Comedy Showrunners Roundtable: Bill Hader, Jerrod Carmichael, Ali Rushfield & More | Close Up

[Music] [Applause] [Music] hi and welcome to close-up with The Hollywood Reporter comedy showrunners I'm joined today by Alan yang Ali Rushfield - rod Carmichael Tanya sriracha Bill Hader and David Mandel hi thank you guys for joining us so there's an old adage write what you know curious for you guys what are the most personal things you've put into these shows and these characters I named the dog after my dog mm-hmm I like it I did a joke this year where Selina complains about why the New York Times covers modern dance so much that I'm very proud of really really do I find they cover modern dance boring they cover the Yankees what are the pieces of you of your history that you're sort of mining for for Laughs or or for not I mean for more serious when my oldest friends wrote Castillo he's an actor I we worked on looking together and I put him on the season and he wanted a tattoo of I'll eat that which is his mother's name on the thing and then when it was time to write his mother this has to be named I'll eat that so like it was this meta thing I've known this guy since we were 14 we went to high school college together he's on my show now and I'm casting his mother - that was and I was like trying to get as close as I could without like you know and but yeah so like it's very meta did you read his mom for it no that I did I don't know I like talked about my dad's illegitimate kids and stuff well you nervous not really I feel like you should just be honest your dad react well oh yeah I mean reacted like a dad you know there's a legitimate kid Jimmy some of the suppressed violence that manifested so Cowboys games no dance my dad had a similar thing on the topic of dads on the last show I did on master none we did an episode where he is dating two women at the same time 65 year old Asian man in Southern California which is like a pretty rare story in television and we had lunch we're like eating some seafood or something he was like so I watched the second season and I noticed you had an episode where I'm dating two women at the same time he's like I don't do that I was like yeah it's fictionalized account be super stoked you know you know as you're writing that that you're probably going to be at dinner sitting across from him yes I let's go for sofort for the show forever you know we mind a lot of my co-creator Matt Hubbard's life because he's been married for years and years that what you just did is like so fun that went on the ends got more of a serious vibe and that big one that's the just a bad boy - good yeah I can see that it's kind of like a James Dean you could put a salad in yeah you might go for a walk yes but real quick do you happen to know of a river that runs through Paris descent are you sure because then that makes this suffle Owings there's an argument between Maya Rudolph's character and fred armisen scare achter where for essentially 20 years he's been loading the dishwasher in a way that she's been loading the dishwasher drives Chris you didn't watch and and and basically it was just tines up your Forks being kinds up and it was like yeah he's like that's a real argument that me and my wife had and it got ugly just about the direction you put your Forks in the dishwasher and probably uglier when I went yep and then I turned to my wife and also we had a discussion about where you cut the butter oh stick of butter up I I cut a slice of butter yeah she likes crepes the top of the butter like I don't know when you're right but she's an alien you put the fork up so that I guess up cleaned better yes but you put a knife down in case the loser is well it seems like all of us can be married rational things to do what about you well my shows about a murderer so they're pieces of your past that she was surprised yeah I mean I think there's also with that character like what you're saying is you try to be as honest as you can especially I don't know you guys are in the writers rooms but sometimes it can feel like group therapy where those writers rooms are so could get so personal I find like I will share things in the writers room that never shared with like closest friends I'm trying to get to some truth about something so you just start you know talking about like yeah man I remember like and you know ninth grade just feeling like a utter failure and I would just cry a lot just like start crying not knowing what and everybody going on my best friend Duffy Boudreaux writes on the show and he's been friends with me since we were 13 he's like I didn't know any of this but um you've just try to find that Venn diagram of your main character and you and the room you know you just try to pull people and stuff the idea of wanting a community wanting like acceptance there's a scene in the pilot of berry where he's sitting there with all these actors he's looking at them and that's me my first season on Sarah alive that's me being with Amy Poehler and Maya Rudolph and Fred and everybody just going I so badly want to be accepted by these people but I feel I don't have the skills at all and they're speaking a totally different language than me you know and so it's taking that emotion and instead of making a show about a guy getting on SNL it's people I don't think we really care about it you know you know Alec I talked a lot about stakes you know and I think you know in comedy and you just go can we do a show about death you know life and death you know it'd still be funny you know so I guess my point is you take those things from your life but you could put it in to a genre type thing if you wanted to what if I train your guys they already have physical train yard they have like three not at a gym I'm talking about I'm a Marine alright I could teach him how to shoot combat skills I don't have to kill anymore debt paid he'd give me on me return these pumpkins into Cinderella's overnight huh I could take over Burmese mafia go back to 5050 with crystal ball or you just take the whole thing for yourself 50/50 was crystal ball like the sound of that well in the room and I was it was just Lindy and eighty who created it with me and we're talking about something about the mother character and I told this thing of my mother saying like to me when I was upset once like you're never alone and they were like oh that's so sweet okay we need to do that but just not as on the nose as that yeah I don't