The Philosophy of Beholder Share

The summer, serve up the cookout classics, craft Mo and dressing, toss green salads with delicious ranch dressing or zesty Italian Serve smooth, craably creamy potato salads with mayo We all know it's not a cookout without craft. This summer, Prime Video takes you back before legally blonde, before law school and into the world of Elle Woods in high school. Set in nineteen ninety five, this Gemini vegetarian knows exactly who she is until her family moves from Belair to Seattle. Packed with iconic fashion, nineties nostalgia, and a throwback soundtrack, Elle proves one thing Law school was hard. High school was harder. From the world of legally blonde, watch L, a new original series only on Prime videoide. Watch now. Lee Seung Jin, welcome to my podcast. Thanks for having me. 've been wanting to do this for a long time. Yes, I am a big fan. I watch So it's a bch of clips here That That means a lot to me. I feel the same way about your work. And obviously we've talked a bit about my reaction to beef, specifically beef season two as well because I had Phineneas on the show about a month or so ago and he was just wonderful. And a lot of the thematics that we talked about, I wanted to open up with you as well. And this is you know, when I generally open this show, you know I know we're speaking about a television series The show itself is designed to helpopefully help audiences understand all the decisions that you make as an artist that kind of make it to the big screen. But from a pivotal moment for you growing up, was there a movie that you saw in a theater that kind of gave you the understanding of the importance of the communal experience of storytelling and just the kind of the idea of being in a theater with strangers I don't know, enjoying a story all together. What was that movie for you? I mean, there's so many, but the one that immediately came to mind and as you' werere asking that was Jurassic Park. ninety three. Yeah. I mean, that was like the most communal, you know, like it was just like everyone collectively having their minds blown Do you remember where you were Uh, I think I was in Minnesota and u You know, and then I think like a I forget maybe like five or ten years ago, they like brought it back in three day Universal City and then, you know, I went to that as well. and just how much it holds up It almost like puts like even like modern blockbusters to shame in terms of like the VFXs and everything.. It just like T the fact that it's timeless now like just reminds me that in ' ninety three, it was just like Revolutionary Yeah. And I think Spielberg in general, like I think for so much, I mean, I was born nineteen eighty one, like Like he's sort of like childhood seminal like, o, this is storytelling. you know, ET is one that I go back to all the time. Yeah But then I think in my adulthood The movie that really broke my brain was Old Boy It came out two thousand three, but I watched in two thousand four. You just talk about Director Park before the interview. ye. I mean. And a friend of mine had the DVD, popped it in, had no idea what I was getting into. You know I wasn't really aware of like Korean cinema really. sort of a shame to say Yeah, I just I was like, what in the world did It felt like illegal watching it, you know? I know exactly what you mean. I remember being in a blockbuster and I told Ritor Park this actually I was walking by the shelves and I got to the O section and I saw on the cover it was like something about Quentin Tarantino approved. Yeah I remember that that was a h huge Tarantino fans I'm like, oh, if he likes this. Tarantino was responsible for me for learning a lot about cinema from all over the world. tootally. And I went back and then found Director Park's work through that film. but I agree with you. there was something when that woner hits that tracking shot, which is I love that it's imperfect.. It's not a perfect tracking shot, which is why I love it. It feels real like peopleople are missing punches and things like that. But obviously and I'm going to connect that later on in the interview to the episode eight Woer, which is just like there's a fluidity to Wonders that I think is really interesting, like an organized chaos.. But yeah, that was that wner like What was what was going through your mind when you saw that woner for the first time? I mean, I didn't have really like a cinematic language, you know, I didn't go to school for it or anything. And so just watching it, I just didn't understand why everything felt so visceral And now I understand that like, you know, the less cutdty a scene is, the more you're in the moment. But you know, just every aspect of it felt so intentional and precise U that that made me realize One, like, oh, I didn't know movies could be like this and two, the fact that a Korean artist did this that just made me go like, you know, deeper dive into his work into Director Bong's work. You know, And also funny you mentioned Tarantino, that was the other movie for me. I think it was I think it was ninety nine, like where Was it out on DVD by then? but no, because I think I was at a sleepover with two friends in I want to say eighth or ninth grade. Andrew Willis and Josh Reyns And's so amazing. you remember that? I mean I miss sleepovers, man. Yeah. Why can't we do those as adults? I know. It's like fun sleepovers and watch movies and order pizza with your friends. It's like Well, my parents never let me do sleepovers because they were so worried like what I'd be exposed to and they were one hundred percent right because here we are like staying up late and they had like a bootleg like VHS that we popped in in the basement And that also broke my brain. And I remember us like finishing that movie and just being like What what was it? was the movie? Pul fiction It was pul fiction Yes. Yeah. And we got like a notepad and we just started like trying to like write down all the timelines and like just understanding how a human being like structured a movie like that. And so yeah I think You know sort of like Spielberg, Tarantino, Director Park, Director Bong, those were some early influences. dude, I remember I remember doing the same thing with pulp fiction and trying to figure out the linear timeline of where the beginning was and the ending was. It's just remarkable. Like that movie was such a game changer in the way that it like told stories. but also I also think about that movie sometimes and people reading the script for the first time and not having seen the film. how did it feel? Did they even understand like what he was doing. I mean, nonlinear structure is not a new thing, it was the way he was doing it. Rly Yeah. Just amazing. So you were born in South Korea. get to the United States when you're nine years old from what I understand? Well, first nine months old. becauseuse my Dad was going to grad school at University of Illinois or Bana Champagne. And and then you know we moved around every three to four years and then I moved back for elementary school in Seoul. So that was like third, fourth and fifth grade. And then moved back to Minnesota in sixth grade I guess I don't know if this is too hard of a question to even contemplate, but like do you can you see how that moving affected your storytelling as you are now? Um You know, I've actually talked about this a lot in therapy. interest. Yeah, because I think like when you move that much, it also you