"The Russo Brothers"
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All right, so who's up for a little chat and giggle? Yeah, should we do another singing one where we sing our names in harmony or something? What do you mean, for an opening of the show? Yeah, right now. Ready? Will, you hold a note, and I'll build it, and Jason will top it. I don't even know what I know. Just do it with your name. John. Jason. Smartless. Smartless. Smartless.

Welcome to SmartLess. What's wrong with that? Oh, God. SmartLess. SmartLess. SmartLess.

That was perfect. We were a little late today, but I got a luncheon, so that was great while we waited. Oh, buttons. You got it fed. So, okay. So I'm walking down the street around like Broadway and 70th, and I'm not making this up. This girl is 20-something, I'm guessing. She has a jacket that's open, and she has like a lace tube top, and her boobs completely out. Just the one? Just the one boob. And I'm like, is everybody seeing this?

And everybody was looking at her, and she was just walking around real confident with just one boob hanging out. It took my eyes a minute to believe it. I once saw a guy confidently hanging a shit on 6th Avenue at noon on a Wednesday.

No, it wasn't. I was with you. It was 8th Avenue, and I'll tell you, this is how it went down. I was walking with Jason, and he goes, look at that. And then we see a dude, and you see it actually coming out, and I said, thanks for making me look, because now I'll never not be able to see that. It was a high-pressured garden hose style one. Again, it doesn't. And he didn't even bend his knees. I mean, this is noon on a weekday.

On the sidewalk. He didn't try to go to the corner or down an alley or anything. So, Jay, you'll like this. The other day, I'm here in Atlanta. And I still want to move to New York. And I'm at the Publix here in Atlanta just buying a few items at the grocery store. Hey, stars are just like us, you know? Sure.

So I'm pushing the cart, and I'm here with my buddy Eli, as you know. Oh, fuck yeah. Eli, who got recognized at the gym the other day, a guy says to him, because he was wearing a SmartList sweatshirt, and the guy goes, we love SmartList. Where'd you get that? He's like, yeah, I got it. He's like, yeah, you know. And he said, my name's Eli. And the guy goes, are you Eli from the? And he was ecstatic. Oh, really? Are you kidding? No, I swear to God. That's crazy. Yeah.

So he's friends with this guy at the gym. Anyway, that's a different story. Wait a second. They swapped numbers? They're in Publix. They swapped numbers because he doesn't... You know, he's got a whole life. He goes to the gym. I work out here at home on my own thing, and he goes to the gym, and he comes back, and he's like, yeah, I ran into Gordo again, my buddy there. He was wearing the hockey... I go, how'd you start talking to him? Mm-hmm.

He says, well, he was wearing this shirt that said such and such hockey. And he goes, so then it was just on. And I go, yeah. Canadians are just fantastic. He's so sweet and he's so nice. Anyway, Eli's very engaging. And people love him. Everywhere you go, people are like, hey, Eli. So anyway, we're going along the aisle. And we stop. And he stops.

And he picks up some men's wipes. And it's a three-pack. And he goes, oh, it's a three-pack. They're not on their own. I go, what are you doing? He goes, I'm getting the wipes. And I go, what? And he goes, yeah. So he puts them in the cart, at which point I push the cart away from me, hands off. Yeah. Yeah.

that's it yeah you don't have anything to do with it no i can't be no associated with the wipes um i did get a text from our friend jt justin throw last night oh and uh i have to share what he said and i'm sure i'll be so happy i'm sharing this he said we're chatting we're chatting let's get together we're gonna have dinner blah blah and he goes by the way i saw a picture of bateman and arnett yesterday are they skipping body day like every day

That son of a bitch. Wow. You know, listen, when you're walking around with 2% body fat and freezing in the middle of summer as a result, I don't want to hear it from him. You know, he's... Talk about somebody who's malnourished, Will. Yeah, it's true. Why don't you take a run at him? You know? I'd like to. Hey, hey, hey.

Don't worry. I do. As you know from his insane text that when he tries to be poetic, you know, he gets like real. In our other thread that we have... God, we're in too many threads now, aren't we? Yeah, we are. Jason just got pumped back into the octordal, chordal, wortel. I know. I just saw that Affleck is now in it. I'm not happy about it. Well, no, that got put out there that I guess that Ben, as we know, we had him on here, but he's not part of it and he claimed that...

He was just in a wordle thread with you. And anyway, Sam was all aghast. Yeah, I'm not happy about it. I didn't ask Matt to do that. He just thought it would be a fun goof if he just put me back on there. And then sure enough, first thing the next morning, it's not even 7.30 in the morning. And I'm in Austin, so that's 5.30 in the morning for me. And these freaks who are on East Time are already done with their...

An hour of crossword type wordplay. And they say, Bateman, you're up. I'm like, I haven't even evacuated myself yet. Which I brought up, which I did bring up. Which you did, yeah. Because I know you. I like to do my thing with this Wordle stuff when I was on, deep in the afternoon, right? I do it before I go to bed. But these guys like to know who won and who lost before breakfast. And talk about it.

Right. Bradley and I were up early already going like, wow, that was a tough octordial. I know, the fourth guess. Yeah. And I wake up, I look at my text thing, and I've got 19 texts already. I'm like, ooh, something exciting is happening in my life. No, it's just a long wordle thread. Yeah. Yeah. All right, listen, let's get to it. Let's get to it. These... Oh, there's two. We have two guests, all right? Now, we have... We've had two guests before, and...

These two, they have worked together their entire career and somehow have managed a very happy and healthy family life as well. It's very, very inspiring. They produce together. They write together. They direct together. They've created some of the most successful film and TV projects together as well as an enormous production company. And in fact, I don't think...

There is a more successful Hollywood couple behind the camera. Wow. They have directed 10 films together, grossing in excess probably of about $5 billion. What? And they better continue to get along, not only for the health of the industry, but also for the fact they are stuck together for life. Well, Sean, they're not a couple couple. They're a couple of brothers. Guys, it's our friends, the Russo brothers. Oh, get out of town. Yeah.

