The Interviews (ft. Richard Kind; Regé-Jean Page & Halle Bailey; Ian Tuason & Nina Kiri)

21:23Chris Hewitt:Yeah. Because you've worked out. Yeah. At the theater, it's the same sort of feeling. You can't really describe it, but you're a little bit spent. You might feel better, you might feel worse, but you're different. You're physically different. Well, I was exhausted watching you. Yeah. Going, enough already. Give me a break. Enough. I have to ask, because we're a film podcast. Go ahead. I have to ask about Inside Out. Go ahead. Which is an interesting, such a beloved film. And you as Bing Bong are very much a beloved character as well. Yeah, I believe that. Do kids recognize you for your voice? Because it's not, obviously you're using a different voice for Bing Bong.

22:04Chris Hewitt:Kids don't know. Adults know of a different voice. Slightly different voice. I wouldn't say that Bing Bong and you are exactly 100 % the same. Oh, I wish I was that talented. I can't change it. I mean, you know, maybe I'm in a higher register. But no, no, it's what I sound like. Adults get it. I love it when kids who are the age of 8 to 14, 13, 14, when you say, I'm bing bong, their eyes brighten. It is the most lovely thing. kids younger than eight they don't recognize that somebody is a voice of a cartoon but around the age of eight they realize oh it's a cartoon they're not real people and this guy had to voice it that's a wonderful thing but even adults when they find out Bing Bong or they know that I'm Bing Bong it's pretty special for them I love it as Frank Oz said to me I'm the Jiminy Cricket you know in this film and I'm the Ed Wynn for this generation and it's true and I have not this is all Pete Docter's handiwork he directed it he wrote it I voiced it and I do a good job but you ride the apron strings of much more brilliant people and Pete Docter in this situation is the brilliant one if you ever see the movie A Serious Man?

23:38Yes. Okay. The Coen Brothers. I mean, I'm not saying I didn't do a good job, but hey, I'll ride those coat strings anytime.

23:45Chris Hewitt:You know, they're the geniuses. That's one of the other films I wanted to talk to you about because those guys... They're the greatest. That film's terrific. It's a terrific, great movie. For those who have watched it, they respect it as much. Yeah. Do people know about it as much as some of their others? No, but, you know, that's their favorite movie from what I hear. People listening to this will know what a serious man is. Oh, those will say a serious man. Yeah. They may even have double-billed it with Inside Out. You never know. You never know. One has great hope and one is just, oh, God, where's the, you know, let me kill myself.

24:21Chris Hewitt:It's a cosmic joke played on one man ultimately. But I know from other interviews that you've done that you don't watch yourself. No, I don't like to watch myself. But have you watched Inside Out? I don't like to hear myself. Oh, so you haven't watched Inside Out then? yeah watch Inside Out yeah I have first of all I went to the premiere so I'm there okay you watch that because Bing Bong's exit from that movie shall we say I think it's traumatized an entire generation so well done Richard I am a Christ figure truly a Christ I have died for her not her sins but I have died for her I have given up my life for her it's the most beautiful thing in the world it's a beautiful I'm very proud very proud of it amazing amazing Richard I'm going to let you go because you do have to get to the Garrick you've got to get to the Garrick it's been a pleasure Richard Kind thanks so much for coming in thank you okay that was Richard Kind talking about The Producers and if you want to see the show which I can highly recommend tickets are available at theproducersmusical.com Richard will be playing Max Bialystock until around the beginning of May and then Andy Nyman will return next up You Me and Tuscany is a sun-kissed romantic comedy in which Halle Bailey flits from New York to Tuscany and falls in love with the lush landscapes, the gorgeous food, and the locals.

25:43Chris Hewitt:Or in particular, one local, Michael, played by Reggie Sean Page. And when the two, that is Bailey and Page, popped into the pod booth recently, I went along and had a fun conversation with them about rom-coms, chemistry, Page's recent cameo turn on SNL UK, and more. Enjoy. Halle Bailey, Reggie Sean Page, welcome to The Empire Podcast. How the devil are you both? I'm doing pretty good. Thank you for having us. Thank you. You jet-lighted, you okay? Because I believe you were in the Napa Valley last week. Yeah, just a little bit. A couple of days ago. Yeah. I mean, a jet-light would be too bad, I guess.

