Livestream from L.A. with 2020 updates

you was born and then Nazareth right okay better you've got it good the kind of direction that's changing film take a little longer pause got it got it the dramatic pause so some of you are new some of you have probably heard some form of this speech before but I first just want to say thank you so much it really means a lot that you're here I know that mingling and doing these kinds of scenes isn't always fun sometimes you know we're in the heat and sometimes it's just a lot of waiting around the fact you're willing to do that means a lot this is a very important scene obviously some of you know this is the scene of the wedding at Cana and this is one of the most famous and impactful stories and the Gospels and one of the keys about it is the crowd and the fact that there are a lot of people here and that ultimately one of the main reasons that Jesus did this miracle was to save his friends from embarrassment and to obey his mom and the reason that his mom was embarrassed was because so many people were here and back into these days running out of wine at a wedding was a massive massive social faux pas and so Jesus cared about his mom and his friends so keep that in mind whenever you're starting to get a little bit bored because still making sounds exciting but it's really not it's actually quite boring most of the time but thanks for your patience in advance I really appreciate it you guys look great and it's really gonna be a really meaningful scene for many people to call background you start here you go and you see good yeah background Duffey diner up there well this is the best party I've been to in a long while [Laughter] much thing Great Scott will do one more think on the on the hook and you Sam I think you can take your time on that okay any time you want to stop and just really slow down I mean I can always speed it up in my new work but if the awkwardness players okay and you and she's playing great off just as I say you can at least okay like that'll that'll be a nice mix what you're doing and then a view I just noticed this time when he points out the hooker you look at her first give her a look at this okay just like I thought you said this was crooked looks fine to me and this wine is delicious must not be seen yet [Laughter] but we had a wedding it just wasn't like everyone else's why not you know why I would have gone I know if Joseph were here he would be so proud of you and Rafi so happy for you dinah they're here I mean put off Easter never you behead left oh you can you can exaggerate all to look like okay it's been a really may have to be miles we should be luck Parker you have a little more fun okay thanks not just nothing did we write the nervous part diamond energy okay [Music] [Applause] [Music] there's no need to speed up the voice of the bridegroom and the voice and then run and also to sing to anything I want together we can practice the dance once or twice before we get down there it's not going to be long now five six seven eight one two three oh yeah you got it [Music] [Applause] perfect looks great then on this side man inside for now Tony you over here right now just join the guys over there Jason you know we go you know Michael could take you back from the guys over there please first things first is I'm going to start with this table right here which is going to be our disciple if you two gentlemen are going to join this group you're gonna join them as well so if you're like if you're like arms and shoulders like this yeah so it's not close close I would do I would do it more are you good with this to this be normal huh yeah damn hand on shoulders you're good one like this so it looks like we need one maybe two more okay so you can come right on in and then use over here in Dallas Jesus over here Jesus that's great yeah yeah never have Jesus let me [Applause] blessed are You Lord our God King of the universe who brings forth the fruit of divine further on into the wedding so we'll just be kind of kind of the reception part where everybody just kind of hanging out talking so we'll have you kind of mix and match and walking around a little bit more and talking to each other and just hanging out having a good time doing lots of drink it stay hydrated the theme of this episode is similar to Downton Abbey you see what's going on Otto main-floor and then all the things that happened backstage the servants and people who are making sure that everyone has enough wine if they asked you for more to tell them you'll be right back but guess what you won't be understand today is where we start to see fact that they are running out of wine and we're also shooted a solution to the wine so you come in you talk you're telling me what to do when you walk in the conversation knock East between Jesus and Thomas I do plan on doing overs so there's not a whole lot of places just going to put them but to shop for sure yeah it could be you could cheat a little bit a little bit so thought we land here you heard him start drawing water quickly tell anyone you find to stop what they're doing and help always counting always measuring that's my job and the people who think I've not done well tonight join me and I will show you a new way to count he looks back closing the door Jonathan Smith don't stand here earth beat you to knock up beats and then it's as simple as means I want to see the reflection if we can pull it off and he has a line I am ready father just close your eyes [Music] [Music] Oh fantastic it's a cat that's a wrap one day 27 things sticking with us [Applause] hey it's Dallas in the crater of the chosen and yes season one of the chosen is complete all eight episodes they're available right now you can look up the chosen in the App Store or Google Play and we're easy to find you can download it and be watching within minutes and in fact it's unprecedented technology you can connect to almost any device you have directly and you don't even need a subscription so I hope you check out season one of the chosen right now [Music] hey it's Dallas and the Creator the chosen and one of the most common questions or comments that I get is about the characters in the show the people from the Gospels that we chose to feature prominently in the chosen questions about why we chose the people that we did or how we went about creating the backstories for these people when there's actually somewhat limited information in Scripture and of course the challenges of doing things and writing about scenes and characterizations that might not be explicitly outlined in Scripture especially when we're doing that with Jesus where you have to be really careful so we asked our head writer Ryan Swanson to talk about this we interviewed him on the set and I think you're gonna get a lot out of all of the insights that he has about how we went about doing this so check this out the character of Jesus immediately presented a challenge we're certainly cautious with words we put into Jesus's mouth I'm lucky enough to work with Tyler Thompson in Dallas and I've never seen these characters like this before I don't know what this means I don't know yet how I'm going to provide my crying wood I see the humanity of the characters was I think one of the first things that really gelled for all of us we each came to the table with some preconceived ideas about who these people might have been based on mostly on what they did so we were in a way reverse engineering all of our characters we looked for characters that were compelling and the first one was Simon Simon had a moment where he was called and we felt like that was the emotional midpoint of our story we want to have an emotion that's earned by circumstance we want to have a victory that's earned by hard work ingenuity Simon's miracle had none of those things Simon was floundering but we are replacing familiarity with Simon's circumstances too as the sort of sleight of hand let us know what this miracle could possibly have meant to him when it happened and so at that cathartic moment for Simon we feel every bit of his humility when he drops to his knees we feel every bit of regret and joy and overwhelming grace that he received because we know the context in which that miracle occurs I think at a certain point each of us made the characters personal we started to add and our own foibles our own strengths we started to hear ourselves in the dialog for them but they were all based on the idea that these characters have been available to us but never personalized so when we started to think of merry struggles and we started to think of who she might have become we had a lot of source material to look at and actually track her life but what was her feelings through all that how did she interact with people having to imagine what it was like with free will as a real person waking up with the choices that Mary had to face it made us make choices while we've known for years what these people did the idea that we really had to articulate it to each other it had to pass story standards that it had to pass biblical standards that it had to pass each of our faith standards created something that heretofore we couldn't have predicted a Nicodemus has character for example we had very little to go on we knew that he was at the cross we knew that he was on the rooftop with Jesus in our story we get to explore what it was like to have a lot of a lot invested in his life a wife who loves their lifestyle students who are looking up to him a place of reverence in his temple what pressures must this person be under when he encounters somebody he knows is radically radically different from anything his faith preaches is breaking the laws on which his belief system is founded everyone's here the dissonance that he's experiencing doing one thing believing another there anyone else we were then introduced to a character who had never been three-dimensional to us before I came so close what do you mean we need to go for it to make it to a camp in Tiberias by nightfall Simon is correct let's go they're gonna wear that engine my clothes should that leathers we looked at the difference of Matthew's Gospel versus the others and we saw a certain rigidity a certain adherence to fact certain he tracks lineages imagine who is that person that is both exiled from society has a job that he's hated for rights in this way and the Matthew that we came together to create was for us there was discovery in every day and it kept the work exciting every time we wrote a Matthew line we imagined all those factors he has a dog because we imagined a person who had difficulty in voting and in screenwriting you want to give a character a sound board but he doesn't have a best friend to share his troubles of the day with he doesn't have anybody to commune with at all so we imagined this dog and you know the character we ended up creating popped off the page at certain point the dog was less essential to find out who Matthew was and we could watch him react to life as it was happening around him but people love the dog if it wants it how does a tax-collectors life change his priorities shift when suddenly up isn't up anymore his world just turned inside out it's amazing impossible the character of Jesus immediately presented a challenge we're certainly cautious with words we put into Jesus's mouth I want to do the will of my father and I want to spread the message of salvation so yes I'm happy to not stay in one place I think we're all sort of in awe at the idea of writing anything for Jesus but what each of us understands is Jesus humanity and we each have a relationship with Jesus and because of that he sounds different to each of us I'm telling you this because even though you are children and the elders in your life have lived longer many times adults need the faith of children and if you hold on to this faith really tightly someday soon you will understand all of what I am saying to you his humanity is our first organizing principle this is a human how would he respond to the pressures of life in the context of the ministry he's begun but who's I thought I did you teach answer to me knowing what we each know in our hearts about this character how do we then put those words into his mouth how do we write his blocking how do we help make a decision for Jesus in the places between Scripture that effort is exciting it's daunting it's something that gives us anxiety as we eat tuna over the sink in our 12 on a given day when we read the Bible we're getting God's version when we watch the chosen we can imagine ourselves there and then we can get some sense even through our own experience watching the screen of what it could possibly have been like when Jesus answers their lives we're trying to set the stage we're trying to provide a place where the characters live and breathe the moments that you've read about again from that authorial perspective to come down from 10,000 feet and live it at ground level as we experience our own lives with uncertainty about what's around the next corner it is an incredible new angle on the passages of the Bible that we are inspired by [Music] wait my first name and my last name you very sure go ahead and give me your first okay uh my name is Kailyn Reese and I'm from Port Charlotte or Arcadia okay sorry no you're fine we'll probably use that that's cute my name is Kailyn Reese and I'm from Port Charlotte Florida with our daughter she had some quirks when she was growing up she was also obsessed with certain things we didn't know it was Asperger's at first different ways that she would struggle in different ways that she processed things I guess didn't think much about it as she was growing up until a couple of family members who are teachers mentioned that you know she may be on the spectrum sometimes I think of things a little bit more deeply than some do and don't always understand people's jokes and I had a few ticks growing up that I've I've kind of learned to control the heartbreaking thing as a mother is when you watch your child you know struggle with friendships and you know to feel left out but then watching her kind of overcome those struggles with some of her gifts has been really amazing she had such a gift of just musical an ear for music and an eye for artwork we watched it together as a family and we were all like crying and stuff and it was really good [Music] seeing Matthew for the first time it just kind of struck all of us like huh that's really interesting Matthew's quirks the way he interacted with people was very mechanical always looking around and I kind of recognized that at least I had suspicions that he might be on the spectrum especially how he was an outcast and how it was really hard for him to make friends and like relate with people and the part where he was looking into his family's house and he was like sad because they didn't invite him or anything not that my family is like that but I've had some friends who have done stuff like that to me well I just saw the character and I just really related with him and I don't know I just I just thought they maybe if they need a cellist that I could come and if they needed me and also I wanted to tell you that how much that it impacted me so we we said of course that's no problem I never ever expected really that we'd hear anything back I thought that was kind of a neat cute gesture that she wanted to send a letter and I immediately had an idea of what the letter was about because when we created the character of Matthew we decided that based on some of the characteristics we saw in the Gospels and it was plausible it's not factual but but but plausible that Matthew had Asperger's syndrome I have personal experience with it on my side of the family there's a lot of people on the spectrum I have a daughter who's on the autism spectrum and so it just made a lot of sense and so once we decided that writing into Matthew these characteristics that I know very well I felt like we could really do an accurate portrayal Kaylin wrote me this letter and she simply said I was moved by seeing a character on screen that I could relate to and it also brought me closer to God and made me realize that I'm not alone but God is with me and sees me in these moments one of our composers Matt is actually a world-class cellist and so we didn't actually need one but but as soon as I mentioned to Matt and Dan our composers her letter and I said you know what would you think of us maybe allowing her to participate man it's really cool that I'm in a position to support and encourage a really cool experience for somebody that I that I didn't get to have I am always a fan of supporting musicians who are up and coming in or just have this