“The Big Short” was originally to be released this year, but writer-director Adam McKay pushed it up and the result is five Oscar nominations; "Daily Show" Samantha Bee made a strong debut with her new late night show; with the primaries in full swing, which candidates are getting support from Hollywood?
Adam McKay's 'The Big Short' is a factor in the Oscar and presidential races
"The Big Short" just barely snuck into this year's Oscar season. Most moviegoers hadn't heard of it at the time of its Dec. 11 premiere, and that's partly because the filmmakers were originally looking at an early 2016 release. But since then, not only has "The Big Short" landed five Academy Award nominations, it has also become one of the most talked-about movies of the year.
Director Adam McKay says the conversation that the film has generated is exactly what he hoped for. The director of comedies such as "Anchorman" and "Step Brothers," McKay has always aimed to be topical in his films — but it usually gets washed away under the deluge of jokes. But "The Big Short" — adapted from the Michael Lewis book of the same name — was a different story. Dramatizing the lead-up to the 2008 financial collapse, the biggest creative challenge of the premise was whether any part of the story could entertain.
Adam McKay sat down with The Frame's John Horn and Vulture's Kyle Buchanan for The Awards Show Show to talk about the making of "The Big Short."
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
Kyle Buchanan: I know the movie was originally pegged for a 2016 release. When did that change?
It tested really well. It was amazing. Crowds were really excited. That's why we released it early. We were always talking about March [2016], like Cannes. You chase a festival like that and let the movie simmer throughout the year. And it was really when we did a rough screening of the editor's cut, and usually those are awful.
But the editor's cut was pretty damned good. We kept our mouths shut, edited for about two to three weeks, and did a friends-and-family [screening]. And I [thought], This is working. We should have been months away from bringing Paramount in, but I was like, I want to bring them in now.
We brought in all the senior executives from Paramount, well before my director's cut was done. And thank God they all walked out and said, You're right. It's playing.
John Horn: At what point did you realize it was going to connect with audiences and get critics' attention?
All we were doing was working on the movie. Some of our sound mixers would say, I think we have a special one. I was like, Stop it! We were putting out an unusual movie about finances. It wasn't really until the release started that we started going, Holy crap!
Buchanan: And I have to think that, given the subject matter, the box office success must have been really gratifying to you.
It's the best news. And then you mix that with the word-of-mouth. When you read the Twitter comments, and the op-eds, and you see that it's causing trouble — that there are some arguments going on between financial experts and journalists. This is what I wanted.
We've had other movies, comedies, where you just hope they do well so you get to make another one. And you kind of know with comedies, they're going to go on cable and [audiences will] watch them there. So it's a totally different game. Whereas this movie is right now. It's active. Bank reform is being talked about. We're in a presidential election. So this one needed to get on its feet much faster. I was so happy when I saw Forbes going after it, and the New York Post, and a guy from Politico really went after it. Then people came back and defended it, economists and financial journalists. I was like, Yes! This is what we wanted.
Horn: Is that more satisfying to you than the awards attention and the box office, that it's starting a conversation?
Yes. That's the number one thing I'm excited about. That was why we made the film. And I would even say, more exciting than these arguments and columns, are the regular audience members.
And I don't usually read Twitter a lot ... but it's been really cool to see. There was one kid. He looked like he was about 22 and he [wrote], "I just saw 'The Big Short.' I don’t know how to feel." And I was like, That is the coolest! He's encountered something he's never encountered before. So yeah, that's the most gratifying thing.
What's great about the awards, obviously, praise from your peers is awesome and always will be. But it puts a light on the movie and helps it get out there, profile-wise. Don't get me wrong. The 12-year-old in me is doing backflips that we got nominated for Oscars. No, the 47-year-old in me. But it all kind of connects — the box office, the word-of-mouth, the awards. And it was also really edifying to see the American public go see something this challenging and [say], Thank you for challenging us.
Horn: Do you think this film has become part of the conversation around the election of the next president? I know you support Bernie Sanders, but have you seen it bleed into the conversations around both parties' candidates?
I think there's no question it's had an impact on the Democratic candidates. Bernie Sanders has openly referred to the movie several times. Also one of the big issues with Hillary is her cozy relationship with the banks — that's been discussed quite a bit. It was natural that this movie would affect that side of the aisle.
I'm not so sure about the Republican side. But I look at this movie as about halfway through its lifespan. I think we've got a lot more box office. We have the on-demand, we have the iTunes, the cable, the Netflix. I look at movies as having a two-year life span. And then you really know what they've become.
Buchanan: This is a year of upheaval, in terms of diversity and voting in the Academy. I've noticed you've pushed back on Twitter when people tar your movie as being emblematic of [the lack of diversity]. You say this movie is about how white guys screwed up the economy.
Yeah, it's a tricky thing. We're doing a true story. For us to recast Wall Street as diverse does a disservice to diversity. Part of the dynamic of Wall Street is it's a lot of white guys in a boys' club who tanked the economy. So I knew, coming into it, that it would be a lot of white dudes. I did the best I could with all the ancillary roles to get a little diversity in there. But the story is about a bunch of white guys. You couldn't recast "All The President's Men." It was a white boys' club movie. It had to be.
You can't not go after targets that are dominated by white men because you're afraid of lack of diversity, because the overall message of our movie is: Who got hurt the most by this collapse? African-Americans, minorities. This is a movie about how lack of diversity actually hurts our country. I just want to remind people what the point of the movie is.
Hollywood ramps up for campaign season—and we don't mean the Oscars
Iowa and New Hampshire don't produce big box office returns for Hollywood, but every four years those small states get a lot of attention from actors and other industry types as the presidential campaigns get serious.
