Episode 644: A Sit Down With Chapman & Maclain Way, Directors of "The Kings of Tupelo: A Southern Crime Saga"

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I'm Ash. And I'm Elena.
And this is Morbid. It's special Morbid.
It's a special Morbid. we have some directors on today honey we have emmy award-winning directors at that mcclain and chapman way they are brothers we have them on the show today you might know them from wild wild country or untold and perhaps now from kings of tupelo which is a three-part documentary it dropped on netflix back in

december i think it was december 11th there are probably going to be some spoilers in this episode so we definitely highly suggest that you watch it before you listen to this but and it is so good listen to it or watch it listen to it and watch it the order that we would love for you to do this in is watch it and then listen to it correct and you know what live your own life though make your own choices do what you want to do but they were great to talk to they were awesome to talk to this story has crazy details there's rice and lace letters being sent to president obama if anybody remembers that from i think 2013 yep there's a, dark conspiracy about black market body parts, severed heads in freezers. And somehow that all culminates into an Elvis impersonator's massive feud with a taekwondo instructor.
As it usually does. Yeah.
So if that doesn't entice you, I love you, but I don't know what's wrong with you. But I don't know what you like, okay? I don't know what you could possibly like.

But if that does entice you, keep listening. So before we get into the details of The Kings of Tupelo, we wanted to talk a little bit about how you guys got into filmmaking in the first place.
It's obviously something that's in your blood. So was it something that you guys were always interested in? Yeah, it's an interesting question.
I think Mac and I grew up in a family that has worked in the film industry.

Our. interested in yeah it's a it's an interesting question i think uh mac and i grew up in a family that has worked in the film industry our uh our father was a screenplay writer uh growing up and wrote screenplays for films and um we've had uncles and and to our producers and actors and things like that and so um it was kind of always around us but truthfully mac and i kind of loved sports growing up and so really we played a lot of sports and then i think as we got older and realized uh there was zero chance of us ever becoming professional athletes uh which i my my dream is still don't don't kill my fan yeah right i'm 30 i'm a 34 year old guy and it's still got a great jump shot there time.
Never give up. There's still things that.
We kind of got obsessed with music and film and the arts in high school and really kind of came to it on our own in a way. And I was kind of studying cinematography and Mac was actually studying history at the time.
And this was around 2007, 2008. And quickly realized that there was kind like kind of new ways to make documentary films like i think we kind of grew up where documentaries were kind of like the vegetables so they were like the broccoli of the entertainment industry and yes we were starting to see like more entertaining more thrilling more artful documentary filmmaking and so we kind of dove in and around 2010 and kind of have been doing it ever since.
Nice. Awesome.
So for our listeners that have not seen this specific documentary yet, Kings of Tupelo, can you give us a brief overview of what takes place and kind of what the story is all about? Because there's a lot there. Yes, I think brief is probably the most important word in that question.
So I'll do my best because it's a weird story. But story but basically in 2013 kind of one of our country's preeminent elvis impersonators had been arrested um for trying to assassinate president barack obama and had sent poison in the mail a poison called ricin just very potent dangerous rare um poison and uh basically a week later he was released from uh interrogation from prison uh and it had been announced that he had been framed by a local rival parani instructor in the town of tupelo mississippi where they're both from and so that's kind of the headline uh we flew out to tupelo mississippi, which is the birthplace of Elvis Presley in 2020.
Started meeting with a lot of the characters and kind of quickly realized that there was a whole hell of a lot more to the story than just that insane headline. So our journey began in 2020, probably, I'd say, is when we kind of started working on this full time.
You left so much chap you left out you left out that was a lot easy you said the dogs don't realize what a great job i did there i was like that was like i was like four percent of the documentary it's so wild too because if you heard that synopsis or read that synopsis on the back of like a fiction book you'd be like that's a lot like you that's crazy that's a little far-fetched it's like this is real we always say like if we like pitch this as a narrative film like no one would ever believe that's wild like no one's gonna buy that yeah that was our experience too because like we the first time we you know when you go into tupelo you fly into memphis and then it's like 90 minutes south you cross over the state border into into mississippi and like it you're not really driving to anything like you know you just kind of like go to tupelo it always felt like kind of like the town from like big fish a little bit where it's like you kind of like go off this like beaten path to this dirt road and like you see these like telephone wires with like everyone's like shoes like strung up and like no one really like leaves this town but it's like a really like cool magical place uh but it was interesting like because when we first got there there was almost the element that i was like a little nervous i would wince when i would tell people i was there because we kind of just by the by the fact that there was like seven or eight or nine or ten of us in our film crew and we have film cameras and we had like a small production van like people just notice you immediately and they ask you like what you're doing there but they're very friendly about it it's like a very like hospitable welcome and i almost like wince telling them you know like oh we're doing like the 2013 presidential assassination because it's like a small town you would think that they would like that not that that's not they wouldn't be that excited that the netflix talking and i wouldn't be doing something on that story and it felt like their reaction was like the exact exact opposite like they were so stoked that like netflix that someone was coming to town to do something like kind of involved with elvis but more on this like wackadoo crazy story with all these like really fascinating characters and it was like that almost like set the tone for the whole doc where it's like oh we can actually have like a lot of a lot of fun with this one it's it and i think we certainly did it was cool that's amazing because i would assume that you probably don't run into that a lot where people are so willing to talk to you like that and especially in a small town too yeah it's i mean like especially in la like no one wants to be on camera everyone's like very angry when they see cameras and when we got the two blow not only were they excited but there are certain characters in our story who play like the quote unquote role of the villain or the bad guy and they were like so excited by that opportunity and even relished the opportunity to be the bad guy in this story and so uh we had so much fun we quickly realized down in the south uh especially in tupelo and mississippi that they love telling stories you know they love embellishing the truth. They love heightening the truth.
They're just such larger than like characters. They're proud of their eccentricities.
And I think kind of where we're from is a little bit different. People kind of hide their quirks and their weird things.
And it was just so much fun and so refreshing to be in the South where it's really a badge of honor, your eccentricity. And we truly had a great time hanging out with these characters and then getting to film them.
That's so cool. I love the way you guys open the documentary too, where you talk about how Southern people and the South in general is just so good at storytelling.
Because immediately that documentary opens and you're like, oh, this is going to, first of all, you know, it's going to be a tale if you read the description. And then the way it starts, you're like, this is a cozy vibe.
I vibe i like this it was our uh like we always joke that that was like our version of like a legal display it was just using using like a william faulkner quote like and then steve holland who's our mississippi undertaker kind of just waxes poetic on on uh yeah exactly what chap said just like how they love to embellish stories for a good time because it was interesting like there was so much to this documentary that like i think it took a while to make it i think it took us like you know from from like real production to finishing was at least two two and a half years you know and then we had support from netflix so it's like it wasn't like we needed to like rally resources like we went at it pretty quickly. But like to investigate like all the truth claims in this documentary, like I think would have taken like 10 years to make it easily.
So there was kind of an element of like when we were down there, like within reason, I think we just tried to like ride the waves of these interviews and some of the outlandish stuff that was that was being said, said to us. So when did this story first like come across your desk, I guess I would say? Was it the presidential assassination that you heard of first or was it another element of the story? Yeah, I mean, so 2013, we just have like a very faint memory, honestly, of just the first part of the story that an Elvis impersonator had been arrested for trying to assassinate the president.
So just that headline kind of always stayed with us. And then in 2020, I kind of became fascinated with small towns and small towns that have these incredibly bizarre and human stories that maybe other people don't know.
And I was doing research and kind of stumbled across Tupelo, which is like a world unto itself. It's just filled with Elvis statues and Elvis murals.
And they're kind of like the stepbrother to Graceland and Memphis, where Elvis is really known for. And then all of a sudden, just researching Tupelo, I saw that the presidential assassination story, the two main characters lived in Tupelo.
And so then I started reading it again. Then Mac and I started researching we we flew out there in 2020 not even knowing if is it a short doc is it a feature what is it and like I said we met Paul Kevin Curtis who's the main character who was arrested initially arrested for for trying to assassinate Obama and and within 10 minutes I was like Kevin is an incredible storyteller he's an incredible character uh he's so dynamic on screen and he just has an amazing story that no one really knows about and so that was kind of the impetus that started it all that makes sense he really is such a good storyteller it was wild and I love the storyboards that you guys kind of intertwine throughout the documentary that's awesome I was gonna say that was it was the way you guys shot this that like you get that town like while you watch it like you feel that town you get that it's like this like it's over the top in like the best way like everyone is shot like so dynamically and in such like dynamic environments for who they are like you just got everybody that's really cool it was.
It's always awesome to hear. I mean, like we're less maybe like investigative documentary filmmakers

