leaves in there for us to read. I think that we should refer to the first part

of the show where we do that as Quickbyte. if you will. Oh, sure. Kind of like seven minutes or less, but just takes, right? Yes, just pure takes. I feel like that. But you can only hear them. If you get the app? If you get the Andy app.

I think that that term is going to be available, like public domain soon. So we should grab it. And then what Andy was alluding to about like the West and the amount of, I guess, mustache work that's going to be done on this podcast in weeks to come is, you know, it's been a really long time since we did a book club kind of thing

or any kind of project on the side. And out of nowhere, we've mentioned this a couple of times. We've talked about Larry McMurtry a few times on the podcast. This is not, this is for you guys and for us. This is not the kind of thing that you put at the top of a podcast if you're trying to chart. This is also not finger on the pulse of 2020. And we got to follow our hearts. So Andy and I kind of randomly both started reading Lonesome Dove at the same time.

Like two weeks ago. And that has essentially taken over our relationship. So Larry McMurtry's 1985, 850-page epic of the Old West. Get the mass market, 963. Yeah. It's more impressive. Light or carry, too. And I think we were talking about, like, how do we translate this into content?

Because that's what we do. I think what we arrived at is maybe in about a month giving people time to read if they would like to or watch the miniseries, which we're also going to do. and then we'll do like a lonesome pod in August. Is that right? I think we should, I think we should think about that. I think if people feel strongly one way or another, maybe Facebook group could do a poll or something. Because basically the question is, do we do just bonus content dove pod, where we talk book and miniseries? Sure. Or should we do a legacy watch and watch the, the miniseries like collectively and spread it out over the back half of a couple episodes? And I like that. I like that. I kind of, I kind of like

that too. We've never done it. We've talked about it. Each episode, so those are on, they are on Amazon for purchase and they're on stars for streaming, correct? Yeah. And so just a little bit more context. This is not a quick bite. This is a big morsel of buffalo liver, which apparently is a delicacy that I don't think Chris and I are in any hurry to try, but we like reading books about it. So we've talked around Larry McMurtry before. We love his books. Foolishly, it's like choosing, going to the restaurant and ordering the wrong thing. His Hollywood books are genius. His West Texas books are incredible, but he's best known for this almost thousand-page Pulitzer Prize-winning novel that basically resurrects the cowboy story and puts it to bed. And I stayed away

from it, both because I thought I didn't like cowboy stories. I was wrong. Yeah. And because there's this interesting relationship with the miniseries, which aired on CBS in 1989. And if you were like we were, if you're a contemporary of us, this miniseries cast a really, really long Shadow. It was basically, until the Sopranos happened, held up as the greatest thing TV has ever done. And it was watched by, at that time, to give you an idea of, we always talk about monoculture and stuff having the belt. At that time, 26 million people watched that mini-series, which was four one-and-a-half-hour episodes, I think. And it's Robert Duvall, Tommy Lee Jones, Diane Lane, Robert Urick, Danny Glover, Angelica, Houston, Chris Cooper, Margoe, Margot

Martindale in a very small role. I mean, Steve Busemi, maybe one of his first roles. Yeah. I never saw it. I'm just fully out there. Just didn't see it for the same sort of aversion to cowboy stuff. And so I'm saying it's a legacy watch. Imagine AG in 89. Just contemplating lonesome dove. Now, we know that- I was too busy with my Twin Peaks fanzine. I know. I watched it when it was, I think I watched it when it was on or maybe on VHS after it was over in the early 90s. But I did remember lots of major. plot points. And part of the reason why I was kind of like tripping through the weeds a little bit, getting started with the book, even though I really love McMurtry, is because I remembered so much

of the plot. And I had seen like in the book, it's pretty faithful. The miniseries is a pretty faithful rendition of the book. And I was kind of like, well, I know the major things that happened. Do I really want to? And then you get to, and it, the mileage varies for everybody. Some people get page one. Some people, it's page 50s. For me, it was page 250. But, you know, what else am I doing? And I just, it catches fire. And when it does, it's, it's absolutely unput downable. I just want people to understand that like, we like TV a lot. We like to talk about it.

Sometimes we all joke about me not seeing movies, love movies. I think that Chris and I both secretly or maybe not secretly, love reading maybe the most, like in terms of just pure pleasure when it hits. And this book is top five most pleasurable reading. experiences maybe in my life. I think that your idea about doing episodes at the back end of, like an episode per episode of the watch, an episode of the Lonesome Dove in a couple of weeks would be great. And basically a watch along with people. That would be awesome. I think that you could probably also, and many people have done it this way,

watch it first, then read the book. If that's the way you roll, I'll say that the only knowledge I had of the miniseries when I picked up the book was who the leads were, that it was. was Duval and Tommy Lee Jones. And maybe that, you know, just got in my head because I knew it, but I will say that while reading it, I have never, I've never known more perfect casting, sight unseen. Oh, yeah. I mean, actually, funnily enough, I was trying to answer that very question. And I think the only other moment where I've been like, oh, you find out the cast and you can never unsee them when you're reading the book is no country for old men. Also Tommy Lee Lee Jones. But, but Josh Brolin, Javier Bardem, and Tom,

