Latest / Revisionist History / I Am Superman with Patty Jenkins | Development Hell

Transcript

I Am Superman with Patty Jenkins | Development Hell · Revisionist History

0:15
Speaker 1: Pushkin. You called it a fairy tale? Yeah, do you have?
0:23
Speaker 1: Is there a fairy tale that you were inspired by?
0:27
Speaker 1: Which fairy tale is this?
0:29
Speaker 2: I don't know if there's one. I think it's so
0:32
Speaker 2: the opening, the opening of the movie is and this
0:35
Speaker 2: will just tell you the tone. There's a voice over
0:36
Speaker 2: throughout the movie, and the opening shot is you're pushing
0:41
Speaker 2: in on this kennel in the middle of nowhere, and
0:45
Speaker 2: it's out in the field, and it's like there once was,
0:48
Speaker 2: you know, an animal named Bandit, and the Bandit used
0:52
Speaker 2: to have had dreams of blah blah blah, blah blah.
0:54
Speaker 2: And you're pushing in, pushing in, pushing in, until you
0:56
Speaker 2: get to this pit bull sitting at the center, and
0:58
Speaker 2: it's a thing of fighting pipules. And he named himself
1:02
Speaker 2: Bandit because and you see a flash of a little
1:05
Speaker 2: boy that the dog had seen from his kennel far
1:07
Speaker 2: far away, playing with his puppy, named Bandit, and Bandit
1:10
Speaker 2: had dreams of one day being that dog, and he
1:13
Speaker 2: hoped that one day someone would give him a chance
1:15
Speaker 2: and believe in him. And this dog trainer comes, the
1:18
Speaker 2: fighting trainer and takes band It out, and he's like
1:20
Speaker 2: come on, get out of here. And he's pushing, dragging
1:22
Speaker 2: him along, and then he's like, but that's many, many
1:24
Speaker 2: years ago, and Bandit suddenly turns around and just fucking
1:27
Speaker 2: launches it as trainer and kills the dude. And at
1:32
Speaker 2: this point in Bandit's life, all Bandit ever wanted was
1:36
Speaker 2: just revenge, you know, like just bloody revenge for the
1:39
Speaker 2: life that he's lived. I'm not remembering it verbat him.
1:41
Speaker 2: It was a long time ago, but it's like and
1:43
Speaker 2: all he wanted was just one shot, just to get
1:45
Speaker 2: paidback and nothing more. And then you just push in
1:48
Speaker 2: on him and he's just got blood down his neck.
1:58
Speaker 1: Welcome to Development Hell, our mini series about the movies
2:02
Speaker 1: that Hollywood never made. This episode is about a film
2:07
Speaker 1: starring a dog, I Misunderstood Dog, that the filmmaker Patty
2:11
Speaker 1: Jenkins wanted to make. You've heard of her, I'm sure
2:15
Speaker 1: her debut feature was A Monster, an incredible portrait of
2:19
Speaker 1: Eileen Warenose, a prostitute who killed seven of her clients.
2:23
Speaker 1: Jenkins wrote and directed Monster Charlie's Throne, took the lead
2:27
Speaker 1: role and went on to win the Best Actress Oscar
2:30
Speaker 1: for it. Patty Jenkins next tour of force, directing the
2:34
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen version of A Wonder Woman. The movie was
2:37
Speaker 1: a hit with critics and made more than one hundred
2:40
Speaker 1: million dollars in its opening weekend. But somewhere between those
2:45
Speaker 1: two hits, Patty Jenkins had the idea of telling a
2:48
Speaker 1: different kind of story.
2:55
Speaker 2: So I became aware of these dog prison programs and
3:00
Speaker 2: started to really research them and watch them and came
3:03
Speaker 2: up with this story, which is kind of a fairy
3:06
Speaker 2: tale that takes place in a dog program where the
3:10
Speaker 2: lead characters are the dog. And my ambition was to
3:14
Speaker 2: make a rated R dog movie where I wanted the
3:18
Speaker 2: dog to give a performance so good they discussed whether
3:22
Speaker 2: to give it an oscar. You know, that was my
3:24
Speaker 2: whole goal, But there was a heavy there's a serious
3:28
Speaker 2: tour de force role for a man.
3:31
Speaker 1: So far in development. Hell, we've only told stories about
3:35
Speaker 1: men and the movies they haven't made. This is our
3:38
Speaker 1: first story involving a woman. It's not for lack of trying.
3:42
Speaker 1: We made call after call. We recorded a truly fantastic
3:45
Speaker 1: episode with a prominent female screenwriter, and then she asked
3:49
Speaker 1: us not to run it. With good reason. Her movie
3:52
Speaker 1: never got made because she ran into a male director
3:55
Speaker 1: who didn't get the most beautiful and brilliant part of
3:57
Speaker 1: her script, and she didn't want to out him, not
4:00
Speaker 1: if she wanted to keep working as a screenwriter. And
4:03
Speaker 1: she's right. Women in Hollywood play by a very different
4:07
Speaker 1: set of rules than men. They don't have the same freedom,
4:10
Speaker 1: and more specifically, they're not allowed to tell the same
4:12
Speaker 1: kinds of stories, which was the brick wall that Patty
4:16
Speaker 1: Jenkins ran into with her fairy tale about a misunderstood
4:20
Speaker 1: pitbull named Bandit.
4:26
Speaker 2: This is a bad dog, right for sure. You end
4:29
Speaker 2: up realizing as the story goes by, these trainers beat
4:32
Speaker 2: the shit out of these dogs, they abuse them, and
4:34
Speaker 2: so yeah, every once in a while they're going to
4:36
Speaker 2: turn on and kill somebody. And that's life, you know.
4:38
Speaker 2: I obviously, having made Monster, have sympathy for why people
4:41
Speaker 2: do the things that they do and interest in why
4:44
Speaker 2: they do the things that they do. But I think
4:47
Speaker 2: that's also what the core of the story is. By
4:49
Speaker 2: the end of the movie, you've seen that bann It
4:51
Speaker 2: is this wonderful dog if someone had just given him
4:53
Speaker 2: a chance to prove what he's capable of doing.
4:56
Speaker 1: Patty, Patty hold on, yeahackup dog prisons. So tell me
5:00
Speaker 1: the story, Tell me the story, and tell me what
5:03
Speaker 1: a dog prison is.
