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If theyre all speaking French, thats the premise ofCall My Agent!
(or,si vous parlez francais,Dix Pour Cent!
with a particularly British sense of humor.
Thats me post-rationalizing, though it wasnt ever a tactic.
But getting those stars every week was full of all kinds of happy accidents.
So many of our guest stars are by definition very busy.
Theyre all about to commit to a six-month Netflix series somewhere or a film in Mexico.
So they go, Yeah, the eight days you require me for, thats fine.
Then six weeks later, the Netflix series shifts and suddenly its got to be someone else.
We are booking them to do a comic version of themselves.
Our fictional characters are the ones who run around like headless chickens week after week.
Theres a Dominic West episode in which hes terrified about acting in a very modern version ofHamlet.
Dominic West is at a point in his career where hes very successful.
Im fascinated by the idea that someone like that could get completely freaked by fear.
If theres anything in the script that doesnt feel true, nows the time to say.
They were all very good about it.
Why throw him into the mix?I wanted to tell that story.
Im sure there are Simon Goulds in French culture and American culture, but theres something British about him.
In his 20s, he was an actor people probably said was going to be the brightest star.
In his own way, hes weirdly charismatic and very kind.
Simons got access to that.
there are three generations there.
It gives it layers.
You may rail against it or you may go with it.
I wanted to see what we could do with that Anglo American cultural relationship.
I did it inW1A,and that was mostly a lot of meetings and office stuff.
Do you just find those sorts of interactions funny yourself?I do find them funny.
I think its another difference between the French show and ours.
Its particularly true around meetings and power.
But he cares about her too much.
But the French show did something more interesting and more truthful, where they gave you a dysfunctional family.
There wasnt really a chance because of COVID and it being all-consuming to make this show.
It was a memorable weekend!
And it allowed us in the opening episode to have a spin around Soho.