Milly Jones as those three main characters in no country. So I would just say is my last pitch, maybe we'll figure out a way to talk about the book in more detail, but before we get into these quick bites, you know, maybe it's a little bit our age, maybe it's a little bit our moment, but what this book has to say about just physically about America and it's rough, rough beginnings, which is, you know, which it has in common in a lot of ways with something else we're about to talk about that was big this weekend in Hamilton, but also just kind of about mortality and being human and being alive. And then also just the ability to lose yourself in it for that many pages. I don't know what

I'm going to do with myself. Yes, there's a sequel, but I still don't know what I'm going to do with myself. So I think, you know, we do think about whether or not what we're interested in always translates to an audience. Yeah. And I think 26 million people at one point we're interested in Lonesome Dove. But I don't know how many people are still and whether or not they're interested in going on this journey with us. Kaya. You're going to saddle up, Kaya? Kaya, are you ready to become, you know, the producer of the number one Lonesome Dove podcast for at least late summer July 2020? I have to say that this is like solidly not really what I'm interested in. But wait, Kaya, Kaya, what if I were to tell you, we haven't talked about the plot. What if I were

to tell you it's about two graying Texas Rangers deciding to lead to the first cattle drive from South Texas to northernmost Montana. 3,000 head of cattle. How many pages is this? Fuck. 900. Oh. Go with the mass market.

Don't listen to him. You listen to me. 900 plus. And there's not a bad page among them. Maybe I'll give them the mini series a try. Yeah. I'll try the first episode. Kaya, did you know that when bartering for cattle, you refer to them as

beaves as plural beef. The F, like in the word elf, becomes a V. Did you know that? I didn't. Am I selling you on it now? Now I'm sold. So we'll do a loads of dove rewatch a little bit farther down the line. But for today, I wanted to talk a little bit about stuff that's actually happening now, Andy. Is that okay?

Fine. I'll put down my Winchester rifle and we can move on. Do you want to do Hamilton or these series announcing their final seasons first? Let's do the news. Let's talk about these final season things. So obviously, we've been making sort of quick bites jokes. Quibi is in the news today because Benjamin Wallace wrote a very long, thoughtful, and revealing piece about Quibi in New York magazine. We'll maybe talk about that on Thursday. But under the radar, a couple of things happened over the last, about the last week or so. And that is two of Netflix's biggest dramas, I think I've called Det Me a Drama, announced that they were going to be ending

after their next season. So Ozark is going to do a fourth season that they are splitting into two seven episode mini seasons or 4A and 4B, and Dead to Me is going to be ending after its third season. So that's not uncommon. I think we and I have talked a little bit before about Netflix and its relationship to cancellation or its relationship to constantly kind of going forward with these shows. In a different era, something that is, by all accounts, as popular as Ozark and as dead to me, if that was on ABC or Fox or whatever, A, there would be different shows. There'd be less profanity and violence and candor or whatever. But people would be going, bending over backwards and tying themselves in knots to try and figure out a way, how do we keep this going?

How do we keep the gold mine open? Obviously, in this, peak TV era, we are dealing with different economic factors and also, I think, different creative factors. And I thought it was really interesting that these shows are choosing to go out, at least publicly, on their own terms, rather than, oh yeah, you know, like season six of Ozark when they moved to Alaska and start, you know, bringing cocaine over the Bering Strait. That was kind of, that didn't really make sense to me. Like, I think that there's like- When you said that, your mustache grew another two inches. You were so excited about that story. Yeah, I should copyright that. What do you think of this news and do you think it portends to anything wider, either with Netflix or in the TV business

in general? Because I have a couple of ideas about it, but I want to hear it. Sure. Well, as you correctly pointed out, like for the last 20 years, the story of the changing TV landscape is really about shows being finite. That wasn't a thing before. And there was some interesting quotes that came out from this past week from our pal Damon Lindeloff talking in more detail, and a lot of this was kind of generally known, but talking in more detail about the negotiations that he and Carlton Kuse, his co-show runner-on lost, had with the executives at ABC, beginning at the end of the first season where they were like, look, we're going to run out a runway here and we're going to run out pretty quick. And they were like, cool, call us back. And then they were like, look, look,

it's starting to get a little dicey here as we hit into the third season. There's only certain things, more things we can do and they'd already planned the Oceanic Six part and the network was like, okay, okay, you're right, you're right, we see that now, we see what's going on and we're willing to come to the table with you. You can end the show after 10 seasons. And they were like,

what fuck? Like, that's, we can't do that. Finally, there was back and forth and with great fanfare, they did end the show eventually, which was unheard of at the time. And, you know, ever since then, Damon's only made one. First he was making three seasons, now he's just made one season. And that's been a boon for creatives. That's

true and good. The second change, though, that's a play here is something we've also talked about before, which is Netflix isn't really in the TV business in any form that we've ever recognized it. Yeah. Netflix is in the get new eyeballs and keep them business. And I have to say, I don't have insight into this. I don't have canaries in that particular coal mine. But the vibe I get is that Netflix was kind of shocked at how Ozark made the conversational, cultural leap in its third season. I think Netflix is really proud of Ozark. They do big Emmy campaigns for it.