become very like No you know, in your own head and and very, uh Eespecially as like a Korean kid in the Midwest during that time So you're very internal and very observational and My immediate instinct was always like when I enter a room, like checking out everyone who's in there, what are they like? you know, how can I assimilate and fit in? And I think when that part of your brain, you know, is so active that as an adult, I think as a writer, I do find like when I enter a space, I'm immediately observing everybody and just noticing little ticks, little character traits And ye, there's a word in Korean actually called Nunchi, which I think literally means like U, you know, how how the awareness of how people perceive you And it's such a common term that people use it all the time s that's how important it is culturally to be aware of your surroundings. I think that as a writer, that's like a really important skill. You know, As a human being, it can be debilitating because then you're like, Always and over analyzing everything. But it certainly has become useful as a writer. It's interesting. I'm glad you brought therapy because I'm in therapy. I've been in therapy since I was fourteen. I think a lot of people can relate to that and just like how those childhood moments affect who we are in our adult lives. There's superpowers that come from those things as well. and like, you know, the things that I remember being bullied and picked on for asking too many questions and now I do it for a living. So it's very interesting to think about like how those moments that seem hard for us end up becoming part of the way we talk and tell our stories to audiences in a way. I mean, I think So much of at least my life has been Um, returning to my childhood self. I think like You're born with all your idiosyncrasies. You know, I have a one year old daughter now and like out the womb, I'm like, oh, there's her personality, which is absurd. You know I'm like, whereere did that come from? But that's who we are. And then as we grow up and all these outside forces, like you know bullies and peers, teachers, parents they'll start to like, you know chip at yourself. and then you start wearing all these masks And u And then even as a writer, then like my writing early in my career wasn't very authentic because I'm just like wearing masks pretending to write stuff that I think other people may like. And it really took therapy to start becoming more comfortable in my own skin. And you know' this still a process I'm working on. We all are working pro. really we are. But you can kind of tell on my IMDB like when I started therapy because you're like, oh, his work is changing. And I guess so this is your first child Yes I imagine changes as an artist I mean, like I can't I mean, again, I know you're only a year in or a year plus in, but I imagine now as you have you written since You've had your daughter No, but I am starting to like think about My next idea is for, you know I just re up my overall with Netflix, and they are truly like all daughter based. I mean, honestly, that's kind of cool. I'm interested to know like how your writing is gonna shift or how your directing will shift and how your characters will be different just kind of based on now being a dad. It's so interesting. Music has been a big part of your life And you were in the A capeella group at University of Pennsylvania, from what I understand. You currently also play violin, piano, guitar. I've been playing guitar since I was a kid. Music is something obviously it's a big part of the beef show and the way you use music, the way it like It's like disruptive in a way, even at the end where it just like hits. like the way the way your music hits in the show is like it's like a character. It's beautiful to listen to and also like it's really jarring at times as well, which I love because it keeps you on your toes as an audience member. And I say disrupting in a good way. like it's like there's a flow of it and just kind of hits it the right way Yeah. Talk about your love of music and kind of how that's affected the way you tell stories. And I know you bring Fineneas in as a composer here. you had Bobby Krillick on the first season But what is it about music in terms of your writing and how you feel music and think of music and your storytelling Um, Well, I find that somethinghing unlocked for me as a writer probably like ten years ago when I read some article about how there was this machine learning algorithm that a university fed like all our classic literature into. and it found that human beings only tell stories in six or seven ways. And it was like different configurations of like Rise fall, rise, fall, rise, fall, rise fall, rise, fall, and there's all these like shapes, which, you know, Kurt Bonneatt used to give lectures kind of about that. L he came up with the man and the wholeo graph, you know, And which is kind of like a rise, fall rise. And that really fascinated me because as I understand it, you know musically our modern ear is only really attracted to like six or seven chord progressions. And to me, I was like, wait, That's so weird that our human minds like love these shapes U, you know, like a very like quintessential top forty or even like, you know church song is like G E minor CD G, classic, you know. And so G is like status quo E minor is the fall from the status quo. CD, you're rising back to where you started, G That's like literally three act structure, story circle. Harmony and distance. It's hard to use that, but yeah that is interesteresting, ye. Yeah. So then I kind of came up with this like rise fall method of writing that I tried to you know, uh tell my writers's rooms about where I think it's just rise falles all the way up and down. So we'll start When we're beating out a season where we come up with like the rise fall shape, And then we'll do that for each character. We'll do that for story. we'll do that for plot. We'll do that for each inner character dynamic. And then we start whittling it down then to like You know, rise falls for an episode, for an act, for a scene. And then usually in dialogue even there's like a rise fall. And so we have like a column in our spreadsheets in the room that tracks all the rises and falls between stuff. And so that helps me a lot where It kind of gives us a railing um, that everything can emotionally ride on where you know, I think if the chords feel sound And that's where you can get like really messy and interesting with the textures, but the audience still feels like you're in good hands because the cord progression feels like it's in a good place. So interesting. I think at close encounters and the way that the aliens communicate with the human beings. It's through the like that five note reggression motif that piece that stays in like because John Williams wrote music in the world and out of the world, which I thought was so interesting. But you're right, there's like a satisfying nature to that rise and fall. I mentioned harmony and dissonance because I got to bring this up I think's episode six. The monologue that Oscar has has really been echoing in my mind for months now. It's something that I think I'm going just continue to in my life just. because my therapist recommended this book called The Happiness Trap which is this idea of like this concept of like, you know, we're not meant to be happy all the time. There has to be rises and falls, essentially