believe it was a laptop and season one where I get the girl I like a laptop and she goes that's too nice of a president and a lebesgue and I actually thought that was a nice president and all the women in the writers room were like no that's super creepy that's way too much a laptop a laptop ever early in a relation like we've hung out once oh yeah that's and I was like I dated someone once and I got them an iPod they were totally creeped out like a transaction that's why you know there are some people who come up to me and be like I wouldn't take a note of course oh I know I have six cousins on top I would marry I said well when's the last time as you guys were writing that you or your collaborators were a little nervous just for the things you're gonna tackle stars pitch me the show they just said we want a show about gente fication not gentrification but gentrification of a latina space by another upwardly mobile at enix East LA millennial female and then after that that was it that the ROI and a no-go I was like the trending page we have six months then I have enough to keep us going for six months no that's [ __ ] terrifying that's without you and me making a penny you should be scared shitless we're gonna have to buck the [ __ ] up if this is gonna work I'm ready to buck I put the queerness in there to have a you know a bit of me I put um brujas because I practice Brujeria I practice witchcraft like it was like how am I gonna get in here you know the queerness then we wanted to do it right and there was this one scene first season that a non-binary person and a fem-pop are having sex that already is we haven't seen that right and I was like and we I have mostly queer all at enix writers room we were like that's right but we've never seen the non-binary person with breasts have sex with a femme top and like what does that mean and we workshop that thing people would be like well like sort of like pitched how I've done it you know like but it was so like the responsibility was felt so hardcore you know cuz like it was like we've never seen that and also we've never seen brown queers do that it was workshop to death like you see writers hanging on to the doorframe being like see she could get eaten this way like everybody was just like oh no we could like whatever it was and then who we've cast was so important the person needs to be gender non-conforming to like all of it was so but then it turned out there anyone that comes to mind we had in the first episode of abortion hmm and it was like obviously purposeful to have it in the first episode I don't think anyone was nervous about it but like when I wrote the draft of that the actual abortion scene I kept making it a comedy scene and then the people I wrote it with kept taking out the comedy stuff why was it important for you to have it sort of I just thought I would be funny if she was like talking about like is this like removing them all or like killing a fly or like like asking the woman doing the procedure all these like nervous questions and they were like you're you're taking every bit of dignity out of this man who won the battle and there was someone explaining the play it was us like clinical it wasn't a comedy scene I'm not gonna brag but our abortion scene was pretty funny as far as bortion seems I can't try kept being like we could do it take where she says my jokes and they were just like I really liked how it was handled you know juh Roger I remember a few years ago when you were working on your show you talked about through your frustration with these sort of network notes of wanting characters to be likable yeah I am curious now that you are on a streaming platform what have you been able to do with the Romney character others in the show that you wouldn't have been able to get away with on that worked helps you what I realize it's not necessarily just network notes it's also like within like writers rooms like I love a lot of like the writers I work with I I don't like writers rooms like it at all it's like terrible for comedy like in both film and television like the roundtable punch ups and [ __ ] like ruined movies I've seen it happen like dozens of times and it's because everyone starts telling jokes to each other and then you get called away like you feel the emotion can go away yeah not saying I didn't you know I love them all as individuals but as a concept its it's terrible I agree but disagree I actually don't mind a writers room for punch up for making something funnier yeah when you are trying to make something funny I mean I will say that if you and I it requires somebody to be running it to make sure that if you are doing something that maybe doesn't need to be funny or that there is a motion that somebody is paying attention to those things but I think the part for me that certainly resonates is the notion of shows being written completely in a room from scratch you sort of the be more standard if you will Network sitcom version of like we're all going to be in a room and we're all gonna pitch it and then it's your turn to write or chew as The Tortoise all right it has to be specific that's the thing that drives me crazy and I say it all the time and people are like no you don't understand like no you don't understand yeah and all I can say is at least the shows I've been lucky enough to work I'm like on that's how Larry and Jerry did on Seinfeld that's how they taught us which is yeah we're not writing in a room we might make it better in a room later but our episode is your episode and your episode is your episode that is how you can at least preserve original voice okay write it yourself no you guys did a lot of that yeah I think we're all talking has kind of just point of view right it's like it's the best shows the best films in history have a very singular clear unique usually unheard-of point of view like a new point of view and whether that's comedic dramatic whatever but the thing that drives me crazy when watching something is when it feels like it's written by committee when it feels like it's cobbled together when it feels like every line was written by a writer if that makes sense you know I mean it just it's like no one's feel that way you go I do a joke so yeah you could feel that it's like that was done at 3:00 in the morning on jokes it's the joke like substances in where you can go I see how everyone thought that was very amusing at 11:30 yeah it's like all rhythm exactly so rhythm