Speaker 1: I used to lead whitewater expeditions and somebody said you should,
Speaker 1: you should start filming them, and I said, you mean,
Speaker 1: like with a camera or something. All right, I'll try it.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to go kayaking every day, and I
Speaker 1: tried it, and I suppose I was okay at it.
Speaker 1: And that's really what I tell you now that I'm
Speaker 1: doing this, I really like it. I didn't plan on
Speaker 1: any of this, but it's really fun. It is. It's fun. Hi.
Speaker 1: My name is Randall Einhorn, and I am the executive
Speaker 1: producer and director of the show Abbot Elementary. Hello everybody,
Speaker 1: and welcome back to today's episode of Off the Beat.
Speaker 1: This is your host, Brian Baumgartner. In a great mood
Speaker 1: today because we have a very special guest, my old friend.
Speaker 1: You know him, you love him, Randall Einhorn. He's a director,
Speaker 1: he's an amazing cinematographer and as you know, he is
Speaker 1: the guy who made the camera a character on the Office.
Speaker 1: He made the show what it is, and that alone
Speaker 1: makes him a legend. But it's no surprise that since
Speaker 1: then he has worked on other huge shows Parks and Wreck,
Speaker 1: Wilfred Fargo. It's always sunny in Philadelphia and most recently
Speaker 1: Abbot Elementary. Since I had Randall on the office deep dive,
Speaker 1: I've been wanting to get him back on off the
Speaker 1: beat here and dive deeper into his whole career, all
Speaker 1: of his work outside of the office, tracing the mockumentary
Speaker 1: from the olden days of dunder Mifflin now to Abbot Elementary,
Speaker 1: and will also answer some long awaited questions. What is
Speaker 1: the future of network sitcoms? Is it okay that it's
Speaker 1: always sunny? Has such unlikable characters? What is the real
Speaker 1: power of the camera? Randall, He's seen it all, and
Speaker 1: he's filmed at all and I can't wait for you
Speaker 1: to hear our conversation. So, without further ad here's Randall Einhorn,
Speaker 1: Bubble and Squeak. I love it, Bubble and Squeak, Bubble
Speaker 1: and Squeaker cook at every month left over from the
Speaker 1: Knob people. Hello, what's up, buddy? How you doing? Brother?
Speaker 1: How are you? I'm very well. You know. I didn't
Speaker 1: reach out to you because I wanted my love to
Speaker 1: just seep into your soul. I love seeing you for
Speaker 1: the first time in such a long time. You look good,
Speaker 1: you too? Wow? How are you. I'm good. It's it's been.
Speaker 1: It's been good. It's been a busy time, but fun. Well,
Speaker 1: you're the busiest man in television, as best I can tell,
Speaker 1: it's been. It's been busy. Abbot kept me busy. We didn't,
Speaker 1: you know, work long days, but you know we did.
Speaker 1: We finished twenty two episodes and I directed ten of them,
Speaker 1: like an idiot. Okay. So then I just took a pilot,
Speaker 1: as you do. Um, no rest for the Wicked I was.
Speaker 1: You know, I was planning on taking some time off,
Speaker 1: but I just fell in love with another pilot. So
Speaker 1: I'm doing a pilot. But before that, I shoot the pilot.
Speaker 1: I'm going to go to do the Grand Canyon again.
Speaker 1: You are, Yeah, fourth time in five years, two hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty five miles of rafting. Really good, beautiful play.
Speaker 1: So I'll have you know, some some ramble time. Yes, Now,
Speaker 1: when you go back to your your your roots, and
Speaker 1: we'll talk about that in a minute. You go back
Speaker 1: to the to the bush, to the brush. Do you
Speaker 1: cut off from the world, like, do you leave cell
Speaker 1: phones at home? No? I take it for photos, okay,
Speaker 1: but I mean you're not checking email or no, No,
Speaker 1: there's no means to do that. I have a SAT phone,
Speaker 1: but you can get text messages. But I'm you know,
Speaker 1: what are you gonna do? Tell me when to get back? Right?
Speaker 1: What do you? Yeah? So do you take a SAT
Speaker 1: phone in case, you know, you get injured in something?
Speaker 1: That's that's what you do? Yeah, okay, Yeah, I've been
Speaker 1: watching that show alone. Have you seen that show alone?
Speaker 1: That's My friends show? Is it? Yeah? Yeah, I kind
Speaker 1: of I've kind of gotten sucked in a little bit
Speaker 1: to it, and I think it's more what would be
Speaker 1: the show that I would be least likely to participate?
Speaker 1: That would be it. That's probably it. Yeah, that's probably
Speaker 1: watching people skinning, by the way, expertly skinning squirrels and
Speaker 1: being so grateful for that squirrel. Have you ever have
Speaker 1: you ever ate squirrel? Yeah? Eaten squirrel? You have? It's
Speaker 1: so bad. It's better than rat. You haven't eaten rat?
Speaker 1: You have? Yeah, survivor one. They were eating rats because
Speaker 1: there are a lot of rats around, okay, and there
Speaker 1: was a little bit just left on the grill and
Speaker 1: maybe maybe I might may have tried it. But if
Speaker 1: you had squirrel like my choice, Yeah, it was yummy.
Speaker 1: It was great. Did you prepare the squirrel? No? I
Speaker 1: did not. My neighbors did. Yeah. Okay, Uh, this is
Speaker 1: where we start with, so we can do a whole
Speaker 1: episode of things Randall has eaten. No, I know that
Speaker 1: we could. Actually, that's that is the thing that I know. Um. Look,
Speaker 1: we've had you on before, obviously, and really we talked
Speaker 1: about the office. I am not joking when I say
Speaker 1: I think your story is one of the most interesting
Speaker 1: in all of the thing we call Hollywood. Talk to
Speaker 1: me a little bit now. I know. Originally you're from
Speaker 1: the Cincinnati area, which is where my father hails from.
Speaker 1: For Thomas, Kentucky, since Entucky as they call it. Ye.
Speaker 1: Did you have any interest in film filming when you
Speaker 1: were a kid? No, none, whatsoever. I really didn't have
Speaker 1: any interest in until I started doing it, you know,
Speaker 1: until I started filming outdoor adventure stuff. Right. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: used to lead whitewater expeditions and somebody said you should,
Speaker 1: you should start filming them, and I said, you mean,
Speaker 1: like with a camera or something, and all right, I'll
Speaker 1: try it. I just wanted to go kayaking every day,
Speaker 1: and I tried it, and I suppose I was okay
Speaker 1: at it. And that's really but I tell you now
Speaker 1: that I'm doing this, I really like it. I didn't
Speaker 1: plan on any of this, but it's really fun. It is.
