‘Chad Powers’ Season 2 Breakdown With Creator Michael Waldron

22:44Like, can you believe how crazy that was? But this is the world where the audience is watching the show. You know, and it's like, so I think, I mean, the show is taking place in 2026 or whatever, whatever it is. It's like it's taking place right now. Yes. And so we to us, we are like, let's reflect the reality of it right now. And so it's good for us that they can pay players like because that's like, you know, when Trisha is like, you're going to be Chad Powers for a long, long time. Like, you know, if she's Gus Fring, it's like she can be Gus even more easily. Right.

23:25Joanna Robinson:Yeah. It's like because her power is just out in the open now. It's like. I love Trisha. Buddy Garrity on steroids in the best way. I love it. A reality of running a show for any network is that there's the vision you have and then there's a larger apparatus around the show. And I'm curious how you as a creator handle getting notes that contradict maybe your core idea of what you wanted the show to be. I really am appreciative of my partners at Hulu and 20th because I think that when they heard adaptation of Chad Powers with Glenn Powell, they were like, all right, this is going to be so sweet.

24:12It's like you imagine. I know what you imagine.

24:16Joanna Robinson:Yeah. and I was like, this is going to be fucked up. Like, this show's going to be dumb. Let me tell you about Jerry. We're going to do weird. And then this season, it was like, it's, you know, especially with me directing a lot of it, I was like, it's going to be a thriller. Like, that's just how we want to do it. And the network was like, great. You know, they got behind it, and as cuts came in, they were like, okay. so it's a thriller and I was like well it's a romance yeah but kind of like a romantic thriller yeah they're like but it's a comedy I was like I'm laughing and they're like okay yeah we are too I guess in this season especially like marketed it like exactly how I feel like we made it and and so So they came along for the ride.

25:11And that's really what you dream of. And I think probably harder on a show like this, you're not always so lucky. So, yeah, I mean, you know, Craig and Carrie and everybody who runs things over there, you know, they've been great partners.

25:26Joanna Robinson:Friend of a different pod that we do, House of R, Ryan Condal, House of Dragons showrunner. He's fond of saying that, like, whenever he gets a note that says great first draft, that just means this sucks. So I'm curious, like, are there any coded notes or notes that you've gotten where you're just sort of like, you had to learn on the job. Oh, that's what this means. This is really interesting. I'm like, oh, you hate it. Yeah. Oh, interesting. I thought it was a really interesting choice to have Jerry in his jockstrap doing karate. Incredible. Genuinely incredible scenes. Yeah, I mean, oh my God.

26:06What a gemstone. but both times we've wound up kind of having to shoot this thing like on the run and we're not I mean you know we're kind of shooting I'm not doing a ton of rewrites so it's like you know we're all it's a glimps of movies we're so lucky to have them so you know but but there yeah there's definitely plenty of like let's maybe maybe just pace this up maybe pace and I'm like that's code for okay it's not This scene isn't as funny as I think it is. I mean, I love it because it also just sounds like perfectly mapped on to the coaches giving Chad feedback on how to run the offense. Totally.

26:47But it's like there are plenty of times where it's like people have these adversarial relationships. A show like this cannot get onto television with like a huge marketing apparatus behind it without the network, the studio getting it. And so I'm, you know, I'm, I am lucky that because this is crazy. It's like for the show, I look at the shit that these characters are saying and I'm like, that's, this is so specifically me. I'm like.

27:19Joanna Robinson:But like at a certain point, having had the career trajectory trajectory you've had, do you still say, wow, this is luck? Or do you say, wow, I'm Michael Waldron. I must be pretty good at this. Joanna Robinson wrote about me in Vanity Fair. If I said that to my wife, it would be the funniest. Your story is amazing. Like, it's an incredible career. I've been, I mean, I've been super fortunate and to work on the stuff that I've worked on. But nothing's guaranteed, you know? And it's like, even this show last season, I mean, it didn't, it's not like it set the world on fire, you know? And I think that was a like, oh yeah, you know, just, it's one thing when you make stuff for Marvel, the whole world's going to watch.

28:05But it's like, you go out there on your own and try and make something. It's tough. It's like, you know, it's me. It's Glenn. But like, the audience has to find it and they have to want it. And thank God this, you know, it feels like this season that maybe that's happening. But it's like, there's, you know, it's a tough, it's a tough business. And so the longer you do this, the more you actually do feel fortunate when you're working on something that is connecting. That is like incredibly... healthy and measured perspective. And it strikes me that it is quite distinct from how a lot of the characters in this show think about their life.

