TDS Time Machine | Filmmakers Pt. 2

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You're listening to Comedy Central.

Please welcome JJ Abrams.

Thank you for joining us.

Thank you.

Sad, Sid.

Congratulations.

The number one film, not just in this nation, this great nation of ours, but in the entire of the Americas, as well as,

I'm going to go with Indonesia and

parts of Brazil.

Thank you very much.

It's very exciting.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Is it difficult?

You know, we do this show every day.

And some days it can

suck.

But when it does, we come back in the next day and we do it again.

A film you invested.

How much time did you put into making just this film Super 8?

The movie was, it took about a year or so from the idea to actually start shooting and then we started shooting last September so it was a very quick

production and post-production schedule, insanely tight post-production schedule.

But even within that, how difficult is it to lay something like that out and wait for that one weekend?

What do you do on that one weekend when all this effort, all this creative energy, all this writing goes into the opening?

Yeah,

you're a nervous wreck because the idea that it's actually out there it's a weird thing you know in post-production it's like eight people it's the editors it's like the assistant editors and they're all just like working together for months in this cave and then in an instant it's just out there and you're meeting strangers who are like you know that scene where you're like how do you know like it's weird the idea that suddenly not just the eight of you you know have you thought about not being in a cave because

and again i don't i don't know i don't i don't know hollywood and i don't know how things work out there but a man of your you could do this from, let's say, a grotto.

Not a cave.

Next time I'm going to try not editing in a cave.

I think

that would be the choice there.

Do people feel that they can speak to you like that?

Do they, like, people just come up to you on the street and be like, that one scene.

Yeah.

I didn't care for it.

Like that kind of.

Dad?

No.

No, I think what happens is.

You too, huh?

Yeah.

No, no, no.

I think

my dad liked this movie.

I think

it's hard sometimes because people just don't tell you the truth.

And they'll, of course, say things, oh, hey, that was great.

And you kind of see the shallowness and you're like, uh,

you know.

And so the key is finding people, like, I don't know, my wife, who will just, you know, just kick your ass if there's something that's not right.

And just be totally honest with you, because then when they love it and they say, I love it, you know it's real.

And it means something.

It means something.

Can I have your wife?

No.

Because she sounds like...

No.

No, my wife has to say.

It just trusts their opinion because they have the ability to say to you, wow, that was terrible.

Thank you.

No,

and how do you work?

Do you work backwards?

Do you know, you know, your movies and your television shows are so layered and there's so much going on.

Do you start with a destination and work your way back?

Or

you know, it all depends.

I mean, obviously,

TV is, you know, linear narrative drama shows are very different than doing a movie, because it's, you know, beginning, middle, and end in a movie.

And then a TV show, it's always a leap of faith.

Always.

So you can have big ideas, and you go, I think I know where this is going.

So like when Damon Lindloff and I wrote The Pilot for Lost, we had a ton of big ideas.

But there were fundamental characters, like if anyone who knows the show, like Ben.

Linus was not in the pilot.

He wasn't in the first year.

We had no idea.

And Damon and Carlton, who ran Lost, Carlton Cughes, those guys came up with everything that followed.

I went off and did a movie, those guys were busting their ass on that show for six years.

So, my point is that you can have ideas, but it's like driving in the fog.

Like, you sort of, the closer you get to the destination, the more detail you see, and the more you realize, oh, you know, let's take this road that you couldn't have even seen back there.

So, it kind of evolves as you go.

So, in that fog,

as you're pulling up closer, and then the fog clears, and you go, oh my god, Carrie Russell cut her hair.

You know, is that?

But it is, you know, it's unbelievable.

the creative synergy of that, it's very difficult to trust that collaborative process.

It is.

To create something that complex, hand it over and say, I trust that you will take this, especially with science fiction, which has so many boundaries and rules of engagement that occur within the universes that you create.

Well, I don't know what you're talking about, but the thing is that

so yesterday on the show, I said that Jewish pubic hair is similar to the planet Endor.

I walk back there, they're like, Endor is a moon, you know, and I'm like, oh, I know, did I say planet?

