Interview With "I Saw The TV Glow" Director/Writer Jane Schoenbrun & Star Brigette Lundy-Paine

[00:00:00] You are listening to the Next Best Picture Podcast, and this is Dan Baer's interview

[00:00:05] with the director and writer for I Saw the TV Glow, Jane Schoenbrunn, and the film's

[00:00:10] star, Bridget Lundy Payne.

[00:00:12] I know this might sound crazy.

[00:00:14] I don't want to alarm you.

[00:00:17] Do you remember a TV show we used to watch together?

[00:00:21] It was called...

[00:00:23] The Big O'Bake?

[00:00:26] Yeah.

[00:00:27] Do you watch?

[00:00:29] Why?

[00:00:30] You're in the night sky.

[00:00:31] Night sky.

[00:00:32] I am.

[00:00:33] Are you in the conference room background on it?

[00:00:38] No, I mean, I have to go thematically.

[00:00:41] You know how it is.

[00:00:42] You get an episode of season 6, then for The Big O'Bake.

[00:00:45] Press choice, yeah, press choice season 7.

[00:00:49] I am available if you're shooting it.

[00:00:52] Jane Schoenbrunn, Bridget, thank you so much for joining us.

[00:00:57] I am really excited to talk to you.

[00:00:59] I wanted to thank you for giving me extremely weird dreams last night after I saw this

[00:01:05] movie, but I wanted to start by asking Jane what it was like for you going from

[00:01:13] the we're all going to the World's Fair, which was only two characters, very minimal

[00:01:18] settings, to this, which is almost like directing two projects at once between the

[00:01:24] film and The Pink O'Bake.

[00:01:26] I think from the very beginning, I knew it was going to be a huge jump in terms of

[00:01:31] budget and scope.

[00:01:32] And I tried my best to be humble about it, almost feeling like I was directing

[00:01:37] my first film for a second time because I think actually the two ways of making

[00:01:43] a movie that I've done so far in the feature length, right?

[00:01:46] Like going out in the woods with ten friends and making something completely bare

[00:01:51] with a lot of like handcrafted love and then being at the center of a much more

[00:01:57] industrial commercial process with a lot of other people's money on the line

[00:02:02] and also a lot of resources with which you could do really cool things if you

[00:02:07] could just convince them to let you do that.

[00:02:09] This was a, yeah, it was almost like working in two different mediums.

[00:02:14] And I think one isn't necessarily better than the other, but you can do

[00:02:19] different things with each circumstance.

[00:02:23] When you're making a really small film, I think you have a lot more nimbleness.

[00:02:27] You can do a lot more improvisation.

[00:02:29] You can like really kind of like try to capture lightning in a bottle in a way

[00:02:34] that is hard to do on a bigger budget film.

[00:02:37] But when you are working with the resources that I had on this film, you

[00:02:42] can compose in a way and in a scope, like with a scope that feels like

[00:02:47] utterly impossible without that level of resource.

[00:02:50] And as like a person who really loves films that are beautiful and wanted to

[00:02:56] make a movie that was just like gorgeous and painterly and lush with color

[00:03:02] and music and sound and monsters, it was such a wonderful experience to

[00:03:08] get that level of resource to tell what ultimately was also, I think, a

[00:03:13] really personal and experimental story or piece.

[00:03:21] Each episode, they help each other fight a new monster from across the

[00:03:24] county. But it's way too scary for most kids.

[00:03:27] We're going to defeat them this time.

[00:03:29] We're going to need to harness the full potential of our shared powers.

[00:03:33] Sometimes the pink opaque feels more real in real life.

[00:03:37] Maddie, it was a TV show.

[00:03:41] Are you sure that's all it was? Absolutely.

[00:03:45] And I'm really glad you brought up the monsters in this because I love

[00:03:51] them and they're so twisted.

[00:03:55] Where did the ideas for these specific monsters that we see in the

[00:03:59] film come from?

[00:04:02] I think it was just like sort of thumbing through the fake episode

[00:04:04] guide in my brain of like, you know, the 90s television that I loved

[00:04:09] as a kid and trying to stay really true to the energy that I loved in

[00:04:15] those shows, whether it be like Are You Afraid of the Dark or Goose

[00:04:18] Pumps or Buffy.

[00:04:21] Not trying to do an impression of them and not trying to speak down

[00:04:26] to them or make a winking parody but to really make something that

[00:04:30] could carry the spirit that I loved when I was a kid and watched

[00:04:34] those shows within it because that was the only way that it would be

[00:04:37] believable that the characters would be as obsessed as they were with

[00:04:41] the show.

