EMMY SPECIAL MAY 2018 EMMYS

FYC OUTSTANDING LIMITED SERIES

DARREN CRISS OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES “MASTERPIECE”

FYC Edgar RamIrez OUTSTANDING LIMITED SERIES PenElope Cruz OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES IN A LIMITED SERIES

JUDITH LIGHT RICKY MARTIN OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTRESS OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES IN A LIMITED SERIES “STROKE OF TIMELY GENIUS”

FYC OUTSTANDING LIMITED SERIES

EVAN PETERS SARAH PAULSON OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTOR OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES IN A LIMITED SERIES TV Movies, Limited Series, Documentaries

FEATURES 10 Peak TV’s Race for 16 ‘The Age of the Asshole complicated narrative or Maximum Buzz Is Over’ creating tension when the With hundreds of shows Two sci-fi stories — from ending is known. vying for votes, networks Netflix’s and and streamers are turning Amazon’s Electric Dreams — 26 The Alchemy and the to bigger stunts in hopes land at just the right time. Agony of Adapting of catching voters’ attention. a Classic Novel for TV 18 ‘The Fact That Something “I am very aware that most 40 12 ‘People Are Ready to Actually Happened Is adaptations are judged not Jef Daniels was photographed See the Truth’ No Defense’ on what they contain but on on Aug. 7 at Director Jennifer Fox unrav- Creating a series based what they leave out,” says one Minetta Tavern, which stands els the abuse she suffered on true events comes with writer of the challenges of in for Elaine’s in Hulu’s The as a teen with HBO’s The Tale, a unique set of hurdles, transforming a beloved book Looming Tower. starring Laura Dern. whether it’s rolling out a into a small-screen series.

Photographed by Mackenzie Stroh

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 2 MAY 2018 EMMYS FOR YOUR EMMY® CONSIDERATION OUTSTANDING DRAMA SERIES AND ALL OTHER CATEGORIES

©2018 Home Box Offi ce, Inc. All rights reserved. HBO® and related service marks are the property of Home Box Offi ce, Inc. FOR YOUR EMMY® OUTSTANDING

OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR JEFF DANIELS CONSIDERATION LIMITED SERIES May 2018 Emmys

FEATURES 30 Inside the Icon 36 ‘Like a Triage Doctor’ 40 ‘And Then 9/11 Happened’ From troubled music stars Six documentarians on how Hulu’s limited series to comedians battling their they crafted series that delve The Looming Tower centers demons, documentary spe- into food, culture, crime on frustrated FBI agent cials reveal the complicated and politics — and what they John O’Neill (played by Jeff individuals living within had to leave out to make their Daniels), whose fight against larger-than-life figures. stories work. terrorism is blocked by external and internal forces. 34 Cosmic Consciousness 38 Finding Religion Producer Darren Aronofsky Chapman and Maclain 44 89 Years of THR 34 enlisted astronauts for Way, the brothers behind Laura Dern channeled One Strange Rock shows astronauts environmental doc series Netflix’s , Florida’s Katherine Harris for training on the One Strange Rock: “It’s easy reveal how “a 30-second the 2008 HBO drama Recount, slopes of Mauna Loa, a volcano to forget that this planet, elevator pitch” from a film about the 2000 presidential in Hawaii, to get used to living our home, has been handed archivist led them to the race between George W. Bush on Mars. down to us.” fascinating hit cult story. and Al Gore. GEOGRAPHIC NATIONAL OF COURTESY

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 6 MAY 2018 EMMYS FOR YOUR EMMY® CONSIDERATION

“THE SHOW FEATURES HILARIOUS INTERVIEWS WITH AWESOME KIDS...” – 11alive.com

“THEY MAY BE YOUNG, BUT THEY ARE AMAZING.” – WBAL-TV

“LITTLE BIG SHOTS GIVES CHILDREN THE CHANCE TO DISPLAY THEIR AMAZING AND OFTEN UNIQUE TALENTS...” – Dailyrecord.co.uk

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“A MASTERPIECE.” The Report

Awards Analysis

EMMYS THE RACE

HBO introduced screeners Peak TV’s Race in 1990, and once others began providing them (with the TV Academy taking its middleman for Maximum Buzz cut), it became a competition to see who could offer the most lavish mailing. Then the TV With hundreds of shows vying for votes, networks Academy began renting space to On March 19, Amazon put up a billboard and streamers are turning to bigger and bigger stunts in in Hollywood promoting The Marvelous content providers for FYC events, Mrs. Maisel hopes of catching voters’ attention BY SCOTT FEINBERG . and it became a competition to see who could offer the most lavish Black-ish did a table read and post-panel reception. Efforts to party at Disney) or shorter-term be visible in the media expanded rentals (NBC’s This Is Us hosted at beyond local papers and ulti- Ace Hotel). mately to the internet, and now Some are seeking a compara- everyone fights to secure ads and ble bang from season premieres coverage everywhere, and efforts (the second season of Hulu’s to reach motorists expanded The Handmaid’s Tale debuted at beyond the Sunset Strip to bill- the TCL Chinese Theatre), live boards, buses and bus stops along performances (John Legend thoroughfares spanning from played the piano for NBC’s Jesus Silver Lake to Westwood. Christ Superstar) and an array Five years ago, roughly coin- of stunts: special appearances ciding with the rise of another (the stars of FX’s Baskets are set disrupter that lives or dies by to man an Arby’s counter); in- subscriptions — Netflix — things character ads on public benches got really cutthroat. Content (HBO’s Barry) and business cards providers began hiring the same (Amazon’s Maisel); and cheeky consultants who captain Oscar mailings (Fox’s Family Guy campaigns. Yard signs and food bragged on the outside of a card, trucks started popping up. And “We Predicted Kevin Spacey and then, in 2017, “spaces” hosting Harvey Weinstein, Open DVD screenings, panels and mixers to See Who’s Next”; inside was (Amazon set up at the Hollywood a mirror). Athletic Club and Netflix inside Do any of these shenanigans Above, the premiere for the second season a 24,000-square-foot office actually impact the way vot- of The Handmaid’s Tale and, left, an art building) were established to ers vote? There’s no question the kit promoting Nat Geo’s Genius: Picasso. circumvent the TV Academy’s efforts result in more voters being he first screener of the streaming services — it has never restrictive FYC schedule. aware of and likely to check out season, for Audience been harder to capture the atten- This season, no stone is being certain shows — and again, that’s T Network’s Mr. Mercedes, tion of voters, of whom there left unturned. Actors are run- half the battle, so they probably was mailed way back are also more now than ever before ning the promotional marathon, boost nomination tallies. But they on Feb. 6, and the first (some 22,000). And since most billboards are everywhere, and also cost a fortune and, at the end “FYC” event, for Showtime’s will vote only for something the spaces are back — Amazon of the day, TV Academy members The Chi, was held for TV Academy they’ve actually seen (what a con- returned to the HAC, this time vote in private and for what they members March 9. cept!), there is now an all-out war welcoming the public and offering like most, not for the content pro- That may sound like a strangely to try to register on their radar. “experiences” like Marvelous Mrs. vider that showed them the best

early start to Emmy campaign- How did we get here? Until the Maisel-inspired hairstyling, while time. Last year, the two providers AGES. ing, considering that nomination 1990s, virtually all Emmy noms Netflix relocated to three sound- that hosted event spaces, Netflix voting doesn’t begin until June 11, were split among the Big Three stages at Raleigh Studios, hosting and Amazon, garnered 91 and 16 final voting doesn’t begin until networks — ABC, CBS and NBC A-list talent for events includ- noms, respectively, whereas one Aug. 13 and the 70th Emmys won’t — with an occasional nom for Fox ing a conversation between David that did not pull out the FYC stops, happen until Sept. 17. But in the or PBS. Then came HBO, which Letterman (My Next Guest Needs Hulu, snagged 18 — and Hulu ulti- era of Peak TV — with more than needed subscribers, not commer- No Introduction) and Jerry Seinfeld mately was the only streamer to 500 scripted series, plus an cials, to survive, and was therefore (Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee). win a series award. And HBO, now untold number of talk and reality willing to spend real money in pur- For similar gatherings, other the old kid on the block, landed shows, spread across hundreds suit of Emmys — which, in turn, content providers are increas- more noms (111) and wins (29) of broadcast networks, cable and would attract more subscribers. ingly employing studio lots (ABC’s than any of them. BUILDING: COURTESY OF AMAZON STUDIOS. DRESS: FREDERICK M. BROWN/GETTY IM

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 10 MAY 2018 EMMYS

TALES OF TWO LIVES

Dern stars in The Tale, which debuted May 28 on HBO following its Sundance premiere.

‘ People Are Ready to See the Truth’ Director Jennifer Fox unravels the abuse she sufered as a teenager with HBO’s The Tale, starring Laura Dern volleys back and forth between my list and said, ‘Laura Dern, not possible.’ ‘This is too much.’ ” By Mia Galuppo the teen Jenny (Isabelle Nelisse) she’s the only one with the guts To get the movie financed, and the adult Jennifer (Laura to do this.’ ” the director drew on her years of Dern), who must contend with the Says Dern of the role: “It’s experience scraping together much more disturbing reality of like the most meta. That person documentary funding. “I swear, our months after dozens the relationship. whose eyes I’m looking in, I think I tapped on everybody’s of women came forward “People are ready to see the who is my director, is the person shoulder that I could until there to share their stories truth about just how grotesque I’m playing.” was nobody left to tap on,” says of sexual harassment and this is,” says Fox, who has spent Even with a star like Dern Fox. She strung together a F attached, there were massive dizzying web of French-German assault at the hands of Harvey her filmmaking career focusing Weinstein — the beginning of a on telling other people’s stories roadblocks to getting the story financiers, philanthropic Hollywood-wide reckoning — as a documentarian, with credits told. Fox was insistent on the funds like the female-focused Jennifer Fox found herself onstage like Beirut: The Last Home Movie inclusion of a scene in which the Gamechanger and private finan- at the Eccles Theater during the and My Reincarnation. The Tale, coach has sex with a young ciers, including Gigi Pritzker, Sundance Film Festival, about her narrative debut, is the prod- Jenny. “It was a deal-breaker to artist Regina Scully, entrepreneur to tell her own sexual-abuse story uct of several years of failed take it out,” she remembers. “We Lynda Weinman and producer with her 114-minute movie. attempts and stops-and-starts to got turned down by a million Abigail Disney. “Everybody who The Tale is a cinematic memoir tell a story that she was still try- cinematographers who wouldn’t based on Fox’s life, following ing to piece together for herself. touch this film.” Shooting inti- a journalist who discovers a story Once satisfied with a screen- mate scenes that involve a minor she wrote for a childhood English play, Fox was faced with the also proved to be a hurdle in class about what she believed was a predicament of having to cast getting financiers. “No one even consensual, “special” relationship herself, enlisting the help of wanted to think about it,” says between her 13-year-old self and friend and fellow filmmaker Dern. “It was an endless, ‘Oh how her adult track coach. The movie Brian De Palma. “[He] looked at are you going to do that?’ ‘That’s

→ Tale also stars Jason Ritter and Elizabeth Debicki. KYLE KAPLAN/HBO (2)