I'm sorry, and it's a planet, it's a moon.

But that's my point.

No, no, no.

You hand this over and people are going to pour over it.

It is, but

in television, what's interesting about it is that people start to find connections that you didn't even know existed.

So it's a weird thing.

You'll start to...

You have an idea and you start to do something.

When we did Alias, it was unbelievable in that first season the connections that people who are watching the show were making to things that we didn't really even know there were connections to.

So we would decide sometimes to follow something and someone will say, oh yeah, yeah, I read that online.

Someone wrote, you're like, what?

And they would show me this thing where someone had already made a connection.

So it's this weird thing where when you're doing a show, you have to listen to it as much as it listens to you.

But the viewers are so smart and some have a lot of time.

And they will literally extrapolate based on where you are.

Oh, they must be related.

And you're like,

you know, so you're in the writer's room, you're like, what if it's her father?

And someone else is like, oh, you mean like, you know, Alias Fen Seven wrote?

Damn it.

And you just hope that they prove you to be brilliant as opposed to, you know, thank you, Alias Fen Seven.

That's the thing.

Exactly.

That go through there.

Well, it's so nice to see you.

It's so nice to have you on the show.

Thank you.

Great work, as always.

Please welcome Spike Lee.

Welcome back to the show.

Glad to be here.

Is Brooklyn in the house?

Great to see you again.

And let me start by saying this.

I have been in many a movie theater.

I have watched many movies by Lee.

And I will tell you this.

I have never experienced what I experienced watching this movie.

I watched this movie in Connecticut this weekend, and the cinema was completely filled with old white people, the area I was in, it was Mystic Lake or something like that, right?

And the movie plays from end to end, I think, two hours and eight minutes, and we sit there, and nobody gets up.

Like credits start rolling, nobody moves.

And then I stood up, and we're like in the middle, and then all the white people around me were just like, yeah, yeah, you just keep.

And then, like, even when we were walking out, people were just like, yeah, no, you first, you first.

Like, everyone.

It's a powerful film.

Are you feeling that in the responses you get from that?

I'm on Instagram, man.

I got several

people telling me that they were,

you know, not

one or two black people in the theater.

And then after the film, when the lights finally go up,

the white people who love the film, they were still hugging them.

They're hugging the black folks in theater saying, I'm sorry, I apologize, I apologize.

I never heard anything like it before in my life.

It's a beautiful film.

And just to those who don't know anything about the story, Black Klansman is inspired by the true story of Ron Stalworth, right?

He's an African-American detective in the 1970s.

In the 1970s, the first.

First police officer in Cotoronto Springs.

Right.

And this is a black man who gets into a police department.

And I mean, from the get-go, let's start with that part of the story.

You lay out how difficult it is to play

that role of being a black man and a police officer.

And this is in the 1970s, but in some ways it feels like it hasn't changed.

Well, what we tried to do was, even though it takes place in the 70s, I still wanted to be contemporary.

So there are many things that my co-writer, Kevin Wilmot and I, we put in so people, it would click like, you know,

this stuff is still happening today.

And then it, I know, I'm not trying to spoil anything because it's out already.

Right.

But the ending that really hammers home where we are in this world today it's a story that connects with you on so many levels so Ron Stalworth is a black man who goes undercover as a Klan member which is I mean the premise sounds ridiculous if it if you don't tell me that it's based on a true story I'd be like this is the wildest thing from the images that's what I thought when Jordan Peel called me and he said so he says to you this is the story and six words black man infiltrates Ku Klux Klan

High concepts

you can't get more higher than that so when Jordan Peel said, I said, it sounds automatically I thought of David Chappelle's skit.

Right, right, right.

But he said it's true.

And then I read the book,

and it was a great opportunity for me.

Even though it took place, even though the story took place in 70, I still thought it was a great opportunity to comment on the world we live today with Agent Orange of the White House.

Let me ask you this.

I don't say his name.

Shout out to Busta Rhines.

That's what I got him.

Busta?

Let me ask you this.

Why do you think a story about the 1970s and the Klan and the black man and the police force comments on what's happening today in America?

