Pop Culture Confidential

Episode 18: Behind the Scenes of Narcos - Escobar and the Blow Business

By 1982, cocaine made up 30% of all Colombian export, surpassing coffee, with much help by cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar. The new hit Netflix series “Narcos” traces his rise as one of the leaders of the Meddellín Cartel, the flow of cocaine from Colombia into the United States and the DEA’s attempts to bring down Escobar and the cartel. Brazilian actor Wagner Moura has received high praise for his portrayal of Escobar, who is a complex character – to say the least. He is one of the worlds most notorious criminals, reportedly responsible for over 4,000 murders and terrorizing many more, but to some he is also a hero, a Robin Hood like character who gave money to poor comminutes in Colombia, built soccer stadiums and even ran for office. At the time of his death, he was reportedly worth an estimated $25 billion dollars – making him also the wealthiest criminal in history. “Narcos” is filmed on location in Colombia with some real archival footage mixed in, and many of the real-life protagonists are consultants on the show. The result is equal parts drama and fascinating history lesson. We speak to producer Paul Eckstein about the extensive research that went into developing the project, the amazing cast and crew who have brought the scripts to life, and what is next for him and the team. We also ask him about his experience acting on Star Trek and why he thinks the show is a hotbed for talented writers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Duration:: 41m
Broadcast on:: 29 Oct 2015
Audio Format:: other

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

With Lululemon, the real gift happens when they're living in it. When you give them the softest loungewear set, the real gift is this. And this. And this. This holiday, Lululemon makes it easy to give a gift that goes beyond. Open the moment, shop now at lululemon.com. We go behind the scenes of the TV series Narcos, the rise of cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar. This is Pop Culture Confidential. Hi, I'm Kristina Yarling-Biro. Pablo Escobar is reputedly the wealthiest criminal in history, and had an estimated net worth of $25 billion at the time of his death. The drug lord is the main focus of the Netflix acclaimed TV series Narcos. Narcos was filmed on location in Colombia, and many of the real-life protagonists were consultants on the show. Real archival footage is seen throughout the series, and it's equal parts drama and fascinating history lesson. By 1982, cocaine made up 30% of all Colombian export, surpassing coffee. This is the story of the rise of cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar, one of the leaders of the Medellin cartel, and the rise of cocaine from Colombia into the United States in the DEA's attempts to bring him and the cartel down. The show takes on the murky political history and the climate that gave rise to the drug cartels. America and Reagan's so-called "war on drugs", including the law of extraditing Colombian Narcos to the United States for drug crimes, even if they've never set foot on United States soil. And who can forget Nancy Reagan's "Just Say No" approach? Brazilian actor Wagner Mora plays Escobar, and he's excellent. He learned Spanish and gained a considerable amount of weight to embody the criminal. Escobar is a complex character. He's one of the world's most notorious criminals, who is reportedly responsible for over 4,000 murders, and terrorizing many more. But to some he's also a hero, a Robin Hood-like character who gave money to poor communities in Colombia, built soccer stadiums, and even ran for office. Narcos has a Scorsese-esque-like narration running through it, voiced by actor Boyd Holbrook, who plays special agent Steve Murphy, the DEA agent from Virginia, who was assigned to Bogota, Colombia, targeting Escobar and the Medellin cartel. "Imagine you were born in a poor family, in a poor country, and by the time you were 28 years old, you have so much money you can't even count it." "I'm honored to be joined by Narcos producer Paul Extin. Mr. Extin started as an actor, played on Broadway, and his guest starred on Star Trek, a record eight times. Mr. Extin is a writer and producer best known for his work on the film Hoodlem and the television series Law and Order Criminal Intent. Mr. Extin, thank you so much for joining me. This is one of my favorite shows of the season." "Excellent. It's a real pleasure to be here, Christina." "Tell me a little bit about the genesis of the Narcos project." It really started with one of our executive producers, Eric Newman, who many years ago bought the rights to a book called Killing Pablo, and then found the two DEA agents who we based the series on and got their life rights. And from there, he managed over the years to kind of topple together a couple of creative forces, including our other two EPs, Jose Padilla, who's a brilliant director, and Chris Broncato, who is a brilliant writer who I've worked with and known for 30 years. And so that's sort of where it started. And then as we all started getting together, the idea of how to tell this story and how we were going to make this different than just a gangster story, that was sort of the constant, constant question mark. And as Chris and I assembled the writing staff, one of the things that we were really, really conscious of was that the truth, when you start telling stories about the truth, which