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Refreshingly, thesecond seasondoesnt skip ahead to any sort of snuggling-beneath-the-sheets bliss.
Jessie is the one to fall intoa self-sabotaging flirtationwith an ex while Tom quietly turns paranoid with jealousy.
I like that were both doing this chat from bed.I know.
Im in this frickin hotel room in Hollywood would you believe?
Theres a Shake Shack nearby.
They were filming something here yesterday.
I never want to be one of those guys, but I felt it for the first time then.
You have to ask.I feel likeit wasHacks.
Ill go ask reception today.
I loved the second season.
That got waylaid I cant imagine why.
Which I wouldnt recommend.
Because then we rewrote all of them after we shot the first series.
But it wasnt a completely futile exercise.
It was amazing to write something we knew we didnt want.
We had a team setting a tone that was really unique.
I think were gonna have to rewrite.
And I was like, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Were going to have to rewrite the whole series.
And she walked away.
I do not want to think about the amount of work we are gonna have to do again.
Thats the most intriguing and interesting part of a relationship: the very awkward first few months.
Simultaneously youre, like, the most infatuated and in love with this person chemically and romantically.
But its also the point when you know the least about that person.
Youre learning about each other but also want to have sex all the time.
Youre learning about their flaws and mitigating that with how you feel about them.
Its a whole mess of really fascinating material with the most stakes.
It gave us a much better opportunity to have emotional continuity between episodes.
Theres not much off-screen that you dont see, where you have to put the pieces together.
Plus the nature of the show, how its released, people watch it in a row.
Nobodys going away to mull it over for a week.
You have consistently done a great job playing with and inverting rom-com tropes.
How did you guys land on that as the concept?Guess why that was?
There is something to be said about budgetary constraints and creativity.
Some of the best things come out of the show because people are like, We cant afford that!
Would you have done an airport chase if you could have afforded it?Probably!
Maybe thats the problem with some of the more unsuccessful rom-coms these days.
They have too much money.
Give them less money!
Because we know what were doing.
We wont spend it on anything silly like an airport chase.
Well just pay people correctly and go on holiday.
But Id rather writeoutan airport scene than film one that looks so shit.
So it ended up being in a lake, which was fine.
Its a way better ending!
All of these things are blessings in disguise.
When youve got these restraints, sometimes youre forced to use your creative brain and simplify.
I remember reading something about Taika Waititi doing his first feature in New Zealand.
I think his budget was like, a million or a million and a half.
And they offered him more money, and he was like, No.
I dont want more money.
It would have felt so outside the world of the show.
The show knows enough about the genre it operates in to rarely fully participate in it.
So its not really just about having the money, clearly.Its so true.
The money rarely goes into the writing.
The script is the most important thing, particularly with a rom-com.
Its the crux of it.
Lets go see it then …Is that why we have no posters?
Ours was a sort of word-of-mouth, phone-tree situation.
Do you reckon maybe we dont, as a culture, support a blockbuster rom-com anymore?
I think theres still an appetite for blockbuster rom-coms.
But youre right that the problem is often with the script.And we dont have the stars.
She was like, Where are the next Sandra Bullocks?
I think the nature of celebrity has changed.
Back then there was a real monoculture: These are your celebrities.
These are the movies they will be in.
You will watch it.
And thats on streaming.
I dont know if well ever have another Meg Ryan.
And that makes me sad.
This conversation comes up every few years, where everyone is like, The rom-com is dead!
But its not; its just changing.
I often point people to things likeStarstruck.Its happening on the backburner somewhere in East London.
People do love that discourse.
I think the form were used to, as we knew it as kids, is potentially dead.
But rom-coms have always changed.
Its a reflection of the natural change of culture.
Screwball comedies are rom-coms.
Sixties romps are rom-coms.The Heartbreak Kid?
Theyve now become the most self-referential genre.
Maybe because we have a certain cynicism now.
I think its difficult to write a rom-com that takes place in a world where rom-coms dont exist.
Were massive movie nerds.
I love the people that the reference speaks to: The Lake House?!
You dont see a lot ofLake Housejokes.The people who get it, they get it.
Why do you thinkBringing Up Babyis shit?I do not care forBringing Up Baby.
Ive caught a lot of shit for it.
Im sorry it doesnt float my boat!Now, Voyager: absolutely incredible film.Brief Encounterruins me.
I was having the time of my life that day.
It was such a treat to listen to these older women with encyclopedic knowledge about film.
I hope his people dont get in touch, actually.
I didnt mean it!
I didnt write that.
Alice wrote it in as a joke, which she didnt tell me until well after we shot it.
And they were very cooperative!
Its so funny hearing production coming back to us with updates on theMagic Mikepeoples conditions.
All the while Alice is laughing like,Youre really trying to do this?!
Wow.I was livid when I heard that.
But that was another example we got the realMagic Mike Livevenue and a dancer fromMagic Mike Live.
We dont do anything half-assed.
We have such an amazing team of people who are committed to making work theyre proud of.
Maybe its because Im a bitch.
Like, where is he in relation to George Clooney?Its funny.
Theres a certain level of anonymity celebrities can have in London compared to the States.
And as we were saying, the nature of celebrity has changed.
There are far more celebrities in the world.
Hes in an action movie, hes doing a play at the National Theatre hes a very good actor.
But hes also an up-and-coming guy who does TV and film because you could do that now.
But hes not super-duper famous, where its ruined his life and morphed his mind.
Then he couldnt have been the character he is.
If it was Tom Cruise, I dont think he would like Jessie, for one.
Shes not really primed to become a Scientologist.Shit, maybe we should make Tom a Scientologist.
Oh my God, that would be amazing.
That turns out to be the subplot all along: He was trying to get her into Scientology.
Financially, hes sound.
He gets bothered sometimes but not other times.
For me, the focus is the love story.
Im really uninterested in an entire plotline where its like, Oh, his PR slapped Jessie.
People care about people falling in love.
And I think celebrities are … bad.
And thats the headline of the story!
Tell me how you conceived of the ending.
Its a grand gesture but it feels earned and real.
And that final line Should we get married?
They were always poised to get back together.
We wanted the ensemble all together in the most stressful but slightly romantic scenario.
Again, thats the writing doing the heavy lifting as opposed to the airport chase.
Is there a littleBridget Jonesnodin there, too?So many nods toBridget Jones.
And theSimpsonsepisode where Maggie is getting baptized.
Its a great medium to work in: the big lengthy speech in the middle of the lake.
Do you have a season three in you?Im not sure.
I care about the show so much that we wouldnt do anything we werent excited to come back to.
Youre with it for so long that its unsustainable to do something youre not gonna be obsessed with.