They make a big deal about it. It's clearly a popular show. Successful in campaigns, yeah. Exactly. That's great for them. And that's part of their strategy to get eyeballs and keep them along with, you know, ravishing the international market and also going super hard on. cheaper to produce unscripted shows,

especially now that their biggest pipeline, you know, to like the office or friends, that has now dried up. But I still think they were kind of shocked and caught flat-footed because generally giving shows two or three or four seasons, like that's their business model. Shows get exponentially more expensive

the longer they run. And as long as the pipeline just keeps flowing and it's growth, growth, growth, they can turn the page on these shows. So while, you know, the creators of Glow are being honest when they're like, we are really relieved and proud to be able to make the fourth and final,

the classic alliteration we see in press releases now of glow, they also wanted to make more. I mean, I don't think that's a surprise. It's not like they were given the greatest gift in the world, but they feel like they've gotten enough, they've gotten a gift just to do this. So anyway, all this is to say, I kind of think Netflix probably was shocked.

They're like, oh, wait, this isn't just our breaking bad that we can put in our content library and move on. They were like, oh, are people starting to treat this like Breaking Bad? Could we let this go longer? And so the decision to be like, yes, it's done, but we're going to stretch it out more, it feels like them being caught between the very successful content mill that they are and the older version of like, oh, we could let this run that TV used to be. I think Netflix wants titles, not seasons.

I think ultimately that's what matters is to have the variety of choice among show-to-show rather than, oh, great, I have seven seasons of this to watch. I'm going to binge all seven. I think in contrast, you could look at somebody like Showtime, who I think makes fewer shows, but essentially props those shows up for way past when you would normally say the creative engine of Homeland could support it. I think the end of Homeland, obviously, I had a lot of admirers.

I didn't get a chance to really watch late, late period Homeland as much as I would have liked. But I think that that model, has been kind of brushed aside in favor of volume of titles over like, yes, let's get long-running seasons, let's make Carrie Matheson an iconic television character

that we never abandoned. But part of it, what we have to look at here, and I think this actually goes back to Lost, too, is the kinds of stories that get told on television changed a lot since Lost. And Detimie and Ozark are both shows where the engine of the show

is essentially what is going to happen to these people. Not I want to hang out with them Not Seattle Grace seems like a really interesting place to spend 12 years High body count at Seattle Grace but go on. Sure, but ultimately what you care about is the characters And I as a huge Ozark fan definitely care about all the characters on Ozark a lot But

You're going to dilute it the more you kind of like get away from These people are on the run and these people are living a lie And these people are running from both the underworld and and law enforcement. There is a sustainability about that. The other thing that I think you should look at, or we can look at, is as we get these lines between movie star and TV star, like, what big names are doing with their time, I don't know necessarily that Jason Bateman wants to make Ozark for seven years. Well, that's definitely true. And I don't know necessarily that Linda Cardalini and Christina Applegate want to make dead to me for seven years. They may want

to do more stuff together or make other shows or whatever. But, a lot of these people who are coming came to TV out of movies for creative opportunities, but we're wary of getting trapped in, I'm known for this one character, I have to work 10 and a half months a year, you know, I'm always kind of on the hamster wheel. When you look at, you know, the blotter of shows

that have sold straight to series, like you go to deadline or variety since the pandemic started, you will see Chris Pratt's TV show. You will see Will Ferrell and Paul Rudd on a TV show, the think went to Apple. Those are not going to run for multiple seasons. That's baked in, and you're 100% right about that. Yeah, so I think it's interesting to look at it in that way. Netflix has had some more traditional comedies that they have pushed on and on.

And I think, you know, Big Mouth, for instance, will probably go for as long as those guys want to make Big Mouth, I would imagine. Yeah, I think that if you look, if you want to look at, Netflix is very, very proud and pleased to run, as you said, successful Emmy campaigns for shows like when they see us or Ozark or Master of Nunn when it was on. But if you want to like just push through some of the wheat, and not to say that what I'm about to suggest is chaff, but like the shows that are their dream projects, I would say would be things more like queer eye. nailed it, big mouth. Floors lava. And dark.

Dark hits almost every quadrant that they want to be hitting, which is that it was international. It was expensive, I'm sure, in its way, but not as expensive as a Chris Pratt TV show about the military. Yeah. And it was genre. And it was closed ended. It was designed, and I'm sure, pitched successfully to be these knockout, three seasons, and then you walk away and it exists on their service forever. Like, that is a dream scenario. I am midway through the third season of Dark. I've been reading a 35-year-old

cowboy book instead of watching it, and I have nothing, I'm here. I'm honest about who I am now. I also bought a candle. I'm just naked before you listeners. I will say that my, I've, I will say that my early season review of Dark is essentially the moment in Eastbound and Down, when Adam Scott walks up to Kenny Powers. And he goes, Kenny Powers. And he's like, who are you, man? He's like, I'm your dad. Just kidding.