Anthony and Joe. Look at this. Wow. I was going to leave that on and make you guess. What?

That is really cool. It's a family reunion with all of us. Are you fucking kidding me? What's up, boys? Good morning. Nice to meet you guys. It's been about 20 years. Good to meet you too, Sean. It's been 20 years since the pilot of Arrested Development, but you've worked with Will a few times since then. That's right. And we've bumped into each other a bunch since then. Bateman, you haven't aged a day.

I know, it's amazing, isn't it? Well, I sleep in olive oil. And I go down to Tijuana a couple times a month for experimental medical work. Infuse some Paul Rudd blood into your body. Paul Rudd blood. Will, I didn't want to say anything. You don't look as good as... I know, I know, I get it. Listen, it makes a lot of sense. You know, I say the same thing about JV. He looks incredible. He has not aged. I look like my own father now. Are you living in a tent in your...

He's got tough lighting there in the Whisper booth. It is tough. I'm here in Atlanta, and I'm in the basement, and I've got this portable booth that I bring with me so I can do all my records. And you guys have not met Sean before. Is that right? We have not. No. Get a load. If you remember during casting for Arrested Development, there was a conversation at one point about could we get Sean off of...

Come on. Will and Grace. Is that true? Could we work in between his schedule? And I'm still waiting. I mean, I could probably still get out. Probably could. Well, guess what? Guess what? That son of a bitch has still never seen one goddamn episode of Arrested Development. I saw two. He saw two episodes. Name them. What happened in those episodes? One and two.

uh will was on the couch saying something funny you were being snarky standing up great guess the blocking was will was sitting and you were standing i think i remember the one you're talking about no no that was a good one that was a good one um but i did know you guys directed up all night and i did up all night with will and maya that's right it's true and uh what about todd margaret there was that too right margaret

That's right. With Sweet Sweet Davy Cross. And Running Wild. That's right. And Running Wild. And Running Wild. Jesus. Yeah, we did a bunch of stuff. Do you remember, Will, on Running Wild, those conversations we had early on where we were trying to be really respectful of Arrested Development. And so you and me and Mitch and Anth, we all decided to make it

Not as good as "Rust of the Belt." That was really important. -That was the bar. -That'll show. Well, the truth is this. The truth is it was a good concept and we had some good pieces and we kept getting the note

We kept getting the note on the script from people at the network saying, look, man, you can't just have this be another Arrested Development. Like as if that was a big failure. They kept saying that to us. Like, okay. And you can't just think that you guys are going to come in here and we're just going to have another Arrested Development. We're like,

well, we're really proud of Arrested Development. I don't know why you guys are mad at it. They didn't want us to move the cameras. I remember there was a lot of... But it was with Lionsgate, if you remember, and I think we made that show for, like, two corned beef sandwiches. And then was there any discussion, once you got into the Marvel world, any discussion to go ahead and bring Will Arnett into that as well as sort of like some sort of a horrific flash forward? I think the quote was, we don't want another Arrested Development. There are these characters called the Great Lakes Avengers.

And there's a cheese man really important to that group. You didn't just come up with that. Is that something you got a half a pitch on? No.

And we do. We have a complete project. That's our go-to whenever anybody asks what's our fantasy Marvel project. The Great Lakes Avengers. Now, you guys are done with the Marvel stuff, the group, the whole thing, or do you still flirt with them a little bit? You guys are off on doing your own thing. Well, you did Endgame. It's kind of like that's your Endgame. That was the Endgame. That's right. I mean, I think we... They're very good friends of ours. I mean, we talk to those guys all the time, but...

Yeah, we're focused. They can't afford you anymore. They just can't afford you anymore. I remember, Joe and Ant, I remember when you guys first, I forget which was the first movie

was it Captain America was the first one, right? That was, yeah, Captain America, Winter Soldier. I love that one. And I would, I would, it would do huge. Joe, I remember texting you and saying, fucking congrats, man, huge. And then it just like, and then every time, and then I just stopped saying congrats because the numbers just, it kept getting even bigger. I was like, well, fuck it, he doesn't need to hear congrats anymore. It's the number one movie of all time. What am I doing? Yeah.

But then the next one made even more and then the Avengers stuff made even more. I mean, did you feel like a pressure? Like how are we going to top or try to manage the expectations of –

of the whole, the whole infrastructure over there. Was, was there that, was there a worry that, Oh my God, how can we keep making more and more and more with quality, but also with, with commerce? You put, you have to isolate yourself a little bit from all of the hype around those movies. You have to, they're also physically draining. I mean, you know, look at us,

Yeah. I mean, Jesus Christ. Listener, they look beautiful. One's in a basement and one's in a beautiful office. That's right. That's what happens. We don't split the money. Okay.

Guess who thinks. Yeah, that must be complicated. Well, okay, so hang on a second. I want to get more into the Marvel stuff and how you guys got there, but I kind of want to go even further back to how we came into your world, Jason and I did. But even before that, but even before that, like, what about, like, were you, you guys never struck me as, like, comic book, like,

Guys, were you? No, but you guys made that film, your first film out of, you guys came out of Cleveland. We did. We made a movie called Pieces that went to the Slamdance Film Festival in 97. And this was like, this was a credit card movie. So, yeah.

In the late 80s, Soderbergh made a film called Sex, Lives and Videotape that ignited this, you know, hey, you can make a movie for 10 grand on credit cards and get discovered out of anywhere and become a major filmmaker. You've got to pay that one off. You've got to stop accruing all that expensive interest. We were. That's what Arrested Development was about.

It took 10 years to pay that off. Is that true? It's true, yeah. Did it really? Wow. Yeah. It was a while. All right, so then Soderbergh sees pieces. That's right. And? And then he picks up the phone. He gives us a call a week later. I mean, again, two guys from Cleveland, no connection to the film business whatsoever. Very strange movie. Only a guy like Steven Soderbergh would love this film.