strong desire and passion for music my dad opened a text that he got from my mom and saw the email and then he goes and then I was like what and then I leaned over to look at it and he said no I wouldn't read it to you so then he started reading the response we both like started tearing up and I got so excited that I almost like jumped out of the car then we just sat there like wow God is so good and I was just so happy [Music] when she showed up I think she was a little clearly a little bit nervous but a little bit excited one of the things that were able to calm some of the nerves was we were able to stalk Matt was able to talk about the cello and Dan was able to talk about music in general and about some of the things that we did and then I kind of figured out what I was gonna do when I found out it was the scene with Nicodemus and Jesus I was like wow that's so special just amazing to be able to see these people would take the time to work with with Kaelyn to let her be a part of this we weren't necessarily just doing her a favor she's actually a really good cello player and so when she sat down and started to play we were like wow this is actually really good this is actually worthy of this scene the scene that we chose for her to play on it's actually one of the most important scenes in the whole show the moment that she plays in the queue is is probably the most important climactic moment in in the scene it was neat that it worked out for her to be a part of a moment that was that important and not just a couple of characters walking to the market kind of thing something like that it's cool that it worked out that way a couple of simple explanations of things about nuts and bolts of this is how we do this she was a she's a pro yep she did fantastic in fact I don't think we need Matt Nelson anymore on cello then after we did it I saw the video with the music and I also started crying it was so so cool that I get to be a part of this [Music] bless it up [Music] she actually played beautifully and I think brought to her playing a purity that made the scene even better she's super talented I don't think a lot of teenagers get to have the experience that she was able to have today I don't think a lot of people have enough people pouring into them and just saying hey look you keep keep going keep getting better at what you're doing I can't tell you how much that just impacted me watching it and and knowing that my daughter's cello was a part of it I could not be more proud as a father to hear her be able to play in a studio and to have the encouragement from everybody working with her it was just just beautiful I can't wait to see the rest but that one scene I think that's pretty special all that stuff is great when you can invite people into the process of creating and for us working on our TV show for it to be now it's hers to like it's not just Matt's in my music it's it's hers and I love that we can invite people in that faith allowing someone like Kaylin to participate in this I think as part of the statement that we're trying to make with the show which is you know in the lyrics of the opening credits sequence song got no trouble with the mess you've been jump in the water and I think that's what we were saying to Kayla and we got no trouble with this you know the fact that you've struggled with Asperger's is not a hindrance to you being involved in fact we'd love for you to be involved and we'd love for you to jump in the water with us and paid in this show that God has clearly been orchestrating from the beginning my first you was born in Nazareth right got it already already already we are live I am live and I'm in Los Angeles and if you are wondering why things look a little bit more low-key and low-five and normal it is because I'm in a hotel room in LA I got in today the weather in Chicago was crazy it's snowing like crazy there so I got in just a couple hours ago and we just don't have obviously the means on a hotel room to set up something fancy so this doesn't look quite as professional as the office setup that I usually talk to you from but that's okay because tonight is actually meant to be something a little bit more personal we're gonna talk about some things that have to do with 2020 I'm gonna share my heart on a few things I think it's okay if occasionally I just talk to you directly and not worried about trying to appear as professional as possible one of the things that has made this show what it is and what has gotten us to where we're at today is an authentic relationship between the show and you I've said this many times before and it's 100% true we literally couldn't do without you and I think one of the reasons why you've come to trust us in this process is that we're authentic and so if being in a hotel room in Los Angeles with ear buds just to make sure that you can hear and see me is what we need to do to get this message across and that's okay even though this hotel room is not exactly large it's a relatively small hotel room there are four other people in here we do have three of our actors who you are going to hear from in a few moments and we also have our head writer my co-writer Ryan Swanson is also here you're gonna be hearing from him relatively soon tonight's a big night a lot of things are happening we're to be talking about quite a few thing and I'll go over some of the basics in just a moment and I'll take you through it but it's going to be a lot of fun one of the first things I want to share real quick just a couple of housekeeping items and I say this every time it's important and I'll tell you why number if you are watching on facebook make sure that you do like our follow our Facebook page and make sure that your liking this video and your commenting on it and that your engaging because when you do that it gets these videos out in front of more people so it shows up on more people's newsfeeds when you are commenting when you are liking when you like our page it makes a big difference so it also of course makes sure that you're aware of future videos and also all our videos from the past and our updates is essentially one of our home bases another spot of course is YouTube and if you were watching on YouTube you know what I'm gonna say there is a subscription not've subscription icon below this video and a notification bell you need to click on both of those that will make sure that you're aware of future videos that we do will let you know and it also YouTube loves that so between you and me let's make sure that we are working hard to give YouTube what they want which is they want engagement they want videos that are getting responded to and so when you say to YouTube I want to know more about this page it make the difference and over the last I think month and a half or so we have doubled our subscribers on YouTube and this community is really starting to grow and that gets the attention of social media outlets it's the same thing as happening on Instagram we're not live on Instagram right now but liking us following us on social media makes a big difference it helps to show significantly and of course I know that you want more people to see the show and you want people to hear about the show probably in the same way that you did is it probably came across social media at some point or someone liked it or shared it with you and that made a big difference so please take the time to do that real quick just takes a couple seconds and you could do that right now and if you are watching us through our website if you came through the app a special welcome to you this is the first time that we have actually done a live stream that where the app was kind of the doorway into it and so thank you so much some of you may even be joining us from around the world which is really cool especially if you are if you downloaded the app so if you came to us through the app and you are now at the website which is the chosen dot TV slash pay it forward I will not sing the jingle just yet I will sing the jingle later on later promise but if you're at the chosen dot TV slash pay-it-forward you're also watching us there as well and you are able to chat in the YouTube chat box off to the right of the video and engage there are literally thousands of people right now who are joining you in this live stream and who loved the chosen and the chat box gets crazy sometimes but it's really fun you can really meet and chat with a lot of people who share same passions that you do now what we're doing tonight we'll be right upfront as to what kind of the goals are for tonight we're gonna try not to take up too much of your time but some of that may depend on you and I'll explain why so one of the main things we're trying to do tonight is we're trying to finance episode 1 ok so if you see at the bottom of the app you'll see that there's a central let's call it a time line but it basically lists out the 8 episodes and it gives you an indication of how far we are from financing the entire season - what is the most common question that I get every single day one is season 2 coming out I get that not only from the fans I also get that from our fellow actors who are sitting here in the room with me because they're eager to work and they are eager to get back to this story and to telling these great stories and so we want season 2 to come out as soon as possible we want to make it as soon as possible and to do season 2 is going to be around somewhere around 10 million dollars sounds like a lot of money but it's close to what we raised for season 1 so it's obviously very doable and I'm going to get into all that tonight but that's one of the things we're trying to do tonight we're also tonight is a deadline for this merchandise so you see this phenomenal t-shirt that I'm wearing right now that says get used to different I know that as soon as the livestream started you were thinking to yourself you know what I I've heard about shirts like this but I didn't know shirts this great existed and now that I've seen it in front of me I must also own it well tonight happens to be the last night that you can get a get used to different shirt so write this down if you you can go visit this now if you want to or you can do it later but write this down it's www.hsn.com in fact i'm going to sing the jingle near the come join me this is Nick George and Keon from the show and let's sing the jingle so let's do it together www.hsn.com there go back to your spots okay so that was much worse than I expected it to be so www.hsn.com in case the tune threw you off that is the website the chosen verse calm and guess what tonight live stream only if you are not part of this live stream you won't know this this is a 10% discount tonight on all our merch so if you go to the chosen merch calm when you go to order and you there's a discount code option you type in live stream 10 all one word it's not case-sensitive but live stream and the number 10 all one word and you will get 10% off all get used to different year we've also got the poster there so the deadline tonight the deadline is tonight for that get used to different gear and that's why we're giving you 10% off so again I'll get into more of that later but that's one of the things that we're doing tonight I'm also going to take you through 2020 we are in February now and there's a lot going on right now but there's a ton to come and one of the things that we're hoping comes is obviously season two but I'm going to talk to you about what it takes to get there and what it takes to actually produce and ultimately distribute to you season two or the beginning of season two I'm gonna bring Ryan Swanson again as I mentioned our head writer out here at some point later to give you an update on where we're at with the scripts and kind of what our goals are for this year and our timelines but tonight is about educating you we have never shied away from giving you information even detailed information so we're not hiding the fact of how much money we've raised so far how much money we're hoping to get to get to season two where we're at in the process when I talked to Nick and George and Keon a little bit later we're gonna talk about a little bit of behind the scenes of what their experience has been with this show and what they're hoping for in the future so we're gonna be doing all of that tonight so I've already given you the chosen Murch comm so www.hsn.com is where you get to get used to different t-shirts and sweatshirts and the official season 1 poster you enter that live out that code livestream 10 but here's the other website that you are going to need to know right now and throughout the livestream and for the rest of the night and for the rest of your lives is the chosen dot TV slash pay-it-forward www.hsn.com this time thank you then we blew it the first time yeah yeah me doing it by myself is clearly the winning strategy so the chosen dot TV slash pay it forward as we as I mentioned earlier if you actually go to that website now the the live stream is embedded in that website as far as I know that's the plan if you don't see that or if you if you're struggling if that's difficult for you just go back to the YouTube channel but the chosen dot TV slash pay-it-forward is where I'm hoping you will spend some of your time tonight and here's why if you haven't heard about our pay it forward program I'm going to give you all the details here in a few minutes but most of you probably have heard something about it here's some really cool things that are debuting tonight on the pay it forward page at that website we are now accepting ACH transactions which is another way that you can pay it forward previously it was only credit card now we offer ACH transactions if you don't know what that means and don't worry about it I had to be educated myself I didn't know what it meant a year and a half ago I've learned a lot over the last year of what it means but if you do know what it means and you're like oh good that makes it much easier it's it's just one more way to pay it forward we are also debuting tonight subscriptions yes and I don't even like that word very much because it feels like you're overly committed to something so don't be too scared off by that word but so many of you have asked every single day what about a monthly pay it forward you know what if we can just automatically contribute to seeing people seeing this around the world well we are debuting subscriptions you will now have the opportunity to to commit to a monthly payment of paying it forward so I'm really excited about that because it just meant things easy and so many of you I actually was surprised a little bit by how many of you expressed a desire to do that and obviously we'd prefer that it's a great way to just kind of partner with us and make it be something that you're doing for a longer period of time so that is at the website that shows on TV slash pay it forward so that is the best way to do it the best way to do the pay it forwards is at website so let's go into right now we're going to talk a little bit about 2020 I'm gonna start with what our goals are and kind of work our way backwards so the very earliest that we're going to be able to release episodes of season 2 is likely Thanksgiving ok so everything that I'm about to say is you know goals and and episode end and estimates so you know I'm not locking into anything but our goal is if we the earliest in 2020 that we would be able to release something is Thanksgiving working backwards that would mean that we would need to be shooting by sometime earlier this summer so in 2019 if you remember we were shooting in the summer miserably because it was the Texas heat was miserable but that allowed us to be finished in time to release episodes 5/2 rate 4 episodes by Thanksgiving which would mean that pre-production which is that period of time where were a lot you know visiting the location locking in where we're gonna be shooting offices are set up we're hiring the crew hiring the cast people are starting to fly in and prepare that's usually a six to eight week process that would need to start sometime around April May or so so that does present a few problems and I'll go through them now and here's where you here's where you can help whether it's in prayer or whether it's in actually contributing to season two one of the things that we've been discussing over the last month or so is this routine that we've been doing of four episodes at a time episodes one through four and then we did episodes five through eight that's half a year later that is not necessarily sustainable for several reasons one actor availability it's tough to kiddin people down to its infinitely more expensive