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 12 MAY 2018 EMMYS

Pacino in Paterno, which TV MOVIE couldn’t shoot on the Penn State campus after the school signed on had enormous cour- scenes,” says Fox. In a rare move, refused to participate. age because [it was] before this HBO picked up the movie for moment in history [the about $7 million at the festival. #MeToo movement], and it was (The network rarely acquires really scary,” says Fox. finished films.) Dern and Fox say that co- Since January, Fox, Dern and star Jason Ritter, who portrays HBO have held several screen- ‘It’s the Highest the coach, Bill, took a risk by ings of The Tale for women inside playing such a possibly damag- and outside the industry. and Lowest Points ing role. “One would presume “We retell stories about how for- Jennifer would be like, ‘Let’s cast tunate we are compared to horrors in His Life’ a son-of-a-bitch,’ ” notes Dern, that others have gone through — In HBO’s Paterno, Barry Levinson explores the final few with Fox interjecting, “But these but we don’t give ourselves room to weeks of former Penn State coach Joe Paterno’s life, during the men are not external monsters, really go through what, for us, was Jerry Sandusky sex-abuse scandal By Patrick Shanley they’re everyday people.” Ritter deeply traumatic,” says Dern. has the kind eyes, earnest smile It was at a screening of The Tale and boyish nature that audiences for women in sports that Fox fter earning an Emmy nomination for last year’s aren’t accustomed to seeing met an athlete who worked with Bernie Madof biopic The Wizard of Lies, director in serial abusers. “You can under- Larry Nassar, the disgraced USA Barry Levinson returns to HBO with another film stand how a little girl could Gymnastics national team doctor based on true events, Paterno. Starring Al Pacino as fall in love with him, and you can who was found guilty on mul- theA famed Penn State football coach Joe Paterno, the TV understand how even a family tiple counts of sexual assault of movie centers on the last few weeks of his life, when a sexual- might miss the cues or a commu- minors, his athletes. “She’s one abuse scandal around assistant coach Jerry Sandusky rocked nity might miss the cues.” of the ones who has testified,” the university and the football program. Levinson opened up Fox was turned down by mul- recalls Fox. “[She] came up to me, to THR about bringing the sensitive story to the screen, working tiple actors before Dern suggested tears in her eyes, saying, ‘Honestly, with Pacino and that Anthony Scaramucci executive they reach out to Ritter. After I have been suicidal. But if you producer credit. sending him the script, they met can survive, I can too. If you can with him in person together, fully become an adult, if you can have Paterno obviously had a very big presence in educa- knowing that approaching an a good life, so can I.’ ” tion and college football outside of the Sandusky actor to play a man who grooms Beyond being a personal story trial. Was the plan for this film always to focus on just a teenage girl in order to sexually and a timely narrative about the end of his life and the scandal? abuse her is a heavy ask. “Many, sexual abuse, Fox insists The Tale Levinson Yes, because otherwise you’re going to get into some many men didn’t have the guts,” is a larger examination of how sprawling piece and have to deal with at least 35 years. says Fox. When it came time to women use memory as a means It didn’t seem doable that way. There’s a great drama to the fact shoot, Ritter was paired with an to protect themselves from that in two weeks in a man’s life you can get a good idea about adult body double. trauma. “It’s important that you what the institution didn’t do and the cover-up that went with it, After a year in the editing room, survive trauma, but then hope- and we fold that together as a man is basically stuck in an MRI Fox brought her story to Sundance, fully at a certain point, when machine. So, you’re dealing with the highest high of winning where it quickly became one of you’re ready, you are allowed to 409 games and then the lowest low of being fired. It’s the highest the buzziest titles of the festival. bring in other truths and other and lowest points in his life. “It’s only because the #MeToo narratives,” she concludes. and Time’s Up movements had “The women I’ve met, they func- How did Pacino get involved in the project? started six months before that tion. I am not the exception. I am Al was involved with it earlier on and it didn’t work out — there people were able to digest those the rule.” wasn’t a script that they were all happy with — so it fell apart. Then Al was talking to me about it and I said, “Let me think about this.” I looked at the material and laid out basically the concept of what we have. He liked the idea.

Did you get any response from Penn State or the Paternos? No, we never heard anything from the university. The only : KYLE KAPLAN/HBO. TALE thing from the Paterno family we saw was a tweet from Scott [Paterno, Joe’s son] saying it was all fiction.

What was Anthony Scaramucci’s involvement as co-executive “I felt so free producer? to be an actor telling He had no involvement. You know what’s so terrible nowadays? a story that is in the If anyone invests any money or does anything, they automati- hands of the cally become a producer. I didn’t even know he was involved on person who knows it,” any level until the closing credits. says Dern, on set with Fox (left). : ATSUSHI NISHIJIMA/HBO. LEVINSON: GARY GERSHOFF/WIREIMAGE. PATERNO

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 14 MAY 2018 EMMYS © 2018 SUNDANCETV LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. TV MOVIE

campaign appearance, prompting violence. Philbert fears for his sanity when it seems his fellow citizens are apathetic about the candi- date’s statement and the violence it provokes. “There are some people that are going to point to it and say, ‘This is about the political era that we’ve entered,’ ” says executive producer and showrunner Michael Dinner. “It feels like a very timely story, but certainly when we got the first draft it was long before the results [of the election] had come in.” ‘The Age of the Indeed, Rees adapted the story way before the 2016 presidential election. But executive Plemons plays producer Isa Dick Hackett (daughter of Philip an online game in Asshole Is Over’ which he holds K. Dick) agrees on its timeliness: “I think — Black Mirror his co-workers’ this mention of ‘the others’ is more relevant Two futuristic sci-fi stories ’s and Amazon’s avatars captive. Electric Dreams — land at just the right time By Lauren Hu now than perhaps when she began writing it.” Each of the 10 stand-alone Electric Dreams episodes had the challenge of creating a uni- verse. Rees’ installment was the third to shoot to ask him how heavy he was,” says Haynes. in Chicago. “She started from scratch with Black Mirror’s “You just don’t know with Jesse because he’s a crew that was a little tired at that point, and a shape-shifter for roles.” she had to come in with a whip and get them #MeToo Moment Although at first Daly seems like a sym- going,” says Dinner, who credits Rees with The script for the “USS Callister” episode of pathetic outcast, it becomes clear within establishing an effectively relatable future Netflix’s creepy sci-fi series Black Mirror was the game that his Captain Kirk-like character world. “What I think is interesting is when you conceived long before the Harvey Weinstein is playing “bad God” — and that, unfortu- take a piece that’s set in the future and yet it’s bombshells and the subsequent #MeToo and nately for him, he completely underestimates Time’s Up movements, but the episode felt Nanette. “Right as he meets her, [he] thinks especially timely when it aired with the rest of she’s kind of a pretty little thing and doesn’t the six-episode fourth season in December. really see her as a worthy adversary. And then Following tech genius Robert she gets to overcome him in such a brilliant Daly (), who creates way,” says Haynes. “She triumphs ultimately.” his own -esque universe That victory creates a more optimistic end- within an online game where he ing to the episode compared to other chapters Haynes controls and abuses digital clones of the -created series. of his co-workers, the episode Says Haynes, “This one really did feel like hit Netflix two months into the workplace a message of ‘We will overcome.’ The age of the harassment reckoning. “It kind of contextual- asshole is over, and it should be.” ized [the episode] in a way that was completely unexpected,” says director . “It just brought new meaning to it. You’re watch- Electric Dreams’ ing it going, ‘Crikey, this is really touching on something here.’ ” Louis Herthum (left) and Rodriguez, whose character Terrifying dares to question a political leader’s deadly edict. Still, Haynes largely credits star — who plays Nanette, a co-worker who Tyrant eventually refuses to comply with Daly’s in- With the “Kill All Others” episode of Amazon’s still reminiscent, we still recognize the world game demands and leads the others to revolt sci-fi anthology, Electric Dreams, director that we came from.”

against him — with bringing the harassment Dee Rees, who helmed 2017’s Mudbound, took For Dinner and Hackett, the theme of the epi- : ELIZABETH angle to the forefront of the episode. “She an alien-invasion story and morphed it into a sode is clear and especially timely for today’s was already bringing the whole toxic masculin- haunting political allegory. political climate. ELECTRIC ity — the kind of harassment in the workplace As with the rest of the series, “There’s a powerful message about group- — aspect to the story,” he says. “Like any the episode is based on a short think and how dangerous that can be,” says woman in this industry, she really recognized story by Philip K. Dick — in this Dinner. “To somehow see to the heart of the it in her life and she pushed it to the front.” case, “The Hanging Stranger.” matter and see the truth and not be swayed For the part of Daly, Plemons, known for his Hackett It tells the future-set tale of by the mob, I think that’s a really powerful chameleon-like performances on Fargo and in an everyman, Philbert (played by message.” Adds Hackett: “That is essentially films like Black Mass, shaved a bald spot into Mel Rodriguez), who hears the nation’s only it. Beware of that sort of groupthink. People the back of his head. Plus, the actor had to dis- presidential candidate (an eerie Vera Farmiga) should stay awake — and complacency, apathy close his weight ahead of the shoot. “We had instruct viewers to “kill all others” during a and indifference are truly the enemy.” : COURTESY OF NETFLIX. HAYNES: KEITH MAYHEW/AVALON.RED/NEWSCOM. BLACK SISSON/AMAZON STUDIOS. HACKETT: TODD WILLIAMSON/GETTY IMAGES FOR AMAZON. FOR WILLIAMSON/GETTY IMAGES TODD STUDIOS. HACKETT: SISSON/AMAZON

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© 2018 AMC NETWORK ENTERTAINMENT LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 1

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4 56 ‘ The Fact That Something Actually Happened Is No Defense’ Creating a series based on true events comes with a unique set of hurdles, whether it’s ‘cheating a little bit’ to grab viewers, creating tension when the ending is known or casting actors who look and feel like their real-life characters By Carita Rizzo n recent years, true if you get into narrative trouble juries — two defendants, two sets We presented both points of crime and real-life events you can’t just have Vin Diesel of defense lawyers, two sets of view, but with a bias toward what have seen a resurgence on drive his car through your front prosecutors and witnesses galore, the testimonial evidence indi- scripted television. And window and save the day. And all of which had to be compressed cated; that the brothers were in Iwhile it’s often said that truth is while it’s true that reality often into eight 41-minute episodes.” fact molested by their parents.” stranger than fiction, turning strains credulity, the fact that Not only did Balcer have As if creating a dramatically fact into compelling drama comes something actually happened is to truncate the events into pal- engaging narrative about one of with its own challenges. no defense if it strikes a false atable form, he also had to tell a the most sensitive events in U.S. “Reality is messy,” says Rene note in your narrative.” controversial story while keep- history wasn’t hard enough, Balcer, veteran producer of Law & In the case of the Menendez ing a risk-averse legal department in turning former FBI Agent Ali Order, who this year spun the fran- brothers’ murder trial, source happy. “If we were going to offend Soufan’s and Lawrence Wright’s chise that often rips cases straight material was, indeed, abundant. certain members of the family, accounts of the events leading up from the headlines off into the “The logistics of the storytell- we would only do so if the facts to 9/11 into a series, The Looming NBC limited series True Crime: The ing were daunting,” says Balcer. backed it up,” he says. “Most of the Tower creator Dan Futterman and Menendez Murders. “While a true- “The Menendez case stretched family members believed that the his writers also had to have all life story can offer the writer an over eight years, involved two tri- brothers were molested, at least scripts for the Hulu series vetted abundance of ready-made riches, als — one trial had two revolving by [their father,] Jose Menendez. by a lawyer.

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1 Alex Rich (far left) plays the young Picasso in Genius. 2 Taylor Kitsch in Waco. 3 Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Murders. 4 Chris Noth as Don Ackerman in Manhunt: Unabomber. 5 Wrenn Schmidt as CIA agent Diane Marsh in The Looming Tower. 6 In Versace, Edgar Ramirez and Penelope Cruz play siblings Gianni and Donatella Versace. 7 Rose as Shakur in Unsolved.