And he calls us and says, look, I'd love to help you get your next movie made. And then he started a production company with George Clooney. This is the fast version of it. And he and Clooney produced another movie for us called Welcome to Collinwood that absolutely crushed it at the box office. Sam Rockwell. The Sam Rockwell. That's right. Sam Rockwell. It was an incredible cast. Great movie. I love that movie. We spent about $8 million on that film and it made about $300,000. But the quality was good enough to then go on to...

Well, we were very lucky. Yeah. We were so lucky because we actually got hired before that movie came out.

and bombed to direct... That's the key. Yeah, exactly. To direct a pilot at FX called Lucky. So this was right the year after The Shield premiered. And FX wanted to do the same thing with comedy that they had done with The Shield, like make something very dark and risable and... Kevin Reilly. That's right, Kevin Reilly was running FX at the time. Yeah, so we made this kind of really weird, dark...

comedy called Lucky that didn't actually work as a series but the pilot was like an industry favorite like everybody watched that pilot it made its rounds everywhere we got more meetings off of that pilot than I think anything we've done

And that ended up getting us into Imagine to talk to David Nevins about Arrested. So it was Nevins who was the first guy that you met on Arrested. That's right. On part of the Arrested world. And then he says, what, hey, why don't you guys have lunch with Mitch Hurwitz type thing? Exactly. Yeah, I think we sat with Nevins, right, and he said, look, we have this show. It's kind of crazy, but it's going to take some hustling because there's about 35 people

location changes, we got to shoot it in a compressed timeframe. You know, we're trying to get budgets down because we're worried that, you know, single camera comedy may be short-lived because the budgets are getting too high on these things. We got to compete a little bit. And it was pitched to you as a pretty pure mockumentary, correct? Weren't there even testimonials a la... It was. It got pushed more mockumentary, Anthony, right? Like it was more at the time, I think it was...

My memory, it wasn't a mockumentary at all. Yeah, no, it was just a straight family drama that we ended up... Here's the framing. That's why you didn't cast Sean. Sean's too funny. It's kind of a complex framing. So also what Nevin said to us at the time, and he said, look, Ron Howard thinks that the half-hour comedy on television is in trouble. He thinks the sort of the sitcom...

The stage sitcom is getting stale. He thinks the half-hour single-camera comedy has become unaffordable because you get half the ad revenues for a half-hour comedy that you do for an hour-long drama, but it doesn't cost half the price to produce a half-hour of single-camera comedy.

filmed entertainment than it does to take an hour. So they're like, we're trying to figure this out. So what we want to do is we want to take a, we're reaching out to indie filmmakers like you because they knew we were kind of guerrilla style filmmakers. And cheap. To try to react cheap. We're cheap. But also we know how to shoot cheaply. Yeah. So they're like, we're trying to come up with a new model for a single camera that will be cheap to produce. And that's when Joe and I, after seeing the script and seeing the level of absurdism

That is inherent in Mitch's voice. We thought, well, wouldn't this be funny if he tried to like shoot this in the most real way possible? Ah, it's sort of like news gathering, right? Handheld, no marks, no lights, just gathering it. Exactly. And now, a word from our sponsor. All right, back to the show.

Two things. So one is also the guy you brought with you from Lucky was your DP was Jim, right? That's right, Jim Hawkinson. And Jim Hawkinson, who's just an absolute cowboy, who we worked with a bunch on our other stuff too and Running Wild and et cetera. And Jim came in and you guys, the three of you guys had worked together and already had that connection

You already had that shorthand when it came to shooting really quickly, lighting really quickly, and just getting, you know, right? Using a lot of existing light if you had to. Yeah, Lucky was the same thing, right? It was a very aggressive handheld show shot. It was shot on the streets of Vegas, so we couldn't light things. I mean, you know, not a big budget. It was FX, early phase of FX.

And so we had this, we had developed this run and gun style. And I remember, you know, the dogma was big at the time. They were making the dogma films, if you remember that, where, you know, actors were getting letters that said, don't expect a trailer, do your own makeup. You know, this is a no frills production. And we may have even stopped

sent that out with the script at one point. - That's how I got the script to Arrested Development, yeah. In fact, it was reading that cover sheet that convinced me that there's no way they're gonna let me be a part of this cool thing. Because it was declaring like, we don't want-- - 'Cause your makeup budget? - Well, there's that.

But yeah, we don't want any of the traditional sort of known, basically hacky, safe TV stuff. And that was my middle name. No, hey. Yeah, no, Will, it's okay. Jason, how dare you? Multicam sitcom laughing. Don't you say that. Let me say that.

If we get into the casting of it, we can talk about that because it was true there was a stigma against Bateman at the time. Yeah. And I remember we kept bringing you in and bringing you in with other actors to keep putting you in front of the studio. And there was this conversation constantly because Ant and I were like...

The guy's fucking perfect. Why can't we cast him? And they go, you know, he's, you know, he's, he's a guy. He's been in a lot of pilots that haven't gone to air. He's cursed a little bit. I don't know that this is the, we would hear this and just have these blank stares on our faces. Like this is the stupidest thing we've ever heard. That you had no idea who I was. It's like, Oh no, we want, we watched you.

Well, Clooney, well, you had just, and Clooney had somewhat of a long career, let's say, in the pilot world. Yeah, that's right. 11 pilots or something like that. Yeah, and things were working out for him. George had the same stigma, though, right? Where he had like a bunch of failed pilots before he got there. Yeah.

Right, right, right. No, I remember feeling incredibly lucky that I got that. I mean, I wasn't sure how many people were going to watch the show, but I knew that it represented a complete opposite for the stuff that I had been doing in the hopes of kind of creating a reset. You were the anchor of the statement. I mean, like, the show doesn't work because everyone is so insane on the show. It didn't work without...

a conduit for the audience, somebody that the audience could come in through. And what you don't want typically with a comedy is when you have a straight man and everyone else is insane, it's very hard for the straight man to get laughs. It's the opposite was true with you. And that's what we kept saying is, you know, this character is going to be flat. And there were, there were

There were other actors that were trying to push on us that were, you know, very straight. And it was just, it had a generic feel to it. Wait, I've never heard these names. Are you drunk enough to start sharing some of these names? Should we wait? Just go get a beer. It's a Sunday morning right now. If you're just joining us, thanks for listening to the Arrested Development Rewatch Podcast. Listen, I have a question for you. Oh, my God.