is like that I think a little little daughters on my four Oh sometimes play TV and she it's just all rhythm she's like saying yeah crackle just gave your daughter revealed you have no idea maybe a natural segue but what did this sort of the network versions of your show look like to a network and they were like we would we would put this abortion on TV and we're like no you would know like you might say that no they wouldn't here's the thing truthfully it's not that Network can't have it because I I look at my show as an experiment I smoke weed twice on my show I said [ __ ] six times in one episode my grandmother actually killed herself on camera about taking pills and we watched her die we did all of that on NBC you know like on NBC on Wednesday nights right and what happens truthfully writers limit themselves they inhibit themselves you were talking about like those deep conversations that happen in writers room I've seen versions of that like where it happens in the room and then none of it makes its way everyone senses themselves and freaks out of a mortgage and a privacy I think people do get raised in those systems terrify writers are terrified you can do anything on any platform that you want to do you can't absolutely do it you can get away with it we've progressed if you really look at comedy you look at it from the standpoint of like the 90s you look at things that in living color was doing Rosa han was doing like you look at like the boundaries they genuinely pushed as opposed to now like we self applaud so when someone attacks Trump again as if it when it's not an echo chamber or as if it matters and like people do the same thing and we applaud and we pretend that it's edgy and we pretend that it's going to get but it's changed like people are like they're afraid and everyone's like preaches to the respective choir and you know I don't know okay you know comedy is fun we feel like they're willing to push I mean I don't disagree about writers sort of self-generating the the limits but it is funny like I feel like they know what they're looking for or at least maybe can be a little more adventurous on the drama side and yet when it comes to comedy they are looking for I don't know everyone sounds like a virgin like like will you watch comedies like it's just it only makes sense like who like if these people are that's why big bang work because like Chuck actually wrote virgins and it's like Network sitcom characters but I was like oh yeah I believe you haven't had so the Virgin thing absolutely true but I also think obviously those guys are leading men but their characters - yeah real way and if you look at all so many Network shows where the leading man just just is weak chin is no choice but they in their effort to not offend anybody the the main guy is the most boring guy in the show and it's when you were developing Carmichael did you test it and stuff where they did that were there people turning dials or do terribly you get like but again like it's that this whole way of thinking yeah you get a group of people in Vegas and a room and you give them the I agree and disagree they're not writers you hire right or have some courage takes it take a chance and that's what that is the one benefit of like you know streaming or whatever like broadcasts truly they pay you they pay you that amount the two tops no but the sex would be just I don't know if the sex be there especially the way we do it you know it would be that and more like latina --kx I feel like sometimes mainstream latina shows have to be the most latina --kx you know interesting and it steeps itself in drama but it's not a drama D you know I don't know what it is it's coming I guess but but it but it will probably be funnier with more like jokes about our identity it feels like no but like we we don't do any of that the insert punchline here yeah in serpentine about identity because it shows very much steeped in identity but because right now that's sort of what we've been allowed you know and when it comes to comedy about Latina ex like we've been allowed identity themed stuff you know I can't wait to get past that you know but we don't have enough shows the Phoenix theme shows them on television you know for that yet severe on a representation yeah yeah yeah I I feel like for our show it's not even an issue of subject matter it's just an issue of pacing our show is very crazy where every one of the first three episodes is basically a different kind of show because it changes premises like three times the first three episodes that's a spoiler kind of but not really so there's no way I think that in my opinion network yeah it's cool for it to be like the audience would have no idea what the show is until episode four essentially and then episode six has none of the main characters in it as well so it's really like out of the eight episodes it's you just can't get a bearing on the show that's one of things I love the most about it which is that Amazon gave us a chance to do something that was super unpredictable and in a world where I think a lot of times when they give you notes they want the audience to know what the show is in the first five minutes or even the first minute you know it's like someone comes up is like you know your your father died now we've got to move in together and get along you know with it's something like that right it's like that's what they want at the beginning sometimes that kind of note like to tell everything at the top makes you like in the streaming shows are smaller amount of episodes it makes you realize like oh no actually the reveal was what you're doing and you should app it's reminds you to absolutely not to do that sure absolutely what was the last time you guys were completely wrong about the viewers of response to a scene a character something in your show last season we did a scene where Barry he has this friend Chris and and Chris knows about Barry's past and there scene in a car with him where we were riding it and got to a place where it's like oh he's gonna have to kill this guy and this guy is just a nice guy with the what and he's saying I have a wife and I have a kid and then he realizes he said too much he told there I'm gonna go to the cops and then he says I'm not gonna do that and he starts backtracking and we wrote it and then we did it the table read knows that awful feeling people laughter laughs - laughs that scene comes up and then there was just silence