5:04
Speaker 2: So there are these programs throughout the country where they
5:07
Speaker 2: put dogs, unadoptable dogs in with inmates and they have
5:12
Speaker 2: those inmates rehabilitate the dogs. And what's an incredible thing
5:16
Speaker 2: about it is that the closer you get to studying
5:20
Speaker 2: why and what's happening in these prison programs, you realize
5:23
Speaker 2: and this is very much what the movie was about,
5:26
Speaker 2: that you're talking about a population of people that no
5:28
Speaker 2: one gives a second chance to. And this will come
5:32
Speaker 2: back around to because it's, ironically, I think, related to
5:35
Speaker 2: why I could not get the movie made. Everybody wants
5:38
Speaker 2: to believe that these are bad guys, they're only interested
5:40
Speaker 2: in having them suffer and pay their dues. But the
5:43
Speaker 2: truth is that the closer you get to prison, the
5:45
Speaker 2: more you realize that prisons are mostly full of just
5:49
Speaker 2: poor people. The prisons are full of guys who have changed,
5:53
Speaker 2: never were that bad, have been in since Juvie, and
5:56
Speaker 2: there's no way out. So the incredible thing about these
5:59
Speaker 2: dog programs is that they you're looking at a population
6:04
Speaker 2: of people that nobody is interested in anything other than
6:06
Speaker 2: having them pay their dues and then in these animals
6:10
Speaker 2: that don't see them that way and need them to
6:13
Speaker 2: be their hero, and the men just come alive. So
6:17
Speaker 2: you're using their time to do this incredible thing and
6:22
Speaker 2: it ends up being an absolutely stunning program where the
6:28
Speaker 2: inmates that end up being enrolled in this have their
6:30
Speaker 2: acidivism rate drops to almost zero. And that's what the
6:34
Speaker 2: movie was called. I Am Superman. The guy who gets
6:37
Speaker 2: paired with this dog names him Superman.
6:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, So what is the what's the can you
6:43
Speaker 1: can you be more specific about the emotional journey of
6:45
Speaker 1: the actor in this.
6:47
Speaker 2: The emotional journey of the actor is is the last
6:51
Speaker 2: vestige of hope that they can get out and that
6:54
Speaker 2: they can have their life changed, and it's crushed when
6:58
Speaker 2: the prison shuts down the dog program and sends the
7:01
Speaker 2: dog away to be put down and all hell breaks loose.
7:04
Speaker 2: The journey of the actor is very much the journey
7:08
Speaker 2: that I've seen happen with any guys in prison, which
7:10
Speaker 2: is like, oh, I got tricked into thinking that I
7:12
Speaker 2: could get a ged and I could go and change
7:14
Speaker 2: my life, But the truth is no, because even when
7:16
Speaker 2: you get out, nobody's really going to hire you. They're
7:19
Speaker 2: not going to give you a chance. They're not going
7:21
Speaker 2: to ever believe that you're different. They're only going to
7:23
Speaker 2: be interested in the tough guy that you were. And
7:25
Speaker 2: so what are you gonna do. You're gonna become a
7:26
Speaker 2: criminal again, because it's at least there's some integrity of
7:29
Speaker 2: being a bad guy, you know, like there's no integrity
7:32
Speaker 2: of being a loser. And so it's that's his journey,
7:36
Speaker 2: and it ends up going differently than that in the end,
7:38
Speaker 2: but only by a miracle. And so the movie was
7:42
Speaker 2: a fairy tale about a single dog, and the dog's
7:46
Speaker 2: opening scene of the movie, the dog kills its trainer.
7:49
Speaker 2: It's like sitting on top of him with blood dripping
7:51
Speaker 2: down its mouth. It's a fighting pit bull, and he
7:54
Speaker 2: gets put in a shelter and is supposed to be
7:57
Speaker 2: put down. But this dog gets accidentally put in the
8:00
Speaker 2: program and the inmate that gets paired with him has
8:04
Speaker 2: just been brought back into prison after being he had
8:08
Speaker 2: just and he's been accused of another crime. But because
8:13
Speaker 2: he had had, you know, had been a good history
8:17
Speaker 2: when he was in prison before, they let him get
8:19
Speaker 2: into this program. But he hates dogs, and so it's
8:23
Speaker 2: the story of this this terrible pit bull supposedly and
8:27
Speaker 2: this terrible man who are paired together, who actually hate
8:30
Speaker 2: each other, who have to go through this program together.
8:33
Speaker 2: And I can't tell you the whole story because I
8:35
Speaker 2: still may make this movie and I don't want everybody
8:38
Speaker 2: to know everything. But the truth is it doesn't go
8:41
Speaker 2: the way you think. It's not a touchy feeling. I'm
8:43
Speaker 2: not interested in just straightforward issue movies. So this is
8:49
Speaker 2: this is very much a fairy tale, and the story
8:52
Speaker 2: goes slightly differently than you think it would, but but
8:55
Speaker 2: it's wonderful.
8:56
Speaker 1: Can you give us one tiny little hint of a
8:59
Speaker 1: little direction that it goes in.
9:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, you would, one would assume, and will assume that
9:03
Speaker 2: it is that the man and the dog change each other. Yeah,
9:08
Speaker 2: they do start to change each other. But then the
9:11
Speaker 2: entire program is sabotaged by the prison and by the
9:14
Speaker 2: administration and by the corruption, which is exactly what really
9:18
Speaker 2: is going on in these prison situations, and things turn
9:23
Speaker 2: out very very differently, like a bunch of different people
9:25
Speaker 2: go a different way.
9:27
Speaker 1: Who do we root for more by the end, the
9:29
Speaker 1: dog or both?
9:32
Speaker 2: I mean, you really get to know them both and
9:34
Speaker 2: you understand. You end up understanding how misunderstood they are
9:39
Speaker 2: completely and how disinterested in anybody is in what's really
9:44
Speaker 2: their story, except they figure out what's up with each other,
9:47
Speaker 2: but nobody else cares or is open to it.
9:51
Speaker 1: This is this sort of on one level, is super bleak.