in order for us that's just the way life goes no matter who you are. But harmony and dissonance, it was like I liked the way the metaphor of music in that sense. That monologue is so earned and so timed perfectly and his arc and Catharsis in that moment beautiful. And then you even get more arcs and Catharsis as the episode goes on that synth piece that hits at episode eight as they run towards each other.. or Carry runs towards him. It's one of the most beautiful, the hair of my arms stood up the moment I heard that. But just beautiful. But talk about that harmony and dissonance monologue. I guess I asked Fneas this question. I'll ask you the same question as well, Where do you feel the most harmony in your life and where do you feel the most dissonance in your life Um, well That monologue just kind of came pouring out of me. There's certain like monologues in both seasons that are just like me ranting and then the writer assistant sort of like captures it. and then I just like tweak a couple words to make it more relevant to the characters in the show. Like for season one, Alie Wong, I think in episode one or two in the chair gallery, she's like she's like, who's gonna buy Amy something? Amy's gonna buy Amy something. And like that's literally like something I was renting about. I was like, who's gonna to buy Sonny something? Sonny is. Sony's gonna to buy Sonny something. And And then this monologue too, I think You know, a lot of the show is, you know, we've been calling it like Young and shadow work. You know, I'm a big fan of Carl Young it is just like staring at the darkest parts of your own psyche and trying to then excavate it into these characters. And for me when I think about sort of the worst version of myself and you know, especially in this industry when You know, I think we're all in this because we're so hungry, you know, we love what we do. We love film and TV. and then you get into the system and there is this trap that happens where climbing, you're just, you know, trying to just like get any foot in the door And you just you do kind of get blinders on where you're kind of thinking about your just yourself. And then suddenly you blink and then you're in your forties. And maybe you've gotten to where you think you wanted to be, but then all this time has passed and you haven't actually worked on yourself at all. And now suddenly your soul and your literal body feel quite rigid. and it's really hard to change. That was just me kind of ranting that. And you know, Oscar and I then worked on it and You know, Oscar actually added like the harmony dissonance thing because you know, yeah, yeah, he This episode is brought to you by Street Easy. Here's the thing, Wanna be the grandparents who bolted to the burbs or the cool relatives still living in NYC? the city that people come to to be at the center of everything. With twenty years at NYC know how, StreetEasy has the tools, agents, and guidance to make you a forever New Yorker too. Visit streeteasy dot com to buy a rent in NYC Street Easy is an assumed name of Zillow Inc, which has licenses in all fifty states Tomorrow morning is knocking. Stock your fridge now. How about a creamy moocha raappuccino drink? or a sweet vanilla? Smooth caramel, maybe? orr white chocolate mocha. Whichever you choose, delicious coffee awaits. Find Starbucks Rappuccino drinks wherever you buy your groceries. Just based on what you had written. That wasn't in the script. Harmony and dissonance. No I think we rehearsed it and then he started doing it Uh because, you know, I think the monologue kind of stayed pretty close to what was scripted, but then after when he's like meeting with Austin outside, you know, we were sort of playing around with like , well, how would someone be after having that sort of epiphany? You know, you'd be sort of lighter on your feet and I was jealous. L like I want to feel that wash of just like The clarity he received from that. It was Yeah, incredible. I mean, that's and also that's like a testament to Oscar two to always be like honing in on the truth of a scene you know, and so in terms of where I find the most harmony in my life I'd say it's just like, When I feel like I'm in a flow state, when that sense of self is kind of like died down, that meanie me dies down and you're doing something for something bigger than yourself, whether it's making the show. Whether it's spending time with my daughter Or honestly like even like playing tennis or basketball. like suddenly, your brain shuts off and you're just kind of like in play mode. It's like when you drive somewhere and you almost forget how you got there. Yeahah. ' like you're just kind of in a state of like honestly like driving home from set is like the best for me. Re. You can just turn your brain off. I usually have some music going and I'm just like zoning out and it's such like a relief, you know, because I think the You know, my inner monologue can be so loud Which by the way, I just found out that I saw something on whereious to say I saw like a thing on Instagram. I didn't read it. but it was basically like a study that they did with all these adults, like thousands of adults and they found that Everyone's inner monologue is just their parents' voice from a specific year of childhood. Wow. That'sly that tracks. That tracks completely. it's so again, that's something I'm also working on in therapy is like childhood and like and the narratives that were fed as kids and how those stay in our minds, but you're so right. I do hear my mom constantly minds my mom as well. yeah. I could just hear her right now saying something because it's just so funny. one of this is not exactly what you're saying.ember Salimay, I was interviewing him for the Little Women And we were talking about that idea of going from childhood to adulthood And when that moment happens in our lives. And he said something really profound, which was like around the lines of like, it's the moment you figure out that your parents also don't have it figured out. Like And we're just like because we look at our parents almost like these these guiding lights that have every answer. And then you realize they're just figuring it out too. Y. But it's just an interesting thing to think about how we look at adults and why we think that they have it all together for some reason. hundred percent. Yeah. I mean just They're just us, you know. I still don't feel like an adult though. I like weirdly. I'm forty two and I don't feel like I feel the same. I mean, I'm forty four and I'm like you know, I think it was in Senectki, New York, right? where. Yeah, where like you he portrayed that you view other people at a specific age, prettyt much. Yes. And so like even the time had passed, like Philip Seymor Hoffman's character was viewing everyone S still in an era, you know? And and I think we not only do that to people like I still view my sister who is like, you know like thirty nine now. To me, she's like, eleven twelve For some reason, always she will be that Yeah. And I think we do that to ourselves as well. L we I still feel like I'm in like my twenties as like a soul, you know. But ultimately though, I think I don't know, through my therapy the journey has been because you know It's no fault of their own appearntance you know, didn't give us emotionally everything we needed And so then you do end up having to become like your own parent in a lot of ways where like a lot of the therapy that