You and me do. Hang on, hang on, hang on. I want to talk about Captain America, the Winter Soldier. Hold on, comic dork. We're going to get there. Hang on there. We have spent the last eight episodes talking about Dorkville and Star Wars. And Tabasco Theater and shit. Shut the fuck up for one minute. Let us have one moment to talk to the Russo brothers. By the way, I will say, Jason... Sorry, go ahead, Anthony. Go ahead. No, I just wanted to say...

You're listening to your other shows that you've done with the Arrested Development people I would always feel horrible for Sean and I like coming into this I think that my god a week. Are we really gonna do this? I love it fighting digestion on his on his lunch. He's fried chicken sandwich. Yeah Did you so Jason comes in you guys are stoked and

He's the perfect, I've always said, the perfect blank canvas, right? Like every art piece, like just a blank. Give line readings. He does whatever you tell him to do. Just a blank canvas. Just the whitest canvas for the other colors to really pop. So... But he comes in and then he comes in and he reads and then you guys are like, yeah, you feel vindicated. He's...

He's great, and then you start building the pieces around and you start trying to find all those other actors and it just--

It must have been like a... My question is, did it go the way you thought it would or did it all happen like in this kind of surprising way? Like, oh, fuck this person and this person. Super surprising. I mean, you were probably the biggest surprise. But if we go through... Yeah, because that was the hardest part to cast, wasn't it, Job? It was by far the hardest part. And we had an incorrect take on Job, I think. Remember that, Amps?

For a while, we were playing him like the pull-my-finger uncle, this weirdo that was living up in the attic. And so we were bringing in a lot older actors, and it just kept going creepy. You could have just called him Fartnet. Then we got Arnett, and it got even creepier. That's it. That's it. Lean into it. Exactly.

Exactly, but I think it was, I think Michael Cera was first, if I remember correctly. I mean, it was, as you guys know, the whole casting process on that show was difficult. The network never really loved the show. No. Even, you know, as we all know, when it hit the air, but even back then, it was like... It's an understatement. Even after winning an Emmy, they were like, oh, fuck, we can't cancel it now. No, they sent us an ice cream truck, remember? Not truck, an ice cream cart. Cone.

And a banner over the guard gate. A banner that was blocked by the main 20th sign. So you couldn't see it unless, when you drove, you could see it through your sunroof. Yeah. If you were right underneath it. And then I'd go and they'd be like, hey guys, we won the Emmy yesterday for best comedy. Here's an ice cream.

Yeah, with a bell. Not even powered. Somebody had to push it. It was unmanned. That's right. You had to get your own ice cream out. Sean, by the way, Sean, not an exaggeration. It's so funny. God bless him. And there were 10 bars in it. God bless him. Having never met you guys, you know, there's not a lot of directing duos, writing duos, producing duos, let alone as successful as you guys are. I'm not knowing you guys. I want to ask the obvious questions like how did you guys...

Did you both, when you were kids, have this secret about loving the business and you didn't let each other know? Like, at what point were you like, "Hey, I want to do that too. Hey, we should do it together." Two guys, two kids from Cleveland. -That's right. -Yeah. Couple of Indians fans. Yeah, we grew up on the east side of Cleveland and Ant was getting a law degree in, what is this, '94?

And I was getting an MFA in acting. We were both at the same school, Case Western, in Cleveland. We both came back to our hometown to go to school. And he was really frustrated with law school. And I felt like I didn't ultimately want to be an actor. And we started thinking about directing. We did some black box stuff and started working on some comedy sketch stuff together. And then we decided to write a movie. Robert Rodriguez had written a book called

about making El Mariachi for $7,000. And again, this contributed to that craze that was going on at the time. And so we decided to make a film and we wrote a script called Pieces. It was a very dark comedy. Are you telling your family this? Are you telling your mom and dad? Like, hey, we're writing a movie. They're like, yeah, good for you guys. Like, what's going on? Yeah, aunts should tell that story. That's true.

But you never, I would love that, but you never did it as kids? It wasn't until you were older in college that you had this? No, we weren't Spielberg in the backyard with a camera, right? We were more cinephiles. We were just guys who went to watch a lot of movies. We loved going to movies. We had a lot of friends that would go and we'd all quote films. I mean, just sort of the traditional high school experience of, you know. Yeah.

You know, watching movies, talking about them, doing lines all day long, making each other laugh. Whoa, whoa, so it was a non-coke addiction. That's right. Wait, Ant, how did that go down? Oh, so eventually, as we started to, like, get more and more serious about it, I eventually did tell my parents that I was living in their house at the time, that I was going to leave film school to, like, go all in on the filmmaking efforts. And I think...

Uh, yeah, my dad didn't speak to me for like six months, even though I was living in the same house with him. No way. He would kind of grunt as we would pass each other at the refrigerator or something. But, um,

But eventually he became a very big supporter. He was convinced we were going to be broke artists. I remember it actually was the Emmy for Arrested Development that when he finally went, "Okay, fine, you guys can do this." -That's hysterical. -You've been doing it for years. I think he's the one that sent the ice cream cart. So you guys do-- So you do Arrested, you guys direct the pilot and you direct most-- I would say the bulk of the episodes of the first two seasons. Nobody directed more episodes than you guys.

some of the great-- some of our favorite episodes, obviously, with you guys and...