9:57
Speaker 2: It's not. It's magical, No, it is. It is. The
10:00
Speaker 2: journey is bleak, and it seems like it's going to be,
10:02
Speaker 2: but it ends up being magical, and I love the
10:05
Speaker 2: ending and it's wonderful, but really it's it it. You'd
10:10
Speaker 2: like to think that, you know, there are these great
10:12
Speaker 2: programs and that they're changing people, and so of course
10:14
Speaker 2: we're going to continue to do them, But not only
10:18
Speaker 2: does that not happen, but then it goes a very
10:21
Speaker 2: different way, and that goes to the point of why
10:23
Speaker 2: I think no one ever made the movie, because the
10:27
Speaker 2: movie is all about the main character is already changed.
10:31
Speaker 2: He's already a changed guy, and so it really ends
10:36
Speaker 2: up being about the corruption that surrounds these guys, where
10:38
Speaker 2: even if you've changed and you've become a better person,
10:41
Speaker 2: or you've never really done anything, there's no way out
10:43
Speaker 2: because everybody's only interested in seeing you as the tattoos
10:46
Speaker 2: that you have and the history.
10:49
Speaker 1: After the break, Patty and I talk more about dogs
10:52
Speaker 1: and development. Hell, we're back with Patty Jenkins. Are you
11:06
Speaker 1: a dog person?
11:08
Speaker 2: It's not a dog person, fanatical dog person. I love dogs.
11:13
Speaker 1: What kind of dog do you have?
11:14
Speaker 2: I have a pit bull and I have a French bulldog. Yeah,
11:17
Speaker 2: but I've had pit bulls my whole life.
11:20
Speaker 1: Did you grow up with dogs as a kid sort of?
11:23
Speaker 2: I mean I yes, I was always my mom didn't
11:25
Speaker 2: want us to have a dog, but I was always
11:28
Speaker 2: finding a way to get dogs, and so yeah, I
11:30
Speaker 2: had different dogs. And also my grandparents lived in Mississippi
11:33
Speaker 2: when I was young, and so I would spend every
11:37
Speaker 2: summer down there with them in Mississippi, and there were
11:40
Speaker 2: like twenty thirty pitples there. And this is kind of
11:43
Speaker 2: before pitbulls had this bad reputation. And so I grew
11:46
Speaker 2: up around pit bulls and I understand them and know
11:50
Speaker 2: them and love them and think that they're so smart
11:52
Speaker 2: and interesting. And so that's another thing.
11:55
Speaker 1: An incredibly steadfast dog.
11:59
Speaker 2: Unbelievably, And by the way, it's not to say that
12:02
Speaker 2: there aren't some people breeding hyper aggressive ones. I've always
12:06
Speaker 2: I've never been the person who says, oh, they're just
12:08
Speaker 2: like any other dog. Dangerous dogs, you need to know
12:11
Speaker 2: what you're dealing with. If it does bite somebody, it
12:14
Speaker 2: can do a lot of damage. They're not very likely
12:16
Speaker 2: to bite somebody, and they are incredibly smart and independent
12:20
Speaker 2: and emotional dogs, one of the most intelligent breeds.
12:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, so how do you first of all, when you
12:26
Speaker 1: conceive of a movie that hasn't both you know whose
12:32
Speaker 1: principal characters are a person and an animal? What challenges
12:36
Speaker 1: does the Does the dog present huge challenge?
12:40
Speaker 2: I mean chalge? So this is part of what I
12:43
Speaker 2: was so excited and interested about. My goal was to
12:47
Speaker 2: get an honest performance out of a pitbull. They are
12:49
Speaker 2: incredibly emotive dogs and so you can just read what's
12:53
Speaker 2: going on on their face. So that got me really
12:56
Speaker 2: interested in how do we do this, not just having
12:59
Speaker 2: a trainer, you know, be over here. Really what it
13:02
Speaker 2: was going to come down to was putting the actor
13:05
Speaker 2: in the zelle with the dog and actually trying to
13:07
Speaker 2: elicit that real perform it's out of the dog with
13:10
Speaker 2: almost no crew around. I was always when we would
13:13
Speaker 2: talk about budget, I was saying, I want to get
13:15
Speaker 2: the tiniest crew, but I want to shoot a lot
13:19
Speaker 2: of days, and so it was just going to be
13:21
Speaker 2: slow to try to wait until you get that right
13:25
Speaker 2: expression out of the dog and elicit that actual performance
13:29
Speaker 2: from the dog.
13:30
Speaker 1: And so what are you looking for from the dog specifically?
13:33
Speaker 2: It depends, So it's a whole you know, it's a
13:35
Speaker 2: whole story. So you would need the dog to dislike
13:39
Speaker 2: the guy and be hostile. You'd need the dog to
13:42
Speaker 2: become curious and interested but apprehensive, and then the dog
13:46
Speaker 2: to you know, start to fall in love with the guy.
13:49
Speaker 2: You need the dog to all kinds of things. He
13:52
Speaker 2: has to have a moment where he flips out and
13:55
Speaker 2: so so you would need everything. And that was going
13:58
Speaker 2: to be kind of the sport of it.
14:00
Speaker 1: But the whole time that you're trying to elicit a
14:02
Speaker 1: natural performance from the dog, the dog is aware that
14:05
Speaker 1: there's someone with a camera.
14:07
Speaker 2: Maybe maybe not. So if you hid enough cameras around
14:10
Speaker 2: and laughs, you know, like the way that they do
14:13
Speaker 2: like reality shows where their cameras mounted all over the
14:16
Speaker 2: car and you know, or comedians in cars with coffee
14:19
Speaker 2: or like whatever, you can hide different cameras. I would
14:22
Speaker 2: shoot it differently than all of my other films, because
14:24
Speaker 2: everything else I've done, I've done on film, and you know,
14:28
Speaker 2: it's a very big, big production. This I would actually
14:32
Speaker 2: be open to shooting digitally for this very reason, just
14:35
Speaker 2: so that I could get cameras everywhere. The addition, the
14:38
Speaker 2: other thing I wanted to do was I wanted to
14:39
Speaker 2: shoot it in a real prison with inmates as part
14:42
Speaker 2: part of the crew. There are a couple of prisons
14:45
Speaker 2: that have like two different They have a very busy prison,
14:49
Speaker 2: but they also have like a closed down section of
14:52
Speaker 2: the prison nearby, And so I was working on that
14:55
Speaker 2: idea as well. Where you know, just the same way
14:58
Speaker 2: you would run a dog program, you run a very
15:00
Speaker 2: you know the yard where the kind of vetted inmates are.