for the rest of the table reading Alec Berg and I were looking at each other like here it comes in an HBO we're like great that was great that is awesome like don't change a word of that so we shot it and then watched it and then it was that thing where you know the post PA and the post coordinator come out like I show up to work and they're like hey I watched that scene so sad so we were kind of like oh this is where people are gonna jump jump ship and instead it was the polar opposite people really responded to that and so it was a good lesson I think for us of that you know that whole thing as a collective there genius the audience it really could be really smart you know or they can you know they'll go with you you know if it's coming I think from a genuine place yeah [Music] we made a character have a tackle like just eateth that go like a white girl on purpose what does that mean like a sandwich okay and oh my god Twitter it was like this show does not how I would never eat I thought it was like it became this thing well this show they don't even know how that goes in this entire legit latina and it wasn't a choice because this girl's coming back she's like got bougie in Chicago and she's like she's just like putting anything in fact and she races a turban and it cost and it was like now we're we have to deal with it season two why she's not goes like that but like it was so unexpected we couldn't shake it like the stigma of like the show does not know how dare you Jerry like a sandwich you know I feel like I'm never gonna eat a taco in public come to it you can't it's not a sandwich yeah I've never had a tacos they were learning here guys I think the episode we did that everyone really responded to was this fat babe pool party and we went in thinking this is the episode people are gonna like and it was the one people why did you what did you know about what you were hitting on just like seeing in bathing suits all these like different sized bodies that you don't usually see and also seeing her like have this whole awakening they're so hot out here but I'm not even mad about it honestly I'm so much fun people and I'm honestly thinking about buying a crop top which I gotta say was not in the cards for me before but I start getting that pool when we filmed that like people and the crew we're crying and people got really emotional we have a funny thing on our show where the characters and you may have a version of this as well the characters are so horrible I mean ya know if fans are by characters are just despicable but the actors and the actresses are quiet likeable and that line gets very blurred for the audience because selena is horrible but Julia Louie Dreyfus is Elaine you know and so and they and so when she does the things that she's supposed to do there is that initial like oh my god know why they don't want Elaine to do that right well it's always like they say like you know it's like Oh Selena would make a great president it's like you're walking watching through wouldn't I understand you would like Julia to be president that's cool but two separate things and they get very lost in that world I don't come up to me at a restaurant and say I can't believe you made Henry Winkler they're like that was and they were I thought it was a bit at first and then I was like that wall sinking feeling of like oh they're being serious and they're holding my hand the whole time Oh like I was shaking hands with them and I'm like oh my gosh you're really mad at me oh you're not letting go of my head this person was like it was very uncool okay cool well good and you're sure one of the things that that I found fascinating is that you are murder and yet the audience the in many ways is rooting for you and then all of a sudden Sally's character a female people don't get behind in the same way we had a screening of the first four episodes and someone so if I find her very unlikable and someone shot out Barry kills people is an ambitious actress and she's not afraid to play someone is who is complicated they're not a I don't think a bad person who's just incredibly complicated she's human but this was always the thing on on Breaking Bad for ya this Schuyler people were just like I can't stand Schuyler and you're like she's home alone with like a special kid and her baby and she's the bad guy and also I have people Alec loves this first female reporter will say I don't I've never found you attractive but you shooting people was very attractive thank you the gun I found barely attract has happened to me three times and then Alec will always go wait I want to back up you've never found know how to respond to that I find it very strange I find it very weird thing three times it's happening three times you've married the third purpose and I have real estate is weird it's dangerous like listening to Twitter and writing and we should do that I I mean good luck to anyone who wants to bear the cross of keeping Twitter happy and like winner is 24 hour a day audience because that's what we do and when we talk about culture and people talk we're talking about Twitter specifically Twitter like we make it seem like it's in the air no it's it's on Twitter everyone's terrified of trending negatively everyone is afraid of like they're at symbol and like what people are saying and why did everyone has notes one time I sent my mom like a pilot and she was like and I was like tell me what you think and she said well you know first I thought the lighting I was like I'm gonna stop you right there you don't make television what are you doing that's not you're like how did it make you feel that's very important did it give you the experience the intended experience that's very important like you know because of the lighting see anything a character in S&L called her well she was this old guy who hit people with then this one guy from I forgot where he was from but he liked worst character of the season bollock because on SNL we would finish a show and everybody would be on their phones not just on Twitter but like you'd be in the middle of a show and someone be like you know HitFix hated that sketch you know but this guy hated it hated her well traitor her whoops and then I two years later did it he did an interview with me and I'm like in my head going I was a guy but I don't say anything I'm like whatever you know and then as he's leaving like I tell you what character you did that I love herb Welch and I go okay