and more tried like storytelling, I think is what,

and the town of Tupelo is a character in the story.

So it was important for us that it be heightened.

We always said it kind of felt like a Tim Burton movie

or something, a little bit of an upside down world.

And it was important for us to capture that, had a little bit of ailight zone uh feel yes definitely possible very much um and so it's always really cool to hear that that stuff resonates and and comes through yeah it was interesting because even like um yeah when we went to like kevin's camper that was like we knew like this is like a really like authentic interesting place that like this that kevin lives in you know and it was not easy because we we like to shoot with three cameras for talking at interviews which is like you know you at least need two but three is just to get you like an extra angle if you want it um but it but literally like it could only like thank god chap my brother knows how to do sound because like i kind of would ask the questions chap would do sound and run one camera and then our cinematographer david bullen who just like shot so much amazing stuff in this series that just looked so good uh he was like operating two cameras at the same time just because it was it was a tight spot it was we couldn't get like everyone in there but uh but no tupelo is kind of like a little bit like one of the last documentary series we made wild wild country there's a town called antelope and like it very culturally different places but whenever you're a filmmaker and you like get into a town and you're like oh my god anywhere i point the camera it looks great like it's cool because it's real it's authentic and uh you really get those in this like small historic towns and then

tubal is cool too just because like elvis is just pervasive everywhere there's like every street corner has an elvis statue or an elvis mural or like and his like he he looks at you like everywhere you go in that town and such a vibe it is a vibe like and in a weird way like we always felt like that that was

like the subtext to the insanity

of these characters was, like, only, like, the most famous person probably of all time in Western civilization, Elvis Presley, like, came from this tiny town. and everyone here today is like in their own kind of perverse perverted but really like

interesting fantastical way is like trying to reach that level of like uh notoriety like the like illusion of brand yours are there so um you know that that was always fun to kind of play around with that stuff yeah because even when laura said there was one thing that she said where she was like every girl wanted to sleep with one of the Elvis impersonators, like growing up. Like a coming of age tale.
And I was like, absolutely. Like, of course.
Relatable. Like, whoa.
She said it's a bucket list. Yeah.
She said it like, it's just like, that's just what you do. Yeah.
I was like, damn. She's so much fun.
Laura's a great character. She was hilarious..
She was hilarious. I loved her.
Very honest and yeah.

