What Do Showrunners Do After Their Great Show Ends? Plus, ‘Sirens’ and ‘Adults.’

Chris and Andy talk about the finale of ‘Everybody’s Live’ (8:06) and a couple of recent releases, including ‘Sirens’ (14:29) and ‘Adults’ (23:59). Then, ahead of the premiere of Jesse Armstrong’s first post-‘Succession’ project, ‘Mountainhead,’ they talk about what the careers of other great showrunners like Matthew Weiner and Michael Schur have looked like after their most famous shows ended (34:14). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Producer: Kaya McMullen Video Production and Editing: Jon Jones Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

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• 1:36Chris Ryan?

  Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at TheRinger.com. And joining me in the studio, he just fought three 14-year-old boys. It's Andy Greenwald!

• 1:51Andy Greenwald?

  I feel like it.

• 1:52Chris Ryan?

  You look like it, in a good way. In a way that feels like you triumphed.

• 1:56Andy Greenwald?

  Or that I tried.

• 1:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Greenwald, today on the pod, a good one. We are going to be talking about Sirens. The first couple of episodes of that new-ish Netflix show came out last week. We're going to talk about the season finale of Everybody's Live with John Mulaney, which was aired last night. A little bit about adults, the new FX series that just dropped its entire season on Hulu and Disney+ and all the places you get that stuff. Today, it's a new comedy. And then we have like a larger conversation that will probably turn into essentially a two-part discussion about this weekend's upcoming HBO release, Mountain Head, which is the first big work from Jesse Armstrong since Succession ended two years ago, almost to the day. Today, we're going to be talking about the role of the showrunner in our contemporary moment of television.

• 2:42Chris Ryan?

  Hopefully a fun conversation for folks. And then on Monday, we're going to talk a little bit more in depth about Mountain Head itself.

• 2:47Andy Greenwald?

  Do you think we should lean heavily on the thoughts of our own showrunner of the watch, Kaya?

• 2:55Andy Greenwald?

  I think she's nodding like she has a lot to say.

• 2:57Chris Ryan?

  I bet she does.

• 2:59Andy Greenwald?

  We should also say, I think, well, actually, two things. One, I said this to you on the phone, but I want to put it on mic. We are talking about Jesse Armstrong's new project, two years, like you said, like to the weekend, like almost exactly since Succession ended. Would you like to go on record with your thoughts on the Succession finale now?

• 3:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I thought it was okay.

• 3:19Andy Greenwald?

  Awesome.

• 3:20Chris Ryan?

  I thought it was masterful. I thought it was great.

• 3:23Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, that's number one. Number two, you made the joke about fighting 14-year-olds. I do think it's worth mentioning to our listeners that we are both struggling with some physical ailments today.

• 3:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I mean, I'm on a wellness journey. And I can't lift my arms over my head, but like, you know, gotta get strong, baby.

• 3:40Andy Greenwald?

  Are there moments during today's podcast when you would ordinarily throw your arms up in a touchdown gesture?

• 3:47Chris Ryan?

  It's not that. It's honestly, it's holding a steering wheel, which I find challenging, which also other Los Angeles drivers.

• 3:53Andy Greenwald?

  Clearly. And this is my thing, which is I've done something to my lower back and you know what doesn't feel good? Sitting during a podcast, I'll say, but the worst thing is sitting and driving. That's the worst thing. I also do, this is also part of my quiet attempt to steer this into just an aging podcast, which it already low-key is.

• 4:11Chris Ryan?

  It's a loud attempt.

• 4:12Andy Greenwald?

  It's very loud. No, but like our old pal Adam Pally has a new podcast just about like health journeys.

• 4:17Chris Ryan?

  Does he?

• 4:17Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, so if they covered 10% more prestige television and then we took 10% back of like, hmm, this new Japanese lidocaine patch really latens the load.

• 4:27Chris Ryan?

  Do you have Japanese lidocaine patches?

• 4:28Andy Greenwald?

  I make it sound fancy. They sell them at Walgreens.

• 4:30Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 4:31Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, no free ads, but. I've got six on my body right now and I'm not telling you where.

• 4:35Chris Ryan?

  Walgreens is still cranking them out? Oh no, it's Rite Aid is filing.

• 4:38Andy Greenwald?

  Rite Aid's done.

• 4:39Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 4:40Andy Greenwald?

  Walgreens and CVS are cranking them out in the sense that cranking them, cranking the security windows in front of all of the items. You know what I mean? So you can't actually get anything.

• 4:49Chris Ryan?

  I, uh, when I go into my Rite Aid, it's still there.

• 4:52Andy Greenwald?

  What if it's the only one?

• 4:53Chris Ryan?

  It's the closest I'll ever get to Once Upon a Time in the West. Where like you walk in and like a tumbleweed blows across the aisle. And the security guard is like looking at you with a cheroot in his mouth.

• 5:05Andy Greenwald?

  I had a similar experience when I took the girls to a movie theater. They were like, oh, are we going to? And they named like the three movie theaters we often go to. Uh, and I was like, no, no, no, it's near them, but a little bit further down. A little bit like east of Pasadena. And they were immediately like, we don't want to do this.

• 5:21Chris Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 5:21Andy Greenwald?

  And I was like, I'm the one taking you to the Minecraft movie. I don't want to do this. I found a movie theater that has cheap matinees. Is there a reason why it's cheap?

• 5:29Chris Ryan?

  Cheap matinees?

• 5:30Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 5:30Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 5:31Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, so okay, was a little off the beaten path. Yeah, did they not have popcorn?

• 5:35Chris Ryan?

  A print of Minecraft?

• 5:37Andy Greenwald?

  Basically.

• 5:38Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:38Andy Greenwald?

  But we got there and then, uh, I needed to, this is a whole, this, this part of the story isn't important, but we had to go to a drugstore. Uh, no, now it sounds worse. There was parking, I needed to pay cash for parking. There was an ATM at the, so I walked into what appeared to be a normal, maybe now I'm realizing it, Rite Aid. And I walked in and immediately it was uncanny valley.

• 5:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:58Andy Greenwald?

  It was just way too clean, way too empty. Two people working here, the size of an airplane hangar. And everything else looked like, it was lit like the, um, fake plastic trees video.

• 6:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 6:10Andy Greenwald?

  You know, and they just had a lot, a lot, a lot of like six items of like one kind of detergent.

• 6:17Chris Ryan?

  Let me tell you something really interesting. Honestly, we can cut this whole part.

• 6:20Andy Greenwald?

  No. We're gonna, Kai's already clipping this for social.

• 6:24Chris Ryan?

  I have an issue where I might be addicted to Aquafina. Like no other water actually makes me feel hydrated. Did I ever tell you that?

• 6:31Andy Greenwald?

  I don't know if you want to brag about this, but let's hear about it.

• 6:33Chris Ryan?

  So recently, and I'm not disparaging the Aquafina Corporation or whatever, you know, like arms dealer owns it.

• 6:40Andy Greenwald?

  Pepsi?

• 6:41Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 6:41Andy Greenwald?

  But go on.

• 6:42Chris Ryan?

  Uh, I can't find it at most supermarkets. And then I walked into my Rite Aid.

• 6:47Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 6:48Chris Ryan?

  And half of the store was Aquafina.

• 6:50Andy Greenwald?

  So do you think the algorithm did, the entity did this for you?

• 6:53Chris Ryan?

  No, I just think it's like they got the last Aquafina. You know what I mean?

• 6:57Andy Greenwald?

  And what are the odds it's right in your backyard? You understand that like Dasani and Aquafina, there's just Coke and Pepsi buying uh galaxy sized Brita filters and just running tap water through it.

• 7:09Chris Ryan?

  Whatever it is, I just don't feel right drinking other water.

• 7:11Andy Greenwald?

  Any other water?

• 7:12Chris Ryan?

  Not morally, I mean physically, I don't feel like it quenches my thirst.

• 7:15Andy Greenwald?

  I think it's the plastics.

• 7:17Chris Ryan?

  Prob- probably, but like that-

• 7:18Andy Greenwald?

  I think your body's like, mm.

• 7:19Chris Ryan?

  Here's where we're at, though.

• 7:20Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 7:20Chris Ryan?

  We're talking about our wellness journeys, where we are in our lives.

• 7:23Andy Greenwald?

  You are much further behind than I thought.

• 7:25Chris Ryan?

  My boat sailed, dog. I'm playing with house money now.

• 7:29Andy Greenwald?

  Talk about it.

• 7:29Chris Ryan?

  Well, no, I'm just saying like, I don't like, I, I don't want to destroy the world, but I think I'm pretty low on the list of people who are doing it.

• 7:37Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 7:37Chris Ryan?

  And, like with microplas- with plastic bottles, like single-use bottles.

• 7:41Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, you sweet baby.

• 7:42Chris Ryan?

  And-

• 7:42Andy Greenwald?

  I'm not worried about the plastics for the world. I'm saying every bottle of Aquafina is adding a little bit to your own personal supply.

• 7:50Chris Ryan?

  But I did four pods this week, you know what I mean? Like, what do people want from me?

• 7:56Chris Ryan?

  The Aquafina is what's keeping me going.

• 7:58Andy Greenwald?

  You think? It's the only thing that makes you feel, quote, hydrated?

• 8:03Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 8:05Andy Greenwald?

  You could tell the difference. If we did a water taste test on this podcast.

• 8:09Chris Ryan?

  I certainly could, could taste certain textures and flavors.

• 8:14Andy Greenwald?

  Textures and flavors?

• 8:15Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, of different brands. But I don't, you know, I don't know what our advertising opportunities are going forward. Certainly, if Aquafina is interested in a spokesperson.

• 8:23Andy Greenwald?

  It's you.

• 8:24Chris Ryan?

  It's literally me.

• 8:25Andy Greenwald?

  You understand there is no, there is no cohort of Aquafina advocates. Like, I don't think anyone is like, that's the shit. I don't see any-

• 8:33Chris Ryan?

  Don't erase me, I'm right here.

• 8:34Andy Greenwald?

  -like Jenners or Kardashians sporting it in their Birkins, you know what I mean? You are-

• 8:38Chris Ryan?

  Oh yeah, because they have such high standards, yeah.

• 8:39Andy Greenwald?

  I'm just saying, I don't, I, you always think I'm coming to attack you. I'm actually saying there is no-

• 8:45Chris Ryan?

  Oh, like it's a, I've cornered the market.

• 8:48Andy Greenwald?

  What the Lorax is for the trees, you could be, for Aquafina, killer of trees. That could be you.

• 8:55Chris Ryan?

  Well.

• 8:55Andy Greenwald?

  You both have mustaches.

• 8:57Chris Ryan?

  I need a second act in this American life, you know?

• 8:59Andy Greenwald?

  God, this really is fascinating.

• 9:01Chris Ryan?

  Let's talk about.

• 9:02Andy Greenwald?

  To me.

• 9:03Chris Ryan?

  Some Netflix shows. Now, also on Monday, we're probably discuss Department Q, which is the new show from, among other people, Scott Frank.

• 9:09Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 9:09Chris Ryan?

  Uh, and it is a Scotland set murder mystery, uh, mystery show. I'll put it that way. Detective cop show.

• 9:16Andy Greenwald?

  It's like a Scandi Noir, but it has been moved to Glasgow. It is based on, I believe, a Danish series.

• 9:21Chris Ryan?

  Yes, and stars Matthew Good and is quite good. I enjoyed what I've watched of it so far.

• 9:26Andy Greenwald?

  Me too.

• 9:26Chris Ryan?

  Um, we're gonna talk about that on Monday. Also on Netflix right now is Sirens. So why don't?

• 9:31Andy Greenwald?

