you're on i'm on yeah hey actually someone who said that to me last night Mark Gatiss
said exactly the same thing as well but utterly predictable both of us
you can go on a long roster of lovely famous people guys congratulations on the show
thank you thank you uh it's it's so much fun i really really enjoyed it i can't wait to watch
the rest um John i want to start with you what was the lure for you to to take on the
the british quote-unquote remake for this one and what did you think you could add to it that was
that was shall we say not in the french version yeah uh well the lure was i mean obviously
the privilege really of being invited to um play with something that was already so incredibly
i was a big fan of the show before you know i um i i had the first cup of coffee about this um
so that was the attraction i mean it comes with with an equal amount of or you know uh
anxiety really because you you feel a huge from the beginning from the very first thought about
it you feel a huge responsibility to the french show and to the fans of the french
show to not mess this up so it was a it was a is it was daunting and exciting in equal measure
and then um in terms of what one could bring to it you know um in in in in adapting it i mean
i think it's a bit like trying to... it's a bit like being given responsibility for a very valuable
and exotic plant which is growing beautifully in some soil and saying well okay let's we've got
to transplant it into a very different soil um that's not a very good analogy actually but um
some some things don't read across they just don't into our culture and um
tonally this show was always going to be different it had to be different so we were trying to bring
those that like the french show with us um but also this show was always going to feel
different because british people are very different they don't um you know they don't
we're very poor i think it's saying what we mean uh when it comes to our feelings it's just part
of growing up in the british culture which i don't think is part of what's so attractive and stylish
about the french um uh show and about the french life as as as uh as shown in it is their kind of
if the incredible stylishness with which they argue or fall in love and it's all out there
on the surface and it's passionate and it seems so beguiling and so attractive but
for better or worse probably worse we don't move like that in this country and so as a
writer i'm always very interested between in the gap between what's being said apparently
uh or what's being done and what the truth of that moment really is there's a gap if
you i it is yes i think particularly in all cultures but particularly in british culture
it's just baked in somehow and in that gap i think lies all the good stuff the comedy the pathos the
um drama and you need a really really good set of actors who are who are giving you access to
stuff that's not actually on the page or not on the screen so that you know jack was saying
uh that he has lots of lots of lines which are just the word right as someone said you know but
there are many there are many different versions of that and sometimes it's a holding it's buying
a bit of time sometimes it's disapproval sometimes it's anxiety that's covered up
sometimes it's enthusiasm that's covered up and you need and the absolute a list of actors to
do that because they haven't got long speeches where they say what they mean yeah because i've
taken them all i mean i i don't do that and and when i've done it i take them out again yeah you
know over to the over to the world just to add a little thing to what john just said in terms of
i think one of the the big distinctions perhaps between the two which he's alluded to as an actor
one of the things that was really fun to kind of play around with is that there by nate by
definition uh agents have to be hyper articulate as professionals they're talking all day long and
also kind of keeping in their heads quite what they've said to you know like it's complicated
but personally they're emotionally inarticulate so the tension between those two things allows
you to kind of play in this space where you're constantly switching back and forth between
you know at least the the impression of sort of fluent you know hyper articulacy and actually all
the kind of you know mortified in contortions that are going on underneath and and that and
that i think is a function of britishness and and when it's laid underneath this world where
you know you've got professional talkers there's a lot of fun to be had in that tension i think
yeah my next question actually was going to ask you jack about the art of the right acting because
it is a very british thing and as as john said it it does mean it doesn't necessarily just mean
the word there's a lot of emphasis in very very different ways no it doesn't but again as an actor
it's such a joy when you have scripts where the writer has the confidence to
give you like one word because because then there's all this space that you can fill
and that allows the audience to do their work rather than us just telling you everything it's
all in the it's all in what's underneath it and and and also in terms of like comic rhythm as
well you know john has such a facility for kind of understanding the pace and and manner of like
you know what is unintentionally hilarious a lot of the time in
in in real spoken dialogue and it was you know that was one at the beginning of this
of shooting like we have these scenes occasionally where there are like eight of us in a conference
room and we were all terrified because really yeah oh no because it's because you don't want
to be doing it you don't you don't want to be the one that [ __ ] it up basically yeah um but we got
into it and then and actually that's where as john says that's where the good stuff is because we
we all kept our end of the bargainer and when the ball is just going bang bang bang bang bang around
the room and then a lot of the time you're not saying anything for a page and a half but you're
listening and then and as you've seen it you know like a lot of the of the joy of the show is
not what is what said it's the killer cutaway to someone listening to whatever it is and reacting
and you can only do that if there's space and so you know that's all thanks to john but the
precision it's an interesting thing just um it just occurs to me whilst you were talking that
as a director something i've learned you know over the years is it's something it's like it's
with those long scenes with lots of people you know chipping in with one word here one word
there it's like a um skipping stone across water sometimes early on in a scene someone will hit a
particular line or a moment in a particular way and everything else in the scene just goes ping
ping ping ping ping ping right down through the scene next take everybody's staying just as hard
for some reason it's different and it just kind of goes clunk clunk clunk clunk and it's maddening
because no it's kind of so elusive um but you know you need a really really great set of actors
to do it and it's it's when it happens in the room everybody knows the actors know the sound people
know the camera you know you can just tell that was a really good take there was some something
rhythmically about it yeah i was just speaking to the some of the other casts and saying about how
how good you all are but maggie steed is just oh on another planet or to anybody else it must be so
so great to say you're in these scenes together but she always seems to be the one so nonchalantly
being able to just steal a scene from you in the nicest possible way when i first watched
it i was like wow look at this like like every time i'm doing something slightly toe-curlingly
embarrassing all you have to do is cut to Maggie [Steed] looking slightly disappointed in there and it does
all the work and i i would add also that you know like there are a lot of things about show business
that are i like truly like beautiful but there aren't many professions where you get to work
as an absolute equal with older people right and the really good parts for older people
are vanishingly rare so when you have the experience of being able to have these scenes
and you have someone you know i'm you know we have at least three generations in this show and it's
like there's maggie and then there's going to me and then there's the younger lot underneath that
and so that kind of intergenerational thing is but you're quite right it's like the rest of us
might as well not bother because like she's she's always going to be the one to like coup de gras
is always left to maggie yeah absolutely guys i wish you all the best for the show i really
enjoyed it i can't wait to watch the rest uh yeah pleasure talking to you thanks so thank you much
and gentlemen you're watching hey you guys hey you guys how are you guys is that from the goonies yes