I do is like kind of revisiting my childhood self as an adult and just like being there for that child itself and like this scary I mean it's u It's sad, you know, because like I think it's it was sad for a while to like feel like, wait, like why do I have to be like my own like source of love, you know? you know, I think in the past I would always like look around and like people would have like, you know, really happy families or like just they seem to have like just this constant source of love. And you know, honestly, that's what fed into the monologue. Oscar gets into that monologue by talking about how, you know, he can just feel that that love is like right there, but he just like doesn't know how to get to it, you know. And that's kind of like how I felt for a long time. Um, I think when you push past that sadness then there is something very profound about being your own source of that. because you know, ultimately, you kind of like enter this world alone, you exit alone, you know? And And I think in many ways, this is all just like you know, some God experiencing itself through all of us. And so you know, it's again, like putting this into the show. I mean, season one finale, that whole monologue by the tree as Amy and Danny sort of was talking about God. you know, they talk about how God's probably just alone in this universe And that's why we are the way we are because we are God. And so you know, I think this act of trying to reconcile being actually alone and having to be your own source, is really like at the core. Um, you know, one of the one of the basic things you have to sort of wrestle with in this life. It's so interesting. and as I'm listening to you speak about that, I think a lot about empathy and this is on a personal note, I look back on my I have empathy for my bullies. L I understand like I think about, okay, what were they going through at home? Yes. And I think I want to use empathy as a bridge into the first episode of season two where we meet this couple who's obviously at their witss end They get caught in a moment of that's very personal to them on camera, essentially. And you have to then build us out over these eight episodes and find a way for us to earn The idea of there that they actually do love each other. They've just been pulled apart in some way, shape or form. at least that's the way I perceived it. And so that moment in episode eight that when she runs to him is earned it has to be earned. But I deeply felt empathetic for them even in that first episode when they're caught in that way. It's like, you know if someone saw that video, not knowing who they were, they would immediately judge them as terrible people of some sort, right? How are you yelling at each other like that? whatever, but not knowing the full story of what their relationship is Can you speak about a moment like that and almost like collaborating with the audience in a way where we are along for the journey and we trust that, you know, you trust that we're going to feel their empathy for them and understand their arc. you know? Yeah. I mean honestly that's a big reason why Oscar and Caree were at the top of the list for me because I thought it was going to be really important to find two actors who have worked together before. You know, with them having worked together on drive and insside Lou and Davis, Dve is one of the greatest one of the I love both those. Both and Inside Lou and Davis talk about therapy. That movie is all about like not being where you want to be in your life at a certain age. Jeez. Oscar is so incredible about it and and Cry too, but, you know, I thought It was important for the audience to feel subconsciously a shared history between these two actors because the first impression that the audience is going to have is going to be so negative. And so I think Carry and Oscar, even though they're having this fight, you can sense like that there is some more stuff buried in there that we we know is, you know more dimensions, there are more dimensions than just this fight. And I think So if we start there, then it's about like really picking your spots to showhow the empathy like you're saying, you know, like Sopranos is a great example with the pilot. Like Tony Soprano is, you know, without a doubt, a horrible human being But then He has a moment with ducks in the pool. Yes. And then suddenly you're like, I like this guy. Yeah, you know. And so the audience actually I find, at least for me, is very eager to want to root for somebody. You give them like a little slice of light and then you know, they can hold onto that fl. Like Charles with the bee. Yes Charles saves the be I know who that guy is. Exactly. That literally told me everything I need to know about how sweet that man is. Yes, exactly. And so I think with Oscar and Carey too was about like, all right, well You know, we want to start them in a bad light inverse of how we introduce Ashley and Austin. But in that inverse arc, like where do we want to find our spots where you give the audience a little bit of levity? And so like end of episode two felt like a nice time for it to bring them together and to have two and three be like this kind of like lift for that couple. And then suddenly you're like, o, like the I do love each other. they could just figure out a couple things. like I want to see more of this with them. But then of course, we strip it away in episode four and five. So it is about like, you know, trying to find where you can give the audience those little glimpses of empathy Um, It has to be earned. It does. Yeah. You can't force it. like like like I wanted her to run to him at the end. So and people listening to this the show has been out for a while. So if you if we are talking about spoilers, of course, but like that moment has to work. It does. And it can't work unless we buy it Well, at that moment too, I had, you know, Phineas had sent me an early demo of vicious thoughtoughts, like during I think it was either prepper shooting, whichich is the theme playing in that moment. Exactly Yeah And I immediately got teary and I had this vision in my head of just two people running towards each other and kissing while a camera goes three hundred and sixty around them And I texted him and I was like, I have no idea which characters it's going to be, but I know that I'm going to write to this moment I know that the score has to hit right when two people kiss. And so thank you so much for giving me this. Wow. And that just became a North star. Like I was able to write you know, to that moment, like we knew, you know, I think in Pixar they always say like you have to know like your start and your ending before you do anything. And so we had that ending, which was a luxury to have. and so we could build everything towards it. And then it just naturally felt right that, okay, well Do you want Ashley and Austin to have that moment or do we want Josha and Lindsey? And since Josha and Lindsey starting in such a negative way, that's like a nice you know, respite to give the audience that, you know, like It's to me, it's it's kind of similar to the Amy Danny court progression in season one where You're kind of doing like E minor C, E minor C, E minor C, E minor C the whole season. and then you don't like resolve to G until the very end. And I think that's just like Tension, tension, tentension, tention tension, then you finally give relief And so that was what we did for Josha