And Jason and I talk about this too. All of us, and you guys are part of it. You guys and me and Jason and the cast and Mitch and everybody, we made those first... Not Sean. Not Sean. Those first like eight episodes completely in a vacuum. We had no idea if people were going to like them or think that they were shit. And so we were kind of like this real tight group of us just doing it with no feedback. And it's like, and we're taking big swings and thought like, fuck, we could... I remember driving home some days after shooting going like...

this might be the worst thing ever. Right in that segue around, copping attitude. I have no idea. I might get ridiculed for this. You know what I mean? I had no further to fall. I was like, I was fine. I'm comfortably on the bottom. But then we have a lot of fun doing it, and then you guys, and then the show ends, and you guys end up sort of moving on and doing a bunch of other stuff. What was the first...

When you kind of started to break out of the arrested world, what were you guys thinking? Okay, now we want to do...

X or Y? What was the plan? Well, I think really what was going on then, we had struggled so long to sort of make a life as like indie filmmakers and then kind of segue into television that once Arrested had that success, once we won the Emmy, it was all of a sudden we had work coming at us for the first time in our lives. Like everything prior to that point was just like us pushing the boulder up the hill. Right. Like trying not to listen to people tell us no. Now it's chasing you.

Yeah, all of a sudden it was coming at us. So we welcomed that. And we had a run in television there that ended up turning into shows like Community and Happy Endings and a few other shows. What our process would be was basically what we did on Arrested, where we would come in, we would direct a pilot because, again, we had sort of patterned ourselves as sort of indie feature makers. So we would approach a pilot like it was a feature.

sort of execute it like that and then we would stay on with the show for just like with Arrested for a season or two and do some episodes and then kind of like pass it on normally the show would be canceled by that point but we would but that became our process right and then what was what was the first big film after your television run there

Captain America. Yeah. In between, we did You, Me, and Dupree. Oh, You, Me, and Dupree. Right, right, right. By the way, which I also did the table read of. Remember that? That's right. I played, I think, was Michael Douglas in that? Yeah. I read his part at the table, right? That's hysterical.

That is very cool. It's a long and storied history, Mr. Arnett. It's crazy, right? Yeah. I remember Downey calling me about you guys. So what do you think about the... I remember getting that call going, holy shit, the Russos are going to do a fucking Marvel movie? Yeah. I remember thinking that quietly to myself because I didn't want to say it outwardly to... To Downey. Yeah. I didn't want him to hear the surprise in my voice or envy. But I just immediately went into like,

I got so excited thinking about you guys combining with his humor and his sensibility and his comfort on set and you guys just the way you just move around through this. I just thought I couldn't say enough about what a great match that would be. I'm not taking any claim for him signing off. No, you should take all the – I'm completely surprised that he was calling about that. This is a great clickable story for the internet. Yes.

Jason Bateman is responsible. Yeah, yeah. Wow. I'm happy to repeat that. But here, I'll tell you something. The other side of that coin, I mean, there's a lot of truth in that because...

You know, the first Captain America movie we did, Winter Soldier, Downey wasn't in it. Amazing. Then we went back with our partners, Marcus and McFeely, who wrote all the Marvel work that we did. And we conceived the next Captain America movie, Civil War. Yeah, amazing. You know, Downey was never supposed to be in that movie. He wasn't contracted to be in that movie. But we had designed a story where it was built as a two-hander between Captain America and Downey's character, Iron Man.

So we finally got the approval from Marvel. Kevin Feige said, OK, let's do this. He got the approval from Marvel Publishing in New York. We're going to do it. And he said, OK, now you guys got to go get Downey.

He like just tossed it to us. That's an easy fish to boat. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, listen, Robert, we want you, I know you've revitalized your career playing a superhero. We want you to be the villain in this next one. That was literally the pitch to him as we had to go sit there and explain to him

you know, how his, you know, how his character wasn't going to be, um, exclusively a villain in it. So it was a big swing for him because, you know, here are the guys coming off of Captain America doing it. You know, this is going to be our second movie with Evans. He's coming into Evans's franchise. I mean, it was a big, um, it was a big swing and I'm stunned. I'm still stunned. He said yes. Well, but he, he loves taking chances as you know, and he's such a, uh,

I would have loved to be in that meeting of you guys convincing him. And I can imagine the questions that Downey asked you guys because he's so thoughtful and he's thinking from so many different steps ahead, always inside way, like in every direction, right? I just want to see his outfit. I want to see, I want to know what he was wearing. He had us out to the house. He might've been in shorts and a t-shirt, Anthony. Remember, he was kind of laying on a shade.

Shay's lounge thing. Yeah. Anthony and I are sitting across from him, leaning forward, you know, excitedly pitching. And then this happens. Sweating. Right. And then he almost kills you. And then he's got, down he'll be wearing like a see-through Fendi raincoat. In green socks. With a fucking...

He literally came to a barbecue, no, a cookout on the beach once, and he was wearing a see-through Fendi raincoat and a fucking yellow T-shirt. And I go, what the fuck are you wearing, man? A see-through raincoat. But nobody can pull it off like Downey. By the way, he made it look cool. Like if I wore it, I'd look like the worst tool of all time. He's a walking piece of art.

He is a fucking piece of art. Guys, I have two questions. I have two questions about Endgame really quick. One is, I'm sure you've seen the reactions on TikTok and everything. I think the crowd reaction videos about Endgame, it must have been like...

So satisfying and thrilling. That was just huge. That's the first thing. And then the second thing is how in the world one of the most now iconic shots in all of cinema history is all of those superheroes in one shot when Iron Man dies and they're all lined up and the camera goes through every single one of them. And what'd you say? What'd you say? Nothing. What did he say?

I guess I don't need to see that now. Once I'm 18 years old. No, I saw it. Sean, have you still managed to scrape the jizz off your TV from that? No, it makes everybody look beautiful. And so, anyway, so it goes through and the camera goes through and every single superhero ever, like in every single movie, somebody in the business watching, I'm like, how did you organize

everybody's schedule to shoot all, like so many schedules to figure out. We start with number two first. Yeah. That took a year. That took a year of planning. Just that shot? Yeah. And we referred to it as the wedding. I mean, it took us a year to plan how to get all those people together. And then we had, we had a couple of months to plan out that shot.

