>>> I don't know, it feels calculated.
I need something that captures the blind innocence -- Kerry, get me a bunch of blindfolds!
>> James van Der Beek stars in the viceland comedy satire, "What would diplow ws wrote
it, produced it, Brandon directed it.
And, yeah, I was all-in on this one.
>> Where did this whole idea come from?
It's very meta?
>> The weirdest idea anybody has ever heard.
Yeah.
This came -- I had originally done a commercial for the block party.
Just a one-off thing.
I had heard diplo talk about how he approached music and thought this guy is a genius, I'll
be associated with him when they offered.
So we did it.
It was one day.
Thought that would be it.
And then it got covered by a bunk bunch of press aand came to us and section is, this
is not a show.
This is just a weird idea.
And then I went back and thought about it and thought, wait a minute, this could totally
be a show.
Musical genius, terrible at life.
He's smart enough know you can't take yourself too seriously.
So he just went right for it and said yeah, he, just make it completely ridiculous, carte
Blanche.
So we got the musical part and added in a fiction.
What we tried to do was parables about life through the eyes of of a clown.
And testifies down for that.
>> You know what's funny you're saying not take yourself seriously.
I feel like for you, this is when your career totally turned coming off "Dawson's creek."
You did "Funny or die" everyone and saw a whole new side that was absolutely hysterical.
And you cornered this niche market that very few people could do.
>> It's interesting when the offers dry up and you look around and say, okay, what do
I have to offer and what can I do and "Funny or die" was there.
>> What was the sketch again, I can't remember?
>> There were a couple.
There was -- there's one I can't say.
>> Okay.
>> Were -- yeah, we made fun of the meme thing at one point.
>> And the cheeks and the beaks was way later.
>> That was for "Apartment 23."
We played a blocked out version of myself.
That weird jeans commercial.
>> So we said diplo, of course, is in on this, as executive producer.
Is he giving you ideas, this happened to me in a show, and you write the script based
on it?
>> Every once in a while.
He's actually been really hands-off.
He gave us the music, obviously, which is gold.
But he does not micro manage.
He doesn't come in and say, hey, change that, that's too much.
That's too far.
He was just -- in 100%.
The one episode you saw where he was trying to find a new sound, came from a text he sent
at 4:00 in the morning.
Yo, what if I itne hit?
I was like, yes!
Let's do that.
>> How does diplo feel?
Did you see the whole Katy Perry stuff?
She had to rank her lovers.
>> Right.
>> And they put diplo -- and I felt they didn't give him a chance to shine.
>> I loved his response, which is he posted -- his response was, I won the bronze in the
sex Olympics.
>>I love it!