Lindseay. What's interesting about television and post to films is generally in films you have one overseeing directing voice, sometimes two, depending on the film that you're seeing. With television, multiple filmmakers step in That always interests me because I feel like the showrunner ultimately ends up becoming the director of the series because that's the consistent tone of it. You have, I think three directors here, four directors here. Jake Jake M and Katal. Right. You have three different filmmakers, different voices. How does that work in terms of keeping a consistent tone with different voices as directors In TV, it's really about finding the right collaborators who already exist in sort of the same tone And you know Jake and I have been friends for almost a decade now. so that helps a lot. This Kendrick video still blows my mind with Taylor. Oh my God. Taylor Taylor page. Yeah that That's a wonner. a winner. on a l b, you know. We actually almost did there was a version of the fight that we were gonna to do with Josh and Lindseay where I referenced that video and we were gonna not see the fight until Like we originally one of the earlier drafts, we saw the fight purely from Ashley andne Austin's perspective because we just wanted to start with one character's perspective. so we just assume that it's bad And then it wasn't until we saw the security footage later as Josh is scrubbing it and trying to delete it that we were gonna like enter the footage and do like, you know the Kendrick Wner where it was the Kendrick Wner then like have Josh. cleaning up the mess of the fight as the fight is happening. Oh wow. that proved to be too tricky. ye, it was a really fun. I wanted see that. But no, Jake's incredible and you know, so much of what I know about directing, I've learned from him, he kind of created this, you know perspective driven rubric that we do on the show of imbalance coverage where you kind of find whose seen it is and like let's say is Ashley seen then you're dirty over Ashley to the other person, but you're clean on Ashley on the reverse on her. you know It's pretty simple, but it really works. Not a lot of people do it. like the Cohen brothers do it sometimes. but like switching the different look of the shot on each side, essentially? Yeah, where normally you'd have balance coverage where like your overs are dirty. So like you feel the shoulder of both characters where for our show, you've almost You know, not always, but you tend to only see the propective character's shoulder dirty and then their frontal is clean. That's narratively driven. Yeah. So then you just kind of like the camera is like you know subtly closer to the main character. So you're like not really sure why, but you're like feeling their emotions more It gets harder when you have now, you know four arguably six perspective characters this season. So it's not just Amy and Danny. So then we're having to do a lot of like passing off of perspective where like you can you know, in my episode episode four, you know, there's one scene where Ashley and Austin are talking to the doctor and Ashley miscstrues pain scales as being like letter boxed ratings. And so that scene starts in Ashley's perspective where we're dirty over Ashley to Austin, but her frontal is clean on her. And so we're never clean on Austin then once she started to realize that her pain scales off and maybe she is crying wolf And then that two shot of Ashley and Austin starts to push and it becomes a single onto Austin. And then suddenly we're clean on Austin and actually we don't even cover actuallyh, we just rack to her. So that is a way to do kind of like a perspective shift. And so a lot of these tools I like learned from Jake season one, but you know, like you're saying as a showrunner, you sort of end up being kind of like, you know the version of a film director for the whole season. So for me, I was like, well, then I'm just gonna like direct more. And so because you did two, three, four, and seven. Yes. Yeah.. But theoretically you're overseeing all of it. Yes, exactly. Like I'm at the monitor for every single scene And what's the reason for not directing at all? is' just time, right? Yes. Okay. I mean, I would have directed more, but I was I'm notoriously late on scripts and the network was getting very nervous.. I mean, it did happen. So yeah. But you know, for me, it was really fun this season getting to kind of take Jake's rubric and then a little bit of like my own sauce onto it. so You know, episode four, that was a really personal episode for me. It was kind of based on a real life hospital experience at a loco Ei hospital U I wrote that episode in like, two days because to me, it's just a documentary. I wrote down everything that happened in real life and put it on the screen. And so It was very important that I got to direct that one because you know all those details of like the tone of voice that the doctor had and you know the right amount of condescension. You lived in that? Yes. And like, you know the teenager extra with the bandaged head and sunglasses, like what kind of sunglasses? You know all these things are living in here. so it's just nice to have a more direct line to the HODs And that episode too is kind of where the plot really rev up and it starts to get a little bit more surreal in that episode. So it's fun to be able to play around with the language a little bit more where you know, you know, for example, you know, Austin leaves that scene I just told you about and he's on the phone with Eunice And normally our show would cover that differently. like you'd probably be like Steady Cam leading and following or Dolly to be really with him But you know, James Lxton, our incredible DP who shot mooonlight and does a lot of Barry Jenkins films We were huddled up and we're like, we always do this. Like should we break this up? Like this is where the episode starts to feel more surreal? How can we visually show that So then we switched to a wider lens and we actually put the camera just at the end of the hallway and we just let Austin come towards camera. And once he landed, then we pulled a little bit and revealed the vending machine And that to me felt a little bit more like ominous. where it kind of started to feel like a horror movie. And it almost felt like there was a guiding hand, like almost like the hand of God leading them to their demise rather than staying with their perspective so closely. And that really set up then the sequence of kind of staying in wides as we push and pull to you know create that like dreadful feeling that, o, this is gonna like head somewhere where neither of these characters even really realize but it's going to be very bad for them. If we knew more about our sleep, what would we do differently Would we go to bed at a consistent time or take steps to reduce interruptions to our sleep? with sleep score Apple Watch measures your bedtime consistency, interruptions, and sleep duration Every morning it combines these factors into an easy to understand score from one to one hundred So you'll know how to take the quality of your sleep from okay to veryer high. Know your sleep score with Apple Watch iPhone eleven or later required.' What I love about what you're saying and this is something I've brought up a lot on this show is the idea of how the camera can speak to you narratively. Spielberg talks a lot about his work with Kaminsky and the idea of like every movement