Speaker 1: It's fun. It is so you were just like you
Speaker 1: were just an outdoors men, like you just wanted outdoor adventure.
Speaker 1: Could you have seen yourself just living that life for
Speaker 1: your whole life? I still can, Ok, yeah, back pocket
Speaker 1: In case the whole directing thing it doesn't work out,
Speaker 1: I can go back to being a raft guide. Yeah. No,
Speaker 1: I never. I never that was the plan. I just was.
Speaker 1: I was guiding, and I was doing a lot of
Speaker 1: kayaking and leading expeditions, and I figured that was what
Speaker 1: I was going to do. I never saw myself getting
Speaker 1: out of that. But you know, one thing led to
Speaker 1: another and I got hired. I convinced Mark Burnett that
Speaker 1: he should hire me to shoot the Whitewater sections of
Speaker 1: Eco Challenge, which is a five hundred mile wilderness adventure race,
Speaker 1: and he was foolish enough to hire me. And then
Speaker 1: I convinced him he should hire me to be the
Speaker 1: deep DP on Survivor one, and he did that, and
Speaker 1: then all these years later, here I am. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you when you first started filming. Now, when you say
Speaker 1: someone said you should film these things? Was this like
Speaker 1: filming like for tourists, like just filming them going down
Speaker 1: the river? Yep? Okay. I used to kayak ahead and
Speaker 1: film film the tourists going down the rapids, and my
Speaker 1: kayak on kayak down the next section of rapids. I
Speaker 1: hop out and filmed the tourists and I'd sell them
Speaker 1: photos and video. Okay. Yeah? And then how did you
Speaker 1: get from there to convincing Burnett to hire you on
Speaker 1: Eco Challenge? Like? What are the steps there? I was.
Speaker 1: I was a sponsored whitewater kayaker and a lot a
Speaker 1: bunch of kayaks, and a friend of mine was a
Speaker 1: locations manager and he called me to ask if I
Speaker 1: could help him find a river section for Eco Challenge
Speaker 1: and got it. I had, like, you know, twenty kayaks,
Speaker 1: and so Mark and I and my buddy the locations
Speaker 1: manager went out and started searching for for river sections
Speaker 1: to do with an Eco Challenge race. Yeah. And then
Speaker 1: and then I think the interesting part is where I
Speaker 1: came to the United States to after being away for
Speaker 1: like twenty three years, and I was I was shooting
Speaker 1: something for Ben Silverman. Yes, I was shooting Sean White
Speaker 1: and Jeremy Jones in Jackson Hole right in Jacksonville, And
Speaker 1: for some reason, you know, I was filming those guys
Speaker 1: and Ben said, that's the guy who we need to
Speaker 1: be the documentarian in the office. Like why he took
Speaker 1: me from Jackson holl extreme skiing to that's the guy
Speaker 1: we need, I don't know, but it worked out. So. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when that opportunity came up, were you all in Like
Speaker 1: were you like, yes, I can do that. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: do have this really foolish sense of bravada. Yes, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: you and I, You and I share that in some regards. Yeah, easy,
Speaker 1: you can do it. Ye today, were you hesitant because
Speaker 1: I mean, you're you're an outdoorsman, You're like doing, you know,
Speaker 1: filming extreme sports and you're out there and you love
Speaker 1: that stuff. Was there a part of you that was like,
Speaker 1: well I could do it, but I think I'd rather
Speaker 1: stay here Or were you did you see the path
Speaker 1: changing for you and and and saw where that might lead? Um?
Speaker 1: I was very aware of like, Okay, well now I'm
Speaker 1: going to go from outside into an office and this
Speaker 1: is not my happy place right Certainly I was aware
Speaker 1: of that, But then I figured I could still go
Speaker 1: to my happy place when I'm not working, which is
Speaker 1: what I do now now. I go. I spend forty
Speaker 1: to fifty sixty days a year doing outdoor stuff on
Speaker 1: rivers and so forth. Yeah, but also also, you know,
Speaker 1: I saw the pilot of the Office, and I thought,
Speaker 1: that's that would be really fun to shoot to tell
Speaker 1: jokes from the camera. I was very attracted to. Oh
Speaker 1: so you saw the pilot. Yeah, would you saw the
Speaker 1: pilot and you were like, Oh, I get this, I
Speaker 1: can do this, or I can do this better. Yes, Yes,
Speaker 1: that's very interesting. I don't think i'd heard that before. Wow. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because I didn't do the pilot of the office, but
Speaker 1: I remember Ben. You know, it's a really funny choice.
Speaker 1: But I think for Ben to make is that I
Speaker 1: can go extreme skiing with these these great, really talented athletes,
Speaker 1: and that to think I could also do the office
Speaker 1: for some reason, well, Ben is a crazy genius in
Speaker 1: that way. I mean, let's be let's be clear. I
Speaker 1: mean he's he sees things, you know. I mean it's
Speaker 1: very well documented what he sees in business and the
Speaker 1: and the business of film, but also talent as well,
Speaker 1: that he sees things that mortals do not at times,
Speaker 1: and we'll take an out of the box choice because
Speaker 1: he feels it right. Yeah, and I mean to his credit,
Speaker 1: I think you know, Greg, Greg and I hit it
Speaker 1: off immediately. And Greg was you know, he said, you're
Speaker 1: telling jokes with a camera. I'm like, yeah, I'm trying to.
Speaker 1: He just Greg some you should direct some. I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: I'll try that. I'm sure I could do that. So
Speaker 1: in terms of your move into directing, once you're on
Speaker 1: the show, you're carrying the fifty pound heavy thing and
Speaker 1: dping the show and Greg gives you an opportunity to direct. Now,
Speaker 1: we talked before about what a one, what a bold choice,
Speaker 1: and how thankful you are to him for giving you
Speaker 1: that opportunity. Were you immediately kind of smitten by it?
Speaker 1: Did you love it with directing? Yeah? Absolutely, as soon
Speaker 1: as I got my chance, because I got to see,
Speaker 1: you know, by this point, I don't know how many
Speaker 1: episodes I HADDP. I suppose thirty or so, So I
Speaker 1: got to see all these really great directors do great
Speaker 1: and I got to see some do good and seeing
Speaker 1: what worked and what didn't work, and seeing what work
Speaker 1: with actor is not necessarily other actors and seeing how
Speaker 1: they influence the camera. Those were all That was a
Speaker 1: great education. I mean that was a great education. We're
Speaker 1: shooting thirty plus, you know, forty page scripts five days
Speaker 1: a week, and I got to see it. I got it.