to do it that way because you're basically doing pre-production twice three just a lot of us especially me but because there the entire time but some of us you know we have families and usually shooting involves travel and becomes very difficult to shoot you know for two-and-a-half months three months including pre-production twice within one year and so it's looking to us like it would potentially I'm not saying for sure but it potentially makes sense to shoot all eight episodes at once even if we're not releasing all eight at once but to shoot all eight episodes at once and that saves at least a million dollars that saves at least a month and a half to two months of time by doing it that way and so that's something that's really on our minds well to do that we've got to have eight scripts finished we've got to have the financing finished and so to have a chance of releasing at least some of the episodes by Thanksgiving we have to jumpstart now I mean we have to get moving now and we have to get serious and about the financing that we bring to the table and that you of course bring to the table with your purchases and with your pay it forwards so the goal for tonight is by the end of the night it would be so great if I could look at the bottom of the app and see that that we have financed episode 1 of season 2 Jeff episode 1 totally financed it's just a great goal to shoot for now I'd love for us of course tonight to get going into episode 2 that's significant because by Easter of this year if we want to have any chance of getting at least episodes 1 through 4 underway and released or at least the first episode whether we release it one a week or whether release them all at once well that's something we'll figure out later but we need to have the first four episodes financed by Easter and so if we do that then that that allows us to know and project that we're going to be able to do the whole season a few months after that and we can get the process started we can launch into pre-production we will at least have the first four scripts written by that point and then we can decide if we're going to open up investment again that's not a guarantee we may not open up investment again we hope to not we hope to know we want to get to a point where our original investors we don't have to keep going back to old investors or to new investors for more finance and we'd love to get to the point where the show is starting to pay for itself that's the goal and the faster we can start doing that the better and that's what this pay it forward program is all about not buying dvds the books is all about buying merchandise is all about it all contributes towards season 1 episode 1 where we're at currently we actually just passed a million dollars shortly before the live stream started the episode the the budget for episode 1 is going to probably be about 1.1 well I'm sorry 1.25 so 1 million two hundred thousand dollars times 8 is 10 million dollars for all the episodes so doing that tonight would just be a great way to jumpstart 2020 and let us be confident that we can get to episodes 1 through 4 financing by easier so again the the main thing that I want to emphasize you this is the headline is that we can't guarantee that we're going to release episodes by Thanksgiving but if we want to even have a shot of releasing some episodes by Thanksgiving we must have episodes 1 through 4 financed by Easter it would be a great start and a great vote of confidence for all of us to know that we have episode 1 financed just for me just tonight just to know that you are with us in this and then you're seeing the value now how do we do that how do we finance episode 1 tonight how do we finance 1 through 4 by Easter how do we get the whole season financed in time to be shooting it just here I'm gonna go ahead and share from the heart because this project is tough there is no magic there's no big studio or TV network that is writing a big check that allows us to just green light you hear that term a lot coming from Hollywood is Greenland is the project greenlit and when the project is greenlit that means that the studio that is worth billions of dollars is writing a check for however much money that show or that movie is happening or is requiring and they're going into they're going in it's it's done when people say to us are you greenlit for season two the answer is not yet and here's why because we know that we are creating something brand-new the way that this show was financed is a brand new thing with a number one highest crowd funded media project of all time in season one the content itself is new it's the first ever multi season show about the life of Christ the way that it's being watched is brand-new this technology that allows you to use the app to download the app to your phone and connect directly to your streaming devices without needing a subscription the fact that we're able to offer it to you for free at least the first few episodes of each season offered to you for free to where the only way that that that people need to be to pay for it is either to wait to see it for free no no I'm not saying perfectly but track with me to wait to see it for free until more free streams open up or for us and you to pay it forward and that is the way that this is happening this whole concept of get used to different is what this show has been all about and to do that to create something new is is heart-rending and it's like feels like crawling on glass sometimes we are scratching and clawing for everything my wife and kids and the wives and kids of my partners and the partners over that angel are making a big sacrifice for this new thing it's a lot easier when you just know going into it that the check has been written and you can just go right into production and you don't have to worry about the financing we're creating something totally new that's going to last for decades and so some of you have even said well why don't we just put this on Netflix so why doesn't it just go on TV well that's not always up to us but even if it was we wouldn't necessarily want to do that because we are creating something brand-new we are creating a system that will allow us to reach to continue to reach every country in the world with a push of a button where we're not competing with other streaming services or they don't have to pay us a big fee just to access the the streaming service monthly where we can get the chosen directly to the people and all of that requires blondest years literally it requires mistakes requires learning lessons not everything about this process husband smooth we've made some mistakes we've made some decisions that we looking back on which would have done differently but it's all been part of the process of figuring out how to do a new thing isaiah 43:19 behold I am doing a new thing the Harmons who run the danger and my partner Darrell and myself I mean sleep is at a premium at this point I mean that it happens quite often where it's one o'clock in the morning and I'm up responding to comments on Facebook or I'm developing an idea for the next thing and and it turns out that Jeffrey is on at the same time it comes up at the same time Jeffrey Harmon oh one of the cofounders of it angel and why because we're sleeping on the floor on this this is our thing it is something that we feel a tremendous responsibility not only to you but to God to get this right and to build something that's going to last forever and our team that you know the people who are turning out the videos for you on social media and keeping the social media going there's not a lot of I mean they're underpaid and but we're working to respond to every single comment because we want to connect we believe that every single one of you matters and so we're trying to respond to all of our comments or like all of the comments that we get trying to engage as much as possible this project is way bigger than we are and it requires way more than we are capable of and because of that God is going to have to feed the 5,000 we're not capable of doing it ourselves but we do need you to provide the loaves & Fishes with us and if you can provide those loaves & Fishes and working with writing those loaves and fishes and we're making them as good and healthy as they can be then when they are grown and when God does do that thing that only he can do that we're not capable of doing on our own and that's really going to change the world but to accomplish that and to pull that off it requires these kind of live streams but I don't want to be a fundraising machine I don't want us to be televangelists we're not a non-profit do you know begging for money we don't want to be doing that my goal is to actually stop doing these kinds of live streams I don't necessarily love asking for your help it's it's it's a sometimes a pride-swallowing thing if I could come on and say hey look I'm ready here's season two I know sometimes it's annoying to get to get notifications for the next live stream and wouldn't it be great if we could do live streams in the future that were solely reserved for fun and for building our community and for watching episodes together but these live streams are necessary because we need you to partner with us in what I'm talking about in reaching the world and in doing that we do want to provide value like I said we're not a or not a non-profit is just asking you to give us money we are trying to provide something of significant value to you and so these methods these are kind of the ways that we are generating the income for future seasons I'm gonna list them now one of them is merchandise I hinted at it earlier one of the benefits of purchasing merchandise is that yes the proceeds of the merchandise does go to future episodes and seasons and we've made the merchandise high-quality the shirt that I'm wearing right now is one of the most comfortable shirts I have the sweatshirt the the I have a sigh of against the current chosen sweatshirt that we're gonna be offering here soon in a little bit a couple weeks it's the most comfortable spectrum I own we're really trying to make sure that that like the show everything we do is of high quality so we're not asking you to just donate money we're actually giving you something in return that you're actually going to want to wear the benefits of purchasing merchandise in the goal of financing season one or season two or financing episode one is the money does get to us a little quicker the margins are a little higher we're able to we don't have to spend much money at all and marketing in fact I don't think they spent a dime on marketing so that's really cool it helps it allows us to kind of keep the trains running and keep the lights on as we're doing something bigger which I'll get to you in just a minute so it doesn't require a ton of effort on the logistics side of things we had a third party team who handles all that kind of stuff when you go to the chosen merge comm to get it which I hope you're gonna do tonight at some point that it's all it's all done pretty easily and it doesn't require a ton of effort on our part but yet all of those shirts all of those sweatshirts the official season 1 poster all that stuff when you purchase it it does go towards future seasons and the other really cool thing about it is that when you buy that stuff you become a an evangelist for the show when you're wearing shirts like this or sure its message to go on it we're shirts to save in Jesus on it all that stuff starts getting those phrases out to the world people start wondering what that means and we're also trying to do more than just promotional stuff we're not trying to just give you a sweatshirt or a t-shirt that just says the Chosin on it and it's just become kind of crass that way it's like here here thirty bucks you can buy a sweatshirt and it'll say that chosen we're actually trying to provide some phrases and some meanings and some calls to action in many ways get used to different is the line from episode 7 of the show of season 1 binge Jesus is a show that causes a lot of I mean when I wear that sweatshirt people kind of look at like what does that mean we can explain well it's actually the first ever multi season show about the life of Christ you can binge Jesus with it so we're trying to create a bit of a movement here you know and so I think that that's one of the main benefits of the merchandise as well and so our goal is through merchandise alone if we could finance just one episode out of the 8 just for merchandise alone that would be a great goal so that's one of the ways that we're doing it it's not it's it's not the best way it's not did the comprehensive way but it's one of the really good ways of doing it the second way is of course DVDs and books some of you don't own a DVD player you don't care about DVDs we do care about peddling books and so the devotional book that we did of season one has had tremendous impact thousands and thousands of people have gotten those books some people have started group studies around those books and I've told us that it has made a huge difference because it takes goes deeper into the stories of the Gospels and goes deeper into the people of the Gospels in a way that you can't get in a show and so there's 40 devotional entries it's a really cool thing the DVDs also have those Bible roundtables some of you have seen they're really cool we've released some some clips from them but where we talk to our Bible experts and our historical experts and our religious and cultural experts to talk about these episodes and to talk about some of the scenes and break them down and go deeper into it we talk about what we got right what we got wrong and it really allows you to go deeper into these stories and into these scenes in a way that you can't get anywhere else and so those are on the DVDs so we're trying to provide value there but when you buy DVDs and books if you go to the gift factories it says on the app or you go to the website which is the chosen TV slash store www.hsn.com or write that down you don't have to go there right now but we also offer you the ability to buy bold bulk DVDs and bulk books so you can give them to ministries and so we even have a ten thousand dollar option we call it our about one of our big backer packages where for $10,000 you can get hundreds of DVDs and books that you could give to a ministry but it also allows you the opportunity to be a partner with us and gets you a set visit and all that kind of stuff so there's a lot of really cool things about that but that's another way a really cool way that allows you to partner with us on the project goes towards future episodes and seasons and also allows you to be able to give gifts and having things that are tangible is oftentimes more beneficial to people than streaming or apps so having the book especially having the book in your bookshelf being able to hand it someone say this really blessed me being able to hand hand a DVD is a really cool opportunity for you to share it now also with all of these things that I just mentioned posting pictures on social media of the of the shirts posting pictures on social media of the books and the DVDs allows more word to spread it gives you an excuse to post something but that leads me to the third method and this is the biggest and most important method and it's the one that's the longest term this is the more of a long term play it does move a little bit slower because the costs of paying it forward as I've told you before are significant and here's why the reason pay it forward is because our goal is to allow people around the world to watch the show for free now if we just made it available for free completely and didn't ask you to pay it forward we would lose potentially millions of dollars the Chosin right now because of those of you who have paid it forward is literally in every country in the world I'm not exaggerating I'm not giving I'm not summarizing it is in every country in the world it is currently being translated in as many languages as we can try to catch up yes excuse me it is growing like crazy we've done viral in the Philippines we're one of the top 100 entertainment apps and Iran I'm going to talk to you later about what's happening in China I mean it is phenomenal what the show is doing because of you paying it forward if you weren't paying it forward and we just decided to tried to make it free streaming costs money I've said this to something you you may have heard this before but not everyone has and I know it's something that I didn't know but I didn't realize that when every time you stream an episode of the show on anything it actually costs the stream or money and so it does