Because

I like to say, I think one of the mistakes people are making, I feel, is that they're saying this is just an American phenomenon.

The rise of the right, this is happening globally.

And with this guy in the White House, he's made it okay for these supremacist white spreads to come out in the open.

They're coming from out from the rocks and he's legitimized them.

And I would even call it a dog whistles.

He's like on a bullhorn.

The film ends and I won't spoil the ending of the film for you, but the film ends.

Go ahead, Peep.

Well, not the ending, because I still want people to enjoy.

There's a magical ending.

It's a beautiful film.

But what happens post-the movie part is we get thrust into modern day.

We go from the 1970s to 2017.

We go to a shopping.

We go to a year ago, what happened, a year ago, yesterday.

Right.

And

again, I could feel an audience that was taken from a world of make-believe, which was real, to like very much what you don't want to believe is real.

Right.

When you are putting that on screen, when did you make that decision?

Because this movie you had been creating, when did you make the decision to put current-day Charlottesville into a 1970s film about the Klan?

Well, we didn't start shooting to the fall.

So I was in my summer home in Marlowe's Vineyard, and it hit me just like that.

This has to be the ending.

But

I

got Susan Bro's number, the mother of

Heather Hare, who was murdered.

And I got her blessing, so she gave me the permission to use

her daughter's photo at the end.

So that was a year ago yesterday.

She was murdered, and it was nothing but Trevor.

It was nothing but

American homegrown

act of terrorism when that car drove down that crowded street and

murdered her.

That's a fact.

And

the President of the United States had an opportunity to tell the world

that

we are not for hate.

And

he did not denounce the Klan, the alt-right,

the KKK.

He didn't do it.

And a lot of times for me, I found like, you know, he'll say something and then they pull him on the back and say, you got to change it.

Then he says, you know, he...

But I feel, whatever comes out of his mouth the first time, that's the truth.

And that's what's in his heart.

I just want to say thank you for making another amazing song, Hank.

Thank you so much for being on the show.

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Please welcome back to the show at Ben Advanced!

Thank you very much.

Thank you, thank you.

Young man,

despite the whiz-bang nature of that clip, there's a lot of excitement to the movie.

It's a very special one.

Okay, and I'm going to say this now.

It's a bureaucracy movie.

It's not a bureaucracy movie at all.

I have a lot of actors on the program.

Not a ton.

A few.

But enough.

Sure.

And I oftentimes will

lie to their faces, will say to them,

well, this is a tremendous work you've done and excellent.

The actor Hugh Grant comes to mind.

I watched this film today.

Phenomenal.

Thank you.

Phenomenal.

Suspenseful.

Interesting.

Well researched.

Well acted.

Well directed.

I mean the energy of it, the kinetic energy.

Do you know when you're in the middle of this?

I'm done.

Thank you very much.

No, no, no, no, no.

This thing is.

I was incredibly impressed.

Thank you very much with the film.

I appreciate it.

And I think the actors only rarely lie to your face.

Yes.

Had a great time.

Thanks.

Good to see you.

I'm still there.

It's terrible.

Yes.

Where did this, did you spend time, you know, to do a film about Iran in 1979?

Where did this story even come from?

I've lived in this country a long time.

I'd never heard of it.

Yeah, it's a true story.

It happened, obviously, around the host era, you know, during the larger hostage crisis.

Six people got out.

They escaped, they hid out with the Canadians.

They were rescued by a CIA exfiltration officer who teamed up with some folks in Hollywood.

They pretended to be a like B science fiction movie crew to go back and get them out of Tehran.

Sounds, it's like a horrible movie if it wasn't true.

You know what I mean?

But it's tense and it's funny and it's exciting.

And I just got this, a guy read the, named Josh Bierman found the declassified material, Clinton declassified in 97.

A guy named, a brilliant writer named Chris Terrio then wrote a script from it.

They sent it to me and it seemed clear that even just with the most feeble execution, I could do something special with the movie.

But

this is not feeble.

You clearly had worked out.

There was a scene in the movie.

It's his shirt off.

That's kind of a trademark.

I don't know if...