Your dad's dead. That's dark. That's one of the best moments on TV this century. So you're enticing me. But we will get to dark. I hope shortly. It is definitely, I'll be curious to see whether or not. Honestly, I mean, and I'm happy to talk about this with other folks who have watched it.

Like, I'll be curious to see whether or not you're like, this thing left the like this is the thing with sci-fi shows. You're either in it or you're not. It's really hard to be a casual time travel fan because the first season of dark, its brilliance is the creation of this town Winden and these kids. And it has a lot of the same things that were great about Stranger Things season one.

As it goes further and further and it's more about the mythology of time travel within this show, I think it sheds a lot of its like, hey, I checked out this show. it was about teenagers, but they also travel through time. I'm down for all of this. I am a time travel guy, I would say.

My favorite season of loss was the time travel season. True. All right. Well, then I can't wait. Chris, I've spent the last two weeks time traveling back to the late 19th century on cattle drives. It's time travel back to 2015. But before we do that, last thing, I know we touched on this briefly when we were talking about, I think we were talking about HBO Max, but I'll just, I'll just plant the flag here again,

which is to say that whatever TV business model or entertainment business model emerges from the pandemic and we have no idea what that's going to look like with the streaming services

at war with each other and there have been a lot of business reports saying that there's just unexpected amounts of churn like people signing up for free trial then bailing or jumping on to watch the thing they want to watch and jumping back off again

and you know there's always a recoil like these giant splashy sales with movies stars, that might be a sign that the business is just going to keep on keeping on, or those are the last big splashes of the previous iteration of TV. I will say that I just think that on some core level, TV audiences want something more stable, that they want a comedy or a drama that they can grow old with, or watch into the night, you know, or watch knowing that it's

going to be coming back. And these are stories and people that you can invest in. And that's why we're seeing, you know, a lot more Mad Men, the big splashy sale of Mad Men now is going to Amazon and it's going to live forever because of that, the continued demand for these legacy sitcoms. And I wonder if some of that thinking has gone into, like there was a very quick renewal of Amazon's upload, which is a comedy. We touched on briefly. Didn't love it, but, you know, obviously one of the great stars and friends of Briar Patch, Allegra Edwards is amazing on it. There's a really charming, likable cast. Greg Daniels, who did The Office, created it. I don't know their numbers, but it just felt

it just felt right in a way, you know, in a way that Amazon has been chasing the next big thing a lot. They're like, well, we have a comedy that people might want to watch for four or five years. Okay. We can do that. I was thinking of the exact same thing, but about the boys. Right, right. I mean, that's another show that we've not really touched on.

Yeah, and I like the first season a lot. Maybe we can touch up. We can hit it when the second season comes. We did because our friend, Aya Cash. on it now. Yeah, but that is a show that feels very much primed to be on for five years with or without some of the main characters that we know. Like, they'll, they could, I could see them just restocking and revamping that show like three times over six years. Easily, easily. Yeah, and those feel like smart investments at this moment, you know. Yeah. So are you, speaking of smart investment.

Disney Plus. I, no churn from me. Bobby back. Bobby King. back he was like, you guys thought I was sleeping. I didn't have my Marvel shows. We didn't cut. We didn't hit you with another Star Wars show. I'm sorry. And then he just moved Hamilton up. I got to say, I know there has been some, there has been some probably deserved skepticism of the whole Disney Plus play, particularly for adults. Um, once the Mandalorian ended. But if you have children in your house, it has become a verb, basically. like there seemed to be no end of straight to video sequels or prequels of The Little Mermaid.

And my children are like, did you know that's how Ariel met flounder? And I was like, you know, I can't say that that, like the outrigger and loss, that was not some great question that I've been wondering since 1989, but they will watch that shit. Yeah. So, but now there's something we all watch together. Yes. Which is Hamilton. Yeah. I was, it was interesting.

I obviously didn't have any, like, pressure to watch this over the weekend. Like, I was lucky enough to see Hamilton. Drop it. Drop the brag. It's not bragg. It's more of like a non-Daddington Island brag. I was just like, there was nobody in my house who was just like, we better for watch this. The brag isn't that you had time to choose to watch it.

The brag is you and I both saw the original cast on Broadway in New York City. Well, land of dreams. No, so it's even more of a brag. I wasn't like I can't wait to start fire up Pamilton. I watched my favorite songs basically. I imagine you had a much more ceremonial and drawn out like screening of the movie. T-shirts were worn. How many times has it been watched in your house since?

Well, one, because it's extremely long. But they're not like, can we watch wait for it for just like a second? The idea of treating it like a mixtape has not come up yet. Okay. Because, you know, interestingly, both my children have, favorite songs, like, they are very well-versed in it. And so actually watching it, it was, look, it was a joyous experience. And the only real note I have to say about it is, I think it's great that they moved it up.

