Geri Cole: This is the psychotic hypocrisy, the seemingly inability to recognize another person’s equal humanity. The obliteration of [inaudible 00:17:12]. So much of this is what we’re, I feel, currently living through. And so my question really is, how do you guys deal with writing a show about trauma and these evil institutions while sleeping through arguably a very traumatic time? Are you guys okay? Is there a lot of therapy?
Bruce Miller: I think there is a lot of therapy, but I don’t know if it’s any more than any other group of writers. But because I think that kind of inhabiting people’s minds who are dealing with conflicts is kind of the job. So you have to be able to kind of find the good in a bad character, no matter if you’re writing our show or some other show. But it’s wearing, the worst part is when people say, “Oh, isn’t it funny the stuff that you think of?” But when you’re in that room, we know that the stuff we’re coming up with is what we consider our worst case scenario. The worst thing that could happen. And then when it happens, it’s not fun. Because what you were doing is saying, “Okay, this would be awful if this happened.” And then it happens. None of that’s enjoyable.
But the other thing is it allows us, I think, with the particular group we have, to talk about the news and tease it apart in a way that I find comforting. Even if it’s just to kind of have a group of people also think the world is falling apart. Like minds is nice and supportive. I wanted to just say something about Yvonne, in that performance that she gives us. Yvonne Strahovski plays Serena Joy, and I think she’s gone beyond any of the models that we have because she’s so much more skilled at… She’s so much more intelligent, she’s so much more charming than so many of these people.
That character that Yvonne has put together, I think, is even kind of the version that in real life, you wouldn’t be able to resist. I think she’s so good at that. And I think that’s a lot of it, is that she uses her charisma as a woman, Yvonne does, to help Serena have a lot of charisma. Now, Yvonne could not be any more different than Serena. Yvonne is a giant, loud, Australian, drinking, hilarious…
Geri Cole: Whoa. What?
Bruce Miller: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Really Australian. Yeah. And so it could not be any more different than that character is. But all of that vibrancy, I think, is what you get that you don’t get from Laura Ingraham, and you don’t get from these people who seem to be just mean husks. She isn’t like that.
Yahlin Chang: It’s so true. And she inhabits that character and makes her so human where you feel bad for her. You can feel she’s so… You’re just instantly drawn to her. You really see her suffering. And then it wakens up that little bit of empathy for her. And you’re like, “I can’t believe I’m emphasizing with this horrible, horrible person.” But she plays the suffering so well. And I mean, I really feel like that character, she’s inhuman, yes, of course. But in a way, she’s all too human, because she has all these excessive human faults of just excessive selfishness, excessive self-delusion, excessive desires, and cravings, and wanting everything.
And you can relate, it’s like she wants a baby. She really wants to be a mother. Those are very relatable desires. Yeah. So she’s brilliant at that. It’s funny, I think that the writing for the show is somewhat cathartic for the times that we’re living in, because the darkness that is in the world and that we’ve been dealing with and that we read about or experience on a daily basis, you can kind of just channel that into the show and you can do things and have your character say things and act in ways that you can’t in civilized society, but your characters could do it.
Bruce Miller: By tearing Fred apart.
Geri Cole: Which is so satisfying. Jason and I were talking about that right before you guys came on, about how he was like, “I still felt so unsettled.” I was like, “I felt very satisfied.”
Yahlin Chang: Yeah. That’s great.
Geri Cole: And I was like, “I don’t know if that’s a gender difference or anything.” But I mean, yes, I guess it was a technically, obviously unsettling to see a man ripped apart. However, so very satisfying.
Bruce Miller: I just love that it doesn’t hurt your feelings about June.
Geri Cole: No.
Bruce Miller: Is that you’ve got a main character who, I mean, everybody talks about antihero, no one talks about June as an antihero. She kills a guy in the first episode. And then again, she tore a guy apart already. [inaudible 00:21:50] yeah, yeah, yeah, Everybody’s like, “Oh my God, what did she do?” That was Thursday in Gilead. So it is so interesting how no one ever says how hard it was to like her after the first episode, and you’re like, “She did kill a guy with her bare heads in the first episode.”
Geri Cole: But it was called for. But it was called for. Man, yeah. I’m curious about what I imagine must be an incredible level of trust that you guys have on this creative team, I wonder if you guys could… Because this is obviously very difficult material to deal with, and making sure that everyone’s voices feel heard and that there’s no one traumatized in the process, I suppose.