I gotta tell you, it was at the time, I was thinking, it's a little gratuitous.

I cut that

down.

I showed that to some of the producers, and it was me getting out of the the shower and toweling off and the whole thing.

And we got, we did, you know, I don't have any notes except, do you want to tell them or should I?

You know, the shower scene.

Maybe.

Close it down a little bit, girl.

A little bit, yeah.

Did you meet the foreign service workers,

the people that were in the embassy in Iran?

Did you meet with them?

Are they alive?

I did.

There are five of the six, what we call the house guests who were there, who were the diplomats,

the family members of Chambers, the guy who Alan Arkin played, obviously my character I worked with very closely.

So we had this whole nucleus of people who worked with us and helped us keep it real, and also who landed to me the fact that this really is in part a tribute to the dangers that our diplomats face, our Foreign Service people face, our clandestine service face without any hope for recognition.

I mean, obviously in Benghazi, you saw tragic results there, and that this is really something that,

in addition to your family, being away from your wife, being away from your kids, all this tough stuff.

And so when I saw that stuff happening, I think the silver lining for me about this movie was, you know, we were paying honor to these folks.

What's amazing to me, and it always has struck me, is no matter how the situation is in any country, how chaotic, how volatile, Canadians can travel freely.

It really is.

It's very...

You know, this is, honestly, like, there's guys in the streets with machine guns, they're blowing each other away.

all kinds of things and chaos, people getting shot in the streets, and all of a sudden the car pulls in with just two Canadian flags and just drives right there.

Go on,

go on

I didn't realize we're in the middle of a violent revolution but uh you're Canadians you're good people go on

it's remarkable they're a peaceful people

and they're a known peaceful people and this was a big you know we worked together with them they housed our folks saved our lives it was international cooperation all the good things that we like to see for the sake of peace and hiding under the shelter of Canadians which is you know that's us that's America hiding behind the Canadians

you know what?

I think they will enjoy that interpretation, very much so, from what I can understand.

I'll tell you, this directing thing, though, I would continue to do this.

Kaputsky or no?

No, no, no Kaputsky.

I would continue.

You're doing a nice, I'm beautiful.

Thank you very much.

Just a beautiful thing.

I appreciate it.

You're very good.

Argo, it's in the theaters on Friday.

You've got to go see this thing.

Ben Affleck, everybody.

Please welcome Ava DiVernac.

Hello.

Thank you for being here.

Hey.

First of all,

congratulations.

Thank you.

This is such a beautiful film.

Thank you.

And so well done.

I'm glad you think so.

Oh, absolutely.

I was incredibly moved.

The lead performance, David Oyelowo.

It's just yellow.

Yellow.

O yellow O.

O yellow O.

Yeah, yellow with two O's.

Yellow with two O's.

Remarkable.

He's amazing.

He's amazing.

We got to know the name because this guy is going places.

He's got to learn it now.

He's already gone places in this film.

How does it feel to present a story like this now that racism is over?

Is it

to be able to

present it as a part of our learned and shared history

that we no longer deal with?

That's right, that's right.

Well, it's interesting because, you know, we opened the film with King accepting the Nobel Prize at a time when he was at the height of his powers.

And at that time, if you read

a commentary and columnists at that time, we're talking about how we had gotten past racism because he had gotten the Nobel Prize.

I mean, this post-racial thing is not new.

The idea that

one achievement

just kind of cleans the slate for everything else.

So it's interesting.

And these events took place 50 years ago.

I thought it was very interesting the way that you portrayed

his pragmatism, because it humanizes him to a large extent, in that he chose certain moments for their

cinematic quality at times.

He had to be careful and cautious about what moments could represent his highest aspiration.

And you show him suffering.

as he watches individuals be punished for that choice.

Yeah, I mean, during the Selma Selma marches were really the first time that people died under King's watch.

I mean you know you have three people who lost their lives during the Selma campaigns and so that was a great weight upon him, a great guilt that he was carrying, you know, non-violent theory resulting in violent death.

And so that's why

this time in his history is just so ripe, so robust for exploration.

You know, the big controversy is that Lyndon Baines Johnson is not enough of a hero in this.