That cracked me up when she said that

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That's BetterHelp, H-E-'s betterhelp.com slash morbid. Did I read that one of you guys used to do autopsies? Is that correct? Yeah, I was an autopsy technician.
I guess you're always an autopsy technician. I'm curious to ask you a question.
I'm curious your interpretation and take on this body parts black market conspiracy is this like it's right we were just talking about it we were America is listening all right America is listening you're about to piss off half of America and become the hero to the hat so just choose the side you want to be want to be up i'll choose i'm gonna step my toe over it's i can when he said he went like when he said he went down into the morgue and he was cleaning up and like when he said he just like opened a free a fridge to like get a doctor paper i was like from where but he was like we don't have those down there but when he said he opened it up and he saw at first he said, you know, I saw a severed head and I saw all these body parts. I was like, all right, the severed head, strange.
It probably shouldn't be there. But body parts in a freezer are very typical.
And I was like, it would freak someone. Like, you know, that you have to store them.
You're preserving them for research and for tissue sampling and for donations, anything like that. I mean, we would store entire like spinal columns in the freezer sometimes.
So it's like if you opened that, you'd be like, what? It would look like Hannibal Lecter. And this is the point.
Outsider would look strange. But for someone who has experience knows like, okay, these things get tested for diseases.
Yeah. And it looks strange because it's just by itself.
I'm is an odd question but i did i love that we're talking to like aren't the best expert on this issue on the podcast and not and not the documentary film that we made it's kind of giving me joy um but i did have a conversation with someone that also worked in i think a dental morgue is what it was called which i don't like i guess it's yeah i don't know it's like that but identify teeth and people yeah i guess so something like that was in new york city and he and he made the point but i'm curious if this was your experience where he was like my morgue was surprisingly like messier than you would think messier in terms of like bro it's grotesque it can get grotesque down there so i'm curious if that was your take or if it's like no like that's not how it's not like it doesn't get that mess so that's always it's funny because i think like the csi effect has made people think that like morgues are these like high-tech right super pristine everything is like glass yeah like yeah like and it's like we were very clean and it was cleaned every night and you know procedures were followed and like things were taken care of that way but it's a wreck i mean it's like there's because it's like a car shop or something you're gonna have it's just like so like and and things are surprisingly like not high tech like when you know i always tell people like when we you have to cut the ribs to take the chest plate off and get to everything we would use home depot hedge cutters to cut ribs it wasn't like we had a rib cutter that was that so they're like the orange handle like all right very interesting but yeah it was there was a lot of like a lot of blood smears get on things it's it's not you clean up at the end yeah somebody walks not. Yeah.
Somebody walks in there in the middle of the day, it's going to be a wreck.

The most important question I think their audiences are curious about, there are no

Dr. Peppers in the freezer.

No.

All right.

No Dr. Peppers in the freezer.

We got that one on good authority.

All right.

I can promise you that.

I love the thought of him just taking hazmat off for Dr. Pepper.

I love that so much.

That was the other thing. I was like, dear God.
What a choice. I was like, no way.
Something you touched on earlier. I do feel like Tupelo is a character.
It's almost more of a character than it is of a setting. So what was it like spending those nine months there capturing everything you did? The way kind of documentaries are made now is it's much more of like a factory machine where, you know, you're given two weeks of filming.
You have to film all of your interviews and all your B-roll in this amount of time.

And I think the one really cool thing about our partnership with Netflix is they really give us the resources and the time to go live in these places and make these documentaries. And I think when you just fly into somewhere as an outsider with cameras for 10 days and then just throw people on camera and then leave there's something like very like non-human about it i feel like you don't actually really get to know the people the way of life what they do so most importantly for us it was just about us getting to spend time with these people, have meals with these people, sit around the fire with these people, and learn how to embrace the weirdness of their lives, but also honoring the weirdness and the humanity behind it.
And so being out there for nine months, I mean, it's a cliche, but it does kind of become a big family with all the different subjects subjects and you get to know their families. And by the time you start filming, there just is an inherent trust.
We know them. They know us.
And I think it really lends towards kind of getting these more authentic and insightful looks into these characters in their lives. And like, it was so funny because like since the documentary comes out, like, yeah, there has been like a big reaction big reaction to, like, wow, these are some, like, weird characters, you know? But I was always, like, well, like, what about the two dudes from L.A.
that chose to go spend, like, 10 months, like, living? Like, that's weirder than any. And I was, like, they're weird, but, like, I think we're the weirdest of them all to be, like, a part of this.
But, no, like I said at the top, like, they were just so welcoming in a way like i literally remember the only time i think and not that like kevin or laura cared about this but it did crack me up the only time i felt like i ever put my foot in my mouth was when you call when i called someone an elvis impersonator and like i got pulled aside and was like politely but sternly told that they're called elvis tribute artists they're not people is impersonating it is more serious than i always mess that up i was never able to really commit the elvis tribute artist to to memory it's a mouthful you're like writing it on your hand in between takes it's a it's it's a wild town like it's you know we even have some sections that are a little like heavier but but that was like our experience there like kennedy who's kevin's son kind of goes on a little bit of like a monologue and it was one of the more interesting interviews that i think we did and he talks about the poverty that like he feels like he and the kids around him have have kind of lived in and it's true it's like these towns tupelo has elvis so that does go a long way in terms of like an economy and tourism and it is like a nice town but um it's an interesting experience when you start to get outside of tupelo and you start to like drive around more in the south and mississippi and you you run into areas that are time capsules from like the 1950s and as a filmmaker that's an interesting experience but as a human it's also uh it's heavy you know it's heavy to go to a town that uh literally is you know like i said is is kind of a time capsule so it's a weird amalgamation you know but like one that uh was was was poetic and very interesting definitely it's like an extended field trip to one of the coolest places. It really is.
It's a good way of putting it.