  I'm gonna. You want to do Sirens before Mulaney?

• 9:34Chris Ryan?

  Okay. No, that's a good point. I just don't want to do, I like Mulaney, like, what do you want to say about Mulaney?

• 9:39Andy Greenwald?

  Nothing other than, uh, I loved it.

• 9:42Chris Ryan?

  He fought the boys.

• 9:43Andy Greenwald?

  He fought the boys. Now, here's good old parochial me. I was clock watching. I was like, he's throwing to Slater Kinney at like 7:56.

• 9:53Chris Ryan?

  Slater Kinney was the musical guest, yes.

• 9:55Andy Greenwald?

  And I was like, he's gonna say we ran out of time to fight the boys. He's dodging. And then I realized it's Netflix and time slots are artificial construction. And of course, it ran over and he did fight the boys.

• 10:07Chris Ryan?

  You know who else is playing with house money?

• 10:09Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm.

• 10:09Chris Ryan?

  Uh, with their lungs is Sean Penn. I feel like he's like, I'm on third base. I can keep smoking. You know what I mean?

• 10:16Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, yeah, I got him here.

• 10:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 10:18Andy Greenwald?

  I feel like.

• 10:19Chris Ryan?

  He smoked on Mulaney, which I thought was.

• 10:21Andy Greenwald?

  At least three darts went down.

• 10:22Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 10:23Andy Greenwald?

  While he was on the couch. Do you, don't you think though, like, there are very few of those stories of like, well, you know, they got me this far.

• 10:31Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 10:31Andy Greenwald?

  That end awesome, you know?

• 10:33Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 10:34Andy Greenwald?

  I think they, I think when these things take a turn, you know, there is that, ah, I didn't think the leopards would eat my face.

• 10:40Chris Ryan?

  I think that, God bless him, one of our great artists, David Lynch is a good example of this.

• 10:44Andy Greenwald?

  Well, that's who I'm thinking.

• 10:45Chris Ryan?

  Right? Like smoked American spirits right up to the, not quite very end, but like, at the end was like, maybe I shouldn't have done that.

• 10:51Andy Greenwald?

  Due to the emphysema.

• 10:53Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 10:53Andy Greenwald?

  Um, I think Harry Dean Stanton was the only one maybe who just floated away in a Marlboro cloud, like in his 90s.

• 11:00Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 11:00Andy Greenwald?

  Just smoking to the end. So, you know, I guess you're all, he's the pace car and if you can do your best to keep up. Sean Penn, Sean Penn out here curing disease, but inhaling disease. It's kind of interesting.

• 11:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 11:14Andy Greenwald?

  Sean Penn's presence was ultimately an example of why, like in the, first of all, the show found its footing. We talked about it at length last week. I love the show.

• 11:24Andy Greenwald?

  It was one more, it felt a little bit like one more, fuck you, I do what I want. Because, you know, it opened with Sandler as the guest and a teen named Zephyrene, I believe. And they were delightful couch guests. Sandler, by the way, just takes such palpable pleasure in other people being funny that he is awesome to have around.

• 11:46Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 11:48Andy Greenwald?

  Adding, and then you add the younger comedian, Joe Mandy, who has a funny special that just went up. And then you add Sean Penn.

• 11:53Chris Ryan?

  Yep.

• 11:54Andy Greenwald?

  Which feels a little willfully obtuse.

• 11:55Chris Ryan?

  Talking about the rules of beaches in.

• 11:59Andy Greenwald?

  Street fighting.

• 11:59Chris Ryan?

  And street fighting, yeah.

• 12:00Andy Greenwald?

  Which was relevant, I guess, but he wasn't, I don't know if he knew precisely the type of show that he was on. In fact, maybe no one knew. But they really, I just felt like they really were in the driver's seat for this finale. How did you feel about the actual boy fight?

• 12:16Chris Ryan?

  Pretty good.

• 12:17Andy Greenwald?

  At the end.

• 12:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, it was good. I mean, I'm glad, in some ways, it was like, I'm so glad that they played it straight.

• 12:24Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, there was no secret bit.

• 12:27Chris Ryan?

  Joke, yeah.

• 12:28Andy Greenwald?

  It really was, they were trying to get him down. And it was also sort of sweet that they were just kids and he's a, you know, what did he say that he used to talk about his girlish hips? Like, so there wasn't, it's not like they were, anyone was taking headshots or swinging. They were just really just trying to bring him down, which he did and was relatively gracious about it. And then we were all rewarded because then Bone Thugs in Harmony came out.

• 12:51Chris Ryan?

  That's right. He did get Bone Thugs to show up for, he had tried earlier in the season to bring them together and finally they came back.

• 12:58Andy Greenwald?

  Do you know what's the, do you know what's the ultimate heat check? Or is it the opposite of heat check? Because I don't actually know how to use that phrase correctly.

• 13:06Andy Greenwald?

  All rappers who were famous when we were kids.

• 13:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 13:11Andy Greenwald?

  Or in high school. You Google them to be like, oh, what's, I wonder how Lazy Bone is doing or whatever, which I did. And unrelated, Emelani, I did this two months ago.

• 13:22Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 13:23Andy Greenwald?

  They're all 50. They're like two years older than us.

• 13:26Chris Ryan?

  I know.

• 13:26Andy Greenwald?

  When they were famous, they were 17 or 18.

• 13:29Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 13:29Andy Greenwald?

  Or 19. That's, that's, that's wild.

• 13:32Chris Ryan?

  Are you saying that they peaked too early?

• 13:35Andy Greenwald?

  No.

• 13:35Chris Ryan?

  And that life must be complicated for them now?

• 13:37Andy Greenwald?

  No. Would you like to have that conversation? No, no. I feel like there's, there's a robust, you know, legacy act touring market that probably keeps them.

• 13:43Chris Ryan?

  Certainly.

• 13:44Andy Greenwald?

  Right?

• 13:45Chris Ryan?

  And there always has been. There always has been like a secret, like I remember, I think I've told this story and it's not really like much of an anecdote, but when I moved to New York City and I looked in the back of the Village Voice, this is in 2000.

• 13:55Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 13:57Chris Ryan?

  You see Big Daddy Kane and Rock M. are playing SOBs and you're like, did I just arrive on the most perfect weekend ever?

• 14:02Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, yes.

• 14:02Chris Ryan?

  Oh my God. And then you look in the Village Voice next week and they're like, Big Daddy Kane and Rock M. are playing SOBs.

• 14:08Andy Greenwald?

  No, they're playing Wetlands, probably.

• 14:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, but it's like, oh, so this is even in 2000, when those guys were only eight years, whatever, removed from the peaks of their fame. Yeah.

• 14:18Andy Greenwald?

  My thing is Ice Cube has been famous since we were 11.

• 14:24Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 14:25Andy Greenwald?

  He's only 55.

• 14:26Chris Ryan?

  And he's on the studio, yeah, like he was on the studio this season.

• 14:29Andy Greenwald?

  I'm just saying, it's a, it's a long life.

• 14:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 14:32Andy Greenwald?

  If you get famous when you're a teenager, like those boys on Mulaney last night.

• 14:36Chris Ryan?

  That's right.

• 14:36Andy Greenwald?

  Anyway, I, I, I thought it was excellent. I really hope they bring it back. I, it is just like we said last week, it is just a mix of highbrow and lowbrow and convention and unconventional that we don't get and.

• 14:50Chris Ryan?

  Have you spoken to your parliamentary team about how you're going to finagle this in the top 10 at the end of the year?

• 14:54Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, I thought you meant how I was going to make it part of the big, beautiful bill to fund it. When you said parliament, I forgot what country we lived in. What, what a pleasant fantasy it was to think we were in a different one.

• 15:06Andy Greenwald?

  No, but you know, no, but the committee is meeting.

• 15:08Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 15:08Andy Greenwald?

  The subcommittee is meeting about it. I, it is interesting to note that like, if they want more of this, I hope that they, in the spirit of everyone kind of being like, okay, let's get these shows on a clock.

• 15:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 15:19Andy Greenwald?

  That like, they decide soon and not like in December when it will take six more months to get the everyone and then they'll be that far out of rhythm.

• 15:27Chris Ryan?

  Yes, I think it would be cool if this became an annual 12 week run. That's, I think that it would have been neat if he had taken six weeks or a month or whatever and come back.

• 15:36Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 15:36Chris Ryan?

  Later in the summer and been like, we've done this, this and this differently. Obviously, Mulaney is really busy, but I did think it was a really cool thing to have as like a background marker of each week of the last few weeks. And that's just what TV is supposed to be, which we were, are gonna kind of talk a little bit about the way TV's changed in a little bit. Sirens, we can kind of run through these a little bit more briefly. Can you tell me a little bit about the background for sirens?

• 16:00Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, sirens is based, is created by Molly Smith Metzler, who, who is someone that I know in real life. And it is based on a play that she wrote back in 2011 called LMNOP. And it is the next offering of her Netflix overall deal that she signed after creating an executive producing maid. With, oh my God, what's her name?

• 16:24Chris Ryan?

  Margaret Qualley.

• 16:25Andy Greenwald?

  Thank you. Yes. And it is, so five episodes dropped this week. I was really taken with the show. And the reason why I was taken with the show is because it has the trappings of what, you know, put, put a, put this in quotes, put a trademarks emoji after it. What everybody wants. Right, there is a robust, not running dry market in upscale, inside the homes of rich and successful people with dark secrets.

• 16:55Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 16:56Andy Greenwald?

  Genre, I mean, I think.

• 16:57Chris Ryan?

  Big Little Lies.

• 16:58Andy Greenwald?

  Nine Perfect Strangers back this week. You, your silence on it has been deafening.

• 17:01Chris Ryan?

  White Lotus, I wonder, is it gonna be delayed at all because Mike White's going on Survivor 50?

• 17:06Andy Greenwald?

  I wondered if you had a take on that.

• 17:07Chris Ryan?

  I don't, I mean, I think it's amazing and I, and I, I can't imagine going through the physical and emotional turmoil of White Lotus. And then be like, I would like to go on Survivor now.

• 17:19Andy Greenwald?

  What's crazy is it probably won't. If, if everything that we have come to understand about him and his writing.

• 17:25Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 17:25Andy Greenwald?

  Is true, it may have been baked in. Maybe he's already filmed it, right? Like when they're announcing stuff, haven't they already done some of it?

• 17:31Chris Ryan?

  Well, they just announced the cast. I don't know if they've left yet.

• 17:34Andy Greenwald?

  I'm not sure. This is something I can't speak to.

• 17:37Chris Ryan?

  Anyway, sirens.

• 17:38Andy Greenwald?

  But, um, anyway, so there's a, there's a robust market for this and it's clearly reflected in, like, I think it's number two on Netflix's top 10 already. What I like about the show is that it is not that. Now, the framework is not a familiar one, but you could slot it easily into a description of something like White Lotus. The conceit is Megan Fahey from White Lotus plays a young woman named Devon, who's taking care of her ailing father in Buffalo, New York.

• 18:06Chris Ryan?

  Played by the god Bill Camp.

• 18:07Andy Greenwald?

  Bill Camp, phenomenal as always, and is infuriated by the absence of her younger sister, Simone, played by Millie Alcock, who was on the first season of House of the Dragon. And she will be Supergirl, woman of tomorrow, in a film coming out next summer. And so in order to exact revenge for the receipt of a thoughtless, edible arrangement, Devon grabs the fruit and goes to what appears to be like-

• 18:35Chris Ryan?

  Montauk?

• 18:36Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, Hampton's, the fancy part of Long Island, to confront her sister, who is working as a tireless 24/7 personal assistant to an incredibly, impossibly rich woman who also enjoys falconry, played by Julianne Moore. And the show is weirder than its conceit. It's consistently funnier than its conceit.

