What Happens When Authors Hate the Adaptation? Plus, Emmy Nominee Yahya Abdul-Mateen II Says Goodbye to “Wonder Man”

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1:19Hello and welcome to Little Gold Men, Vanity Fair's podcast for film, TV, and awards lovers. I'm Rebecca Ford. And I'm John Ross. Today we're sharing Rebecca's interview with Yaya Abdul-Mateen II. Rebecca, how did it go? It was great. He was pretty open and honest about the very sad cancellation of Wonder Man, for which he's Emmy-nominated. We also talked about his theater background, and we had some fun questions at the end. So it was a lot of fun. We're also going to talk about a new piece that Rebecca has out, about the controversy surrounding the film adaptation of a YA fantasy novel. and about the long history of book authors in Hollywood.

2:01They don't always get along so well. No, it can be a bit of a rocky road. But first, John, we have some big news to discuss. The latest in the Paramount Warner Brothers merger saga. I think a lot happened this week. What's the headline for you, John? Well, this is our new It Ends With Us lawsuit. evidently Hollywood needs some never-ending lawsuit but basically David Ellison told Paramount senior execs at a meeting allegedly that he was contemplating moving the studio out of California if the attorney general decided to continue all the way to the trial date for this lawsuit, which is March of 2027.

2:53And then about a day later, the DGA and IATSE sent a letter to Ellison and the Attorney General of California saying that they would prefer for this not to go to trial and that he enter settlement talks. And they listed a bunch of things that they would want in the settlement, which is all the things you would expect. They want the same number of theatrical. They want theatrical windows. They want HBO to remain linear. They want to keep the lots open. Yeah. He has told these theater owners, you know, AMC and Regal, they're doing 30 movies a year, which is 15 per studio, which is where they're at now, if not higher.

3:34So it's interesting now because I think there is now a shift in the community between people that really want to try to block this merger and people that are like, actually, we need to accept that the merger is happening and get as much out of it as we can. Yeah, I think people may be realizing the worst case scenario is this drags on for a very long time and still happens anyway. And what happens to the industry as that drags on? Or the worst case scenario is Ellison moves this to another state, which I think is a pretty strong threat. Unclear how that would really work. But, you know, Larry Ellison has moved the Oracle headquarters to Texas.

4:21So this isn't without precedent, but it feels like a threat that may have actually worked since the letter came after the threat. I think it's more like if they have to pay these ticking fees, there just comes a point where I think people are like, look, guys, like if Paramount ends up having to hemorrhage money for this suit and then it goes through anyway. Right. It's such a waste. Yeah, what will happen is that they're going to turn around and say, like, well, we spent all this money that we didn't think we were going to have to spend. And we know the answer to that, which is always we have to make cuts.

5:01And so I think the DGA of all the guilds is always, you know, the most studio-friendly, the most pragmatic, and is also led by Christopher Nolan. Right. Which is not a small person in this industry. And he's almost beyond director. He's an entity. Yeah. And so when he signs something on behalf of his guild, I think it's pretty powerful. So we shall see. But now let's talk about Children of Blood and Bone and what happens when an author takes public issue with the screen adaptation of their book. Like I mentioned at the top of the show, Rebecca recently wrote a piece for VanityFair.com about Children of Blood and Bone, which is a fantasy novel written by Tomi Adeyemi that's now being adapted into a feature.

5:58Everyone should read it online. It's really, really good. It's complicated. So I'm leaving the complicated work to you, Rebecca. Explain to us the drama behind the scenes of the making of this movie. It is complicated. I could take up the whole podcast trying to explain it all. But basically, Tomi wrote this trilogy of books, and there was a historic, huge deal for both the books and the film adaptation. when she was just like 23 years old. And, you know, it was supposed to be like the next Black Panther, but with magic, basically, is how she described it at the time. And the adaptation moved hands and stuff.

6:43But once it landed at Paramount, she got a lot of power as an author. She was going to write this screenplay. She has an executive producer credit. She was very involved in casting. She seemed really excited in interviews. Gina Prince-Bythewood is the director. It has a great cast. Viola Davis is in it. Idris Elba. Like, huge names. It's an all-black cast. Everything seemed great. And then this summer, she posted two videos on her social media that basically said she wanted nothing to do with this adaptation and sort of hinted at that something upsetting had happened during the filming of this and that she wasn't going to sort of lend her name to it anymore, which is a shocking 180 from what sort of, you know, seemed like a very healthy relationship between director and author.

