The Watch - SAG Strike Updates, ‘Lessons in Chemistry,’ and ‘Beckham’ Director Fisher Stevens

Episode Date: October 19, 2023

Chris and Andy give some updates on the actors strike (1:00) and talk about the first two episodes of the new Brie Larson show ‘Lessons in Chemistry’ (16:42) and the ‘Beckham’ docuseries (47:58). Then, Chris is joined by the director of ‘Beckham,’ Fisher Stevens, to talk about the making of the show (1:00:22). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Guest: Fisher Stevens Producer: Kaya McMullen Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Stand up and walk now. Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at the ringer.com and joining me in the studio for the last time before he's off to Real Madrid. It's Andy Greenwald! Do you think I'm a Galactico?

You are to me, at least. Andy, it's great to see you. We are here with Kaya McMullen, our producer, who has hit record on this... A while ago, I think. Candid, casual conversation that we have twice a week about the world of popular culture.

Kaya, do you ever tempted to just, like, release the prepod tapes? I mean, you guys had a rousing about L.A. acupuncturists before this, so... I think I was just a little spiky, because what happens is... Speaking of acupuncture. I hurt my back. Not doing anything interesting,

leading over to get my valise. Jesus Christ. I think it's a back spasm. It felt like a firework went off in my spine. And I just, you know, I just... I'm screwed. I'm old. And I just feel like...

I mean, I'll get better by itself with light of cane patches and hot shots. hours. See, no. See, this is the thing. And you want me to go... Kaya and I... Get hands put on you. This is the thing, Chris. You can stay in pain. That's...

Pain is a choice, man. Like, you just don't want to do the things that'll help you feel better. So we weren't going to talk about this on Mike, but Kaya wants to, clearly. Kaya's worried about our demographics and feels like this podcast should become what it needs to be. Which is a wellness

podcast? Which is not about new Apple programs like Lessons in Chemistry or the Beckham documentary on Netflix or even the state of the industry, it's really about two aging men taking different paths towards self-care. That's the friction point. That's what's going to drive this thing into the next decade. One gnaws on nicotine tablets. And one does Pilates multiple times a week. Sure. But who's healthier? And who's having more fun?

Yeah, that's the question. No, it's not a question. Do you think it is? I just wanted to say I went to the haunted hay ride last night in Griffith Park. more fun. They moved locations. For legal... Legal purposes? I don't know. It's a great question. I wonder if there was an environmental impact study that was done.

I think I ruined a pair of shoes, doing it, sneakers. And it was okay. Because you were running? Like, I don't understand that every year you tell me that you do this. No, it was just like much dirt, like a dirt path rather than any sort of paved action. Right. You know, the first year I went to this thing,

so I'm sure people in their town have something like this. Like where... Sometimes it's not even like... Experiential harm. Sometimes it's not even in the amusement park. That's what I'm saying. This is now my second haunted experience of the fall. I went to one in Portland, Oregon,

and then I went to the usual one in Los Angeles. I wonder whether or not it's like... It's like a class A drug, you know, where it's just like you're always chasing that first high. Did you have one like sort of foundational? Yeah, the first year we went to a haunted hayride. I was like, this is unbelievable. The narrative thread about it was like that it was like a cult of children who were like living in the...

It was like basically children of the corn. Like they were living off the grid or something? Yeah. Because I did apply to that preschool. Is that Montessori? It was very, very hard to get in. Did Ryder and Wolfie get in instead of your kids? Tallulah.

Yeah. But yeah, I mean, it was scary, you know? Maybe just like I can't just reach over for my bag every time I want. Maybe I can't be getting on. hay rides and getting shocked by Oh, oh, I see. I thought you were still doing the Class A drug metaphor and your bag was full of more drugs? No, I got lost.

You mean like you're hurting yourself, you're chasing the old times. Yes. So that plays into what Kai and I are saying. It's just, it's time for a new Chris. A new Chris. I got a lot riding on the old Chris, you know? I got a lot tied up. Like a whole brand.

For what it's worth, I don't think our listeners want a new Chris. And I think that... Do you is the question. No, I just, I'm constantly delighted and amazed. Like one thing that we've learned about each other, because we're still learning, is that this week, you know, there's been a lot of postseason baseball for our beloved Philadelphia Phillies. And we have been texting a lot, perhaps more than normal. Sure.

With, especially with our buddy Zach. And recently we've been noticing that like, Zach and I are like locked in on the diamond. Yeah. And every so often, Sierra will drop in and be like, oh, I'm at this hot spot. It's not a hot spot. I'm trying to recreate English social culture where I go to get a drink

in between whether it's after dinner or right before dinner we try to go out. That's nice. And it's not really working in Los Angeles. I was also going to say, and we are going to talk more about it. Because in London you don't drive

four blocks away and then make 14 U-turns within Hollywood Boulevard looking for a parking space. That's true. I also would say that for the many charms of the UK that are present in the Beckham documentary, I would say it doesn't make pub culture look awesome. I would just say, like, I've only had good experiences in pubs.

But the thing that's so funny is that you say that, and I know what you mean, is that it's a bit laddish, right? Is that what you're saying? The 90s footage of people in pubs being like, let's garot David Beckham after I finish this carling. But here's the thing. When you send me 143 text messages

over the course of the second half of an Eagles game, don't you think that you are that guy? That seems low. Yeah, but I'm doing it safely at home. I'm conflict averse. From your massage table. I don't have my...

Audible Kyle laugh for the first time. I don't have my own massage table. I do have some of those like, you know, like plastic things like get the kinks out, you know? the back. Do you have a... Like the muscle gun?

Yeah. Do you really? I do. Oh, well, you run, though. I run, but on a treadmill. You run to your parking space to put more coins in so you can have one more logger before heading off to your 645 dinner. 645.

What do you think I am? Are you a manual? We only eat it five or ten in the city now. That's true. Andy, that's my story. Mm-hmm. I have a couple of news items before. Oh, you know what I didn't say?

Yeah. Is that today we are being joined by Fisher Stevens, the director of the David Beckham documentary of Beckham. I would like to request, first of all, that's exciting. And I didn't say that at the top of the podcast, which is my fault. If you are someone who made it this far in the podcast and was like, if these guys say one more thing about massage tables, I'm turning it off, and then heard Chris say Fisher Stevens, and you were like, oh, they got me.

They keep pulling me back in. You let us know. I feel bad sometimes. because I feel like we gave a lot of attention, strenuous attention, as you did in your own life, to the writer's strike. Right.

And the actors, we've been a little bit more lazy fare about. Yes. There hasn't been that much news. There was the kind of following the shape of the writer's negotiations. There was a, it's all collapsed and pointing fingers

across the table. The studios walked away. The actor side, usually through the voice of Duncan Crabtree Ireland. Or the voice of TV's The Nanny. Or her, Fran Dresher. We're like, we're waiting. We made some suggestions. They walked out. You're right. Ted Sarandos from Netflix. They did their quarterly earnings this week. And he commented on the strike and he didn't seem very happy about it. This morning,

the only real news I have for you is that a deadline piece that outlined a effort on the part of some of Hollywood's biggest acting names. So Scarlett Johansson, George Clooney, Ben Affleck, among them, made an offer to remove the cap on residuals to bring more money into SAG. Deadline characterized the offer as, quote, Hollywood's biggest star is laid out to SAG after a groundbreaking proposal that amounts to the town's biggest earners defraying the cost to AMPTP signatories by eliminating the cap on membership dues to be used to bolster health benefits and other areas that SAG is trying to shore up.

So to be clear, what this means is, like if you're a member, of any union, you pay your dues and often you pay a percentage of your earnings. So in like the Writers Guild, it's like 1.5 percent, something like that goes towards the guild. There's a cap on that. Right. So since actors salaries can get so high, no one is paying more than a million dollars, even people who are making hundreds of millions of dollars a year. And now George Clooney and Scarler Johansson and Ben Affleck are like, if we make $20 million or however many million dollars on an acting, we're fine to go over that if it helps. Yeah. I think that's amazing. Yeah. Do you think that this is like, I mean, what is the part about defraying the costs to the studios mean? Do you kind of grasp that? Or is that, is that about like, look, if this is the gap, let's bring it together by doing this?