26:17It would be bad. We worked out that it's currently 3 a.m. on Hallie's Body Clock, just so you know. So I'm having a wild night out. I like that. You haven't described a lot of that before. That's great. This is our wild night out on the Empire Podcast.

26:32Chris Hewitt:Absolutely. That's what we all, my interviews are wild night outs. so how do you counteract that body clock thing is it with the intake of wine from the Napa Valley yeah it's coffee you know it's coffee the worst thing is I don't like how in character Wild Night Out with my cup of tea is it's kind of summed me up very quickly so I believe I was talking to Kat and Will yesterday also for the podcast and they told me that the first time you guys met was at the Met the Met Gala which I'm guessing means one or maybe even both of you were dressed interestingly. Is that the case? You were both dressed extremely.

27:12Chris Hewitt:I was wearing a cape, sir. Hello, sir. It was a great cape. He was wearing a bright red cape. It was so cool. Like, he looked like a superhero. And I was wearing a lot of sparkles. Yeah. An entire suit made entirely out of sparkle in two different tones. Yeah. Oh, my God. It was not an ordinary Monday. Yeah, but what it means is that we had this moment where I could catch Halle like a beacon across the room, just literally shining and glowing. And we knew that we were going to be in this film together at the time. So like, you see this beacon, because the other thing that no one tells you about the Met is that almost everyone goes alone.

27:50So you have a room full of the most glamorous people in the world at their most glamorous. Yeah. But also everyone's walking around going, friend, friend. And so to see this kind of shining light of hope across the room going, hey, let's be friends is not a bad way to meet your co-star, you know?

28:08Chris Hewitt:That's amazing. I see now while they've never invited me because I'm very much, this is a jumper from Sainsbury's and I don't think I could pull off a cake or glittering diamonds. How expensive was your outfit that night? Oh, I don't know, honestly. Were you worried in case there was like an Ocean's 8 style heist? Oh, you know, I did not think of that. All my diamonds have gone. Damn you, Sandra Bullock. Happens all the time. That's such a good movie. I love that movie. It's a great movie. So in terms of meeting at the Met, the Met met, you know that you're going to be in this movie together. Yes.

28:46Chris Hewitt:You're both dressed, interestingly. That must be a huge icebreaker. It was. And then to top it all off, Stevie Wonder came out. What? And was performing with Usher. A surprise collaboration set with Usher. Yeah, it was incredible. About as far away from us as you are now. Shut the front door. It was a lifetime moment. It was incredible. And so to get to share that is the me cue to end all means. It really is. Oh, yeah. And then you were like, well, I guess we've got to go to Tuscany now after this. So the only way is up. I'm not going to lie. We watched Stevie and Usher and then we were like, shall we fly to Tuscany, hang out in some vineyards, drive through the rolling hills in vintage convertibles and maybe film a movie along the way.

29:32Chris Hewitt:Occasionally film a movie along the way. Oh my God, that is amazing. So tell me about the experience of making this movie. It must have been hell. You know, sun-kissed, Tuscany, glamorous locations, wine on tap. I feel so sorry for you guys. It was absolutely incredible getting to film this movie. I mean, I feel like Italy is sort of becoming a second home for me because I filmed a lot of Mermaid, half of Mermaid in Sardinia. And then I filmed this in Rome. We were there in Rome for like five to six weeks. And then we went to Tuscany for a few more weeks. And it's just so beautiful feeling like the community and the family energy that the people of Italy have and how everyone just wants to welcome you in and like take care of you.

30:20like you're their own. And that was so special because you felt that and you can see it in the making of our movie. You know, you can see that. And we had a blast. It was just, it was a great time. No, it was an incredible experience. And aside from just kind of what we got from it, the name of the movie is You, Me, and Tuscany. Tuscany is that third character. And we couldn't have faked that on Hollywood Backlot. Like you could make it look like it. But our job, as much as we joke about we had a great time, which we did, was to sit in that culture. You can't separate food from land, from people in Italy.