is something that we've great experience in, that's pretty much where my career has always been, is you have to look at getting at the essence of the truth and not try and tell the truth. Because as we discovered in the dozens and hundreds of books that we read and dozens of interviews that we did with people who knew Pablo Escobar, or were there, or were part of events that happened, everybody's perspective on the truth changes, and is depending on you, what your experience is. So you have to try and interpret it. I remember in college, I had a history professor who said, you know, history is written by the victors, but the victors have only their perspective. And that's truly the way you have to sort of look at when you're doing something that has these epic, real life events. And so, you know, I have a lot of documentary backgrounds, Jose has made a couple of amazing documentary movies, and we started trying to shape the story from that perspective, and as well as telling the story with voiceover and looking at sort of a Scorsese-like good fellows-like outlook. And so, when all these forces started coming together, and then you add a bunch of diverse, brilliant writers, and then on top of that, you layer them with an extraordinary cast. Sometimes you get lucky. Let's talk about creating Pablo Escobar in your story, because I guess you don't want to make him too likable, for what he is, but at the same time, there is a likable side to him, right? I mean, look, you go to Medellin, or you go back to Columbia, there's still flowers at his grave, fresh flowers every day, you know? He truly did build parks and hospitals and schools, and saved many, many people's lives. Like many Robin Hood gangsters, you know, a lot of his, the complexity to a guy like that is that they do a lot of good. They help a lot of poor people, you know, and he did. He helped a lot of poor people. Now he did, as many people as he helped, he did way more atrocious, horrible things as well, but that nobody is just one thing. So, you know, I think it's, it wasn't, it's not hard to make a character like Pablo Escobar likable. I think it's more like you got to make him complex. You got to make it so an audience goes, wow, I never thought that somebody who could torture and kill and burn somebody and rape children could also really care about his family. Could really be loved by the people around him, and, you know, that's, that's what makes it so interesting. During the early 80s, the best smub in the world was Pablo Escobar. He was a living embodiment of the Colombian dream, and with the money, came the violence. Welcome to the many in Cartel, you know, it's wonderful, okay, so I got pointed with it. Yes, we did an amazing job in creating this character and writing it, but you got to give it to Wagner. Yes, yes. That's the point of the plate and has, has been giving such a tremendous performance that, you know, what everything we wrote would, would not, it wouldn't hold up if it wasn't for him, spitting the words and dropping. He's amazing. He's really, truly, and I mean, this is a guy who, you know, he didn't really see even speak Spanish. Right. You know, and he got the part, I remember the day he got the part, the next day he was on the plane and moved to Medellin and enrolled in Medellin University to learn Spanish and learn Medellin accents. Wow. And he spent the next three months transforming himself into this character. And when you got an actor and you got actors who are doing that, I mean, I'm experiencing it now on the show, I'm on on the same level of actors, you know, you could do so much. You're so free to write. Yeah. People who could deliver. So he's amazing. He totally transformed himself. And he does that balance between likability and scary. It's just amazing what he's done with that, with your writing, of course, in the background. Who are some of the real consultants on the show? Well, I mean, let's start with my incredible staff. You know, when you're doing a TV show, it's a collaborative writing process that happens. And that's really important to that kind of team unity that we had. And what I loved about our staff was we had this great rich diversity. We had a woman named Allison Abner, who was a West Wing writer, but whose husband ran an economic policy for Obama for his first term, and she lived in the White House basically. So she had this and she was a really, really understood Washington and Washington politics and what was going on there as well as having, you know, written for West Wing. And then we had another amazing writer, a woman named Dana Calvo, who won a Pulitzer for her coverage of the drug cartels in Mexico. And she's this sassy, beautiful Argentinian woman who literally got ran out of the journalism business by the drug cartels. Oh, wow. So she had another perspective coming in that was so great. And then we had this young kid, Martin Zimmerman, who was a playwright out of Chicago, who's play won a Fulbright. And he's he's from Chile, just those right there, you know, we had these people giving us these perspectives on how they build story, how they research story that was was really unique. And those are just a couple that I'm mentioning and then we had researchers in Columbia digging up research, whether it was documentary footage, news footage, or finding us books. And you know, both, both Chris and I, especially me, I'm a real research history rat. So, you know, I could teach a graduate level course on the drug cartels in Columbia in the 80s and 