that's weird you specifically said you hated it he was old friend of mine said that was lame and I should go back and watch him so I did and it was it they're funny you also look great shooting a gun have you ever read is a book difficult men and it talked about rise of though those types of characters people want interesting character like that like that's all that's all there is and someone being kind of [ __ ] up is interesting Lucy and I Love Lucy Lucy Arnaz is insane the same person who weakly sabotages her husband's life for personal gain there's [ __ ] that's why it was interesting yeah that's about it that people don't want to yeah think about everyone is kind of on this road to like way you know the road to happiness why does everybody always want to go to the road of unhappiness you always make these weird choices ago and people have been writing about that for well but also it's like century I don't know any happy people yeah my kids are yeah you talked about some representation or under-representation I'm curious one of the worst cases of misrepresentation that you guys have encountered on television that maybe they inspired you to do what you're doing or maybe they just made you want to bang your head against a wall I feel like misrepresentation is anytime you do representation for the sake of representation you know if you just start putting the United Colors of Benetton and you're the show it doesn't reflect real life a lot of times like like we have this tendency to paint this utopia that just doesn't exist in Los Angeles if you drive by any school like high school being let out you know you usually see the Asian kids with the Asian kids the Latino kids you know Latin kids and the black kids with the black kids and everyone kind of sticks in groups and look while I would like for there to be a meshing of all these cultures that doesn't necessarily happen and it's not true to a lot of people's experiences and some when I see it on television it just feels forced and contrived most of the time it feels very cosmetic and I would much rather like you know I I did a show with an all-black family and there were all black people in the pilot right I'm doing a show with with Nate bargatze and you know it would be a surprise to ABC there should be all white people in the show that's what it's in Tennessee and a certain that it makes sense to the show like Roseanne add in like the black kid I'm like what do you do make another show about a black family and Roseanne is a that that's not the existence that's not the truth of our existence like so anytime people lie for the sake of the trend it bothers me Joey did a shot it's a commercial of fake political commercial for Selena where you see her in an office working and we kind of United been conned it up on purpose so it's just her handing papers to somebody you know in a headdress and just a little bit of everything just because it's so wrong the both the exploitation by her of it but also the fact that she just is probably casually racist in her own real life and you know the character but it's tough it's it's I mean I don't know I have no great answers for it but I agree yeah I think people are looking forward to right it's like I did an interview once and they were like yeah your first show mr. Nunn you had all you talk about race a lot and then in forever it's like why don't you talk about race more it's like every show I have to do has to be about race I mean it's insane is because I'm Asian like my show has to be about being a it's like and by the way the show stars Maya who's biracial I'm Fred who's a million different races and just their existence by that very fact is like okay that's their they're just playing they're playing people no one is yes by the way there's an episode episode six which is about a black man an Asian woman falling in love over the course of 30 years and they do talk about race I was like is that the whole show has to be like it really was it really opened my eyes to the expectations of wow you really think everything you ever work on has to be about that it really doesn't you know it's I'm happy to make more stuff I'm making me more than all Asian cast but not everything I do is gonna be that but I think that there is I mean once you're in the door perhaps you do feel a pressure pressure no Sensibility yeah it does like hiring in my show below the line to like a lot of Brown Femmes like it's important you know just because we haven't like the my cinematographer is the first time she got a shot like all my directors in the last season are Latinas female most including me first time a lot of us you know so like it does feel like okay I got the door open just for I don't know how long I'm gonna have this door open but for now just go through go through it does feel and and then my people put that pressure to there's like come on you're in so get me in and it does feel that and they I maybe I should say no we're stubborn a.m. Twitter shrill is is a show a lot has sort of been made about the fact that we haven't seen these stories and and a lead character like 80s on television before what kind of added responsibility does that come with or those conversations you are having in the writers room when we talk about different arcs for her life there's like Annie and family Annie and work Annie in France and one of them is Annie in her body but it's like mostly her life isn't really about being fat and I think I read that when you guys were pitching it one of the things you made very clear was you didn't want it to be a show about a woman who gets on the scale in size yeah what did that mean to you what would that have become that show would become someone who wishes they were different than they were instead of realizing that they just want to be who they are like anytime you're talking about would have her on the scale or talking about losing weight you're saying she is not happy with who she is I have to say that girl that pool scene was so and I'm a former fat actress and you know and I've I was on hung and my name was fat woman number one Oh doing a fad like all my characters for a long time we're like big lady fat like the district rip you know and um and then I left it because it was like I'm I was okay with who I was but like the industry hadn't you know like I couldn't play the lawyer yet I can play it you know that kind of thing but when I saw that like I had to watch it twice I never seen that