I think it's phenomenal and wonderful that everyone in America who, you know, shells out the $499 or whatever for a month of Disney Plus can have access to it and that it is the filmed production that is the stage show, which, you know, getting to watch it on screen, you appreciate a lot more performances because you kind of can't see them if you're not in the first five rows, the faces, the choreography. But more than anything else, like, I still stand by what we said when we potted about it four and a half years ago. I just think that this was one of the great artistic experiences of my life getting to watch it. I think it's one of the great achievements of our time and of our century. And I think it just kind of gets better. What are some other really

good achievements from our century? I'm having a hard time remembering. Eastbound and down, particularly the Adam Scott scenes, the second re-up gang mixtape, the time I told you that I watched Ozark. But not actually Ozark? Just like you telling me about it? That was my favorite part of Ozark, yeah. Okay.

No, rather than going down to a dark place, I just, you know, I listen to Lynn Manuel on fresh air, hashtag Daddington tweet. but you know he he's talking about how it does hit different like it it was sort of marked as a celebration of like Obama era triumphalism and obviously it hits different in our current nightmare reality but it's attention to you know just its interest in the small bore work of politics and life and the sort of capricious subjective nature of history and just purely as an artistic exercise of being like, I am going to write myself a starring role. I'm going to write

my friends and people who look like me into American history. I'm going to, you know, just grab hold of a narrative and rework it both for on a small board level in terms of like Lynn Manuel Miranda's career, but also in terms of how we perceive our foundation is just, it's breathtaking. And it is a very, very moving experience. experience. And obviously, yeah, it's a little, is it a little more dusty in there when you're watching it with your children? I would say probably. And it's a lot better than, you know, the Little Mermaid 0.5 arrival at King Triton City or whatever. But it's a really, I still think it's a transcendent experience, whether it's in person or whether it's on the screen. And it was pretty cool that that was washing over the country on a weekend when a lot of other negative stuff was washing over it as well. I don't really want to get into like any sort of revisionist critical kind of sort of fighting about it. But I, because there was a lot of that online over the weekend and people being able to be able to. Sorry, I found that really exhausting.

But I did, you see one really interesting conversation online about Hamilton that I thought I would mention, which was our old. You could stop. You found an interesting conversation online. Go on. Yeah. It was on, uh, our old Grantland colleague Mark Harris was talking about. basically the the scarcity of how hard it would be to do film level productions of these plays

to capture them for all time and for also I think part of the reason obviously people are paying for Disney Pleuss and there's like a whole capitalist conversation to be had about that and this is always really baked into tension around Hamilton even back in 2015 where it was

like the people who this play would, or this music would mean so much to rarely have an opportunity to go see it because of how expensive the tickets are, what it quickly became, especially once it moved to Broadway. But Mark was sort of talking about, you know, how expensive and difficult it is to convincingly capture a theater performance.

And also, like, even watching it on Disney Plus, I was like, man, I just, I'll never forget exactly where I was sitting in the theater, when I saw it and like my mother-in-law like kind of like getting excited about certain songs or certain moments in it and like the energy that you feel when you do participate in something with a group of people and yep I think we're being forced to like contemplate that on so many different levels with sports possibly coming back in this country and without fans and whether or not we can kind of like participate in these usually communal activities in a in a like in an aquarium of kind of like well

this is what hamilton looked like it's it's too bad no one's ever going to be able to be in a room to see it again i think that i appreciate that that that whole line of thinking because i one of the things that's tricky is that you know works of art often work best in the box that they're designed for whether it's a book or it's a movie or it's a tv show or it's a show musical or something meant to be done on the stage. And one of the reasons why, and I think people are like, it's, you know, it's very easy to be like, oh, I'm allergic to musicals or I don't like them or whatever. And there's stuff that's, that can be corny and there's stuff that can be, you know, tough to kind of line up with your general diet of Ozark or whatever. But the one thing that is very hard to translate if you're

not actually in the room is that being in the room is what makes it special, right? Like, sharing that moment with those performers and that audience and seeing the sweat and the spit or the mistakes and feeling, it's like, it's the same feeling that can happen in a sports arena. It can happen in a religious service when people start, the choir starts singing. You can be lifted outside of yourself. And I think that's one of the reasons that people continue to go to theater always on any level. Generally, when something is adapted, the first thing you do is lose that. And you try to think about, okay, well, what's it going to be not on a stage, but what's it going to be on a set or on location and the great movie musicals, like Sound of Music was one thing in the theater. And then when

you're actually filming on hills that are literally alive, it became something else. And it had to because of that. And your spirit is stirred for different reasons. It was really wild that they tried to film it because to film it on stage, look, I mean, I could show you the VHS of my high school performance in Guys and Dolls, but I would say it's a little static, you know, wasn't a lot of camera movement. Performances were money. But, yeah. But if you rob it of that, and so what they did, I think Mark is right. What they did here is actually a lot harder than it looks. Because it's not an adaptation.

It's a filming of a performance. Yeah. But they did it in a sort of a hybrid fashion where they did film it with a lot of cameras and angles up close when they were in between performances when they're doing eight shows a week in June of 2016. And then they also filmed two actual performances. So you can feel them responding to a crowd. You can hear the crowd at appropriate moments. And it feels seamless. And it's dynamic and alive.

You're dynamic and alive. Don't let anybody tell you differently. We can wrap it up there. I think we'll probably talk a little bit about Quibi and I may destroy you on Thursday. I'm sure other stuff will come up. Do you want me to hit the Netflix Babysitters Club adaptation? Because I can...