15:06
Speaker 2: You have them come and be trained to work as
15:08
Speaker 2: crew on the film. The problem is it, you know,
15:11
Speaker 2: it becomes a little tough if there's lockdowns and things
15:14
Speaker 2: like that, and that happens all the time. But this
15:16
Speaker 2: was all gonna you know, I was going to try
15:17
Speaker 2: to figure out how much of it I could do
15:19
Speaker 2: that way.
15:19
Speaker 1: And what about the actor.
15:22
Speaker 2: The actor would have to be on board in a
15:24
Speaker 2: in a different it would be a ride. It would
15:26
Speaker 2: be like a journey. You and that actor would be
15:28
Speaker 2: on a ride trying to figure out how to do
15:30
Speaker 2: this film together and try to figure out how. They'd
15:33
Speaker 2: have to love dogs. They'd have to be interested in
15:36
Speaker 2: the endeavor and it would be you know, interesting to
15:40
Speaker 2: find out how it went. You'd have to be learning
15:42
Speaker 2: the dog as you went.
15:44
Speaker 1: But it's not just have to love dogs. It's that
15:46
Speaker 1: you're also acting. So in the first part of the relationship,
15:49
Speaker 1: you have to act that you don't love dogs.
15:52
Speaker 2: M So again, that would go into camera work. When
15:56
Speaker 2: I've worked with kids before, you sometimes have moments where
15:59
Speaker 2: the actor is directing the kid off camera. I've had
16:03
Speaker 2: one where this act, this adult actress was was Geene
16:07
Speaker 2: Tripplehorn was acting out for the child what the child
16:11
Speaker 2: should do. It was wonderful because we couldn't get the
16:14
Speaker 2: kid to totally do it. So, you know, there are
16:16
Speaker 2: many ways to get you know, you might be having
16:19
Speaker 2: to do something strange to the dog to get the
16:21
Speaker 2: dog to react strangely, you're not doing your part.
16:24
Speaker 1: Oh I see. Yeah, So before we even get to
16:27
Speaker 1: the studio, you've got to find an actor who's willing
16:33
Speaker 1: to do something very unorthodox.
16:37
Speaker 2: I wouldn't, which I don't think would be that hard actually,
16:39
Speaker 2: because I think it's such a juicy like, it's such
16:44
Speaker 2: a juicy performance for an actor. It's such a good role.
16:47
Speaker 2: Had been talking to Ryan Gosling about it at the time,
16:50
Speaker 2: and this is way back, this is two thousand and
16:52
Speaker 2: six of two thousand and five, and then Ryan and
16:56
Speaker 2: I were going to sort of do it alternately off
16:59
Speaker 2: and on, but then he kept not being able to
17:01
Speaker 2: do it or wanting to do it because he'd wanted
17:02
Speaker 2: to go make money or various different things. When I
17:05
Speaker 2: would try to go to other actors but Ryan Gosling,
17:08
Speaker 2: I would get the same sort of thing from the guys.
17:09
Speaker 2: They wanted to be tough and scary and stab somebody
17:12
Speaker 2: in whatever, and and I thought that was such a
17:15
Speaker 2: telling thing that that that was a story people struggled
17:20
Speaker 2: to embrace, a non redemption story about prison. That was
17:24
Speaker 2: the issue I had more of. Interestingly, when I tried
17:27
Speaker 2: to make the film, even the most liberal people in
17:31
Speaker 2: Hollywood and the most issue we companies that make these
17:34
Speaker 2: films would always say, yeah, but can't he stab somebody
17:38
Speaker 2: at the beginning and be about his redemption? And I
17:40
Speaker 2: would say no, you're very much missing the point of
17:43
Speaker 2: the movie. The point of the movie is that you're
17:45
Speaker 2: romanticizing prison. If you think it's a bunch of super
17:48
Speaker 2: dangerous people in there, it's not. I've walked around the
17:51
Speaker 2: main line of Full sum you know, of some of
17:54
Speaker 2: the most dangerous prisons in the country, and I'm not
17:57
Speaker 2: fraid at all because ninety nine point nine percent of
18:02
Speaker 2: the guys are just sad. It's just a sad sack situation.
18:05
Speaker 2: It's very organized, it's just a warehouse for human beings
18:09
Speaker 2: with no way out. And that's what I found so
18:13
Speaker 2: fascinating about people not wanting to make it is that
18:15
Speaker 2: no one's interested in the story about prison not being
18:19
Speaker 2: just you know.
18:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's it's a what's fast saying about the
18:24
Speaker 1: script is you begin I mean, the very thing that
18:28
Speaker 1: makes it hard for the studio or an actor is
18:32
Speaker 1: what makes it so intriguing for an audience, because you're
18:35
Speaker 1: messing with our expectation about an animal movie. We've seen
18:39
Speaker 1: animal movies and we know how they work. Right.
18:42
Speaker 2: That's why I think it's great is because the truth
18:44
Speaker 2: is a lot of people also said to me, you
18:46
Speaker 2: can't make a rat at oar dog movie. I was like,
18:48
Speaker 2: but everybody said you couldn't make a dog movie at all,
18:50
Speaker 2: and every time they make dog movies they're huge. We
18:53
Speaker 2: love dogs, and so what are you taking. It's not
18:56
Speaker 2: like only kids like dog movies. Adults like dog movies.
18:59
Speaker 2: So yeah, you can definitely make a rat Atar dog movie.
19:01
Speaker 2: So but it's just listen. I make myself feel better
19:04
Speaker 2: by saying you can't. Both want to do things that
19:06
Speaker 2: nobody's ever seen before, and then before frustrated that nobody
19:10
Speaker 2: understands why it's going to work or why you believe
19:13
Speaker 2: in it. But this plagues me in my whole career.
19:16
Speaker 2: I've never done anything anybody thought I was going to succeed.
19:19
Speaker 2: Everybody thinks everything I do is like a wonder woman
19:21
Speaker 2: that's going to be terrible. Oh monster, that's going to
19:23
Speaker 2: be terrible. Oh the killing is going to be a
19:25
Speaker 2: bad TV whatever.