90s right now. And what that brings isn't just, you know, isn't just facts, but a sense of authenticity that I think really comes through in the show. I understand that the team visited President Santos. Tell me a little bit about that meeting. Well, I wasn't at that meeting, so I can't really give you the one on one. But you know, what the takeaway was. This was to be able to film in Columbia. Yeah, this was to be able to film in Columbia. But that, I mean, that was one thing, but also I think what it really was about was also making sure that we were, as we were, we're further in the cause of sort of giving a perspective on the war of drugs, on the war on drugs that's never really been told. You know, how, and giving a less American point of view on law enforcement, which, you know, usually when you're doing something in America, or you're doing something on television or movies, it's all about the white hat American hero who comes down to save the day. And there isn't certainly an aspect of that, and that what we like with our main character, with Steve Murphy and Boyd playing him, was that that's what his intention was. But that's a very limited perspective, and we tried really hard to point out and to bring out over and over again how that perspective is false. And I think one of the strengths of the show is that we're able to sort of put fingers at American foreign policy and American foreign policy objectives in those times, and talk about the hypocrisy of the war on drugs in a very underplayed, subtle way, and that's definitely I think one of the things that people are drawn to. Who did you work with on the ground? You went to many different places in Colombia, and Medellin, and everywhere, right? And who did you work with on the Colombians there on the ground? We had a production entity there, and there were two producers who were great of sort of American Colombian producers who went back and forth with us and really helped us sort of navigate production elements, as well as just sort of get us a pass in certain areas. Because look, when you're shooting in Medellin, and you're in the communities, you've got to go talk to the shock hall and say, "Hey, man, we want to shoot up here, so can you let us and we'll pay for security." So those kinds of things, and we just had some great guys on the ground there who really knew the world. And it's not like they haven't done a bunch, I mean, they've done movies there, so it's not completely foreign to them. How long was the research process? How long did you get? I mean, you know, always, we were doing it all year long, but it was really focused for about four months. We were doing that and really looking to get a holistic view of what was going on, and a million little specific facts all the time. And then the real Steve Murphy came in, for example, what did you learn from these consultants? Well, I mean, it's funny, because I'm kind of a rebel, but I love cops, man. I've been around them a lot, I've been lucky as a writer to be around them a lot, and you know, I find them to be, most of the time, law enforcement guys, to be these incredible superheroes who just, you know, they just want to get home to the families at the end of the day. And I know when I talk to Steve, like, we have nothing in common. He's a Republican, he doesn't believe anything I believe, but I know he feels the same way. He's one of the greatest guys in the world. And so, you know, having to get a chance to talk to these guys who were on the front lines is so fun, and it's so fun for them, too, because, you know, he was this older guy who did his thing and really was sacrificed, you know, and he gets to talk about it in a way in, you know, in like Hollywood, Hollywood guys. And we're celebrating him and really, really trying to present a character who was rounded, but fair, a hero, but complex and not, you know, not that just that white hat, but a great personality, a character that, you know, was right and wrong and good and bad and is representative of that point of view. And with both Steve and with Javier, they were so wonderfully open and excited about what we were doing and what we were trying to do and how we were presenting it. And, you know, look, you know, in the same way, do you have an example of one of the details that they gave you or one of them gave you that you didn't know about that got into the script? I mean, dozens and dozens from literally DEA tactics on how they would take a house or how they do interviews or information on relationships of really how you do the snitch in this time, dozens and dozens of stories, many of them heartbreaking and full of drama where, you know, we took their experiences of, you know, going after this guy and dealing with Colombian police and dealing with the CIA and the Special Forces. And we took all these stories and kind of, once again, pick and choose some of the essence of what those stories are. I mean, one of the greatest examples, I think there's an episode, I think it is two where there's, you know, the hooker with a golden heart who is an amalgamation of numerous snitches and one of the things that they always talk about all the all these informants, all these confidential informants was they want to go to Disneylandia and Disneylandia is the place where we must go. And so, you know, that became a whole episode, like that, that idea of the dream of Disneyland. And once again, how that's, that was warped in this hypocritical, bizarre world of the 80s and 90s drug world in Colombia