No, I want you to get your fucking windbreaker on and get in an Audi and watch this time travel show with me so that we can go back and forth across centuries. Or I will just tell you what happens. Huh. Okay. We're going to have this conversation.

off air. And let's get into this interview that I did with Crystal Moselle, who is a phenomenal director. She directed a documentary called The Wolfpack and then has been working on iterations of this story for a minute. And we got into that. She first did a short film with the young women who are now starring Betty. Then she made a movie called Skate Kitchen. And Betty derived basically, just organically from Skate Kitchen on HBO. People know it's one of my favorite shows of the year. And Crystal is the director, creator, showrunner, and here she is, live from her New York City apartment. I'm so excited to be joined by you, Crystal, and to talk about the show Betty, but I have to start a little more informally, which is to say, as I'm sure you know,

2020 has been a pretty low year for everyone and for America. And I just want to personally thank you for giving me an absolute moment of joy when watching Betty is one of the few things that has brightened my day, and it's filled me with so much happiness. I wish I could carry that with me forever. So thank you for that show. Oh, yeah. Yeah, thanks. I mean, it's kind of an incredible achievement and it just sort of snuck up on me. So I wonder for people who aren't, who've only just discovered your work through the show and aren't familiar with Skate Kitchen, which is the film that you made that precedes it and in some ways, you know, is the source of a lot of the show. Can you give us the origin story? How did you stumble upon these young women and their world of

skateboarding through New York City? I was on the G-train in New York City, and I ran into Rochelle and Nina and their friend Leslie. And I just was listening to them, I guess. I was eavesdropping on them, I guess, you could say. But Nina has that charismatic voice that sort of just carries. Like, if we go to a restaurant, sometimes I feel like all the tables around us, like just go silent and they're just listening to her. is there something very charismatic about the way she speaks and she's very much the girl on the show.

I met them and I just, you know, ask them, I said, would you ever want to do some sort of film project? And they were like, yeah, of course, yeah. And that's how it began. And we made a short film. And that went to the Venice Film Festival. We did it with Mimi's Woman Tales. It's like kind of an initiative they have for female filmmakers.

And then we made the feature like the next summer. And HBO hit me up and they were excited about it and now we're doing Betty. I mean, it's sort of incredible because I think that all pitch meetings in Hollywood involve executive saying, you know, we want you to show us another world. Very often though, that world is like Westeros or Middle Earth or something incredibly expensive in CGI. And yet here you are giving people a world that is right underneath their noses or right. next to them on the subway if they just paid attention? Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, when I first started hanging out with the girls, I was incredibly just, like, inspired and felt it was, like, the most incredible feeling.

It's like I had this, like, a reawakening because I lived in New York, I think, about, like, 17 years at that point. And I was just completely exhausted by it and over it and, like, ready to move somewhere else. and they just changed my entire point of view of New York. Like I started looking at the city in a whole new way. And it was really beautiful. It just made me realize people like, oh, New York's done, New York's over.

And then I'm like, you don't hang out with enough teenagers because they will show you the way because they're always finding something that's unique and it was beautiful. I love what you're saying, not only because I lived in New York for 17 years, before I did do the bad thing and give up and move here to Los Angeles. But what my co-host, Chris and I, who also lived in the city for many years, kept talking about when watching your show, is that it just reminded us, I mean, not just of being young, even though we were never young female skateboarders. But it reminded us of, like, the most magical part of the city, which is when it opens up, like, a chutes and ladder board for you. And behind every corner is a possibility. And you could always meet someone or fall into a different rhythm or fall into a different day or life. And it was really inspiring. Yeah, there's something about New York where I think the most beautiful part about New York is being outside.

And I remember my dad visited me when I moved to New York when I was younger. And he's from New Jersey. But he lived in California. He hadn't been back for over 20 years. And he had said, I remember him being like, oh, New York is, it's like your living room. It's like everywhere you go, it's just so comfortable. It's all an extension of, you know, your house is outside. And there's just like, you know, every time.

there was like an awkward amount like when the girls were like on the street and I was like there's a scene on the street and it felt weird and I'd always just be like let's just sit on the ground and see what happens if we get like down into like the concrete and it always made it better. They always like sit down on the ground and I just started doing it with them nine. It's in the ground as well. Well there's just such an unspoken sense of community that I you know frankly I miss a lot but like immediately I just zeroed in on in the show because in the first episode there's a you know there's a sudden thunderstorm. And immediately every person, no matter who they are, no matter what they

have to do with each other, knows what to do. And you go to the, you get cover under the awning, or you go to the bodega, you get the crappy umbrella. And there's just a shared language. And immediately, you feel, you know, when you're watching the show, you're in the hands of someone who understands a place, but also isn't being snobby about it and is welcoming you into it. You know, there's a very inclusive spirit to the show that I found really, really appealing. Yeah. I mean, that's like these girls are very inclusive, which is very different. then when I moved to New York, felt like there was a lot of just competition and mean girl attitudes.