• 19:01Andy Greenwald?

  There are elements of supernatural or something extra going on, and then there's just elements of satire that I really appreciate. Like Felix Solis plays the head of the house staff.

• 19:12Chris Ryan?

  Yep.

• 19:12Andy Greenwald?

  And all one has to do is say his name and he appears like a genie.

• 19:17Andy Greenwald?

  There's also undercutting, oh, and Kevin Bacon is in the show as Julianne Moore's husband, and Glenn Howerton from your show, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, is pretty funny.

• 19:26Chris Ryan?

  How many episodes of that have you seen in real life?

• 19:28Andy Greenwald?

  How many have there been?

• 19:29Chris Ryan?

  Hundreds.

• 19:32Andy Greenwald?

  Three. No, I've seen the Chase Utley one three times. But doesn't that count for something?

• 19:38Chris Ryan?

  Sure it does, man. Any effort is an effort.

• 19:42Andy Greenwald?

  Anyway, what I really liked about the show is, and this is sort of a difficult thing to parse, and maybe it does come from knowing Molly a little bit, but like, there is a, always been a healthy lifeline of playwrights to TV.

• 19:53Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 19:54Andy Greenwald?

  And, uh, um, my god, I'm having, I'm having trouble with names today. I think I'm gonna blame my lower back ailment. Is that possible? Is it, is there?

• 20:03Chris Ryan?

  William Shakespeare, is that you're trying to think of?

• 20:07Andy Greenwald?

  No, or just the new black. The, uh, the, the woman who created-

• 20:11Chris Ryan?

  Genji Kohan?

• 20:12Andy Greenwald?

  Genji Kohan, thank you.

• 20:13Chris Ryan?

  Is that right?

• 20:13Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, she, she, she's, I think, personally responsible for bringing out lots of playwrights.

• 20:18Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 20:18Andy Greenwald?

  Including Liz and Carly, who created Glow. And, um, there's a certain cadence and a certain, um, interest in internal lives that playwrights just naturally bring, because that's the medium that they were trained in. And so when you have scenes between Megan Fahy and Millie Alcock in this, the directions that they take, like, actually if you were doing a Kirk Goldsberry style, like-

• 20:39Chris Ryan?

  Heat map, yeah.

• 20:40Andy Greenwald?

  Of, of, of the shots, they come from surprising places that immediately jolts you and make, and for, at least for me, makes me lean in. Similarly, like, the Falcon stuff.

• 20:49Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 20:49Andy Greenwald?

  It's just like, not exactly what you would expect in a show like this. And then the other piece of it that I really enjoy is, at a time, like, this time, that the show has a deeply skeptical point of view, and particularly a grounded point of view character in Devon, that is looking askance at the enormous wealth.

• 21:08Chris Ryan?

  I see what you're saying.

• 21:09Andy Greenwald?

  I really appreciate it. I just think it is coming at all of this, and I'm talking about the mansion and the spa treatments and the treatment of staff and having a staff and all of it, not from a place of, boy, wouldn't it be nice even if I then had the frosty relationship with my rich husband, but from a, what the fuck?

• 21:25Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 21:26Andy Greenwald?

  I kind of like that undercurrent that is really speaking to me at the moment. So I found it to be, it's frothy, which I think is exciting to Netflix, it's fun, which I think is exciting to, hopefully, a larger audience, but I think it's thoughtful in a way that is making me lean in.

• 21:39Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, it's an interesting, uh, package of a season, just five episodes. Um, I, I actually don't know much about like the end and whether it's conceived of as a limited series or whether it's an ongoing, uh, project. But really, really perfectly cast is the thing I came away with.

• 21:55Andy Greenwald?

  Um, Faye's so good.

• 21:56Chris Ryan?

  Bacon as the kind of mysterious aloof husband who arrives from the business trip. Um, Faye, he's fantastic, uh, and kind of fun that she gets to now play. Like you're saying, she was, she was the guest at one of these places and now she's the outsider.

• 22:11Andy Greenwald?

  Who keeps getting kicked off the grounds.

• 22:12Chris Ryan?

  And Alcock's really good. Um, she's like a real force of, force of nature and I always got time for Julia Moore. It's a cool show. Uh, I'll definitely keep watching it. Um.

• 22:21Andy Greenwald?

  It, it's interesting. The other, the last thing I'll say about, I want to finish it and maybe we'll, we'll get another chance to talk about it. But the, whenever we use, we, there's a phrase we overuse. And in fact, I made a joke about it the other week that I then didn't explain, like all good jokes need to be explained to people. And, and the look you gave me is still seared into my eye when I was, I was like, well, you know, blah, blah, blah. You know, I'm, I'm living inside of a wooden horse and you were just like, is that why your back hurts? I was basically saying that so much of professional screenwriting is Trojan horsing. And I was saying that I was, I do that too.

• 22:53Chris Ryan?

  When will we get to the point where the Trojan horse is actually just to do a drama?

• 22:57Andy Greenwald?

  That's what I'm saying. I, this, we, when we use it, it's essentially saying, boy, we wish there were more straight up and down like detective crime shows, but in order to do one, you have to make it in the Marvel universe or, or whatever. I think maybe we're, we're being limited with our view of what the Trojans could do with wood and horses.

• 23:19Chris Ryan?

  I don't know much about it, honestly. I've been saying it for 11 years.

• 23:23Andy Greenwald?

  This is an, this is an interesting, this show, at least through two episodes that I've watched, is a, is a very interesting drama about sisters, about family obligations and about class. And it is Trojan.

• 23:37Chris Ryan?

  And it's tacked on to a show about, look at all the pretty dresses and canapes and.

• 23:42Andy Greenwald?

  And the dresses are pretty and they're on a beach and they filmed in, you know, in New York in the summertime. So.

• 23:47Chris Ryan?

  Did they?

• 23:47Andy Greenwald?

  They did.

• 23:48Chris Ryan?

  Oh, I thought it might've been Toronto, you know?

• 23:50Andy Greenwald?

  No, you, what was it? By the way, you were the one that was like, for the. Studio finale, you were like, what, did they green screen this entire casino?

• 23:58Chris Ryan?

  That was not my experience of a Las Vegas hotel room.

• 24:01Andy Greenwald?

  I understand that, but there's, there are still people out there and I, you know, you know, I love being on video. I think it's awesome and I was, I was for it from the beginning. But the one thing that I think, that I thought that it could do would be finally root out the subsection of people who think that our voices are coming out of the wrong mouths from their experience, listening to the podcast. Um, and yet it still happens to the point where.

• 24:23Chris Ryan?

  I'm not in a Philip K. Dick story. I don't know how to like process that information. When people are like, I thought that your body was Andy's body or something.

• 24:30Andy Greenwald?

  Sometimes we forget whose body is whose, man. We've been friends a long time. You can have my working arms and I'll take your trunk. Despite all the, maybe it's, maybe it's the plastic that's accumulated there, like that big trash island in the Pacific that keeps you buoyant.

• 24:46Chris Ryan?

  All gotten in between my vertebrae.

• 24:48Andy Greenwald?

  That's why you're up.

• 24:49Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 24:49Andy Greenwald?

  Anyway, all of this was to say that someone was just like, I can't believe Greenwald thought that they didn't film on location for the studio.

• 24:56Chris Ryan?

  Oh, and that was me.

• 24:57Andy Greenwald?

  And it was you. You gotta own it.

• 24:58Chris Ryan?

  I didn't say, I didn't think they shot in location. It's a very expensive show. I was just like, I haven't seen the Zoe Kravitz suite at Caesars. That's all I'm saying.

• 25:07Andy Greenwald?

  Like the Apple's marketing team and the studio gang released what seems to be endless footage of them making the show. Just like Bryan Cranston's standing over a fake canal in Vegas with six THR cameras capturing every minute. And Matt Bellamy doing a podcast in the boat.

• 25:24Chris Ryan?

  Um, let's move to another new release, which would be adults. That's on FX. This one is courtesy of two creators, Ben Cronigold and Rebecca Shaw. And, uh, is very much in the tradition of friends, how I met your mother, you know, group of pals, living, young pals, living together and living all over each other.

• 25:49Chris Ryan?

  I, uh, I want to say this, this is one where.

• 25:54Chris Ryan?

  The first couple of episodes, I couldn't tell if I was feeling old, or if I was just, or if the show was like pitched at a frequency that wasn't quite where I wanted it to be, or what I thought it should be. And I admired, but also didn't particularly like care for how forcefully provocative it was. Which is very funny, because like, when it comes to gun violence apparently on screen, I'll be like, that's something I haven't seen before, well done, you know?

• 26:24Andy Greenwald?

  By the way, 90% of people who begin that sentence wouldn't end where you went to that sentence. When it comes to gun violence on screen, how much is too much? Not in CR's plastic beach.

• 26:36Chris Ryan?

  That's an example of it. I started a sentence and I really didn't know how to finish it.

• 26:40Andy Greenwald?

  That's the story of podcasting. I love it. I'm here for you.

• 26:43Chris Ryan?

  Aquafina bringing it to the max. So anyway, this series starts off, and I think it goes to great lengths to just show like how out of touch I am, you know, not, that's not what the purpose of the show was. The third episode though, is where I felt like maybe more traditional sitcom bones kicked in. And some of this, it really just leapt out at me how great it was. And I really wanted to-

• 27:12Andy Greenwald?

  That's the episode called Have You Seen This Man?

• 27:14Chris Ryan?

  Yes, and I wanted to shout out one performer in particular from this, which is Owen Thiel, which I thought, he plays a guy named Anton on the show, and is hysterical in this third episode.

• 27:26Andy Greenwald?

  He's really good.

• 27:26Chris Ryan?

  And we could talk about it a little bit more, since it just dropped. I don't want to get too into like, this happens and then this happens. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna probably finish it, because I love shows like this generally. I just find them very comforting to watch. What'd you think?

• 27:40Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I mean, I felt, well, first of all, what you're saying about like, traditional sitcom things taking over, I want to shout out again- Based on, this is just from the results, we actually have no insight into the process, but FX's half hour development

• 27:56Chris Ryan?

  Yep.

• 27:57Andy Greenwald?

  is pretty unimpeachable at this moment. And one of the secret things that they do, that is absolutely, by the way, not a secret, like, they're very clear about this, and we talked to Brian Jordan Alvarez about this when we were talking to him about English teacher, is that in the half hour space, they can do things at a, what they call, at a price point,

• 28:15Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 28:15Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, which I think we all know what that means. Um, there are no restaurants in Los Angeles that are currently at a price point, for example, just so you understand what I mean when I say that.

• 28:24Chris Ryan?

  I do, I spent $20 on a turkey sandwich yesterday.

• 28:26Andy Greenwald?

  God, that's so depressing. Um, and they can, so they can take chances on different ideas, younger creators, and then what they do is they take people who are passionate about the world that they've created, whether it's for themselves to star in or for others, and then they bring in some veterans

• 28:41Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 28:42Andy Greenwald?

  who have been there before, so...

• 28:43Chris Ryan?

  Stephanie Robinson worked on adults, right?

• 28:45Andy Greenwald?

  Stephanie Robinson from Atlanta and from what we do in the shadows

• 28:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 28:48Andy Greenwald?

  is an EP on adults. Jonathan Kreisel, who's directed tons of great comedy, um, is one of the-

• 28:54Chris Ryan?

  Kroll's on this too, right?

• 28:55Andy Greenwald?

  Is one of the executive producers and directors. Nick Kroll is an executive producer of the whole series and directed an episode. Jason Wallner, who's done all crazy stuff.

• 29:02Chris Ryan?