cost us money to make streams available for free to other people and because of that it's a it's a long Bri and difficult thing to do to make these to create this pay it forward program so that's one of the one of the the challenges of it but the benefits are so huge and here's why because when you pay it forward as I said you're allowing people around the world to see it for free and oh this is how a portion of a large portion of that pay it forward goes towards future episodes and seasons it's got this double value and I'm actually going to read to you I actually have a note from someone in India I wanted to share this with you just a minute ago but I forgot but I have this note from someone in India who said this tears rolling out of my eyes I am a Muslim and it is Muslim responsibility to respect Jesus in the Bible thank you once again so think about that that is someone who doesn't necessarily align with us on a spiritual level doesn't necessarily believe the same things we do but the show is getting to them and it actually said tears are rolling out of my and now they are going to be watching this show and I know some of you have that motive and that and that passion to get this show not only to Christians around the world but to people of different faiths and to show them about authentic Jesus and to plant seeds for this story and so when you're paying it forward you're doing that and that in and of itself is what we're going to be planning to do for the next several decades is to continue to make sure that this show gets to his fore it gets in front of the eyeballs of as many people as possible our goal is at least a billion people around the world again that sounds like a lot but it's actually everyday becoming more and more possible to me see how much people love to show and as we're able to continue to pay it forward and get money for different translations different languages which we'll talk about down the road but this is the way because when you get it in front of those people then may become evangelist for the show and they start spreading the word about the show in their country which is like what's happening in the Philippines and in Iran so this is the engine that is going to drive this show long term when you go to www.hsn.com TV slash pay it forward huh she might bring us back sometimes since I started to lose this yeah a little flat near the end but when you go to the chosen TV slash pay it forward that is the engine that's going to drive this show long term I do want you to buy the merchandise I do want you to buy the shirts and the sweatshirts that makes a big difference too I do want you to buy the books and the DVDs and there are some really cool updates that are happening with those like for example right now my wife and Kristen Hendrix or co-writer are working on the season two devotional book we're also in discussions with focus on the family with largest organizations in the world for curriculum but we're gonna be able to get to you as well so hopefully before the end of the year curriculum for this show it's going to allow for Bible studies I mean all of those things are important and they all add value to your life and they add value to the lives of other people and they do build the audience for the show and they take you deeper into these stories all of that stuff is important and it keeps the trains moving and it keeps the lights on and it's low risk and it builds community but the pay it forward option the pay forward plan that is the big long-term play that is and I even the word play is probably the wrong word because I don't want you to be distracted from the seriousness of it it is the global engine it is the thing that's going to drive this forward and one thing that I want to be very clear and I'm monitoring if you've listened to nothing else I want you to listen to this right now and this matters for tonight when you pay it forward you are not only financing episode 1 which is our goal for tonight you're financing season 8 what do I mean by that we're wanting this show to be eight seasons that is our goal we believe that that's possible and we believe that over the course of those eight seasons it's gonna probably cost in the neighborhood of 100 million dollars you might be thinking 100 million dollars sounds ridiculous well you think about a show like Game of Thrones their budget for that eight see those they did eight seasons their budget was close to a billion dollars we don't need anywhere close to that 100 million dollars to finance the first eight seasons is very doable especially considering that season one based on a short film I did on my friends farm in Illinois we were able to raise ten million dollars and shatter the crowdfunding record it's very doable it's extremely doable and the way that we're gonna get there is not by every single year coming back to you and saying alright let's try again let's raise money for season three let's raise money for season four let's see let's add even more investors to to the way to that we're going to accomplish this if we have a chance of getting to eight seasons is the pay it forward model that is the engine that is the driving force and that is what I want to get in your head because of the you know I want you to think of it in two ways one is as I said the people that it gets in front of hey or word is how people are going to be able to watch this okay yeah around the world that is the method pay it forward that is how people can afford to see it for free or how we can afford to give it to them for free but I want you to recognize that when you're doing that this is a long-term play a long-term method to get to eight seasons is pay it forward and so I want to say this again tonight I want you to consider that that as you are helping finance pisode one you're also helping finance season 8 because eventually this engine will catch up to the fact that it starts to just generate itself and I don't have to keep coming back to you so please consider that please make that a priority if you're capable if you're not that's totally fine too we covet your prayers we cover your support recovery your spreading of the word I want you to do what you're capable of it just know that when you do if when and when you do watch a season because of others who paid it forward I do hope you consider at least thanking them you know we have that option that you can thank in the app when you watch it because we're trying to build this community and I know that that's a great motivation for you so I really appreciate that so one thing I'm going to do real quick and a couple things I want to reduce you to so I'm going to take out these earbuds so hopefully I assume you can still hear me but I want to I want to show you something that's going to kind of illustrate what this pay it forward is and I just got a note right now right now we are at one point one four three which means that tonight because I know we just passed around a million dollars around the livestream when it started 143 thousand dollars already so that is really phenomenal someone has come in from merchandise someone that has come in from DVD buys and then of course pay it forwards so that is phenomenal so please keep that up and that means that we're essentially a little under a hundred thousand dollars left will finance episode one and get us off at that amazing start so that's incredible so thank you so much for that all right so one thing I want you to see in fact I'm gonna bring him out now this is Nick Shakur and Jordan keen are also here and I want you guys why don't you guys go sit in this area right here I'm gonna that's George and that's Keon John and James and this is Nick and it played Zebedee in season one I hope you recognize him I've asked you Nick to read something he did not actually read it yet but this is a note that we got about a week and a half ago from a mother in China and the note is pretty self-explanatory but a reason I wanted you to read it is because Nick is someone with a really big heart when I talk in just a minute but I wanted you to know some of the impact that your work is having on other and I want you as your water about some of the work that some of the impact that this show is having around the world particularly in China especially during this coronavirus so nice and loud please because this is a mic yeah for sure there's no so this says chosen came into our site just after the government announces ever cancel any gatherings and staying home for our own safety we watched two episodes in the evening with our TV connected to the fault I'm the one who has the best understanding of English in the family the other six members including my husband and five children struggle through the lines but from my own observation language very less than their enjoyment and the eagerness for the show when one of the episodes finishes the children begs me for another during the day I get to participate in translation of Chinese subtitles hoping to offer my skill of interpretation as my pieces of fish and loaves to offer to God it is hard to measure and describe the encouragement the Chosun has blessed our long days um at this difficult time and how it how it lifts our spirits and draws our hearts to Jesus a lot of my kids stare at Jesus he brushes his teeth washed his feet and tries to start fire but with their with their mouths wide open the Lord's figure has become more and more real in the hearts of many children of my children as they come closer to his life we are from the coronavirus hip area but we stand with our folks there fighting the stamina I'll finish it off go for it with spiritual fighting the same battle with spiritual weapons thank you again for allowing us the opportunity to view the chosen he is doing new things so when we hear things like that we hear something similar to that almost every day from a world that that's what paying it forward does and one of the reasons I wanted Rick Nick to read that is because your story of being involved with this project is not traditional I'll sum up real quickly how I cast him he came in and read and for some well and I liked him he was clearly a great actor and he brought a lot of things to it that I thought well he'd be perfect for zebedee even though Zebedee is actually as we wrote him was 50 years old 50 nick is in his 30s but I've developed a complex because but he gave such a beautiful performance both behind the seriousness of it and I knew he'd be perfect for 70 so when we cast you I expected to hear back pretty quickly always excited he's an eager for it but you were in a different spot in your life and talked about what you were facing well you at first just decided you didn't want to do it cuz you didn't feel like the part yeah what even while you were facing once you decided to do it and you were flying over to Texas to shoot what was kind of going through your head yeah it was it was so insane so I found out I get the role from my aging and all of a sudden like you're saying instead of being happy about it it's hard to describe I was just flooded with a lot of negative feelings and you told at one point you were like I had multiple voices in my head like at least four or five or something like that and I could talk in the everybody and so finally after a lot of back and forth so I turned the project down twice and my manager was like you know you can do what you want she calls me and you can do what you want her but uh but but but I ended up saying fine if they're willing to work with my schedule I'm down to do it night I couldn't explain why I didn't want to do it because usually when you book something you're happy about it could not oh gosh I booked a job no I don't want to do it so I get to Texas and you know I get along with everybody instantly these guys everybody even you and it was a great three or four days and and our shooting the the miracle the fish scene and we were due to shoot at the next day we're gonna finish it off why so much thumbs out videos a couple day that it was going wow you were like at least the people are cool yeah it was really nice mood and then you know I get a random call from my brother-in-law saying to my dad remember easier to talk about but it's still not easy um that that misty he had just experienced a heart attack out of the blue and so I was kind of faced with the choice of leaving to fly back to California or staying in Texas you got the news late night too yeah I was at the restaurant with the guys I couldn't even finish my baby back ribs and uh and so it was weird because one voice was telling me you know you got to go kind of a stay here and you got to be with your family and then there was a small voice that said basically just sat there and meditated said you know if you leave now then everything something - they said of everything that you've believed in me so far is if you leave now you don't believe in my power and so say well that's odd that that that thought came to my mind of all the thoughts of what I booked the flight you know how I get out of here and if there was any other production I would have left no hands down and so I just made the choice of you know I'm just gonna let for the first time in my life kind of dictate what the situation was gonna be and I'm just gonna stay here and finish what I what I started and so you know the next day everybody was just great about it told me about Justin overall Anderson our associate producers was there with you that night yeah and he was that he'd given a big stuff in the morning and he just I walked into the lobby and he was being goofy with me at 5:00 a.m. because he knows I'm a big jokester and he just looked at me like what's wrong so I was just pale and I just kind of broke down and started crying and he just hugged me right away just saying those words of my dad had a heart attack oh my god and he was great about you know just being supportive along with some of the other producers that came told me they were praying for my dad and that you know that kind of spiritual moral support I've never experienced on a set and so when all is said and done I was you know I flew back when we took that short break before shooting the hammer she flew back went to the hospital it was it was insane because when the doctor came in he told us that when they finally I was gonna be better at this when they believe this is real I mean this is what we is what we do one day when they put his heart in they were about to jump him as they do with the patients and they said the minute they may put his heart in all his vitals kicked in and they just started working so he held the nurses back and he was like wait and then he told me he said Oh Skippy all mine forever when he basically told me he leaned over he was just like he was acting like it was just another day at the office for that was a big deal and I'll never forget his words he's like Otis like by there he's like you your dad should have actually passed away cuz all three of his arteries were done but there's like you know this is this is a miracle what happened and I just got a smile and I was like yeah yeah it was like I think the comfort that you felt to stay listen I didn't I wouldn't have stayed and there was a network because I think it was and this show from day one has been in the hands of someone bigger than us and I just loved yeah I want I wanted you to know that you're being impacted by the show and that mother in China is being impacted by the show but we're being impacted as well our lives are being impacted by that and I just again I love the story of what happened while you were shooting but I also wanted you to read that note because you standing impacted people ba wants to show your work is having a tremendous impact on people all over the world right now so well if you brother handle moving soon it all right George fine just try to follow that who's in the hot seat George does get extra points because look what he's wearing oh yeah I'm wearing I'm wearing much yeah so that will be back at some point but George I know your story isn't quite as dramatic as Nix but as you may have heard from George's accent he's from Australia that's right good night how's it going yes and one of the coolest things about George was that um he addition for two different roles every other role that he didn't play but he came in at the end of the first day of filming our first day of casting and audition for Simon and was terrific but didn't quite fit when I had mine and I think we were already we'd already seen hard I'd seen like Shahar seemed part of what we were looking for but I'm like I gotta work with this guy in something so I had you come back the very next day and read for