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Not that anyone seemed to learn anything.
(I had been invited to do so because Imhosting a podcastHBO is producing about the show.)
Hes a super producer; you might know him fromWhite Lotusand various other shows.
Dr. Bernad kept saying to Dave, I have a Watergate figure, and his stories are amazing.
And Dave had told us, My dad pitches me bad TV shows all the time.
I cant get him to drop this.
Nobodys done this story yet.
I dont think the words were even out of his mouth before we said, Thats a fantastic idea.
I mean, these guys are superlative writers.Veepis one of the greatest sitcoms of all time.
He got to do more crazy shit.
WH: It happened twice.
PH: You were like, It feels like its gonna happen again.
Is Theroux gonna play all the funny shit and Im just gonna have to carry the water?
I was like, No, no.
Hes a real eccentric character.
Youre gonna have fun doing it.
What do you think, now that were done?
WH: He still got the best part.
But Im still quite happy to be in the project.
How did you figure that out?
Liddy, specifically, was such a big personality.JT: Liddy was tough.
And hes tough because hes kind of performing the character of Liddy.
Hes a tricky character to play in that respect.
WH: Id say you nailed it, sir.
JT: Oh, thank you, Woody.
Woody, what about you?WH: I tried doing Hunt closer to what he was.
Im not calling him boring, butIwas boring trying to do him.
He was very monotone and had a very flat, polished disposition.
The night before we started shooting, I was really upset with myself for not figuring this out yet.
I just started trying a Patton voice, and I kind of liked that.
David Mandel: The performances are grounded by facts.
Theyre grounded by the reality of how we shot it.
I always thought of Hunt and Liddy as a has-been and a never-was.
That was the weird, dangerous Hunt-Liddy combination.
Like Willy Loman, Hunt is deliberate.
Hes seen it all.
And he knows some of this is wrong, but he so desperately wants it back.
That, to me, grounded all of it.
Its the desperation that grounds these guys closer to reality.
And these guys accomplished it, which I loved.
He was trying to clamp down on demonstrations, the Pentagon Papers.
He really wanted everything to seem stable, and it wasnt; it was spiraling out of control.
So the more he tries to clamp down on his kids, the worse it gets.
And the same with Nixon.
JT: The phrase we like isbuddy tragedy.
Theres something uncomfortable about it.
Youre there with the camera.
The camera is on a dolly, moving smoothly.
I dont want viewers to think about it, but its there, bothering you in an interesting way.
What do you make of Liddy and Hunts relationship?
Youll see as the series progresses that its the tragedy of two families.
You could make an argument that its the tragedy of one family, which would be the Hunt family.
Liddys life really took off once he got arrested.
He was ecstatic to be serving his time.
He was able to be a martyr for Nixon and take this bullet, you know?
He sort of was the beta version of Roger Stone or Steve Bannon.
He was going into the courthouse and having fun doing little press conferences before he walked in.
Once he got out, he was the definition of shameless.
He was one of the first people in the media age to co-opt his infamy into dollars and cents.
Now we see that playing out all the time.
Woody, what do you think of their relationship?
Theres also a sense that hes just this young punk from the FBI, not as seasoned.
Then slowly, you see a shift take place.
You see it in that scene where hes talking about his kid and the therapy and such.
They become good friends.
Things get a little unhinged later, though.
AG: Hunts son described them as teenagers when they were together.
There was a lot of roughhousing, and they were just giggling all the time.
They were having a great time doing all this nefarious stuff.
At one point, they were actually plotting to kill the columnist Jack Anderson.
But then they realized his children might get it, so that was maybe a step too far.
We had to cut all that out, but that was really them.
That all fits the tone of the series.
Its a very, very funny tragedy.
Thats what it felt like to us the entire time.
At all times, you are very aware that laws are being broken.
So its not like you’re able to really soft-pedal that and make it somber.
Its a strange movie in that it never leaves a certain tone.
And it all just kind of exists in this world.
DM: What I love about movies like that is that its often … We see this true-believer thing that is destroying our politics, their enthusiasm for doing the wrong thing.
They truly think they are saving the country.
Its desperation plus vicious enthusiasm.
And thats part of the tragedy of Watergate.
They want to make money, they want to be important, they want to have proximity to power.
I dont think money has anything to do with it.
AG: The million dollars represents how much mayhem they can cause.
Its not so much about pocketing the money.
ItsLook at the shit we can do with a million dollars.
And I would say that misguided zealotry is also the life of a Hollywood writer.
That was a big part of the pitch to the acting attorney general, John Mitchell.
And then they were going to kidnap protesters and take them to Mexico and maybe kill them.
They had this elaborate plan, and it was probably five pages of dialogue.
JT: It was seven.
But we had some secret weapons.
We were shooting one day at the National Airport.
It was okay except planes are landing and trains and buses are going by ruining takes.
How would you like some pictures with you and your entire family with Woody Harrelson?
And he turned the charm on.
We were there until almost noon.
PH: We shot a lot of what you see also in Albany and Albany doesnt care.
They literally gave us the entirety of downtown, like, How many days do you want it?
you’re free to have downtown for a month, it doesnt matter.
One night, we all went to a bar, and every department started showing up.
Were all blowing off steam.
Then we hear the fire chief is here.
Woody and his body double were behind the bar serving drinks like it wasCheers.
Five-star service in Albany.
You were shooting all of this through COVID.
It was a very long process, and it was also in the shadow of Trump.
What was that like?
I recognize that, I recognize that, I recognize this, I recognize that.
Go back to true believerism, too.
So the constant echoes of Trump were there without us having to do anything.
To me, its there because Trump isnt an aberration.
Theres a direct line that you might draw from Watergate straight up to the present.
We dont want to ring that bell too hard, but we want you to hear that ring.