Wow. But I remember the day that we, yeah, we took a, we sent a drone up just to get footage of base camp that day. I've never seen anything like it. Everybody said it was the largest base camp they'd ever seen in their 40 or 50 years. It went on for miles. I mean, it was insane. In excess of 50 trucks. It was the Deal Points Olympics, I bet.

Oh, yeah. For sure. Not a cheap scene. A portal-to-portal meeting, trailer requirements, meeting food, and just workout trailer, everything. Oh, my God. But we rehearsed that shot, Sean. We did. We, like...

We scouted that location multiple times. We brought stand-ins. We rehearsed the entire shot over and over so that we refined it, we refined it, because it was so much pressure. Amazing. I mean, name an actor, and they were in that shot. It was crazy. It was a lot of pressure. It was, and I remember...

Yeah, that day we were able to shoot that on a ranch down outside of Atlanta. So we had control of the property. There was no paparazzi around, right? It was several hundred acres. So it was, you know, very clandestine. And to get on the set that day was the most, you know, intense security. You had to be at the highest level, sort of the... I'm sure. And how long did it take to actually film the scene? I think it took us about two hours. I probably did that shot like...

eight or nine times, you know, you're only getting people to stand around for so long because, you know, they're not really doing anything. They've got to get back to the cable machine. And it was so impressive. Blast backs and buys. Yeah.

Well, it interrupts a lot of workouts. But those fan reaction videos too, Sean, that you brought up, we've watched those things so much. I mean, they are some of the most satisfying things we've ever seen. Amazing. I mean, to be, to see a movie theater, you know, to a crowd to react like that in a movie theater, that's not a live show. Yeah. Um,

It just was extremely rare. And it's for people who just like love that experience in the theater. It's just, it was priceless. Yeah. And my, my God, you know, growing up for, for me, it was like, you know, Star Wars, cause I'm not, Star Wars was the thing, but my, one of my godsons, Sammy, uh,

He was like crying his eyes out when Iron Man died. And I was-- You know, and he called me, he's like-- I'm like, "What's the matter?" He's like, "Iron Man is dead." I'm like, it was such a huge deal for this massive generation of these fans in a way that Star-- It was just so cool to see like-- Sounds like Sammy needs to get a life, to be honest. Yeah. Sam might want to take a step outside. No, let me just put it in perspective. You know what I mean, Sammy? I mean, he sounds like there's some bad parenting or something, but--

But let me ask you, guys, no, JK, we love Sammy. What about your own kids and their reactions to you guys being part of something that is such a huge part of, I'm sure they're friends and everybody loves the movies and they do too. And can they appreciate it in the way knowing that, you know, that you guys made these movies?

It's a really complex question. Yeah. I think it's like, you know, the same movies that took us away for two years. Right. But they're, my kids are not big comic book fans. So it was interesting. It's grounding because you come home and they could give a shit, you know, which is great, I think. And, you know, but I do think that, you know, for Ant and I, look, we, we, and you said this earlier, Bateman, we were,

huge comic book fans and we nobody knew this but i have a you know i have like five boxes in an attic still filled with you know 50 year old comic books um so this was a dream come true for us and what you're talking about sean is watching these reactions in the theaters

That's who we were as kids, right? I watched Empire Strikes Back like five times in a row in one day, sitting in the front row by myself, you know, crying at the end every time. That was me masturbating behind you. Check out this lightsaber. And put it this way, Joe, he wasn't watching the movie, all right?

But to be able to give that to, like, you want to recreate that experience. That's what we wanted. That's what we love about film. So if there's a line you could draw from who we were as kids to these movies, and that's like falling out of his booth right now. He cracks himself up all the time. We'll just turn him down in the mix and you just keep talking. And we will be right back. And now, back to the show.

Did you guys get any advice when you were first starting out as directors, you know, doing films at a tiny scale that's that's

that you're still using today on stuff that you're doing in a massive scale? Are you, or have you changed so much as directors, had to adapt so much as directors that everything you learned at the beginning is not really applicable now? Or is there some evergreen? Don't work with Jason Bateman. Aside from that one, aside from that lesson learned,

I mean, look at the short answer. I think for us is like, because we've done so many different things, like we've made movies for as little money as you could possibly make a movie for. And we've made movies for as much money as you can make a movie for, you know, we've done TV, comedy, drama, you know, network, cable, streaming, we do shoot commercials. So it's like for us, you know, because we like working in all these different forms, it's kind of all the same for us. Like we have the same process, no matter what we're doing. We just sort of dream up,

something that's exciting to us and then figure out how to execute it. So it's kind of just that process repeated over and over again. So I think, and we love technology. We've always loved the way that technology allows you to create certain feelings or effects or, or, or, uh,

How do you stay up on that? Because I'm sure that, you know, if you can imagine it, you can do it nowadays. But how do you know that for sure? How do you stay up on where technology is so that you know whether what you're thinking of is actually manageable? It's hard because you have to use it. So it is really tricky. You have to just figure out ways. You have to learn it too. You have to constantly learn. The only way to learn it is to use it. Filmmaking was a giant collaboration between hundreds of people. So you're relying on...

you know technical experts technologists that come in and can show you new things that are going on tell you but you know favros a really good friend of ours and he's you know he's done all this incredible work with uh with star wars shows um using led screens and really trying to advance the craft to make it more efficient and it's important thing is where technology helps you is

You know, the higher the budget goes, the higher the risk, right? And then a studio becomes more risk averse when you're spending more money on a project. If you can get that number down, then they'll take more risks. They'll take risks on, you know, filmmakers with interesting voices, younger filmmakers. I think it's critically important because it has gotten absurdly expensive to make, to tell stories.

Uh, and, uh, there has to be a future where that number comes down dramatically. But, but while you say that it, your new project Citadel on, on Amazon, uh, seems to be, the trailer's incredible by the way. Um, the, the,

You're doing a show. Tell the audience a little bit about the show. But what's exciting to me is that you're doing it in, you're doing multiple versions of the show that kind of cross pollinate each other, like in different territories around the world. Yeah. Explain that. I mean, basically it came from, Jen Salke came to us who runs Amazon and said, look, I have this idea. It's basically a business model, which is I want to do a US mothership show.

that somehow connects to various local language shows around the globe in some manner. There's interplay between the Mothership English language show and the local language shows. And she's like, can you guys come up with anything? We love the idea because we love the global audience. That was one thing that the Marvel experience really turned us on to. I mean, we were globally minded all of our lives since we were like early film fans. But...