Quintus who is the opposite of Simon in many ways or the episode we were thinking what for people who don't know why is saying I'm gonna read for a different role the kind of thing that is not quite as easy as it sounds what works give us like a 30-second version of why that's far more difficult than people think oh well because there's eight pages you go to sort of learn by the next day that's one of the things and it all for you because some people might say well I I can't do it so I'm just gonna come and read but George is a professional to the enth degree and I think one of the reasons why is performance it's been so great because if you you wanted to come in prepared mm-hm and have be off-book as we say which is means no script so whatever for hours I mean that's that's what it's like in Australia that we don't they don't really like you holding the script in Australia and then you come here and they're like just just hold the script just just hold it they don't like you're coming in without it so I've had to learn so I was still quite green in terms of the astre the American experience is very yeah I came in god I want to know about the script I know it all like I know every line so on yeah it was it was tough but you know what I tell you what they always a lot of actors and the other tool set this as well when stuff is written well you can remember it easier and I tell you what I remembered it really quickly I think it's a testament to how well the show has been written than that and the way it's been made so well and we'll be bringing out the man responsible for especially it's a lot of the quintus scenes as ryan who's bring him up just couple minutes here to talk about the writing but yeah the writing of those of cordis I think is juicy and Brandon does a brilliant brilliant job playing to acquaint us can I say I mean it's it's it's great I don't mean to say like oh thank goodness I didn't get that role but yes because I I feel more connected to Jon but also great job our Quintus is so incredible it just worked out perfectly and it it whatever you guys saw in what I did with Simon and Quintus that we landed on John which I'm sure you'll get to it's it's worked out the right way you know yes I'm grateful for that yeah well my wife is the one who really pointed out to me I mean I love George and I wanted to work with him in something but she said he's John he has the combination of strength and spirit and heart that John as as we know from the book of John the book that John wrote he's emotional but he's also very passionate in fact John and James were called the sons of thunder because they were so yeah just spoiler alert in season 2 episode 1 we do start to introduce why they're called the sons of thunder and we bring in that nickname for the first time so just a quick spoiler alert but uh just real quick cuz I'm like there's a lot of other things we want to cover tonight but talk about playing the Apostle John John is probably one of the most famous men in history much less in Christianity he wrote one of the primary books of the Bible he wrote John chapter three which is the most famous chapter in the Bible the most famous verse in fact in episode 7 when Nicodemus and Jesus are meeting on the roof and having John chapter 3 that discussion we cut briefly to you outside taking notes because we know that that results in John chapter 3 when all those lines yes right so but just talk briefly about as an actor playing a part that's so historically significant and in fact in the Gospels John described himself as the disciple Jesus loved I mean he was a big deal Jesus actually trusted him with his mother on the cross he says to John you are now her son and it's basically I'm entrusting her to you huge huge biblical figure yeah briefly about playing a part like that what the research is for that and how you kind of withstand some of the pressures of doing well it's an incredible honor to play you know John I mean it's it's it's it's incredible because I got remember when I got you know was you guys said we want you to play you know John the Apostle and it's you know you don't know what you think about it at the time but couldn't be more perfect literally I mean we're very similar in our characters as well and and if I came to learn that you know when you do your research and there's Greg there's a lot of good resources online and also in the Bible where where they will associate characteristics with specific experts out of the Bible to give you an idea as to why they feel this way but you know it says someone that was quite hot-headed but learnt a lot from Jesus and it's incredible because I also feel that way on set with Jonathan I mean Jonathan please use this in place to place Jesus I mean it's great because I'm getting this this synergy between how I am as a person and also how John is or how John was and it's an incredible honor to play that character but you know those characteristics are initially of a form of instinct or to do something but then there's that that that moment of thought and then okay let's let's see how we deal with this in a in a specific way so you've got the e passion but also the measured right way of dealing with it that fitting fitting the the the macro level part of the character into the script and into the lines that you have to say and I think what our job is is to make to write lines that that fit and that makes sense easily and then your job is to bring something unique to the part and when you're playing a storica figure it's there it's a little bit more I think challenging when you're when you know that you have to also kind of live up to the history of it so anyway I just wanted you to meet George because he's he's his role is only going to continue to grow in these seasons because John takes a pretty significant role and it's I mean you've mentioned this a lot as well like your inspirations as television shows you've mentioned Breaking Bad before when you have a lot of these shows you you've and and that's what's incredible about this is that you know it's it's it's you know it's it's historical and then we're telling true stories here but at the same time as a television show and what's incredible is the way that the show has you know introduced the characters and you know it's like when you begin we begin watching something like Breaking Bad and you see a character that's small and then later on they become this massive figure I'm not gonna try and say that it's nice bigger but you probably will make you know he's he's literally is the last that he's the one to cross easy sitting there before the cross is the last person to sort of sit there and you know grieving you know Jesus on the cross so spoiler alert Jesus guys yeah yeah yeah but you know it's it's it's great that this is also a television series that you can you can invest in and is this characters like Zebedee that that you know we only get small extra from but becomes this incredible counter three-dimensional person is just a word yeah so first that's also incredible that all you guys get to come on that journey with us not only just looking at historical facts but also a television show it's easy it's great yeah well thanks man beautiful love you too thanks man did you see yeah come on in um one of the reasons why you keep hearing these voices like comes from episode 4 when Zebedee says go to his to his funds and a lot of for me like making fun of so here's what's interesting about qian and here's what i wanted to talk to you just briefly is in episodes 1 through 4 you don't actually see can the part of james was actually played by a different actor who unfortunately couldn't make it for the second half of the season and that was of course not great news but it also but it did allow us to get qian end of the show and you had actually auditioned for the first four episodes for the role of simon yeah and did you know its assignment Matthew did someone else like three times additional exam so I think you did Simon and Matthew four episodes one through four once and then we went to episodes five to eight and you auditioned for Thomas Thomas and every time he auditioned I thought I really like this guy and I'm at my wife love didn't do it again as you know my wife is a co casting director with our great casting directors but but the final decisions are mine and my wife is as much a part of that as me she kept and and so when we when Shyam couldn't come back she said it's Qian Qian's games don't need to audition don't need to ask look at other people he ends the guy and so what I wanted to ask you about was twofold yes I want to get into a little bit of playing a historical figure and what that's like real quick sidenote well thank you what is your accent what is here you have a you know I was actually born a race in Germany yeah and then to England and then after they moved to New York and I'm here in LA for a year so it's a combination of Germans are ready for New York pretty much I heard an accent so anyway but also coming into a show like this it's very difficult when there's already a group of people that have connected and Shayan who played James and the episodes one through four was a great guy and then we had built a community there and so I remember being concerned a little bit like it's gonna be tough for you to come in and feel like you you fit in especially in a family like this talk about what it was like coming to the set of the chosen yeah well I mean first of I was I was scared because I got the call in three days later they they flew me out to Texas and I just didn't know what happened and then and then Dell assumed it was private link so I could actually follow and catch up on the show and that's when I actually notice that I'm actually panicking which is scary because I had pretty big shoes to fill and I founded a pretty great job and I had to find a way in a short amount of time to continue where he left off and still bring certainty once it's like my characteristics into it which made it really tough and considering that I arrived at a set and I didn't know anyone and I just landed a funny story at the airport actually I met Giovanni and I didn't know it's Giovanni was sitting Avani plays fat ass yes exactly he was sitting next to me and and I kind of had the urge of top like talking to him and he just looked man okay how's it going and then it ended up actually the airport when we landed in Texas that George and Giovanni we're actually there picking me up and that was the first one for looking it's just in great courts it's comfortable I don't feel too um I've kind of feel like this can go somewhere and then I arrived at assist and I was kind of worried because I could see they all had their feel it their thing going on there I don't know how to do it it's like I don't know if I fit in there and I just the first set is one set and at the end of the day I must say with those guys and everyone else in the show I became we became one big family and I felt like I was I've always been a part of it never been away from it but um it's just I was gone and now I'm part of it I just came to it and it was never a stranger and I have to say if this is something you don't really see on many it's really alone in your corner you do be preparation to where we have to do but once I set foot on set and everyone even the PA is the guys to here the cast the hell is even everyone was super nice to me and I was worried that I was looking down right now like what is this new kid gonna do now replacing the other one and let's see what he got and I wouldn't up it didn't matter because right within the first day you became a big family and we just I was able to act without any obstacles but I mean anything standing in front of it yeah well it's been great to have you on board and I think everyone who's come on board in this show cast and and and even a lot of the crew that's sitting it feels different and that's what this phrase is our motto get used to different it applies to so many things it applies to the content of the show itself it's a line that Jesus said to Simon Peter in Episode seven when he said get used to different it kind of define his ministry and also has defined how the show has been and I think when Cass come to the set I think sometimes we are essentially saying get used to different this is gonna feel different and so before I like to go real quick just playing the part of James we've talked about the brothers the sons of thunder yeah and the impact that they had in history has there been added pressure playing a part that you know has a lot of meaning for people in the who are believers in the Gospels or have you tried to just kind of separate that and say listen I just got to focus on making this a human being I mean I had to do I mean that's a new justice I was a huge responsibility because I'm actually portraying a biblical figure and they're actually based on real human beings with people so of course on one side who Dave evaporation as an actor you just bring where research you did but at the end of the day you have to be able to bring certain there we had we had this in the past another one of those other views that we see them as a sculpture like very steady people in the past we've seen these cases like very like we have to bring life to that because those people they were actually people having the same problems that we probably have today they're irrelevant and now I have to bring the certain element of humanity into it without getting too far away from who they actually work so it was kind of difficult to find a base in between in a short amount of time but uh I think it was a huge responsibility and I hope I did justice well you have and I think one of the one of the cool moments that if it happened in episodes 6 & 8 is one we were establishing James is a bit of a historian someone who is more logical and and measured and so in episode 6 we see James talked about how he knows the story of the massacre of the innocents and then in episode 8 when when we're going through Samaria James steps florence's whoa the you start giving a history yeah and now we've used your characters you kind of give the audience a bit of a history lesson so we're gonna continue we're going to continue with that thank you so much Amanda you guys can go back to your corner yes in just a couple minutes I'm going to bring out our writer head writer Ryan Swanson but before that I just want to kind of recap a couple of things we've talked about kind of remind you of some of the biggest things that we're doing right now and what the goal of tonight is by the way just said our Ivan has just paid it forward for 30 episodes that means 30 people are going to get a chance to watch this show for free because of you well so thank you every time you're doing that and I got word that since we started the live stream over seventy thousand dollars just from pay it forward and DVDs have come in that doesn't include merchandise that doesn't include some of the Payette forwards that have been coming and even before the live stream started so keep this up our Virginia just paid it forward for a hundred episodes that's so fantastic so they're also saying thank you yes that literally is true is that when you paying it forward you are actually also contributing to making sure that we can pay our cast and crew that's where this production budget goes to and some people say well why isn't why can't the show always be free well the dvds can't be free of course and the Payette forwards are doing this because we actually have to pay for equipment and pay for cast and crew so so please keep that in mind but I just wanted to remind you so we are getting close to I don't have the exact number in front of me I'll probably get that relatively soon but our goal at least for tonight our minimum goal for tonight is to hit 1.25 million which will finance episode 1 of season 2 so the ways that you can do that and before I bring out Ryan I want to talk to you about that if you want to contribute to making sure that we are able to do season a finance episode one and to remind you the reason we want to finance episode 1 tonight is is it's a great jumpstart and it gives us confidence to know now we can have episodes 1 through 4 financed by Easter if we have episodes 1 through 4 financed by Easter that significantly increases the chances that we're going to be able to have something released by Thanksgiving again working our way backwards because we don't have someone writing a big check so we can just get going right away we need to have 1 through 4 financed by Easter which will let us know that we can get 5 through 8 and the entire season financed possibly if not likely by the