19:27
Speaker 1: When you finished the screenplay and you said, what did
19:31
Speaker 1: you say to yourself? Did you think this is a
19:33
Speaker 1: slam dunk? Someone's going to help me make this?
19:37
Speaker 2: No, but I knew how how very happy I was
19:42
Speaker 2: with it, and the people who read it had the
19:44
Speaker 2: same reaction. You know, like people would say you know
19:47
Speaker 2: that it was. I've had still people some people write
19:50
Speaker 2: me and say it's still one of their favorite screenplays
19:52
Speaker 2: they've ever read. But but I knew it was going
19:56
Speaker 2: to be a little bit hard, but I didn't And
19:59
Speaker 2: I still don't understand why no one would roll the
20:02
Speaker 2: dice on my very low budget second film, other than
20:06
Speaker 2: to speculate that the sexism that I was very very
20:09
Speaker 2: disinterested in throughout my career, but see much more clearly
20:12
Speaker 2: now wad into the fact that you know, if a
20:16
Speaker 2: guy makes an Oscar winning first film, then then you
20:22
Speaker 2: roll the dice on their second thing. Whereas throughout my
20:25
Speaker 2: career people have not been interested in or not had
20:27
Speaker 2: confidence in what I want to do. They've embraced me
20:31
Speaker 2: and wanted to hire me for what they want to do.
20:33
Speaker 2: But still to this day, like when I have my
20:37
Speaker 2: what the stories I want to tell are, people are like, ah,
20:39
Speaker 2: we've never seen that before, And I'm like, yeah, but
20:41
Speaker 2: you've never seen monster before either, Like you want to
20:44
Speaker 2: just give it a shot. So so, looking back, it
20:47
Speaker 2: took me all the way until now to be like, wait,
20:49
Speaker 2: how did nobody just say, yeah, we'll give her five
20:52
Speaker 2: million dollars to make her second movie. Different thoughts of.
20:54
Speaker 1: This is super interesting and something I've been thinking about
20:57
Speaker 1: a lot recently, which is that you're talking about sexism here.
21:02
Speaker 1: Sexism discrimination of any kind takes all kinds of different forms. Yeah,
21:07
Speaker 1: And in this case, what we're talking thing about is
21:09
Speaker 1: someone is perfectly capable of saying, you made a brilliant movie.
21:14
Speaker 1: So the sexism doesn't prevent them from seeing the genius
21:18
Speaker 1: of Monster. It prevents them from seeing that you could
21:21
Speaker 1: do it again. In other words, the way they make
21:23
Speaker 1: sense a monster is, oh, it's a one off.
21:26
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. And I also think it's that, of course,
21:30
Speaker 2: it's not anybody's fault that the industry is based on
21:34
Speaker 2: looking backwards. So if it's something this is what I
21:37
Speaker 2: think is the real gender issue, and by the way,
21:40
Speaker 2: not just gender issue. Diverse stories issue in Hollywood is
21:45
Speaker 2: you can want to invite as many people behind camera
21:48
Speaker 2: and into these positions as possible, but as long as
21:50
Speaker 2: you're still basing what can and cannot succeed on the past,
21:54
Speaker 2: you're basing it on a blueprint of a very specific voice.
21:58
Speaker 2: And so I think that when I want to tell
22:02
Speaker 2: a different maybe a guy wouldn't think of that story
22:04
Speaker 2: that I'm coming up with and maybe the way the
22:06
Speaker 2: emotions work are slightly different. Whatever, it is the combination
22:11
Speaker 2: of the fact that they haven't seen it before, and
22:13
Speaker 2: also they don't like to think of women as auteurs
22:16
Speaker 2: or artists or take it as serious, Like there's a
22:19
Speaker 2: there's a romantic desire to look at guys who do
22:23
Speaker 2: like crazy art things and be like, oh my god,
22:25
Speaker 2: they're a genius. Much less so with a woman, you know.
22:28
Speaker 2: And so I think it's like the combination of those
22:31
Speaker 2: things that make it tough.
22:34
Speaker 1: So what exactly you said a little bit? But I'm curious,
22:38
Speaker 1: So you take this script out? You want five million dollars, which,
22:42
Speaker 1: just for those of you listening in Hollywood terms, not
22:45
Speaker 1: a lot of money at all.
22:47
Speaker 2: No, I mean, everybody thought that Monster costs more than that,
22:50
Speaker 2: like they they there was a there was a big
22:52
Speaker 2: lawsuit about it, and one of the sides tried to
22:54
Speaker 2: say that it costs eleven million dollars, So that's what
22:56
Speaker 2: they thought Monster costs. It actually costs one point five
22:58
Speaker 2: But it's very that was as little money as a
23:01
Speaker 2: movie can be. Is five million? Really?
23:03
Speaker 1: And what do you so? What what exactly are you hearing?
23:06
Speaker 1: You're hearing a people want they want. First of all,
23:09
Speaker 1: they get that they want a different perspective on the prisoner.
23:13
Speaker 1: You've said that they feel more comfortable where they have
23:16
Speaker 1: a very clear redemptive narrative when it comes to the
23:20
Speaker 1: to the past. But what else, keep going? What else?
23:24
Speaker 1: What else is in their area?
23:25
Speaker 2: You know, I can only say that it was always
23:28
Speaker 2: like no, It's like even these people saying like it's great,
23:31
Speaker 2: we love the script, but it's not for us. There's
23:33
Speaker 2: always a million different reasons. It's only as the years
23:36
Speaker 2: have gone by, and my husband's always pointing it out too,
23:39
Speaker 2: that we've had this so many things that I led
23:43
Speaker 2: that or my idea like I wanted to do an
23:45
Speaker 2: MMA show called the Fight about People in the MMA world. No, no,
23:49
Speaker 2: we don't. It doesn't make sense. Then sure enough that
23:52
Speaker 2: goes on and becomes huge. It's like I when I
23:55
Speaker 2: go and pitch things that I want to do and
23:58
Speaker 2: what my ideas are, so often it's been met with
24:02
Speaker 2: with like no, but we'd love you to do this
24:05
Speaker 2: hooker with a heart of gold script or this you
24:07
Speaker 2: know other thing. And I'm so grateful to have been
24:10
Speaker 2: embraced to do other people's things, but there is something
24:13
Speaker 2: about it, and so yeah, it's always something different. I
24:17
Speaker 2: don't think that they're ever even aware of it, but
24:19
Speaker 2: I do think that there's something about confidence and excitement
24:25
Speaker 2: in in in women's artistry that is slightly less, you know,
24:34
Speaker 2: they're they're less confident in.