Ted Johnson is a senior editor at Variety and has been covering how Hollywood intersects with politics. He recently wrote the articles "Hollywood Conservatives Spread Support Among GOP Field" and "Hillary Clinton vs. Bernie Sanders: Hollywood Donors Take Sides."
The Frame's John Horn spoke with Johnson about who in Hollywood is endorsing which candidates, and how it might impact the upcoming election.
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
Before we talk about which candidates are getting what kinds of support from Hollywood, I want to talk about the broader questions about celebrity endorsement in an election. Are they particularly notable this year and what do they actually mean outside of giving money to a candidate?
They are pretty notable. We saw, last weekend in Iowa, Bernie Sanders appearing with Vampire Weekend in Iowa City. He was getting a lot of college support and I think that got people energized, it got them out to the caucuses. It's pretty difficult to get people to show up at one particular time. The thing about endorsements is that I never thought that a celebrity endorsing a candidate will make someone say, I'll vote for that person, but what it can do is draw attention to the candidate and get people to the polls.
Can you think of a celebrity endorsement in a political race that has had a material impact — for better or worse — on a candidate?
Well the endorsement to end all endorsements is Oprah Winfrey. Why it worked so well [in 2008] is she had never endorsed a political candidate before, she was at the height of her talk show fame, and she was endorsing a candidate that a lot of Americans were familiar with.
This is when Oprah endorsed Barack Obama.
Yeah, and it helped his campaign and it got people to pay attention. There was one study that said she may have been responsible for one million votes in some of the early primary states for Obama. I'm not so sure I believe that, but what I do believe is that she really did help the Obama campaign in terms of organizing.
Let's talk about the Republican field. It sounds like even though the idea of Republicans in Hollywood sounds like an oxymoron, there are some conservatives in town and it does feel like they are very divided about which candidates they are supporting.
Actually he hasn't officially endorsed yet, but former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appeared at a campaign event last week for John Kasich, the former Governor of Ohio. He's one of the names out there for Kasich, so there seems to be this contingent of people within the industry who like what he says.
On the other side of the coin, you do have people supporting the more conservative candidates. There's a group called Friends of Abe and it's a fellowship of Hollywood conservatives. Donald Trump appeared before them last year and it was a rousing success. It kind of gives you the idea of just how all over the map Republicans in the entertainment business are out here.
Let's come back to the Democrats. When President Obama was running against Hillary Clinton, the town was very much divided. Is the same thing happening this time around between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders?
We're starting to see a little more harshness between people within the industry who like Hillary Clinton and people who like Bernie Sanders, but right now it's nowhere near what we saw in 2008. First of all, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, their support was almost even. You could actually look at the fundraising numbers and they were raising almost equal amounts of money from the entertainment industry.
That isn't the case with Bernie Sanders. First of all, he hasn't been out here raising money nearly as often as Hillary Clinton has, but that said, I talked with Sanders supporters and they notice that Hillary Clinton supporters are starting to change their tune.
Samantha Bee brings a female perspective to late night TV
Late night television is often a go-to source for finding humor in the political process, and the viewing options just got a little more interesting with the debut of Samantha Bee’s “Full Frontal” on TBS.
With the weekly show, which airs on Monday nights, Bee becomes the only woman currently hosting a late night show. The Frame's John Horn spoke with Mary McNamara, a Pulitzer Prize-winning TV critic at the L.A. Times, about how Samantha Bee is offering something new to the late night world.
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
Samantha Bee had the longest run of any correspondent on "The Daily Show." Does it feel a little like you could take the correspondent out of "The Daily Show," but you can't take "The Daily Show" out of the correspondent?
[Laughs] Well it was definitely a "Daily Show" flavor to "Full Frontal," but that's fine with me because it's a good format, it works. Certainly having lost both Jon Stewart and ['The Colbert Report'] right before this historic presidential election, it's been a huge problem. So it's really nice to have her accepting that format and running with it.
It almost feels a little more like "The Daily Show" than "The Daily Show" with Trevor Noah is right now.
Absolutely, and it's even more up-tempo than "The Daily Show." I mean, we've only seen one [episode] and it went by so quickly that I literally was looking at my watch thinking, Was that a half-hour? Which is, of course, a wonderful sign because you certainly don't want people snoozing off in the middle. But on the other hand, you're going, This is once a week? Now I have to wait another week? It was quite disturbing. I want it on tonight.
Let's talk about the context in which Samantha Bee is operating. Much has been made by how male late night talk shows are, and Samantha Bee did not duck that issue. Bee opens her show with a fake news conference, and even though it's a joke, it's touching on some very real things.
It's shocking that there are no female hosts on late night. It was shocking when there were no females in the running to replace David Letterman or any of them. There was no serious contention, I mean they had to go to England to get another male. Not that I don't love James Corden, but there are people here that could do it if you broke out of the male-mold.
It's pretty easy if you're a late night host right now to find material, especially in politics, but how can Samantha Bee cover that topic in a different way than her male competitors?
She can point out the female perspective on a lot of these issues. It was funny, she went on Colbert and she pointed out how many times he refers to male genitalia, but the point that she was making was that these are standard jokes for late night. They're very masculine, even down to the language that you use. She can point that out and then she can turn that around and open up a whole different way of making fun of things.
One of the things that you and other people have seized on is that TBS is only running 30-minutes once a week. Even though "Full Frontal" is off to a good start, are they pushing their luck? And how do they remain topical in a 24-7 news cycle?
That was the big question, and that was the question John Oliver faced on HBO, but she's just going to have to bring her own kind of voice to it. And the presidential election will carry her through until November because something's going to happen fairly that will keep the humor topical.
"Full Frontal with Samantha Bee" airs Monday nights on TBS.