Manhunt: Unabomber takes more and I think, in the end, embraced it.” dramatic creative license regard- In his true crime anthology ing one key event in particular. series Unsolved: The Murders of Centering on FBI agent Tupac & The Notorious B.I.G. for Jim Fitzgerald’s (played by Sam USA, showrunner Kyle Long took  Worthington) investigation of similar liberties, creating a fic- the Unabomber case, which led tional meeting between the two the agency to Ted Kaczynski detectives who put everything on (Paul Bettany) based on his mani- the line for the investigation festo, the series features many into the murders of the rap icons. key scenes of the two men going “Greg Kading and Russell head to head — events that in Poole never met,” admits Long. reality never took place. “The meeting happened in real “I said to everyone, ‘There’s no life between [police officer] Daryn version of the show without the Dupree and Russell Poole. It cop and the killer meeting,’ ” says didn’t happen with Kading there, executive producer John Goldwyn. so I cheated a little bit.” Real-life Fitzgerald, who acted as a Long wrestled with the deci- consultant on the series, initially sion, but ultimately found it was took great exception to the scenes. important for the show. “I knew it “It was a very legitimate position didn’t fundamentally change the for him to take,” says Goldwyn. truth,” he says. “These guys really But the exec producer, whose did put everything into this case casting of actors Worthington and they kind of got screwed over and Bettany was a major coup for by the departments in the same Discovery Channel’s relatively way. I just felt like it was necessary new foray into scripted fare, was and tied everything together.” adamant that this was a situa- While Long dealt with sensi- 7 tion where taking liberties within tive material that implies both the narrative was not just war- police corruption and criminal “We had a researcher who Was it deliberate?’ We got to a ranted but non-negotiable. activity on the part of well-known was footnoting every script, place where we felt comfortable “I said to [Fitzgerald], ‘Jim, entities that still roam free, the and often the lawyer would task expressing it the way it came I understand. I really do. But legal implications were not the her with coming up with some out in the show.” when you have the opportunity reason he thought the show would more footnotes: ‘Where did While both The Menendez to have actors of this caliber never get made. “When I wrote this come from? What are you Brothers and The Looming Tower in your show, there is going to be this, part of the reason I thought : TINA ROWDEN/ relying on? What’s the conjec- take calculated liberties in regard an unspoken expectation from it’s just too hard [to realize] was ture here?’ ” says Futterman. “We to chronology and composite the viewer to see them face off,’ ” the casting,” says Long. “When MANHUNT were working under that kind characters, Discovery Channel’s Goldwyn recalls. “He accepted it, it came to Tupac I thought, ‘How of scrutiny.” are we going to find this guy?’ ” The issue they often faced Long deferred to director : JUSTIN LUBIN/NBC. was that their research appeared Anthony Hemingway (Red Tails) to contradict itself. “You have when it came to the hiring of MENENDEZ : RICHIE KNAPP/USA NETWORK. CAMP: CRAIG BLANKENHORN/HULU. to decide what you believe is Marcc Rose as Tupac Shakur TUPAC the most likely thing that actu- (the actor’s only previous credit ally happened,” says Futterman was a turn as Shakur in 2015’s of conveying the persistent Straight Outta Compton) and the : RAY MICKSHAW/FX.: RAY conflicts between government entirely unknown Wavyy Jonez

VERSACE agencies that rendered their as Christopher Wallace, aka

: PARAMOUNT NETWORK/MILLER MOBLEY. counterterrorism investiga- Biggie Smalls. “One of the things

WACO tions fatally ineffective. “There Anthony and I are most blown were certainly some moments away by is Marcc, because he was

: JOJO WHILDEN/HULU. where we were trying to fig- very inexperienced, and I knew Bill Camp in ure out, ‘How do we express this a scene set this was really on his shoulders,” LOOMING moment in which information on 9/11 in says Long. “It’s so gratifying The Looming was denied? Was it sloppiness? Tower. to hear, ‘Oh my God, the guy who : NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC/DUSAN MARTINCEK. NATIONAL : GENIUS DISCOVERY COMMUNICATIONS. COMMUNICATIONS. DISCOVERY

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plays Tupac is amazing,’ because that resulted in a fatal fire, kill- character, and to flesh it out more 1 Michael Stuhlbarg in The Looming Tower 2 Julia Garner and Rory Culkin in Waco. 3 The we had a real anxiety about get- ing 76 Branch Davidians, brother we wanted to give him a backstory, Menendez Murders. 4 Banderas in Picasso. ting it right.” filmmakers Drew and John like, maybe he grew up at Waco Jonez was discovered through Dowdle faced criticism for mak- and that insanity is what made on set to inform the actors about a cellphone clip he sent in. “He’d ing the members of the cult too him this horrible, crazy person.” life inside the compound, FBI never been at an audition,” says relatable. “That’s a funny thing Drew adds that reading David hostage negotiator Gary Noesner Long. “It could have gone so wrong. that Drew and I turned over in Thibodeau’s 1999 book A Place filled them in on the events out- They really stepped up.” our heads,” says Dowdle. “Like, Called Waco: A Survivor’s Storybook side it. “I remember, one day, A retelling of any real-life we could have made them more was “such an eye-opening experi- looking over and seeing Thibodeau event is guaranteed to invite cri- monstrous somehow.” ence for both of us. It was totally and Noesner, the real guys, break- tique. After they created Waco, Appearing too sympathetic to different from any narrative of ing it all down and making sense Paramount Network’s mini- the Branch Davidians is a reproach Waco we had ever seen before.” of it together,” says John. series about the 51-day standoff that they can accept. “The whole It is a story they feel could not Adds Drew, “There were times between David Koresh’s reli- project came from a place of look- have been told accurately without in the script stage where Gary gious cult (known as the Branch ing at the story differently,” says consultants from both sides of Noesner would say, ‘Hey, this scene Davidians) and the FBI and ATF Drew. “We were writing a ‘bad guy’ the conflict. While Thibodeau was isn’t completely fair.’ We really

Q&A ← The women of the town of La Belle attempt to defend their homes in Godless. Michelle Dockery, who Jeff Daniels also worked I was resistant to at first a lot. He was always Godless only because I only knew riding a horse. He would Work her from come to set on a horse. — when I saw her audi- He would have one by How writer-director tion, she was so clearly his trailer all the time. Scott Frank lassoed his exactly what I had in Sometimes I’d see him seven-part Western BY REBECCA FORD my head. I completely for- riding barefoot. got about anything cott Frank spent Frank, 58, spoke to Steven Soderbergh had she had done before Did you get on a Syears trying to make THR about his star- just done Behind the and can’t even see horse? Godless — a Western that studded cast and their Candelabra on HBO and her doing Lady Mary I rode the horse follows a town full of horse-riding abilities. said, “It’s like a whole anymore. Frank a lot. Sometimes women (widowed when other world right now. the camera would a mine collapsed) who How did this project end Maybe [TV] is a good What sort of preparation be really far away from find their homes threat- up as a limited series? place for you.” did the actors need? the action and it would ened after the arrival of I wrote it in 2004 as a film Every actor that was on a be faster to just jump on a an injured outlaw — as a and tried to get it made You have a lot of British horse had to go through horse and ride out to where movie. It finally came forever. Westerns just were actors in your cast. Was a little bit of cowboy camp. everybody was. I was just to fruition as a seven-part not in fashion and they that a coincidence? Jack O’Connell spent a always praying, “Don’t fall Netflix series, starring didn’t do well overseas in I just cast people based good two months before off in front of the actors, Jack O’Connell, Michelle particular, which was on if they would just we started shooting work- don’t fall off in front of the Dockery and Jeff Daniels. a key part of the decision. feel right to me. Even ing with the horses and actors.”

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Q&A we worked really, character in your story really hard on it and as being worthy of car- were trying to do rying their own movie. something differ- Even if it doesn’t neces- Complex Mosaic ent, and the fact that sarily manifest in any Writer Ed Solomon reflects on HBO’s it landed well made kind of an overt way, it innovative ‘branching narrative’ series it that much better. I often comes through BY JACKIE STRAUSE didn’t know how or on a deeper level. And if it would land. I’m so glad to not he HBO mini- What do you think be beholden to Tseries Mosaic of the feedback to How has working the studio movie began as a storytell- Mosaic? on this new form system on any ing experiment. It I was really over- changed your Solomon kind of a creative was 2013 when Steven whelmed with the writing process? level. Being able Soderbergh first response to both It’s made every charac- to forge new ground is brought the idea of a the branching ver- ter I write more rich, so much more exciting. 4 “branching narrative” sion as well as the nuanced and detailed. Even if it doesn’t suc- platform to screen- “traditional” Mosaic When you’re writ- ceed, it’s more exciting. wanted to honor that. Not just so writer Ed Solomon versions. I’m really ing in this form, you It’s just a better way they would stand behind the (whose film credits proud of it because must think of every to live, being fascinated show, but so that we could feel include Now You and challenged. that we got it right.” See Me, Men in Black While the challenge often is and the Bill & Ted Has there been any truncating an abundance of mate- films, including the discussion of a Mosaic rial, sometimes the dilemma recently announced sequel? is the opposite. In producing sequel, Bill & Ted Face I don’t think we’re the follow-up to the hit limited the Music). Over the going to do a series American Crime Story: next three years, they sequel. Mosaic was The People v. O.J. Simpson, pro- developed a 500-page designed to be a one- ducer Nina Jacobson found that script and filmed off, ultimately. Its FX’s The Assassination of Gianni eight hours of foot- style of storytelling Versace proved a more difficult age to tell a murder was really rooted in story to tell than its predecessor. mystery in two forms: the style of story that “Whereas with the O.J. Through the Mosaic it was. We learned Simpson trial virtually every app, where users fol- so much about how person involved with the story low a customized to evolve the form fur- had written a book, in the case of branching narrative; ther that it felt more Versace, we had much less infor- and through HBO’s appropriate to work a mation available to us,” she says. six-episode “linear” new story from The series creators based many version, released two the beginning, and of the key events in the story of months after the app. try to totally take Andrew Cunanan, who murdered Solomon, 57, spoke to advantage of the form the famous fashion designer out- THR about creating the rather than try to side his Miami home, on Maureen mystery centered on change the tone and

Orth’s 2000 book Vulgar Favors. the disappearance of a Sharon Stone plays author Olivia Lake in the innovative series, style of Mosaic to have They gathered additional infor- famed author. which also stars Garrett Hedlund, Fred Weller and Beau Bridges. a second season.

: NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC/DUSAN MARTINCEK. NATIONAL : mation from newspaper accounts and available video footage. “But GENIUS what happened between David Madsen and Andrew Cunanan, for saw [People v. O.J.]. She said, ‘It’s one particular way. That’s been will the character do next. example, when they went miss- not a documentary, but they our approach for the Crime Story We know that Picasso’s going to : JUSTIN LUBIN/NBC. ing for several days, or how exactly captured the emotional truth series in general.” die at the end of the story. We

: CLAUDETTE BARIUS/HBO. SOLOMON: GILBERT CARRASQUILLO/FILMMAGIC. some of the murder scenes went of what happened,’ ” recalls But how does one tell the most know that he’s going to become MENENDEZ

MOSAIC down — the only people who know Simpson, adding that producers compelling story where the out- wildly successful and famous. about them are dead,” says exec did not, for either season, con- come is already known? “I think The trick then becomes the cre- producer Brad Simpson. “They had tact any of the people involved. it’s really challenging,” says ative speculation about the inner to be imagined based on what we “We want to be cognizant of Ken Biller, creator of National turmoil of these characters.” knew of the personalities and the the victims, but at the same Geographic’s Genius series, Biller, who based much of the crime scenes.” time we think it’s best to tell the which this season features Pablo dialogue on letters and events

: PARAMOUNT NETWORK/URSULA COYOTE. That’s where the storytellers story based on historical evi- Picasso (played by Antonio on research, turned to nonlinear

WACO must rely heavily on what they dence and to try to unpack what Banderas). “So much of the ten- storytelling to create suspense call “emotional truth.” “Marcia happened but not be beholden sion of drama comes from the within the narrative. “It’s a tech- Clark used that phrase after she to telling one particular story in audience wondering about what nique where we could inject : JOJO WHILDEN/HULU. : URSULA COYOTE/NETFLIX. FRANK: STEVE GRANITZ/GETTY IMAGES. GODLESS LOOMING