of a camera, every light, every shadow, every reflection is narrative. It's not just to look cool. We're not just doing a wonder or to look cool It's like it'sosed to make you feel a certain way. I think one of the times I really started to understand that was have you ever heard about how Michael Mannchot the diner scene in Heat Neiro Pino across each other. I mean you've seen the scene. I the scenees. But like so I remember as a kid before the internet, like there was a controversy that they didn't shoot that scene together because they're not you never see their faces in the same shot. And I'm like, that's interesting. and sorry if you've already heard me talk about this before, I found it interesting when I was growing up, and when I started doing interviews, I'm like, why want I talk to De Niro and Michael Mann about how they did that? I remember going to De Niro for an interview that I did for this movie The Family and saying, wereere you guys there Be I had my ticket for the for heat and he's like, Ohh yeah, we were there, and he was telling me the story about Pacino and I, we shot it at night or whatever. And I was like, but why did Michael Mann not show their faces in the shot in the scene. And these guys were coming off of like Godfather Part two. They've never been in a movie together. They were in different timelines in Godfather two. So like, you know, obviously they share scenes later on in heat But I went to Michael Mann for an interview for this movie Black Hat with Chris Hemsworth. And I was like, Hey, real quick before we start, can I just ask you why didn't you show like a two shot of their faces. and he goes, I'll tell you why. He goes, I ran three cameras I had one camera on the two of them from the side and then I had the two over the shoulders. But if you watch that scene closely, it starts over the shoulders and gets tighter and tighter and tighter and tighter until eventually they're single on screen. And he said if I cut out to that two shot, I would lose ten to fifteen percent of the intensity of the moment. and I was like the restraint You must have to have as a filmmaker, arguably one of the greatest scenes of all time. to not show their faces together. Yes because of a narrative reason. Yeah He's the master just amazing. I mean, Jake and I talk about this a lot where to us like What's more impressive than wers is actually in collateral When Tom Cruise gets out of the cab and shoots multiple people, there are no cuts because Tom Cruz learned how to be able to pull out his gun that fast. I think he like trained for like nine months to be able to do that all so fast. like a normal human couldn't do that, which is why like normally you would have to cut. for that sequence. And so that's not like a fancy onener, but it allows the audience every time you cut, you're kind of like taking the audience out of reality. putting bumpers on the bowling Yeah exxactly. And so you know that that's what, you know, we love on the show. you know, obviously we did a fancy wner at the end, but there's a lot of moments where we're trying to just like live in two shots or block the scene in such a way where we're what's the simplest most elegant way we can cover the show without hting too much that the audience kind of can stay in the moment And and so it is very like narrative based. like we almost never approach a scene where we're like, okay, what's like the what's the coolest looking shot to do. But, you know, that that Ultimately, you can't do that unless you have cast who can Uh bring it so that you can stay in these moments longer. you know, L the reason shows art can be so cuddty is because you need to cut it up in post to kind of like artificially create the beats that you need. But then with this cast you are just like remarkable You don't have to do that, which is a luxury. It's amazing. u Animals are something that I find genuinely fascinating in storytelling because there's a vulnerability you can also learn a lot about a person by the way, they treat an animal. And just the negligence of Kayley's character with Burberry. there's just something interesting about like you kind of get an idea of who that person is by the way. And this is something I find really interesting. Obviously with in storytelling, you never want to see animal Yeah There's it's harder to watch animals get hurt weirdly sometimes in movies than it is to watch human beings. Y. But you do go kind of fully there with this dog. Trust me, I did not want to do because When I see a dog die in anything, I turn it on. Brutal. I can't And I so didn't want to do this that I explored like an arc where Burberry survives and has like one of those like little wheelchair thingies for like the entire rest of the show. but it just felt not to what the show wanted. Yes. It was necessary to the story. I agree with that. but it again, but it was hard it was hard to watch. Ver hard. And you know, for me too, ultimately why I chose to go there is because You know, in the making of this show Uh, you know, um I have a sixteen year old beagle who I've had since he was seven weeks old and I had a fifteen year old Chihuahua. My sixteen year old beagle during the making of this season like almost died four times U And I lost my fifteen year old Chiuahua Bella. during the making of the show and Oh you know, to me, like there's just nothing worse than losing a pet. like I I still haven't really processed it. I think I'm throwing myself into work to not think about it. I got a tattoo of a dog that passed on my arm because I didn' I't want to not see him again. Oscar. And I literally did that so I could see him every day. Yeah. It's kind of a nice way to remember him, but there's something It's rough. Yeah I You know, again, this show is like sort of young in work and so it felt to be able to U have this have Burberry pass and see how our characters deal with that Which is real life, whichich is real life. What helps me a lot when I watch it though is that the actual dog Jones who is the best likeike amallectter I've ever seen in my life. He played Berberry two point zero. We just like, you we aged him in we gave him like a little makeup to age him as Burberry and then Berber two point zero we removed the aging. he lives on. Yeah. We also added a spot in post, like a little spot on his hind leg to give the difference. but knowing that there's something about like knowing that it's such Like the same dog that like somehow makes it okay for me a little bit better. but I, you know, I've definitely seen the comments of people being like so upset that Berberoy dies. and I like I'm like, I get it. Yeah, you know, But it's necessary. it it has to be there to push the narrative forward. Y. It's not just an egregious it's not just a scene you just put in just to be shocking. like we have to the consequences of that because then Kayley's arc is a lot more impacted by that because of because of essentially leaving the door open, right? I mean, and really this is a show about characters who are dealing with like everyday life struggles without the means and resources to be able to get over it Yeah. And I think that's just what's so true about life. For myself and for my friends, for my neighbors, you know, when people go through it, when it rains, it pours, you know? And I think when you're not a billionaire when you can't afford to just like, you know pay for everything at the animal hospital or at the human hospital, suddenly