imagery is so powerful you know like and to get it right because it was the commentary with it wasn't about that it was just her enjoying herself being it's it's so powerful and I feel like hopefully it's like we'll turn something you know um yeah thank you yeah yeah I watched it with glee David I want to turn to you what goes into trying to wrap up a show what's that process are you looking at models or you are you getting advice from people and and ultimately how do you tune it all out and just smell it I think I'm good at tuning it out it's the opposite of when I joined the show you know when I took over for Armando I guess I'm not sure I quite realized the amount of noise about that happening until later on and sort of realized oh people were really I don't know expecting slash hoping it all went hell and then we're pleasantly surprised when it didn't people in me involved in the show we're outside of there was something I'll say the following game it makes me laugh when the first reviews came out of my first jobs some of them and I made the show and I'm the first to tell you I think good but some of the reviews were so crazily strong that it made you realize oh wow their expectations were so low that they'd already sort of pre-written me this is a disaster they kind of they're they're like over selling like a bad movie that you go you're actually things you're so lonely like let's say it's actually kind of good yeah they they were kind of a little crazy I think they were good but some of the reviews so I know you kind of you get used to that that being said I live through the end of Seinfeld and so I'm aware that and I'm seeing it as this season sort of unfolds even which is we've been playing a lot with like the Dan and Amy relationship and again the I guess the the fans they are visions of this beautiful marriage between these two horrific people that just is never going to happen and I don't know how else I always say like and you get to the end of it I think it's a really it is the ending that makes sense it is the logical ending I've joked it's the ending that America deserves and I and I really feel I have felt good about it since like I had it Leon I'm still I'm not sure about this part where I say I want to be President for all Americans I mean do I you know all of them how about real Americans oh yeah that's good and then we can figure out what I mean later okay I don't know what she's saying so here good the voters need to know clearly and definitively why you want to be president in your own words if you want me to use my own goddamn words and write me something to say okay oh and take out this stuff about immigration because I feel like it's a little too issue okay there was a point where the show is going to shoot earlier yeah obviously it ultimately did care of Julia's health and you went back in and and rewrote or reframed season politics was just I mean our background of politics was just changing the the norms have gone out the window yeah so it just all of these things that were kind of the I don't know the veep bread-and-butter just were pointless like so much that mean well like for example so many of the episodes if you look back on the first you know I don't know six seasons have her at some point kind of giving a speech and really screwing up in the speech and paying the price losing some sense of whatever what she wanted well what that seems like from the 1800s yeah the notion that her staff is so spectacularly incompetent that you can't believe these people are working in watch and by the way just even this is connected to that first one just the notion of sort of like that there's a price to pay for anything I just and an even the notion of like this is what politicians are behind are like behind closed doors there are no closed doors so it was just a chance to just go oh my god like like I think our stories are overall sound but the the details the when you go in with the paintbrush it just everything has changed and you have to reflect this you have to find a way I don't know I don't know how to describe it we're like you just kind of go oh my show set in New York and now New York doesn't exist to explain it came out after the civil rights movement [Music] sure doesn't mean after having an experience of writing for your own character now you are working with someone who is sort of telling his story and it's a world but that's different from your world what does that process been like for you what are the pieces of your own world and perhaps it's the religion piece and perhaps us other pieces that you've tapped into to tell his story yeah really my my role I think as a producer is to run block mm-hm you know that's pretty much what I'm there for that end be a dick on marketing calls it's really upset and marketing is for comedy specifically is very difficult it's a difficult task to make your characters not look like [ __ ] idiot no no that's a fight is what it looks like a fight ten people don't realize the amount of calls and fights you get you get a poster for a more community that has that's not like it's the fastest moving piece of it everything else moves slower marketing moves very quickly and it's this unfair battle where you don't have control of the assets when you're creating a show you control the acid the what you write what you direct but you control that in marketing it's a it's a lot of you know the illusion of collaboration with 40 pulses they have ready to be put up in Cincinnati you know like this key art that you disagree with like that but I'm there for that and really to make sure that he stays true to himself and that he doesn't hide any of that truth you know of whatever that means and just to remind him that like you know his parents judgment on the show shouldn't affect his writing you know like like you have to write from your own truth and it's again Twitter's judgement of the show any of you can't write from that place otherwise you're just you're writing in a box and a bubble and you you've begun an impossible task and so that's I'm just doing it as a reminder of that and it's also important to refine the universality in in subjects that can feel very very specific and I know in his case meaning that is a very sort of specific take what how have you tried to use your own experiences to draw out the stories he wants to tell a lot of times is as simple as if something's based on reality here the story and then see what's being