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[00:05:27] And it was actually quite easy to tap into because I just did spend

[00:05:38] much, like most of my youth being obsessed with that kind of

[00:05:42] world. And so getting to play within it.

[00:05:46] You know, and sort of like twist it and mutate it a bit.

[00:05:51] You know, from adulthood.

[00:05:54] Yeah, it was just such a natural space for me to enter and feel

[00:05:58] almost like a kid in a candy store a bit. A kid in a monster

[00:06:02] store.

[00:06:04] Were there any ideas you had that didn't make it into the film or was it

[00:06:07] always, you always have the same concept?

[00:06:10] I like girls. You know that right?

[00:06:12] Totally. That's fine.

[00:06:14] What about you? Do you like girls?

[00:06:16] I think that I like TV shows.

[00:06:20] It's our destiny.

[00:06:26] How can I have a destiny?

[00:06:28] If something is wrong, this is how life is supposed to feel.

[00:06:32] Tell me you know it's true.

[00:06:35] It's just the suburbs.

[00:06:40] Seems like you're always somewhere else like it.

[00:06:46] Maddie disappeared without a trace.

[00:06:49] All they found was her TV set burning in the backyard.

[00:06:56] I told myself I made the right choice.

[00:06:58] There is this really messed up one where there's going to be this

[00:07:02] episode about like a car, an evil car wash that moves into town

[00:07:07] and starts abducting kids and kind of like hooking the kids up to

[00:07:13] the machine.

[00:07:15] Basically creating the soap that washes cars by plugging it in.

[00:07:19] Wow.

[00:07:21] So there are going to be tubes stuck in these kids' mouths leading

[00:07:24] down into the car wash.

[00:07:26] This was in an early version that was maybe a little darker than

[00:07:30] what ended up on screen.

[00:07:32] So that was one.

[00:07:34] It was really fun coming up with all of the additional episode names

[00:07:39] and descriptions that you can pause and see briefly throughout the

[00:07:43] film.

[00:07:44] I want to watch Time Warp Talent Show.

[00:07:46] I want to see that episode.

[00:07:49] Absolutely.

[00:07:51] We don't have too much more time either, but I wanted to.

[00:07:54] There was a connection that I noticed that Jane, your last film,

[00:07:58] the protagonist's name was Casey and Brigitte on Atypical,

[00:08:04] your character was also named Casey.

[00:08:07] So I had to ask, you know,

[00:08:09] what would your respective Casys have thought of The Pink

[00:08:14] Opaque when they were kids?

[00:08:17] Great question.

[00:08:18] Yeah, really great question.

[00:08:19] What if I really was someone else?

[00:08:22] Very far away on the other side of a television screen.

[00:08:28] I feel like Casey would have been like,

[00:08:33] what is this?

[00:08:35] I feel like Casey would have just been like,

[00:08:37] but that made me a bit intrigued.

[00:08:40] I feel like Casey would have,

[00:08:45] I don't know.

[00:08:49] Maybe she would have been obsessed with it,

[00:08:52] but I don't feel like he's like that soft.

[00:08:56] I feel like Casey's a bit tough.

[00:09:00] I think she likes reality TV.

[00:09:04] I think Casey, from where we're all going to the World's Fair,

[00:09:08] would have loved it as a kid and thought it was really cool in the way

[00:09:11] that Brigitte does in the movie.

[00:09:15] And then once she was 14 or whatever,

[00:09:20] and people were making fun of it and calling it gay on YouTube,

[00:09:23] she would have joined in, but then she would have secretly been like,

[00:09:27] felt like she was betraying a friend or something.

[00:09:31] I can see that.

[00:09:34] Unfortunately all the time we have, I think,

[00:09:37] but thank you so much for speaking with us today.

[00:09:40] Thank you for this gorgeous, beautiful, touching film so much.

[00:09:45] Thank you.

[00:09:46] Thank you both.

[00:09:48] Hey everyone.

[00:09:49] Thank you so much for listening to Dan Baer's interview

[00:09:52] with the writer and director for I Saw the TV Glow,

[00:09:55] Jane Schoenbrunn,

[00:09:57] and the film star Brigitte Lundy-Payne

[00:09:59] here on the Next Best Picture podcast.

[00:10:02] I Saw the TV Glow will be released in theaters from May 24 on May 3rd.

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