The idea that we live in a world now where you can reach people in every corner of the globe with a story that they can enjoy together at the same time and communicate together. It's a very powerful thing. So we thought, okay, this is a new frontier. This is new technology.

Amazon now exists and their business model says, oh, we can make shows in different languages and different places around the world and they can talk to one another. Wow. And cast members kind of cross-pollinate as well? That's right. They can cross-pollinate. Also, you're creating a... Stop saying pollinate. There's something so gross. You really hung up on that. I can't wait to see it.

Well, and we produce, this is a show we produce. This is something that our company Agbo, you know, we were, Joe and I have been able to, since we moved on from the Marvel, we formed a production company with our partners, Chris Marcus and Steve McFeely, who are writing partners. What's Agbo mean real quick. Absolutely. Nothing. It's nonsense. Go get that beer, Joe. I want the answer. Yeah.

That's so dope. No, the shortest answer to that is when we were first writing together and we started doing some sketch comedy, we tried to drum up publicity for it. So we wrote an article for the school newspaper that was a phony review of the show. And the reviewer just lacerates the show.

And everything he hates about the show is everything we love about the show. And we needed a name for this article. We looked in the Cleveland phone book and found some guy named Gozy Agbo. And that was it. That's hysterical. Wow. All right. Have you guys ever wanted to dive? By the way, sorry to back up for a second. Have you guys ever wanted to dive into the Star Wars world? Is there plans to do something in there? I thought you were going to say want to dive into theater. I really wanted you to say dive into theater. Specifically musical theater.

It's coming. I know it's coming. It's a follow-up. Well, that will be a follow-up. We love Star Wars. I mean, this is, you know, the same way that... You're not going to say anything that you've had meetings on that you're talking about because you can't talk about it. Guaranteed had meetings on. No, there were early conversations. There were early conversations with us. And, you know, Kevin Feige is a huge Star Wars fan. And there were some early conversations about maybe teaming up with Kevin to do Star Wars. Speaking to take from Jason, there's been a lot of cross-pollination. Yep.

Oh, now he's awake. Between Star Wars and Marvel, a lot of the same, because it does have a sort of a similar, are bees? Similar sensibility, right, between those two worlds. So it makes sense that there have been people who have done both. And I bet you, if I'm Kathy Kennedy, I'm like, yeah, I'm calling the Russo brothers because I want them to get in here too. Couldn't make their deal. Guaranteed.

It's too expensive, Will. Not now. These guys are running the world. But let me ask you this. So you're a fan, but if something happens, it's great. They're fans. They're on the record as saying they're fans. And by the way, and the ball's in their court. So you guys, by them, I mean Star Wars. So you guys, you do all this Marvel stuff, and then you go off and you make a bunch of big movies. You guys made some movies with... Grey Man.

-Awesome. -Great. -Gossing and Evans, great man. -Yeah. All those guys. -Cherry with Tom Holland. -Yeah. When you go and you do those movies after coming out of that world, do they just seem so much easier? Because, like you do, like Sean was saying, for Endgame, you plan a shot for a year and you fucking-- and you do all this stuff and there's so much into it. Now when you make just a regular old sort of action comedy or whatever, you're like, "Yeah, it's pretty easy."

It's something you're starting. I mean, Joe, you wrote Gray Man, right? That's right. Yeah, we started, I mean, look, the transition for us after Marvel was more towards artist ownership. You know, we wanted to start our own company. We wanted to start, you know, controlling, creating our own content as much as possible. We went out and raised money in the studios, well-financed. Kind of like what Ben and Matt are doing. Yeah, exactly. I mean, it's sort of a, you know, for us, I mean, I think, you know, it's a very disruptive time in the business. And to have

where you can be protected, right? And you can protect yourself. Mm-hmm.

and you can work on what you want to work on at the pace that you want to work on. Hire yourself. Basically, exactly. And, you know, so that was the focus for us. Be a fan of your own work. Hire yourself. That's what John was mumbling behind you, Joe, in the movie theater. Hire yourself. Hire yourself. Just be a fan of yourself. Hey, do you guys... How much time do you guys spend... I know you keep saying... Talking about Paul and I. When you...

When you guys came out, you were young filmmakers and you were recognized or you were sort of discovered, if you will, by Steven Soderbergh. How much time do you guys spend looking for those new young talents and young voices? Because there are a lot of people out there who are trying to make or are making films and putting them online, etc., etc. Like what Soderbergh did for you guys. Yeah. Do you guys spend a lot of time doing that stuff, looking for emerging talent?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's a big part of our agenda at Agbo because we're able to. You know, the company is built in a way it's a well-funded company. It makes large projects. We have the capacity and the space. And Joe and I also look at it as like we it's a karmic debt that we owe the universe to like find space.

people who are interesting artists who have important stories to tell and figure out how we realize those movies because some of those stories aren't going to get through the system any other way. Right. You know, like we wouldn't have gotten through the system any other way. So that's really important to us. And in fact, I mean, look, everything everywhere all at once is a... Congratulations, by the way. Thank you. Thank you. I wanted to get to that. No, it was such a great night for all you guys. Yeah. That's unbelievable. Yeah. What a film. It was massive.

I mean, they're incredibly talented, and that's sort of part of the... I mean, these are guys that made a movie with a farting corpse. You know, they're risk-takers. They're very inventive. Swiss Army men. You guys ever see Swiss Army men? Three callbacks for that. Yeah. But that's a good... I mean, there's a good example of Swiss... Because his resume's always said, can fart on cue. Special skills. Try it. Count me down. I'll do it. Juggles. Now...