summer which could increase our chances of releasing something by Thanksgiving so that's a huge thing so please tonight consider that and the ways to do that or I'm going to first bring up the chosen merge calm let's try again ok don't join in until I see www.hsn.com there we go a lot better I still have to making progress of the chosen merge calm remember when you order at the chosen merge calm tonight you will be able to get to get used to different t-shirt to get used to different gear all these people who have been loving it you see that up on the screen right now the discount code when you go to a checkout is livestream 10 that's all one word it's not case-sensitive but live stream 10 if you are outside the United States shipping is going to be expensive I'm going to tell that to you right up front but you can order if you want there was a there's a email address on the front page that you can email and let them know that you do want to order from overseas it is possible even in Australia George people can be ordering so we have get used to different t-shirts get used to different sweatshirts and tonight is the deadline is it the last night that you're able to get this gear and when you purchase this merchandise it is one of the most effective ways to finance future episodes and seasons and allow us to continue to produce these videos that we do for you every week every day at our social media channel so please consider at some point tonight if not right now at some point tonight going to the chosen merch calm I remember the discount code is livestream 10 the number 10 okay that would give you 10% off everything you were 10% off across the site if you order $100 worth of stuff if you order 10 t-shirts you're going to get 10% off tonight only on this livestream okay the other thing is DVDs and books so remember when you go to the chosen TV slash store the chosen dot TV slash store right up now is the pay it forward option which I'm going to get to in just a second but the store is where you can get DVDs and books you can buy them in bulk the more you buy the cheaper it is we make it on purpose easy for you to buy in bulk we want you to have these gifts to give out to people and so when you do that when you go to www.hsn.com never pay attention when you get to the store and you'll see that you have the option to buy in bulk and that gives you opportunities to visit the set it also gives you an the opportunity to have multiple DVDs and multiple books the devotional book that chosen for the easy Jesus is fantastic I'm telling you it is going to impact you and when you do that you allows you to have give gifts so that's one of the benefits of buying the DVDs and the books is that it gives you gifts to hand out and spread the word about but again the number one thing long term to get this going to make sure that we're able to get to eight seasons the engine that's gonna eventually start to allow the show to sustain itself and not rely on me having to do these live streams all the time asking you to partner with us you can do that long-term at the chosen dot you've paid for WWE chosen Eevee thank you guys okay but and starting tonight you are able to do monthly automatic contributions paying it forward monthly automatically is an amazing way to to pay it forward and you also now we at that website we have an e CH opportunity to do that for the first time so go to that website and pay forward I'm going to bring out my dear friends he's been waiting on the other side of the hotel room Ryan come come here when you get a moment I was putting in Ryan have been didn't have a chair so he's been kind of uncomfortable so go ahead and sit here Ryan here's why I'm introducing Ryan to you you can see right there and so you'll be able to look right here into them to talk to our viewer but um one of the reasons I'm bringing Brian out right sorry it's been a long it's been a long night so one of the reasons I'm bringing Ryan out is because I want to give you the overview of 2020 so I've already talked about this earlier but if you're just joining us I want to remind I want to tell you and if you've heard it before I want to remind you of what we're trying to do this year if our goal is to release at least some of the season by Thanksgiving and if our goal is also to try to shoot all eight episodes at once which as I mentioned earlier saves at least a million dollars if not more saves us at least a month and a half to two months of time how do we pull that off well Ryan aswanson is our head writer so we have a three person writing team it's Tyler Thompson who's out of Chicago a good friend of mine we've worked together before Tyler and I actually co-wrote the sharpness Shepherd the pilot episode the Christmas pilot episode that you enjoyed we brought Ryan on for the show because obviously was way bigger than were capable of Ryan is an expert screenwriter so he brings a sense of any knowledge of he's forgotten more about how to tell stories and plots than I know he's it's he's a wizard at it and he brings that expertise to the table so that we can take these stories from the Gospels not change them but fit them into the construct of a show which is a whole different ball of wax and very challenging so talk real quick about first of all where we're at now again knowing that our goal is to get all eight episodes written this year knowing that it takes more than just you don't just start writing the script right away so talk us through what we do and what we're doing right now as we're plotting out season one and what what it's going to take to get these scripts done by the summer right now so hi everybody we've talked about this before Dallas has told you that we meet at a writer's retreat we do that we've done this before each four episodes segment and we get a lot of work done in a very short period of time because we're trying to be efficient we're using everybody's time where we're like I said we're in different parts of the country so we're not trying to write scripts at that point no we're trying to know what the seasons gonna look like so far we're just there's so many steps planning these things so at that retreat what we do is we figure out what what the start of the season is gonna look like and what the end of the season is gonna look like we plot that out just like we do an episode we're looking for a beginning a middle and an end and so we we get a sense of what every episode has to it has to accomplish in terms of everybody's everybody's arc introducing you to who these people are in three dimensions and so we've now taken the next husband um that part of the season two's been done so now we've so you have you know more spoilers than anyone on planet earth for what season two is going to be you probably even know more than I do but if someone wanted to know what season two is and would hold a gun to your head and they would get more spoilers than anyone else that's not a dare that's just that's just fact hopefully that won't happen so we're at a point now and and you know the great thing about this is that there's discovery in every step of the writing process for all of us you know and so regardless of spoilers that I know now when we actually sit down have to make a choice about something that we've plotted out or a character that we find out sometimes they surprise us sometimes we we find an option that we hadn't seen before and we just stumble upon it and then we go with it of course we we stay Scripture is our mandate and we never leave that but within the lines of it we do find some opportunities to to go even deeper and that's that's been a place where that wider and deeper allows us to tell more of the story and give some of the history and cultural context that Scripture didn't see fit to share because I had a different mandate and gold and what we do another example of where things can sometimes change is sitting actually in this room after one through four I remember you specifically were like we got a brings Emma T back more often like the choice to have the the healing of the paralytic take place at somebody's house was a deliberate choice based on what Nick brought to the table and it's also not an accident and not too deep with his father the reason why 70 will return and we weren't we weren't planning on that we were Zebedee was kind of a means to an end he was to kind of introduce us to James and John and then he was going to send them off on their way and we didn't really have a strong reason to bring him back other than his performance and so I think I think you've made that very clear I think even in how we shaped the relationship between Matthew and Quintus Matthew and Gaius has come from what's what we've discovered as opposed to what we plotted out so true even you know when many episodes are released and we see who's reacting to who's just there's some storylines that are undeniable and we're responding to a lot of those this season we're finding characters that we need to to emerge because they've been so electric on the screen and others that you know questions were left hanging about how Matthew is gonna fit in the group for example episode 2 of season 2 is largely about Matthew finding his groove if you will with in amongst the other apostles and that's gonna create a multi-episode arc that he's going to maybe finally break through in this the second half of the first year of jesus's ministry which is what season two brings us to right because it would be fair to say that the cats out of the bag now as a Samaritan woman ran away from the well screaming she was she said I'm gonna tell everyone and Jesus said I was counting on it season two picks up where that left off the cats out of the bag the words getting out healings are gonna start to increase miracles are increasing the word is spreading and that's got both positives and negatives the positives are the fame is good and that Jesus's message is getting out there but there's also a lot of hatred that comes from that and then within the group you know like you just said Matthew getting his groove but an episode of southern one we introduced a very key member of the team Thomas and if you noticed at the end of episode five Thomas and Rhema say Thomas says the Rhema he wants us to join them in Samaria in 12 days so if you're paying attention this shouldn't be too much of a spoiler Thomas and Rhema are going to show in season and Thomas brings to the table the fact that we recognize that Simon isn't the only one who's ticked off and having a tax collector in this inner circle so all that that that kind of intra group dynamic is going to be at play so let's talk about just before I let you go goals and deadlines or is it reasonable that we can get the first four episodes done before Easter and with the goal of trying to get this whole season done I mean the assembly line has begun Tyler delivers usually the first draft of what we call a scriptment which is kind of us treat a narrative mix with some dialogue you do or that to you you turn it into a you then deliver that to me I make I can I had my own things to it while we're doing that Tyler is moving on and you're moving on what do we need just in terms of Prayer and in terms of support to be able to do season one this year they say the worst writing assignment is to write something that nobody wants to make and so knowing that everybody's behind us knowing that the actors are excited to get going that is always extremely helpful just psychologically practically so nothing so that on that note when you're hearing from people on the fanclub page which by the way exists wait to go to the main Facebook page you'll see an opportunity to join them chosen fan club Facebook group it's great the people in there talk about the chosen constantly and they're they love it and you hear constantly 1 season 2 coming out we're praying for you oh we can't wait that doesn't that's not a negative okay doesn't feel like it adds more pressure I mean every day when we wake up we hope that this becomes of production we hope that we get these actors in front of cameras we we hope that we have something to release by our own deadlines that we said and we're inspired every day you know Tyler and I took a trip recently to Israel to work with Matthew McEwan and rabbi Shapiro and Sunday yeah so you are still on in some ways on Tel Aviv time Tel Aviv time but you know that opportunity was was fairly mind-blowing hymns life-changing we we come back with so much inspiration and we're just chomping at the bit to do this so so that is always helpful to know that we've got an angle again psychologically practically what we're looking at is that Tyler me and outs are now all working on so it'sit's we will be ready by Easter with with four scripts we want to get to five we want to get to six seven and eight we want to get to a place where again we know that these are going to become shows because we've got it all plotted out there's gonna be some discovery and among the margins but right now we're looking at a very exciting midseason it's never climax but the mid-season does something specific for us it shows us the characters our success is within their grasp and it's never been further from them so we might get to this frustrating exciting midpoint the season and I think it'll surprise everybody I don't know if we've released any information about what happens at our midpoint in the C's no no and and we're not going to and yet and then also we can also I think it's very safe to say as safe as safe as we knew that the ending of episode 4 of season 1 was going to be great and we knew we could confidently we could constantly state that the ending of episode 8 of season 1 was going to be emotionally impactful and it was going to be a great cliffhanger we can confidently say that the ending of season 2 is a terrific jumpstart into the next season and people are introduced and things are happening that will not disappoint is that is that safe to say it's safe to say and it's in it's it's so exciting because both of those moments are moments that people know right and and so we're gonna present them in a way you've never seen them because we're gonna give back stories in context for for all those moments two of the most defining moments or people in the Gospels head take place in season two and so on the one hand like you said you know it and so it's going to be great you're going to be excited but on the other hand it's going to be in a different way than you've ever seen before because of the fed up and so that will continue so I want to say this with him here I'm gonna let him go and then I'm gonna having a couple more things I really want to share with you but pray for this man I I mean this very sincerely obviously I'm the boss of the show and I'm not going to pretend that that's not true but if there was someone who I probably am most reliant on it's him the actors are most of our lead actors have been cast they we know what they can do they're going to deliver the same a lot of the same greatness that they already have but he's more than any of many more than anyone else on this in this show is each year has to work hard to lead us as fellow writers to create new things the Bible has been set in stone obviously we're not changing that but to make it into a show and to honor the Bible while also introducing things that are interesting and compelling is a task that I'm not capable of and he is more capable of than anyone and so I'm more reliant on him than I am pretty much anyone that I can think of in the cast and crew and he bears a great weight and responsibility as the head writer the words that the actors in this room say a good chunk of them were written by Ryan and if they weren't written directly by him because all three of us I think contribute equally in terms of dialogue and stuff but they have to go through his they have to pass his muster even I have to get approval from Ryan that this is going to make for good storytelling and so we're all capable of that I think we all bring something interesting to the table but this guy is the one who decides this is this works as a plot this works as a show and so please continue to pray for him and the next four months or so of this year are is contingent upon Ryan as they're about as there anyone else including me because there are periods of time where I'm actually not writing I'm just communicating with you and he's doing the bulk of it so pray for him and pray for Tyler of course pray for me but I just wanted you to know the importance of this man sitting right next to me who by the way was my wife Sadie Hawkins date in high school and we didn't I didn't know him back then of course and my wife lost