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Limited Series surprise and irony into events by juxtaposing what the younger character was expecting was going to happen with what really Q&A happened,” he says. While the consensus is that spinning reality into a working Killer Role narrative is often a tougher Jessica Biel returned to TV after a nut to crack than fiction, those 15-year break — this time, with a who have turned it into an art producer credit — to play a murderer form have learned to embrace BY KATIE KILKENNY the challenge. “I’ve really gotten to enjoy it,” est known for The Sinner is in so many says Biller. “We might know what Bher onscreen ways about trauma happened when these charac- roles, Jessica Biel was that women experience. ters emerge from the room, but a central figure in It aired just before the we have to ask ourselves, ‘What developing The Sinner #MeToo reckoning. What could they possibly have said — USA’s eight-episode do you hope people will to each other that would make limited series about take away from the story them emerge from the room a quiet mother’s very in this context? with this outcome?’ It’s a really public murder of I hope it’s part of the fun challenge.” a young man — and conversation and the stewarding the narrative that now, as mystery drama to TV, female collaborators 1 and into a second- around the world, we season renewal. She take a piece of art like and producing part- this and say once again, ner Michelle Purple “This is another reason Biel (right, with Nadia Alexander) received a Golden Globe became attached to that we have to stand nomination for best actress for her work on The Sinner. the adaptation of Petra up and speak out and Hammesfahr’s 1999 not be afraid of the con- anything away how step forward, develop novel when the story sequences of saying the much I will be involved material, find things was just in its manu- truth or the shame or onscreen — that’s still and get behind them.” script stage. the guilt.” being developed and I felt finally confident “I really got a very looked at. But lucky for in my life, as a person, authentic, shot-out-of- The Sinner was the top me, no matter what to do that. Also, televi- the-cannon experience new cable series of the I will always be able to sion was changing: It’s as a producer for the year. What accounts for be a part of the show become such an incred- first time in a really that success? and I’m very proud of it. ible place where if big way,” Biel says. The Maybe there was an you have a thought-out, 36-year-old star spoke undercurrent of some- You took time o from interesting, fresh idea, with THR about how thing going on [before TV after 7th Heaven. you have a great oppor- the show resonates in the #MeToo movement] What was behind that tunity, especially as the wake of the #MeToo that was subcon- 15-year hiatus and what a woman, to put some- movement and plans scious, that we couldn’t brought you back? thing on television. for season two. put our fingers on but There wasn’t like a was touching a nerve, driving force behind it. What are you working What were the changes culturally. This busi- I got on a path of doing on now? or directions that the ness also has such films. But, as we all I’m developing a series takes that you an element of luck, like know, the film industry satirical puppet series advocated for? lightning in a bottle — has become very lim- called Going Doll I think you can see sometimes you catch ited. I wanted to take that’s Muppets meets my handprint in it and most times you control of my career South Park meets the the casting. Also in don’t, but this particu- again, which is what Housewives. We’re really developing lar time we maybe had I had in mind when I developing a couple of the Harry Ambrose a little luck on our side. started this small pro- other TV shows and : ISABELLA VOSMIKOVA/USA NETWORK. character [played by duction company [Iron producing a film based The Sinner Bill Pullman]: That was renewed Ocean Studios]. I felt on a popular YA book. UNSOLVED core character was for a second season. that it was my duty to I’m working on my very well-developed Will you be involved? step into my own and [sex-positive initiative] and thought-out in the I’ll definitely be say, “You can’t just Tryst Network con- : JEFF DALY/FX.

2 book, but for the tele- involved as a pro- sit back and wait for tent, and being a mom VERSACE vision audience and ducer. I can’t really someone to call you; and trying to have 1 Luke James as Sean Combs in Unsolved. 2 Ricky Martin (left) and Edgar Ramirez format we wanted to say much at this this is not how careers my own time and do in Versace. expand that character. point without giving are built. You have to things for myself. : PETER KRAMER/USA NETWORK. SINNER

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Limited Series

The Alchemy and the Agony of Adapting a Classic Novel for TV ‘I’m very aware that most adaptations are judged not on what they contain, but on what they leave out,’ says one writer of the challenges of transforming a beloved book into a small-screen series BY BRYN ELISE SANDBERG

1 2

split ting off that can happen in a climate — it was important to to create a more obvious narra- personality when someone has show how hard and brutal it tive of harassment and abuse and (Netflix) been harassed or assaulted or has can be to have to leave home and what that can do to a person. The SARAH POLLEY, WRITER come of age in a world where seek refuge somewhere else, pieces of the puzzle were in the Novel by Margaret Atwood women are prey, the ephemeral and to remind people who take book, but I wanted to shine a light nature of memory and the idea their citizenship and rights for on that aspect of it more glar- FIRST IMPRESSIONS that we’re all unreliable narrators. granted that this is how most of ingly. When I wrote it, I thought I first read the book our ancestors, grandparents or I would have to explain this deci- when I was 17 years WHAT WAS KEPT FROM THE BOOK parents got here. sion or that people would miss old, and I remember It was extremely important to that thread. As it turned out, the WHAT WAS CHANGED Polley little else of that year me to keep the immigration from I made the series came out at the same time besides the transfor- Ireland, in all its squalor and history of sexual abuse in Grace’s as the #MeToo movement, so mative experience of reading struggle, in the show. It was past, with her father, more pointed no explanation was needed and that book, over and over again. It expensive, and it would have been and literal, and I tracked the line everyone seemed to get it. It was reached deep into me, in a way an obvious thing to cut, but I felt of her trauma and dissociation to a shocking, thrilling surprise. I’m not sure I completely under- that — especially in this political this part of her history. I wanted stood at the time. It addressed ANOTHER BOOK I’D LOVE TO SEE ADAPTED things that were hidden from me, 1 Sarah Gadon stars in Alias Grace as a woman imprisoned for a murder that she may or may The Journalist and the but pertinent to my life: the not have orchestrated. 2 The four-part series Howards End stars Hayley Atwell. Murderer by Janet Malcolm

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 26 MAY 2018 EMMYS Howards End (Starz) Q&A COLIN CALLENDER, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER Novel by E.M. Forster Margaret Atwood The writer of The Handmaid’s Tale FIRST IMPRESSIONS and Alias Grace reflects on authorship I first read E.M. and ownership BY DANIEL J. FIENBERG Forster’s novel when I was a student. n 2017, televi- got [a writing Emmy], Callender Professor White was Ision finally caught she said, “Oh, we’ve my English teacher up with 78-year-old got a chance.” And and we studied the story of Canadian literary icon then when Ann Dowd the Schlegels, the Wilcoxes and Margaret Atwood got it, she said, “Wow, the Basts, discussing at length and her work’s femi- we’ve got an even the themes of class, social mores nist themes and dark bigger chance!” Then and the changing cultural undercurrents. Atwood when Elisabeth Moss landscape of turn-of-the-century was front and center got it, she said, England. But when I reread the as Hulu’s The “Get ready! Get ready!” book as an adult, and as the father Handmaid’s Tale domi- of two teenage daughters, the nated the Emmys. It’s been discussed story of Margaret and Helen, the Sarah Polley and Mary very amply why “If I had known yes or no, it wouldn’t have been nearly as interesting,” says Atwood of the mystery at the center of Alias two Schlegel sisters, took on a Harron’s adaptation of 2017 was such an Grace, which explores a young woman’s innocence or guilt. completely different and strik- her historical novel appropriate time for ingly contemporary resonance. Alias Grace premiered your themes to said, “What’s that?” from the covers. It’s Here were two smart, indepen- to acclaim at the hit home, but why do That’s what she did, out there in the world, dent, single-minded young women Toronto International you think TV, as a and it’s appropriate, so it has taken on in search of their own identities, Film Festival and medium, was so ready and it allows it to a meaning that it did navigating the tough and often on Netflix. She even for you in 2017? have the pace that it not have in 1984 or confusing realities of a man’s had a children’s show, I think because this requires. 1985, because in 1984 world and struggling to make their Wandering Wenda, new platform had come or 1985, the political way with integrity and without on CBC Television. along, which is the Sarah Gadon’s perfor- events we see unrolling compromise. It seemed relevant Atwood spoke to streamed series. That mance in Alias Grace before us had not yet to the world we live in. THR about why 2017 allows more complex involves at least three happened. This hap- was such a special novels to expand to the dierent characters. pens to a lot of books WHAT WAS KEPT FROM THE BOOK year, Alias Grace lead length of time that is What made you think — they get read in dif- Though we wanted to place Sarah Gadon and how appropriate for them, she could handle it? ferent ways depending the story of Margaret and Helen Handmaid’s Tale has rather than squishing She has an extremely on what then happens. center stage, it was very impor- “escaped from the them into 90 min- flexible face. You saw tant to remain faithful to the covers” of the book. utes or 60 minutes. in the opening That makes it easier story and broader themes of such The new platform has sequence when she’s for you to let go, a famous and well-read novel. What did it feel like to allowed a number saying, “Some people the fact that it’s been receive that standing out there?

: TAKE FIVE/HULU.: TAKE of longer works to find think I’m this, some WHAT WAS CHANGED [Screenwriter] ovation at the Emmys? the shape that’s more people think I’m that,” I don’t think it makes

HANDMAIDS Kenneth Lonergan was concerned We didn’t know it appropriate for them. and she doesn’t overdo it easier or harder. It’s

: COURTESY OF DOVER THRIFT EDITIONS. that the two main romantic was coming, of course. Alias Grace started out it. It’s just a slight just a thing that hap-

END relationships in the story would I had a coach who’s as a feature film, and shift. And she looks pens to some books, be difficult to dramatize because another Canadian. then Sarah Polley said, like a very different and you cannot control both girls were so intellectual She plays a Martha in “It’s too long. Would person. You cannot tell that, because as soon in their attachment to other peo- the show. So she was you mind terribly if I whether you’re looking as you publish a book, ple, but most of all he was not sitting beside me and made it into a six-part at an innocent person it’s no longer in the sure the book explored fully why when Bruce [Miller] miniseries?” And I proclaiming her inno- hands of the writer. If Helen was drawn into a relation- cence or whether you’re you want to retain con- : LAURIE SPARHAM/STARZ ENTERTAINMENT. ENTERTAINMENT. SPARHAM/STARZ LAURIE :

ES. ATWOOD: GRIFFIN LIPSON/BFA/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK. ship with the character of Bast. looking at a guilty trol of a book, you don’t At first, Kenneth was reluctant to person covering up. publish it. Then it’s HOWARDS adapt the novel for these reasons, all yours forever. Until, but I persuaded him that his Has there been a of course, you croak concerns were the very reasons shift in how proprietary and then somebody I thought he would be great to you feel toward finds it in a suitcase. A adapt the book. Handmaid’s Tale now book out in the world that the series has is in the hands of its

: COURTESY OF PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE. HOUSE. RANDOM PENGUIN OF COURTESY : ANOTHER BOOK I’D LOVE TO SEE moved past your book? readers, and they will

ALIAS ADAPTED J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher It’s one of those interpret it no matter in the Rye Moss in The Handmaid’s Tale. books that has escaped what you say. : JAN THIJS/NETFLIX. GRACE POLLEY: GEORGE PIMENTEL/WIREIMAGE. CALLENDER: JAMIE MCCARTHY/GETTY IMAG

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 27 MAY 2018 EMMYS Limited Series

Little Women ( PBS) HEIDI THOMAS, WRITER/ EXECUTIVE PRODUCER Novel by Louisa May Alcott

FIRST IMPRESSIONS I was 8 years old — my mother gave me her own child- Thomas hood copy to read. I fell deeply in love with the March girls and their world, and wanted to be the fifth sister. I reread the novel many times over the ensuing decades, but because of the power of that first, very juvenile, encounter, I suspect I always saw it through a child’s eyes. Sitting down to adapt it for the screen in 2017, as a 55-year-old woman, I was stunned to realize how deep, complex and multilayered it actually is.