  A bunch of Modern Family and stuff, yeah.

• 29:05Andy Greenwald?

  But, but also, I think he's done like, you know, Borat-type stuff, and he started on Human Giant. So, there are people who have the, the, the experience in trenches. And that really did influence my watch. I, I kind of at this point know, when I'm firing up a brand-new sitcom, particularly one from brand-new creators, that, what to look for.

• 29:24Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 29:25Andy Greenwald?

  You know, it's kind of like, when, when Keith Law goes to check out, like, a triple A team or something, you know, he's just like, the way, the way he's-

• 29:32Chris Ryan?

  His gait, yeah.

• 29:33Andy Greenwald?

  You can teach this, but you can't teach, you know,

• 29:35Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 29:35Andy Greenwald?

  bat speed or whatever. So, there were things in the pilot-

• 29:38Chris Ryan?

  Incredible Keith Law drop.

• 29:39Andy Greenwald?

  I've been on The Athletic a bunch recently, because Andrew Painter's coming, so I'm just, just full disclosure. So there were things in the pilot that I felt were noisy in the ways that a written pilot to get the job might be.

• 29:54Chris Ryan?

  Yes, that's kind of what I was saying. It's not that I was scandalized by it as much as I was like, I think I'm supposed to be like dazzled here.

• 30:00Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, but also you're, you know who is supposed to be dazzled there is Nick Brad at FX, reading it on the page. It's eventually what this will live or die on being a hang and a good hang. And I think people understand that and it's cast that way. I mean, we can talk about the cast chemistry is pretty excellent right from jump. In the pilot, there's a scene where Issa, who's kind of the most out there of the roommates, is claiming her right to be in a protected place. And so she pulls out a woman card, then she pulls out an immigrant card and they're literal cards. And I was like, that's the thing, that's a thing that was in the pilot that is never going to happen again. You know, like that is, like what, what level of reality we're in.

• 30:39Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, that's why I think I reacted to three so well.

• 30:41Andy Greenwald?

  Um, yeah, and by the time, and so, so if you look at it from one to three, getting to a place where like, oh, I know these people, I know their interactions and I know what's going to happen when it's kind of heightened and you get to three and to credit to the, to Cronin Gold and Shaw and their vision for the show because there are aspects of it that are familiar, like misunderstandings or one group goes to do this thing and we try different pairings or groupings of characters. But the opening scene that Anton, that you're talking about that is so, that is funny where he is basically, he can't stop befriending people.

• 31:12Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 31:13Andy Greenwald?

  He is.

• 31:13Chris Ryan?

  He creates intimacy with people.

• 31:15Andy Greenwald?

  Immediately and he's airplaying his 4,000 texts, all of whom are under names like, you know, kneel with the leash or nice straight flight attendant or whatever. And like, that is what the show, that's the argument for the show. Not that we are like button pushing and the show is originally called Snowflakes. What we're doing is like comedy is comedy and then how can we update the context? So I appreciated that.

• 31:37Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, they become instead of, um.

• 31:42Chris Ryan?

  Instead of like, uh, keywords, they become characters.

• 31:45Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 31:45Chris Ryan?

  In the third episode.

• 31:46Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, exactly. And so it's funny, like, all of this is to say, I'm still okay with it. Like, I'm not so fired up and making the case that this is the next hot shit, you know? Because shows like this take a minute to find themselves and to sort of ease into it. And there were moments, like, in the second episode, I mean, the tenor of the show is loud. Like, the all these people-

• 32:08Chris Ryan?

  The bathroom scene in the second episode is like-

• 32:10Andy Greenwald?

  They are all yelling.

• 32:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 32:11Andy Greenwald?

  A lot. And I don't know, are you familiar with Ben Greenwald and Rebecca Shaw? Prior to their creation of the show? They, they became semi-famous for their speech at the Yale commencement in 2018.

• 32:22Chris Ryan?

  Didn't, didn't have that in my YouTube save for laters yet.

• 32:26Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, I, well, I was there. That's weird. I, I got an honorary doctorate from, from Yale, from my contributions to this podcast.

• 32:34Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 32:35Andy Greenwald?

  And-

• 32:36Chris Ryan?

  Check with the federal government, make sure it's still valid.

• 32:39Speaker 04

  Hasn't come up in my algorithm, so weirdly.

• 32:42Chris Ryan?

  You're, you're a fucking weird guy. You know that, right?

• 32:45Andy Greenwald?

  I reject that. I reject that.

• 32:47Chris Ryan?

  You're like, I reject the internet, but I read Keith Law updates about Andrew Painter and-

• 32:53Andy Greenwald?

  No, no.

• 32:54Chris Ryan?

  Yale commencement speeches.

• 32:56Andy Greenwald?

  I read Keith Law for the cultural takes.

• 32:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 32:58Andy Greenwald?

  The baseball stuff just comes secondary.

• 32:59Chris Ryan?

  The recipes.

• 33:00Andy Greenwald?

  For those recipes and like his opinions on television.

• 33:03Chris Ryan?

  Does anybody who's listening to this pod know who Keith Law is?

• 33:05Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, by the way, yes. And they will text us. Tim Simons probably firing up a text right now.

• 33:13Andy Greenwald?

  No, I used, I thought we would, like, this is a thing that, that, okay, should we do a little behind the curtain here?

• 33:18Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 33:19Andy Greenwald?

  I'd never heard of these guys either, but then I read reviews-

• 33:21Chris Ryan?

  Oh, you Googled them. Yeah. Yeah, okay, you made it sound like you watched this four years ago.

• 33:26Andy Greenwald?

  To like fake, uh, authority.

• 33:29Chris Ryan?

  Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah.

• 33:30Andy Greenwald?

  Don't you do that sometimes for clout? Like, when you pretend to do baseball when you were a kid?

• 33:33Chris Ryan?

  I, what do you pretend to do baseball? What are you talking about?

• 33:36Andy Greenwald?

  I thought that was just a story to make yourself look stronger.

• 33:38Chris Ryan?

  I'm about to flip the fucking table over.

• 33:40Andy Greenwald?

  Except you can't, cuz you hurt yourself and you drink too much plastic. So, mark safe today.

• 33:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 33:49Andy Greenwald?

  From Lou Ferrigno over here. Anyway, I, I know you did travel baseball.

• 33:53Chris Ryan?

  All right, man.

• 33:54Andy Greenwald?

  You were good at it. You walked the plate.

• 33:55Chris Ryan?

  I'm gonna take this personally in about three seconds.

• 33:59Andy Greenwald?

  The point is, they did a bit as like 22 year olds in front of Hillary Clinton about how they were giving a speech and then they broke up during the speech. And it was very like, "To the rafters!" with this comedy. And that's, that's the voice, is all I'm saying.

• 34:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 34:14Andy Greenwald?

  And I'll say that as someone who watched these three episodes at different moments of the day with different levels of lower back pain, there were moments where I was like, "Really liked the pilot, was not as into the second, really liked the third." And it was more about me than about the show.

• 34:28Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 34:28Andy Greenwald?

  The show is finding its rhythm, it's finding its voice. And generally, I find like, very, very strident criticisms of new comedies based on the first few episodes or even the first eight episodes, which is what the season is, to be not really that useful in terms of what things are gonna become.

• 34:43Chris Ryan?

  You're so level-headed today. I love this. Maybe your back injury has really brought you into a new critical space.

• 34:48Andy Greenwald?

  I'm on a lot of medication.

• 34:49Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 34:50Andy Greenwald?

  Can you tell?

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• 37:06Chris Ryan?

  Why do we do this broader conversation? So adults, you should check it out. Sirens, like we mentioned, we're fans of. Department Q, I would recommend.

• 37:15Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, we'll hit that next week.

• 37:16Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, let's take a step back and have like a broader conversation about the role of the showrunner in 2025 and this contemporary moment in television. And I think it's worth mentioning that, again, that Jesse Armstrong is returning to our screens on Sunday night with Mountain Head from HBO. It's about four tech titans of industry having a sort of reunion gathering at a mountain estate in Utah as the world literally is falling apart.

• 37:46Andy Greenwald?

  To reiterate, we're not spoiling it.

• 37:47Chris Ryan?

  Not spoiling it, it's all in the trailer. If you like Succession, I think you'll like this movie. And what I wanted to talk about was how interesting I thought it was that

• 37:59Chris Ryan?

  Jesse Armstrong chose to make a film, make a film that wound up being on HBO. Make a film that wound up being on HBO, at least in terms of the credits, with basically the gang from Succession. Nicholas Patel does the music for Mountain Head, Tony Roche, Lucy Prebble, all these people, Mark Mylott is a executive producer.

• 38:18Andy Greenwald?

  A lot of the greatest hitters from the writers' room.

• 38:21Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 38:21Andy Greenwald?

  Get producers' credit suggesting that they were involved at some level in the creative process.

• 38:26Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 38:26Andy Greenwald?

  For a movie that ultimately is written and directed by Jesse.

• 38:28Chris Ryan?

  Correct. And I thought this was a fascinating decision on Jesse's part. I hope we get to ask him about it. And I wanted to talk to you about the showrunners that we've talked about consistently over the course of podcasting together. So going back to 2012 when we were doing Hollywood Prospectus with Grantland, and now with The Watch since 2015?

• 38:50Andy Greenwald?

  Fifteen?

• 38:51Chris Ryan?

  Fifteen? You know, we've obviously gone through a bunch of different phases of television. When we first started, there was this great creative flowering and I think is widely regarded as the golden age of television, this Sopranos, Wire, Mad Men era. And then you basically had, at that point, networks doing provocative, cutting-edge comedies like, you know, 30 Rock. You had premium cable networks changing the paradigm of what scripted dramas could be. You had shows doing quite well ratings-wise or not doing quite well ratings-wise, but everybody who watched them insisted on talking about them. So you had this, like, storm of conversation surrounding shows.

• 39:36Chris Ryan?

  And over the years, obviously, there's been, we've had the streaming revolution, we've had the IP explosion, you know, the intellectual property explosion, the franchisification of a lot of TV shows. We've had COVID, and we've had strikes.

• 39:51Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 39:52Chris Ryan?

  So over the course of these 10 years or 11 years that we've been talking, we've had all these different... Phases, stages of the role of the showrunner. And I wanted to use Jesse as kind of a way to get into talking about a bunch of the people that we, I don't know, maybe they're, the shows that they were best known for ended during our run.

• 40:14Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, and what I really appreciate about that very nice introduction you just did, was really making it clear that these careers are existing, because they are still existing, they're still ongoing, in a time of just profound existential, industry-wide change. It's like, it actually, in a weird way, it is a test case for those sort of hypotheticals that you see on websites like The Athletic where Keith Law works, which is basically like, sorry, if a player existed in multiple eras. Would they be able to recreate those stats across eras of a sport? Because when you look at, and we'll get into some specifics in a minute, but if you look at the touchdown points of certain creators existing in the boom times, then leaving for

• 40:58Andy Greenwald?

  a few years, whether it's to develop things, or to just muse, or to count the residuals, and then returning, the earth shifted under that person's feet, and they're returning to a different landscape. So it is more interesting, I think, to consider it, because whatever version we used to have of a storied, successful, maybe even legendary television career, it's kind of all out the window. You know, you can't really be Steven Bochco anymore, if that was ever the goal.

• 41:24Chris Ryan?

  Well, and I think it's worth mentioning with people like Bochco and David E. Kelley and-

• 41:31Andy Greenwald?

  Even David E. Kelley can't be David E. Kelley anymore. He's completely changed his career.

• 41:33Chris Ryan?