7:38And so through a lot of reporting, a lot of people talked to me anonymously, it sounds like there was some drama where Amandla Stenberg, who is in the movie, this actor has gotten a lot of backlash for her casting because she is biracial. and I think some fans thought this role should go to a darker skinned actor. And so she posted a video kind of defending her casting and saying that Tomi was very supportive and, you know, Tomi had been involved in the casting. And then Tomi released a screen grab showing that she told Amanda never to use her name in an interview again. And so then from my reporting, I found out that, you know, that it did create a lot of tension on set.

8:21And Tomi was on set. She has a cameo in the movie. She was on set for a few weeks and it wasn't the easiest shoot. And then after that, she sort of distanced herself from this project. Wait, just so timeline-wise, Amandla posted something when she was announced in the role or was it while they were filming? It was right before filming. So the casting announcements didn't come very early. And so, yeah, it was like she was in prep already. She was about to start filming. And Tomi, when she said, never use my name again, you know, she meant like, don't. What do you think she meant by that? It seemed like she meant, like, don't talk about my support for you being cast in this, which, you know, from sources, she was part of the casting process.

9:07She was excited about Amanda being in the movie, so. I think it's also worth noting how active she is on social media in general, right? Yes, she's big on social media. And that is something I guess authors didn't have to deal with a long time ago. So that's sort of a new component of this because she is, you know, using social media basically to express her feelings on this. And I don't know how her publicist feel about that. Well, but it's interesting. I think it has helped make her a celebrity author. And isn't that important? You know, I mean, who can blame her for wanting to use it? And, you know, it makes her work even more popular and read.

9:59But I think what we found is that when you take that and add it into the publicity machine of making a movie, it can get bumpy. Yeah, so she hasn't seen the film. She says she's never going to see it. and you know there's some other stuff she's switched agencies quite a bit she recently parted ways with her manager there's some sort of other behind the scenes stuff going on here but I think the question is does this affect the movie's success? I've heard the movie's great it's coming out in January and you know as we know making a movie like this in Hollywood a big fantasy epic with an all black cast that's really hard that's very rare to get that kind of support in Hollywood.

10:47So, you know, there's a lot of people who really want this to work and, you know, hope this hiccup doesn't really hurt the film. I mean, this has been a tale as old as time of authors not liking... I think I wrote that in my piece. Yeah, yeah. Not liking the adaptation of their work. I mean, I always, you know, Stephen King hated Stanley Kubrick's The Shining. George R. R. Martin writes about when he doesn't like Game of Thrones or any of the spinoffs. The power of adaptation is hard, I think, for authors to accept. And in her case, she really did have a lot more agency than a lot of authors where they basically are given a fee.

11:36Sometimes they're given a producing credit, but they don't get creative control. I mean, the most powerful author still, despite her various different political views, is J.K. Rowling. Because she has, you know, in her original deal with Harry Potter, which will never be repeated ever, ever again, she has complete approvals pretty much on anything Harry Potter ever, right? And she has managed to navigate that system pretty well. I mean, obviously all the movies, the spinoffs, the plays, now a TV show. She has worked with Warner Brothers in a way that seems pretty... Successful? Well, not just successful, but...

12:27Copacetic? Copacetic, yeah. It's like, considering her power, you have yet to read, you know, massive clashes between J.K. Rowling and the various different studio systems. But that is not always the case. No, I mean, I remember covering the Fifty Shades of Grey adaptation. You know, E.L. James had a ton of power. She was on set. And, you know, I think Dakota Johnson has talked about this. They had to shoot scenes the way E.L. James wanted them shot and then the way Sam Taylor Johnson wanted them shot. Like, it was rough. And I think, you know, is why a lot of times authors don't have that kind of power because making a movie is different than the book.

13:14Like you have to make a movie so that it works in two hours for an audience visually and that results in changes or things being cut or combined. Like lots of things have to happen for that to work. And of course, understandably, that can be hard for someone who created this world in their head and on the page. So, yeah, E.L. James was another example of this kind of going awry. But Susan Collins, I think, has a lot of influence in the Hunger Games adaptations, but never has said anything critical of them. Well, they've done a really good job. Yeah, they're very loyal to the book. I think they capture its essence really well.

13:53Yeah, I think that Nina Jacobson, who's the producer on that, has done a really good job of being loyal to the books, yet like you said, but, you know, making it a movie. I mean, the craziest adaptation is obviously Adaptation, the movie by Charlie Kaufman. Oh, yeah, of course. I love that movie. But you know that that is a quote unquote adaptation of Susan Orleans, The Orchid Thief, that is just so out there. But it has the characters in The Orchid Thief in the movie. And I sometimes wonder what she must have thought when Sony was like, well, it's not really. It's not exactly a straight adaptation.