24:36
Speaker 1: That's my well, that's my that's my point. There's a
24:39
Speaker 1: a much more constricted view of of your talent. It's
24:45
Speaker 1: like you're this desire to see to if you can
24:49
Speaker 1: explain away a big success by saying it was like
24:53
Speaker 1: a like a a, it was an anomaly.
24:56
Speaker 2: And by the way, it's always miss I feel it's
24:59
Speaker 2: always misunderstood as well. I remember people saying to me
25:03
Speaker 2: when I made Monster. The one studio executive actually said
25:06
Speaker 2: to me she came into the editing and she actually
25:09
Speaker 2: watched a part of it, and she goes, sweetheart, no
25:13
Speaker 2: one wants to see a film like this. Oh, no,
25:17
Speaker 2: one wants to see a movie like this. And she
25:20
Speaker 2: wrote me an email saying like, oh, you're a great kid.
25:23
Speaker 2: I know you're gonna make it one day. I'm just
25:25
Speaker 2: really too bad.
25:26
Speaker 1: You know.
25:26
Speaker 2: And this is before, of course the movie comes out
25:28
Speaker 2: and ends up, you know, succeeding and making eighty something
25:31
Speaker 2: million dollars by the way, and then I would hear
25:35
Speaker 2: everybody saying like, oh, do you have any more female
25:37
Speaker 2: serial killer things? And you're like, that's the take home lesson.
25:41
Speaker 2: The take home lesson is that they want female serial killers.
25:44
Speaker 2: And the same thing I felt with Wonder Woman. I
25:46
Speaker 2: felt like Wonder Woman was there was just so much
25:50
Speaker 2: emphasis on gender where it was like, Oh, everybody wants
25:53
Speaker 2: to see a woman directing a woman's story. I'm like,
25:56
Speaker 2: is that it It's not because of the movie. It's
25:58
Speaker 2: not the hero's journey, it's not you know. It's like
26:01
Speaker 2: and then there are a hundred women get women action
26:04
Speaker 2: things made on the It's like it's always it's the
26:07
Speaker 2: wrong lesson. But but I think in the there's so
26:12
Speaker 2: much focus on the woman part of it versus being like, Oh,
26:15
Speaker 2: it's a good film and it's an unorthodox film, but
26:18
Speaker 2: they pulled it off. Instead, it's just like, oh, female
26:20
Speaker 2: serial killers, that's it, That's what everybody wanted.
26:23
Speaker 1: At what point do you think it would change, Like,
26:27
Speaker 1: give me a hypothetical, what would have to happen in
26:30
Speaker 1: your career for people to say you want to do it.
26:32
Speaker 1: Given your track record, let's go for it.
26:36
Speaker 2: I mean, honestly, I don't know too many of the
26:39
Speaker 2: women I know who have had major successes are also
26:44
Speaker 2: we all behind closed doors whisper about how it sort
26:47
Speaker 2: of doesn't. I think the world is really really long
26:49
Speaker 2: way away from that. It's not going to happen in
26:52
Speaker 2: my lifetime. I think it's you know, I may find
26:54
Speaker 2: my own financing and have my own people and get
26:56
Speaker 2: my own movies made. But I think that the world
27:00
Speaker 2: is still genuinely run way behind closed doors by the
27:07
Speaker 2: same people who have a desire for the interests that
27:11
Speaker 2: they have, and no matter who they're putting on the
27:14
Speaker 2: lower levels, the mandate is still bumping up to that level.
27:17
Speaker 2: And the truth is like, we're real far from really
27:22
Speaker 2: diverse voices being understood and embraced. And it's not about
27:27
Speaker 2: money either. So that's the unfortunate thing.
27:32
Speaker 1: I'll be right back with more from Patty Jenkins. While
27:53
Speaker 1: Patty was telling me about her dog prison fairy tale,
27:56
Speaker 1: I kept thinking about what the story shares with Monster,
27:59
Speaker 1: how upbringing and events can conspire to wound people or
28:03
Speaker 1: dogs and shape what we expect from them. Monster and
28:07
Speaker 1: I am Superman both stories that ask us to look
28:10
Speaker 1: for nuance in some very dark places. Jenkins, I was thinking,
28:15
Speaker 1: seems compelled by these kinds of dark places, So I
28:19
Speaker 1: asked her about it. Where where does this come from?
28:23
Speaker 2: In you? So it's funny because I think we both
28:27
Speaker 2: have very backgrounds of a lot of exposure and travel,
28:33
Speaker 2: and I think that that's I. You know, when I
28:35
Speaker 2: was little, we moved to Vietna, to Thailand and during
28:38
Speaker 2: the Vietnam War, and then we moved.
28:40
Speaker 1: To You're an Air Force brat.
28:42
Speaker 2: Are Air Force brat? Yeah, And I think I grew
28:45
Speaker 2: up consciously or unconsciously in the shadow of the Vietnam
28:49
Speaker 2: War in Thailand, you know, with my father's people dying
28:54
Speaker 2: right and left, and the plant, you know, everything that's
28:56
Speaker 2: really going on. So I think I was I was
29:00
Speaker 2: born into the around the darkness in a familiar way.
29:07
Speaker 2: And then my own father passed away in a plane crash,
29:09
Speaker 2: and you know, all these things, and I lived all
29:12
Speaker 2: over the place. So then I've always never quite been
29:16
Speaker 2: one type of person. I'm not like from somewhere and
29:19
Speaker 2: like of a type, and so I've always been curious
29:22
Speaker 2: in all types of people and what's going on with you,
29:25
Speaker 2: and I'm not daunted by the darkness, and as a result,
29:29
Speaker 2: I ended up making friends with all kinds of people
29:31
Speaker 2: my whole life. Like I've been friends with definitely people
29:35
Speaker 2: who have done some terrible things and ended up in prison.
29:37
Speaker 2: And as much as I've been friends with, you know,
29:41
Speaker 2: upper class socialites or whatever, I've known all kinds of people.