And these girls, like, when they meet somebody new, they give them the chance right away. And thought that was very beautiful about this group. And I was like, oh, this is like the way things should be. Like, things need to change in like a new direction. And it's funny because, like, the world seems to be catching up a little bit with, like, their attitude. But when I first met them, it wasn't like that. like things were a lot different.

Like it's funny, the world has shifted a lot. Well, their attitude and their energy just feels undeniable in a way that is very affirming and optimistic, I think, maybe for people who are on the other side of that age. After you, we made, you made the film Skate Kitchen and it presents the characters in their world and Rochelle's character's entrance into that world in a very specific way. When it came time to make the TV show and you suddenly, you know, could open it up and you had a lot of, I don't know the right skateboarding term. What does skateboarders say when there's like a lot of space in front of them?

But anyway, they had a lot of space in front of them and in front of you. Talk to me about the creative process that went into that. Because one of the things I love about the show is that it feels like where you've placed these women and placed our entry into their world, it can go anywhere now. I mean, it just feels so open-ended in a really thrilling way and they're capable of telling us almost any kind of story. Yeah. I mean, I think that they're really great characters to bring us through a lot of current issues and things that are happening right now and ways that feel very real.

Like, I don't, like, they're consultants on the show. So I'm always asking them, you know, how they feel about something like, oh, do you think that this, you know, would this happen to you? Like, how would you react to this? And it's very important to me that like it all feels authentic to their world as much as possible. And, you know, I have so many conversations with them and I like hang out with them all the time. So they're always saying funny stuff that I write down and bring into the script later. And, you know, when we're on set, they always, you know, do a version that's more improv of the scene that we've already written. It's just about authenticity and then really paying attention to things that are concerning us right now.

But the way that the show pays attention to them, it feels so natural. It comes from character first. It comes from the world first. And there's a moment in, I believe, the third episode or fourth episode, I'm sorry, I don't remember which one exactly, where the girls who had been arrested basically turn on Kurt. And they're like, you could get away because you're white. And obviously, that moment hits pretty different for a lot of people watching the show. show in June, July of 2020, and yet this was just something that was natural, you know, and observed and thought about by your writers and by your performers. And, you know, it's just,

I guess I'd say it hits harder because of the naturalness of that moment, you know, in no way is it forced. It's not, you're not forcing topicality onto the show. The show just lives alive in a, in the present moment. Yeah, it's been really wild how, um, how things have unfolded with the show and like what's happening in the world right now, It just kind of hit like a really nice time together. Yeah, I mean, like in the movie, I'm not sure if you saw the movie, but there was, you know, there was like this moment where, you know, the girls are telling their Me Too stories and that came out before Me Too.

Like you shot that movie before Me Too even existed. So it's like we have, I think there's like this kinship with the show and the issues in this world. And it's unexplainable. I mean, it's amazing, and I'm glad you're going to get to keep working on it. Clearly, you, in your directorial style, you know, it feels incredibly kinetic and loose, and you're capturing these women in motion and capturing the skateboarding in motion. And as you're saying, there are these observed moments that just feel like they came up when you're on set. To say the show has a vibe is one thing.

To create a vibe, there's obviously an enormous amount of hard work and forethought put into it. So I was wondering what kind of set you like to cultivate. How do you get the practical direction done as you want it to be done while keeping the vibe the way it is? Well, we shoot the scenes kind of like a documentary. So the camera's very loose. And we know that like the frame that we need to get, there's a lot of movement and like it's never the same. I always wanted to feel like you're discovering something for the first time. I don't like it to ever to feel like it's set up.

There's like a lot of flowing and like movement. For me like as a director it's like I can't like when the camera is still, it better be up close on somebody's face in an emotional moment because and with these girls like their whole life is always flowing and moving. Like they're not they're not standing still very much. And if they are, it's like very beautiful and quiet. And I know like we know the scene that we're going to shoot. We know like that we have to get like the different.

sizes of a frame. But then a lot of magic happens and like I see things on the spot and discover things as they come and the girls do as well because they're on the spot

improv is amazing. It's incredible. And usually I'll just push that along and like really just kind of try to like support what they're doing with that. It just feels like a very magical and delicate.

it balanced to me because you obviously have a background also making documentaries like the Wolfpack and these women are playing, you know, fictionalized versions of themselves, recreating their world. Authenticity matters, as you just said. But you also managed to collaborate with Leslie Arfin, who was an executive producer on the show, who comes from scripted comedy. How do you strike that balance between the shape that you'd like it to be and the shape that just emerges naturally? Well, the thing with the girl that's vet. they're really like we do a ton of rehearsal like a ton like we did like three weeks of rehearsal like every scene

we rehearsed so the performances like we know where the performance needs to be and they're really good with understanding the pillars of the scene like the beats of the scene and what they have to go through so they'll they'll improv around those beats so they know where it needs to go but they just they go off and give us magic over here over there and then they take it home.