Speaker 1: It was such a great school. Yeah. It occurs to me, however,
Speaker 1: that in the world of unscripted, when you're out there
Speaker 1: shooting say the first season of Survivor or Fear Factor
Speaker 1: or certainly Eco Challenge, where people are going I don't
Speaker 1: know how many miles per hour just down a rapid,
Speaker 1: you are in a way directing yourself. Now, I'm not
Speaker 1: dismissing there are directors who are working with you and
Speaker 1: you guys are talking about stuff. But that's the thing
Speaker 1: is that live in the moment shot you have to
Speaker 1: make the choice because it's not repeatable, essentially correct, and
Speaker 1: you know those those things. You know, there were producers
Speaker 1: there who are basically writing down what happened. They weren't
Speaker 1: saying can you get me a shot of this or
Speaker 1: can you get me a shot of that? Oh? No,
Speaker 1: you know, we were we were camera operators who were
Speaker 1: telling a story. We're definitely self directing, right, you know,
Speaker 1: they couldn't keep up with where we were going at
Speaker 1: times because I would go out with you know, the
Speaker 1: contestants on a raft, or I'd go on a hike
Speaker 1: with them and i'd you know, tell them what happened
Speaker 1: on the way back. But in the first one, they
Speaker 1: really weren't. There's nobody really directing camera. Yeah. I mean
Speaker 1: you've talked about how how reality wasn't really your thing,
Speaker 1: but clearly it taught you a lot at how do
Speaker 1: you how do you think it prepared you for your
Speaker 1: next career? I do think reality television makes gives people
Speaker 1: some some people really great skills. It makes you know,
Speaker 1: camera operators more autonomous and more story forward, so they're
Speaker 1: telling the complete parts of a story. Worry. It also
Speaker 1: does wonderful thing for editors. Editors are just taking this
Speaker 1: mess of footage and weaving it into a story. So
Speaker 1: editors are doing what writers normally do right into reality television.
Speaker 1: So I think it gives everybody very very high level
Speaker 1: of skill. It's also just the hours on the camera
Speaker 1: or under the camera, shooting eight hours a day and
Speaker 1: trying to make it look artful. That's great training. Whereas normally,
Speaker 1: like on a TV show, but you're really rolling the
Speaker 1: camera maybe two hours a day or something like that. Right,
Speaker 1: It occurred to me when you were just talking. Do
Speaker 1: you feel like when you were shooting there's a mess
Speaker 1: of footage? Right, there's guys, you know, eating bugs or
Speaker 1: surviving in one way or the other, or going down
Speaker 1: the river. Do you feel like you started to self edit?
Speaker 1: Did you start to construct shots thinking about how it
Speaker 1: would fit together to tell a story of even a
Speaker 1: character that you were watching. Absolutely, you know, I certainly
Speaker 1: self editing and making a shot end and making a
Speaker 1: story end and knowing how you know, just to let
Speaker 1: them walk their foot go through the frame and they
Speaker 1: walk off into the distance and you end the shot
Speaker 1: and the shot at a big wide shot. So, I
Speaker 1: mean the reality television it gets you, you know, how
Speaker 1: you come into a scene and how you get out
Speaker 1: of a scene. The stuff that happens happens in the middle.
Speaker 1: That's up to them saying interesting stuff. But at the
Speaker 1: beginning of a scene, the end of a scene, you
Speaker 1: should be able to create those as as a camera operator.
Speaker 1: Was there anything about the reality or unscripted that lent
Speaker 1: itself to comedy specifically? Not really? Okay, you know, just
Speaker 1: being that observational, verite style documentary that we were shooting,
Speaker 1: just being a fly on the wall. I think it
Speaker 1: was interesting. I don't know that it lent itself to comedy,
Speaker 1: right per se. I think that, you know, yeah, but
Speaker 1: it's interesting because you you know, you were obviously an
Speaker 1: active participant as you were holding the camera in the office,
Speaker 1: and oftentimes, you know, you would find things that were
Speaker 1: happening in the room that buttoned a joke or buttoned
Speaker 1: what was saying that wasn't necessarily scripted by a writer.
Speaker 1: I guess that's sort of where I'm going with this,
Speaker 1: Like somebody says something that the camera into the person
Speaker 1: operating the camera into it's as funny, and there's one
Speaker 1: of your famous like quick zip ins to a face
Speaker 1: and then a pan over. You know a lot of
Speaker 1: that stuff, and I don't think you guys ever got
Speaker 1: as much credit as you deserve for that. I mean
Speaker 1: a lot of that times when people are laughing out
Speaker 1: loud as they're watching the show is due to what
Speaker 1: you guys are doing with the camera as much as
Speaker 1: the actors, as much as the writers or anything else.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah, we talked a lot about the office.
Speaker 1: If you want, you can go back and listen to
Speaker 1: Randall's deep dive into the show. He was great. I
Speaker 1: made him cry. I remember that. Thanks man, But one
Speaker 1: of the shows that comes out of the gate for you, Randall.
Speaker 1: He begins getting opportunities to direct other shows, and Greg
Speaker 1: Daniels lets him go, and eventually he decides that it's
Speaker 1: time for him to move on and take that fifty
Speaker 1: pound camera off his back and begin directing. My recollection
Speaker 1: is is that you got hired to do a full
Speaker 1: season of It's Always Sunny? How did that come about? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I did. I got I got hired to do a
Speaker 1: full season of It's Always Sunny. And when I first
Speaker 1: I don't know if I can say this on here,
Speaker 1: you can say whatever, say whatever. But I watched it
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I don't know, it's I don't think
Speaker 1: it's sad. It's not me. And I remember my agent
Speaker 1: at the time he says, smoke a joint watch four.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, oh no, this is really funds pretty
Speaker 1: good stuff. And I took it. I took the job
Speaker 1: and I had a blast doing that. I had a
Speaker 1: really good time on Sonny. It was it's really fast,
Speaker 1: and I remember coming into it and the director I
Speaker 1: watched for a couple of days on sad he says, look,
Speaker 1: there's not much you can do. It's four people all
Speaker 1: at once, like well, surely punctuation, so you know, I
Speaker 1: can punctuate the jokes. I could certainly give you some
Speaker 1: help with the comedic timing, but it came pretty well
Speaker 1: banked because they all wrote it and then they all
Speaker 1: acted in it. So what I could do there is
Speaker 1: actually create ins and outs and punctuation to jokes and
Speaker 1: had a blast doing And I love those guys. Why
Speaker 1: do you think you were hired? Was there an experience
Speaker 1: that that you had that that made them want want
Speaker 1: you to come on for such a long time? I
Speaker 1: think telling jokes with the camera from the office that
Speaker 1: they did see that I could tell jokes and start
Speaker 1: scenes and begins you know, get get obviously at the beginning,
Speaker 1: middle and the end, but also in a way that
Speaker 1: amplified the comedy. Yeah, you know, it's always sunny. Is
Speaker 1: certainly a cruder show, isn't the right word? Very different
Speaker 1: than the office at that time or parks and recreation.