Does it surprise you?

Because in the film, I mean to be honest with you, when I read the controversy, I expected the film for him to be villainous.

He is in no way that.

He's a politician.

I know, I know.

I'm a little baffled now.

I'm doing the same things you are.

I mean, literally, people cheer in the theater for LBJ at the end of it.

I mean,

I'm a little baffled as to what the challenges are, but everyone has a right to their opinion.

I mean, the bottom line is we don't paint anyone as a saint in this, we don't paint anyone as a sinner.

Tell me about your esteem for Dr.

King after going through this process.

Does it enhance it in any way?

Were there sobering moments to it?

Ultimately, what's your feeling through that?

I think, you know, my feeling before was that I thought I knew him and I was comfortable with what that was.

It was very compartmentalized.

A brave man, a courageous man, but not really a man, you know, really an idea.

You know, he believed in nonviolence, he had a dream, he believed in peace, he died.

Those are the broad strokes of what I think people understand about him.

And he was a radical, he was a charismatic, he was a dynamic,

he was a strategist, he was a tactician, he was a prankster, he was guilty, he had ego.

He was like me, he was like you.

And I gained so much.

You don't have ego?

No, I just, when you say like Martin Luther King, he was like you, you're like, no, I don't.

Yeah, but, but no, I mean, I would, I would argue.

I'll say like, yeah, I'll give you a prankster

I Wargue that he is because he was just a brother from Atlanta who got swept up in history and was able to step into that greatness But truly he he was a human being and that's what we try to paint I think that's so interesting too when you talk about you know

when it starts out where he's stepping onto the stage of the Nobel ceremony and he's uncomfortable with the trappings of this newfound and worried how it will make him appear.

And you never sort of think of that aspect of him in the third person going, hey, I represent this.

I can no longer

be this.

It's as though he came to see himself

as a mythological feature, a figure as well.

Right, right.

Well, he knew what he meant to people on both sides of it.

You know,

for folks that were not steeped in the culture of people of color, he was

a safety to him.

Some of them saw him as safe, some of them saw him as dangerous, but not as dangerous as Malcolm X.

So he was the safety.

You say how that's portrayed with Linda Baines Johnson.

If we don't let Dr.

King or Malcolm X, what's our option?

There's some interesting ideas in there and I would just invite people not to dismiss it based on the challenges that a few people who are supposed to be the custodians of one man are riling up.

I think there's a lot of good stuff to it.

I hope they don't.

It's moving and complex.

The narrative,

the Linda Baines Johnson is the least interesting.

It's the people that did that march and sell me.

It's about their their courage and struggle.

It's so beautiful.

Oh, I'm glad you're so happy.

And I congratulate you to the high heavens for it.

Really lovely work.

Thank you so much.

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Your earbud fell in a coffee cup.

You need a taco, pick me up.

When modern life gets rough, grab the timeless taste to love.

Pass all the old El Paso.

Welcome back to the show, John Appetal.

up, baby?

Oh, I thought I saw like fluorescent green in there or something.

I don't know what the hell's going on.

How are you?

I'm doing great.

Great to be here.

Very nice to have you here.

Congratulations

on the...

This is the trilogy.

This is...

It is the trilogy of sex, marriage, and death.

This is death.

This is, well, not really.

It's a funny mortality play that stars funny people.

I don't know why you're not in it now that I think about it.

Are you suggesting that I have the same neurotic obsessions?

I think, well, have you seen it?

Wait, what?

Knocked up?

It was hilarious.

I love that.

No, this new movie, 40-year-old Virgin, was great.

No, because we sent you an invite to see funny people, and they said that you were going to go, and you were really into it.

I thought Knocked Up was phenomenal.

And what was the other one you did?

40-year-old Virgin was like, that Steve Carell is going places.

And I think that he, what's the name of this one?

I did see it.

Oh yeah.

I think...

Who's in it?

Are you scared to see it?

What?

You might feel something in here?

In your heart.

You know that wouldn't happen.

Is this a film that lays open your deepest

fears about mortality and these types of situations?