to be this dream that was completely fake. Yeah. Yeah. You know, actually Disneyland was ghetto in, you know, in Miami, that's worse than anyone in Bogota or Medellin. So, so that I think that it wasn't, I mean, yes, there were a lot of specific facts about tasks and how they worked and what they did and, you know, what are the experience, but most of all, it was getting impressions of this whole world that we were allowed to kind of be complicated than you think. We had no idea what we were in for. What about cartel members, Narcos themselves? Did you, what, who did you get a chance to meet there and talk to? You know, fortunately, most of those people are dead or in jail. So, you know, the reference is, the references to the Narcos mostly came out of the literature that we read. All that, it's not a world that I'm unfamiliar with from my crazy youth. I think that one of the things that, you know, I feel most proud about about this show is, you know, my father's British and he was born in World War II. And when we talk about sort of, when I, when he talks about his experience of growing up in World War II, he talks a lot about how many people he's lost in his life and people that, that one of his youth, he couldn't, that died there or what, what have you. And in many ways, I, I, I realized, or my dad realized when I'm talking about this show and I'm talking about the people in my life, like this is my war, the drug war, it's my war, it was my generation's war. And I know a lot of people who died and, and because of it, you know, whether they bled out from a bullet or they OD'd or they were in the game or I know plenty, plenty of cats who, who lost their lives and are now living in a cell too. And so, you know, when, when, when the world, interviewing the narcos and finding about narc, finding out about the narcos stuff was not that hard on a, I think, an energetic personal level, but the greatest was digging into getting these facts of the crazy shit that they did and in genius ways that they did, and they continue, by the way, there's El Chapo in Mexico is doing it every day for us in America now. How did you get those stories? So that was literature and journalists and stuff. Yeah, that was a lot of research and, and also from law enforcement side, you know, getting, getting those stories. And there's a lot out there if you dig. So, you know, the books that the other reference books and material written about Escobar and about the Kali Cartel really give some amazing stories of what went down in that time. So when we were able to pick and choose, we, there was an, there's an abundance. There wasn't a paucity of, you know, freaky. Are you kidding these stories? What was Pablo's own relationship to cocaine? You know, like all Colombians, it's just an export or most Colombians, it's just an export. They didn't consider, there wasn't anything that he was, he was a pot hat. He loves smoking ganja all day long. He'd wake up as we depict, he'd wake up, smoke a joint, and then he'd smoke about all down. He never touched it. None of those guys did. Most Colombians didn't. They thought it was stupid and we were all, all the Americans were fools. I mean, and you know, Colombians are known for being smugglers and getting things out. Like that is a cultural heritage. So, you know, the idea that that's where it came from is not really surprising because that's what they're really good at for whether it's emeralds or coffee or whatever their product is. They're really good at getting it to wherever it needs to go. And the show is pretty, it's heavy on narration, which of course makes it just fascinating in terms of learning sort of the history and getting all kinds of perspective. And I understand that Jose Padilla, he said that this is a big part of Brazilian filmmaking, which I had, didn't really know. I haven't seen that much Brazilian, how was your, how did your thoughts in the writer's room go towards the narration, building it through narration? I mean, I love that stuff. I mean, I'm, I'm, you know, a good fellow, Scorsese fan, I believe in the voiceover. And I think a lot of times it's used, unfortunately, in other situations to fill in the gaps of bad storytelling. Like usually, you know, that's the, that's the rap on voiceover. I'm using a voiceover, oh man, you must have never heard of that. Right? Oh, I suppose it. But, you know, yes, it's not only Brazilian, Latin American, particularly filmmaking utilizes it a lot. And, and I think what was so smart about, um, Jose's inclination was, and believe I spent a lot, it was so fun. I got to spend a lot of time with Jose, kind of doing V.O. in the editing room with him because he's not American. So I, you know, we'd come up with stuff and I'd make sure it sounded like an American was speaking it. Right. And he was really great and helped me understand like the gut, good fellas does it, um, in a way that's really personalized. And, um, that's important. But what's really important is understanding that it's not, uh, it's a, it's not a tool. It should be just as important as your dialogue, just as important as your plot. Like, if you're going to use it, you got to fully use it. I'm Steve Murphy, drug enforcement agent, 79th, the bad guys I was chasing were flip flops. What's he got? What is that? When I started, a one kilo grass bust was caused for celebration. Before long, we were seizing 60 kilos of coke a day. The hippies had been replaced by Columbian, these guys didn't work flip flops. We were witnessing the