you just feel trapped and you start lashing out, you go into survival mode, which I think is most of the world now as we like enter this kind of extreme class divide And and so it felt like we had to go there to really turn the screws on these characters. one to warrant some of their actions later and then two to be much more of a mirror of where everyday people's lives are at in twenty twenty six. It's absolutely incredible. I mean, Pineneas' score Just like absolutely remarkable. The onener in episode eight, obviously I'm assuming you've talked about it at length, but It's there's a moment in that and I don't remember if Carrie's like fake sneezing Like like she kind of dry heavves becausees Ashley holds up like a piece of flesh. Yes. Yeah And she like misses the punch like like that and I'm assuming it'ss a it's a true one or there's stitching No stitches. Jake's very anti stitch. But getting but getting the timing of something like that because if she misses that beat she gets She would get hit, right? Yes, ye, yeah. Wow. Yeah, we you know TV, it's tough because you don't have as much time and resources as film to you know, cover you know we're doing like seven, eight page days. J that's the norm, sometimes like nine hundred ten So we didn't really even have time to rehearse that one or with our cast until we got to Korea. and they never rehearsed it together because of how, you know, u, you know, short on time we were So you know, Jake and I in LA, we kind of like taped off the stage and we were working with our incredible stunt team. and we're trying to like you know, figure out the fight and it was just feeling like too cool. It was like very like John Wick And You know, I was like, you know, I hate to do this. like this is all really good, but like we need for it to feel more beef, we just need to like more like comedy in like the stupid minute of what like humans do in situations like this. And so that's when it kind of came alive where You know soet Yeah, like yeah, like Lindsey Wood dry heave. We even as like Ashley is hitting the guard with the hammer in the mix, I kept pushing for the mix team to find more pathetic sounds of the hammer hit because at first it was like d And we're like, no, like it's supposed to be like kind of like pathet. And so we kept finding like douller and douller sounds so it's like clear that she's not like making any damage and she like hits in with the hammer. Everyone in that scene had to be like so precise Uh and, you know, we actually ended up getting it in I think, I think that's takeake nine that you're seeing. So u Fitcher would have done it in one hundred and twelve or something like that. What's funny about Fitcher to me is like, I'm sure you've seen that like Zodiac behind the scenes thing where it's the insert of Jillan Hall throwing the book into the back of the car. And I think they did like one hundred thirty seven takes or something. And was they show every take And and at first you're kind of like, o man, poor Jake, like having to go through this. But then it gets to take one hundred thirty seven and then you're like you're like, I totally see why Fincher kept going. Like there was something about the last take that was truly perfect. you know, so I like I kind of get it, you know? L there is this thing that happens when when it feels perfect as's like something like clicking into place You know, unfortunately in TV time, like you just like unless you're euphoria you don't get a chance to do that. And they're shooting on film and Euphoria with morecel. Do you shoot digitally on this? Yes. It looks like film though. Do you add grain and stuff? Very little. I mean, we Lxton and our colorist Alex Bookle and Alex Memenz at Color Collective, they worked on season one as well We had more gra in season one, but season two, we were kind of going for more like prristine polished look.amorphic, right? sphericals. No're spherical. Yeah ye. And you know, we use the RA two hundred sixty five, which is a brand new camera. and you know, so there were, you know So kind of like some growing pains with that camera at first, like during prep, but eventually Um, you know, Laxon wanted to use it for a variety of reasons and just kind of having us have like a grander scale to, you know, normally you'd use sixty five for like blockbusters to like show like, you know, epic fights and landscapes. you know he wanted to show like these faces and close ups to also have that same feel because so much of the show is living in the minute of micro expressions. And you know, I'm so happy with that camera choice. but you know, so we in post we added very minor grain, but, you know, Cor Cector came up with an incredible lut that, you know just while we were shooting, it was, so nice to be able to just know like, oh this is is going to look good. It's amazing what a face can do without even speaking. Like I remember You know, Oppenheimer, like, you know, we we open up on Killian's face and IMax on an eight story screen And you think, oh, well, you would use an IMX camera for action sequences, right? But no, what look at his face on that screen. Look at every emotion and everything he's been through on that screen. L there's something about facial expressions that and close ups that you don't have to spoonfeed the audience and tell them they just feel it. Yeah. I mean, that was a big thing I learned watching Sopranos was that those writers almost never wrote dialogue where the characters are saying how they truly feel. Yeah. Someone's always lying to someone else or to themselves. And that's a rubric that we follow on beef is almost all the time, every piece of dialogue is covering the truth. So it's less about the words that are being said and what's happening between the words. And as a director, then it's your responsibility to be able to catch that, you know. And so that's why even in our editing pattern and we have incredible editors in LauraZemple and Lauren Conolly, truly the best. You know, our cutting pattern too is like to try and stay with someone even though someone else is talking. you know, like there'll be blood is sort of like a masterclass in that where there's you're just like, wait, why am I staying with this person? Normally I want to see the other person, but then you know, Down Day Lewis is doing something so interesting that like tells you everything you need to know about the scene So you know that again, like that perspective driven approach informs all of our decisions, editing, cinematography, even like our costume design, Olga Mill, who's you know a genius, you know, every piece of clothing is rooted in character. It's not just for like what looks like It's incredible. We talk about episode four just in terms of like how personal that was to you I have to imagine like obviously as you write a show and direct episodes and put it out into the world, there's a catharsis that you gain from it personally, just kind of using story to kind of like flesh out things that you're also going through in your life or thinking about in your life Is there a different catharsis you had on season one versus season two? And did episode four bring a specific catharsis to you as well Yeah, very different. I think I think season one was a lot of me expressing some of my young in shadows from my young adulthood, you know I think I've spoken about this openly before, but know Danny's sort of suicidal ideation is very much just wrpp from the