Well, I thought talking about mortality through the eyes of comedians would be a way to talk about a serious subject with an enormous amount of f ⁇ jokes.

Because the truth is, there's no limit to how much a comedian will talk about his penis.

And people say there's so many f jokes in the movie and I'm like, in real life, it would be 300 times more penis jokes.

Because they're endlessly funny, I think.

In your office is how many penis jokes per day?

There's quite a few penis jokes in our office.

I have to say that oftentimes some of them can be incredibly erudite.

Yes.

And some of them actually could just be drawings on note cards.

But I do admit there is

quite a lot of that.

Not a lot of death talk, though.

So I think it's a good conduit.

It is.

It is.

And it's about a young comedian played by Seth Rogan.

And he plays this guy, Ira Wright.

Oh, someone recognized that name.

One guy.

Wait, what?

Who?

And he plays Ira Wright.

And Ira Wright, his real name is Ira Weiner.

What's he running away from?

Apparently there are some people who have Jewish names and they change them so they don't sound Jewish.

Wow, that's ridiculous.

Whoever does something like that should stand up because the only thing that matters in this world is that what you do personally is okayed by other people of your same ethnic persuasion.

I think that you think that you're passing for non-Jew and you're not.

What?

Do you think people think I'm one of you?

Well, wait till they hear about this at the club.

I mean,

Marge is going to have a real

in-her-gin gimlet.

Do you know, I'm such a big fan of the show, and something weird happened the other night, and I thought I would admit it on the show because it just seemed interesting to me, which is I was watching William Crystal and Bill Crystal, which I call him William, but he's the editor of the Weekly Standard, And I was home and I thought, you know, it's late and I'm going to masturbate.

And

I thought.

To the interview?

Well, here's the thing.

What I thought was, I wonder if I could pull it off while the interview was going on with Bill Crystal.

Would you turn the sound down or would you leave it off?

No, I left the sound up.

And I thought you had some great jokes.

You had some really funny jokes.

Thank you.

And did you look at the music?

Did you look at the screen?

I looked at the screen.

Wait, wait, wait, let me ask you a question.

Yeah.

And this is important.

Yeah.

Who did you focus on?

I have to admit, I looked into Bill's cold, dead eyes.

So that's what you get off on.

How long was the interview?

It was kind of a long interview, so not that impressive of a feat.

It'd be one thing if in a shorter interview you could pull it off.

I mean, eight minutes.

I could pull it off three times.

I mean, for God's sakes.

It gave me four minutes to cuddle with Bill afterwards.

Now, I don't know if you guys heard about this, but I became, I was this close this week to being on the cover of Time magazine.

Really?

Yes.

Well, basically, they said, if there's a big story, you're going to get bumped, but for entertainment, we think you're going to make it.

And then at the last second, it changed.

to something else.

I'd like to show you the cover because they let me see what it was.

There it is, right there.

And that is not fake.

And look how handsome I look.

Yeah.

And you can't see my bald head.

You can't see that.

It looks like you went down to the Jersey Shore and won that on the boardwalk.

Exactly.

And that is it.

And it looks bad, but that is it.

And then they switched it.

I just want you to know that they thought this was more important than me.

How much publicity does this guy need?

That's what I want to know.

He doesn't have a movie coming out at this point.

Can I tell you something?

Time magazine is like O magazine.

Like Obama has to be on the cover.

It is like Oprah Magazine.

I think he's been on like 30 times this year.

Lol, it was a heartbreaker for me.

Well, let me tell you something.

You're on the cover of your heart mensch magazine.

Yes.

You're a good man.

Thank you, sir.

Funny people, it's in the theaters on Friday.

John Appentown!

Please welcome Ryan Kugler.

Thank you very much.

Thank you so much.

This is great for so many people to see the face behind the films.

Congratulations, by the way.

Oh, thanks, Charlie.

Creed is amazing.

Thank you so much.

It really is.

It really is.

I'd like to take a moment and go back on this.

First of all, let's start with the fact that you are just 29 years old.

Yeah, 29 years old.

And already there's Oscar talk around the film.

Does that make you nervous?

Is that just a

humbling experience?