touch with him for several years and we came back and touched just a couple years ago and I believe absolutely that it was for this purpose so thank you in advance for all those continued prayers and thank you for what you've been doing so far so glad you're here brother love you very much and I've got a lot more work to do so why don't you go all right so I have a couple of quick announcements to make a couple of quick updates to give you a couple of quick reminders as of right now I am being told that we are at one point to one which means that we are less than 20 we are just we're less than 30,000 between 25 and 30 thousand dollars away from hitting our goal just for tonight which is extraordinary I can't thank you enough for that so that means quite a lot let's finish strong and and I want to give you a reason to finish strong I want to read to you a couple quick things that also came across us just in the last couple days I had Nick read or at times tried to read because it was very emotional for all of us what that woman and that mother and that wife and mother in China had to say about watching The Chosen and what your peut for words did to allow her to do that but we got this note just the other day from a woman named Eddie who said I watched the first season because my good friend paid it forward so she had a friend of hers that paid it forward and allowed her to be able to watch this first season that was almost two weeks ago I'm a believer but I've gone through incredible physical pain coupled with severe depression I was at the point of feeling I had no way out except to take my life it was no joke and then through my friend words can't say what the timing of this has been for me it has made the Gospels but even more than that Jesus come alive I can pray again and I really feel like he hears me I too have paid it forward and I really hope to do so again god bless all of you for this amazing production and may by God's grace the up and coming seasons be financed soon this is the good news the power of God unto salvation so that's why I want you to understand how pay it forward works when you're paying it forward - and when I say I've said this a couple times tonight when I say this this is why when I say tonight when you pay it forward you are not only financing episode 1 of season 2 but you are also financing season 8 of this whole show is because when you pay it forward other people get a chance to watch it and when they watch it they end up wanting to pay it forward now some people can't do that some people only have the opportunity to watch what you provide for them and that and nothing more and so that because of that they're able to share the word they're able to spread it to other people but they're not not even one is able to pay it forward and that's okay and that's part of how this works is we're doing this for the purpose of spreading the word to all those who maybe can't afford it otherwise and the beauty of this being able to be on a cap the the technology that was invented and created by the Harmon brothers a company over a good angel under their stewardship but I know that Jeffrey and Neil Harmon would be the first to tell you that they didn't do it themselves they have an incredible team over there that is working hard there are people you know you got Ryan in this room and you got these actors in this room right now who are delivering some of this content that you love so much but the content doesn't get to you you are not able to watch the content without the incredible work of people who sit at computers all day long and oftentimes into the night I have met them I've gone to the video Angel offices and I've met guys who spent 36 hours straight creating the opportunities creating the technology I know Neil Harmon in fact one of the owners himself all-nighter to help to make sure that we could pull this off so that you are able to watch this show without needing a subscription without needing your own to get a subscription to a streaming service you're able to just use a phone all over the world to just plug right in and watch this show on on your streaming device and that is an extraordinary thing and so when you pay it forward you're allowing other people to spread the word and they end up paying it forward and Debbie who was at the brink brink of suicide saw this show and it brought her back to God and because of it she's also paying it forward um Angela had this to say the first night we watched the first two episodes later that evening I was in tears for the first time in a while Jesus felt so real to me I felt a strong connection I felt desperate to close the huge gap that I'd inadvertently put between me and God through neglect I was determined to go to church this past Sunday with the kids I gave up asking my husband to go a long time ago so her husband had not been going to church for a long time we hear this often spouses saying my my my spouse doesn't care about the show doesn't care about the Bible I'm just trying to get them to watch it and then we'll hear these stories of them starting to watch it and then getting drawn in a monitor much more surprisingly he went with us without me saying anything because of the show it was awesome and I can't help but believe the show had so much to do with it I have a renewed spirit can't wait to talk about it over some coffee soon she's talking about the saw their friends um again that's because of what you're doing that's because of what pay-it-forward is doing Sarah bi I've missed that one but Richard C has just paid it forward for a hundred episodes that hundred episodes that's people like Debbie Lake her first initial was M and I wanted to also let you know about one other thing some of you may have heard of Mandisa who's a very famous singer and particularly particularly a gospel singer and I didn't know about this I didn't someone just showed me this this morning not on her Instagram on her Instagram story it's at Mandisa official and AMD is a official someone asked her because she sometimes does questions and she says bring me a question someone said what do you do when your time with God becomes a chore how do you make it enjoyable again she says I love the u.s. this Rachel God is pleased with your heart that he wants it that wants to walk in a close relationship with him she gives a couple of examples of what to do reading Psalms trying to reading the Gospels in a different protective Bible translation and she says this weekend I had no idea this was coming I did no idea she'd seen the show she said then check out this incredible series I just discovered called The Chosen it's free to watch think about that again it's free to watch and that's because of you and I want you to hear that every time we talk about these testimonials I pray it will make the life of Jesus jump off the page for you like it did for me swipe up for more information so to her hundreds of thousands of Instagram followers she's giving specific direction on how to find the show because it impacted her and she said it's free and so that's what pay it forward that's what I want you to focus on tonight as we wrap up as we try to get to this funding of episode one I want to just give you one final recap of the why and then the how and the why is that as I said earlier we don't have a big studio just writing a check we don't have a big TV Network just writing a check saying it's greenlit it's going to on the air everything that we do with this is as I said like crawling on glass it is a struggle it is a challenge it is tough it has not fun you know it it's joyous it's it's very redeeming it's very rewarding but it's not always fun and we try to make it fun but it is work because we're not only doing giving you a show but we're also coming up with ways to communicate to it oh this is different that's why I'm wearing a shirt that says get used to different is because this whole show has been different and we're doing a new thing behold I am doing a new thing as isaiah 40:3 says and that is a hallmark of our show and so everything is coming from scratch and that's you you are literally responsible in so many ways for what we're doing and of course you know and I know that as soon as we've seen and heard from some of our actors tonight and as we've seen for and heard from Ryan and for me God is behind this project and he is doing things that are tough to explain at times but he's not letting us get he's not letting us take it easy I think very hard believe very strongly that it's hard for a reason he wants us every day to have her hands open for daily man like the Israelites in Exodus who had to get there I don't know if it's an exodus exactly so forgive me if I'm wrong but in the Old Testament the Israelites every day had to go out for their daily bread their daily manna and they couldn't get any more than just that day because God wanted them to be reliant on him and that's what this show is so I hope that you recognize that that were reliant on God through this but this is a this is an effort and it requires a lot of sacrifice on our part and on our family's part and I want you to join with us in prayer and in support knowing that when you do that it allows us to keep going I'm not asking for something that I'm not asking for you to join in something that you don't love or care about we don't ask you to pay it forward until you've seen a few episodes and we said this show please pay it forward we're not asking you to donate to some nonprofit and hope that eventually you might get a thank-you from us we want you to know that this is having valued and it's having value for you and we hope that if this show has provided value for you that you will in turn help provide value for others but if the show haven't provided value for you if you're watching this live stream right now and you're just not a big fan of the show or you don't care much about the show then by all means please do not pay it forward please do not buy merchandise and choose do not buy DVDs but if the show has provided you some value I hope that you will give back in some way not only to the show but to others and the way to do that of course I'm going to run through it here is through we've got merchandise tonight tonight so last night tonight is the deadline to get our get used to different merchandise and our official season 1 poster the official season 1 poster is really cool I had it framed on my wall I love it and it looks really cool and we've forgotten some pictures and people who put it on their wall if you've got a student and you want to help them with our dorm room it's perfect for that or if you just have there's a man cave where you putting up different items season one official chosen post here's a great start so please go to WWE [Music] what's got a barbershop quartet that's kind of cool I bailed because I didn't think it was anyone and then you guys kind of rescued a little bit it's kind of cool so www.hsn.com remember the discount code and write this in the in the margins if you don't have it if if you if someone is asking what it is write in the chat box livestream 10 Li ve stre am the number 10 all one word livestream 10 and you can join in with the many others who are getting used to different or do it giving this call to action and in a couple weeks we will have some new merchandise for you we'll bring back some old merchandise but tonight I really want you to consider this because a it's really cool in this very comfortable be the message of what we're saying is very strong and it's a great conversation starter it's based on episode 7 where Jesus says to Simon get used to different and see it goes towards episode 1 of the chosen tonight and future episodes and seasons every time that you get the merchandise there's of course also the DVDs in the books I'm a DVD guy myself so I loved having the DVD I love having something tangible the season 1 DVD get this has all eight episodes but it also has a third disc that contains the eight Bible roundtables where we talk to our Bible and historical and religious experts about the season we even disagree on a few things there's even comments that people have made about the show and about the round tables where they've disagreed with some of the things that's what's so great about it we get a chance to talk about these things and work through and debate and you get a chance to see that in the season 1 DVD and there's also yes indeed the Christmas special the pilot episode the the birth of Christ from the perspective of the shepherd to show that starting at all on the season 1 DVD and you can see it there and that's really cool and that's what allows you to give it to others cause you know maybe if you have a group at your home sometimes it's easier to play it on DVD than to do it via streaming and then of course the chosen devotional book season one devotional book two chosen 40 days with Jesus it's 40 essays devotionals whatever word you want to use that take you deeper into the story's deeper into the people behind these shows amazed behind the behind the Gospels and from the show in a way that the show cannot do and so it's very it gives you scripture references it gives you prayer guys it's really really cool it has impacted thousands of lives just that devotional alone so when you go to the store the chosen TV slash store www.hsn.com TV slash stores what you get two dvds in the books and if you notice again it's very important you notice this there's backer packages that allow you to get these in bulk the more you buy the cheaper it is and the reason we did that is because we wanted you to have gifts and when you are able to give out the DVDs and give out the books hand them to people as gifts the chances that they're going to actually watch it or read it are much higher and so that's a great way to get it out there but it also is of course a terrific way to support future episodes and seasons but finally the most important long-term plan the long-term engine for this show is to pay it forward method and so please tonight at some point if you haven't already or at some point in the future hopefully you can also just click the option that allows you to do this automatically every month is www.osemtv.com one more time I flew too high to the Sun like Icarus I made a move I have faith and God said there's only so much I will reward you with basically make sure you keep them in their lane his actress not a singer all right good to know so the chosen TV slash pay-it-forward is where you go and there's the option to do monthly pay it forward automatically that's the best way to do it honestly and that is I can't emphasize this enough that is the engine that is going to keep this show going if we have a chance of this show going eight seasons it's going to be it's gonna be because it pay it forward and if you keep doing that and if you keep spreading the word to do that it will lead to the ability to down the road the show will start to sustain itself and I won't have to come to you each season will just be able to to live and that will continue and will allow the show to continue for decades for decades people around the world will be able to send in testimonials like what we read earlier all over the world people able to watch this show wouldn't it be so great if I late the season if there is someone in the Philippines someone in Iran someone in the United States who hears about this show and is able to watch all eight seasons free because of you because of your ability and your willingness to pay this forward thank you so much for that well with that I think we're going to wrap it up I'm gonna check in to see how close we came I just heard that a gentleman named Langford who has been a tremendous investor and supporter of the show from day one I believe he actually visited to set era guess he did visit the set and actually gave act the shirt that you're wearing I'm gonna show you this Langford contributed he gave this unfortunately some of the letters are starting to fall off because I used this so much so I use this literally every day but this chosen backpack he gave that as a gift to the members of the crew the Langford has been a tremendous supporter I don't want to embarrass somebody just did a $10,000 paid for $10,000 from Langford Langford thank you but I want to make this very they're very clear and Langford would agree with this $100 pay-it-forward $15 pay it forwards are just as important as $10,000 pay for words I mean that because what this is about is sustainability being able to do it long term but it also is very much about the relationship you end the show and the relationship between you and the viewer and when you are able to pay it forward for