I think there's a bunch of ways to look at it, and I'm not an expert in labor, nor am I a member of the Screen Actors Guild, despite multiple efforts. They just won't have me. I think you could look at this purely in terms of the spirit of the collective. embodied by these top earners. I think it's remarkable. They want to take care of their industry. They want to take care of their peers and the next generation of it. I think that's great. I think it is also a smart reflection.

I mean, they're being aware of the wide disparity in salaries. And wanting to contribute more is fantastic. And instead of just sharing enormous amounts of wealth with his 20 best friends around a dinner table, which I think is also awesome, and I'm still waiting for that invite to your million-dollar party. Clooney's doing it this way. I think that's great. I also think it's indicative of people wanting to get back to work. When we saw that there was a meeting between these members of SAG and the leadership, it did remind me of the contentious and I think ultimately canceled meeting that happened near the end of the writer's strike when some of the top showrunners were attempting to sort of meet with the brass and the negotiating committee of the WGA saying, we just want to see if we can be part of the solution. There's an element of that here, too. They just want to move. this ball along. The bigger picture is, I still feel like we shouldn't be here. I mean, I think that the AMPTP, especially certain members, have the money to make SAG solvent. And it's pretty

ridiculous that this falls on. This is the fancy star-studded equivalent of a GoFundMe for medical expenses. It's so nice that people are doing those things. We shouldn't have to do that in a functioning democratic capitalist society. But here we are. All of this is sort of getting the headlines from the fact that it's weird right now. Like I definitely came on this podcast and said what I had been hearing from people more connected than I am, that the SAG deal should follow very closely on the heels of the Writers Guild. And there was a lot of premature assumption of that fact. I think that just the tenor of the stories and the trades was basically like,

the end of the strike summer, what this means, when things are going to get back to work, et cetera, et cetera, assuming that SAG would be very ready to rubber stamp isn't a fair word, but to very, just pick up the bones of what the Writers Guild had done, you know, just adjust some clauses and just get it done. Yeah, I've read some analysis that there was an assumption that the WGA framework for their deal would be the framework for the SAG deal. And instead, it's like the floor for the SAG deal in some ways. I'm not saying that SAG is asking for too much. I'm saying that that is like perhaps where that disconnect came of like, right, we'll just do a layup line here. Well, I think there were two things. I think it's just assumed, I think, that in any industry,

like the previous deal sets the floor for the next deal. And there's good faith in saying that in goodwill. But the other side is kind of like, and the ceiling too, right? You know. There's an element of that. Yeah. I also think there was an assumption that the SAG deal would happen quickly because from what I understand, that SAG had been negotiating constructively with the AMPTP up until the moment when things went hour and then they struck. So the sense was that there was some a crude common ground to return to as opposed to the writers, which the WGA and

AMPTP had not really done anything when the strike happened. So that said, it seems really bad right now. And it does seem like the issue is about success metrics, about how to get everyone in SAG involved in sharing. Yeah, there's another element of the Clooney proposal.

And I call it that just because he specifically talked a deadline, where they wanted to change the nature by which residuals were paid out and have it go to the people at the bottom of the call sheet first. So that, like, basically the highest earners got their residuals last. Also interesting and very selfless. On a very basic level, I think it is a numbers thing for writers, but also, like, writers who are stakeholders in the success of a show, which is not necessarily lower levels, staff writers,

but people who are executive producers or showrunners or the creators, there aren't that many, right, that could potentially get bigger payouts going forward, which isn't to say that writers of episodes don't get residuals. They do. I'm not trying to talk past their contributions. But even with that, the sheer number of potential payouts in a successful Netflix show

on the writer-producer side is ultimately smaller than actors because a lot of actors are in every episode. Yeah. And how does that work? out. So I've heard, we can't, we don't know what it went on in the room. I've, I've, I've heard that that the ask suddenly was really, really broad and, you know, shut down conversation. It sounds like the saga is trying to have some kind of participation in streaming revenue. Yes, on all the revenue from the company is, is, is what I heard. And I think what is interesting and will be

worth watching is just where everyone's appetite is for this. You know, everyone needs to get back to work on both sides of this. A&PTP is acting as if this was a bridge too far and they would rather just not have shows anymore, which seems untenable. So we'll see. But it is a little nerve-wracking because there was an assumption that things we're going to get going again. And while writers, like me and much busier writers are back-to-work writing,

production is not back, and that's a big deal. How would you like to divide up the rest of this podcast? Because we have our Fisher-Stevens' conversation. I'm happy to talk about Beckham now. We can talk about Beckham leading into that interview. I think we should talk about leading into the interview. Okay, so let's talk about lessons and chemistry on Apple TV. Andy, you know, one of the things I love about being your friend and also being your colleague is you're out there, you're scouting.

Always. Not only did you scout this show out and you were like, let's check out lessons and chemistry on Apple. TV, but you were like, I hear tell of a dazzling young performer who's appearing in this show. Yeah. Not the star, not Brie Larson, but someone to keep an eye on. Just, I wanted to put a little, I just wanted to, yeah. Tell me all about Lewis Pullman. I just wanted to plan a seat. Because I, I haven't heard of this guy. Yeah. He seems, he seems like one to watch. I mean, I don't want to get ahead of myself. I feel like he's someone who could potentially be a guest on this podcast someday. Maybe you could do the interview. Is that too soon to say that?

It was like three years ago. So he's due to come back. Also, three years ago, that was a crazy time. Yeah. Do you remember? I do. I was watching Outer Range for Lewis Pullman. When you saw him, were you like, this guy's good?

In lessons in chemistry? No, in Outer Range. I thought he was good and Out of Range. He's obviously very good in Top Gun Maverick. And I also would just say that I saw him in the K. Mutiny Court Marshall, which is on Paramount Plus right now, which is the last film by William Friedkin. and is pretty hardcore law. Like, it's just in the courtroom.

It's Monica Raymond who is on Hightown and Kiefer Sutherland and Jake Lacey, Jason Clark, and Lewis Pullman. And it's pretty good. Great cast. Yeah, and Lance Redick. Great cast. So, yes. I'm just kidding. My own, your contribution to the podcast when I'm not on it, Eurasia, aside.

I was very interested in this show. Yeah, tell me why. Well, for a number of reasons. I think big picture, I'm still interested in what Apple is doing. And this seemed to be a great exemplar of what they most want, which is they took a best-selling, well-reviewed book, which is Lessons and Chemistry by Bonnie Garmes. They secure the rights to adapt it.

They get a A-List star in Brie Larson to headline it. and then they package it together and make a show that will be broad in its appeal. I mean, they want to make shows that people, and similar to their products, they want people to feel warmly about the shows. They want people to love them. I don't know if they necessarily want to push, challenge, fend, divide, whatever. I don't think they want to challenge audiences that much in the shows that they make. That sort of was a top-down mandate.

That doesn't mean they haven't made some more interesting choices. Just out of curiosity, what do you think is a challenging TV show? What do I think is a challenging TV show? Give me an example of a show that's been on in the last year or two that you find challenge, that you would say would be challenging. The Apple would be like, it's a little... Special Ops Lioness? Yeah.

I mean, it is. That's personally challenging. I guess what I mean... Would Apple do succession? That's a great question. I think that it would. it would you know

this is a potentially I think interesting digression I think they would be interested in a succession like show I think the key difference here is you know famously HBO's development process they were like we kind of want to make a show about money

and like that the 1% and how that how they determine you know our society and their impact on it and then they started developing and I'm sure they talked to many many people many, many different takes. Famously, and we mention this all the time,

David Milch had a show called Money with Ian McShane. They shot a pilot. It didn't work for them. Eventually, Jesse Armstrong and Adam McKay, and then a cast of not A-list stars, came together and made something that is absolutely unique and was a triumph. And was the type of show that we are continuing,

we're going to continue to talk about and mourn because it feels like that type of, even though it only ended up running four seasons, longer running show is harder and harder to come by. My sense is that Apple's development process would start in the same place. I want to make a show about money, or I want to make a show about a feminist chemist

who becomes a TV chef. And what they would do is they would throw money at it and stars at it and make it. And it's top down, not bottom up, ultimately. And the results in that may vary. When I was throwing around words like challenging, I think I was meaning more like the stuff that HBO still finds time to do. Somebody somewhere I may destroy you.