written on the page and seeing where we've lost the honesty like see where we've lost tension and see where we've lost like the things that makes the situation interesting to begin with a lot of times we even as creators have a tendency to protect stories and in that protection we lose a lot of the interesting elements that make it a worthwhile story to begin with I can sense protective um protective wear you know Oh my mom did this to me but that makes her look a little too rough so that will make it you know she hit me with you know a pillow instead of an ashtray nobody's gonna be talking about you in this Columbia there's a lot of each or is it all like a Muslim a skirt for a man I mean it's really too much are you wearing a tracksuit looks dope don't be jealous okay Run DMC baby Run DMC all day like a Russian basketball coach it's kind of good this season on the barre all the characters are trying to fight their nature and just be honest and truthful but some of the characters what they're realizing is that's not what this town wants cuz that doesn't make a lot of money it makes people feel bad the thing we keep saying appeal go that was a bummer yes what everyone says when they see the honest thing yeah and and it's funny cuz Steven roots character Fuchs is just as hitman kind of he's like my hitman agent guy just dumb he's like people don't want that he's the one telling me he's like people just want Braveheart they want that beef flavor we gave that speech in Braveheart No you see it was like the greatest thing you've ever seen so don't worry don't worry about being honest being honest just makes you vulnerable and scared you know but it doesn't I mean I wonder percent on the bummer thing but I don't even think it has to be about the bummer thing I remember back in the Seinfeld days the way we would hire writers was just lists of ideas it was it was incredible because you'd look through that list of ideas and you'd go no no no no no no these are all terrible there was there was one idea that was pitched over and over and over again that was the bet the worst idea I've ever heard which was constantly George dates a transvestite but doesn't know that was that was every terrible writers like George idea yeah but you would read through the list and then you get down to one and you would go like this story argument about a an argument in a stereo store that happened didn't it and they'd be like yeah it's like it's your only good idea yeah they don't want to be terrible they don't have to be bummer ideas now but the reality of this is a crazy thing that you got into it speaks to something and uh these days it's a little harder to do that but there are things in veep that are universal like bad bosses and those kinds of things and you know you can still take those things from your life but again I think it's what we've been talking about all day which is truth it's just yeah they think the truth is the hardest thing to and like every time you say we're gonna do the truth there is a moment of like okay we're gonna we're gonna do this guys we're gonna say this you know we're cool with this you know and without being pretentious of being an artist I mean that's like why you gonna create but that's why you want to create and do this though but they can be silly ideas true ideas but again they sparkle because they were gesture of reality so the audience can tell ya did that really you could just tell it's something about the details details man I'm gonna sell me on some exactly the truth of the pain of it as well isn't it's that thing that I've seen extract that so much even black comedians with like jokes and things on stage and situations it's like tell me about the pain of your experience show me the you know show me the lowest moment show me the most tense moment the moment worthy of like asking for people's time to watch you're gonna say about what's the bad TV version a berry we always said was like it's a very glib show about death and you treat the murders is a glib thing I think when it was announced and I would say oh I'm doing this show about a hitman wants to be an acting class they're like haha all right that's hilarious like weekend at Bernie's type stuff like the dead bodies like those my brother you know I'm gonna love it you know and you're like no and you're like no no it's gonna be about how you perpetrate violence it destroys your soul yeah and it like makes you like not want to live it it's a bummer yeah and you get this guy and we talk to people and that's what happens all right I want to touch on where we are in the industry right now where I think everyone's disabled is had to fire their agents and I want to ask the question that I think is being asked for around town without any judgement which is why do you need an agent and is that a question you guys have been asking ourselves I'm not really like my agent yeah like Josh Katz just what his ears are burning yeah I'm not sure I'm not sure if I'm fired her if we just switch to cell phone calls you know I didn't I just haven't and I hope they work this thing out I really do I think it's really important and I think you know you know I just think it's something that like I need more understanding on exactly gence it's the agency and the practices right I mean like I adore my agent I wouldn't be here you know he plucked me out from the off-broadway show that you know I was doing and then he you know he brought me over here basically I owe him a lot I love him but it's the it's the practices right it seems like if I understand it correctly the pack and everything else and and there's a lot of that anxiety everybody needs some CBD right now and I feel like we're just holding on for the right most people I know love their agents but these practices are gnarly so like yeah I don't at the initial question of like like could you do it without your agent like in my experience like like as far as my TV work like I would never have met the people yeah that I met without them putting everyone together mmm like it like started all every relationship that I now can get jobs without them were started because of them right and I think people you know who aren't at this table who aren't running shows and hiring people it's more yeah you're a young writer coming up that's when it really hurts you yeah yeah that being said I support the Writers Guild and I hope we can work this out but but certainly you know that's when you need the age of