headlines of my life. Like that whole cold open with Hibachi Girls is something that I actually did. I went to Home Depot, I bought Hibachi Girls, I researched, I bought a carbon monoxide detector that I still have. and I was going go through with it, but then, you know, obviously I didn't do it. And when I returned it, I was so embarrassed to be returning them because I thought Cerk was going to know. So I actually held I only returned the grills and I held ono the carbon monoxide detector. And I still have that to this day. So when our prop master was asking, well, what kind of detector should Danny have? I was like, o, actually I know the perfect one. Let me bring it home from home. You use your actual one? Well, I think I brought it and showed her and then she bought Yeah And then um, And then so you know, season one was a lot of like excavating stuff from my like you know, twenties and early thirties. And I think season two was reflecting on a lot of, you know, sort of like mid forties And you know, not just for myself, but for the other writers and for the cast, like just talking about passage of time and how how we change. You know, I remember being on staff in my twenties. And you know, a showrunner would make us stay till like seven hundred three PM. I'd be like, I can't believe we're staying here past seven. you know, In my head, I was like, this showrunner must hate his family. You know? And then here I am forty four and I'm like routinely staying at work till like eleven thirty PM. And so there's this humumbling that happens as you actually have to walk the walk. and as you enter your forties, you're realizing, oh, that's why every generation before us was the way that they are, you know, like And u and so that was very cathartic, I think not only for me but for the cast as well and kind of seeing where we're at and we haven't gotten to as elder millennials or younger GenX kind of, um you know express some of these ruminations that are happening to us, even though it's happened to many gener generations before, but I think there's something unique in the way that our generation is processing it and against how Gen Z is processing where they're at And ultimately, you know, I think initially The real life story that inspired this neighborhood spat that I overheard in real life That was that was a boomer couple And I found that when exploring that, it felt very too cliche, you know, It's like classic like, booomer, get off my lawn against younger kids What interested me more is, well, what if the generations were closer together where they technically like should be seeing things the same way, but just that ten years difference suddenly puts you in a different arena and they start warring against each other when the person they actually should be warring against is the billionaire. But I think that's just true to twenty twenty six is The people in charge want us to be arguing. They want us to be leaving hateful comments online. They want us to be distractedating Exactly. because then we don't have the time or power to actually look at what the real problem is, which is that there are like, you know, ten people hanging on to everything And that's why, you know, we structured the season the way it is is, you know, ultimately, you know, Millennial versus Gen Z. when the true villain is Chairman Park H It's so interesting. When you put a show out like this, there's something about digesting it that is interesting. Like obviously, we live in a binging era.. All your episodes come out at once. someome streaming platforms they'll do the week to week release. As the person who's creating this and putting this into the world, do you are you somebody who would say, maybe watch it one and then stop and think about it and digest it? Or do you like that idea that someone can watch all eight at one time? O does it matter to you how people digest it? That's a great question. It's a pretty heavy show. Yeah. and I honestly don't know what the right answer is because I Do you think there's something nice about Wekly Pers And you can still do that if you want.' if you're if you have what's the word for it? If you have you can't click the next episode restraint. Yes. you can't but you can't you end the episode with the cliffhanger and I'm like, I need to know what's happening again in the first five minutes to the next, then you're stuck. Well there's also a cultural conversation that takes place when it's weekly where a water cool Everyone else is also stuck on that episode So then you get to dissect it and talk about it and there's an anticipation that gets to build U, you know, I've certainly asked Netflix about it past L maybe breaking up into form four or something or You know, I think they are very Data driven and, you know, I think they found that probably like Uh there I think they do weeklyies for some of the reality shows, but u I think they still do find that binging works best for their platform. And I do trust, you know, that kind of stuff is like above my pay grade. you know, like I'm focused on the creative and at a certain point I have to almost trust the people who are in charge daily, like their job is to like build the best platform they can. And so you know, whether that's going to change though in the future, I'm not sure. I mean, I think the modern audience changes so fast now. And some what has worked for, you know, decades may not work for today. And and so I don't know. I mean, I know that I like to sometimes consume things weekly and then sometimes I like to just like shred through it. The hard part is when you shred through it because of how much stuff is coming at us all the time. It's like there and then go, you just forget about it and you're ono the next thing which is like truly depressing as someone that like works like so hard. And like the cast and crew worked so hard. think for a movie though, I guess you know, no one puts Odyssey out you sit down for three hours and and then then you move on. but it's like I mean, it is kind of, but it's kind of like an eight hour movie, you think. Yeah in a way, or no, not that long, but yeah. But I think that's also why For us, you know, the collaborators who work on this, we're trying to Um, makes something that Hopefully people want to revisit and that it can be interpreted differently when you revisit later in life. Like I rewatch Sopranos, Madmen all the time and I take away something different depending on where I'm at. And I think that only happens if you write and direct something that kind of leaves room for interpretation And something that I talk a lot about is this concept of beholder share, which is an art history term. and it's kind of like used to describe paintings where You know a great painting has the right amount of beholder share where you're leaving enough for the eye of the beholder to share in coming up with the meaning. So like a bed bath and beyond painting has no share. It's like, this is an ocean. Good night, you know. And so the audience is like, cool, I didn't get to participate in that, but I know that it's an ocean. Whereas Mona Lisa You stare at it every time and it means something move. you're I don't remember it looking like that last time. Yeah. And so for us as writers and directors, it's about like trying to find that bullseye of like how much do we w to leave, how much shared do we want to leave? Because then if you leave too much, then it can kind of become a tone poem