30:56They're all one. You eat together. It's about how you eat. What you're eating has a family story. Everyone's got their own olive grove. Everyone's growing their olives. They've got their own olive oil that you have to try. And you have to try the olive oil, not just because it's good, which it is, but because it's got generations of the family built in. Like, Hallie learned how to make cacio e pepe from scratch. She can roll the pasta herself. And that has, like, different techniques in every region and has a family history built into it and all of that our job was to kind of sit in this paradise like escape but then just capture that put it in the camera put it in the cinema so that you can kind of come visit us you get that escape when you buy

31:34Chris Hewitt:the ticket go into the dark room yeah yeah yeah and come into that real environment you know what i mean my god and did you have to immerse yourself a little bit more reggae because michael has been there all his life michael grew up in it yeah and that was important for me um i landed i leaned in really hard for that because you don't often see characters that have multiple cultures embraced within them that have grown up through multiple cultures and i kind of wanted to make that feel real and lived in and natural um and so i spent a couple of months with an italian tutor i flew out early and kind of just hung out in tuscany for a while um just to kind of let that sink in and seep in so that when he flips into italian when he has this kind of switch between his identity with his family british identity which was a little bit easier for me to research not that they both felt like they had a weight and a realness within him.

32:23And that gives us a nice subtle complexity to play with when he meets the American. And you have the shared fish out of water experience, but also finding those connective commonalities, which was another. I mean, like the movie is this really fun romp of a rom-com and love and discover yourself. There's also all of this found family stuff. You worked into the script that you're Hallie's from the South. and when I'm talking about that food culture like that's what you grew up with you know like food and family that's the south and we worked that into the film there's a line towards the end where it's like here's my spin on this traditional Italian dish because this makes sense to me this is familiar and those familiarities the things that unite us that's what I love about rom-coms like I'm actually pretty passionate about romance in that way because it is a vehicle for things you can't do in movies that are about punching each other harder than the other person you know what I mean when you don't have romances in cinemas you don't have movies where people talk through their problems and grow and become better at the end of it and I think that's a pretty important thing in the ecosystem

33:27Chris Hewitt:it very much is it very much is Hallie do you feel the same way about rom-coms because they're an endangered species these days yeah I love a rom-com because of the escapism that you get from it and also like how happy I feel and how I feel good I love watching something and feeling good after. And it has such a big impact on me, on a lot of people, because we can get away from our regular everyday lives and just sit somewhere and feel good, be taken on a journey, and feel happy at the end of it. It's like, that's powerful. Even though it seems like something small, it's powerful. There's something really interesting about how inevitable the end feels from the beginning.

34:14Chris Hewitt:So from the moment you two guys meet in this movie, you can sense where it's going to go, where it's going to end up. And I was just wondering, as a pair, how did you navigate that journey? Because when Michael and Anna first meet, or Anna, because that pronunciation is a thing in the movie as well, when they first meet, obviously it's hate at first sight, but there's an underlying attraction there and then you have to plot that across your various meetings. So how do you do that as a pair? Yes. Wow. I feel like it was really easy, honestly to build upon our chemistry because of the way their story has an arc.

34:51So Anna, I love the fact that when she first meets Michael, she's like not feeling him. She's mad at him. She's like, who is this? I love the fact that she doesn't like him at first because it makes it so much easier when you see them build and like, oh, that's actually cool about you. It makes it feel real and something to build off of. So I love that arc and their relationship. And I'm also, I'm like a very fiery girl myself. So I feel like I would be like Anna if he took my sandwich too. Harry doesn't have a problem leading into the antagonistic aspects. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. So I feel like that was, it was fun and easy to do, to play their story.

35:32We had a great kind of structure to that kind of enemies to lovers type trope, which is fun to play with. but also in terms of how the chemistry builds like we've been talking about chemistry a lot and for me chemistry between actors is mostly about trust it's about finding that space where Hallie is delightful as you no doubt picked up very very quickly I picked it up quickly and it's about knowing that when you're making romance every day is an emotional trust fall and I knew very quickly that Hallie was going to catch me and I think Hallie picked up pretty quickly that I'd catch her and once you're there you get to play you can bring all the unexpected things out of each other and the unexpected is chemistry.

36:09That's the chemical reaction where you don't know what's going to happen on the other side of it. That's where the scenes come to life. That first table read, Anna was there straight away. Hallie came to play, I came to play, and we were both like, oh, this is cool. I'm not talking to Hallie Bailey who's just kind of reading some words on the page. I got to meet the woman who was kind of in my head when I was reading the script, but I made the full, real, unexpected version of her. And that's what chemistry is in real life. If it's meeting the full, real, unexpected version of someone else, that opens up a whole new world for you.