14:45But the good news is Meryl Streep is playing you. And she's like, oh, what? And the bad news is you're a drug addict who wants to leave her husband. You have an affair with your subject. They're twins, you know. But think about that because it is an adaptation where you read it and you're like, okay. Like, I think he got like what that book was putting down. So I think it's important for, you know, the filmmakers to have creative license. What do you think happens comes January with the release of this film? Because on social media, this is a very, very heated topic. People are really talking about it.

15:29people seem really split as to whose, I guess, quote unquote side they're on. How do you think that this will affect? Well, my hope is that people go out and support this movie so that more movies like this can be made as is always my hope. You know, I think Tomi did have one response to a follower where she said, like, you should still go see the movie, you know? So I don't think she's telling people not to see it, but it's a hard question because, you know, it's already an uphill battle for a film like this. So I hope audiences support it. And, you know, there's many months till January. Maybe things will change and she'll come back around.

16:09We don't know what the next few months will hold. But there's a lot of really, you know, Gina Prince-Bythewood is an incredible filmmaker. She made The Woman King, which I thought was great. And she can create this kind of world. So I hope it gets the support it deserves regardless of this. Yeah. And it's hard to get a movie made, especially a movie like this, and it's really hard to release it. It's being released fully theatrically by Paramount, and I'm excited to see it. All right, now we're going to take a quick break. When we get back, my interview with Yaya Abdul-Mateen II. Stick around.

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18:22Critical. Insightful. Profound. Wide-ranging. Hopefully doesn't take itself too, too seriously. I'm David Remnick, and each week on the New Yorker Radio Hour, my colleagues and I try to make sense of what's happening in this chaotic world. I hope you'll join us for the New Yorker Radio Hour, wherever you listen to podcasts. The thoughtful, exquisite, just, you know, real.

18:55Welcome back to Little Gold Men. So last week, I got to speak with Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, who stars in the Disney Plus series Wonder Man. Yahya plays Simon Williams, an aspiring actor desperate to make it in Hollywood, amidst the backdrop of the Marvel Universe, superheroes and all. Simon spends much of the series trying to convince the people around him and himself that he is, in fact, destined for stardom. And Yahya brings a lot of his own experience as an actor to that story. Yaya earned his second Emmy nomination for the series. He previously won an Emmy in 2020 for Watchmen. This nomination came as a bit of a surprise, but there was an even bigger surprise when Disney announced that they would be changing course and wouldn't bring the show back for season two.

19:41A real bummer for me as a big fan of the show. Yaya and I chatted about his reaction to that sad and surprising news and also how he related to Simon as an actor himself. Let's dive in. Hi, thanks for joining me. Thank you very much for having me. It's a pleasure. I know it's been a few weeks, but can you take me back to Emmy nominations morning and where you were and how you heard and who was the first person you called? How did that all work for you? You know, this time around was so different from the first time I was nominated. I think I was nominated back in 2020. And I was out in Berlin.

20:21and I knew that the nominations were coming up. I was sort of checking the websites to see about the predictions and just sort of see what was in the air and things like that. And, you know, I was told to not set my expectations to, not necessarily too high, but just, you know, there's a lot of people whose time is coming and things like that. So I was sort of giving some context so that I won't be disappointed. But I was still watching and I set up my little camera and I saw my name and I started screaming and jumping. And I was so excited. It was a really beautiful moment. This time around, I was actually, I was at work.

20:58I was on set at craft services, sitting down in between breaks, eating some cranberry applesauce. I had no idea that Emmy nominations were going on that day. And I was just in the world, minding my own business. and I got a text message from my publicist saying, congratulations on my second Emmy nomination. And I said, what? She said, you just got an Emmy nomination. Best actor in the comedy. It didn't even register to me. It didn't make sense because it wasn't on my radar. I wasn't checking in the same way that I was the first time. And that has really, really allowed me to have a beautiful experience with this whole thing.

21:43because I experienced it as a gift, truly as a gift. It wasn't something that I was expecting. It wasn't something that I was looking for. I did that job for all of the right reasons, the reasons in my heart, and I had a great time doing that job. And, you know, to me, the job was really the gift. And I got to receive that gift, and based on the reception from the show, I got to give that gift away. And I'm just glad to still have an occasion to talk about the show and to represent the show. Well, I wanted to jump into that because, you know, you're talking about the show in past tense because it has been announced that it's not coming back for season two, which is heartbreaking to me and lots of other fans.