Also, I think our favorite part about being down there is people get off their phones and they talk and they hang out and they eat dinners and they cook. I think for us, being from California and growing up in Los Angeles, everyone's so tied to their computers and their phones.
And honestly, my favorite part was just like eating barbecue outside, listening to cicadas and hearing them talk about stories was like, for my soul, at least were very, very healthy and very positive. Yeah.
Just like disconnecting while reconnecting. Yeah.
100%. That end scene.
That was poetic. You know, I try.
That end scene where you guys are at the party with, what's the senator's name who opened up the documentary oh holland holland yeah yeah steve holland when you guys are sitting with him and like his family and everything and then you go to the end with kevin's family i'm like i want to go there it just feels so wholesome it really did i know it does it's like like it's uh and like again we were we were there to talk to them about a presidential assassination plot that like has that that deals with body parts that were like chopped up in a hospital and then they flew right past that they like didn't i didn't mean to cut you out chat but i do find i think i know she yelled it like it was just like there's a simplicity that is just like intoxicating which is like let's eat good food let's not judge each other let's share a bunch of weird fucking stories and let's have a good time and let's have a beer and i and let's do a lot of karaoke and sing a lot of elvis songs oh my god i it was a it was a really fun nine months for us that we spent out there you must have heard so much elvis like so much elvis music i was gonna say to say, how many facts did you learn about Elvis approximately that you did not know? It was interesting. There was a point in the documentary where I think I was like two months in at Tupelo and I was meeting a lot of people and talking about a lot of people.
And I was actually tired and exhausted with how many times this had happened with people i met where they would ask me they would talk about graceland and i would be like well and eventually i'd have to interject and say i have never been to graceland and then they would just like that was the ultimate like stop like we need to go right now to graceland so i haven't i remember like driving back to memphis which is like 90 minutes to get back to memphis uh to go to Graceland to take the tour. And, you know, Graceland's cool.
But those tours, I have to say that those tours are like three, four hours long. So it's like that.
That was like when I like I got my like Elvis education. I got my master's degree in Elvis on the Graceland tour.
But no, Elvis, like, yeah, they play as me. I mean I mean the other cool thing is like you think you go there to be like um all right like let's go to on an important day like Elvis the day Elvis died is like typically actually like the biggest celebration day or obviously a birthday is big but it's like every week there's something Elvis like oh this is the week that Elvis performed his first guitar concert at Milo Middle School like and then it's like cool we're all gonna go to mila middle school and like see the celebration so elvis is everywhere but uh it was fun i don't know chap do we learned a lot about elvis one of my favorite factoids that didn't make it in and i have no idea if it's true or not but our main character called kevin curtis is a uh uh has a a foot fetish he is he is very into into women's feet it's part of the documentary and uh i remember him telling me that he has it on good authority um that he heard it from uh family members very close to elvis that elvis as well had a foot fetish so like it was another thing that spiritually connected him to the king.
I love that. And I always found that.
It always made me laugh. And also one of my favorite images, the first time we got there, I didn't even know it was Elvis week, which is like people applied from all over the world to come.
Oh, damn. Wow.
And I remember just like walking by and like passing a man in Elvis outfit, Elvis impersonator. Then he turned the corner he's another elvis impersonator and then i turned another corner i saw like an elvis impersonator like drinking coffee and smoking a cigarette outside the coffee shop and like these images it was just such bizarre imagery and then finally mac told me that that it's elvis week and that's why there was literally hundreds of elvis impersonators just walking around the town but it was like uh it was like, I don't know if you see it being John Malkovich, but there's this scene where he walks in and it's just, it's just a restaurant full of John Malkovich.
That was, that was our experience. That's so surreal.
And it's too blundering out. What a time to arrive.
No, seriously. So setting Elvis aside for a moment and going back to the meat of the story, which of course includes Elvis.

I read that you guys typically look for three things going into filmmaking. Do you mind telling us a little bit about what they are and how they kind of applied to this story? Yeah, I think like we talked about a little bit, but we're always looking for like a strong setting, a strong location.
I think especially for me, there's so much stuff on Instagram and TikTok. and you see so many many images that when i watch a documentary i really want to travel to places i have not been and learn about them and learn about the culture so setting location is always really important to us and no better place than the birthplace of the king of rock and roll and then i think we're always looking for larger than light characters in a way.
I found when you have subjects who can be brutally open and honest about their wants, their desires, their insecurities, their failures, their accomplishments, it really allows them to hold a mirror up to the audience. And for some reason, it allows us as the audience, I think, think about our own lives and and think and what are our desires and wants and needs and having someone larger than life perform that role i've always found it makes it easier for the audience to kind of think about their own lives in a way and so we're always looking for like really interesting characters and then i think we're also always looking for incredible twists and turns and stories where you do not know where they are going next.
And there's kind of two types of documentary filmmaking. You have documentary films that are very activist driven with an important message.
And those are super important for so many reasons. I just think the only thing as an audience is you already know what the message is.
You already know who the good people are, who the bad people are.

And it's just a different viewing experience.

So for us, I think we're always looking to subvert expectations, keep the audience on their toes.

We never want the audience to think they know where the story is going next.