What's that like to see?

It It's humbling, man.

With filmmaking, it's an art form that you don't do on your own.

I saw several collaborators come and go.

I wrote the script with a buddy of mine, Aaron Cummington.

I got to work with one of my best friends, Michael B.

Jordan.

And it really feels like

it's just a blessing to be able to do this job.

So to have people talk about your movies at the end of it for awards and things like that.

It's just icing on the cake.

My barber literally said to me,

he was cutting my hand.

He's like, yo, man, you seen Creed?

You see Creed?

And I was like, no, he's like, yo, that's the Black Rocky, man.

he's like cast black rocky for this generation is that what you were setting out to do when you wrote some because you you i read a fascinating story you wrote this film you were inspired by your father yeah absolutely my dad was a was a huge rocky fan whenever you put these these these rocky movies on he would cry you know what i'm saying so so so i know these movies had a special you know special power over my dad and i came to like them because my dad liked them you know i wanted to be just like him and then when i finished up film school my dad got sick you know um and he started to you know develop a neuromuscular condition he was losing his his skeletal muscles muscles.

He basically was becoming weaker.

And had to help him from the car to the house sometimes.

And all of a sudden, this dude who was always so strong

became weak.

And it really did a number on my psyche.

But then I came up with this idea that maybe if his hero

went through something similar,

and it was a young man who formed a relationship with him, maybe it could be something that my dad would be into.

Maybe it'll cheer him up.

Maybe it'll motivate him to fight through it.

That's beautiful, man.

And

how does a young black man from a rough neighborhood, like you said,

go into making films?

I mean, you said your dad was an ex-football player.

You were going to get into football.

Yeah.

What changed?

I mean, school, and I always had great teachers.

And then I got a football scholarship to a school called St.

Mary's College.

And I had a teacher there, you know, during my first year of school, read something that I wrote.

and called me into her office and basically suggested that I get into writing movies because my writing was real visual.

No, no, I'm sorry.

Just the image for me, because I watch a lot of movies, just the image that a football player gets called in and the teacher goes, you need to write more.

You should quit football and you should write more.

So you went straight into that?

You didn't?

I laughed at her being in the class.

And then, you know, while we were sitting in the office, I thought she was crazy at first.

I thought I was in trouble when she called me into her office.

I would think that too.

That's what I would think.

I never, again, she called and she was like, hey, you know, she called me in my dorm room.

I was in the dorm room with my friends.

She was like, hey, are you busy right now?

And I'm like, you know, I couldn't lie because I'm in the dorm room.

Like I said, like, there's no lies in dorm rooms.

I couldn't lie.

Because I was in the dorm room.

But she knew where I was.

You know what I mean?

She could walk down from her office and knock on the door if she wanted to.

So she said, I want you to come by my office hours right now.

So I had to kick all my partners out the room.

Like, man, I gotta go.

Maybe the teacher, like.

I can't remember what I wrote about to be.

The story was actually about my dad crazy enough, you know.

And I thought maybe, because it was something that crazy that happened, I thought maybe she was like hey you know you need to see a psychiatrist with your light ball or something you know or like or like you know or i'm gonna get to the or i'm gonna get to her office it's gonna be like the like the dean of school like the police they're waiting for me like hey man you know true salt you know i'm out of here

but you know i went in there her name was rosemary graham and it was just her you know and she she you know she sat me down and asked me what i wanted to be when i grew up you know and i had i had no idea really at the time um and and you know she suggested that i get into you know writing screenplays doing amazing things thank you so much i appreciate it creed is amazing fruitville is amazing.

You're amazing, my friend.

Thank you so much.

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Why are there ridges on Reese's peanut butter cups?

Probably so they never slip from her hands.

Can you imagine?

I'd lose it.

Luckily, Reese's thought about that.

Wonder what else they think about?

Probably chocolate and peanut butter.

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Please welcome Catherine Bigelow.

Welcome to the Daily Show.

Thank you.

I am such a huge fan of your work.

You have directed some of the most gripping films we have had the pleasure of experiencing.

You were awarded an Academy Award for your directing.