22:28And I know it had been announced that it was going to be coming back. So a little bit of whiplash there with that. Yeah. How did you find out that they were changing their decision on that? I got a little phone call. You know, I got a little phone call with the news. You know, it was very straightforward and was told that it wasn't coming back. And I understand that that's the nature of this business. You know, there's highs and lows. As my favorite playwrights, August Wilson, says in one of his plays, he said, you got to take the crickets with the straights. That's the way that it goes. And so business and life moves on.

23:02It's so, like, ironic that this was a show sort of about this sort of heartbreak, right? and being in show business. It's so meta. It's like you couldn't even make this up, I think. Look, it's a lesson in life. It's so close to what real life is. And you have this guy, Simon, who finally had his dreams come true and things like that. But we saw him overcome after all of his attempts of getting close and then not closing the deal and working in this same business. Many people have that experience in real life where we're not in any way, shape, or form exempt. And the cancellation of the show is just another one of those examples.

23:45Did you get a specific reason or was it just like this is the nature of the business? Well, yes, yes, I did. I was told that it had something to do with the viewership numbers. I wasn't told what those numbers were. But ultimately, for whatever reason it was, I think they decided that it didn't make sense for business. And that's the decision that we live with. And, you know, we keep on marching forward. How much had you talked about where it would go next season? Did you already know what the arc was going to be? No, I didn't know. You know, I stayed away from that. I think we have fantastic writers.

24:26They did a great job of setting the tone for season one. So I had my hopes and my dreams about where I wanted the character to go for season two. You know, I was very interested in telling the story of Simon, who we watched pursue everything he's always wanted. And then I think for me, the interesting question to explore is, well, what are you going to do when you finally get it? What do you do when you finally get everything that you've always wanted? What are you going to do with that? and for a guy like Simon to get fame and notoriety and a little bit of power, you know, Simon at the same time, he has a big heart, but he also has an ego.

25:08You know, he also wants to be a star and things like that. So he has to feel what that's like. So yeah, that's what I was looking forward to seeing with our season two. Andrew Guess, the showrunner, posted a video after the cancellation, And it had a line in it about conversations that needed to be had about what kinds of shows are being greenlit. And I know there's been online discourse between the cancellation of this and Mahershala Ali's frustration about the Blade film that may never happen at this point. And I know it's a priority of your own production company to make stories that are more inclusive and diverse.

25:48And do you feel like there is a problem here with what is being greenlit or supported? Look, I think the optics are obvious. If I'm a big business, if I'm Disney, if I'm Marvel, I don't want to be attached to these optics. So it should be a priority to change that narrative and to do what it takes to responsibly change that narrative with quality stories, with quality resources. I felt that our show did have quality story, did have quality resources, did have quality actors and people and did produce quality results that the viewers responded to positively, that the voters responded to positively.

26:32So our show is interesting. I think that it does deserve some study and some real hard information about why a show like this did not continue forward because it had all of the ingredients that we want in a show. You know, at the end of the day, it is business. But like I said, if I'm one of those three companies, then I don't like the way that it looks, you know, so it definitely deserves some attention. So let's talk about the series. I loved it so much. I watched the whole thing and I rewatched a few of it before we spoke today. And I was watching the first moments of the first episode where, you know, Simon is doing these actor warmups and he's like pumping himself up.

27:16And I was curious, how close is that to anything you do? You've seen other actors do. Like, where does that inspiration come from? Yeah, that's probably sort of an amalgamation of all of my insight about being an actor and picking and choosing from a lot of the more funny, you know, quirky things that we do. I really did want to give insight into what it's like to be a working actor. And I know a lot of people looked at that and they said, yes, that's what we do. The process can look very strange. Now, the difference between my process and Simon's process is a lot of Simon's process is meant to get rid of his nerves.

27:53Right. All of that's shaken out. He's getting his body warm. He's really in there just psyching himself up and trying to get out the nerves. And my process looks more like taking the time to warm my body up. And my process is a lot more intentional and specific in comparison to what Simon is doing. Simon's a nervous wreck. He's a nervous wreck. And I could not, it couldn't be me. It really, it really couldn't be me. The job is, it can be stressful enough, but I wouldn't want to do nothing to add any type of, you know, Simon Williams stress to what it is that I do. Are there other aspects of him that are very much you?

28:39So Simon's doing, if you look at that first episode, right? The way that Simon takes up the space in that first episode when he's asking questions and getting things right. I'm not that bad. I promise I'm not that bad, right? But I do get what I need. I do take what I need. And if something doesn't make sense, I will ask questions. And I like to size up a scene and take the space that I need in order to do my job. The difference is Simon's doing that as a person with only a couple of lines. Right. I know when to come in and, so to speak, deliver the pizza, you know. And I know, also know when to bake the pie and to add the ingredients and then come and set the table and tell you everything that is going into this meal.