Yeah, exactly. The rehearsal. Yeah. How to. And it's just a different way to make TV. And I am not against crowd-pleasing content, you know. And all this is to say. So Lessons and Chemistry premiered with two episodes, I think, out of eight.

And I found it very, very, I find the whole thing kind of interesting. Because in a, there's one pass through it where I was like, this is, first of all, I think it looks phenomenal. I think Sarah, Dina Smith, as really talented director, did the first two episodes at least. You know I'm biased because my guy, Zach Gowler, I think is a brilliant cinematographer, shot those first two episodes as well as I think the last two. I think it looks, it looks expensive in the best way. It's period shot in California, bright colors, considered framing. well-cast around the margins. And also just in very small ways, like cooking inserts, chemistry, insert shots, like the way it moves.

I just really enjoyed being in its world. It's professionally done to such a degree that it's pretty compelling. I think underneath that there's some questions that I think you and I are going to, we're going to get to them that I think keep me from falling in love with something as opposed to admiring it. It's funny that we've kind of like settled into this Siskel and Ebert thing where like we go watch a new show and we're just like, hmm. And then one of us is like, I want to light myself on fire. Which one of us does wants to let himself on fire?

Me. Yeah, I did. Sorry. Yeah, I didn't really care for this very much. It was more just, I think, I found the first episode to be really, really, really plotting. I thought the second episode was better. And I think from now on we'll consider the spoilers for the first two episodes of lessons in chemistry. The second episode is much better. Yeah. I thought that the runtime was much more kind of like fleet-footed. I thought that the story, I'm glad that they answered some questions

immediately rather than being like, that'll just be a mystery that you guys have to wait eight hours to find out. I thought it was it felt more real. I think that the first episode was trying to get in a lot of different things, for one thing, signaling where the show is going by doing

this kind of nesting device of like, here's five minutes. of Brie Larson as a television chef and then seven years earlier, she's a chemist assistant. The Brie Larson, the Brie Larson piece, let's talk about it.

She has probably got one of the more fascinating careers of an actor I can remember in recent times, just because of the trajectory that she's been on. So she comes out of the gate and it's almost like saying

I liked her early stuff, but a lot of people were very fond of her in short-term 12. Me among them. Yeah. It's a fantastic indie movie if you haven't seen it. It's the birthplace of modern cinema. It's basically like... Dustin Creighton who did...

Who will be doing the next Avengers movies. He did Chong Chi. He directed it. It is like the origin story of Brie Larson, Rami Malik, Lekeith Stanfield. John Gallagher. John Gallagher is great in that movie. It's a remarkable source text.

Is Anna Kendrick in that movie? Who else is in that film? Stephanie Beatrice is in that movie. That's who I was thinking of. Is Caitlin Deaver in it? Caitlin Deaver. Caitlin Deaver is in this movie. This movie invented modern Hollywood.

Destin Credden. Good job by you. Great movie. Ten years old this year. Well, there you go. And it's been an interesting decade since then, because she wins an Oscar for Room. She appears in my beloved The Gambler.

Mm-hmm. As a waitress and, you know, smitten with Mark Wahlberg. decaying, crippled by addiction gambler. She directed a film. She started a YouTube channel.

She appeared in 714 Nissan commercials. Right. And is now a part of the MCU and the Fast and the Furious universe. Yeah. And it's like, and it's interesting that this is coming out

when it is, which is essentially paired with the Marvels. because these are the two sides of what she seems to be interested in doing, this very prestigious, dramatic work, and then big blockbuster popcorn and stuff. And even in those two performances, and I haven't seen the Marvels, so I can't really comment beyond watching the trailers,

is that she seems to have left behind like a kind of relatability, I think, that she had in short-term 12, And I think that that's obviously inevitable for people as they get more and more famous as it's harder and harder to kind of see the person. But I can't help but feel like sometimes she's playing a character on a spreadsheet to check off boxes of like maybe things she's interested in, but also things that are like appealing different quadrants rather than like I'm playing a person. But I haven't read the book and I don't know if this material is like really my vibe.

I think that's probably more, I think that's definitely can't be discounted. But I am interested in her as a performer because, you know, another movie that we mention often when we're talking about her is Joe Swanberg's Dinging for Fire. Yeah, that's right. She, what made her absolutely remarkable in Dinging for Fire in Short Term 12 and her earlier work was that she seems so intimately comfortable on camera and just being a person. And just she's there and she's sort of alive and she's present, which is an incredible skill. and the thing that we've talked about when she joined the MCU, and I think probably for better or worse, more likely the latter, when we talk about the Marvels,

is that she does not seem comfortable doing big green screen acting. Frankly, why would she? It's super weird, and not just because we recently talked to Joanna Robinson about her book, but like, just like when you see images of what these movies actually look like when you're filming them, when you're just covered with sensors with some dust at your feet

in a green screen in Atlanta, I don't know where you ground yourself in it, so I don't blame her. I think that's reasonable. But what's odd about this is, once again, she does feel kind of othered by the scale of it, whether it's being the star of this piece

or the nature of the character, who is someone, this is a show set in the 1960s, 50s and 60s, and it's not, so they're not using language like on the spectrum, I think it's not unfair to suggest that that's Elizabeth Zott, her character is perhaps. So in a way, I found her performance similar to her performance as Carol Danvers, is that she's an otherworldly superhero who's not really comfortable in her skin or on this planet.

It is not necessarily fair to her, or the way I even want to frame my conversation to the show to say, bring it full circle, and say the reason the second episode of Lessons in Chemistry works is because of the lesson in Chemistry on screen. Lewis Pullman is phenomenal on the show. You should really check him out. I bought stock early, so I'm sorry you can't get on the price I did. I know. It's tough. Much like what happens in the narrative where his character sort of draws her out to a degree,

makes her feel comfortable and safe. Eventually, yeah. Eventually. The episode is at its best when they are just two people on screen together. They're really good, and I really enjoyed a lot of the stuff with them, just sort of romancing each other. It's very sweet. and that's the part of the show that worked for me.

I will reiterate that this is a spoiler conversation for the second episode of Lessons in Chemistry. Here comes the spoiler. The second episode is a tender romance between these two slightly off-kilter sciences. It's also a harrowing, traumatic origin story for Elizabeth, where we get a sort of snapshot of what she's like as she's entering the world of science.

I mean, we should say, I feel like we sort of glossed this over. It's in the early 60s. Elizabeth Zodd is a god-level chemist and genius who got a master's and was on track to get a PhD in chemistry when she was the victim of a sexual assault that ended her academic career

and of course traumatized her life and her. So when we meet her, she is working as a lab tech essentially making incredibly refined coffee for scientists who belittle her. And working at this place called the Hastings Institute

where she's, even though she is a lab tech, asked to participate in, like, beauty pageants and stuff like that, where it's, like, you know, essentially, like, demeaning herself or belittling her own accomplishments. And she then forms a surprising connection with another outcast, who's like the boy genius of the lab, played by Lewis Pullman. You should check him out and out of range, a show I talked about frequently on the podcast.

And they then become partners in work and in life. He shows her how to swim. He teaches her out of swim with the still controversial kissing technique. Sure. Which is not how they taught me at day camp. I did not get that at my YMHA CPR class. Sadly, it is why you were asked to not return as a lifeguard that one summer. I didn't know.

I decided I was finished. You know what I mean? Okay, Kanye, that was your... That's how you left school? Yeah. Got it. and we're dancing around the fact that in the last seconds of the second episode

while she's home making a delicious omelet for their breakfast and their new life together their beloved dog kills him. That's not quite what happens. You make it sound like it's a wolf attack. The dog yanks on the leash. I blame the dog. And a bus hits Lewis Pullman

going like 58 miles per hour on Fountain Avenue. Like, it is the fastest I've ever seen a bus moving. Kaya's face says it all. What in the absolute fuck are we doing here? The bus hits him so hard and then the episode ends. But, like, I understand if that's, like, first of all, like, I'm having, like, a real problem being like... The face is in the studio right now. Elizabeth Zod is not a real person.