  Yes, and he's become a purveyor of limited series in some ways, and has like really found a lane, and is still prolific, but, you know, there are plenty of people that we're not going to discuss today that probably will hear this discussion, or, you know, if they heard this discussion, they would be like, well, like, what about Greg Berlanti? Or what about this person? Or what about this person? And I completely understand, it's really, this is about the people that kind of Andy and I were really focused on when we were first podcasting.

• 42:02Andy Greenwald?

  Or their shows, particularly.

• 42:03Chris Ryan?

  And I think we thought, in our minds, maybe subconsciously, this is how it's always going to be. We're always going to be drawn to a work because of the name that we associate with it as an author.

• 42:14Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 42:15Chris Ryan?

  Now, I just wanted to ask you briefly, if you could tell me- Succinctly, I guess, just for the sake of the pod, like, what would you describe for people who are like, I have no idea what you guys are talking about? What is a showrunner in 2025?

• 42:28Andy Greenwald?

  Geez, it's a good question, one that I am not fully prepared for.

• 42:32Chris Ryan?

  Well, what's, give me a couple of different versions of it.

• 42:34Andy Greenwald?

  Well, not, I mean, not in a, I didn't mean like you caught me off guard, but that it is, essentially, and people have heard some version of this spiel before, but like, showrunner is not an official title.

• 42:45Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 42:46Andy Greenwald?

  It is essentially the title bestowed upon the, often in this case, the creator of the show, and I don't mean this case, but in often contemporary terms, it means the creator of the show, or the head writer of the show, who is also an executive producer, who the buck stops with that person. Ultimately has final cut, has decision-making power over every aspect of the production, and thus is the person who, and in, you know, I'll put it this way, the thing that I liked about the job when I was able to do it was that I was the first person with my laptop, with the script, you know, blinking, writing, interior, whatever, and a whole lot of stuff happened in between.

• 43:29Andy Greenwald?

  New groups of people would come in, producers would come in, and then writers came in, and then writers left, and then actors came in, and then, you know, cinematographer and wardrobe people and lighting people, and then we were in production and location people, and then they all left, and then, and then the editors came in, and the post-production team, and then the sound artists and mixers and Foley, and then they leave, and then color correction comes in, and then press, and all those people come in, and I was in every one of those rooms.

• 43:52Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 43:53Andy Greenwald?

  And that was awesome and fascinating and interesting, and that, I think, ultimately is what a showrunner is in this day and age. The person who is there from, from sunup to sundown, in charge of basically everything, and there, nothing, you know, we, and it'll come up here, we, I think, auteur theory is kind of hackneyed and not really accurate, because anything successful is a testament to a collaboration at an enormously complicated scale.

• 44:18Chris Ryan?

  And almost every single one of these people, the ones that we've spoken with, if you read interviews with them, they'll They'll say like, well, this was down to this, this was down to this collaboration.

• 44:27Andy Greenwald?

  And even, I know we, I'm still struck by it. I know you were too, but when Tony Gilroy was on the other week talking about Andor, I mean, this is someone who does not come from the world of showrunning, comes from movies and has written and directed an Oscar winning film in Michael Clayton. And the, the degree of collaboration that he experienced as the showrunner of Andor and then his gratitude for it was palpable.

• 44:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 44:49Andy Greenwald?

  So it is, it's an incredible opportunity.

• 44:51Chris Ryan?

  That's exemplified by making as production designer and executive.

• 44:54Andy Greenwald?

  Exactly. It's an incredible responsibility. But ultimately, anything successful, the creative buck has to stop somewhere. And that, and that's essentially what we're talking about.

• 45:04Chris Ryan?

  So one of the things I wanted to do was take some of the showrunners whose series ended during, uh, whose sort of most notable series is ended during me and Andy's history of podcasting. Talk a little bit about their apprenticeship or how they came up, what they're best known for and what they've done since then, as a way of talking about how interesting it is specifically about Jesse Armstrong, but where maybe this more recent generation or more recent iteration of the showrunner is going.

• 45:31Andy Greenwald?

  Because I also think the framing is Jesse Armstrong is back a lot quicker than most people.

• 45:36Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 45:37Andy Greenwald?

  Almost outrageously quickly, because we'll talk more about it on Monday, but Mountain Head, Mountain Head was filmed two months ago and is debuting this weekend.

• 45:44Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 45:45Andy Greenwald?

  That's wild.

• 45:46Chris Ryan?

  It is incredible. And I have a lot of questions about how they were able to pull that off. But let's start with someone who I think you could associate with that golden age, who's got a show that is on a lot of people's Mount Rushmore of television series from the century, if not all time. And that's Vince Gilligan, who's best known for Breaking Bad. Now Gilligan came up through network writers' rooms and worked on X-Files, uh, and famously with a bunch of really talented writers who came out of that X-Files room. He was best known for Breaking Bad, which ended in 2013. And since then, let me just run down Vince Gilligan's post-Breaking Bad career. Battle Creek was a network kind of week to week procedural that um he was based on an old script that he wrote like 10 years prior, but David Shore, who did House, wound

• 46:31Chris Ryan?

  up actually running Battle Creek, but that got made. He wrote and directed El Camino, which was the Breaking Bad sequel film on Netflix. He worked extensively on Better Call Saul, but Peter Gold-

• 46:42Andy Greenwald?

  Was the showrunner.

• 46:43Chris Ryan?

  Was the showrunner. Um, he apparently had an unrealized or an unproduced Jim Jones series-

• 46:49Andy Greenwald?

  Kool-Aid, Kool-Aid, not-

• 46:50Chris Ryan?

  No, I mean, this is, and he was uh, was maybe going to start, he was developing it with Octavia Spencer.

• 46:55Andy Greenwald?

  Cool.

• 46:56Chris Ryan?

  And that never happened. And up next, officially, he has a untitled um, Apple series that he has described as sci-fi leaning-

• 47:05Andy Greenwald?

  Mild sci-fi, I heard the phrase.

• 47:07Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, with Ray Sehorn.

• 47:08Andy Greenwald?

  And that got a two-season order.

• 47:10Chris Ryan?

  Which is kind of par for the course from Apple, so, but I-

• 47:13Andy Greenwald?

  I think they, I think Apple gives out a lot of soft wink wink, it would be hard for us to cancel you, but rarely do shows get two seasons out the gate.

• 47:21Chris Ryan?

  Yes, and obviously Gilligan making his move, he had been, he had been with AMC, he's done stuff with Netflix. Netflix was largely responsible for, I wouldn't say largely responsible, but had a huge role in the popularization of Breaking Bad because of people being able to catch up with it on Netflix, binge it on Netflix.

• 47:39Andy Greenwald?

  Not to be that guy, like, he's still with Sony. He's always been with Sony.

• 47:43Chris Ryan?

  Correct me where I'm wrong.

• 47:44Andy Greenwald?

  So, his deal's always been with Sony TV, um, Sony made, they made the show for AMC, but because it was an independent studio, then there were some, there was some licensing in Netflix-y stuff that got involved, and then his former bosses or collaborators, honestly, because he's been doing it for so long, at Sony, uh, Zack and Jamie are the ones who run Apple TV.

• 48:03Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 48:04Andy Greenwald?

  So that felt like, I'm not saying it was collusion, but that was a natural home for his next project.

• 48:07Chris Ryan?

  Now Gilligan's an interesting uh, person just to talk about, because I think you've obviously had this experience working on Harry Potter, if you don't mind me saying so, with Francesca Gardner, who worked on Succession.

• 48:18Andy Greenwald?

  I don't mind.

• 48:19Chris Ryan?

  Gilligan's interesting because he's created his own kind of coaching tree, in the Greg Popovich sense of the word, like, people have come out of Breaking Bad, whether they've stayed in the Breaking Bad universe to some extent with Better Call Saul, like Peter Gold, or they've gone on to do other things, like more Wally Beckett, um, like Thomas Schnauz, like Sam Catlin, like-

• 48:38Andy Greenwald?

  Jennifer Hudson.

• 48:39Chris Ryan?

  And Jennifer Hudson, who've gone on to run their own shows, write on other shows, produce on other shows. Any larger thoughts that jump out about where Gilligan has gone over the course of his post Breaking Bad career?

• 48:51Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, all of it is going to be pretty 10,000 foot because we've never crossed paths with him, we've never had the chance to interview him. I think what's notable about him and about, and the next person we're going to speak about is that they are bridge creators in the sense that they worked on TV 1.0, essentially.

• 49:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 49:10Andy Greenwald?

  Vince Gilligan was himself part of Chris Carter's coaching tree on The X-Files.

• 49:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 49:14Andy Greenwald?

  He spent time as like the hot, young movie writer. Remember, he wrote that movie Home Fries with Luke Wilson and Drew Barrymore in the early part of his career. He did a lot of kind of like work-a-day scripted stuff. Often when you approach, we have the opportunity to create TV, having created TV, it also means you have experienced how you would like this to go. And by all accounts, he is a very genial guy and a good boss and a good collaborator, and he's kept his collaborators close. You know, given them opportunities to have their own, run their own thing like, like Peter Gould, but you know, kept one foot in it. And it has, I think the real test is forthcoming. Like, big picture, by the way, I want to be clear, and we're going to talk about this

• 49:59Andy Greenwald?

  when we talk about Weiner 2. It, I want to, you weren't doing this, but it's not like, when we talk about television creators and their work, it's not like we would talk about musicians being like, well, they had two good albums, then they had a bad album, you know, or then they never lived up to the albums. Breaking Bad and its attendant shows is almost two decades of professional work. And it's exceptional and enormous, and even getting to make a show half as good at that is incredibly, incredibly rare. So for anything, so when we talk about like the Vince Gilligan sci-fi show that's coming up, we're going to take it on its own merits, but it's also, it's like, we're not going to be mad at Paul McCartney for being in Wings.

• 50:38Chris Ryan?

  Well, this is why I wanted to bring up Gilligan first, not only chronologically, but also because of the idea that you can do two things if you've got this.

• 50:49Chris Ryan?

  Some people would call it an albatross, some people would call it a trophy, but when you have a trophy show that you probably will be in the first line, first paragraph of your obituary.

• 50:57Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 50:58Chris Ryan?

  You can either run away from it and say, I'm gonna do something completely different. It's completely divorced from that.

• 51:04Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 51:04Chris Ryan?

  Or you can kind of lean into it. And I think Gilligan has very, very expertly leaned into it by not only supporting other people as they played around in the sandbox and Better Call Saul at times and maybe with history will look back and say, it might even be better than Breaking Bad in some ways. It's a different show, but it is like a huge accomplishment. He also did El Camino, so obviously there is a, an attachment to this story and these characters that it took him a while to kind of flush out of the system.

• 51:35Andy Greenwald?

  There's also something to be said, and I just said, let's not use music analogies, but now I'm going to.

• 51:40Chris Ryan?

  Please.

• 51:40Andy Greenwald?

  There are artists, who are some of our favorite artists, who only make one kind of music.

• 51:44Chris Ryan?

  Absolutely.

• 51:44Andy Greenwald?

  And they do it their entire career. And so I don't know why this is, like, when Kurt Vile makes a new record, I'm not checking it for trip hop beats. I'm like, he made another Kurt Vile record and no one makes them as good as he does. And I do think there's something-

• 51:55Chris Ryan?

  I always love reading Mogwai reviews and Pitchfork because it's like, everyone is 7.6.

• 51:59Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, because they make, they, they know what they do and they mine the same furrow. And I do think that there is an element of self-knowledge and humility within great artistry to know what you're good at and know what you enjoy doing.

• 52:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 52:12Andy Greenwald?

  And continuing to work within that rather than saying, because you can then stumble into mistakes and we'll get to a few from, you can, you can do it two ways. You can, you can, you can stumble into a mistake from ambition and ego, or you can stumble into it from just testing your limits.