Bruce Miller: No, we don’t do that. We don’t traumatize everybody. I feel [inaudible 00:22:33]. Right. I don’t do that. But it’s, that was the goal. Yahlin, you came in from the outside, after the first [inaudible 00:22:39] , it seems like she’s been on forever. But, do we have a high level of trust or zero trust?
Yahlin Chang: Oh my God. I mean, I remember so clearly coming in in season two, that was my first season, and just feeling like I’d landed in the loveliest, safest place in the world. After having come in from the cold, from a bunch of other places and other shows, some which were good, some which were not so good.
Bruce Miller: I made it exactly the right amount of time to Facebook because she was just despairing and wanted to [inaudible 00:23:09].
Yahlin Chang: I entered this show this traumatized human being. And then the show kind of healed me, to be honest. And I think I said this to you, Bruce, a bunch of times, I was like, “Oh my God, you saved me.” Because coming into the writers’ room, it was a place where you could say anything. It was finally the first time I was in a room and I suddenly stopped feeling incredibly self-conscious and being scared. Being scared to pitch, because I remember very much on other shows, being so scared to pitch and then being so scared to hear no to my idea, and being so devastated if I didn’t get it right and didn’t get an idea on the board and stuff. And then, I mean, [crosstalk 00:23:58] maybe I should have more of that. I don’t have any of that anymore. [inaudible 00:24:01] of that.
Bruce Miller: She even had a sticker that said she did well once, and that’s it. That’s it. [inaudible 00:24:08] perfectly fine.
Geri Cole: Don’t start.
Yahlin Chang: No, I don’t give a crap about what people think of my ideas. I’m like, “This is my idea. I like it and I want to do.” Oh my God.
Bruce Miller: I mean, I think good writers’ rooms are safe and secure in terms of a secret, which I think is important. But we knew each other before. I mean, I hired almost all writers who I had worked with before for that reason. And also you just can’t be afraid to kind of ask the stupid question. I think our room is very generous about that. Because the only way a show that’s created by me is making any sense to any woman is to have people on staff who say, “No, it doesn’t feel like that. It feels like this.”
Although when you get our staff, which has all women, basically, they never agree. So it becomes less useful, that you ask a question of one of them goes, ‘Well, absolutely the answer is this.” And everyone’s like… So luckily we’re coming away from a time where they’re used to being the only woman in the room, and now they’re used to being in a room full of women, which is better so they don’t feel like the reference point. You have to actually be able to ask the stupid question. What does it feel like when you get your period? And do you know? How do you know? All those [inaudible 00:25:29]. You have to have those stupid conversations like I’m 14, because I don’t know, I’m a boy.
Geri Cole: But then I feel like what you get is so many different, very specific experiences, then you can draw universal truths from, I would imagine.
Yahlin Chang: Exactly. Right.
Geri Cole: Wow. So, we’re at the end of season four, starting to write season five or in the middle of writing season five?
Bruce Miller: We’re shooting season five. Yeah.
Geri Cole: Shooting season five. Okay. Oh man. I’m going to try and get some spoilers at the [inaudible 00:25:56]. So I’m curious as to how the writing room has evolved over these now five seasons. Do you ever still get to a point where you feel like you’re in the weeds or does it just feel like a well-tended garden at this point that things, is growing and you’re just plucking to…
Bruce Miller: Yahlin.
Geri Cole: I wanted to hear Bruce’s answer to that.
Bruce Miller: Well, for me, there’s two answers. The first big one is that the staff does a lot of the work because they are so well motivated and they’ve done this for so long, is that the ball keeps rowing. So for me, it’s a little less stressful because the great thing about being a writer on TV, as opposed to feature writer, is if you don’t have an idea, someone else does.
And so that really is born out in our writers’ room, that everybody kind of has ideas. So for me, it makes it a lot easier to have that support. But coming up with stories is always hard. And every season I think we’re not going to come up with anything and all of that stuff. But on this show, I think I came into the show late enough in my career, and so everybody else said, “No one’s afraid to try anything.”
I am constantly sure they’re going to say, “What?” We did a female genital mutilation story in season one and they were okay. So I think that the room and figuring out the story has a lot of freedom because they are comfortable with us doing that. That doesn’t make it easier to come up with stories, but it makes it easier because you usually only have to come up with one. You don’t have to come with the eight, and then you throw out seven, really I have to come up with the one. Is that [inaudible 00:27:36]?
Yahlin Chang: Yeah, it’s great. I mean, I think it’s really magic in a way, how you kind of, on your own, you’re like, “Oh my God, what are we going to do? What are we going to do? This is an insurmountable problem.” And then you bring it to the room and in 15 minutes you’re like, “Oh yeah. Okay. Yeah, that’s what we’ll do. [inaudible 00:27:51]. That’s okay. Yeah, no, there is [inaudible 00:27:53]. Oh yeah, we could do this. We could do that.” But yeah, when you’re on your own, you’re like, “What could it be?”