Speaker 1: How was that for you working on that? Being so
Speaker 1: different from where you had come from. You know, there
Speaker 1: was always a lesson, I think, and everything they were
Speaker 1: doing there there was a lesson by doing the wrong thing.
Speaker 1: They there are points of view, were deplorable and completely wrong,
Speaker 1: but in doing so there was a message I think
Speaker 1: behind that. Yes, I mean all those characters, they're all
Speaker 1: good people who were talking about things that um were
Speaker 1: relevant and important to them at the time and culturally important.
Speaker 1: It's just that they were doing the wrong thing to
Speaker 1: talk about it, and that was pretty funny. Yeah, It's
Speaker 1: like Michael Stodd, Michael Scott was not that he was
Speaker 1: always you know, it wasn't saying the right thing, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't It wasn't mean spirit. It was just coming
Speaker 1: from a place of not knowing any better, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the difference is and that's actually
Speaker 1: my argument now for when people say you couldn't you
Speaker 1: couldn't make the office today. You know, for me on
Speaker 1: the office when he would say or do something inappropriate,
Speaker 1: I don't know, to say the least, you had fifteen
Speaker 1: other people telling you that that was not good what
Speaker 1: he said. So it was an example, I think, and
Speaker 1: always sunny. We didn't always see the other side of it,
Speaker 1: which which just yeah, it's just that the tone of
Speaker 1: it is different. What do you see as the show's
Speaker 1: heart always sunny? I mean, I suppose the show is
Speaker 1: hard as they have each other. As deplorable as all
Speaker 1: of them are, they still have each other, right, And
Speaker 1: I think that it's it's you know, leading leading by
Speaker 1: bad example, right, all the all their things that they
Speaker 1: gang does, this, gang fights, this gang fights that they
Speaker 1: do it all in the wrong way. But they know
Speaker 1: where they're all coming from. They know what the point
Speaker 1: of view is. It's coming that they want to portray. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you you start in reality, you know, then you're
Speaker 1: doing mockumentary. Now you're doing a show for an extended
Speaker 1: period of time that the camera style is totally different.
Speaker 1: Did you find that challenging in a way or were
Speaker 1: you just continuing to roll down a trajectory? No, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean, for me, form follows function, and from day
Speaker 1: one that I started on, it's always sunny. Is like,
Speaker 1: I should have three cameras here because you want you
Speaker 1: want this, you want bat and you want the Master.
Speaker 1: You know, it's this not a precious show. It doesn't
Speaker 1: need to look great. We should have three cameras rolling
Speaker 1: on this, and so I introduced the third camera to
Speaker 1: my seasons It's Always Sunny, and they've never shot ever
Speaker 1: again without three cameras, right, So that show is shot
Speaker 1: in three days. An episode of It's Always Sunny shot
Speaker 1: in three days because it's three cameras going all at once.
Speaker 1: And you know, to me that was the style of
Speaker 1: the show is already established, and I don't think it's
Speaker 1: a director's job to go and a guest director to
Speaker 1: go create something that's, you know, not consistent with the
Speaker 1: rest of the season. So I think guest directing it's
Speaker 1: always about doing the best job you can within the
Speaker 1: constraints of the show and within the style of the show. Right.
Speaker 1: But that's pretty genius in terms of you seeing, well, look,
Speaker 1: we're not going to change the style. We're just going
Speaker 1: to make things more efficient and potentially at least more alive.
Speaker 1: I e. The fewer takes you have is always better
Speaker 1: as long as you can get it right. That makes
Speaker 1: so much that I didn't know that there's that sense.
Speaker 1: I think there's this thing if an actor thinks you're
Speaker 1: going to do ten takes like some directors do on
Speaker 1: all shows, you see that there is a point of
Speaker 1: diminishing returns and being aware of those. If you're going
Speaker 1: in and you think they think you're going to do
Speaker 1: four takes, you're gonna get four great takes. Everybody's just
Speaker 1: gonna leave it out there, you know they're gonna really
Speaker 1: And that's I think there's some wisdom in that, is
Speaker 1: actress just believing he's only gonna do three takes, right,
Speaker 1: and you're gonna get the gold and then and then
Speaker 1: you can keep digging, digging if you think there's more
Speaker 1: in there. I'm sorry, like I'm digging away. You're so digging.
Speaker 1: I'm like someone is just digging the hell out of you.
Speaker 1: A group chat um you that just reminded me of
Speaker 1: us working together and being in the conference room or
Speaker 1: somewhere and just the side looks that you and I
Speaker 1: would of each other and others when it was like
Speaker 1: we're going again, we're going again, we're going again, and
Speaker 1: at some point someone would say, why tell us what
Speaker 1: we're not getting. We'll do it. I promise you just
Speaker 1: tell us what we're not getting so we can do it.
Speaker 1: You know, it's always sunny. It's so crazy that you
Speaker 1: just told me that because one of the things that
Speaker 1: I was going to say to you is it's always
Speaker 1: felt to me like a multi cam show like it
Speaker 1: just even though it's not, and I know it's not,
Speaker 1: but it has that feel and that style in a way.
Speaker 1: It's always felt that way to me. So that's that's
Speaker 1: so interesting that you kind of forced it into that
Speaker 1: you finish that, and I think this, for me is
Speaker 1: what I'm the most proud of you for. You start
Speaker 1: working on a couple of things which are huge changes.
Speaker 1: One is Wilfred that I came and joined you for
Speaker 1: a tiny bit on that, and also Fargo, which I
Speaker 1: consider to be one of the most underappreciated, not that
Speaker 1: people don't love it, but it's never talked about so
Speaker 1: much for some reason, and I don't exactly know why,
Speaker 1: but it is a brilliant show. And again, these are
Speaker 1: two shows that don't follow your lineage from the way
Speaker 1: that they're shot to really the tone you know from
Speaker 1: the office and then to always sunny. First, let's talk
Speaker 1: about Wilfred. How did that come about? So I read
Speaker 1: the script of Wilfred and I you know, I lived
Speaker 1: in Australia for seventeen years and I was amazed when
Speaker 1: I read that script, but I didn't know about the
Speaker 1: show existing in Australia. It felt so much in my
Speaker 1: wheelhouse for firm a show that I would like, and
Speaker 1: I'm always attracted to high degree of difficulty and I
Speaker 1: read that script and I thought, Wow, I can really
Speaker 1: make a mess of this. Wow, that's gonna make me
Speaker 1: try it even harder. And so I just thought I
Speaker 1: was really attractive. If I could pull this off, this
Speaker 1: really interesting obscure tone, that'll be really fun, that'll be
Speaker 1: something special. So I think it's like me and paddling
Speaker 1: Whitewater's the bigger, the harder, the rapid, the more exciting
Speaker 1: it is to do it. And like many things with me,
Speaker 1: I just think you really enjoy that high degree of difficulty.