• 52:28Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 52:29Andy Greenwald?

  You know, and there's a very different spirit and flavor to those kinds of missteps, I think.

• 52:32Chris Ryan?

  Well-

• 52:33Andy Greenwald?

  But Gilligan, Gilligan is one of the greats, I think, for his consistency.

• 52:37Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and I think what Armstrong does with Mountain Head, you'll see, is, um-

• 52:44Chris Ryan?

  Right within the language of Succession without writing about, without writing an episode of Succession or Succession movie.

• 52:50Andy Greenwald?

  Cause it's the way he writes. You know, I, you don't, I think, I think we often, we overpraise diversity of ability rather than like exceptionalism or specialization.

• 53:03Chris Ryan?

  Sure. Yeah. I mean, like, I kind of feel that way about Sorkin is when people are like, well, he's written that scene 100 times, or he's written that line in different ways 50 times. I'm like, it's a pretty good line.

• 53:11Andy Greenwald?

  It's pretty good.

• 53:12Chris Ryan?

  Uh, let's talk a little bit about Matthew Weiner.

• 53:14Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 53:16Chris Ryan?

  So he came up also through network writer rooms, uh, worked on Becker, worked on The Naked Truth, the Taileoni.

• 53:22Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 53:23Chris Ryan?

  Smash. Obviously is best known for Mad Men. Uh, it ended in 2015 and it's worth noting.

• 53:30Andy Greenwald?

  It's just the 10 year anniversary.

• 53:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, that's right. Uh, I feel like during COVID and post-COVID, there was another batch of, I've re-watched Mad Men and it in fact is the best show ever made.

• 53:42Andy Greenwald?

  There's an argument.

• 53:43Chris Ryan?

  Um, since then, he wrote a feature film towards the end of Mad Men and directed it called Are You Here?, which was roundly rejected. Uh, he did The Romanoffs, which was an anthology series for Amazon Prime during their, we just give people money to do whatever they want. And that was also more or less roundly rejected.

• 54:02Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 54:03Chris Ryan?

  He also, uh, had some problems off, like extra professional problems or problems related to alleged, uh, professional behavior. Um, and then he has pretty much been out of the mix.

• 54:18Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, there was an FX thing maybe that we heard about.

• 54:20Chris Ryan?

  Yes. There were some. A dramedy with a tinge of mystery that was being developed in 2020 something.

• 54:26Andy Greenwald?

  Went away.

• 54:28Chris Ryan?

  And I cannot confirm this, but I read that he was being paid to develop a, uh, a series based on the Nicole Kidman thriller Dead Calm.

• 54:38Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm.

• 54:39Chris Ryan?

  So I don't know if that's true. I don't.

• 54:41Andy Greenwald?

  One, one safe rule of thumb in this town, all caps this town. Everyone on this list is being paid handsomely to develop something right now.

• 54:49Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 54:49Andy Greenwald?

  No one is, no one is taking a few to find themselves.

• 54:52Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 54:52Andy Greenwald?

  Everyone's working. It's just a question of what stage of work it is.

• 54:55Chris Ryan?

  Uh, I didn't have any like lessons from Matthew Weiner's career other than treat people decently, but like.

• 55:03Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 55:03Chris Ryan?

  You know, I mean, he obviously is chiefly responsible for one of the greatest shows to ever be on screen and also.

• 55:12Chris Ryan?

  You know, I think got a little lost in his own sauce on Romanoff's.

• 55:16Andy Greenwald?

  For sure.

• 55:17Chris Ryan?

  I don't know what, putting aside like his personal issues, I don't know what, like, what do you think? I guess he's also older because he'd been working in, you know, in television for a while. But I don't know what really to take from him. I just thought it was noteworthy that this is someone who had, was arguably at the sort of like the pinnacle of the medium and is now no longer really working.

• 55:40Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, he's two years older than Vince Gillian.

• 55:43Chris Ryan?

  Oh, okay.

• 55:43Andy Greenwald?

  He's fifty-nine. He, it's funny, like, most people don't even get to make a masterpiece. Most people don't even make, don't even get to make something that is good or beloved. He made something that is in the conversation for the greatest show of all time.

• 56:02Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 56:02Andy Greenwald?

  He's good, you know, in terms of like legacy. And again, I don't fault people for maybe not being able to do it again. Or have a second incredibly brilliant, profound thing to say. I think it's interesting to compare him to David Chase, his mentor, and sometimes like, you know, Bett Noir in terms of like the way he, that's what the money is foreseen is famously inspired by his, in that, in that scene in Weiner's psychology, he's Peggy and David Chase is Don Draper.

• 56:36Andy Greenwald?

  David Chase made The Sopranos and will be remembered forever for it. He also made it closer to the end of his career. He was in his 50s, I think, when that actually happened. And he had spent a career being very, very, very successful by all television at that time standards and by any like financial metric that anyone would want to use in America, but he was miserable.

• 56:56Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 56:56Andy Greenwald?

  He made his masterpiece and it's treated differently from Weiner's masterpiece because of where it fell in his life cycle and in his CV.

• 57:04Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 57:04Andy Greenwald?

  You know what I mean? So I think the only other thing to take away from this is one, fifty-nine is, you know, as long as he's not drinking Aquafina, I think he's going to be fine for a long time. And he still could come back. He still could have more to say.

• 57:17Andy Greenwald?

  TV is not an easy medium to be like, you know, I got a crazy little notion here. I'm just going to rip it off. If you was writing books in a solitary conceit, he could write a weird book of short stories, get it out of his system, and then write another novel over 10 years.

• 57:30Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 57:30Andy Greenwald?

  A lot of things have to have fallen into place to give him the opportunity to drive the car again, to get onto the road. But that said, it is noteworthy, and maybe it speaks to some of the interpersonal stuff, that some of the people we're going to talk about have found ways to continue to feel, to spark joy.

• 57:46Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 57:47Andy Greenwald?

  By collaborating.

• 57:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 57:48Andy Greenwald?

  Once they've said their mission, you know, they've made their master's.

• 57:51Chris Ryan?

  And that man is arguably the most complete and colorful and deep television experience I've ever had.

• 58:01Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 58:01Chris Ryan?

  So it's kind of like being like, hey Chuck Yeager, like, what else did you do besides break the sound barrier?

• 58:05Andy Greenwald?

  And by the way, just to reiterate the conceit here, we're not talking about Chase because we didn't cover The Sopranos.

• 58:10Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 58:10Andy Greenwald?

  On the podcast.

• 58:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, this isn't like, who are the best showrunners ever?

• 58:13Andy Greenwald?

  No, we're not talking about The Wire because that ended before we started podcasting.

• 58:16Chris Ryan?

  Next up, I have Mike Schur.

• 58:18Andy Greenwald?

  He's been on the podcast.

• 58:20Chris Ryan?

  He has been on the podcast, and he came up through SNL, The Office, as a comedy writer. He worked with Greg Daniels, so he was under, all these people kind of apprenticed under someone else and then kind of graduated. Mike Schur is best known as the co-creator and writer of Parks and Recreation, and then the creator and showrunner of The Good Place, both of which ended over the last, you know, 10 years. Since then, he's co-created Brooklyn Nine-Nine, co-wrote an episode of Black Bear, co-created Rutherford Falls, worked on a scrapped Field of Dreams series for Peacock, which I still want to see.

• 58:54Andy Greenwald?

  He still wants to make it. He's still bitter about it.

• 58:56Chris Ryan?

  Helped produce Hacks, helped produce our buddy Shay Serrano's Primo, produced or worked as a producer on Aziz Ansari's Master of None, and he now works on A Man on the Inside, which he created for Netflix, and...

• 59:10Andy Greenwald?

  And he's doing a new Amy Poehler show called Dig, a news broken on The Good Hang with Kay McMillan podcast, I believe.

• 59:17Chris Ryan?

  And what's, do we know what Dig's about?

• 59:19Andy Greenwald?

  I believe archaeologists, it's based on a conceit? I don't know, I don't want to speak to it. Kay could.

• 59:25Speaker 04

  I think it's about a group of female archaeologists doing a dig in Greece.

• 59:30Chris Ryan?

  Oh, wow. How fun is that?

• 59:34Andy Greenwald?

  Mike, so Mike is a great, I mean, he's a great guy. He's also a great example of a different conception of the role, and maybe it's partly because it's comedy, but he has a really, really robust coaching tree.

• 59:46Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 59:47Andy Greenwald?

  People seem to come out of the experience working for him, feeling empowered and excited, and then he often helps people achieve what they're doing next, whether it's Aziz Ansari, who was on the cast of Parks and Rec, who wants to make a show and does it through Mike's banner. Jen Statsky, one of the co-creators of Hacks, worked on Good Place. You know, there are a lot of other great veterans of the shows.

• 1:00:08Chris Ryan?

  I mean, like a lot of, you know, Stupinski and...

• 1:00:13Andy Greenwald?

  Well, they were on The Office.

• 1:00:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, no, I'm just saying, like, they just, like, the surrounding word cloud of all the people.

• 1:00:18Andy Greenwald?

  We already said Joe Mandi, he was on the staff of Parks and Rec. And I think, in that sense, it is a both old fashioned, that he just keeps working and giving people opportunities. And, you know, whether it's not his passion project, he makes space for other people to have their passion projects. And, look, a lot of people, those of us who've done a lot of therapy know that a lot of what your identity and ultimately ends up being is parental modeling. And I think that maybe there's a professional corollary here, too. He came on, he went from SNL, which is a fierce but deeply collaborative kind of place, to The Office, where, you know, we heard Mike talk about this on Amy Fuller's

• 1:01:02Andy Greenwald?

  podcast, about what kind of collaborator Greg Daniels was, and who he invited into his circle to be, to have a stake in the show they were making, people like Mindy Kaling, BJ Novak. And so he has tried to pay that forward with co-creation and executive producing. And that's a very, I think, psychologically and professionally healthy way to be.

• 1:01:23Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, the, the reason why I threw Mike in here, aside from the fact that I wanted to have someone who's largely known for comedies, is...

• 1:01:33Chris Ryan?

  Where I feel like Jesse Armstrong looks into the human heart and sees cobwebs.

• 1:01:39Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:40Chris Ryan?

  Mike Schur ultimately sees like a tender, beating organ and

• 1:01:44Andy Greenwald?

  Very sweet.

• 1:01:45Chris Ryan?

  Uh, I think even at this point, like his shows have gotten, I wouldn't say saccharine, increasingly sweeter, you know, the, the Ted Danson show is almost too sweet for the way I like my coffee.

• 1:01:57Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:57Chris Ryan?

  Um, but I, I admire how he takes a sensibility and a worldview and translates it into these different stories. And he seems like he is very good at balancing ideas with real nuts and bolts. Like here's how you make an episode of TV. Here's how you make a season of TV.

• 1:02:14Andy Greenwald?

  And I think he was uniquely qualified to, to shepherd television comedy into this current more serialized era.

• 1:02:23Chris Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:02:23Andy Greenwald?

  Um, it really struck me when rewatching Parks and Rec and rewatching The Good Place with my daughters that like, these shows really relate to younger audiences, not just because they're incredibly sweet, incredibly funny, but because they move.

• 1:02:35Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:35Andy Greenwald?

  And as someone who grew up, I mean, he says his favorite show of all time is Cheers. Cheers did not move. There was a, there was a fight with Gary's Bar every year and otherwise, and Carla was married to someone else. Otherwise that was basically the show for eight or nine years. Right? Um, those shows were really, really relished in changing the status quo and moving forward in a, it does, it's not a rhythm that matches serialized dramas, but at least can be considered in the same breadth as. And I think that, I think he deserves a lot of credit for that.