No. No. So I'm like... Part of me is, like, are you adhering to some biographical history that we need to, like, pay hold space for Lewis Pullman getting pulverized by a fucking wot suit. It's also very reminiscent of the end of Meet Joe Black where there's a massive car accident. There's something about this that is so unintentionally funny and so fucking I'm just like, so I spent two hours getting invested in these two people and I thought

like, oh, he must have just been off camera while she's cooking or maybe they maybe they grew apart. And it turns out they did grow apart because he is in heaven because he was hit by a bus. No. And that's where he lives. He lives.

He lives in Santa Barbara. Now apparently he does Lewis Pullman, great young actor, apparently does return in series like flashbacks and stuff. Really? Because they've known each other

for like four days. Also, this is what... What are they flashing back to? One of my favorite things in the show. And I bought it. This is a small nitpick but I mean it that like,

it's fine. because I thought it looked really nice, is that, like, the show suggests that they have been living and working together for at least six months, right? Maybe a year before they start living together, living together.

Oh, I must have been looking at Instagram. No, but, I mean, like, they're working together. They're, like, have this breakthrough. It's Christmas. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then they have this, like, nice dinner scene. And, uh... I have to admit, I'm starting to lose track

of how time passes on television shows. I have no idea. I think it's a great point. Yeah. But the reason I say this is... Like, at the end of the goal, when they're like, it's been,

years. And I'm like, what? It took you guys years to do this? I just mean that like when you're working that closely with someone, you usually don't wait until Christmas night when you spend the entire day to be like, do you have family you normally visit this time of year? And she's like, ah, now is the perfect time to tell you that I'm estranged from my parents. And he's like, I too am estranged. We've never talked about it until this moment in front of the Christmas life. You buy some of that. By the way, the movie that you referenced when we were texting about this is the Robert Pattinson classic, Remember Me, which is just like, like a tender coming of age story.

And then he's like, I will always treasure these memories of remembering you and falling in love as I ascend to my breakfast meeting at Windows on the World on September. Wait, what day is it? And then like the last shot is, it's pretty weird. I also was like, you know, I'm not going to say that. I was going to say something unkind about dog leashes in the 60s and maybe like, I would basically be like the dog walks on the outside and sidewalk. You know what I mean?

The dog needs to go on trial for human slaughter. Apple TV doesn't let you do screenshots. I'm sure I can figure it out, but they don't let you do screenshots. It's the DRM or whatever it is where it blocks that kind of content sharing. But I have a screenshot that I wanted to send you of the last shot of this episode, which is just the dog. The dog's like, oh, shit. The dog's like, how am I going to explain this shit? Are we being insensitive?

Is this a fictional character? Is there a person? Because the dog, she meets the dog in the episode, and the dog's eating garbage. And she's like, don't do that. I will prepare you a fine meal. The dog's like, cool. And the dog eats the food and shakes hands with her.

And the dog is having the greatest life ever. Until the day she learns to swim. And then all of a sudden, there's a dad around, taking up half the time eating half the omelet. I think the dog had a plan. Apparently in lessons in chemistry, the book, the dog is a narrator. I'm not joking.

I think 630 has like a from my POV. Here's something else I want to say. You can't ever say that we don't do the work. Books are so weird. And that's why you and I love books. And we often talk about some of our favorite crime novels being like, this not only could this never be adapted, this should never be adapted because this is either abhorror.

are so weird that it just doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make sense now, but you're kind of lost in the flow of it. And so there are details in this story that I think is accurate. Lee Eisenberg, who as one half of the writing team with Gene Ziphnitsky wrote on The Office and has done a lot of other work in various genres,

he adapted this. I get the sense that it's quite faithful in many ways to the book. I think there's one chunk that we're going to talk about in a moment that is not as faithful. But when I saw some of the decisions in this character and like,

I'm like, this is insane. So I'm like Googling reviews of the book. And the New York Times is like, this book confounds every stereotype and it is excellent. Like people love this book and details like your man, Louis Pullman, getting pancakeed, like the dude that ran onto the field of Citizens Bank Park the other night. I was waiting for see if how you would work this in. That's in the book.

But sometimes a one-to-one doesn't work because when you put it on the screen, it feels absurd. I have to be completely honest, this was like red wedding level for me. I was just like, what? Isn't this? Who else is in this show? I also think that this is potentially an issue

that I think you cast this part. This is, okay, it's not even a bit anymore that I think Louis Pullman is great, but like, he so outkicks his coverage here. Yeah.

That I think the show might have a problem. Do you know what I mean? Like this show, I think the next. nature of the story, the book and the story is about this woman who doesn't fit in her time. It's anachronistic in her personality, in her point of view, and in her wants and dreams and needs and behavior and overcoming her time period.

And she finds the one guy who's like, why would anybody be sexist? It's true. And so I think in the written narrative of it, he exists solely for her to learn from and survive and endure and thrive. But in the visual storytelling language of this show, the show was working best when it was a romance, frankly. And I don't mean to belittle what the show wants to be or Brie Larson's performance or anything. But I don't know how you do it. It felt preposterous because it had found its footing.

And that's one of the reasons why I find the show interesting is because it does fit into this larger conversation that we've been having and just sort of thoughts that I've been struggling to articulate. which is just like broadly, what are we doing in television? Because you work really, really hard to make a entertainment. Yeah. And you create a world and you have characters. And these two making it work and cooking dinner with their dog and like overcoming the patriarchy, I'm like, fucking put that on ABC on Thursday nights for 10 years. Not everything needs to be Game of Thrones.

You mentioned the Red Wedding. But like, or this should be a light two-hour entertainment movie, right? Which is a genre we used to have is that books that were a little bit baggy and a little bit beloved would be optioned. And then when they would be adapted into movies, they would be a bloodthirsty, no, not bloodthirsty, cutthroat. Bloodthirsty would be killing all the characters with buses. Cutthroat adaptation, meaning we understand that it's a book, but we can't do that. We have two hours of screen time, so we will make this a movie version of it,

and it'll be what it'll be. You know what I was thinking of when I was watching this show was in her shoes, which I think is a fantastic movie. It was a Curtis Hanson, LA Confidential, directed movie based on the Jennifer Weiner novel,

and it was Cameron Diaz and Tony Collette, set in the great city of Philadelphia, City of Champions. It's true, it is. The final scene in that movie is set in one of Philadelphia's beloved Jamaican jerk chicken checks. You've not seen this movie?

Honestly, don't think I have it. It's rewatchable to me. My point is that it is a light entertainment that doesn't, that knows what it's doing. It takes it, it is made with seriousness of purpose and care. But you get in, you get out in two hours. When you're making an eight-hour thing that has to have the weight to almost earn its runtime and its star's salary, you get these moments where it's like, let us really delve into the everything about this

Calvin character up into his outrageous death and then we keep going and then you get into the whole other part of the show which is the thing that I think we also are bumping on which is also she's not only is she going to overcome the patriarchy and solve DNA and people's dinner problems

she's also going to fix civil rights and that seems to be the suggestion just based on the cast list so Asian Naomi King plays a character named Harriet which I think is new to the show was not in the book, correct? Or perhaps like some elements of conflation, but from what I understand, they're going to build the 10 freeway through the vibrant heart of a black neighborhood.

What is now kind of West Adams is then called Sugar Hill. That's all true, but putting that into this show, I think, is an addition from the book. Okay. So I imagine that they become friends in this. Seems like it. Yeah, because the Harry character, was neighbors with Dr. Adams. R-I-P.

They had a falling out over the fact that Dr. Adams did not come to a meeting, like a city planning meeting. I can't believe we're getting so into the weeds with lessons in chemistry. I was really intrigued by this. I find you were just so unpredictable.