WHAT WAS KEPT FROM THE BOOK I’m very aware that most adapta- tions are judged not on what they contain, but on what they leave 12 out! There were two aspects of the story that struck me as espe- cially precious. Firstly, this isn’t just a story about Jo. The story is as a patient, saintly figure — in finding its own identity and faces adaptation, the writers give equal very much about Meg, Jo, Beth and fact, she is anything but, and she issues that are still relevant today: importance to Laszlo Kreizler, Amy, and I wanted us to spend knows it. class division, immigration, the Sara Howard and John Moore. This time with the sisters as individu- old versus the new, how do we treat allowed us to spend more time als and as a group, understanding ANOTHER BOOK I’D LOVE TO SEE the weak in our society? The with each character separately, what makes the family dynamic ADAPTED I feel Villette, by Charlotte timelessness of this story is what mostly in a moment of introspec- tick. So I only gradually closed in Bronte, has been somewhat resonated with me the most. tion. The camera often overstays on Jo. Secondly, although the overlooked in the Victorian canon, its welcome and lingers on the death of Beth is one of the most as has Esther Waters, by George WHAT WAS KEPT FROM THE BOOK The characters, which allows the audi- deeply felt events in literature, Moore. In terms of contemporary Alienist is a series of contrasts ence to really get under the skin I believe that what comes after it work, I’m a huge admirer of and we wanted to highlight these of these intriguing individuals — — the absolute devastation of the Appalachian novelist Silas extremes — like the seediness thereby having the viewer become her surviving family — is one of House. His novels have the of the brothels juxtaposed against the voyeur. the best depictions of grief in most exquisite sense of place, the luxurious and excessive world fiction. I felt we had to make room and he draws female characters of fine dining at Delmonico’s. ANOTHER BOOK I’D LOVE TO SEE : for that, and not treat the death as exceptionally well. One of our main goals was to cre- ADAPTED Days Without End by the end point of that story strand. ate a city symphony that brings Sebastian Barry. During the Indian

Beth’s death is, in fact, like all life’s the audience a unique insight into Wars and Civil War, two former WOMAN, ALIENIST great sorrows, the beginning of so everyday life during the Gilded soldiers adopt a Native American much more The Alienist (TNT) Age. Our obsessive research and girl. It’s a relatable story about JAKOB VERBRUGGEN, the importance of detail were family and identity set against an WHAT WAS CHANGED It was essen- EXECUTIVE PRODUCER key to re-create a world that feels epic backdrop. And Raven’s Gate tially not a change at all, but Novel by Caleb Carr very authentic, visceral and real. by Anthony Horowitz — an outcast simply a departure from the norm teenage boy learns that he alone in terms of adaptation: I looked FIRST IMPRESSIONS WHAT WAS CHANGED The book is holds the power to protect the in depth at the Marmee who Louisa Carr’s story is an epic told from Moore’s POV. The audi- world from a nuclear disaster. This May Alcott created, and found roller-coaster ride ence is therefore unable to spend book has the potential to be an : COURTESY OF MASTERPIECE ON PBS/BBC/PLAYGROUND.

myself stunned by her complexity, that takes you on a time with any of the characters ecological thriller mixed with a VERMES/TURNER: KATA ENTERTAINMENT NETWORKS/TIME WARNER. LITTLE THE her self-knowledge, her resource- Verbruggen journey deep into the when Moore’s not present. In this coming-of-age tale. fulness and, most notably, her dark and seedy 1 “We had the delicious luxury of three hours in which to tell the story, so happily there were no struggle to suppress her anger. underbelly of New York in the late major sacrifices,” says writer Thomas of the Little Women adaptation starring Kathryn Newton (left) Many adaptations present Marmee 19th century. This metropolis is and Willa Fitzgerald. 2 Luke Evans plays a sketch artist tracking a serial killer in The Alienist. THOMAS: JAMIE MCCARTHY/GETTY IMAGES. COURTESY OF PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE. HOUSE. RANDOM PENGUIN OF COURTESY

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 28 MAY 2018 EMMYS for your emmy® consideration OUTSTANDING LIMITED SERIES DOCUMENTARY SPECIAL INSIDE THE ICON From troubled music stars to comedians battling their own demons, documentary specials reveal the complicated individuals living within larger-than-life figures BY SHANNON L. BOWEN

ho is Jim Carrey, take a chance on being loved or really? That’s a hated for who you really are, or question that Chris you’re going to have to kill who you W Smith’s documen- really are and fall into your grave tary Jim & Andy: The grasping onto a character that you Great Beyond — Featuring a Very never were.” Special, Contractually Obligated Such somber musings gave Mention of Tony Clifton poses but Smith a new respect for Carrey, doesn’t quite answer. The Netflix says the director. doc special is a journey into the “I don’t think I was fully aware mind of the iconic actor, who, dur- of the depth of his character, ing the making of 1999’s Man sort of how humble and compli- on the Moon, famously journeyed cated and introspective he was,” 1 into the mind of comedian Andy says Smith. “To me Kaufman, who in turn occasion- the message of ally dragged everyone around the movie is to really him into the mind of his insuffer- look at ourselves able alter ego Tony Clifton. and react and under- impressive access to the subjects And like Jim & Andy, Diaries Forman Thanks to clips from more than stand that the things themselves — or if not, then to the exists because of remarkable 100 hours of behind-the-scenes we’re working figures closest to them. source material — in this case, footage that collected dust in toward, that we think When it comes to Carrey, his three decades of Shandling’s hand- Carrey’s office for nearly 20 years, are going to make existential ruminations are key written journals. Says Apatow, it’s clear that no one, including us happy, may not to two of this year’s doc specials “We had the opportunity to go director Milos Forman, knew who Apatow in the end do that,” — the other being HBO’s The Zen much deeper than a documentary was going to show up to set on he explains. Diaries of Garry Shandling from usually can because we had insight any given day. Would it be Andy? Revealing the Judd Apatow. into what he was thinking at each Would it be Tony? The only thing human side (flaws and “It was very important to me stage of his life.” anyone knew for sure was that it all) of entertain- that Jim Carrey would talk about Shots of Shandling’s handwrit- wouldn’t be Jim Carrey. Broomfield ment icons was the Garry for the film because they ten entries reveal that the late “At some point,” Carrey tells main aspiration of had been spending time together comedian was on a lifelong quest Smith during the film’s only inter- the documentary directors whose in the last year of Garry’s life,” not only to be the funniest man view, “when you create yourself specials are circling the Emmy says Apatow, who was one of on television but also to grow as a to make it, you’re going to have to race. To do that, they had to mine Shandling’s closest friends. “Jim human being. either let that creation go and old footage and often gained is somebody that understands a “It was great to see that when lot of the spiritual issues that no one was looking, he was sitting Garry was so interested in. And alone trying to figure out how to they had those conversations be a kinder, more loving person,” “I feel like Jim is someone about what it means to be a cre- says Apatow. “He was a very sen- who went ative person and how to balance sitive person in what can be a very to the other side of the life and the challenges of being brutal business, and it always mountain and a funny person in this business seemed to surprise him how bare- came back and said, ‘There’s and in this world.” knuckled show business can be.” nothing there,’ ” says Smith.

30 eleventh-hour story reshaping. Lili Fini Zanuck’s documentary Producer Marta Kauffman and was exactly the opposite. directors Roberta Grossman and In Eric Clapton: Life in Twelve Sophie Sartain faced a similar Bars, the famed musician shared challenge after they had picture- intimate details about everything locked Seeing Allred, their Netflix from his decades of drinking doc about the life and career of and drugging to how he felt when civil rights attorney Gloria Allred. his 4-year-old son Conor fell to The filmmakers had chronicled his death from an open window. Allred’s personal story, from her It helped that Zanuck and blue-collar youth in Philadelphia, Clapton were old friends. “We to her rape in her 20s at gun- already had trust in our relation- point, to her relationship with ship, which you can tell from her daughter, attorney Lisa the film how open he was with 2 Bloom. And they had woven it all me,” says Zanuck, who reveals together with the narrative of that it was Clapton who brought the Bill Cosby case, in which Allred the project to her. represented a number of vic- Zanuck began her work by tims. Then the Harvey Weinstein searching for archival material. scandal erupted. Clapton didn’t have much in his The subjects “It exploded after we locked the possession, and he didn’t know of docs Eric Clapton: Life in film,” recalls Kauffman. “So we who did. But Zanuck found more Twelve Bars (1) had to go back in and add some of than she knew what to do with, and Seeing Allred (2) both that. We had to because [other- from YouTube clips to photos that participated Clapton’s wife, Melia, had col- in the films. wise] the film would have felt like Many of the late it would have been topical a year lected to old footage moldering singer’s close 3 friends spoke ago and not today.” in a shed in Devon, England. for Whitney: Can In fact, Weinstein was the film- Zanuck decided to eschew I Be Me (3). makers’ second major pivot. The celebrity interviews in favor of first was Hillary Clinton’s loss to conversations with people who Another star ill-equipped that] whenever she was Nippy and Donald Trump in the 2016 presi- knew the real Clapton, like long- for the harshness of the enter- wasn’t Whitney Houston, the pub- dential election. “The moment time friend and collaborator Ben tainment industry was Whitney lic somehow felt shortchanged.” [in the film] where they’re all Palmer. “[Celebrity interviews] Houston, who turned not to Houston’s estate also declined watching [as the election results don’t do you a lot of good some- meditation — as Kaufman, to participate. “They sent a mass come in] and Gloria realizes — times because it’s very hard Shandling and Carrey did — but email out to people who hadn’t you can see that change in every- to get a great guitar player to wax to drugs. From her childhood even heard from the estate for 30 body,” says Kauffman. “I hate to on about how good Eric is, just in rough-and-tumble 1960s years or more, saying they’re doing even admit this, but in a weird by the nature of their egos being Newark, New Jersey, to her tragic their own film and they would way it became a real emotional involved,” says Zanuck. death at age 48, Houston’s story appreciate if they didn’t take part center to the film.” The result of her choices is a gets a warm retelling by director in the film I was making,” says The filmmakers had planned portrait of a human being who has Nick Broomfield in Showtime’s Broomfield. a trip to Washington, D.C., for suffered immensely, made bad Whitney: Can I Be Me. A number of Houston’s Clinton’s inauguration, but they decisions, struggled to find him- The title alludes to the crux friends and colleagues did speak ended up going for the Women’s self and lived to tell the tale — all OR IMDB. : JOEL of her issues and the film’s cen- to Broomfield, but it’s clips from March — and capturing one of in the public eye. tral conflict: the friction between hundreds of hours of never-before- the film’s most com- “The thing that’s so great about CLAPTON her two personas. There was seen footage shot by co-director pelling scenes, when it is that he survived,” Zanuck Nippy, the impressionable young Rudi Dolezal in the 1990s that a male Trump sup- says, “and he survived in kind of a girl who grew up exposed to provide the clearest view of her porter gets in Allred’s glorious way.” drugs and violence, and Whitney, struggles. Kaufman face on the steps of Clapton’s story resonates “for the picture-perfect pop star Over the years, a number of the Lincoln Memorial. the same reason that the blues whom Arista Records and Clive companies and people, including But what makes resonates,” she says. “You’re look-

: COURTESY OF SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL. Davis groomed to be palatable to Davis, had tried to buy the footage, the film compel- ing at so much pain and so much D STAWIARZ/GETTYD IMAGES FOR SCAD 2018. ATVFEST white audiences. but Dolezal wasn’t selling. ling isn’t the politics tragedy, and even if you haven’t PELLMAN/WIREIMAGE. APATOW: RICH POLK/GETTY RICH F IMAGES APATOW: PELLMAN/WIREIMAGE. ALLRED Davis declined to participate, “It took me a very long time to Zanuck — it’s the humaniz- had that same amount or your life saying he was working on his own find Rudi. I don’t think he wanted ing of Allred, a steely hasn’t been like that, you feel that documentary (2017’s Clive Davis: to be found,” says Broomfield. litigator and one of the most you can empathize.” The Soundtrack of Our Lives). “I think he wanted to have his polarizing figures in today’s cul- Apatow echoes that sentiment: “He is quite defensive about his own role and creativity reflected. tural landscape. “When people watch [Diaries], role with Whitney because I think He didn’t just want to be an If Allred is by her own admis- they have a powerful emotional he was very responsible for the archive source, so that’s kind of sion a subject who has no reaction to it. An enormous Whitney Houston persona, which the arrangement that we made.” problem not sharing — “It’s not amount of people have written : LAFAYETTE FILMS/PASSION PICTURES/SHOWTIME. was so different from Nippy,” says But Broomfield and Dolezal hard for me not to talk to people me very long letters about