Can you tell us at all what, maybe not specifically, but in the world of what might be next that we can be all looking forward to seeing coming out of you guys? So Citadel comes out very shortly.

Extraction 2 is out in June. That's the Hemsworth franchise, action franchise. Another little cute little indie you guys do. That's right. And then Ant and I are working on a project called The Electric State that was starring Chris Pratt and Millie Bobby Brown. Chris Pratt, that's a mistake. That's a mistake. Yeah, you might want to reconsider with Pratt. Guys, the movie's already shot. It's in the cans. Oh. By the way, I ran into Chris the other day, and he said he had the best time making that movie.

We love Pratt. I mean, obviously, look at how many times. He falls a lot, though.

Guys, see what I did? Pratt falls. Pratt falls. It took me a minute. But he's like you guys. You guys know him. He's the greatest. He's so... He just brought amazing energy every day. He's always looking. He's always searching. He's always sort of surprising you. And he's very smooth with everybody. Good dude. Happy to be there. But, Ant, you said something right there, which is... And I've always loved Pratt for this. From the day I met him, from the day he did that... We talked about it. We had him on the show. And he did the first season of...

I know he was in Parks and Rec, but I remember the first season, the first time I saw it, he was so surprising, and he always is surprising. Yeah. And so the ultimate weapon in comedy is that you never know what the fuck Pratt is going to say or do. Yeah. And he catches you off guard, and it's always really fucking funny. Yeah, he's so funny. And that's the mark of somebody who's,

Genuinely funny. And a great golfer. He's decent. He's decent. He's decent. Let's not give him too much. It works too much to be fantastic. Well, I'm realizing as, you know, we do tend to work with a lot of the same actors. We like family. We like hanging out. We like having fun. You spend a lot of time on set together. But I think we've worked with you probably double.

what we've worked with anyone else on. So I think we've done like six or seven things together. Yeah, only once with me and nothing with Sean. It's coming. No, no, it's coming. Yeah, so I'll double check my email. I can beat that everything everywhere all at one script and I have a 310 page script I'd like to send you. Jesus. Right on the money.

Like send it. We'll read it. We'll read it out loud right here. Yeah, we'll do a whole podcast around it. Just workshop it. You guys, we love you and thank you for all of this time. Didn't I go by fast? Yeah, so fast. Thank you guys for doing this. Yeah, thank you guys. Thank you. And by the way, it's remarkable what you guys have done with this show. It's like I listen to it all the time. It's true. We're blown away ourselves. It's so funny, crazy, surprising, amazing.

and valuable. So congratulations. Thank you for even calling it a show because it's such a haphazard piece of shit. But let me just say this. I'm so genuinely happy for you guys. It couldn't happen to two better, more talented, nicer fucking dudes. I love you guys. I'm a huge, huge fan of you guys. Thank you very much. You give this business a good name, you Russo brothers. As do you guys. All right. We love you. Love you guys. Have a great rest of the day and we'll see you soon. See you guys. Take care, everybody. Bye, boys. Bye, guys. Ciao. Thank you.

How about those guys? I didn't know they worked that much on Arrested Development. Oh, yeah. The whole first year, second year, too? Most of the first two seasons. I didn't know that. I mean, there were other people, but yeah. That's so cool. They're so cool. They're so chill. Imagine that, Sean. For all of the gain that Arrested Development afforded me and Will and everyone else who's watching this show,

to watch what happened with their career after Arrested. Can you imagine what Will and I and everyone else was like, oh my God, there they go. And they've like up until what, last year or something, they're responsible for the highest grossing film in the history of movies. In the history. I think probably like number one and number two. And now I think what, it's number two and number three or whatever the hell it is. Yeah, Avatar.

They're just responsible for so much health of this business. I know. And they're legitimately great dudes. They are such nice guys. They're such regular guys who really have not changed, I imagine, since the day they moved from Cleveland. Yeah, and in this short amount of time we spent with them, I can tell that they're...

They are very balanced individuals. Very. Which is rare in this business. They're very just kind of, you know, together. Yeah. And a pleasure to be on set with. Oh, my God. And Joe would be when we were doing... Remember, you brought up all night when he was coming and he was doing up all night and you go like...

He'd be like having a little something to eat and he was working on his fantasy football, which Jason and I used to do with him at various times. And then he'd be like, you come back in and they go cut. And I'd walk in and he's like talking to the thing. He's looking at his thing and go, Joe, what do you think? He goes,

kind of looks up and he's like, yeah, yeah, let's just do it again. Maybe just do it a little faster at the top there and then look at her in the eye and blah, blah, blah. All right, let's go. And then he's, I need to go back. All right, yeah, I think maybe I can get a trade for this guy. He's just easy going and effortless and just like, you know what I mean? Yeah, it's rare. Just sweeping on top. Yeah, rare. And they're brothers too. I mean, aren't brothers supposed to fight all the time? I know, that's what I wanted to ask them, but I didn't want to be weird about it. I was like, don't you guys ever get in a fight? I've never seen them, I've honestly never seen them fight. No.

Or even get sort of annoyed with one another. No. Not like us three. No. No. You fucking cunt. What about, I didn't ask him, but what about splitting the money? That's got to be a pain. I've always wondered about these directing duos. Do they get twice the directing budget or do they have to split? No, it's probably one and they split it.

But I wonder if that still is the case with them. They might get like a one plus. Yeah, they're big shots. You get a one plus. But they're family, so it probably doesn't hurt to split. Jason, price of bread right now, go. Ooh, a dollar a slice? Am I close? You're laughing at me like I'm not close. I love a bread that's $35. And maybe 50 cents for the heels? $50?

I don't know. Or are they selling them all together? Do you get a break if you buy a bunch of slices together? Well, only if you buy them together. Well done, Sean. Bye. Bye. Stupid. Smart. Worse. Smart. Worse.

SmartLess is 100% organic and artisanally handcrafted by Michael Grant Terry, Rob Armjarv, and Bennett Barbico. SmartLess. If you like SmartLess, you can listen early and add free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.