36:44That's amazing.

36:45Chris Hewitt:But obviously, movies are not shot chronologically. So what was the biggest whiplash for you emotionally in terms of portraying that relationship? Did you have a morning where you were slightly antagonistic than an afternoon where you had to be more attracted to each other or vice versa? I think they did really good with not... Well, I didn't have to do jumps in a day at least. But I will say our first scene that we did together, we were kind of hopping to the middle of the story in the film where Michael shows Anna the family restaurant. And that was our first day of filming. So I liked that that scene was the first one that we filmed because Anna is in a new place and everything's new for her.

37:32and everything was new for me. So I could play off of Ali's experience too. But it was cool because Michael had to go in there and act like, oh yeah, this is my, you know, my home ground. And that was our first day. We like, we didn't really know anything. I think sometimes we had, there'd be contrast between, I think maybe we filmed pieces of the fight on the same day as like something very, very tender or intricate. And then you'd go to like the barrel race. And so that was a bit weird sometimes. just because it also gets sweaty as well. It was really hard. Do the barrel race in the afternoon.

38:07Yeah, absolutely. So you've got to be a little careful with that one. We're going backwards and forwards in the sprinkler scenes. Yeah. Soaked to not soaked is not an easy transition. That was hard. It's hard. Emotionally or physically. It's tough.

38:19Chris Hewitt:You can't dry on command, right? Yeah. I had to learn. It's the old studio actor system. Dry, kid. so yeah I've got to let you guys go but when did that scene come in in terms of shooting schedule the sprinkler scene in the vineyard we were in Tuscany yeah we were in Tuscany so it was the end of filming first half shooting was Rome and then the second half we had like five six weeks in either location okay so it was later on in the process we were very comfortable by the sprinklers yeah would you consider that an action scene yeah I would there was a lot of running there was running involved yeah Yeah, definitely.

38:58There's slow motion involved.

38:59Chris Hewitt:If you've got to run a slow-mo, I'm saying that's an action scene. The sprinklers weren't actually in the script. I just needed cooling down. And we were like, hey, get that. Yeah. Oh, my goodness. It was all improv'd. It was all improv'd. I love that. The writer is out there, so the WGA is preparing their lawsuit now to come get me. This is your writer that you actually have. People don't know this right now, but you can't see them on the cameras, but Regauchon has sprinklers with him right now. we installed them pre-interview in all situations we had sprinklers at the ready we did not turn it up it's the best way most people have handheld fans to try and cool down but not you and I respect that I like that you respect it the makeup department does not oh no it ruins all our equipment every single time I should say that as well it costs thousands of pounds worth of damage every single time Heath Ledger had the same right the Joker makeup was meant to be perfect it was like pristine Jack Nicholson makeup yeah and then sprinklers sprinklers every single time which is why that movie cost absolutely I do have to let you guys go but very very quickly Reggajon you were in SNL UK yes the other night just the other evening that's still so sleepy a surprise sprinkler free cameo but how was it we're still talking to them about that we're not pleased the sprinklers were meant to go off the second time they could even be funny and yeah that's the one place oh my goodness sorry yes did SNL UK the other night it was an absolute privilege it was the first episode of them launching in the UK so it was a joy to come in and be a part of that and contribute my little piece to kind of launching this incredible platform for British talent British writers British comic acting talent and getting to share the screen with Tina Fey who is a lifelong hero of mine so big wins all round absolutely Hallie can we expect to see you pop up on SNL UK oh I would love to maybe one day That sounds too loud they're listening We're throwing it out there Let's make it happen We'll keep the sprinklers to one side but we'll make it happen Yeah, that'd be great Alright, on that note Hallie, Rega Sean it's been an absolute pleasure Thanks so much for your time Thank you Thank you Okay, that was Rega Sean Page and Hallie Bailey talking about You, Me and Tuscany which is in cinemas across the country from this weekend Finally this week did you hear the one about the Deadly Podcast?