Anyway, she doesn't go to this meeting. And she's like, I can't really count on you. Yeah. So peace out. Like, when I see you, I see you. And then he gets up by a bus. So Harriet is, also going to be dealing with the fallout,

things unsaid to Dr. Adams. And I think this goes to my biggest, maybe both of our biggest, the reason I was trying to, maybe we're taking even too much time talking about it, is because I did want to praise the specifics of the show that are working and the spirit of a show like this

that could work, and maybe will work. I mean, this could be getting great viewership numbers for Apple. We don't know. There's a larger, there's a larger issue that I'm, I think we both have, they both are struggling with that the show is a absolute

front of the line example of, which is, and I think I'm just, I'm done with, which is characters from 2023, basically like points of view from 2023, like time travelers in period pieces, who are there to win moral victories

for contemporary audiences that defy history. Well, you were asking what is Apple doing? and that is something that they do do like where they take what would be like say the first season of Ted Lasso has some elements of like hey this guy's lonely

and like he's having a hard time with this divorce but like here's the story of this this crazy story like what if an American football coach took over a European soccer club an English soccer club and then the second and third seasons get way more into like mental health and like so many more issues

as they go along and then the you know whatever the same thing it could be said for morning show. If morning show was a salacious basically prestige soap set on the behind the scenes day to day production of a morning

news program, I think it would be pretty incredible. I mean, not incredible, but it would be like that's worth the price of admission, but it's also now been about COVID the war in Ukraine January 6th. January 6th. And it's sort of like a quasi-newsroom show. What I'm curious about is,

whether or not that is coming from some unknown part of Apple HQ, like somewhere in Cooper Tina or someone's like, we got to make sure that we hit trending topics, hot button issues, the things that people care about. Or are those are the things that big stars kind of care about? And they're like, I'm not just going to do TV. I'm going to do TV that matters. I think it's a combination of a lot of things.

I don't think Cooper Tino is just like, let's really talk about election integrity and get to the bottom of it in our shows. I think there is a desire among all the creative classes to engage with the actual business of being alive in this country and to do not just good work,

but capital G, good work. Sure, you know? I hate to be cynical, but I hear that and I'm like, you mean on Twitter. Like, you mean like what it feels to be alive on Twitter. But this is tweeted, yes. This is also tweeting.

And you know the thing we're just like, oh, if I had access to a time machine, I could go back in time and kill baby Hitler. And then we'd solve all of these problems. The problem in contemporary art is that people have access to a time machine. You can make period pieces. And they're using it not to kill baby Hitler, but to move near Germany and shake their head and be like, I wouldn't do that. I know better than that. And it feels good. Do you know what I mean?

I do know what you mean. Honestly, it's coward shit. Yeah. Like, there are serious issues in the founding and the development of American cities, and certainly Los Angeles chief among them. But to sort of railroad, which is a poor metaphor, since we're talking about highways, that story into this feels borderline insane.

Because... Well, we'll see. Because now we've cleared out all the other distractions from this part. It's true. It's just there's this element of... It is the equivalent of a superhero movie to me for a certain type of NPR listener to have like the Brie Larson character is autistic for everything but sexism and racism. Right. And which isn't to say I want her character to be like super racist. I just mean it's it's just.

That's what an amazing note from Cooperino. Yeah. Tim weighed in on this personally. Yeah. He wants. No, it's just, and it's this is this show is not the only show that does this. It's just bizarre. It's like either tell us a story about people in history,

which is what Mad Men was doing to a degree, or tell us a story about now. But don't put heroes of resistance Twitter throughout the sacred timeline just to have them like pop off some like... Secret time. You know what I mean? That's what this is.

This variant branch needs to get pruned. Yeah. It's bizarre. Like, Asian Naomi King is a great performer. As you said, there's a lot more to be done with Harriet Stone. But, like, what she does in these few episodes is to, like, deliver a very well-written speech about why her neighborhood shouldn't be bulldozed by, well, a bunch of white men who don't have mustaches, but it essentially could be like, humbug.

We'll get this neighborhood yet. I don't know who that, I don't know what that's doing. I don't know what that's doing. I've actually, so first of all, I think that Rissolo, Bill, and House are going to do a part four of the over unders to discuss how they all took the under and how long we were talking about lessons in chemistry but we wound up breaking

like this is a long episode of this pod um you've almost now made me curious to see the rest of this or at least another episode to kind of see what I mean I was going to start the third episode because I needed to know like like you think Elizabeth's

going to take this well like is it like Benson and Stabler looking over Lewis Pullman's body like how does this fucking thing start next. I also just feel terrible. Like, again, it is the difference between books and movies where I'm like, in a book, it's handled a certain

way, and the author, Bonnie Garmus, I can imagine, can bring us into Elizabeth's POV, or maybe the dog is like, oh, shit, and the dog P-O-V chapter. Or the dog is like, got him. Got him. Got him. But on camera, the dog is like, it is what it is. This just felt

wildly cruel. Yeah. It just feels unhinged. This is TV. man, this is TV in 2023. There are a lot of worthwhile things that could prompt a 40 minute conversation. Lewis was like, I've got to get back to the outer range. Is that where you? Yeah.

Outer range season two is coming. Did that worry you when you saw that your favorite actor was going to be on lessons in chemistry? Were you like, what does that mean for out of range? No, I'm sure. I know that they're done the second season, I think. I mean, I assume they are. I don't know what the strikes and maybe they didn't. Okay, we're running long-ish. You got somewhere to be?

I actually don't. I actually don't. You want to do a four-hour probably? do a four-hour body. I am perfectly caffeinated today. I had stuff from the, from the top of the pod that we can still hit. No, I think we should talk Beckham. I love this docu-series. Tell people about it.

So, very much in the vein of the last dance, I think David Beckham was casting around to put together the definitive docu-series documentary look at his story career as not only probably England's most famous footballer of all time, but also a very 21st century story about a individual athlete becoming a huge brand very much in line

with the likes of Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods to England it's Beck's Beck's Beckham marrying Victoria Adams who was better know as Posh Spice and the Spice Girls and his international celebrity as a footballer and as

as like as a star and so I think there was obviously a story to tell there the way that Fisher Stevens, who people may know is Hugo from Succession, but has made documentaries and has done some feature work as a director and is kind of just sort of a mainstay of Hollywood over the last... And of... New York Theater.

He's a that guy. Yeah. Is very much in service of the Beckham myth, gets under the hood on the Beckham myth to some extent, and also is just a fabulously entertaining and compellingly watchable portrait. of sports and celebrity over the last 25 years. I watched this. I said this to Fisher. I watched this with my wife Phoebe,

who is actively like, what are you doing when I'm, like, can we go out? And I'm like, no, no. By the way, that sounds like Posh and Viz. Ashton Ville is playing wolves. She, that Posh by his,

drink every time she says she doesn't like football. Yes, I love watching him. You know, Phoebe does not love watching me watch football. So I don't have that. No, she's actually very nice about it. But she was like, do you want to watch this?

even though she was like, I don't really care about this stuff, but some of her friends had been like, this is really, really cool. I learned about this documentary from our friend Amanda Dobbins, who famously, I think, East Face Safe to say, is not into the FA Cup. No, but I think he's into English popular culture and has a warm relationship to football, I think.

But anyway, like, this documentary will satisfy sickos who know that Manchester United win the trouble and also casuals who, of like, so how many teams are in the Premier League? And like, why are they also play against Italy? You know? What did you think of it, man? I didn't finish it yet, but I'm going to. I watched half of it. It's four episodes. I thought it was wildly entertaining. It's really, really good. And I'm also glad that I watched more than one because I did have, I thought I had a slight criticism about it and then it was answered. It's, when you start watching

the first episode, it throws you right in. And you're, you know, Within moments, Beckham is bending the ball in an insane half-court shot that kind of made him... Half-court? Half-court shot. Is that what it's called? Midfield strike? Liquid football. Yeah, that's right.