29:44
Speaker 2: But I think that the people who end up living
29:49
Speaker 2: some of the most dangerous lives have I have a
29:51
Speaker 2: real soft spot for because I've watched them turn into
29:56
Speaker 2: those people and seen how how misunderstood they are and
30:03
Speaker 2: how easy it would be to happen to anybody should
30:06
Speaker 2: they were. They the ones that went through that journey.
30:09
Speaker 2: So it's just it's not my only as you can see,
30:12
Speaker 2: like wonder Woman is also my interest, you know, like
30:15
Speaker 2: I have Arrested development is also my interest. I have
30:17
Speaker 2: lots and lots of interests. I think the reason I
30:20
Speaker 2: like such diverse work myself is because because of what
30:25
Speaker 2: I just said, I'm not one type of person. I've
30:27
Speaker 2: had to learn how to live in different circumstances at
30:29
Speaker 2: different times. But this issue, these issues definitely are near
30:34
Speaker 2: and dear to my heart. And also I think the
30:37
Speaker 2: most misunderstood because people have so little access to understanding
30:42
Speaker 2: these stories.
30:44
Speaker 1: How old were you when your dad died?
30:46
Speaker 2: Seven?
30:47
Speaker 1: Oh? Wow? I always think about you know. In one
30:52
Speaker 1: of my books, I had a whole section on what
30:55
Speaker 1: the I think does all this work on what happens
30:59
Speaker 1: to people when they lose a parent at a young age.
31:03
Speaker 1: And it's this incredible study that was done in England
31:07
Speaker 1: of extraordinarily high percentage of high achieving people lost a
31:13
Speaker 1: parent in youth. And wow. The argument is that it
31:18
Speaker 1: has one of two effects. You know, it's like, you know,
31:22
Speaker 1: it's a Nietzschean thing. It either crushes you or it
31:25
Speaker 1: makes you stronger. You've gone through just about the most
31:30
Speaker 1: horrendous thing that can happen to a child, and if
31:33
Speaker 1: you can emerge from the other side of that, you're
31:36
Speaker 1: kind of toughened in some way. I'm just I'm just
31:40
Speaker 1: using by how drawn you are to investigating this kind
31:46
Speaker 1: of darkness and finding some some value in it. Mm hmm.
31:53
Speaker 1: I think that that's or some understanding.
31:54
Speaker 2: Well said, that's well said understanding. I think it was.
31:58
Speaker 2: It's interesting to look back on this and how first
32:02
Speaker 2: of all, it was the definitive event in my life
32:05
Speaker 2: was my father dying. It was had a huge, huge
32:09
Speaker 2: on everything after, particularly in my youth. I think it
32:13
Speaker 2: was funny and watching Anatomy of a Fall this last year,
32:16
Speaker 2: what I thought was so interesting that and illuminating to
32:19
Speaker 2: me was how condescending everyone is to the child about
32:22
Speaker 2: their understanding of what's going on. And that really rang
32:27
Speaker 2: true to me, where I think that a lot of people,
32:31
Speaker 2: even at our age, don't necessarily know how bad bad
32:34
Speaker 2: can be, Like they just don't know they haven't been
32:37
Speaker 2: close to it, to the worst possible thing that could
32:39
Speaker 2: ever happen to you happening. And when it happens to
32:44
Speaker 2: you as a child, you're obsessed with your parents at
32:46
Speaker 2: seven years old, you are in love with them. And
32:48
Speaker 2: my father was like such a heroic figure, like taking
32:51
Speaker 2: off on his motorcycle every day and then flying off
32:53
Speaker 2: in his F four. You know, it's like he was
32:55
Speaker 2: like a superhero in my life. So to have that
32:59
Speaker 2: happen and then tell me you'll never see him again,
33:02
Speaker 2: like it was such exquisite revealing of how bad the
33:08
Speaker 2: world can be. And now when I look back, I'm like, oh, yeah,
33:12
Speaker 2: people are saying to you, like, oh, every cloud has
33:14
Speaker 2: a silver lining and all these things, and you're like,
33:17
Speaker 2: I want to die, Like you're done, it's your suicidal, really,
33:19
Speaker 2: your your interest in this place is over. And I
33:22
Speaker 2: only now realize that looking back, I'm like, oh, all
33:26
Speaker 2: of these words, and how I was probably being viewed
33:28
Speaker 2: as a seven year old is she'll forget him, she'll
33:32
Speaker 2: get over him, she'll and you're like, dude, I can't.
33:35
Speaker 2: I don't want to be here where that can happen
33:38
Speaker 2: at any moment. I don't trust any of this now,
33:42
Speaker 2: And so I think that it's it's a very interesting
33:46
Speaker 2: thing that you do have to kind of toughen yourself
33:49
Speaker 2: and learn how to exist in that world where you
33:53
Speaker 2: know that that can. And I still really struggle with it.
33:55
Speaker 2: I really struggle with it as it relates to my child,
33:58
Speaker 2: where I'm like it with the knowing how bad bad
34:02
Speaker 2: can be, like knowing that we all feel like it's
34:05
Speaker 2: not going to be us and it can't really happen,
34:07
Speaker 2: but it really could, you know, and it happen at
34:09
Speaker 2: any moment, and there's nothing you can do about it,
34:11
Speaker 2: you know. Interestingly, I don't think I would be the
34:14
Speaker 2: director I am if my father hadn't died and then
34:17
Speaker 2: I think monster I made literally directly about the death
34:19
Speaker 2: of my father. It was about like, oh, okay, cool,
34:22
Speaker 2: everything works out, everything happens, Like the voiceover in that
34:24
Speaker 2: movie is saying, everything, you know, it's all these myths
34:27
Speaker 2: that she's heard throughout her youth. If you just you know,
34:30
Speaker 2: if you just love and believe in yourself, anything can happen. Nope,
34:33
Speaker 2: not for Eileen Warnis, you know. So that it was
34:36
Speaker 2: a direct a chance for me to express how dark
34:41
Speaker 2: the world can be that people might not realize. And
34:45
Speaker 2: I think the driven part, what's interesting, don't I'd have
34:48
Speaker 2: to think about what I think it is that makes
34:49
Speaker 2: you driven. For me, I was. I was passionate to
34:53
Speaker 2: take control of the narrative. And my original reason for
34:55
Speaker 2: wanting to be a filmmaker was that I thought that
34:57
Speaker 2: the stories were always going to be terrible in real life.