• 1:03:04Chris Ryan?

  Uh, should we do Damon?

• 1:03:05Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah. Damon is interesting too. Do you want to run through it?

• 1:03:07Chris Ryan?

  Let's do Damon Lindelof, who came up also through network television, uh, working on a variety of shows like Nash Bridges.

• 1:03:12Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:13Chris Ryan?

  He is obviously best known for Lost, but for the purposes of me and Andy's relationship to his work, I think almost even though you started out recapping Lost for Vulture, right?

• 1:03:23Andy Greenwald?

  No, I never did Lost.

• 1:03:24Chris Ryan?

  Oh, you never did Lost?

• 1:03:25Andy Greenwald?

  I think it was done. Maybe I did the end. I don't remember.

• 1:03:28Chris Ryan?

  Oh, I thought that you wrote, I thought that was like one of your like

• 1:03:31Andy Greenwald?

  No, I would just call you and read you Jeff Jensen's recaps in a really excited way.

• 1:03:35Chris Ryan?

  But for our purposes, we're talking a little bit about his work on The Leftovers, which ended in 2017. And since then, he has created The Watchmen, which is also one of the great shows that we've gotten the privilege to talk about over the last decade and a half. Um, he wrote a horror movie called The Hunt, which was Famously, the, I can't remember what, it was like the last movie before COVID or the movie that, I can't remember like-

• 1:03:58Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, it fell apart because of COVID, right?

• 1:04:00Chris Ryan?

  No, I mean-

• 1:04:00Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, it was released in theaters, I mean, right, but then it was held-

• 1:04:02Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, it was, yes, yeah, it was held. Um, he wrote an unproduced Star Wars movie.

• 1:04:07Andy Greenwald?

  He sure did. It was gonna be awesome.

• 1:04:09Chris Ryan?

  And he is the executive producer and a writer on the upcoming Lantern series, which we're both very excited about on HBO. And executive produced and co-created and wrote on the Peacock series Mrs. Davis, but he did not showrun that.

• 1:04:22Andy Greenwald?

  So the way you just described The Hunt and COVID is often, I think, the way that Damon feels internally about his role as showrunner, because he, along with his partner on Lost Carlton Cuse, were kind of the first celebrity showrunners. They-

• 1:04:36Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:36Andy Greenwald?

  Maybe more than anyone else helped popularize the term, not by anything they did, but because it was thrown around a lot when they were on, being interviewed on Jimmy Kimmel and people were waiting with bated breath for their next comments on, you know, who was in the hatch or whatever. So he, you know, in ways that I think have, were, and continue to be deeply uncomfortable for him, he became the face of an amorphous being known as the story of a show and its relationship with its fans. Um, so he really rode that roller coaster for, for a long time. He's also been quite upfront with us personally, with us on the podcast, with many others when he does interviews, about how the job is fucking hard-

• 1:05:12Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:12Andy Greenwald?

  And takes up so much of your life and how much of your energy, how much of your life, how much of your stress do you want to give over to it? So, um, I, I, you know, it's no surprise that I think we both feel this way, that I'm like, you're, you're good. Your Cooperstown plaque is, is already made-

• 1:05:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:29Andy Greenwald?

  Um, to have made not just Lost, but also The Leftovers and Watchmen, um, you're good. Uh, I think it's really interesting and maybe in, in, uh, has some harmony with Mike Schur, and I know those two know each other and are friendly, um, that Damon seems excited about a phase of his career where he can pay it forward and work with people. Mrs. Davis was a series that was very intentionally, he was a co-creator of. Um, the Star Wars movie was very intentionally a co-write with, um, the great Justin Brit, uh, Gibson. And, um-

• 1:06:03Andy Greenwald?

  His MO now seems to be like, I want to work with people. And by the way, on a personal level, I think it's great for him. I also think it's a very smart and savvy way to be alive in the industry as it is now. Because it's not just that like, we reject the auteur theory. The model of every three years, I shall move heaven and earth to make my vision is really, really hard to do in a lot of ways. Not just like stressful, like it's incredibly hard.

• 1:06:26Chris Ryan?

  Well, I mean, part of the reason why it's, this is such a fascinating list is how few people are actually doing this anymore.

• 1:06:31Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:32Chris Ryan?

  Now, Damon.

• 1:06:32Andy Greenwald?

  It's too, it's too punishing, maybe.

• 1:06:34Chris Ryan?

  I think it's really.

• 1:06:35Andy Greenwald?

  To get the boulder up the hill.

• 1:06:36Chris Ryan?

  One of the things that I didn't really mention when I was sort of setting up a brief history of showrunning over the last 15 years was the moment where we thought all the great film directors in the world were just gonna make six to 10 hour series all the time. And so you had Carrie Fukunaga and David Fincher and Steven Soderbergh making these kind of masterful, beautiful, visually provocative series. And that's fucking hard, dog. Like, it's hard for them to do that. You know, I think Soderbergh would have kept doing the Nick if he could do anything he wanted with the Nick.

• 1:07:08Andy Greenwald?

  Sure.

• 1:07:09Chris Ryan?

  Uh, he was also in talks to give the Nick to anyone else, like who he, you know, possibly Barry Jenkins, that where he was like, we're gonna try and think of a new way of doing the show.

• 1:07:18Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:07:19Chris Ryan?

  Um, but I do find it interesting that Damon famously does not go to set, correct?

• 1:07:25Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:26Chris Ryan?

  And Tony Gilroy did not go to set.

• 1:07:28Andy Greenwald?

  No.

• 1:07:28Chris Ryan?

  He's like, I'd just be a pain in the ass there. Um, I think he was like, we get everything so ready and then we say to the directors, you guys do the coverage you want to do. Like, we don't, you know.

• 1:07:39Andy Greenwald?

  And then you give me the pieces and I'll put it together.

• 1:07:42Chris Ryan?

  So it's interesting to see Jesse Armstrong directing Mountain Head. Now, uh, one of the fascinating elements of it is that it does have aspects of succession visual language.

• 1:07:52Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:53Chris Ryan?

  Um, and Mark Milat is a executive producer on the show, but it's very curious to me, I would love to ask Jesse about like, how much of succession is visually also Jesse's idea?

• 1:08:02Andy Greenwald?

  Well, I think that's a, that's a good question to ask him. I think that what, one thing you do see about showrunners and their relationship to the job is it does make them have a different kind of reckoning with what level of control they need or want. There is 100% a successful avenue for showrunners who are like, I run everything, then I get to set and someone else is nominally in charge, even though I can tell them to do another, you know, to do it again, to get more. And that's a silly barrier because I know everything about this and I want to get involved in it. And you know Vince Gilligan started directing on Breaking Bad and then directed the El Camino movie and is a director now.

• 1:08:42Andy Greenwald?

  There are a bunch of people on this list who've gone down that path.

• 1:08:43Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, we're gonna get into some people who have come from the world of director, writer, become more maybe writers.

• 1:08:49Andy Greenwald?

  And Jesse too. Jesse's like, I know what this is, so I'm gonna do it.

• 1:08:52Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:54Andy Greenwald?

  And you know, and I want to be clear, that is not necessarily an ego, an act of ego. Like usually people who are good collaborators remain good collaborators even when they're directors. They say to their director of photography, you know, let's talk about this. And there's plenty of good examples of that. But there is another school of people who are just like, that's just not for me. Like let the people who are trained to do that, do that and then I'll pick up the pieces.

• 1:09:19Chris Ryan?

  Can I ask you a question that you don't have to answer if you don't want to? But is it hard being in the middle?

• 1:09:24Andy Greenwald?

  No, see, I mean, yeah.

• 1:09:26Chris Ryan?

  Is it hard being the person who's like, this is, like I'm running the show and I wrote a lot of this and this is my idea. But I'm also okay with this director here telling, saying like, let's do it this way.

• 1:09:36Andy Greenwald?

  There are many different types of directors and there are many different types of experiences. I have no desire on any level of my body to direct anything ever, ever. And I know you, like you did student film stuff, like I think you like direction and there are people who like that. I don't think visually in that way and it's a lot of work, like with the scouting and everything. And I would rather leave that to professionals if anyone would even ask me to do it, which for the record, I'm not saying that they had. I'm not interested. Thank you.

• 1:10:02Chris Ryan?

  We should definitely clip that.

• 1:10:05Andy Greenwald?

  I'm always trying to be careful that I'm not acting as if that this is some like noble decision that I'm making here.

• 1:10:12Andy Greenwald?

  I found it in the same way that I found it just truly inspiring to work with writers who have a completely different brain than I have or customers or gaffers who do things that I could never do. Working with collaborative directors who make it a conversation, who help me see things their way. And then you work together in a really interesting symbiotic way is beautiful. And then there are times when there are directors who are like, this is how I do it. And you're like, you've given me, you've given me ashes. In the sense that you're making it hard, you are being so decisive and distinctive, but you're not thinking about, and this is a challenge for episodic directors generally, how do we fit this into a diorama that you don't even see the whole picture of? And that is something, and again, to be fair,

• 1:10:53Andy Greenwald?

  any director of any ability or ambition who works in episodic TV finds this maddening. That they come in with a style already established and then have to do a relay race handoff to someone that they may never even meet? That's asking a lot. And so it's hard for them to find their voice within that structure.

• 1:11:13Chris Ryan?

  The next person coming up is I wanted to talk about because this was sort of, she embodies the larger-than-life showrunner to me in some ways. And the showrunner as avatar for everything that people feel about their work, they project onto her, and that's Lena Dunham. So she obviously came up through independent cinema, part of like the, you know, unofficially mumblecore scene in New York City, like hipster art world of that.

• 1:11:40Andy Greenwald?

  You were in that world, weren't you?

• 1:11:41Chris Ryan?

  I absolutely was. I still mumble. And is best known for Girls, which also ended in 2017. And since then, she's split with her creative partner on Girls, Jenny Connor, but Camping was sort of the last thing to come out that had both their names, I believe. Camping was not a success. She appeared in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, directed the first episode of Industry, which I love. Features still one of my favorite moments in the series is the end of Industry, Episode One. And she also directed the films Sharp Stick and Catherine Called Birdie. I bring her up not only because she ran shit for a while there, like and basically lived rent-free in everyone's head for five years,

• 1:12:23Chris Ryan?

  but also because she has a new Netflix series coming out this summer called Too Much, which is her first series basically since Girls.

• 1:12:32Chris Ryan?

  This was a weird time where everybody was like Lena Dunham, I want to be you, but I also hate you. And obviously that level of passion, I think she would say did a number on her. And she spent a lot of the intervening years grappling with different ways to sort of relate to and reject the discourse around her, her work, girls. What are your kind of current thoughts on her?

• 1:12:59Andy Greenwald?

  I think she's an amazing person to have up in this, to have in this exercise because like we were saying about where, where David Chase's big success fell in his career.

• 1:13:08Andy Greenwald?

  And how that affects our perception of them. I mean Lena Dunham's whole thing was that she was younger than everybody. And this was incredible. She had this opportunity and she was the, the V of her G, as they say in adults premiere. And as you have been saying recently, because I think you've done some rewatching, like Girls is, is, is still a little bit him, right?

• 1:13:25Chris Ryan?

  Girls, Girls is goaded.

• 1:13:26Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:27Chris Ryan?

  It's so good.

• 1:13:28Andy Greenwald?

  It's really, really good. It's really, really funny. I loved revisiting it for Stick the Landing last year.

• 1:13:32Chris Ryan?

  With us then, right, Kaia?

• 1:13:34Speaker 04

  Yeah, I put Girls on my best of the decade list.

• 1:13:37Chris Ryan?