WHITNEY Broomfield. “Whitney’s problem didn’t connect until the film was about things,” she tells the direc- what Garry’s story brings up for really stemmed from [the fact nearly done, which meant an tors — the subject of director them.” : COURTESY OF NETFLIX. AXELRAD/COURTESY OF SHOWTIME. ZANUCK: JASON LAVERIS/FILMMAGIC. FORMAN: S JIM SHOWTIME. OF ZANUCK: LAVERIS/FILMMAGIC. AXELRAD/COURTESY JASON BROOMFIELD: THEO WARGO/GETTY IMAGES FOR NANTUCKET FILM FESTIVAL. KAUFFMAN: ASTRI JIM

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 31 MAY 2018 EMMYS DOCUMENTARY SPECIAL OPERATION ODESSA Showtime

Tiller Russell says the making of his documentary Operation Odessa was “as insane as the movie itself.” “A narc I know called me with a tip,” says Russell, who writes for GANGSTERS such TV dramas as Chicago Fire and Chicago P.D. and directs docs about cops and crime. “He said, ‘There’s AND GARBAGE this Russian gangster named Tarzan who had a strip club in Miami. He tried to sell a $50 million Russian subma- TV documentarians found hope and humor in three diverse rine to the Cali drug cartel. This dude subjects: a surgeon turned comedian, a Miami arms trafficker is locked up in a Panamanian prison and the food waste epidemic BY DON STEINBERG right now, and he has a BlackBerry. Do you want his phone number?’ I said, ‘Hell, yes.’ ” TICKLING GIANTS The result is a comedic doc about Starz mobster bromance that took Russell and his crew all over the world, from Miami to Brooklyn to Moscow. Of the many spinoffs and imitations that Jon Stewart’s Tarzan is Ludwig Fainberg, a The Daily Show has spawned, maybe none has been as Russian who worked in the blossom- fascinating as Al-Bernameg, Egyptian for “The Show.” Sara ing 1980s drug traicking scene Taksler’s Tickling Giants documents the rise and fall of this in Miami. After the Soviet Union fell daring political satire program, which Bassem Youssef, a in 1991, Tarzan began selling Russian 37-year-old cardiothoracic surgeon, started in the laundry motorcycles and military helicopters, room of his Cairo apartment in 2011. eventually connecting with a mysteri- The charismatic Youssef became one of Egypt’s most ous Cuban man known as Tony, who famous faces with a lovingly spot-on imitation of Stewart. said the cartel would be interested in The Show became a sensation, moving from YouTube to a Russian submarine. The FBI, DEA national TV before government authorities, unhappy with and others were listening via a task the mockery, forced it off the air in 2014. force named Operation Odessa. Taksler, a producer on The Daily Show since 2005, met Russell flew to Panama to meet Youssef when he was a Stewart guest in 2012 and pro- Youssef (left) on his show Al-Bernameg. the imprisoned Tarzan, “this giant, posed documenting his show. “We never could have sweaty Russian bear of a man,” imagined how much was going to happen when he said another before Abdel Fattah el-Sisi’s regime finally suc- the filmmaker says. “Then he opens yes,” she says. “I thought, ‘I’ll follow him for two months ceeds in killing it off. to see what it’s like to make a comedy show in a place “I didn’t discuss the movie at all publicly when we where free speech is not necessarily acceptable.’ I had were filming,” says Taksler. “One of my crewmembers was no clue.” They ended up shooting through 2014. beaten up for his footage.” Amid threats and fears for The documentary opens with Youssef’s decision to his family’s safety, Youssef never dilutes the jokes. Once, switch from medicine to comedy as a way to make a Stewart is flown in as a secret guest and escorted onto the difference, then covers two violent regime changes in set with a black bag over his head. “Satire gets you into Egypt. The Show cracks jokes all along the way. It gets trouble,” Youssef says, to which Stewart replies: “It doesn’t dropped by one skittish TV network, then picked up by get me into the kind of trouble it gets you into.”

one of the few problems in the world that you can influence individually.” Star chef Anthony Bourdain pro- duced the doc; it was financed by the Rockefeller Foundation, which aims Operation Odessa, which profiles to cut global food waste in half by 2030. Fainberg (aka Tarzan), debuted March 31. “Chefs really hate wasting anything,” says Kye. “Tony [Bourdain] was saying, his mouth, and it’s this loquacious, ‘Hey, can we shame people into not charismatic mobster who felt like wasting food?’ ” he jumped out of a Scorsese movie.”

But instead of shaming, the filmmak- But Russell says the Russian mob : COURTESY OF SHOWTIME. ers oer a gentle nudge, highlighting had been tipped o, and Tarzan was WASTED! THE STORY OF FOOD WASTE programs throughout the world that are afraid to talk. ODESSA Starz making a dierence thanks to innova- Years later, Russell got an email tors like chef Dan Barber of Blue Hill from Tarzan with the subject line in Manhattan. Barber creates restau- “Jailbreak!!!” He’d busted out of A film about garbage that somehow ↑ Wasted! reveals that the annual cost of rant delicacies from parts of food plants Panama, caught a boat to Cuba and whets viewers’ appetite to cook a deli- food waste has reached $1 trillion. — stems, flowers, leaves — that are landed in Moscow. “He told me if I : COURTESY OF SUPER LTD.

cious meal? Directors Anna Chai and normally thrown away. At an elementary could get to Moscow in five days he WASTED Nari Kye wanted to avoid a grim tone in all food produced worldwide is never school in New Orleans, kids grow was ready to start making the movie,” their doc about food waste — in hopes eaten. Ninety percent of American food vegetables and compost organic waste. Russell recalls. of making it an appealing learning waste ends in landfills, where it oozes There’s a beer called Toast that’s made “All these crooks are huge movie experience. “It doesn’t gross you out, ozone-destroying methane. out of unwanted bread. bus,” the filmmaker explains of his and it doesn’t freak you out. That was “Once you know some of the statis- “Everybody who sees the movie subject’s eagerness. “They think, a big goal of ours,” says Kye. tics, it’s hard to throw food away,” says wants to run out and get a compost bin,” ‘My story is worthy of being part of The film reveals that one-third of Chai. “Everybody’s guilty of it. So it’s says Chai. “It is a hopeful story.” that gangster movie canon.’ ” : COURTESY OF SARKASMOS PRODUCTIONS LLC. TICKLING

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 32 MAY 2018 EMMYS Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Series

“JAW-DROPPING.”

“THE VERY DEFINITION OF FASCINATING ENTERTAINMENT.” “EXUBERANTLY CRAFTED.”

“+++++” DOCUMENTARY Q+A

1

COSMIC CONSCIOUSNESS Producer Darren Aronofsky recruited astronauts for environmental series One Strange Rock: ‘It’s easy to forget that this planet, our home, has been handed down to us’ BY KATIE KILKENNY

fter nearly to structure the broad-reaching three decades of narrative. (Will Smith serves as making films on narrator of the series.) A a spectrum of Aronofsky, 49, spoke to THR subjects — ballet, about the complexities of produc- wrestling, drugs — in the past tion, his environmental work and few years, Darren Aronofsky has the state of U.S. climate policy. settled on a common theme: the environment. In 2017, the helmer As an executive producer, what did released the divisive environmen- you specifically bring to the project? tal allegory mother! and enlisted First, I’m a storyteller, so I was

Patti Smith and Jessica Chastain trying to figure out how to com- 3 to narrate a VR experience about bine all these different sciences the cosmos, Spheres. His latest into a story that had an emo- effort to get viewers to preserve tional impact. At a certain point, of looking at the planet as one and biology and blending them the planet, One Strange Rock, is we came up with the idea to use huge system. That gave us the nar- into one single story because a National Geographic Channel astronauts as our narrators to rative and underlying themes of that’s how all of these different informational series about the lead us through the history of the show: that all of these differ- astronauts perceive the planet complex, interlocking systems the planet. That also allowed us ent systems on the planet work when they think about it. And so that keep Earth running. to explore their personal sto- together to allow life to happen. we really wanted to do a global Aronofsky and production com- ries. One thing that really stuck presentation about Mother Earth pany Protozoa Pictures worked out to me was that all of these What dierentiates One Strange and how Mother Earth works. with British documentary produc- astronauts had a similar experi- Rock from other docuseries about ers Nutopia to film for 100 weeks ence, that if they went into space the wonders of Earth? Were there any specific challenges in 45 countries and combine for eight days or they went into Instead of focusing on just ani- that came up because you were an array of branches of science space for 665 days, they all went mals like Planet Earth, we doing something so epic? into one narrative. As execu- through the spiritual transfor- actually work with all the dif- We shot in the coldest place on the tive producer, Aronofsky helped mation — it’s called the cosmic ferent sciences. It was about planet and the hottest place on brainstorm using astronauts and consciousness or the overview taking astronomy, anthropology, the planet; we also shot in a space their insights about the planet effect, and it’s basically this way sociology, chemistry, physics station. It was about shooting that

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 34 MAY 2018 EMMYS emotional appreciation of your DOCUMENTARY 2 surroundings. Celebrating the DABBLERS Earth and celebrating how amaz- How 5 narrative ing all these systems are means helmers made the move you’ll take things less for granted to nonfiction and maybe have more respect for our shared home. 1 Scientists walk through an acidic One Strange Rock is part of landscape in One Strange a larger body of recent environ- Rock. mentally focused work for you 2 An asteroid impact including mother! and Spheres. 13TH crater viewed What inspired these eorts? Ava DuVernay from space. 3 In November My father was a science teacher, DuVernay, the helmer of Selma and 2017, Aronofsky A Wrinkle in Time, directed and pro- directed Smith so I was always interested in duced Netflix’s examination of mass incarceration, which garnered an (left) on a One science, and that led me to an Strange Rock Oscar nomination and won the Emmy set in Surrey, interest in the environment. for documentary special in 2017. England. 4 A Also, growing up in New York City, VFX-enhanced in the concrete jungle, I wanted view of Earth from the to get out of New York City and wit- International ness nature. When I was in high Space Station. school, I started to work with this 4 You’ve said that One Strange Rock school called The School for Field aims to help viewers understand AND EVERYTHING IS Studies, which basically trains GOING FINE why they need to be “stewards” of young people to become the next Steven Soderbergh the planet. How so? generation of environmentalists. He’s produced numerous docs but has It’s a little bit like a beautiful I traveled with them to environ- directed only one: the 2010 film about monologist Spalding Gray. He chose watch that gets handed down mentally sensitive areas. I went to to focus the film solely on archival foot- age instead of any new interviews with from your ancestors: There’s just Prince William Sound [in Alaska] those who knew Gray. so much respect for this beauti- two years before the Exxon Valdez ful pocket watch that you’re given spill. I was lucky to witness that and there’s respect for all of the place when it was completely pris- knobs and wheels inside of it. It’s tine. But then to watch on TV easy to forget that this planet, as it was devastated woke me up our home, has been handed down about how important it was to type of stuff in new and unique to us. Unless you open up the protect these incredible places. STORIES WE TELL ways. The space station is a good back and look at all those knobs Sarah Polley example: When I talked to the and wheels and gears that make The head of the EPA is actively Polley, known as an actress and for throwing doubt on climate change, helming 2006’s Away From Her, turned astronaut that did the work, Paolo it work, sometimes it’s hard to the cameras on herself for this 2012 [Nespoli], I wanted it to not look [remember] how intricate and and the U.S. has backed out of an doc, revealing secrets buried by her parents, British actor Michael Polley like all the other footage that had how beautiful all those different international climate accord. What and TV personality Diane Polley. been shot, so I gave him specific parts [are] that work together to can filmmaking accomplish in this lighting ideas — I said, “Can we tell time. So that was the strategy political climate? turn off all the lights in the space with this: “Hey, let’s look at all the Everyone should be working on station so that the inside is just beautiful parts and all the differ- this issue. It’s crazy that science