formation of the famed Medellin Cartel. There was Jose Rodriguez Gotcha. He had Shower Brothers, and last but not least, Pablo Escobar. Before long, Denarko's pulling in $5 billion a year and that American take. And in this show, you know, we're covering such huge sloths of, of time, of, of geography that, you know, without it, you're so busy trying to just get the, the audience to know where you are, that, you know, it pulls, it holds back the story. So, you know, I wouldn't recommend it all the time, but in something like this, it's perfect. And, you know, we are, we didn't just embrace it. We didn't just say, hey, we're going to use it to fill some holes or tie this or bridge this time period to this. We use it as like, no, no, no, this is a main character in the story, the voice over. And we even were talking about like, all right, and, you know, who knows, season two, it might happen. Okay, let's do some Pablo voice, voice over. I mean, we've written Pablo voice over. We wrote, you know, the other Javier's voice over. We would just, we would do it all the time and just see where it flowed. And eventually it was like, now we got a limit to, to focus it on, on, on to one character, on to Murphy. Right, right. And one of the wonderful things is that there's so much Spanish in it, which just makes it so true. Was that a hard sell to an American network? Um, you know, Netflix, their, their intention, their primary intention for making the show was to capture South America. So, you know, that's the way that's what's great about Netflix is they just have a different perspective on, on their business objectives for their, for their mod, for their media, for their product. And so they were happy. They were happy. I mean, we were, we went back and forth and back and forth. But I mean, we were, we were excited about the notion and shoot on it a lot. And I think what we did in terms of putting the Spanish in was, was, well, I'm not to, not to, not to be braggered, to be braggered, but I'd say this, this is why it works. We made sure that the first time you hear the Spanish, you start going, Oh, wow, everybody's speaking Spanish in that show, you can, because of the voiceover, because of the, the narrative style and documentary footage, and because of the choices of scenes being rather obvious, it doesn't matter that you don't understand what they're saying. If you pop into a room and there's a guy with a big pile of money, and he's got a huge old phone, and there's a pile of blow there, and he's talking on the phone and he's got a gun in his belt, you know, he's a drug dealer, you know what he's doing. So you're not, you're like, Oh, okay, I get it. So if you miss some of his dialogue, you don't feel like you're missing the story. If you're like, I can't read at the bottom of the screen, this subtitles are too much. You're still in the flow, and the authenticity of that Spanish makes you think that you're really seeing behind that fourth wall in a way that I, you know, I think, I think other shows and other people have tried to hide it. You know, the bridge did it. They did, they did it pretty well, but they still tried to hide the Spanish and then and just kind of stick it in here or there, and we're doing it just for authenticity sake. Whereas we went, no, no, no, we're going to embrace this. Just like the voiceover. Do you know what the, what the, how they feel about the series in Columbia? You know, funny, because they've just had this story so much, you know, they had a soap opera that ran for five years. There's been two or three movies in Columbia and South America made about Pablo. So they're kind of done with it. Can we please talk about something else, you know, free money, get over it. So that and the other thing that's so funny is, you know, South American and Latinos in general, they, they, everybody's a different accent. You know, if you're Tina, it's different than Mexico, Columbia. And so, you know, we tried as much as we can, but our Colombian accents, the accent, the actors don't always have it right, right? And so their biggest beef is whenever, and I've sat with a bunch of Colombians and washed the show. The only people that sound real are the one line guest players. So that's what they're worried about. So that's what they're more beefed about. I think that they, the other impression on the positive side is I think they're sort of impressed with our authenticity and, you know, our desire not to, to present Americans as just the heroes and the complexity of Pablo really speaks to that country. And so, so I think on, on, on a bigger level, they're very appreciative of what we did with the story, even though they're tired of hearing this story. What would you say is the, as the sort of the average Colombian's relationship to this era and the States and what happened? I mean, this is what's crazy. I don't know anybody who I've met, who's Colombian, unless they're, you know, under 25, who doesn't have somebody in their lives who was killed, tortured, kidnapped, or a part of the cartels. Not one person, everybody that I've met here in America and there talks about this time with, you know, as a major part of their lives. We can't really imagine what it was like, you know, where we talk about terrorism now and the, you know, that's the big fear. These guys started it. These guys were, they wrote the book on terrorizing an entire nation. I mean, 20 cops a day, dead, 80 bombs a day went off. I mean, there were, and for long periods of times, they, they