41:15Chris Hewitt:No, not this one The Emperor Podcast doesn't kill you although it has come close to bumping me off once or twice No, instead I'm talking about Undertone, the directorial debut from Ian Tuwison, in which a podcaster played by Nina Keery bites off more than she can chew when she encounters spooky audiophiles that soon have a terrifying impact on her. We sent Mike Munster along to Zoomtown to have a chat with Tuwison and Keery, and that is what you're about to hear. Unembellished, you will be delighted to know with any terrifying noises or backwards messages. Yajne. I'm delighted to welcome to the Empire podcast Ian Tuerson and Nina Keery Hello guys Hi Hello Ian, Undertone is such an interesting idea This is a movie that relies almost more on audio than it does visuals actually Tell me a little bit about the origin of this film Where did the idea come from?

42:07Started as a radio play You're a radio host, aren't you? I'm a horror podcaster actually Yeah, so there you go, perfect Your setup looks so professional But yeah, it was a radio play like Orson Welles, War of the Worlds. But then I added the elements of what Evie does in between recording because my parents got sick. And then I got this idea of how a possession film about your dying parent would be really scary. So, you know, I experienced it. I knew it was going to be scary. So I revisited this radio play and I started writing the scenes in between. Nina, tell me, what did you make of the script when you first read it?

42:55What did you make of the character of Evie? I felt very claustrophobic. I felt afraid. I was a little, honestly, I was kind of like, oh, I don't know. This is going to be like, it freaked me out. And then the next day I met Ian and Dan on a Zoom and I was kind of like, okay, they're cool and normal. I feel safe around them. I can do this with them. But when I was just reading it myself, there is something scary about, first of all, because you never leave Evie and the space, the tension is just built in a really organic way in the script as well as the movie. and so I uh read it all through in like one go no no stopping no like oh I will get back to this later it was just it really freaked me out and that's a good thing but it also genuinely scared me um and then that made me a little bit like okay if if if there aren't the right conditions I don't know if I can do this and then when I met them like okay this is the right conditions like these people I trust them and I I see Ian's vision and I like see his own personal vulnerability coming through i feel safe to do this it must have been quite intense nina as well like because you are like you say it's basically you are on screen the whole time right i mean you and and it's essentially you by yourself for 90 of it as well that must have been quite an intense experience it was but it didn't feel like i was alone we really had the experience worked because it was such a like easy group of people like they was so it felt so easy you know um we just had us because there was such a small amount of people in that space there's like a streamlined effect where i'm like i go upstairs and then i come back down we do the scene i go back upstairs we do this and there's just it's all there you're in the same house and there's something about like it's almost like making something with your friends um in the sense that there's something just so familial and because of that when i think about us making it i don't think like oh that was so intense and hard like some of the scenes were really emotionally draining but other than that it was honestly pretty just like fun and light we went to the sauna like in my backyard after uh after some after shooting days yeah it was a makeshift sauna in um oh basically like in like a tent or what what is that like well it's it's a legit sauna a sauna i love this so this so this house where the film is set was actually your real house Ian.

45:25Yeah. Amazing. Oh my god. Okay. I love that. So you guys were all just hanging at Ian's house throughout this shoot. Yeah. Pretty much. That's why we had. That's why I was making them do the sauna because they brought beer and they were like why don't you have it. It was winter time so. Oh perfect. A lot of snow everywhere. It was really snowy February. Oh delightful. You must have all had wonderful skin by the end of this Nina. You know the snow. The cold snow and the sauna at night i only did the sauna at the end but it was the whole experience was we were just like cozy at ian's house making a movie i love that i love that um ian tell me a little bit about adapting this then from a radio play to a film like what and and you know i think particularly those scenes with the podcasting what were the challenges in kind of i suppose making them visual making them cinematic yeah i thought i was it was pretty it was hard at first thinking about it because uh that the portions where nina's just listening i had to i had to make a list of things that could be happening and uh eventually i came up with a bunch that made sense like you know the the did you get the the the idea that the stuff was happening or happened in the house that she was listening to yeah absolutely but i suppose the the fun of it right is that it's quite hard to tell what what is coming from where especially i watched it in a dolby screening so it really had that beautiful kind of surround sound yeah you know and and while she's listening to these these couple in the house uh you know sometimes i would just cut to the room that they'd be in right like the kitchen or running down the stairs oh there's a bunch of other things too like um you know when when she is banging i i cut to different inserts to each bang so it's like uh i stole that from the changeling uh the the that horror movie uh 1980 with the with the wheelchair yeah that i i felt i i sensed a bit of the changeling in there as well the scene when he listens to the tape recorder in the changeling there's an element of that isn't there yeah and then the push down the stairs yeah of course yeah that that happens in the changeling nina how did it work with those podcasting scenes when you are talking to somebody remotely or you're just listening to tapes like were you listening did you have stuff that you could listen to and react to while you were filming it yeah so the mike and jessa tapes um they were i heard them for the first time when we were actually doing it so amazing that was really helpful and the tapes are so good that them even when i had heard them multiple times they still freak me out when i hear that yeah and then the conversations with justin were actually like a live conversation which i think was really helpful for me um and yeah so those those little tweaks i think made a big difference in just helping me have a genuine reaction and like feel as truthful as I could.