And so finding locations, great towns, great settings, great characters, and then a great story of twists and turns is kind of like the three things I think we're always looking for. One of my goals this year is to create a better morning routine.
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And I think you like

touched on something interesting too which it's like you know i think we're actually at like an interesting time in the world of documentaries and documentary filmmaking especially at the the major platforms where um you know i i think in the last couple years it's it's like fair to say that there is a shift toward stories that people already have some familiarity or an understanding of. And those documentaries are fascinating, too, that are on like, hey, you think you know this topic, but let me go ahead and subvert your expectations or present a little bit of a different side or something like that.
It's a little bit of a different type of documentary because those comes with its own challenges and obstacles. Over the course of Chapman and my own career, I think that we've tended to gravitate towards documentaries that most people, and by most people, I mean 90, 95% of people, if you stop them on the street and ask them about the 2013 rising presidential assassination story, they wouldn't really know what that story is.
So they're coming to it for the first time. Wild Wild Country was like that too.
Like, yes, people in Eastern Oregon certainly remember the Roshnishis if they were around and cognizant in the 80s. But for most people where I come from in Southern California, my age obviously had no recognition.
And it's interesting because I think that those stories that have the familiarity, that have a name, that have, you know, just a little bit more name recognition usually do tend to do a little bit better on these platforms. So I think that's the way that the industry is going.
But for Chap and I, that's always like a big question mark is like, do we want to make a story that people think that they know and figure out how to make it interesting from there? Or do we want to make a story that you're going to not zero familiarity with? And hopefully you're just along for the ride for all these twists and turns. You know, that's the thing, because I remember hearing, of course, about like the 2013 presidential attempted assassination.
But that was the very tip of the iceberg in this story. Everything every time I thought I knew where this story was going, it was we're going this way now yeah that's part of the fun i think or at least when i'm an audience member like that's what i enjoy i like being on the edge of my seat i like thinking that okay i know who this character is and then boom they end up turning out to be something totally different or unexpected and we're trying to i mean it can sound crude but we are trying to make entertainment people have busy lives there's a lot of things uh you can spend your time doing i think we take responsibility seriously that if someone's going to sit down and press play we feel we owe it to people to uh to really give them an experience and sometimes we do better at that than others but that's always the goal at least is uh every time every time you press play, we want to make sure you know you're going on a ride.
I think you guys are in the right mindset, though, with the way you do it, with taking a story that most people will not be familiar with. Because, I mean, personally, I love those much more because I love being able to be like, I just heard this story and none of you are going to know about it, but I need to tell you everything and And now you need to watch this.
And I think it's also, I think people are starting to have an appetite for more like original and unique content too. Like slowly, I think we're going to get there because I think people are getting sick of even like, you know, the fictionalized like narrative movies that are just kind of like being redone and it's the same thing.
And people are looking for original stories stories and original content so i think like slowly people are going to come around to realizing that like you want to learn something new like you want to go into something totally blind yeah we definitely hope so and i think i i'm the same way you are like when i see something about a story i didn't know like i'm so much more inclined to want to call it my friends or my family and talk about it and discuss it and share it. To me, that's like the best part about doing this is talking to your colleagues at work and sharing stories about what you've seen and what impacted you.
So I hope so. We love these kind of like off the beaten path weird stories.
And hopefully we'll be able to continue doing them. I you guys are kind of definitely starting to become known for the the weirder stories and just wild fascinating documentaries our mom certainly thinks so she's like oh god what's this other one now she's you want she wants us to do like a great easy like a like a cooking documentary on yeah how to make a great yeah you could but you could flip it on its head yeah discover something crazy there's knives in kitchens or anything's gonna happen oh yeah so what was different though about making this film than some others that you've made in the past i think we kind of touched on it a little bit but it it quickly became clear that it was going to be impossible to like fact check or investigate a lot of these claims you know and so in the beginning we were sitting there kind of twiddling our thumbs like what do we do here and i just think we decided early on like let's just fully embrace the madness and the mythology and the storytelling and it's such a part of the culture and these

characters like let's find a way to make that a tension point of the story um is kevin telling the truth you know he the story starts early on with him finding a severed head in in a morgue in a hospital which kind of kick-starts the whole path to the presidential assassination and so so much of it for us became

exploring the humans

inside of the story and maybe less the um actual like true crime facts if that makes sense and so i think that's what made this one a little bit more difficult to make is yeah well it's like kind of on that point like what chapman and i would like we always talked about especially with our editor neil michael john who was like a big part of our character and our producer juliana and and everyone on our team is like because we've made true crime documentaries before but we learned like conspiracy is actually like a weird cousin to true crime where it's like you can rely on facts and like motivation of individuals and like that is a part of the fun game of like who done it you know and we've made those documentaries and we love making those documentaries conspiracy is like this weird amalgamation of like well a the conspiracy itself is super confusing so you but but it needs to be like accurately or not accurate but it needs to be like comprehensible in the editing of it right like it needs to be comprehensible to like a wide audience to understand what the conspiracy is but then there's this whole side game of like yeah i mean is this conspiracy real or not and then you're like cool that's a whole nother thing that we need to like kind of dive into and like balance the scales a little bit of like maybe it's true maybe it's not um but like and then and then what was weird about this is like the whole conspiracy of kevin's conspiracy and body parts conspiracy and then like everett's conspiracy that was above kevin's conspiracy it got like called in the sense of like wait what is real and what is not and like are people even understanding what the conspiracy is so so i feel like that was the the genre of like we made kind of a weird conspiracy comedy documentary but the conspiracy was was the weird part to to figure out was certainly my experience but i didn't mean to cut you off yet but i felt like that i don't even think we succeeded at that yeah i watch it and i'm like still confused yes but the story on but i've been three years but you learn something new every time you watch it because you're like oh yeah i'm like oh maybe it doesn't make sense now after watching it a hundred times there's nothing better than a town and people with like deep deep lore that you can't verify that it's all just like hearsay 100 and it's like passed through like telephone style that was my favorite part it's like all of them would kind of share the same story but like little details would always change. There is some kernel of truth here, you know?