decided as we depict, they took out the Supreme Court. I mean, this was terrorism at a level that Al-Qaeda could only wish for because these guys were shrewd, ruthless, believed in themselves and had more money than anybody else on the planet. You know, and so they, they, they scarred every, every, I think every Colombian citizen over the age of 30 in some way was has a scar, a wound, something. And how do they feel about the Americans policies during those years, you know? You know, it's a mixed bag. You know, I think that we're very truthful in depicting that the, the, the people of Colombia were, were happy that we were there, but, you know, we're very mixed on sort of the results of us being there. You know, there's a lot of blame put on America's America. And yet at the same time, there's, there's many people who, who recognize that. Thank God that we were there as well. Um, retrospect. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, honestly that there's, the, the Colombians won't tell me too much. Okay. One thing is about you, and it's interesting if you've, for people who've listened to this show, Star Trek comes up a lot in terms of writing. Um, on, on another, um, show I, I interviewed, for example, the exec producers of Mad Men, um, a couple named the Jacob, Jack of Madness, and they had been writers on Star Trek and another person I, uh, writer, I spoke to, and they all say that Star Trek is the most amazing breeding ground for writing because every human emotion possible, every conflict has to take place in that little bridge and the little cockpit. Did you learn anything from all your years, um, as an actor on Star Trek? Yeah. I mean, a lot of things. I mean, I think a lot of people say that the right, I know a lot of the writers from there are buddies of mine and they really, a lot of talented cats there. I mean, Rick Berman and put it all together really was, he got a lot of really good young writers. He, he managed to find writers and make them in a way that I don't think any series, even law and order, uh, was tons of, uh, of writers that, that whole dick wolf world. Um, you know, here's what's great about science fiction. To, to my mind, you can explore truly, truly human emotions on a grand scale through this perspective, a fantasy that you can't in other ways, you just, you know, whether it's, you know, James Kirk falling in love with the green skin girl, you know, and dealing with the racism of that or, you know, how, how, how, uh, how you, you're dealing with this, the, a subtlety of abortions in a world where abortions are reborn on deep space. Not, you know, there's, there's just this, this ability to take issues that we as humans now are really, really grappling with and give them, uh, take them out of our realm to explore them. That science fiction is, you can't do it any other place. Um, and so I, I think that also applies to the acting as well. You can really, um, uh, leap through your character in a way that you can't, um, when he's grounded in today's reality. So that, that's, that's one thing. And number two is this. Star Trek is great, they have a lot of well trained actors on that show. You got to know how to do the classics to do stuff, to do a, a Star Trek. If you're not, yeah, you got to have the voice training and the vocal understanding. You came from Broadway to before Star Trek, right? Yeah. I did. I mean, I did a lot of Broadway. I did a lot of Shakespeare in the park and Guthrie, my background in, in my twenties was theater in New York. So, you know, I, though I didn't do one of these amazing training programs, I certainly was well versed in, in, in, in how you deal with classical theater and still, still enjoy it quite a bit. Um, uh, so a lot of those actors, you'll see, um, have that background and that's because you got to be able to once again, handle the mythic nature of science fiction as well as act your way through the makeup. I mean, sometimes I was on a show, I'd just be like, I just got to stay in the lines and let the, let the makeup do the work. I can imagine, yeah. But what about Law and Order, what did you bring from there to Narcos? Well, Law and Order, you know, I mean, that's like the Bible for a lot of, a lot of us actors and writers, you know, particularly if you're from New York. I mean, my, one of my first acting jobs on TV was doing a guest star on Law and Order, you know, and that was, that was when I knew I'd made it, man. I was a lawyer, you know, it's very much, um, you know, it's an institution. And so, you know, what, what I learned, what I gained from Law and Order was a couple of things is once again, you know, as I said before, I'm obsessed with telling real life stories. I don't think you need to make anything up, like the real world is crazier than anything that can come out of my brain. And so, you know, that's the basic idea that Law and Order tries to follow is real true life stories and give it a perspective. So once again, perfecting that ability to take real life and look for the essence of the truth really was enhanced at Law and Order. And the other thing is just basic writing structure, things like understanding what an act out is, how turning points are so important to end parts of stories, how character development has to arc and where it has to work. Where your setups are, where your turning points are, where the conflict and climax in a scene as well as an act comes from. All those things are huge strengths of Law and Order of the franchises. And one because, look, you