Speaker 1: I think it makes you pay attention more, you know,
Speaker 1: keeps you on your feet and that's exciting. Yeah, if
Speaker 1: you haven't checked out Wilfred everybody, you definitely should. It's
Speaker 1: one of those where you're like, what, what the what?
Speaker 1: But you really gave the show heart. I felt like
Speaker 1: I found it very funny, totally bizarre, but really relatable
Speaker 1: and human and realistic in a bizarre way. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: really enjoyed that I came to play with you for
Speaker 1: a couple of episodes, and I think you may have
Speaker 1: told me this that you guys were trying to get
Speaker 1: Robin Williams on the show, and I was like his
Speaker 1: orderly and he wanted people for his orderlies that he
Speaker 1: had worked with before, something like that, or you were
Speaker 1: trying to make him more comfortable because he and I
Speaker 1: had worked together before. Do you remember all of that? No, No,
Speaker 1: I just remember loving you and wanting to work with you. Okay, well,
Speaker 1: perfect orderly with a fake head. Yeah. It was a
Speaker 1: weird episode, very weird, very weird. I remember Robin Williams
Speaker 1: after we do a bunch of takes, he says he
Speaker 1: said to me, says he bought some boss, can I
Speaker 1: try something? I'm like, you could do whatever you want,
Speaker 1: thank you? Yeah? God, yeah. But we shot that show
Speaker 1: on Stills cameras. Do you remember that? Now? I do
Speaker 1: shot that entire series on Still's camera as long vintage
Speaker 1: lenses I bought off eBay And that was from the pilot.
Speaker 1: Is like, you know, form follows function. I wanted I
Speaker 1: wanted Elijah's dementia to be mirrored visually, so anytime he
Speaker 1: was going deep into his dementia. We would shoot on
Speaker 1: these We would shoot in a seventy millimeter aspect ratio,
Speaker 1: and the only way you can do shoot seventy millimeter
Speaker 1: aspect ratio is by shooting seventy millimeter film, which is
Speaker 1: crazy expensive, or shooting on these stills cameras and these
Speaker 1: nice old vintage lenses that were the depth of field
Speaker 1: was so shallow. It gave the show a really cool
Speaker 1: look and we ended up winning an Award for cinematography
Speaker 1: on that show. That is I totally forgot that you
Speaker 1: did that. How did they let you do that? That
Speaker 1: is so crazy? It is crazy. I can't believe we
Speaker 1: did it. I'm like, I was convinced that this is
Speaker 1: this is what I wanted to do, and it it worked,
Speaker 1: It really did. And you know, that was my very
Speaker 1: first pilot. But yeah, we cold. You can buy those
Speaker 1: cameras at costco. How many of those did you direct? Uh?
Speaker 1: Fifty one of fifty four? Dear goodness? Yeah, wow, yeah, wow, folks,
Speaker 1: that doesn't happen. Just so you know, unless you're in
Speaker 1: a b unless you're d you're really shooting a multi
Speaker 1: camera show, then it can happen. Jimmy Burrows can do that,
Speaker 1: but not many others who are shooting other shows. How
Speaker 1: did you make that work with scouting locations and everything else?
Speaker 1: How did you do that? Um? Well, we had you know,
Speaker 1: we'd have, um, you have all all the episodes written
Speaker 1: all at once, and so we shot it. You'd shoot
Speaker 1: a movie, you'd shoot scene fourteen from episode ten right
Speaker 1: next to scene one from episode you know two, and
Speaker 1: so you had just had to keep all that in
Speaker 1: order and had to really pay attention continuity. And so
Speaker 1: what what we used to do on that show is
Speaker 1: I would I would we would be doing scenes that
Speaker 1: were after a scene we wouldn't be shooting for weeks.
Speaker 1: So I would say, okay, let's go read the scene
Speaker 1: right before this scene so we know where we're coming here,
Speaker 1: and so the actors would kind of we'd perform it
Speaker 1: and then they would figure out where they need to
Speaker 1: be in this scene even though we hadn't shot that
Speaker 1: scene before, which that happens all the time, but never
Speaker 1: so much is you know, episode ten and episode one
Speaker 1: shooting at the same day. But then again I had
Speaker 1: Elijah Wood who shot three movies at once, you know right,
Speaker 1: Well that yeah, I mean, that's it that's a long movie. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean if you're doing six and a half seven
Speaker 1: hour mo wow, yeah, wow, then I want to Fargo.
Speaker 1: Fargo is one of my favorites. I mean, you and
Speaker 1: I've talked about it. How did you get? How did
Speaker 1: you get? Now? Was this your relationship on Wilfred and
Speaker 1: with the network? Is that how they allowed you to
Speaker 1: come into Fargo? Yeah? You know, I had I had
Speaker 1: an overall deal at Effects for some time, and I
Speaker 1: knew John Landgraff and I had some development there. But
Speaker 1: I think, you know, looking at Fargo in my body
Speaker 1: of work, that's kind of a jump that I would
Speaker 1: be eligible for something like that. But I had also
Speaker 1: done Nurse Jackie by this point. I did the final
Speaker 1: two episodes of one season, and then I came back
Speaker 1: and was executive producer and director of the next season.
Speaker 1: And when I look at that show, I don't I
Speaker 1: think totally it is a half hour, but totally it
Speaker 1: shares some a lot of DNA with hours. So I
Speaker 1: submitted and said, look, you know, yes, I have this
Speaker 1: body of work that is I mean, Wilfred had some
Speaker 1: heavy stuff and it's some really dramatic stuff in it,
Speaker 1: But I said look at look at the show Nurse
Speaker 1: Jackie and consider that it's not really the comedy of
Speaker 1: that show is not what I was interested in. And
Speaker 1: Eric Schreyer watched it, watched my episodes of Nurse Jackie,
Speaker 1: and he said, yeah, I totally get it. And so
Speaker 1: that's how I got on Fargo, is somebody actually being
Speaker 1: open minded enough to look at a half hour and
Speaker 1: consider it how that would translate into an hour if
Speaker 1: I was to direct Fargo. What was different about working
Speaker 1: on Fargo than anything you've done before. It was really cold.