any amount you will be seeing thankies in your in the app you'll be getting notified when someone thanks you and that means so much so obviously we want to thank Langford for that but that made a big that makes a huge difference of course so at some point soon we will no doubt hit our goal whether it's 10:00 at night or in the morning or whatever it is but please continue to pay it forward because that is the long-term sustainability and as we finance season 1 sorry episode 1 we are also financing the season 8 that is how we are going to be able to get this show completed so but first things first first things first is season 2 and as I introduced you earlier Ryan is writing right now Tyler is writing I am writing we're working on these episodes so we can get season 2 to you if we want to have any hope of getting to you something by Thanksgiving we're going to need to finance the first four episodes in the next couple months otherwise which is not a bad if we it's okay we will no doubt be able to shoot something this year we will get those episodes to you as early as we can and I hope that you'll be part of that so thank you so much god bless you I care deeply about you and your contribution to this project and just remember this it's not your job to feed the 5,000 only loaves and fish and I hope that you will continue to get used to different and and partner with us on this incredible journey that is to chose them thank you so much and God bless okay my name is Kailyn Reese and I'm from port charlotte or acadia okay sorry no you're fine we'll probably use that that's cute my name is Kailyn Reese and I'm from Port Charlotte Florida with our daughter she had some quirks when she was growing up she was also obsessed with certain things we didn't know it was Asperger's at first different ways that she would struggle in different ways that she processed things I guess didn't think much about it as she was growing up until a couple of family members who are teachers mentioned that you know she may be on the spectrum sometimes I think of things a little bit more deeply than some do and don't always understand people's jokes and I had a few ticks growing up that I've I've kind of learned to control the heartbreaking thing as a mother is when you watch your child you know struggle with friendships and you know to feel left out but then watching her kind of overcome those struggles with some of her gifts has been really amazing she had such a gift of just musical an ear for music and an eye for artwork we watched it together as a family and we were all like crying and stuff and it was really good seeing Matthew for the first time it just kind of struck all of us like huh that's really interesting Matthew's quirks the way he interacted with people was very mechanical always looking around and I kind of recognized that at least I had suspicions that he might be on the spectrum especially how he was an outcast and how it was really hard for him to make friends and like relate with people and the part where he was looking into his family's house and he was like sad because they didn't invite him or anything not that my family is like that but I've had some friends who have done stuff like that to me well I just saw the character and I just really related with it and I don't know I just I just thought they maybe if they need a cellist that I could come and if they needed me and also I wanted to tell you that how much that it impacted me so we we said of course that's no problem I never ever expected really that we'd hear anything back I thought that was kind of a neat cute gesture that she wanted to send a letter and I immediately had an idea of what the letter was about because when we created the character of Matthew we decided that based on some of the characteristics we saw in the Gospels and it was plausible if not factual but but but plausible that Matthew had Asperger's syndrome I have personal experience with it on my side of the family there's a lot of people on the spectrum I have a daughter who's on the autism spectrum and so it just made a lot of sense and so once we decided that writing into Matthew these characteristics that I know very well I felt like we could really do an accurate portrayal Kaylin wrote me this letter and she simply said I was moved by seeing a character on screen that I could relate to and it also brought me closer to God and made me realize that I'm not alone that God is with me and sees me in these moments one of our composers Matt is actually a world-class cellist and so we didn't actually need one but but as soon as I mentioned to Matt and Dan our composers her letter and I said you know what would you think of us maybe allowing her to participate man it's really cool that I'm I'm in a position to support and encourage a really cool experience for somebody that I that I didn't get to I am always a fan of supporting musicians who are up-and-coming or just have this strong desire and passion for music my dad opened a text that he got from my mom and saw the email and then he goes isn't it and then I was like what and then I leaned over to look at it and he said no I wouldn't read it to you so then he started reading the response we both like started tearing up and I got so excited that I almost like jumped out of the car then we just sat there like wow God is so good and I was just so happy when she showed up I think she was clearly a little bit nervous but a little bit excited one of the things that were able to calm some of the nerves was we were able to stalk Matt was able to talk about the cello and Dan was able to talk about music in general about some of the things that we did and then I kind of figured out what I was gonna do when I found out it was the scene with Nicodemus and Jesus I was like wow that's so special just amazing to be able to see these people would take the time to work with with Kaelyn to let her be a part of this we weren't necessarily just doing her a favor she's actually a really good cello player and so when she sat down and started to play we were like wow this is actually really good this is actually worthy of this scene the scene that we chose for her to play on it's actually one of the most important scenes in the whole show the moment that she plays in the queue is is probably the most important climactic moment in in the scene it was neat that it worked out for her to be a part of a moment that was that important and not just a couple of characters walking to the market kind of thing something like that it's cool that it worked out that way a couple of simple explanations of things about nuts and bolts of this is how we do this she was a she's a pro yep she did fantastic in fact I don't think we need Matt Nelson anymore on cello then after we did it I saw the video with the music and I also started crying it was so so cool that I get to be a part of this [Music] blessed are take refuge [Music] she actually played beautifully and I think brought to her playing a purity that made the scene even better she's super talented I don't think a lot of teenagers get to have the experience that she was able to have today I don't think a lot of people have enough of people pouring into them and just saying hey look you keep keep going keep getting better at what you're doing I can't tell you how much that just impacted me watching it and and knowing that my daughter's cello was a part of it I could not be more proud as a father to hear her be able to play in a studio and to have the encouragement from everybody working with her it was just just beautiful I can't wait to see the rest but that one scene yeah that's pretty special all that stuff is great when you can invite people into the process of creating and for us working on a TV show for it to be now it's hers to like it's not just Matt's and my music it's it's hers I love that we can invite people in that place allowing someone like Kalin to participate in this I think as part of the statement that we're trying to make with this show which is you know in the lyrics of the opening credits sequence song got no trouble with the mess you've been jump in the water and I think that's what we were saying to Kayla and we got no trouble with this you know the fact that you've struggled with Asperger's is not a hindrance to you being involved in fact we'd love for you to be involved and we'd love for you to jump in the water with us and participate in this show that God has clearly been orchestrating from the beginning all right I got a surprise we this was not planned by a good friend of mine well I want you to meet was flying through traffic as he saw the livestream he's like I got to get there make a quick appearance and so but unfortunately the traffic was so bad he showed up a couple minutes late but I thought you should meet this close friend of mine I think you'd really get a lot out of so come on in whoa do you recognize this young man by any chance guys anybody there yes anyone there Sean what you're wearing look what I'm wearing look at this look at these yeah this I get used to different sweatshirt le traffic yes terrible the chosen beanie hat which we will be bringing back some time real quick these men are co-writer Ryan King George and Nick have all had a chance to say something there are still over a thousand people right now oh yeah thanks for sticking around yes so do you have anything you'd like to ship out I don't know where you're at right now as you're preparing for season 2 this Saturday night you and I actually have a screening in Beverly Hills right I can pray for that there's gonna be a good amount of people there to see an episode we're gonna be talking together but I don't what's on your heart mind well you'd love for these people to know does the encouragement toward season to help you add more pressure does it make you feel nervous I mean where are you at right now well because I was stuck in traffic I was able to hear almost all the live stream so I'm really excited to hear about how Tyler and Ryan went over to Israel and got some real inspiration for the stuff that's gonna come up for season two and subsequent seasons and I've started already thinking about what stories wondering what stories that we're going to be telling and how I can prepare for it but I think even with all the with the phenomenal responsibly we've had in the last year it's really just this whole process has just pushed me further in my journey with Christ and with the Gospels and and just wanting to know more and I've been reading I thought of you today because I was reading a breakdown on one of these other parables in the depth that I'd never heard before and it just made me think like wow you know seeing that sort of what we've been doing already and applied to various different parables got me really excited so that's the thing that's what this show does is yes we stick to Scripture and we don't change when we portray something firms have change it one of the things that we're trying to do is what I think a good sermon can do or what a good book can do or a good article where is it takes what you know it takes what's on the page and gives you just a little bit of extra context that can help bring it to life even more and is that necessary in the sense that you know is the Bible enough of course the book but when you've been a believer for as long as I have for example and for you talking about I we just even the last couple of years you've made no secret the fact that you've kind of had a revival in your spirit yeah and it's like you can read the Bible and go I feel like I haven't read that before like I've heard of it but then you're like ah my and that happens a time and if it makes the Bible so powerful as it's a living breathing thing and I think this has been true for you and I think that we experience that when we're on set a lot of times going this is what's on the page in this scene but what can be brought more to it and usually the answer doesn't come from our own brains it usually comes from us shutting up right exactly exactly just surrendering to experience just channeling what it is that is working through the scripts that we built and the production that we've set up and hopefully their performances a final word just as whether it's thanks or a request for prayer anything before we I just thank everybody in advance for for all the prayers that they've been sending all the messages you guys have sent the chosen army everybody that's been keeping us in their prayers and everybody that's been helping us find actually like we all wanted to do this yesterday we all wanted to start season two yesterday so we're patiently waiting and praying that everybody that sees the show sees the value in the show not just as entertainment but as something much bigger than that bigger than ourselves and we'll be as excited as we are to contribute them to help us get there sooner than later I don't want to be 60 by the time we're getting excuse me did you by chance I can't hear what Nick read I did what are you trying to read but I'm curious real quick what you thought as you heard that from a woman who's saying my kids are even though they don't speak English and even though we don't have any translated said a watching with their mouth open as Jesus was brushing his teeth and I'm doing his prayers and starting a fire that's stuff that we wrote and thinking this is going to be impactful to see Jesus as a human as opposed to just a deity and I remember when you were doing it it was real it was genuinely trying to start a fire and I think I was no joke yeah but I think III wanted you to hear that for to that that what you were doing on that day in Texas hunched over a fire has an impact on non-english speaking Chinese children stuck in their homes because of the coronavirus and I think I think when we did that we we both thought we all thought like this would be pretty cool yeah I don't think we thought that it would get to this level to have that life to have that far-reaching and impact a so soon and be in the way that it has right and that yeah actually I just posted a picture today that I think somebody posted on that I got somebody sent me from the chosen fan page but these three kids just perched in front of the TV watching I think it was episode 7 and just kind of just glued to the TV and it's like that's that's what this is about you know it's just miraculous the shirt that I'm wearing a sweatshirt that you're wearing tonight is the last night to get get it while it's hot sing it can you sing it better than so I'm gonna get you started here w-w-w-whoa [Music] one more time WWE chosen merger that's where you can get this shirt and that's lecture right now tonight livestream 10 is the discount code when you go to order livestream 10 all one word you get 10% off everything that you get join us and getting used to different hours away hours awake get it while it's hot yes before it's gone yes god bless glad we could bring those of you to stuck around glad we could give you that little little bonus but thanks again guys it really means a lot thank you guys god bless fill these jars with water it has begun what has miracles signs and wonders all your life you've been asleep [Music] make straight the way for the king he is here to wake in the earth but some will not want to weaken they're in love with the dark I wonder which one you'll be I'll be next new suggestions I'll go with you to the ends of the earth I hope so Simon the man has a following he's a rogue who answers to no one you think that impossible things can happen that overturn the laws of nature and cannot be explained Matthew's son of Alphaeus yes I'm Jesus of Nazareth we've heard about you having it's getting too crowded all these people word spreading wrong people stop by [Music] nice [Music] you asked me before if I knew his name now everyone knows his name and I fear for his safety by order of Rome and punishable by prison and religious gatherings are strictly prohibited the teacher known as Jesus of Nazareth is sought for questioning [Music] then sir the Messiah comes and sort this mess out including me they don't trust in anybody this is different get used to different [Music] as you know these things because you are the Christ I'm going to tell everyone I was counting on it what have you come here to show us I don't know where to start I have so many questions God loves the world in this way that He gave His only Son my whole life I would say just follow me and you'll see more [Music] you

Channel: The Chosen

Views: 357,991

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Id: pxwV3l7-KKU

Length: 154min 27sec (9267 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 13 2020