But, um... my favorite part is like all of them would kind of share the same story but like little details would always change and so i was like their own flair to it some kernel of truth here you know but um it gets built upon and built upon and for us that that was part of the fun and i just think the other kind of hard thing about this one was like i'm not too worried about spoilers now it's been out for a while but uh yeah it's like the first half of the documentary is kind of made to convince you that one person committed this crime.
And then there's kind of like a big rug pull and a reveal that it was possibly someone else who had framed him. And so I think we had never really seen that in a documentary before.
Like how do we convince an audience a hundred percent that this guy did it when he didn't, you know, is difficult, you know. And so that was a process that took us a while to kind of figure out.
But like I said, I think those kind of reveals and twists and turns make it more fun. So it was difficult, but I think it made it more fun.
Yeah, our producer for our show, we watched it at the same time we came into the office the next day. And we're like, we're sitting here watching this.
And you actually forget that the man who's talking most of the time you're sitting there and you're like, wait, how is he not in prison every now and again? And then you're like, OK, wait, but there's so much happening that it doesn't even matter. We'll get there.
Yeah. So like we set up the crime earlier, which is someone tried to kill the president.
And then it cuts to a guy swimming in his outdoor pool

who did it so we you kind of know right away like okay i maybe get into it or what but then our job was like okay but now we're going to convince you for the next 90 minutes that this guy most likely did do this and i think a lot about the experience you did which is like he's not in jail but like a lot of this is adding up and um this is getting very strange and and then i think you learn uh obviously that he was framed and set up and then you get to learn and meet the new character which was i mean it was funny too because you know this documentary was almost like three parts sorry in terms of the production which is like we went made it all kevin curtis documentary and then this middle part was like federal law enforcement going and interviewing them because they have a whole perspective and a to z journey themselves and then the third part was obviously ever dutch key who is in prison and all the prison phone calls that we did with him but it was interesting like federal law enforcement without like blatantly saying it i could tell there was a little bit of understandable sensitivity of like listen we do a lot of cases and of course we understand that you want to make a documentary on the one out of 1000 that we arrested the wrong guy and we know that and we did and they're like you know we're not sure about the concept of this documentary because we did get it wrong and we don't want to come off as completely inept at our jobs. And I remember being like, I don't think that's like, I think a lot of people are going to understand, like, why you made the first arrest you did.
Like, at least like that's the structure of how we're making the documentary, you know. And it's been interesting because as the since the documentary has come out, I very i've never ever heard like oh yeah like fbi really messed up this one i think i think everyone kind of knows like follows the journey and gets wise certainly arrested abreast kevin you know yeah there's never once during it that you're like wow like the fbi is the problem you're like you're just like yeah i i get it i love in the third episode when fbi agents like reluctantly reluctantly and missed that it was a pretty good frame job yeah i always kind of i always kind of appreciated that that was so good and i love when kevin is like i don't even like rice like what are you talking about that was the exonerating fact of the entire investigation was uh the fact that it was that too it's perfect perfect for the documentary.
That it think this guy made rice that was one of our like early on with just like pre not pre interviewing but you know it's like you go to dinner with laura or you know jack the brother or uh paulin or blah blah blah and like or the kids kevin's kids and like you kind of definitely like picked up early that like uh how excited they got when they found out how hard it is to make ricin. Because like me, I was not a biology major.
So it's like ricin. I mean, there's nothing on Kevin's intelligence.
It's not for anyone. But like they were like.
I don't think any of us know how to make ricin. Like seeing the like chemical compound designs and they're like, that's innocent, dude.
There's no way. Like no.
Maybe it's the guy holding the mensa card over there i think it's the guy over here exactly that's the other thing too i like how you guys kind of sprinkle in a little bit about everett dutch key like in part one and part two and then part three comes along and you're like oh shit yeah i remember that guy just from a little bit of parts one and two yeah that's really interesting you bring that up because that was honestly like a huge discussion point for us while making this in the initial cuts you didn't learn anything about him until until it was revealed that kevin had been framed but then it started to feel like a little cheap where you're like okay wow it's shocking but i don't know this guy at all and right really tried to sprinkle them in a few times throughout uh i honestly wish we could have figured out more ways to do it i think it i think it would have been interesting to even have done it a couple more times but it was a little bit like an agatha christie novel where you're like yes you have to set the characters and the suspects and like that's actually really hard to do in documentary because you can't just make things up and writing it.

So, but I'm glad that you pointed that out because it was fun to kind of find subtle ways to sprinkle in the real suspect throughout.

So that when it's revealed that it's him, you do have a little bit of a memory of who he is.

Yeah, it's effective.

It is definitely effective. They say time waits for no one, but I think neither should payday.
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Service not available in all states. Going off that a little bit more, there's so many things like we're talking about everything right now.
There's so many things that happen in this case. And you guys really do an amazing job of connecting it all by the end.
What was the process like? Did you like lay everything out on the floor? Were you moving things around? One of the fun parts about this crime is that you know so three people got this poison in the mail where were victims of it these three victims were you know major enemies so to speak of paul kevin curtis the man that was frank which is why the fbi obviously thought it was kevin but what made it interesting is that you learn that these three characters were also Everett, the guy who actually did send the Reisen, were enemies of his as well. And so this is where it started to get a little complex in terms of like, wow, they share the same enemies.
Like, how can we set this up in a way and organize it in a way that audiences can kind of understand that component of it? And so, you know, we had the note cards. We had, yes, we had the string on the walls.
I remember walking in, watching Mac lose his mind because he was in charge of doing most of the research. And there are times where Mac would just start ranting.
And I was like, I i'm not following anything or saying right but uh sure enough like i said i think we kind of figured it out by the end but i'm still not 100 convinced that we even know all the facts that were gonna happen i don't think you ever could no no but you did do a great job yeah it's easy to follow for sure. By the end of it, you get what's happening.