Speaker 1: It's really really cold, you know. But comedies you tend
Speaker 1: to shoot both angles. I mean, I think that's that's
Speaker 1: the best way to shoot comedy, is that everybody's getting
Speaker 1: everything all at once. The actors are feeding off each other,
Speaker 1: You're never missing a moment. Fargo, like Nurse Jackie, was
Speaker 1: much more composed, and you were actually lighting the DP
Speaker 1: was actually lighting shots, not scenes. So you really needed
Speaker 1: to break it down and think, Okay, I'm going I
Speaker 1: know I'm opening with this, I want to come close
Speaker 1: in on Martin or Billy Bob, and you know, you're
Speaker 1: shooting one side at a time. So that's a very
Speaker 1: different thing. Than just like what we do in comedy
Speaker 1: a lot our times is it just has to be
Speaker 1: more planned. It takes a lot longer, that's for sure.
Speaker 1: You know the waffle Hut scene. There's the pilot of
Speaker 1: episode season two. There's a waffle Hut scene where Kieran
Speaker 1: Culkin comes in and shoots his way out of the
Speaker 1: waffle hut. And we didn't have enough This is winter
Speaker 1: in Calgary. We didn't have enough nighttime to shoot the
Speaker 1: amount of shots we needed for that scene. So we
Speaker 1: built that set on green screen and we shot all
Speaker 1: shot that everything on green screen, and then we took
Speaker 1: that set and built it out in the tun drop
Speaker 1: in the snow and shot the rest of it because
Speaker 1: we had in side to outside links and so on
Speaker 1: and so forth. So you know, it really required having
Speaker 1: a real good plan is how that would all come
Speaker 1: together to shoot the same scene on two locations. It's
Speaker 1: pretty interesting you talked before about when you don't direct
Speaker 1: a pilot, when you come into a show like for example,
Speaker 1: it's always sunny and you're tied to that form that exists,
Speaker 1: and you feel like your job is to do it
Speaker 1: as well as you can, but not to mess with
Speaker 1: the form that's there. Did you feel a pressure or
Speaker 1: was there an attempt by you to channel the Cohen Brothers.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know that sounds weird, but like that show,
Speaker 1: and partly why I find it so well done is
Speaker 1: I feel like the shots come straight out of the
Speaker 1: Cone Brothers. Yeah, you know, so if you look at
Speaker 1: the couplet of the Cone Brothers stuff. Certainly like Fargo.
Speaker 1: The only long lens shot in all of Fargo everything
Speaker 1: was like twenty nine thirty two forty mills a long
Speaker 1: lens on Fargo, right, it was all shot pretty wide.
Speaker 1: The only long lens shot is the opening shot of
Speaker 1: the car. Yeah, and that was shot by the second
Speaker 1: unit DP, just out on his own. They told us,
Speaker 1: they said, go get a shot of a car driving,
Speaker 1: and so he did this really really long lens shot
Speaker 1: of the car driving. And I remember in my episode,
Speaker 1: so it's the moment where all our Platque's character finds
Speaker 1: the cash, that's the money, and I remember I shot
Speaker 1: it exactly the same way. I shot it really really
Speaker 1: really long lens. So yeah, very cognizant, very very aware
Speaker 1: of paying tribute to how that that film was done.
Speaker 1: And I was really that was really fun. It was
Speaker 1: really cool. He worked on so many amazing shows that
Speaker 1: we've discussed in that the Muppets as well, Nurse Jackie.
Speaker 1: You bring up Parks and Wreck and many many more.
Speaker 1: Abbot Elementary is your current show that is a smash
Speaker 1: bang boom success. You returned now to a documentary or
Speaker 1: mockumentary style show. How did you get involved with Abbot Elementary? Um?
Speaker 1: I got sent to the script by Quinta, and you know,
Speaker 1: we really hit it off. And up until this point,
Speaker 1: I had a moratorium on Zooms. I wasn't going to
Speaker 1: do any more zooms. I's gonna take that out of
Speaker 1: my TOOLSHD. But you know when I when I heard
Speaker 1: the story and met Quinta, it was like, this is
Speaker 1: a story about unsung heroes. And you know, I think
Speaker 1: everybody's got a teacher in their life that means something
Speaker 1: to them if they remember something about and they were
Speaker 1: affected in some way. I really fell in love with
Speaker 1: with what teachers do? You know? Being a public school teacher,
Speaker 1: you're you're you're gonna make not enough money. You're not
Speaker 1: going to be well enough paid for the important job
Speaker 1: that you do. Absolutely, yeah, Therefore, the reasons you're doing
Speaker 1: it for are all the right reasons, and I just
Speaker 1: felt like this would be this would be a really
Speaker 1: you know, nice love letter to teachers, but also just
Speaker 1: meeting Quinta us, like, Okay, you're something special. Yes, I
Speaker 1: would like to do your pilots very much, thank you.
Speaker 1: And I did. And it's funny like I ended up
Speaker 1: shooting a lot of that pilot. I actually operated the
Speaker 1: camera on every every camera on every scene. We had
Speaker 1: three cameras, and I would just take one camera to time,
Speaker 1: then I'd moved on to camera and move on next
Speaker 1: camera so that the operator that wasn't operating at that
Speaker 1: moment could see what I was doing and why I
Speaker 1: was doing it. Because it's really hard to train teach instincts.
Speaker 1: You know, they could observe the instinct, but I didn't
Speaker 1: really have the words to tell them about the instinct, right,
Speaker 1: you know. I would always talk to the cameraman like
Speaker 1: you would talk to um an actor. You know this,
Speaker 1: you know she knows this, you know he he does
Speaker 1: not know she knows this, and that would really inform
Speaker 1: the camera's point of view. But only on the pilot
Speaker 1: in particular, I operated the camera because I thought that
Speaker 1: that was that was something I could bring in terms
Speaker 1: of the style. And now we've got really great camera
Speaker 1: operators and um, I don't do that so much anymore.
Speaker 1: They did the camera operators, Uh, share your lineage and
Speaker 1: come from reality TV or no? Yeah, yeah yeah. The
Speaker 1: camera operators on on Avid Elementary all come from reality
Speaker 1: television and documentaries. Wow. I think it proves really good skills.