Looking at this film, Detroit,

would you say that this was one of the more difficult films that you have worked on?

I would definitely say yes.

Emotionally it was very, very difficult, not only for the cast but the crew.

I mean everybody, everybody was, you could not be immune to the emotionality of this piece.

And I would oftentimes, after I'd say cut, I'd go out to the porch whenever you see it, you'll know that this all takes place in this one house and there's this porch.

And I'd find the cast, you know, sometimes with their head buried in their hands, you know, and just, I tried to just move it along as quickly as I could, because it's a very tragic story.

Why did you choose to tell this story about what was happening in Detroit?

Well I think the thinking going in was the canvas is huge.

I mean you're looking at a rebellion that took place over five days in 1967 and that was only one of almost 300 in the year of 1967.

So there was a tremendous amount of social unrest, understandably.

And so you have this beginning of it starts with the riot and then it begins to telescope down to several characters and then it telescopes down even further to this one character.

So it's an opportunity for me to humanize what I think is somewhat unthinkable, which is the degree of police brutality and racial injustice that took place

in those few hours in the Algiers Motel.

Is it ever strange for you telling a story that is set in a time many decades ago and yet it still seems timely, it still seems like the story could have been of a few days ago?

Well, that was exactly my entry point.

When it was first presented to me by Mark Bull, the writer that I work with, Hurtlocker and Zero Dock 30, I was just around the time of Ferguson, Missouri, and I was thinking, this sounds like today.

I mean, this is 50 years ago, yet it's today.

And if it's today, could it be tomorrow?

And so my hope was that the film could possibly be part of a larger conversation and encourage a conversation about racial injustice in this country.

And I think that,

or perhaps other stories coming forward.

You know, I think it's a really meaningful

conversation for this country to have at this point.

What you cannot escape, though, when you're tackling any subject like this is because you're dealing with police brutality, because you are dealing with racial injustice, there is an element of people always questioning, people asking the whys.

And I know one of the toughest whys that came to you was,

Why are you telling the story?

You are a white woman telling a story of black people in Detroit.

Why would you do that?

Well, I think that, I mean, I certainly had to do some soul searching in order to answer that and then go forward with it, but I found the story so moving and I felt that it was an important story to tell and so compelling that, and I had the opportunity to tell it.

So I thought perhaps that mitigated the negative aspects of the fact.

You know, I thought, am I the right person to tell this story?

Absolutely not.

But does the story need telling?

Yes.

And that's what was my motivation.

When you worked on the story as well, I noticed that you worked with some key figures within the African American community, people who could lend credence to the story, make it factually correct.

It was based specifically on the Algiers motel incident.

Why that incident in particular?

And why did you feel it was so important to get prominent African Americans who were steeped in history involved in the project?

Well, we were very lucky to have people like Michael Dyson and Henry Louis Gates help us with this project.

And what was so important

was to base it on actual events.

You know, that the research, it was extremely well

researched.

And

it was very important that we get it right, you know, that it be accurate, that it be authentic, and that we were true to the events that took place.

We also had eyewitness accounts.

Right.

Now, When you're a director, we understand there's the commercial aspect.

You're trying to make money from the film.

It is a business.

At the same time, you're trying to tell stories.

You're trying to move people.

If there was one thing you would hope would move after people watch this movie, what would you hope that thing would be?

Well, I would hope that it encourages a conversation, you know, invites a conversation about the racial injustice in this country.

I mean, for instance, you're from South Africa and there's a meaningful conversation about truth and reconciliation, but here I feel like there's just silence.

And, you know, young African-American men are afraid to drive in their own car.

And there's just who knows what will happen.

And I just think this is, you know,

there's a situation out there that has need, in my humble, I'm just a filmmaker, but in my humble opinion, needs to be addressed.

And

I hope this can certainly encourage that to happen.

I mean, we had a screening the other night in Capitol Hill hosted by Representative John Conyers.

Oh, wow.

And he has a bill to end racial profiling.

And he's

encouraging people to see the movie and gender conversation.

You call yourself a humble full maker, but we think you're exceptional.

Thank you so much for being on the show.

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