: COURTESY OF IFC lit by the sun and the reflection of ent systems that work together to is being cherry-picked for the sun off of the Earth?” It gave allow for life on Earth to exist.” political reasons. Science is sci- : COURTESY OF TIFF. EVERYTHING it a very dramatic look. ence; it’s not political. To turn THE CRUISE VOYAGE How would you hope viewers feel your back on the accepted sci- Bennett Miller Why did you choose Will Smith after watching this series? ence that humans are affecting The Moneyball and Foxcatcher director’s only doc was his debut to narrate? What’s interesting about when climate and that this is having project, a 1998 movie about Timothy : COURTESY OF NETFLIX. The science of the film is very you watch the show is that there’s incredibly devastating effects “Speed” Levitch, a NYC bus tour

13TH guide known for his unique narrative IC. IC. accurate and sometimes it gets a lot of science, but as the show is just political and isn’t truth- style and worldview. very heavy. So we wanted to try builds each hour, it suddenly ful to what’s happening. The

: ARTISAN ENTERTAINMENT/PHOTOFEST. : ARTISAN ENTERTAINMENT/PHOTOFEST. to have an ambassador who could turns kind of emotional. And it’s result is that we’re heading in broaden the audience so that it a weird emotional reaction — the wrong direction, and it’s an CRUISE wasn’t just science fans. Will can some of it’s an emotional reaction extremely scary situation. We’re very much lean into being the to the story of the astronaut in the starting to see the effects, the everyman — he communicates episode, and also it’s about how results of us burning fossil fuels with the world really well and different science works together on this planet, and yet it’s being VOYAGE OF TIME has the biggest social media pres- to make it possible for these beau- completely ignored for greed Terrence Malick ence now as far as celebrities tiful lives we have to exist on this and political reasons. It’s a scary The auteur’s doc, covering everything from the creation of the universe to go. So he has that great ability planet. That’s the unique thing time, and whatever form we can life’s extinction, was released both as a 40-minute Imax movie narrated by to make things that are hard to about the show: Through ideas work in, we need to work in and Brad Pitt and a 90-minute doc narrated relate to really connectable. and knowledge, it gives you this push forward the truth. by Cate Blanchett.  REBECCA FORD : ROADSIDE ATTRACTIONS/COURTESY EVERETT COLLECTION. STORIES : COURTESY OF NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC (3). ARONOFSKY: MATT FROST/NATIONAL GEOGRAPH FROST/NATIONAL MATT ARONOFSKY: (3). GEOGRAPHIC NATIONAL OF COURTESY : FILMS. ROCK

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 35 MAY 2018 EMMYS DOCUMENTARY SERIES ‘ LIKE A 1 TRIAGE DOCTOR’ Six documentarians reveal how they crafted series that delve into food, culture, crime and politics — and what they had to leave out to make their stories work BY JORDAN RIEFE

THE CIRCUS (SHOWTIME THE FOURTH ESTATE (SHOWTIME THE TRADE (SHOWTIME John Heilemann, co-host Liz Garbus, director Matt Heineman, director Now in its third season, this documentary series This four-part series lives in the newsroom of The The opioid crisis gets a full airing in this gets behind the scenes of Washington headlines. New York Times, chronicling the daily grind of the five-part series looking at cartels, users and press under unprecedented levels of scrutiny. law enforcement. I’ve resigned myself to the notion that we can’t literally be everywhere at once. But when It was a crazy year in newsrooms in our coun- I like to keep an open mind, and I think that’s Trump makes big news, he tends to make it try. It was like rolling with the punches, being the most exciting way to make documentaries on Twitter, so it’s not like we’re going to the there at the right time with the right reporters. like this, letting the story dictate where you

presidential bedroom to shoot him in his Unpredictability for us was a huge chal- want to go. It’s constantly evolving and con- RIVELLI/NETFLIX. NICOLE : bathrobe tweeting. lenge, just figuring out how to allocate our stantly changing as the realities on the ground

The biggest challenge is always to try to resources. We probably shot between 500 and constantly shift, especially when you’re deal- shoot events that are widely and highly covered 600 hours to make a four-and-a-half-hour ing with a subject like the opioid epidemic but shoot them in a different way, more cine- series. So that floor in that cutting room is and looking at this issue through these three matic and in a way that other people don’t get. pretty big. And of course there were gems lenses: cartel members in Mexico, addicts in If we could shoot in the Lincoln Bedroom with and there were things we loved that we didn’t the U.S. and law enforcement in the U.S.

Trump, that would be the best. If we can’t, use, and that’s always a little heartbreaking. You’re dealing generally with people who : T.J. KIRKPATRICK/SHOWTIME. can we be in the kitchen with him while he’s But I think the even greater challenge don’t necessarily want to be filmed. It took a FOURTH eating a hamburger? was at the heart of what we were doing, which long, long time to get access and gain the The Trump administration is more cha- was working with journalists and making trust of our subjects. There are certain sto- otic than any administration I’ve ever covered. them feel comfortable while they were deal- rylines that we started filming that didn’t Every administration is more chaotic on the ing with confidential sources. The series ultimately arc or get fulfilled in a way that made

inside than it is on the outside. But what- is called The Fourth Estate for a reason. A free sense for the show. When you’re dealing with : TJKPHOTO.COM/SHOWTIME.

ever your wildest imagination of chaos in the press is a key ingredient to a functioning addiction, despite loving families, despite com- CIRCUS Trump administration, take that and multi- democracy. That’s why we’re making this film, munity support, despite whatever it is trying ply it by six or nine — then you get what it’s like and I think that’s why The Times let me. I to help you get out of the cycle, it is really, really on the inside. I think we’re headed toward was a real pain in the ass for them, but show- tough to kick. So many of the addicts that we

more turbulence rather than less. ing how they do what they do, how careful filmed we thought perhaps were on a path to : COURTESY OF NETFLIX.

they are to get it right, even if that means losing recovery, but then they relapsed, and this is UGLY a scoop — Trump tweets about them or dis- very commonplace. 4 parages them, they go about their day. Nobody We need to stop thinking of this issue as a takes it personally or gets offended, they go war that we can fight. The idea that we can put about their jobs. up a wall and this issue will be fixed is laugh- : JEANMARIE CROCKER/PBS.: able. It’s basic economics, supply and demand.

As long as there’s a demand for drugs in the VIETNAM U.S., there will be supply coming from Mexico 5 and South America. So, we need to view this less as a war and more as a health-care crisis. : OUR TIME PROJECTS/SHOWTIME. TRADE 36 1 The Trade is Heineman’s follow-up to 2015’s Cartel Land. 2 Burns’ Vietnam War spans more than 17 hours. 3 follows Majordomo chef Chang. 4 Season three of The Circus includes Mark Zuckerberg’s congressional testimony. 5 The Fourth Estate shot for 14 months at The New York Times. 6 Wormwood subject Olson died under mysterious circumstances in 1953.

WORMWOOD (NETFLIX Errol Morris, director Dramatic scenes, interviews and archival footage are employed in this genre- bending account of the mysterious death of Cold War military scientist Frank Olson.

I’ve always looked at my films as experimental in nature and that I should always be trying things that are risky. I know that I was blessed, I don’t know how else to describe it, with such a wide variety, such a diversity of material. We produced a lot of archival materials, stuff that I’d never seen 3 before. When you’re really doing research, it’s a constant surprise. Do we ever have total information? Of course we don’t. We’re always UGLY DELICIOUS (NETFLIX putting together a partial picture based on 2 Morgan Neville, director fragments. This is certainly true in Wormwood. Star chef David Chang takes viewers around Originally, I wanted there to be a lot more the world in an eight-part food series that has drama. But we had to cut, really, 40 pages from more on its mind than cuisine. the script just because of budgetary consider- THE VIETNAM WAR (PBS ations. There were scenes we never shot. We Ken Burns, director The show is really like a cultural debate show used everything. This 10-part account of the conflict masquerading as a food show. Did I learn something? I learned an enor- includes interviews with civilians as well as I usually make movies and shows about mous amount, if only that I learned I can work Viet Cong soldiers. culture, but food is the most prevalent part with actors. Actors like me and I like actors — of culture. Everybody has a relationship with we work well together and I’d like to do more. It blew up any assumptions any of us had food. Everybody has an opinion about food, To work with actors and create actual drama, about the Vietnam War. whether or not you watch food shows. Each not re-enactment but actual drama as part The challenges were logistical. How do you episode started with an idea, not food. That’s of Wormwood. I have wanted for some time to interview North Vietnamese and Viet Cong a very different way of doing a food show. incorporate drama into what I do. Someone guerrillas and South Vietnamese soldiers who It’s not just top down, and it’s not just bottom asked me why I make movies, and I answered, are still speaking only Vietnamese? And corral- up. It’s everything. It’s not just the Michelin “Well, I make movies so I can make more.” ling the archives from Moscow to Beijing to star restaurants that tell you something You do one, you finish it, and then it’s time to Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City — hundreds, if not about food or street food that tells you about make something else. I call Wormwood “the thousands, of archives we drew on for this food, but fast food tells you about food and everything bagel,” but I’d like to do more every- production. But that’s always our job, being a — everything, whether it’s mac and cheese at thing bagel projects. So more projects that detective and finding the material. the Sizzler or whatever — also will tell you use drama. In fact, I’d like to use it even more There were wonderful scenes that didn’t fit something about culture. Everything is open extensively but also use interview and archi- just because it didn’t work in the arc of the epi- for discussion. val material and home movies and the kitchen sode or the arc of the entire 10-part series: Through food you can talk about politics, sink, if you like. the shooting of a water buffalo and the real- immigration, economics, authenticity, appro- ization they have just taken away someone’s priation, all kinds of questions that are all livelihood and most likely driven them into the over the culture. It’s asking a lot of big ques- hands of the Viet Cong, regrets on the part of tions about food and not necessarily telling some demonstrators about things they said to you the right way. returning veterans. With documentary, a The biggest challenge was figuring out how filmmaker makes the decision about what lives to put this stuff together because what we did and dies almost like a triage doctor. was sort of insanely ambitious. There was a War brings out the worst, but it also brings scene shot at this fish sandwich place in Tokyo out the best. I’m drawn to war. This is what that was amazing and that didn’t make it human beings do that does not commend because it didn’t fit in one of the episodes. The them as the most intelligent species, but there thing we all wanted to do was to be more like a are also pockets of humanity, fellowship documentary show. It was the idea of all of us and kindness and sacrifice and love that take trying to be in the moment and learn whatever place in war at the same kind of heightened we can because I like the feeling of this as a degree that the bad stuff happens. So, when show that’s loose; it gives it a different kind of 6 you study war, you study the best and the energy. I think it opened up a lot of new ways of worst of us. telling stories.