Bruce Miller: And there’s also a ton of basic TV network series experience on our show. A ton. Much more than you think. And it’s written just… I mean, it is entertainment. We are trying to make it entertaining. I mean, it doesn’t have to be nice, but it should be entertaining and riveting and diverting and all of those things.
And so I think the fact that the trial by fire that Yahlin went through to get to us of CW shows and those kind of things, bringing those kind of very specific problem-solving story, problem-solving skills to bear is the great thing. We have people who have been working in TV for 25 years. There’s no problem they haven’t seen every version of. You cannot pitch them something they haven’t thought of. So that’s when you come in with one, and they go, “Oh, you can do this, this, this, or this because I’ve seen this probably 45 times.”
Yahlin Chang: I mean, I think the other thing that makes it easier and easier is we’ve lived with these characters in this world and this story for so long. We really know them. And so it is easier to go, “Okay, well, how would June feel in this situation? What would Luke do in this situation?” We really know them like people.
Bruce Miller: And we have a closer relationship with our actors now over time because we do go back and forth with them. And over time they understand the voices of the characters as well or better than you do, but they want you to push them. They don’t want to be guiding you. But we have a very good relationship. Elisabeth Moss is one of our executive producers, not in name only. She’s really an executive producer. And in directing now. So all of those things, I think, open contact. And we also have a really smart and nice, a lovely cast. There’s not one jerk amongst them.
Geri Cole: So no jerks.
Bruce Miller: It was sad [inaudible 00:29:42], he was lovely.
Yahlin Chang: I know. The best. And nothing like his character. Oh.
Bruce Miller: Nothing. Nothing. He couldn’t even watch the character.
Yahlin Chang: I know.
Geri Cole: Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. So then actually I’m going to ask, in the middle of this, about the successful show, what are the biggest challenges you still face in trying to…
Bruce Miller: Well, the biggest challenge I face is maintaining an environment where people feel like they can do really good creative work. Everybody. So I think that it’s easier to establish that than to keep it going as you switch people out over time. So over the year, you pull out someone, you bring in someone new, it’s not going to be the same. And so you really want, I mean, I think the reason the show is good, is that every single person feels like they’re a storyteller and they’re improving it.
So that every single person who touches it knows the story, knows exactly what we’re doing, what we’re doing and they try to make it better. So I try to make it better, Yahlin tries to make it better, and so does the guy painting the set. I get calls from them that say, “We’re using this red, but I actually think it might be toxic, and they wouldn’t have it in a house in Gilead. So should we use another shade of red that doesn’t cover the wall as well?” Because they use all natural paints in Gilead because they don’t want any out-gassing.
So you want them telling the story as well. So maintaining that environment is really hard because, A, when a new person comes in, the other people go, “Well, they don’t know the story.” And they try to quash that, their individual idea, which is just natural kind of. And the other person wants to learn the show, they don’t want to bring themselves. So I’m constantly saying to directors and EPs, believe me, I know what you do, I watched your stuff. I’m hiring you to do that. I’m hiring you to do what you do. I can do what I do, I want you to do what you do. And so there’s a lot of that where you are trying to, not just get people in line, but keep people from getting in line, and keep being themselves.
Sam Jaeger’s a really good example who plays Mark Tuello, he came into our show, and a lovely man, a lovely actor. And he said to me, when you come onto a show, it’s like coming into a machine and if the machine is running, your first job is not to screw up the machine. And that’s what he did. He came in, he built a really lovely character, but he didn’t mess up the environment. And he was willing to build his character bravely and with a lot of guts, even though he was coming into an established show.
Yahlin Chang: This is, I mean, the best show I’ve worked on in terms of, you write something and then at every step of the way, it gets better. And every step of the way, just what the production designer brings to it, Elisabeth Williams, and what the costumer brings, and then what the actors bring. It’s constantly elevated. And the end product ends up being better than you ever imagined. And often on a lot of shows, every step of the way, it’s, ugh, you’re compromising, oh, the actor didn’t do it the way you wanted to do it. Oh, this director didn’t get what I was trying to get.
But instead, going through production on this show, you’re like, “Oh my God, that’s such a great idea. I didn’t think of that.” “Oh my God. That’s even better.” “Oh my God. Yes. Put that into the scene. That will make it even better.” “Oh my God, the way you…” That’s the opposite of what I had imagined in my head and it’s so much better what…