Speaker 1: Why was it the best choice in terms of style
Speaker 1: for this show? I think what I liked about it
Speaker 1: is what I like about documentaries is you have this
Speaker 1: veneer of people being very earnest and very real at
Speaker 1: times when they don't think they're being observed, you know,
Speaker 1: So those long lens shots of like Pam and Jim,
Speaker 1: and those long lens shots of Gregory and Jeanine, you
Speaker 1: can put this veneer on it that it there's an
Speaker 1: air of authenticity that I think comes through you when
Speaker 1: you back up on the backup away from the characters
Speaker 1: and zoom into the lens. So I think what I
Speaker 1: like about the mocumentaries. I love the notion that you're
Speaker 1: catching these people when they don't know they're being watched,
Speaker 1: or if they know they are being watched, how they
Speaker 1: interact like when you catch Steve saying something that, oh,
Speaker 1: I know, I just said something that's not entirely great,
Speaker 1: there's something really fun about that. There's another layer of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's there's just another layer of comedy and another layer
Speaker 1: of of heart you can find. I think by making
Speaker 1: it a mocumentary, you talked about wanting to show the
Speaker 1: teachers as as being heroes. Using this style, does this
Speaker 1: help you accomplish that goal in a way or get
Speaker 1: to know the characters more. I think it helps you
Speaker 1: find them when they're being selfless in a real, honest
Speaker 1: way and seeing them do the right thing. Even Ava
Speaker 1: Ava's going to grow it like this much each season,
Speaker 1: you know, because she's still all about self. But when
Speaker 1: you see those real moments that they're playing so real
Speaker 1: because of this veneer that you put on it, it's
Speaker 1: just rich. It just it just hits you as a viewer.
Speaker 1: I agree. I really like. I actually I really like
Speaker 1: when you activate a viewer and you make them to
Speaker 1: trying to look around a corner. Yes, I remember doing
Speaker 1: on Fargo that I was doing these dolly pushes that
Speaker 1: the dolly grip some slower, even slower, annoyingly slow, like
Speaker 1: annoyingly slow, and there you're agitating the viewer. You're you're
Speaker 1: poking at them, You're getting them kissed off, or you
Speaker 1: know whatever. It is apprehension. You know, it's an interesting thing,
Speaker 1: and I think that a mockumentary has the ability to
Speaker 1: really make the viewer a participant rather than a passenger.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like, like on the Office, are the
Speaker 1: cameras in Abbot elementary? Are they? Are they characters? Do
Speaker 1: they have a perspective? Yeah? I think so. I think
Speaker 1: certain actors have different relationships and thretained cameras. Yeah, like
Speaker 1: Tyler James Williams. He talks about that that there's one
Speaker 1: camera operator, Jeremiah, who catches him all the time. It's
Speaker 1: like and I look up, there he is, there, he is.
Speaker 1: Our camera operators are really great, um friend and Jeremiah
Speaker 1: and Drew really good camera operators. And I think they're
Speaker 1: all looking for something all the time. In your first
Speaker 1: meeting with Greg Daniels on the Office, you talked about
Speaker 1: the office being the tofu hot dog, the good food
Speaker 1: wrapped like junk food. Do you think that applies to
Speaker 1: Abbot as well? Yeah? I suppose it does, you know,
Speaker 1: but I wanted I wanted Abbot to look. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, the office had its a look that people
Speaker 1: came there from nine to five, punch the clock. The
Speaker 1: only one who really wanted to stay or you know,
Speaker 1: is Michael and Dwight. And that's if you know. Dwight
Speaker 1: wanted to stay longer because more time with Michael. Yeah,
Speaker 1: everybody else is like just punch of the clock, they're
Speaker 1: ready to go home. So it kind of had a
Speaker 1: flatter look you look forward to getting out of Abbot.
Speaker 1: I really wanted it to make these people look like heroes.
Speaker 1: So we certainly lighted a lot prettier and shoot on
Speaker 1: prettier lenses just to make these people look as good
Speaker 1: as they deserve. To any favorite memories so far shooting, Oh,
Speaker 1: I remember, I'm the pilot. We were trying to get
Speaker 1: the kids to be quiet, and this is during COVID, right,
Speaker 1: and they're six years old and seven years old, and
Speaker 1: they've never been Most of them have never been on
Speaker 1: a film set before. None of them had been in
Speaker 1: school for like a year, ye right. None of them
Speaker 1: had been in a room with thirty other six year
Speaker 1: olds in two years. So they were going crazy, rest
Speaker 1: going crazy, and it was It was the greatest. It
Speaker 1: was so cool, and you know we're old trying okay,
Speaker 1: quiet quiet, please quiet please? Yeah, right, yes, seriously quiet quietly,
Speaker 1: got quiet down, and Quinton and I are just trying
Speaker 1: in adies are trying to get me be quiet, and
Speaker 1: Cheryl leave. Ralph walks in the room and she says,
Speaker 1: good morning, class. My name is Cheryl Lee. I am
Speaker 1: your teacher today. What do we do when I say yet,
Speaker 1: we'd be quiet? We did really good casting here. This
Speaker 1: is great. We're gonna be hit. Quin and I were like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, you well you apparently you guys didn't
Speaker 1: get the memo like the hardest things to work with
Speaker 1: or what animals and children? How is that still? They?
Speaker 1: I mean, talk about the challenges of that on a
Speaker 1: day to day basis, On a day to day basis,
Speaker 1: they make everybody smile. There you go. They make everything
Speaker 1: harder and everything better every day. It's so cool. Add
Speaker 1: kids do it and everything gets real, real, real. One
Speaker 1: there's you know, they have a they pumpkin, you know,
Speaker 1: sit there quietly at you know, act like you're coloring,
Speaker 1: but don't make any sounds. You know. Oh, you can
Speaker 1: only use one one pen. One pen color because we
Speaker 1: hear your pen go down, you pick up another one,
Speaker 1: or we hear you move in your chair. So there's
Speaker 1: a really used by day, you know, used by day
Speaker 1: with the kids is that they're gonna get bored and
Speaker 1: therefore we all need to do our work and we
Speaker 1: need to have it together. We need to have a plan.
Speaker 1: So the actors are very aware of that. They see
Speaker 1: them turn and getting bored and restless. And exactly these
Speaker 1: actors are. They act like their teachers, and they they
Speaker 1: they embody their teachers to get what we need out
Speaker 1: of the kids. Out of the kids are the greatest.
Speaker 1: You know. There was a little boy in the pilot,
Speaker 1: this boy named Abraham whom Janine's telling him to turn
Speaker 1: around and be quiet, and then starts counting to three
Speaker 1: and he just does this. He just did that on
Speaker 1: his own. He just did that on his own. So okay,
Speaker 1: I'm not ignoring you, ignoring you. And he's um and
Speaker 1: he's been he's been in the show so much in
Speaker 1: the background. We've used him for stuff that because he's
Speaker 1: really smart, he's gonna do great work. We've given him lines.