48:28Ian, you make amazing use of kind of negative space as well, especially during those scenes. Like I found myself constantly kind of looking in sort of doorways in the background and that kind of thing. Was that kind of an idea that you had in your head from the script stage that that was kind of how it was going to look? Yeah, that was in my list of things that I was talking about. what can I do? Everything was planned out every shot so I had storyboarded the whole script before shooting and that made it easier for everybody every day everyone knew exactly what I wanted. Nina obviously Evie is a character that is quite internal you get the feeling that she's hiding a lot throughout this movie and that we're maybe not seeing the full story of what's going on with her in this house like did you kind of have an idea in your head of what evie is is really going through what she's thinking and did that kind of inform your performance throughout yeah i really um i think once i was sure about uh her way of moving in the world like we all have our own ways of dealing with what's happening to us um and then i was like oh she's she's denying so much of what she's going through and then that denial is causing her to spiral more and more And then she has to deny more in order to compensate for that, which I think, look, I've done that many times in my life when I can't face something and then I have to deny it or compartmentalize it in order to get through what I'm getting through at that moment.

49:57And I think that was a really big key for me with her as a character. And then, I don't know, just having that grounding force of knowing her point of view, basically, helped me just ground throughout the shooting of the movie. Because there's just moments when you're like, there's so much going on. It's like, you know, 11th hour. And then you're like, how do I, how do I ground myself right now? Because I, I can't think about if this is scary or not, or interesting or not, but I can think about like how to find this person where they're at right now. And that, and that was helpful. There's one, there's one look that you had in the reshoots that, uh, that I loved.

50:41It was when Justin was telling you the stories about the psychologist study and the girl that killed herself and she was pregnant. She drowned her baby in the sink. Because you were kind of scared, but at the end, your face just went blank. I don't know. Do you remember? I remember that scene. It's kind of like you gave up. it's like man it's almost like it broke you that's what i that's what i because at a certain point i think like that is just um like sometimes you just can't handle things anymore i didn't that wasn't in the script so i was really happy you did that ian how important i mean i imagine a lot of time went into the sound design in this movie right as well and and and you know you've got these we've had screenings here in london where you get to watch them in dolby and that kind of How important has that been to you to kind of get the sound right in this movie, particularly for audiences as well?

51:40Right. Very important. It was it was in the script as well. The sound direction I had, I was specific to, you know, you hear the baby crying on your left or you hear the bang above your head. But in surround sound, which is what we could have we could afford. I can't pinpoint sounds that well but I can give you general directions but with Dolby Admos I was I put those sounds exactly where they were supposed to be how do you want people to watch it when they eventually watch it at home is this better to have like noise cancelling headphones on do you think for this movie more important than that directional audio yeah which is pretty much every new headphone now they is capable of that Yeah, for sure.

52:30I mean, are you a big podcast fan? Do you listen to a lot of these types of podcasts? Did you have to do that as kind of research for creating this fictional podcast in the movie? I was a fan of, well, first started with Serial, and then some creepypasta people talking, you know, investigating these creepypastas, true crime podcasts, even scripted narrative podcasts I liked. Nina, what about you? Are you a big podcast listener? Did you listen to a lot kind of before delving into this character? I am a podcast listener. I didn't. So I thought for a second, maybe I'll try and listen to some horror podcasts.

53:12And then I was like, I don't want to. That's not the vibe of Undertone podcast. Like, so I didn't want to listen to that anymore. And I kind of just focused on like story and character more than trying to recreate something. but in my own life I listen to podcasts all the time. I had a podcast myself when I was at university. Did you? What was your podcast? I was head of the news department and I also started my own podcast called Storytime where I would bring in people in the English department who were writers and then I would find actors for them and then we'd do radio plays with the things they had written.