Yeah. And like Chip said, my dad is a screenwriter and I think it's an Ernest Hemingway quote where he said writing is rewriting.
But I think that's the same thing with like editing. And that was certainly our experience was like more than other documentaries we've made.
We have we really played the structure a lot on this one we had we were moving sections around like to

just kind of set it up because to go a little deeper on something that we've touched on is the concept of like hey we wanted the audience to really think kevin did this by the time the rug pull happens at the end of episode two where you find out he didn't do it but that is as much of a plot gain plot a a to b to C to D on plot points as it is like a psychological descent in Kevin's mind. As you feel like you like for someone to do a presidential assassination, make rice and put in an envelopes of mail to the president.
Like, I think you really need to feel like that person is psychologically capable of wanting to do something like that, you know know and that was certainly like a big part of the editing and a lot of the aesthetic and the music and everything else that kind of went into the series is like not just explaining like yeah how kind of like how kevin gets to this point you know and it's a little bit of a personal journey that you follow with him to go on but then again the the weirdest part of making this documentary was like technically none of that is true kevin didn't do this so so you're kind of like always faking your way through to make it feel like he did in a certain way just to set up the gag that he didn't do it so maybe it was worth it maybe it was maybe this is the stupidest documentary when you explain it, I'm like, this sounds so dumb. It sounds like so stupid.
Like you guys spent like three years of your life. Let us do this.
To sell like one joke. Like one joke.
It was such a good joke though. No, it's so worth the payout.
It gave you so much to work with. You're making us feel better.
To like fake your way. I'm just getting slowly depressed on this podcast.
Like wait. How stupid our documentary is.
No, it's amazing. I'm just getting slowly depressed on this podcast.
Just like, wait, how stupid our documentary is. No, it's amazing.
I, I dedicated probably four hours total, just sitting in my living room on a snow day. I was like, I think this is the best documentary series I've ever watched.
That's very nice of you. That feels good.
That was great. In the editing process.
One of my last questions for you is, was there anything that didn't make it in that you wish had or that, you know, just couldn't have?

There's actually two sections that we've worked on quite a bit that ended up not making the cut for one reason or the other. One was that we had a pretty interesting conversation and look into mental health and Kevin's mental health and how his family feels about what he's struggling with.

And Kevin had like a very frank and honest discussion about medications he's been on and how certain medications have made him feel over the years and why he doesn't want to take certain

medications. And it was like a really raw and honest look into it.
I think for time reasons,

we are never able to quite figure out how to get it in there but i i thought it was like a really kind of just like beautifully honest look at at what he talks about his struggles what that experience has been for family members i think one of the one of the real first reasons we wanted to make this was when we were researching i kind of became obsessed with

this reddit thread and it was for um family members who had lost loved ones to the qanon conspiracy and it was just their point of view it wasn't the point of view of the conspiracy theorist and it like you would read these posts and it was such a strange combination of being like really fucking hilarious and equally heartbreaking. And I'm like, this is such a odd thing because it's so easy to talk about conspiracy theorists or this and that.
But when it's a wife or a husband or a brother or a best friend, that's a little bit of a different experience to watch someone you love go through this. And so that was kind of diving into not only a conspiracy theorist story, but what is it like for the people around this person was important to us.
And I think the kind of conversation and the mental health really kind of played into that. I wish we could have included it, but we couldn't for time.
And then the other interesting one was, you know, in 1992, Kevin, our main character, had, and this is 20 years before the Ricean is sent to Obama, had a standoff with the Chicago police SWAT team and had driven to an ex-girlfriend's house and entered the home with a gun and then was threatening to kill himself inside the home. And it turned into a big big standoff and this was also a big look into

kevin's mental health and what he struggled with and it was also a big piece of evidence that the

fbi used in the presidential reising attack to say look this guy's unstable this is why we believe

that he did this and so all that was like a really interesting storyline and thread that would have

added i think another layer to the onion uh but ended up kind of on the cutting room floor