Like a traction engine. And you were just off to the races. And my concern was, oh, is this going to kind of take for granted? You were worried that he wasn't going to bring up some really, like, hot-button issues. I was like, what does he feel about... the building of the M1 freeway through Duke Ellington's neighborhood. Yes. No, but more, like, I think one issue that I have sometimes with sports documentaries,

and I can go different ways, is like, this guy has transcendental magical abilities. And are we just assuming some people have magic, like it's Harry Potter? Like, he's just great at this. And then everything that happened is because of that. I think what Fisher Stevens did was very smartly, get us moving, get the car going down the road, and then he pulls back a little bit. So the second episode opens up a little bit about his psychology and his childhood and his father. It's a pretty interesting way that color everything you've seen before.

So that was my only real no going into it. Like I thought it is, you said it best. I mean, it is just incredibly entertaining. And I was not paying attention to the premiere. You know what? It has, it has Panache. It does. There's when I believe it's introduced, you know, like the Spice Girls are introduced with the wannabe video playing but with no sound.

And it's kind of like, oh yeah, like the shark and jaws is arriving in this, in this. And Victoria is fantastic in it. I would say, honestly, Beckham might be the least engaging talking head. But in comparison to Victoria and several professional media members now who are like Gary Neville, who is essentially like the one of the biggest pundits in England, sports pundits in England now, who is his teammate Manchester Day did. So Alex Ferguson,

who's one of the most enigmatic characters in all of sports. Roy Keene, like the people that they have talking, John Carlin, whose book about Beckham, or about Beckham's time in Madrid,

is a must read. Well, there's a couple things. I think it's interesting, kind of disconcerting, because it starts, the whole documentary starts with Beckham

in his DB-branded beekeeping costume, extracting honey from his many hives. Wait so you get to the part where he grills a single mushroom? I can't wait. Because he's like,

this is what I truly love to do is to come out to my grill and work on like perfecting the mushroom. This is how I think Fisher Stevens used the comfort level they had with him to his advantage because he does reveal enormous amounts about him. Beckham is revealed through the casual moments.

Like when you see how OCD he is in his kitchen that he likes beekeeping, the technique that Fisher Stevens uses where he has a camera close up on people's faces while they are watching footage of themselves and they cannot help themselves but react one way or another. It's pretty insightful.

And also he captured these moments that are pretty breathtaking. Like, in one of her first talking heads, Victoria is saying that she grew up working class and Beckham from the doorway is just like, tell them what car your dad drove you to school. He's like, tell the truth, be honest.

And she's like, we had a lot of different cars. depends when. And finally she's like, my dad did have a Rolls-Royce for a time. And he's like, that's it. And he leaves the room. It's cool. My thing, and I really need to hear you talk about this, is, you know, this was the early parts of the documentary or cataloging a period of time where we became friends and we were also both constantly buying like the British music press and pretty big Anglophiles at this time, if not. I mean, still are to a large degree. But I'm trying to bring this culture back. You are.

To the gridlocked streets of Los Angeles. God, you're just a preacher. But, like, you know, there's the great stuff about Manchester at the same time in the Hacienda and Peter Hook from New Order's interviewed. Oasis plays in the soundtrack. What was truly shocking to me was how provincial isn't the word, but how small the biggest things in England feel, felt then, in comparison to the way that. they are now, whether it's because of like the Emeraldi money that transformed the Premier League or just the globalization

of a certain type of wealth and excess, particularly in the world of sport, which Beckham was a part of the transformation of. But those opening images from the 90s, they're just like doughy boys and baggy shirts. And it and they're running on to like the grassy pitch,

and it does not feel like the glossy product that the Premier League does today. He was part of a two-way traffic that's pretty much like around when Arson Venger takes over Arsenal, but I'm not trying to make any definitive broadstrike. I'm saying that like essentially the Premier League, which was largely just English football players, started opening up to players from around Europe and South America and everything. And they, you know, you start to get your Tieri's and your Patrick

Vierras and, you know, Eric Cantona and these guys coming in who are sort of changing the game in England. The Eric Cantona part where he's just like, We played a beautiful football. It was a beautiful football between us. And then Beckham, for his part, is one of the biggest names to ever, like, leave English football, an English player and go to La Liga. I don't think anybody, and there had been players before him, like Steve McManneman and stuff, I think, had gone to Real Madrid and stuff. But, like, he is the Galactico who goes and changes everything before Gareth Bale and some other guys. I just loved, like you mentioned Gary Neville.

like, they just look like boys. They're just, and, and, and, and, and, my follow-up was going to be like, do you think that you'd feel that way if you watched like a documentary about the 2001-6ers? Like, don't you think you would be like, oh, my God, they had baggy shorts and they didn't look like. It's not, it's not the fashion thing. I mean, and also, no, but I mean, it's almost like. And these are all, in one of the benefits of documentaries at any time.

And Fisher-Stevens had access to incredible archive stuff from locker room and just, you know, as we find out, Beckham's father has 14,000 hours of, like, matches of his game. 1800 matches. 1300 matches. I'm sorry, that's right. To draw from, there's always going to be an element of, oh, my God, when you take away the loudspeakers and the fans and the screaming and the trophies, they are just kids in a room waiting to go on. And that's remarkable, whether it's sports or music or whatever. I think the thing that I'm really responding to was the nature of the rooms and the nature of England itself where it's like Manchester United is a global brand.

But for much of it's But especially in the 90s And up until more recently There was a receptionist Who worked there for 60 years And she's interviewed and it's delightful The rooms themselves are just kind of dingy I mean this is just

It was a local football club And that piece of it And then when you fold in the narrative too Of what he captures and what he builds Of like really reminding us Even those of us who know Maybe not as day to day But like know how important the World Cup is

to see what it, the way that that is manifest in England, in the late 90s, in the pubs, on the street. It's, it's kind of remarkable. And it does feel, it makes it feel like a period piece or a piece about a changing of periods to a degree that I did not anticipate. I was kind of, I was blown away and kind of moved by it in addition to being very entertained. Yeah, it's, it's nostalgic, but it's also very, I think, insightful about everything that came from it, you know, both in the, in European football, but in global sports. Did you ask Fisher Stevens? Clearly, Beckham has had his teeth worked on.

I didn't ask him about that. Did you ask him about that? We spent most of our time talking about our favorite Louis Pullman rules. Oh, so he knew him. Did you tell him? Did you Columbus Lewis Pullman? To Fisher Stevens? No.

Why do we get into my conversation with Fisher Stevens? Andy, it's been a journey through time. It's been a lesson in chemistry between us. Watch out for the bus. And we'll be back. Monday when we will be discussing... I love when you paint yourself into this corner. Well, I know that I'm going to go see Martin Scorsese's Killers of the Flower and Moon this weekend,

but I have a feeling that you may not have the three and a half to four hours of free time. I've been... Trying to talk to my daughters about it. Have you? Well, they're interested in all the words in the title except the first one. I don't think they should see this. I don't think so either. So no.

I'm going to see it next week. So I'd love to talk about it on the podcast, but not. We will eventually talk about Killers of the Flower Moon and also, you know, know, Loki, there's a bunch of stuff coming. We'll find something else. Don't worry. I'm not worried. No, I'm telling our listeners.

I mean, hell, lessons in chemistry E3. This could be a journey for us. Yeah, get on the bus now. Beep, beep. Here we go. Kai is going to watch it now. Well, no, we ruined it. We ruined it.

She has her face when we said. Lewis Pullman. I just want people to know as we get this Fisher-Stevens interview. Yeah, I just want to say, this is an MVP. performance by Guy. Even though she was barely on mic. The playoffs are here, and you can predict the action all the way to the finals with Fandul Predicts. Follow all the playoff dishes, swishes, wishes, wishes, and misses.