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 37 MAY 2018 EMMYS DOCUMENTARY SERIES

FINDING RELIGION

Sheela (left) and the Bhagwan, whose unraveling relationship The duo behind Netflix’s Wild Wild Country reveal how is chronicled in Wild Wild Country. ‘a 30-second elevator pitch’ from a film archivist led them to the fascinating hit cult story BY BRYN ELISE SANDBERG What did you have to leave on the cutting- room floor that you wish you could have fit in? CHAPMAN There was a section in episode six after the Bhagwan is taking his plea deal ince Wild Wild Country’s March How did you persuade the former cult members and has left the country, and immediately debut, the gripping documen- to talk to you? after that he tried to gain access to 27 other tary series has become the latest CHAPMAN The main pitch was, “We’re giving countries, which all denied him access. The Sunscripted phenomenon from you a platform to speak your truth. This isn’t United States government was calling other Netflix. Executive produced by an interrogation, this isn’t a gotcha interview, countries and putting pressure on them to Mark and Jay Duplass, the series is the work of we’re not out to humiliate anyone, no matter not allow the Bhagwan into their country. It another set of filmmaking brothers, Chapman how bizarre your beliefs or ideologies may be was a really fascinating archive sequence to and Maclain Way, who made the 2014 docu- — on both sides.” see what a threat the government still felt he mentary The Battered Bastards of Baseball for MACLAIN WAY I had gotten a sense that everyone was and other countries felt he was. There’s the platform. Over the course of six episodes, felt like they had been represented in these one- footage of the Greek government chasing Wild Wild Country follows controversial Indian dimensional caricatures. Even Antelopians him out of the country with police cars to guru Bhagwan Shree (Osho), his one- felt they had always been talked about as these the airport. time personal assistant Ma Anand Sheela and redneck bigots who are conservative townsfolk the “free love” cult they led in 1980s Oregon. that just didn’t like the Rajneeshees because It’s hard to ignore the parallels to what we’re The Way brothers spoke with THR about the of their religion. And then these Sannyasins seeing in the current political landscape. genesis of the series, the one former cult felt like they were represented as these brain- How much of that plays into how timely the member they couldn’t get to talk and how they washed cult members. series is right now? feel about a potential fictionalized retelling of MACLAIN It was really bizarre when we were the wild, wild story. Who did you try to get for the series who refused editing the series just to see how timely a lot of to be interviewed? these topics were — with immigration bias, How did the idea for the show come about? MACLAIN The one person that we really wanted fear of the other, religious rights. We mapped CHAPMAN WAY We spent a lot of time in was David Knapp, and his Sannyasin name out the entire show in 2014, when Obama was the archives up in Oregon when we were doing was Swami Krishna Deva, the first major of president, and it was a completely different The Battered Bastards of Baseball. The head . He’s the first Rajneeshee who political world we were living in. So it didn’t film archivist at the Oregon Historical Society flips and cooperates with Oregon and the fed- really affect how we structured the story and asked Mac and I what we were doing for our eral government and spills the beans. We were what we wanted to talk about. I remember next project. He said he had this never-before- really interested in hearing his perspective when Trump was throwing around the Muslim seen collection of 300 hours of archive footage on the position that he was put in. But he just ban, and we had these horrible shootings on what he described as “the most bizarre refused from day one to talk to us. and these conversations about the Second story that ever happened in the history of Amendment — and here was this pacifist spiri- Directors Oregon.” He gave us a quick 30-second eleva- Maclain tual group that armed themselves to protect (left) and tor pitch and told us about this guru and his Chapman themselves. It was really strange to see how followers who built this $100 million utopian Way. timely it became. city, and that they took over the local town and then bused in thousands of homeless people Has there been interest in a fictionalized and armed themselves with assault rifles and retelling? then tried to take over the county and ended CHAPMAN There has, yeah. There’s been like up poisoning 750 people. Mac and I just kind a ton of producers and actors and people of looked at each other, like, “There’s no way reaching out to us and the Duplasses. We don’t this is true. Like, how could we have grown up want to be too involved in a fictional remake. in America and never heard about this story?” If that happens, it’s awesome because it’s such We started doing some research, and sure an incredible story. But as far as Mac and I enough, everything he had told us actually did are concerned, we’re just more excited to move happen — so we jumped in. on to our next documentary project. : COURTESY HAYWARD/GETTY OF MAT NETFLIX. IMAGES FOR WAY: NETFLIX. WILD

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 38 MAY 2018 EMMYS

EMMYS SET VISIT

1 ‘And Then 9/ Happened’

Hulu’s limited series The Looming Tower centers on frustrated FBI agent John O’Neill (played by Jeff Daniels), whose fight 2 against terrorism is thwarted by external and internal forces BY JACKIE STRAUSE

ohn O’Neill’s FBI farewell was held girlfriends standing on the River Cafe dock at Windows on the World, the with the bridge in the background,” Lawrence J top-floor venue in the World Trade Wright, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Center’s North Tower, in August book on which the series is based, tells 2001. He gave 25 years of service THR on set Aug. 2. “We didn’t know that until — many hunting Osama bin Laden and they already picked the site, so there’s a kind al-Qaeda, despite U.S. intel roadblocks and a of ghostly presence that suggests maybe we contentious relationship with the CIA. The picked the right spot.” polarizing counterterrorism expert reluc- The final episode, titled “9/11,” would go tantly left the bureau to start anew as head of on to chronicle the day of the attacks in New security at a prior terror target, the Twin York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania. Towers. On Sept. 11, however, O’Neill would “Even though everyone watching knows what become one of the nearly 3,000 people who happens next, he doesn’t,” says Daniels, who died in the attacks on the World Trade Center. researched his larger-than-life character by Sixteen years later, in August 2017, Hulu’s speaking to O’Neill’s partners, including Ali The Looming Tower is re-creating O’Neill’s Soufan. “The way he went about trying to get (played by Jeff Daniels) party at The River Cafe people to do what he wanted didn’t work: He in Brooklyn for the limited series’ penulti- turned tables over, cleared desks, screamed at mate episode. The restaurant boasts a view people. And I think by the time the FBI pushed of the lower Manhattan skyline through its him out, at that retirement party — which he panoramic window. didn’t want — I just made the choice that the As O’Neill, Daniels films several sequences guy was going to start to refocus and maybe gazing out at where the towers once stood. change. He was going to make the best of it, 5 “We have a photograph of John and one of his even though his true love was the FBI.”

Photographed by Mackenzie Stroh

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 40 MAY 2018 EMMYS 

4

6 1 Bill Camp (right), who plays fictitious FBI agent Robert Chesney, says the weight of filming on location in New York was heavy: “Because I live here, it was always part of my hard-wiring in terms of where the story was coming from.” 2 “The joy of playing O’Neill is that he doesn’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow,” says Daniels (pictured with co-star Tahar Rahim). 3 “40 North” was the show’s code name when filming. “We didn’t want to attract attention as to what exactly we were doing,” showrunner Dan Futterman explains. “We wanted people to react to the actual show and not to the idea of what we might or might not be filming.” 4 Daniels (left), who plays a travel guitar between takes, with Looming Tower author and exec producer Lawrence Wright. 5 Says Daniels of Liz (played by Annie Parisse), one of O’Neill’s several girlfriends: “I played that he was just going to start changing for the better in the third act of his life, and then 9/11 happened.” 6 The penultimate episode was one of three directed by exec producer Craig Zisk (not pictured). Says Zisk: “We really dig into the emotions of how the towers afected these characters.”

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 41 MAY 2018 EMMYS EMMYS SET VISIT

1

6

4

5

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 42 MAY 2018 EMMYS 

2

7 1 Minetta Tavern stood in for now-defunct NYC eatery Elaine’s. The FBI gathering (pictured: agents played by Mark Hildreth, left, and Louis Cancelmi) appears in the ninth episode, “Tuesday.” Says Zisk, “John was a regular at the real Elaine’s.” 2 O’Neill first brought protege Soufan (Rahim, right, with Ella Rae Peck) to his stomping ground in an earlier episode. “They run into a reporter that has been working on a bin Laden story and Ali sees that his boss is hero of the place,” says Zisk. 3 Sullivan Jones, who plays SWAT Team member Floyd Bennet, playing the guitar like Daniels does during downtime. 4 O’Neill’s wardrobe consists of crisp suits circa the late ’90s. 5 First AD Joseph Reidy (left) and second AD Justin Bischof on the set of episode six, “Boys at War.” 6 The gathering was called so O’Neill’s other girlfriend Sheri (played by Katie Finneran, pictured with Futterman) could meet his friends after moving to New York. 7 “Everybody sees how Jef prepares and then it works its way down,” says Zisk (not pictured) of his leading man. “Jef, beyond his unbelievable talent, is a really nice guy and great to work with.”

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 43 MAY 2018 EMMYS 89 Years of THR

Memorable moments from a storied history

1998 199999 220000 20001 2200022 20003 22004 20005 22006 2007 2008 2009 2010 22011 2012 201133 20014 220015 20016 22017 20018 In ’0, Laura Dern Channeled Katherine Harris

Laura Dern, who stars in the HBO TV film of the ballot-counting decisions. Apart from in — much like the candidates’ legal staff The Tale, which made a #MeToo splash at her pro-Bush rulings, Harris is probably did,” he says. As for the film’s effect on the elec- Sundance, had a big year in the Emmy movie best remembered for her cosmetic choices, tion process, Roach is unsure. “Many of the race in 2008. Recount won its category, and including berry-red lipstick, extensive lay- people involved, like Brad Blakeman and Roger Dern received a nomination for supporting ers of makeup and Tammy Faye Bakker-style Stone, are still around,” he says. “As a caution- actress and won at the Golden Globes. The eyelashes. On Saturday Night Live, she was ary tale, I’m not sure it succeeded.”  BILL HIGGINS HBO drama focuses on the Florida recount devastatingly played by Ana Gasteyer. “With after the 2000 presidential race between Katherine, we were trying to get beyond what George W. Bush and Al Gore. Sydney Pollock had been almost a cartoonish public persona,” had been set to direct, but illness forced says Roach. “When you cast a great actress him to drop out. The film premiered the day like Laura, I think the audience gets the idea before he died from cancer May 26, 2008. that you’re really trying to understand the soul “After Sydney, we went in a completely differ- of the character.” Recount shot on location in ent direction with Jay Roach,” says then-HBO Florida, where it received a special state rebate Films president Colin Callender. “He comes for shooting during hurricane season. Roach from a more comedic background, and says being in Florida was key to capturing the he brought a wryness and an irreverence to essence of the period between the election and the screen.” Dern plays Katherine Harris, the Supreme Court decision. “We were under Florida’s secretary of state, who made many a crazy time crunch and felt like we dropped

↑ Dern as Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris in 2008’s Recount.

The Hollywood Reporter, Vol. CDXXIV, No. 19A (ISSN 0018-3660; USPS 247-580) is published weekly; 39 issues — two issues in April, July, October and December; three issues in January and June; four issues in February, March, May, August and September; and five issues in November — with 15 special issues: Jan. (1), Feb. (2), June (4), Aug. (4), Nov. (3) and Dec. (3) by Prometheus Global Media LLC, 5700 Wilshire Blvd., 5th floor, Los Angeles CA 90036. Subscription rates: Weekly print only, $199; weekly print and online, including daily edition PDF only, $249; online only, $199; digital replica of weekly print, $199. Single copies, $7.99. Periodical Postage paid at Los Angeles, CA and additional mailing ofices. POSTMASTER: Send all UAA to CFS. Non-Postal and Military Facilities send address changes to The Hollywood Reporter, P.O. Box 125, Congers, NY 10920-0125. Under Canadian Publication Mail Agreement No. 41450540 return undeliverable Canadian addresses to MSI, PO BOX 2600, Mississauga, On L4T OA8. Direct all other correspondence to The Hollywood Reporter, 5700 Wilshire Blvd., 5th Floor, Los Angeles, CA 90036. Prometheus Global Media, LLC: Vice President, Human Resources: Angela Vitacco. Advertising/Editorial Reprints: Reprints of editorial or ads can be used as efective marketing tools. For details, please contact Wright’s Media: (877) 652-5295 or e-mail at [email protected]. Permission: Looking for a one-time use of our content, as a full article, excerpt or chart? Please contact Wright’s Media, (877) 652-5295; [email protected]. Subscription inquiries: U.S. call toll-free (866) 525-2150. Outside the U.S., call (845) 267-4192, or e-mail [email protected]. Copyright ©2015 Prometheus Global Media, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise — without the prior written permission of the publisher. THR.com PRINTED IN THE U.S.A. HBO/PHOTOFEST

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 44 MAY 2018 EMMYS VULTURE “BOLD FILMMAKING ON THE GRANDEST SCALE” –USA Today

CONSIDER IT LOUD IN ALL CATEGORIES

INCLUDING OUTSTANDING DIRECTING FOR A NONFICTION PROGRAM AMIR BAR-LEV