the most I think I've got support the the guild and I mean they have I think the best health insurance and it's fantastic good I love it okay I think they're great however I you know it's disruptive to you know halt certain collaborative efforts and so you just wanted to I feel like the allowances on eyeglasses could be better pretty terrible prescription I find it ok what is your most unusual prewriting ritual I'm constantly pacing the entire time and I'm also the board guy so I'm always writing on the board and then we moved to another studio and I was pacing and I went and I got one no I'm like hey seem like looking down at the ground I never saw that helps me to I always walk around the writers room and you know our writers room for forever is really small and so I'm sure it was so annoying but I'm I'm walking behind it's like and getting on the boss like Untouchables with Al Capone when you hit me with a baseball back so I'm just pacing around that yeah but I works in wreck you hurt you're very ironic sort of yeah but yeah you're still sitting around yeah but when out you know when I when I was writing this movie I did the same thing but I did in New York City so I had no one could stop me so I would walk from my apartment on like Houston to like the Met which is like 80 blocks of getting away from your computer in getting away from your phones to work on South Park and Trey Parker would do that you never stopped moving and he would like go off into another room maybe that's where we got it I worked there briefly to I saw him do this when I start a room like before the day before I I was bringing my blue car to clean it and tell me what spirits are in there okay I've learned no lessons in life I was a college student that wrote my papers the night before and you know whatever the hell they're due at 10:00 a.m. and I will sit down and start writing at 7:00 8:00 burning behind me SNL people do that they would wait like Seth Meyers wouldn't start writing until 4:00 you know he does everything right away yeah 11 p.m. and SNL and it was like were you going like why are you not sleeping what about the Fillmore show that made you want to do what you're currently doing I feel like Laverne and Shirley is what has always motivated me combined with a Little House on the Prairie which one had that sign that sign off like goodnight mister and he'd go like yeah okay okay well I was pretty young my dad let me watch taxi driver and there's a moment in taxi driver he's on the phone where he's just taking civil Shepard to porno movie and it's like the worst thing and embarrassment is such a huge thing when you're a kid and I was like watching I was so embarrassed I was like I can't believe he did that and he's on the phone with civil Shepherd and he's like how'd you get my flowers and everything and you could tell she's turning him down and as she's doing it the camera just Dolly's off of him and it goes down the hallway and it was this thing unlocked in my brain at like 11:00 or whatever if like oh the movie doesn't want to watch this I was like the filmmaker doesn't want to watch this and I was like oh you can do that you can have like a subjective thing and ever since that moment happened I've just been obsessed with movies and also when he shoots Harvey Keitel and the cameras across the street and he leaves it taught me about point of view where it's like you're the point of view the person from the stoop across the street who's watching and then the guy sits down now it's just you and him sitting there like why is that work and and you just start asking yourself those questions and that was the movie that did it for me yeah I think very similarly it was you know for forever the inspirations that we talked about were David Lynch Mulholland Drive and blue velvet and racer head and then benders also which is our stack citizen it just protects I mean like we're gonna make this obviously mine Fred or to that funniest people in the world and it's gonna be funny we're gonna write funny stuff for it but can we do something that evokes you know that atmosphere in that kind of world or then I think in general you know in the mood for love the Wong kar-wai movie and then Seinfeld also much I like watching very different you know yeah when you're writing writing barriers and so like we're sitting there watching it and the Edit Bay where I'm like oh it's kind of like taxi driver you know what when you were kidding yeah you forgot that yeah it's like that's deep-seated in you someplace yeah it's like a musician going like oh this is like the Beatles yeah it's some some kids gonna make a movie that combines Barry with some crazy hologram thing that happens like 20 years from now right if you won't know I think we've done it thank you guys all for being here okay you kept their move in thank you mcgrann this Cruiser hi I'm Tanya said out - hi I'm Ellen yang I'm Allie rescue hi I'm Bill Hader and thanks for watching thanks for watching The Hollywood Reporter Hollywood Reporter The Hollywood Reporter round tables round table on YouTube on YouTube hi everyone on YouTube [Laughter]

Channel: The Hollywood Reporter

Views: 186,799

Rating: 4.9135656 out of 5

Keywords: thr, the hollywood reporter, hollywood reporter, entertainment, hollywood, close up, close up with thr, thr roundtable, roundtable, thr roundtables, interview, bill hader, david mandel, alan yang, ali rushfield, jerrod carmichael, tanya saracho, barry, hbo barry, veep, hbo veep, forever, amazon originals, ramy, vido, the hollywood reporter roundtable, comedy showrunners roundtable, comedy, funny, tv, television, roundtables, close up with the hollywood reporter, 2019

Id: ngcPHqygCts

Length: 56min 41sec (3401 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 22 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/brant_ley]

This is one of my favorite ones. Loved the conversation between Mandel and Carmichael about the how logistics of the writer’s room differs on cable/streaming and network. I also really liked that Rushfield admitted that she lost a battle to her writers with a scene and that it was better for it, seems like expert leadership.

[u/[deleted]]

This woman running the table is really good at keeping shit flowing. These round tables have been getting much better.

[u/rocksoffjagger]

Some of the people in this are just profoundly not funny in the most annoyingly earnest way. Maybe unpopular opinion, but earnesty is never funny.