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signs storewide and everyday low prices on 365 brand items. Enjoy the fresh flavors of spring. Save at Whole Foods Market. Fisher, thank you so much for joining me to talk about Beckham, which is one of those things that comes along every once in a while that I feel like deeply appeals to football sickos like myself and football agnostics, if not outright dismissives like my wife. We watched it with equal passion and fervor. And I think my first question is how does one go around about making something that appeals to both deeply passionate expert level fans and also casuals? Well, that was the goal. So I'm glad that it was the way your household reacted to the show. Because I wanted, you know, the beauty of David Beckham is that he appeals to so many different people for so many different ways.

also I was not into football when he played in England. I didn't really discover it until 2003. So I had no kind of previous knowledge of what he went through in England. And I frankly just didn't pay attention to him in Madrid. At that moment, I wasn't like following how great football was in Madrid and in Spain. It was very good that I had a British editor or Irish actually. he'd be, you know, Irish editor and a British producer producing team. I was the only American, and I think it brought a very broad perspective of David's story.

So they, you know, and Michael Hart, my editor and John Batsick, my producer, they had incredible knowledge of football. Billy Shepard, my other producer, had incredible knowledge of the Spice Girls. And I kind of wanted to be every man for the audience. That was my goal, the reason you hear my voice in the, in the, in the, the show was to be you and just kind of discover things with the audience. So that was part of our planning was to make it for everyone. Now, I think that people see the word director and they understand what it means maybe when I see a Christopher Nolan movie or even when they see an

episode of succession. But for something as broad and scope that involves, I'm sure, choosing music, choosing where David's going to be interviewed, what footage you're going to be using. Can you give our audience an idea of what the director of Beckham does on a day-to-day basis? Well, yeah. I mean, look, this movie was, you know, I had tremendous help. I had producers, Billy Shepard and Nicola Housen and Sean Batsack, helping me. And then my editor, Michael Hart, kind of along with us, we kind of write it as it's going. But the director for this, yes, I'm choosing who's going to shoot it. Who are the camera people? What cameras? What cameras, what lenses, where to do the interviews, how to do the interviews. I have help with the

questions, but then ultimately, what are the questions? What is the story we're going for? Who are the subjects we want to interview? You know, I didn't get everybody. I got most people. And then in the edit, again, my editor is brilliant with music, but ultimately, like, it's my decision with Michael and John and everybody. What music to use? What composer? I actually had a different composer at the beginning, sadly, and it didn't work out. So we were very fortunate to get this great group called Bleeding Fingers in, and they saved my ass, so to speak, because they were brilliant. And then what songs to use? You know, we wanted Oasis at the end of the day. Noel Gallagher said, no way you can have a, we thought, we thought he said, no way you can use a Manchester, my song in a Manchester

United movie, but ultimately, Noel, thank you, Noel, did give us Supersonic at the end of the day we used it. So what are the songs? You know, I tried to use other songs. I couldn't afford them. You know, it's a consecutive, you know, budget. You know, I called the studio. This is the director's job with the producers. You know, I need an extra, how many episodes? We were going to be three episodes. Let's make it four. Okay. That was my choice. I needed to deal with the network. So it's a lot of choice, a lot of decisions. And again, I can't stress how important it is to have a great team around you and what an incredible team I had. have this other partner in David Beckham. He's got to be, you know, this voice in the series itself.

You know, you sort of arrived as Beckham was looking to do this, right? Did he have an idea of what kind of, you've talked a lot about what he was and wasn't willing to talk about sometimes, but did he have an idea of what kind of movie he wanted to make or what kind of series he wanted to make? Like, did he have a, was he buzzing off of Last Dance and said, oh, I want something that has that sweep, or did he have any notes on that end, the creative end? He brought up last dance when he asked me to do the job. He said, I saw that. I want to do something to tell my real story that nobody knows.

Other than that, I asked him, like, who should I interview? You know, who would be interesting early on before we started shooting? But he had no, no, he didn't. And frankly, you know, he wasn't thrilled. I filmed him in the kitchen making coffee. He got comfortable with me. and eventually, I had an idea to open every episode with kind of the real David. Like, other than that, I didn't really want to do a, like, follow David to, you know, do Adidas commercial

or follow David to sign autographs. I didn't, that wasn't the movie. I'll tell you one thing was interesting is if the lighting was too intrusive, he would tell me and say, like, you know what, mate, I want to be, you know, this is too much light. because he knew that like we're going to sit for three hours and we're going to really get into it. And so that was interesting. And he certainly's been lit more than most human beings. So he knows that.

But he was very trustworthy. I had over 40 hours with him. And he was very open. And, you know, sometimes I needed more time to retell a story that I didn't think he really got to the essence of. So we did it again. And I told him, like, I don't think we hit this note. Can you tell me more about it?

But no, he really trusted John Batsick myself to kind of tell his story, I think. You also get lucky, have the good fortune to find an ensemble cast of talking heads who help out with spinning this narrative. And, you know, when you get somebody like Gary Neville, it seems like that's the kind of guy that you almost have to get to stop talking. I mean, he's now become one of like the sort of sensations of British sports media. And there are so many other incredible interviews, not the least of which is Victoria herself, Victoria Beckham. When you sort of started to assemble this murderer's row of people who were going to also fill in the blanks on David's story, were you, were you like, I can't believe my luck that this guy happened to know all of these incredible characters? I don't really know. I kind of knew going in that I needed these people.

And the only couple I was kind of starstruck or nervous about were like Sir Alex Ferguson and Presidente Perez. I was very nervous. And Eric Cantina, actually, I was a bit, because I mean, I had seen a couple of films about him. And he is, to me, such a unique, special human being. I just think he was. So I was a bit nervous for him to interview him because I just revered him so much. But listen, I've interviewed, man, I've been lucky in my career. I've interviewed so many major people in the world from, you know, Bill Gay.

I mean, I've interviewed a lot of people. So I wasn't that intimidated. It's just that the only way to tell David's story was to have these people kind of, and we cast it because I would watch like Rio Ferdinand's great on camera. You know, obviously Gary Neville's great. It has to tell that story. And Michelle Salgado, who tells the story of when David gets in Madrid, you know, that guy I'd seen in an interview and we were like, we got a Philly and Shepard was like, we got a, he could be Gary Neville in Madrid because he played where Gary Neville played on Real Madrid. And he was one of the few players that spoke English and could hang with David.

So I got lucky with him, I would say. But we watch interviews with many people. There were other footballers we just didn't think were that interesting, even though they knew David, they just weren't great on camera. But you have to kind of cast your film. I look at docs is almost like fiction. Like we're just going to tell a story and let it unfold and, you know, see how we do. My favorite part about the interviews with the non-Beckham characters are sometimes when you, when you ball out and you're like at the Atlatico Madrid Stadium for Diego Simeonier or if you're, you know,

was that Lake Como for Fabio Capello? Like, where were you for that interview? I mean, some of these. Lake Lugano. Fabio lives there. I know. What a location. What a great.

but we wanted to also try to find locations that fit the the subjects i mean it listen with rinaldo we had no choice rinaldo said i'm in madrid let's go to my office but it's rinaldo of course i'm going to do whatever if i if i can get an hour with you man you tell me you know sometimes but then often it worked out like diego was easy because he was training the team and gave us the stadium so it was like oh my god awesome yeah that background shot is the backdrop of Diego's interview is just incredible. And he's still so in the moment. He's still so who he was when he did that,

when he had that kick. David, David showed me a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful text from Diego that he wrote him after he saw the show. It was really, really wonderful. Oh, that's great. You know, you and I, so you said you were sort of getting into football when he makes the move to Madrid.

I think I got in, I am also a Liverpool fan as, as are you. and I got into it around 05 when Liverpool made that FAA cup run. And there was this really interesting time period when European football was essentially like on Fox soccer channel. You could watch highlights of it. You could read The Guardian online, but we didn't really have Twitter and YouTube highlights

that you could just inhale and just look at all this footage. And so one of the things that I really loved about the doc is to go back and actually see some of the matchplay and see all of these guys walking down the tunnel, guys getting off the bus. Like the kinds of things that you take for granted if you watch American sports now and you're just constantly inundated with footage. For you, what was it like to go back and sort of assemble the video and assemble the almost the evidence of a sport before you were really, really into it

and before Americans really got access to it the way we have now? Well, it's funny. I love the kit, you know, the jerseys. They were so cool back then. That was one thing I... Yeah. And the way... There was a work ethic that I noticed.