35:00
Speaker 2: So I was like, so, I want to tell my story.
35:02
Speaker 2: I want to be the one who controls the story,
35:04
Speaker 2: so at least I can live a good outcome there,
35:08
Speaker 2: you know. And I turned out to be pleasantly wrong that,
35:12
Speaker 2: you know. I've lived a wonderful knock on wood life
35:14
Speaker 2: in so many ways. But yeah, I think it was
35:17
Speaker 2: like it made me very, very driven.
35:21
Speaker 1: So now you're now you want to take uh this
35:27
Speaker 1: story back out and try and maybe.
35:30
Speaker 2: I haven't decided. I haven't decided.
35:32
Speaker 1: Tell me how you would knowing what you know. By
35:37
Speaker 1: the way, what you just said is incredibly Uh, it's
35:43
Speaker 1: sort of it's it. It's it's moved. I mean, it's
35:46
Speaker 1: really moved. I mean it's incredibly kind of moving. And
35:52
Speaker 1: and honest, you why you do what you do. What's
35:58
Speaker 1: what's interesting is that what is for most of us.
36:02
Speaker 1: You know, I've had a when I was growing up
36:06
Speaker 1: as a kid, I you know, thought all the time
36:09
Speaker 1: about what it would mean if I lost one of
36:12
Speaker 1: my parents. But it was an abstract thought. For you,
36:16
Speaker 1: it's real. That's the difference. So I can't As a kid,
36:21
Speaker 1: when I thought about that, it wasn't something I could
36:24
Speaker 1: put into words. It wasn't something I could make real
36:27
Speaker 1: to anyone else. It was just a kind of It's
36:29
Speaker 1: the kind of weird kind of fantasy you have, dark
36:32
Speaker 1: fantasy you have at three in the morning, you're like,
36:33
Speaker 1: oh my god, what would happen if but you actually,
36:36
Speaker 1: by virtue of gone going through it, you knew what it.
36:41
Speaker 2: Felt like mm hmm, but yeah, because after my father died,
36:45
Speaker 2: then my sister had a like the most beautiful friend,
36:49
Speaker 2: runaway boy who came and lived with us, and I
36:52
Speaker 2: was like so in love with him. He was like
36:54
Speaker 2: three years older than us, Paul Penzini. He was like
36:56
Speaker 2: beautiful and you know, and he'd run away and was
37:00
Speaker 2: living in our house. And then he had to go
37:02
Speaker 2: visit a cousin and he got shot in the head
37:03
Speaker 2: and killed. And so I was between those two things.
37:06
Speaker 2: I was like, this place sucks, I you know. Was
37:11
Speaker 2: it made me very romantic though, like you interestingly that
37:16
Speaker 2: kind of tragedy I think, particularly for the opposite sex
37:19
Speaker 2: parent and then the opposite sex older brother figure. It
37:22
Speaker 2: made me so romantic about everything, but about like love
37:26
Speaker 2: and longing and loss. I think it's like I take
37:33
Speaker 2: for granted my familiarity with the darkness, but of course
37:37
Speaker 2: the romance of the stories I want to tell are
37:39
Speaker 2: very much born from that, And so I think I
37:45
Speaker 2: sort of thought I was this much darker, rebellious, the
37:49
Speaker 2: type of person that makes monster in my youth, and
37:52
Speaker 2: now I realize I'm not that person. I'm also the
37:55
Speaker 2: person that makes wonder woman I'm all kinds of you know,
37:57
Speaker 2: like I've grown up. I'm not just that person. But
38:00
Speaker 2: so I think that makes me look back and say, yeah,
38:02
Speaker 2: why do I have that much darkness? Oh that's interesting,
38:05
Speaker 2: let's look back. You you really don't you just you
38:07
Speaker 2: just go forward for a long long time before you say, like,
38:10
Speaker 2: how do I explain to people that I made Monster
38:12
Speaker 2: and I made wonder Woman?
38:14
Speaker 1: You know? So, if you were to take this movie
38:19
Speaker 1: back out, knowing what you know both about your the
38:25
Speaker 1: first round of attempts with it and about yourself, how
38:29
Speaker 1: would you pitch it differently?
38:33
Speaker 2: I don't think I would pitch it. First of all,
38:35
Speaker 2: I don't think I would. I think I would try
38:37
Speaker 2: to stack it up with my own financing and control
38:41
Speaker 2: because I think I made I've made my peace with
38:44
Speaker 2: the fact that it might not be the easiest thing
38:49
Speaker 2: to trust, and so you kind of need to be
38:53
Speaker 2: left alone to make it. I maybe would take it
38:55
Speaker 2: to one or two places. But I don't think I
38:57
Speaker 2: would go out, you know, with my hands out hoping
38:59
Speaker 2: that Hollywood understands this film. Now I'm playing the game
39:03
Speaker 2: in a more sophisticated way now, with age and with experience,
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Speaker 2: where you're sort of like, oh, I see what this
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Speaker 2: is and I see how it could go wrong, and
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Speaker 2: just to give this film a winning hand, I'd need
39:15
Speaker 2: the space to actually make it what it could be,
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Speaker 2: not be fielding a bunch of notes from a bunch
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Speaker 2: of people who are afraid who needed to you know who,
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Speaker 2: that they've never seen a film like this before. So
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Speaker 2: I think, yeah, it's more just about how to set
39:29
Speaker 2: yourself up to succeed.
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Speaker 1: I want to see this movie. Were you were you?
39:34
Speaker 1: Maybe well were you?
39:35
Speaker 2: Probly you'll If I don't make it, I'll come back
39:38
Speaker 2: and tell you the rest of the story.
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Speaker 1: This has been fantastic. This episode was produced by Nina
39:50
Speaker 1: Bird Lawrence with Tali Emlin and ben A Dapph Haffrey.
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Speaker 1: Editing by Sarah Nicks, original scoring by Luis Quira, Engineering
39:58
Speaker 1: by Echo Mountain. Our executive producer is Jacob Smith. I'm
40:02
Speaker 1: Malcolm Gladwell.