Speaker 1: We given you know, so many kids, so many lines,
Speaker 1: and when they get their chance. Oh they're so you know,
Speaker 1: I remember Abraham came up to me, you know, in
Speaker 1: the first season he says, so, mister Randall, sir, is there,
Speaker 1: how what can I do to prove myself that I
Speaker 1: deserve a line? I can handle a lot. I'm like, dude,
Speaker 1: You've already done it. I'm just waiting for the moment
Speaker 1: to give you a line. And now we're giving just
Speaker 1: finding these kids that you know, they focus on you
Speaker 1: and they make eye contact even even though you have
Speaker 1: a mask on, and they you could see them paying attention.
Speaker 1: And we're giving all these cool kids these really cool opportunities.
Speaker 1: I think it's really fun. That's awesome. It's really cool.
Speaker 1: Speaking of awesome, a few weeks ago, the show Abbott
Speaker 1: Elementary basically it sweeps the Golden Globes. Can you talk
Speaker 1: about this? How did that feels? I mean, it's really cool.
Speaker 1: I mean feeling the love that we're getting is incredible.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's funny because I look into the
Speaker 1: other shows that we're competing against, and they're not twenty
Speaker 1: one minute thirty second shows. They're they're twenty eight minutes,
Speaker 1: they're twenty two minutes. They're thirty one minutes, they're sixteen
Speaker 1: minutes whatever a show needs to be, right. What I'm
Speaker 1: so proud of is that we're making we're making this
Speaker 1: show under the constraints of network television, which I don't
Speaker 1: think has been done successfully like this in quite some time. Again. Um,
Speaker 1: so that that I find very rewarding and being you know,
Speaker 1: competing against you know, Barry and the Bear. You read
Speaker 1: you're listening to who our actors are up against, and
Speaker 1: they're they're they're all sitting there at the table just like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I'll look against blah blah. It's it's
Speaker 1: it's crazy, it's really cool. It's so nice to feel
Speaker 1: the love. It's I think that the reason the show
Speaker 1: has such such such success is it resonates with everybody
Speaker 1: because everybody's had a teacher, everybody's had this really relationship,
Speaker 1: you know, and Quinta has put together a really cool show,
Speaker 1: Like we've been here together since the beginning, and she's
Speaker 1: incredible and just an incredible leader. She knows everybody's name
Speaker 1: on set. She's a great leader and a really good
Speaker 1: human being. So that's awesome. Yeah, it's good to see
Speaker 1: those people rewarded. Yeah, and you know it is you
Speaker 1: bring up a great point about network television. It is
Speaker 1: so has becomes so rare because the constraints are real.
Speaker 1: It forces you into a very specific type of form,
Speaker 1: a type of storytelling, given the time constraints and how
Speaker 1: the acts have to be structured for commercial Where. How
Speaker 1: do you feel like Abbot Elementary can help future network
Speaker 1: television shows and how do you think it and where
Speaker 1: do you see network television going? Why do you keep
Speaker 1: working on them? I mean, you know what I like
Speaker 1: about it being on network television is like some of
Speaker 1: the subject matter that we're dealing with can go to
Speaker 1: every home in America, whatever political, you know, socioeconomic type
Speaker 1: of house. That is. We're talking about things that I
Speaker 1: think are are important, and I think it's really fun.
Speaker 1: It's really fun to push the boundaries like that. I
Speaker 1: did another show called The Mick. I did the pilot
Speaker 1: for the show called The Mick YEP and it was
Speaker 1: like the show could have been on streaming or cable,
Speaker 1: but I really enjoyed the fact that it's it's on
Speaker 1: network and it's really fun to see what you can
Speaker 1: get away with, Yeah, by pushing those boundaries. And what
Speaker 1: I also like is it's it's reaching a lot of people.
Speaker 1: That's an awesome answer, because I think with the decentralization,
Speaker 1: if you will, if that's the way to say it,
Speaker 1: with all the streaming services, it's true, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of amazing work and you can see things now being
Speaker 1: done that you couldn't before. That's a good thing. But
Speaker 1: it's also a good thing to have the challenge of
Speaker 1: making a show that attempts to be more universal, or
Speaker 1: at least, you know, attempts to appeal to a universality
Speaker 1: and not a niche market. I think that's that's really
Speaker 1: well said. Good for you, thank you, Yeah, good luck
Speaker 1: on the pilot. I'm sure it'll be a freaking gangbuster,
Speaker 1: huge success. Like seemingly everything you touch you look amazing.
Speaker 1: I love your face, and uh, it's so good to
Speaker 1: catch up. Let's open a bottle of wine. Oh I
Speaker 1: love that. Let's open a bottle of wine. So I
Speaker 1: got I go. I go away in three weeks time
Speaker 1: the Grand Canyon. So I'm prepping for three weeks. I
Speaker 1: go away for three weeks while the rest of the
Speaker 1: pilot preps. I get off the river. On the twenty
Speaker 1: seventh table, read on the twenty eight, start shooting two
Speaker 1: days after that, so it's gonna be busy. You'll be
Speaker 1: rested and relax. I'll be rested. Well, let's let's let's
Speaker 1: open a bottle of line when I get back. I'm
Speaker 1: so happy for you. Thank you so much, my pleasure.
Speaker 1: Good to see you, brother, You too, Randall. Oh man,
Speaker 1: this was so special. It is so amazing to see
Speaker 1: you again and hear all about Abbott. You know what
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do. Someday, I'm gonna make my own documentary
Speaker 1: about your life, but I'm probably gonna need you to
Speaker 1: shoot it anyway. Listeners, thank you for being here. I
Speaker 1: hope you enjoyed this week's Off the Beat strike that
Speaker 1: I know you did. How could you not, because I
Speaker 1: I really did. Make sure you tune in next week
Speaker 1: and leave a comment on our Instagram page at Off
Speaker 1: the Beat if you would, or go to Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 1: I can't tell you how helpful that is. Also, let
Speaker 1: us know who you want to see on the podcast.
Speaker 1: We'll see you next week. Off the Beat is hosted
Speaker 1: an executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner, alongside our executive
Speaker 1: producer Lang Lee. Our senior producer is Diego Tapia. Our
Speaker 1: producers are Liz Hayes, Hannah Harris, and Emily Carr. Our
Speaker 1: talent producer is Ryan Papa Zachary and our intern is
Speaker 1: Sammy Katz. Our theme song Bubble and Squeak, performed by
Speaker 1: the one and only Creed Brett,