know, what Dick Wolf did was present the greatest stakes in the world all in one. You got the cops and then you got the lawyers, right? So, you know, TV is about cops, lawyers and doctors, basically, that's all TV. So he puts two of those together and you know, and a few Star Trek aliens. Yeah, right. Star Trek. Well, even there. I mean, they're just, you know. True, which absolutely applies to narcos as well. Yeah. Does. What about the second season? Are you involved? Well, generally not involved in season two, you know, both Chris and I jumped ship and just the ABC just said, hey, you know, we want to do a show that, and we need people like you to bring sort of your cable mentality to storytelling. And that's what this is about and they kind of just, you know, just made it off or I couldn't refuse. So you and Chris Braha, you guys are, you're talking to me from South Africa because you're filming that show now. What is the show? It's called Of Kings and Prophets and it's on ABC and it's the story of King David from The Big Little Story of the Book of Samuel. And who's going to be in it? Amazing cast, a bunch of Brits starring Ray Winston from Sexy Beast, who is just one of the most incredible actors I've ever worked with. It's so, I can't tell you how blessed I am to go from Wagner and Pedro to Ray. It's just like you couldn't, I'm a lucky guy. I win. Yeah. Right. I got Pete's guy saying my lines. Wow. It's just credible. And then his wife, Simone Kessels, another extraordinary actress, the guy who's playing David. Is this kid out of Royal Shakespeare named Ollie Ricks and he's fabulous, a bunch of other Brits and international as well. When can we expect this? You know, ABC is talking about dropping it in February. You know, I'm sure they're going to work a little bit the religious season, hopefully Easter Passover, that's when you should really start selling the show. They say Sunday nights at 10, but that's way above my pay grade. So I wish I could tell you, but it'll be out here and it's really, it's really, really good. I got to say, I'm very, very, very, huge production over there. Huge production. Huge. We built everything. There's castles and chariots and, you know, we got every day I got 30 horses and 20 mules and, you know, 200 extras everywhere and, you know, it's very epic. It's very, very epic and by nature of it and in many ways so is the story and the acting is very, very epic as well. What's interesting or what really attracted to me and at the end of the day, what was the sell? Not just the, okay, here's your paycheck was the idea presented by Reza Azlan, who's one of our executive producer, who said, you know, wonderful theologian and a brilliant, brilliant guy. He said, what we're attempting to do here is look at the Bible from a much more humanistic perspective in terms of exploring the intent of the people that we all know, that David or Goliath or Bathsheba, you know, the Bible has a lot of events. And there's moralizing about the events, but there's very little about the intent of the people in it like really exploring why they're doing what they're doing. It's just here the facts, Jack. So we're really exploring that and the other one is what we call the negative space of the Bible. There's a lot of times where this character is presented in a story and we hear about what they did and then we don't hear about them for 20 years or they come back in a way. So we're really having fun with exploring what happened there. And it's very, very similar process to narcos and because we have theologians who are researchers, we, you know, we have talked to rabbis and priests and deep thinkers and studied that material and obviously there's so much written about it. And then we kind of interpret what the essence of the truth might be in these stories and then create drama from that and create the moment to moment lives of what these people were going through. So it's quite fun to have great, great actors and great, great conflicts going on as well as, you know, epic battles with 300 extras and horses and adipults and flaming arrows. That's amazing. Paul, this was so great and just going from, from, you know, location and bone, everything you did there to this project, the amazing things you're doing. And thank you so much for taking your time. You must be super busy to talk to me. No pleasure, Christine. Thank you so much to Paul and don't miss narcos on Netflix. And thank you for listening and for all the feedback last week. Keep sending us your feedback and sharing the show on Twitter. The hashtag is @podpopculture and Facebook and Instagram and anywhere you may be. This show was edited by Tom Hanson, music by Call Boy, produced by Renee Vittchett and myself. I'm Christina Yerlingbyro. Thank you so much. Hello, podcast fans, it is I, Bruce Valanche, for over 25 years. I worked on the Academy Awards, so you didn't have to. In that time, I've seen and heard things that should not be seen or heard or certainly built. And now, for the first time, I'm sharing all my behind the scenes stories and firsthand knowledge about the Oscars, the blood, the sweat, the tears, the slap, all the things you didn't see. So join me as I use humor and insight to break down the Oscar Awards of the past to explain how and why your favorite movie didn't win, why some actors and some directors had to fire their agents, and how the whole process works or sometimes doesn't work. This is the Oscars. What were they thinking? Available wherever you get podcasts. [BLANK_AUDIO]