You know, I got to see the Manchester United Archives. This great company, PDI, filmed them. And we were so lucky that they filmed Manchester United, basically once Sir Alec came until like 2002 or three. Or maybe they kept going. I don't know, but David left then. But the work ethic and the dedication and the training regimen back then, a lot of it was recorded and you see them warming up. And that was really amazing to see.

And the camaraderie and the teammates, obviously David had an issue where they had to come around him. But seeing also just, you know, I mean, you hear about the rabid fan base in England and the UK to see the footage of them going. nuts is pretty radical. It was pretty, that was pretty wild to witness back then. Obviously, it continues, but it's gotten a little better, I think, in terms of the hostility, but who knows? Without that archive, we would have been in a lot of trouble. We needed that archive to help tell David's story. I mean, they were in the locker room. There's a great shot of Sir Alex putting his arm around David at 16 years old in the locker room before he even made the first team that we cut to a couple of times because it's such an iconic moment. But the cameras

were in there. Yeah, I mean, you juxtapose that with the moments, the sort of last moments he has at Manchester United. It's one of my favorite parts of the series. Were there any moments, because I can't imagine putting myself in your shoes, you know, how distracted I would get if I was making this? And were there any things that you would think to yourself like, oh, man, I wish I was making a movie about this. I mean, you could make, you could make a docu-series about the treble season. You could make a series about moving to Madrid. I mean, you could make a series about Roy Keene.

Was there anything that you were like one day? Yeah, Roy Keene was one. I mean, I think he's a bit bummed. I could have used more of him, but it was tricky to fit everybody in. He's an amazing character. I tell you,

the story of the 98 England World Cup team beside David's Red Card, that whole story, surrounding Glenn Huddle. And there's a great movie that I would have loved to have made just about that team.

And, you know, Gascoigne, not getting selected to play on the final squad and destroying the hotel room and Phil Neville getting cut as his brother Gary walks by the hallway, they look at each other. You know, Phil had just been cut

and Gary's about to find out if he's cut. I mean, there were all these crazy stories. Not to mention, there was a lot more about David and him trying to see Victoria and what he was going through. So that was a story I would have loved to have done a whole episode on. Yeah. We almost did a whole episode in 98. And then the, yeah, the LA, the LA galaxy story is crazy and we get into it.

But that had a whole other crazy thing when he left from Milan and trying to build football in America then. And then now with Messi and David, what David took, what it took David to bring messy into Miami. I mean, so, yes, there were tons of times the Canton Now, I know they're making a movie, but I was like, oh, wow, we got to do a movie about this guy. He's genius, you know. Neville brothers and the sister, she's a professional athlete. There's another movie about the Neville brothers, you know, and the father's name was Neville Neville, and he was with David's dad, you know. So anyway, yes, there are lots. How did you go about identifying the moments that you felt like this is going to be the crescendo of the episode? Because one of the favorite,

my favorite parts about the series is how each one of these episodes builds, whether it's the trouble, whether it's sort of David's exit from United, whether it's the issues that he and Victoria face over the course of their marriage. But, you know, there's one in particular section that I love so much where blur, the song Sing by Blur is playing as you're kind of building and building. And how did you go about sort of identifying, okay, this is a moment that I want to hang a lot, lot of stuff on right here. Well, Michael, the editor, we would discuss crescendo moments and then he would, he's so great

with music. So he found that blur track, for instance, and we know, like, we charted David's course in each episode because it is a roller coaster every episode and the series. So it was just a matter how much time to hang and when we're going to stop and put a blur song in and see David come back. Yeah. And so those were long discussions. And there were more songs and more moments that we ended up excising because we ran out

runway. We ran out of time. But we talked about ending the episode at the wedding, for instance. You know, we wanted to end. We thought, okay, let's end it a wet. Once the wedding, we can't go further. Yeah. So, or once the red card, we got to stop.

Those were kind of obvious. It wasn't easy getting the last episode and putting all that in because we cover a lot of ground and a lot of years. And I think Netflix at one point we delivered an 85 minute fourth episode and it was not a pretty. But I knew we'd have to cut, cut, cut, cut. But they were really cool. And I have to say, they were like kind of the ideal partner for this. They were really, they gave. us a lot of room and they gave us some really good notes. And they really let us find the story.

And then when it was time to kind of, okay, that's it. Pensils down. Yeah. Thank God. Because I could have kept going. It was such a joy. I found the fourth episode to be fascinating because it's the deepest character study I thought of David in a lot of ways. I mean, it's called what makes David Run, but you know, you get into some of like... Do you know what that reference is from? You know, I think I don't know specifically, but I know that it's a phrase. So what did you tell me? Well, there's a book, my favorite book, maybe of all time,

is called What Makes Sammy Run. And it's by Bud Schilberg, who wrote on the waterfront. Yeah, yeah. It was a great, great, you know, screenwriter, novelist. And it's about a guy from the Lower East, in the 30s who will do whatever it takes to become the head of a movie studio. And the whole book is this guy trying to figure out what makes him run, what makes him tick.

And my journey on this was why is David always busy? Why is he always got to go? So I am trying to constantly get inside what makes this guy who he is. And the fourth episode, as you said, is, you know, he's not a guy who, is very into self-examination and why he is the way he is. And that was my job. And the reason I needed 40 hours and could have kept going was I just was fascinated by, he's a unique individual.

And the reason we are all fascinated with him is because he's unlike anybody else in that way. You know, you can't, you can't knock this guy down without him coming back stronger. And he, yeah, and he's also extremely kind as a human, which is kind of fascinating. the guy that famous, he has time for things. The thing that jumped out at me though is he's a great subject for a docus series because he has been at the center of these controversies, whether it was leaving Manchester United, whether it was leaving Madrid to come here,

whether it was leaving here to go to Italy and then everything in his personal life. And yet in all of those controversies, whether it's because of his demeanor or whatever it is, but he has this kind of like innocence to him. Like I wouldn't even go as far as say naivitia that it would be a little bit cruel. I would say that there's just something about him where you watch him talk and you watch the way he conducts himself and you're kind of like, well, he didn't mean to upset Alex Ferguson or he just fell in love or he didn't mean to upset the madridistas.

He just wanted to move to America to save his family. And there is this almost like, oh, this guy is so sweet. Like he didn't, this isn't what he wanted. Do you think that he wanted a simpler career and a simpler life and it just turned into this? Or is there a little bit more of a kind of a different side to him that you started to see? No, I think, you know, he kept saying, oh, I never thought I'd leave Manchester. I never thought, I mean, he had to leave Manchester to be who he is, right? Like, if he stayed in Manchester, he's not a global brand.

He's not, it wouldn't have worked anyway because I don't, I don't know. I don't know. He's still heartbroken about what happened in Manchester. But I think it all went in a crazy way according to plan. Now, people say, oh, life works. Everything is meant to be. Now, I'm not saying that necessarily, but I am saying that for David, it worked out.

Through better, for worse, he got to America. He saw how horrible the football was. He was a shock. He left to play in Milan. He didn't want to live. come back, but he was forced contractually to come back to America. And then he came back full on. You know, it was great for his family. And then he wins titles and tries to, you know, up the whole game there. Yeah, the red card, he's not who he is without that red card. He is not, you know,

after the red card, he comes back has, you know, runner up Ballondeur, second best player in the world, according to all the voters, wins the treble. Literally, least. the team to that victory at the end, you know, really help. It becomes a massive leader. That's all after the red card, you know. People throwing stuff, trying to kidnap his kids, sending bullets in the mail. It builds this incredible exterior toughness, yet he's so, like you say, he is vulnerable in a weird way. And that's why he's such a fascinating character.

Well, it's just an amazing portrait of the character, Fisher. Thank you so much for joining me today. We didn't get to talk much about Liverpool, but that's okay. Maybe you'll come back on one of our football podcasts later in the year. I would love it. We're going to make Champions League this year. Maybe win it all.

We got a little screwed over by Tottenham. All Tottenham fans just turned off the pod, but that's okay. Fisher, thank you so much for joining me, man. Thank you. Bye-bye.