So it's very much, it's a collaboration that way where they're very intelligent with story. They get it. So it's just really about letting it be, but understanding what the scene is supposed to tell, I guess. And what is it like along the same lines between fiction and nonfiction, blending the leads who are not trained professional actors, although they're excellent on screen, with the professional actors who have folded it.

into your ensemble. I'm thinking particularly of like Reza Nader who plays Farouk, who's such a phenomenal presence and also just feels like some guy who was sitting in a van. I mean, it feels as potentially real

as everyone else in that world. Yeah, I mean, Reza is also an on actor slash actor. I've known him for like 15 years and I've been wanting to work with him for a while. I actually, I mean,

I had him come to rehearsals and he was like doing like, um, rehearsal stuff with us. It's funny, though because I had spoken to somebody before had done similar work with like actors versus non-actors and I was really worried about the non-actors and they were like no no no you got to worry about the actors you got to make sure they like work into the world really like nicely and like

they understand it so I make to come into rehearsal as well so they can get used to the vibe but I also casting is incredibly important because you have to cast actors. that really can embody the realism of the world. It's hard. I mean, there's sometimes you have to cut around. You're cutting around the actors more than the non-actors, I'll tell you that. That's so interesting. But it actually jives with something.

I worked with an actor who was on the show, Tramey, and had to do all these scenes with jazz musicians. And she was like, the jazz musicians are just jazz musicians, and they're going to do the things that they feel they should do because it's their life. And it was harder for me because I was thinking about the blocking. Yeah. It's totally unexpected and counterintuitive.

but that makes sense. Yeah, yeah, it's a thing. I feel like my life's work is to perfect it. It's not perfect yet at all. There is no bigger cliche than to say that New York City is a character in something, but come on, like New York City is a character in your show and to see it like full and alive and vibrant

in Washington Square Park and the bridge and it made me extremely nostalgic and missing the city, but also, again, in the, you know, along the lines of things hitting different in 2020, it also made me feel melancholy because I don't know when I get when you get to go back to the city, I don't know when the city is going to get back to being the city. But more importantly for this interview, so excited you were renewed for a second season. Yeah.

How can you do a second season? How, I mean, the show is so communal and celebratory and does all the things that aren't allowed to be done right now. Yeah, I mean, you live in New York right now? No, no. I've been out for four years. New York is very alive right now I'll tell you that I saw a picture of Smith Street

it looks like Bourbon Street Yeah it's like very Norleans Like everybody's outside It's very alive So that being said I don't know I mean we're writing season two right now

And we are Right currently writing it To adjust to COVID I'm not sure if, because we have to be in stage four to shoot it, but we're in stage two right now in New York. And so we are trying to shoot it in September. We'll see. We'll see if we're able to or not.

How are all the performers? I follow them on Instagram. They seem fine. But like, again, with that spirit of like the city is their backyard, how is everybody doing? I mean, they're outside all the time. social distancing with masks, but skateboarding a lot. So we're good.

You know, it's weird, but it's like, what can we do? We can only accept what's happening, right? Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, that's true for all of us. It's just so interesting that the show that you made, you know, I don't know if you look back on it when you, if you've spent time watching it again since post, but like, it does feel slightly different. You know, there's a different level of emotion to it and to watching it now.

Yeah. No, I feel that. Finally, I'm sure you get this all the time. Do you use skateboard? Have they gotten you on a skateboard? Was this something that you knew how to do? When I was younger, I would cruise around a bit. They definitely got me on a skateboard a lot at one point.

And then I just was like, I think I fell this one time. And I was like, I cannot deal. I feel the same way. My older daughter wanted a skateboard for her birthday. And we got it for her. And I'm really excited for her. And I'm not projecting any anxiety. But she's been slow to get on it.

So I've actually been watching, like, Rochelle's teaching people how to skateboard videos. Like, I have become, because they are, I mean, I know this is like, this seems sort of tripe, but I find them really inspiring, you know, and I find them very exciting to watch because there's something that is so free about it in a way that I didn't appreciate when I was just scared to fall and playing Tony Hawk on my PlayStation 20 years ago. Yeah, it is, it is very freeing. And, like, you know, they describe it as, like, flying or just like, floating. I think that it's something, you know, so many, like, young women on Twitter

had, like, hit us up and been like, I started skateboarding because of Betty, or, like, my friend, like, sent me a picture of her daughter's, like, busted her chin open, and she's like, thanks. Um, uh, I think it's, you know, something that traditionally women kind of just felt like they couldn't, you know, so something that is something that guys do. But I think just even trying and getting out there is like reminding us like anybody can do anything and you know, we can break down barriers and change things. So yeah, it's, it's amazing because when I first met them, like there's no female skateboarders in New York City. Like they're like practically the only ones down town. Like I'd go and like hang out and never saw any other women.

And like now there's like hundreds of girls in New York City with skateboards that I see all the time. It's wild. I love it. And it's so great because I just feel like when I and my co-host, Chris, when we talk about TV shows or when I used to be a TV critic and talk about them, there were often two boxes. There were shows that were powerful and there were shows that were joyful. And there aren't nearly enough that are both. And I just think that your show manages to do that. And it's really, it's really necessary. Thank you so much. That means a lot. So congratulations also on season two. I will wait for it. We'll wait for whatever stage the world is in. but I'm just happy it's going to be made.

And please stay well and thanks again. Thank you. Thanks for having me.