53:52Amazing. I love that. Have you guys noticed as well, I mean, like with younger audiences for podcasts these days as well, more and more podcasts are becoming visual as well, which to me kind of defeats the point of podcasts. Like what I love about it, as we see in Undertone is it's such an like a kind of audio experience, really, more than anything else. But these days, more and more podcasts are becoming something where you just watch people sitting in a chair podcasting. Right. Like, what are your thoughts on that, on the way that podcasts are kind of changing and growing? Well, you know, there's room for both.

54:22And every podcast is different. sometimes you need that video element uh if it's you know like with the joe rogan show yeah i mean it's it's almost like it's it's a talk show on on tv but i do but i do prefer audio only because sometimes i just want to close my eyes yeah you know lie down and listen or yeah exactly exactly go go do some jobs around the house do some chores while you're listening you That's why I use podcasts. Sometimes I don't have motivation to do something. And then if I put on a podcast, I'm like, suddenly I've cleaned my house. I've done laundry. Like, it's just an easy way to motivate me.

55:01Agreed. Clean out the dead babies in the garbage. Yeah. The usual. I did that just before we started. Yeah. Ian, you mentioned The Changeling. Are there any other kind of horror movie favorites of yours that you kind of took inspiration from for this? The Babadook. Oh, yeah? The famous pushing in on the character, then stop pushing in when the character looks. 2001 Space Odyssey, when the noise cancels out. Oh, yeah. On scenes that are scary. Hitchcock. There's Kubrick. I can kind of, I can tell you exactly which film and which shot, but it would be too long. Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough. Nina, are you a horror fan?

55:47do you kind of scare easily what are your thoughts on horror i don't scare easily i think as i get older i see the um deeper value of horror i think when i was younger i it just some things would freak me out and most things didn't and i was just like no i don't know but um when it comes to psychological thrillers i'm a huge huge fan of those and i um those are the types of movies that i watch all the time and um i'm really happy that this is a movie about a woman unraveling because women unraveling in thrillers is my favorite genre oh yeah and there's there's a lot of those out there throughout cinema history yeah yeah did they have a did blockbuster have a oh like a shelf no i've created my own it's sort of right it's sort of horror seems to be you know people have talked a lot recently about horror having a moment you know we've just seen sinners win multiple oscars and weapons and frankenstein how do you feel about that ian is this a is this a good thing or is horror becoming almost too mainstream well there's there's always room for there's room for everything but i don't watch those movies oh really i've i tried a couple and then uh i appreciate it for certain things but i don't watch it to be scared i'm not sure if many people do there's a there's different intentions for different movies and uh as long as they nailed their their intention then uh it's a good movie but if i want to if i want to feel scared um you know i can't really watch a frankenstein uh it's it's more that's more of a visual kind of you know experience uh cinematic yeah uh yarmulthorough yeah type big thing yeah Visual feast for the eyes.

57:33Absolutely. Yeah. Obviously, Nina, this movie has been, you know, it's already been branded kind of the scariest movie you'll ever hear. It's been scaring audiences. Have you experienced it with an audience, Nina? Have you kind of like sat and watched it at any of these festival screenings or premieres? Yes, I have. And there's a moment at the Sundance premiere, you know, at a pivotal moment in the movie when most people get really scared and a woman went, oh. I will always remember that sound. It was like such a, it was just pure dread, discomfort. And I, it was very, a very visceral sound. And I just, I was so happy to hear it.

58:16That's a good review for the film. Yeah. It's five stars. And that's it. The best kind of review you can get. Absolutely. Amazing. Ian and Nina, we're out of time, but thank you so much for your time. Lovely to meet you both. Thank you, Mike.

58:30Chris Hewitt:Okay. that was Nina Keery and Ian Tuison talking to Mike Munster about Undertone which is in cinemas now four stars says Empire Magazine and on that note that is it for this episode of the interviews thank you as ever for listening the regular Empire podcast is out on Friday and features Team Empire talking about great movie quartets reviewing Undertone California Scheming and more and I talk to the great James McAvoy who is now a director director, in fact, of the aforementioned California Scheming. Right, that's enough from me. I'm off to keep my word to Richard Kind and watch Where's Papa? Hope it's a belter.

59:10Chris Hewitt:Thanks for listening. See you next time. Bye-bye.