  Were you with us at the end of Girls?

• 1:13:39Andy Greenwald?

  When the show ended?

• 1:13:40Chris Ryan?

  I don't.

• 1:13:40Speaker 04

  No, I don't, I don't think so.

• 1:13:43Andy Greenwald?

  But the point being, if done right, you know, and you drink the right water, life is long.

• 1:13:50Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:50Andy Greenwald?

  And careers can be long. And I think what's remarkable about, you know, she did lots of work that, you know, you just mentioned over the last few years, but she just had her 39th birthday last week. Like she's still younger than a lot of these creators were when they had their first success.

• 1:14:04Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:05Andy Greenwald?

  So to come back with a show that is clearly a priority for her and a passion project for her on Netflix, at the same moment when we're also hearing like, oh, she's directing a new Natalie Portman movie.

• 1:14:16Andy Greenwald?

  I, I, I am a fan of second acts.

• 1:14:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:20Andy Greenwald?

  You know, because I think that if done right, a creative life has many, many acts in it. It's not just, and it's not even just two. So I think it's, I think it's cool. I think it's exciting and I am also very curious what's. Her second act looks like in the sense of is it just it's probably more likely to be she will come back and hit things when she wants to hit them and work on what she wants to work on. It's less like community building of like minded artists who she's empowering, which is fine.

• 1:14:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:48Andy Greenwald?

  Not everyone is wired that way. Some, you know, being both an artist and a manager, uh, sometimes those two things don't exist in the same brain.

• 1:14:55Chris Ryan?

  It's.

• 1:14:56Andy Greenwald?

  It's rare when they do.

• 1:14:57Chris Ryan?

  I was thinking about like the sort of reception of Girls when it was on and it was obviously, I think for as passionately as it was discussed and in times negatively, it was beloved when it was first on. And then I think people started to reject where the characters wound up because it those charac- like basically saw where those characters ended up as a rejection of who they were as audience members, you know, because they identified so closely with various members of the cast.

• 1:15:27Andy Greenwald?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:15:28Chris Ryan?

  Um, so it'll be fascinating to see her, uh, reengage with that. And I don't know, maybe that time of watching TV and, and sort of identifying a central kind of creative force behind shows.

• 1:15:41Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 1:15:41Chris Ryan?

  And be like, I can't believe you did this, you know?

• 1:15:44Andy Greenwald?

  But I think the difference is, and we haven't, you haven't watched too much yet, have you?

• 1:15:47Chris Ryan?

  I have not.

• 1:15:48Andy Greenwald?

  The new series, um, Girls, what's interesting, and I'm not saying this would have been better, but if Girls was released into this moment, the audience would have been more primed for it being a very particular passion project of someone that maybe would only go three years and those three years might take six years.

• 1:16:04Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:04Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, Girls was delivered into an ecosystem that frankly, you and I both miss of you're going to hit your release date every year for as long as the show is on the air. And some of the show's, um, loudest or messiest growing pains were probably because of that expectation and schedule. You know, I think some of the show's weakest moments were when it was just literally reacting to the reviews of the previous season. Like when, when Donald Glover, who might be on our list, shows up in like season two premiere, I believe. But then also the fact that that collaboration first, you know, when it was going with Jenny Connor was so fruitful because I think that it was a really exciting marriage between people who had very, very different visions of how to cultivate art.

• 1:16:42Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:43Andy Greenwald?

  Deliver on it. So we don't know, but I do think she's more attuned to this current moment. The moment has met her.

• 1:16:51Chris Ryan?

  Why don't we skip to an end with Donald Glover? Because I had a couple of other people here like Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Benioff and Weiss. We can talk about them next week or we can do this again sometime, but I wanted to do Glover.

• 1:17:01Andy Greenwald?

  Before we do, the only thing I wanted to, and I'm sorry, and I know that we're doing it because we're running out of time here, but like the Benioff and Weiss. I'm always pausing so people don't think we're talking about Benjamin Off and Weiss.

• 1:17:13Andy Greenwald?

  The exact, because they went from Game of Thrones to, you know, the rumors of Confederate, right? To Three Body Problem, which I, you know, kind of controversially liked.

• 1:17:24Chris Ryan?

  With a Star Wars trilogy deal in between.

• 1:17:25Andy Greenwald?

  In between. That there is a, in terms of hangovers from previous generations of showrunning and the industry. I think there is a curse of too muchness and a curse of success. Benioff in particular, great writer and, you know, we love his novel City of Thieves. He loves it. He won't let it be optioned because he wants to make it someday himself. He has yet to do that because he's too busy satisfying the demands of these nine-figure massive genre deals that he keeps signing.

• 1:17:54Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:54Andy Greenwald?

  Because that is what people expect of them. And I have to think that at some point.

• 1:18:01Andy Greenwald?

  The two of them turn to each other and they're like, remember that indie film we used to talk about making? Do you know what I mean?

• 1:18:06Chris Ryan?

  I'm sure, yeah.

• 1:18:06Andy Greenwald?

  Like, I'm not begrudging them, their success, their ambitions, certainly their income, but it is. I do wonder if when Three Body Problem wraps up, which is sooner than I think anyone intended for it to wrap up. You know, it seemed like it was going to be pitched as like the next decade long obsession. And now they're like, can we do this in seven episodes, two seasons?

• 1:18:23Chris Ryan?

  That kid's brain coming back from space.

• 1:18:25Andy Greenwald?

  Can we, can we, can we, it's too late to send a return descender order on that?

• 1:18:29Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:31Andy Greenwald?

  That in the midst of all of it, they, you know, that maybe they would kind of like to. Regroup.

• 1:18:38Chris Ryan?

  Make 25th hour, yeah.

• 1:18:39Andy Greenwald?

  Regroup, reframe, right?

• 1:18:41Chris Ryan?

  Um, Glover, let's just do briefly because I do want to talk about one element of this. So obviously Glover comes up through comedy and sketch and sitcoms, working on 30 Rock, uh, and then going on to be one of the ensemble and community, learns under Dan Harmon, et cetera, et cetera, makes Atlanta, Atlanta's fucking incredible and ends in 2022, is one of the most creatively boundary pushing series that we've gotten a chance to talk about, even when we didn't quite, even when we weren't quite singing from the same hymn book, I think we always were like, this guy is really like on his own journey.

• 1:19:13Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, it was one of one, and I think we settled maybe too much at the time. I don't think that show was under any obligation to meet our standards.

• 1:19:20Chris Ryan?

  No, of course not, yeah.

• 1:19:21Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, even if we didn't like this third season as much as the fourth or whatever.

• 1:19:23Chris Ryan?

  Since then, he's co-created Mr. and Mrs. Smith, uh, with Francesca Sloan and, um, he co-created or created Swarm.

• 1:19:30Andy Greenwald?

  EP'd.

• 1:19:31Chris Ryan?

  EP'd Swarm with Janine Neighbors and, and so he's like, he's in Mr. and Mrs. Smith. The thing I wanted to mention about Glover, I think this kind of follows Donald Glover around in his music career and his film appearances and especially in his television, uh, show running or creator life is, um, it's almost like what Benny Off and Weiss carry around, but it's to some extent, it's a good place to end because it's about what Jesse Armstrong will probably come around, carry around, which is Donald Glover has to be cool. Like, he always has to be cool.

• 1:20:06Andy Greenwald?

  I like that.

• 1:20:06Chris Ryan?

  And Jesse Armstrong is kind of probably always going to have to be funny. Um, I don't know what I would have thought of a Jesse Armstrong movie or television show that didn't make me laugh. Not to say I wouldn't like it.

• 1:20:20Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:21Chris Ryan?

  But it would be almost breathtaking to see Donald Glover do something about like super normal people, you know?

• 1:20:28Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:28Chris Ryan?

  And even in the world of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, which of course in the Doug Liman movie version of it, they're dressed well and they're sexy and all that, but the extraordinary lengths he goes to, to have this impeccably interior design.

• 1:20:41Andy Greenwald?

  White sweater, yeah.

• 1:20:41Chris Ryan?

  His, the costumes, like everything about it is so fucking cool. And I was wondering whether or not like that can sort of be great because like maybe it's effortless and maybe everything he does has got this kind of magic dust on it and the same, same thing can go for Jesse and he's always going to be him when he writes and it's going to be funny. But it's probably a lot to carry around as you get older.

• 1:21:04Andy Greenwald?

  I think this is a good place to wrap it up because what we're speaking to is an odd thing to say about writers. Actors always have to manage their brand as well as their

• 1:21:16Chris Ryan?

  Their appearance, yeah.

• 1:21:17Andy Greenwald?

  Their talent. And also have to have an almost disturbing, honestly, self-awareness of what people like in them, what they're looking for in them, what puts them in the right light, not always the most attractive light if they want to like go a-go to get an Oscar or whatever, but like understanding their instrument in a way, you know, and keeping time to that rhythm as much as to their own internal creative metronome. And I think that writers, being anonymous and, you know, often a-gos, don't have to self-manage to that degree and can have a little bit more creative freedom and hide behind the words and hide behind the page. The rise of the celebrity showrunner has meant a different level of expectation. That there is a more plugged-in creative class of

• 1:22:02Andy Greenwald?

  audience who do say, you know, like we're talking about Department Q. There might be people and probably a lot of people on Netflix around the world saying, oh, a Scandinoir, I'll watch it. But then there are people who are like Scott Frank.

• 1:22:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:13Andy Greenwald?

  He did these three things that were mattered to me and I'm expecting a certain level of something and so I'm going to look at it through that lens. Damon, next time he comes on, maybe we'll talk about it, but the like his personal taste lends itself towards, you know, twisty storytelling. But he carries with him the self-knowledge that people are checking every little, uh, every little road to make sure it's not a cul-de-sac to nowhere or like a rabbit hole that someone's going to fall into. And that's like, that creates, does create a second consciousness, I think, for people when the creative decisions they make behind the camera.

• 1:22:45Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I think it'll be really interesting to see if he makes another series, you know.

• 1:22:49Andy Greenwald?

  Jesse.

• 1:22:49Chris Ryan?

  No, Donald Glover.

• 1:22:50Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:22:51Chris Ryan?

  Um, or whether or not he moves more into features or starts to indulge more in acting or kind of just keeps going with this like, I'll get something started with my name, but it's really somebody else's project or whatever.

• 1:23:01Andy Greenwald?

  I think the other lesson here that we'll carry into Monday is when we go through these people and we talk about hits and misses or like long gaps to reinvent themselves, hitting when the iron is actually still super hot. Does seem smart.

• 1:23:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:15Andy Greenwald?

  I don't think any one of the people we mentioned came back as quickly as Jesse is doing, other than maybe with the exception of Better Call Saul coming pretty quickly on the heels of Breaking Bad. And maybe there's a comparison to be made there. This is what I'm good at. I'm comfortable with who I am.

• 1:23:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. These are the kind of people I want to write about. These issues still matter to me.

• 1:23:34Andy Greenwald?

  Here's some more. And if, and if, it's not just that if Mountain Head was, you know, five years from now, maybe if it was under a normal post-production cycle and it was a year from now, maybe people will be like, oh, he's still doing this?

• 1:23:47Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:48Andy Greenwald?

  I think it was smart to read the room and to read the politics and be like, I actually still have something to say. And while the microphone is still plugged in, I'm going to grab it.

• 1:23:55Chris Ryan?

  Well, we're going to talk about Mountain Head on Monday. We'll also talk about Department Q. We will be back on Monday. It's been a while since we actually hit a Monday show. Thanks to Kai and thanks to John for producing. Thanks to everybody for listening. We'll see you next week.

• 1:24:06Andy Greenwald?

  Let's go get some lidocaine patches.