Thank you. did this and so all that was like a really interesting storyline and thread that would have added i think another layer to the onion uh but ended up kind of on the cutting room floor yeah people thought there were too many layers to the onions already no more layers it was it was unique like like steve holland could be a character in a feature-length documentary like his story from like and i know he's like a larger than life character but he also like wielded like incredible effective power like in the mississippi state legislator and is responsible for like an array of like unbelievable programs like for the people of mississippi for the state of mississippi like i it was always like and i think every filmmaker has this and we produce as much as we direct so i've been on the producing side of these conversations where it's like you're with a filmmaker that's like oh my god i could do like six parts i could do eight parts like there is a bit of a missed exploration in the state of mississippi that to this day fascinates me like and it's hard to explain unless you've gone to that state in a way but it is like every left right turn you make every you can take a drive a highway go anywhere on the highway like it is a the most fertile ground for like such fascinating fascinating stories and people that i think there's a reason that like william faulkner was from oxford i think there's a reason that there's like this southern noir that like eccentricity is a religion down there that like they can tell stories the way they do.
And it was just, I almost felt like we were always having to restrain ourselves from being like, Oh my God, do we go make a 15 minute documentary on this section of Mississippi? That's kind of tangentially tied. And of course you like never do because eventually you're like, Hey, we're making aflix documentary and you really need to keep the narrative like as tight as possible otherwise people will click off um but it was a unique experience just spending so much time down there and just like god i wish we could have done like eight arcs on this state and connected all these crazy pieces of information together you're gonna have to go back i know it's I'm talking myself into it right now.
I do think even with the things that you didn't get to include, like that conversation with Kevin about his medical history, his mental health history, and even, you know, the incident that happened with his girlfriend. I think the conversations that you did include with one of his girlfriends and even his kids, those conversations that really shined through and kind of highlighted the mental health section that you didn't feel like you didn't get to put in there.
I feel like it was in there. That's really cool to hear.
Yeah, I think a lot of it is implied or you kind of pick up on kind of naturally. I think, yeah, some of my favorite sections, like, yeah, there's a lot of funny, dark, hilarious stuff, but some of my favorite stuff was the stuff with his kids and friends and family and hearing about their perspectives and kind of what they've been through.
I think it just kind of added a level of heart and humanity to the story. And I'm glad to hear that even if we weren't able to include those sections, it still kind of is absurd and you kind of feel it in.
Yeah, definitely. All right.
I have two questions left for you guys. One one is serious and one is kind of kidding when do you think kevin curtis's missing pieces is going to hit netflix and are you going to help them work on it that is an amazing you know what's funny is uh so i remember uh kevin when he sat down and told us like listen he's written this book called missing pieces i will say that when he handed it to me it was a little shorter than i expected it was like you know i was expecting that i was hoping for the the tool of of research it was a little thinner than that so i was like okay i gotta gotta figure this out more to do he's just yeah work on it a little bit he's got he's got a workshop you need to like pump up the word count here uh just just a little bit um but he was the one that said like hey after all i'm thinking about the story been interviewing him.
He's like, I've come to the conclusion that missing pieces is not a missing piece to my body parts conspiracy, but it's something in my personal life. And it's been family, you know.
And so I was like, wow, that was like very poignant and powerful. And Kevin can just charm you like that.
Like, and genuinely, too. Like, like a sincere guy.
I will interview him but it the whole thing started because the secret service stole his manuscript you know where they raided his home and there was something so funny to me that like it just feels like something he would make up or say and then it's like a hundred percent true they took his hard drives and he missed his manuscript and i had to rewrite it from yeah maybe that's why it's smaller than i expected maybe maybe the secret service is sitting on the the real expanse of missing pieces that's out there but i remember in justice free missing pieces i think the government needs to release icing i remember going out to dinner with kevin's family members and i would tell them that story about missing pieces and it's not like kevin was hiding that from them or something but i was like hey i think that like kevin's in a spot where this is he's like this is where he's at right now and i found this really beautiful and every single person i went out to dinner with said that's that's a new york tax bestseller so that's that's what i hope it is i i hope it's a new york support system is i want what that family wants but um i doubt it he's an incredible storyteller he's got a good imagination he's really funny with words like i'm i'm rooting for him i'm i'm hoping he can finish free missing pieces i'm looking out for it someone needs to file a freedom of information act to get the yes to get the big one yes somebody listening Yeah. Get on that.
Let's go. And then last question for you guys.
I am so excited to see whatever you make next. Is there anything that you have in the works or anything you want to tease or plug? The thing that we're working on right now is we are working on, it's a big doc series for Netflix.
We were able to announce it, I think on Christmas Day. But like we said, we grew up with sports and we are going to do very different than kings of tupelo so i'll i'll brace you for that it is very not it will be interesting if you like this stuff but it is a 10-part series on jerry jones jimmy johnson the basically the the the dallas cowboys of the 1990s and jerry jones's story it's a big and we're partnering with skydance and nfl films and we're doing it with netflix and in the sports world this story is a bit of a white whale because jerry and jimmy jimmy was the coach jerry's the owner they have an interesting backstory where they won super bowls together and then they went their separate ways we're in it we're able to interview all these characters along with troy aikman and michael ervin and emmett smith a very sports one.
We have more volumes of Untold coming out. But we, we ebb and flow like sports, sports documentaries are stuff that we, we love making.
And there's just a huge audience for that. And it's a great part of, of the business that we do.
And then once we spend a couple of years doing sports stuff, we always end up gravitating back towards like a Kings of Tupelo or wild, wild country or, or something that little bit more off the beaten path but chap any anything else to mention i just remember being like man it's so weird being a documentary filmmaker because we went from filming inside kevin's camper so like the next week we were filming jerry jones on his private jet and it was like amazing such this is too weird our lives are too strange something yeah but very very very very excited for Dallas Cowboys it's coming out this summer um and then uh we're just in the early stages of researching um some more strange off the beating path stories amazing well thank you guys so much for all the extra insight I loved so much it was great uh so much for him and I'm talking thanks for watching and thanks for all the nice words we had a really fun time that was so much for all the extra insight. I loved the Jackie series so much.
It was great. Thanks for watching and thanks for all the nice words.
We had a really fun time. That was so much fun chatting with them.
I loved that. They were amazing.
Yes, definitely. So guys, if you have not yet watched Kings of Tupelo, you got to get on that.
It's still on Netflix. It's a three-part series.
And still, somehow, even throughout that hour-long conversation with Chapman and McLean,

we really only hit the tip of the iceberg. Oh yeah, it's gonna, it's one of those that you're gonna want to tell everybody about after you watch it.
It definitely is. So look out for that.
We hope

you keep listening. And we hope you keep it weird.
Weird! Thank you. If you like Morbid, you can listen early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
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