28:42Yes. Which is like measuring it. Which is how I actually feel. I mean, we all do, right? This is something I wanted to ask you about because let's feel like you're a sports fan, right? You're a Bulldogs fan, go UGA. Curious how you feel about their chances this season. I've got some thoughts. All the way. All the way. Okay. Is their year? It's always their year. It's always their year to at least be in the mix. must be nice. Chad Powers, heels, like sports and the pursuit inside of sports is something you're really interested in. But you're not focusing on fandom so much. You're focusing on the figure who is seeking something and then does not know how to like navigate their own circumstances absent that outcome, which is like an incredibly rich text because it is whether or not somebody is like the head football coach of the Catfish or suddenly the star quarterback or the backup.

29:34Shout out Jerry. We're going to mention Jerry as often as we can today. Yes, as we should. I quite agree. But I love this because you have Chad, like the bad choice, the lack of accountability that we already talked about. The question of whether that kind of emerges over the course of the two seasons so far of like, all right, I got to do it the one time. And then it's like, would that be enough actually? Right. Is the thing that you really need the love of everybody telling you that you're worth something. You have Coach Hudson, who's like got his version of I just need the one. He's maybe the only one I believe it from so far.

30:07Actually, Jerry is Jerry again. He's fascinating to me as a figure for this, because like he goes from aw shucks. How lucky am I just to breathe the catfish locker room air? And now he's like, I got a taste of it for a second and nothing else will ever measure up. Right? So this idea of like the pursuit of excellence, great sports story, like the thing we all love, failing to reach the pinnacle. Like what does that do to a person and how do they exist in the face of that? That's like really central to what you're exploring here. A, I just love yearning. It's probably why I'm always doing love stories.

30:50I love stories. It's like, it's like, that's, it's my favorite thing to write, to film, to edit. It's, it's the best feeling on film. And, and so that can be two people in love. It can also be characters yearning for success that has eluded them. in terms it's what you're saying is is so interesting that idea of like if i just win this championship then i'll be happy i'll tell you a story i remember when i was out here i just i hadn't been in la very long been lucky enough to get an internship on rick and morty first season and i'm i'm like changing toilet seats for dan yeah i always say to my wife my my then girlfriend at the time, I would say, if I could just sell a script, it's like, that was the thing, sell a script.

31:43You'd just like write these pilots. You just sell a script. I literally said this, come in, sit down on the couch. And it's like, I'd just be happy. Then I went, and I got a little deeper in my career. I was a PA on community, and I'd written the pilot for Heels. Shout out DWL. There you go. I sold it. I sold it to Paramount Television and Stars. And, you know, signed my deal. everything and came home and sat on the couch and felt probably maybe for the first time in my life incredibly depressed because I had this feeling of this did not transform me. I am who I was yesterday. And so in working through that, I do think it was transformative because I was like, oh yeah that's not you can't attach your happiness never going to come from one outcome but i am fascinated by characters yeah who think who think that and but and because i it's like i think all of us who are creative people we we build to a thing it's like you know and the release of a thing and it's well this thing and it's like the response and it it's easy to be like well that's going to make you happy.

33:02But it's not. It's like, you know, it's the totality of life and the people in it that can make you happy.

33:10Joanna Robinson:That's how I feel about you. Right? Can I ask you a yearning question? Yes. Who do you feel are like, this is not a planned question, but like, what is the epitome of yearning for you? Like film, television, storytelling wise. Who's our best yearner? It's our best, Like the best yearning story. Or a person who's best at performing yearning. I mean, Brokeback Mountain is like, that's like some of the best yearning. That's a good answer. Ever. Ghost. Ghost is like sneakily, like that's in my letterbox. It's like that. The yearning there is so, because Swayze, a great yearner. Yeah. You can't touch the person.

33:59Joanna Robinson:Yeah. Devastating. Yeah. Yeah. It's like the love that cannot be. Bridges of Madison County. This is a tremendous answer for me. Bridges of Madison County in 2026. That yearning is, oh my God. All right. That's like the greatest. High octane yearning. That movie is electric. That movie is so, when they're in the rain, they're driving at the end. Like that's, that's like, that's like, I'm like, I'll make stuff like that my whole life. Be happy. Do you have a favorite off the top of your head, like a favorite Mad Men episode? And does it, what are we yearning for in, in Mad Men? I love the suitcase.

34:41Obviously it's great. I always think about, I think it's the strategy. It's in the first half of season, the final season. It's where Don and Peggy dance. Oh yeah. But then it ends. but then it ends on that amazing shot of Don, Pete, and Peggy sitting at Burger Chef. Yeah. And it's like, of course, the great Mad Men pull out, which we tried to do at the end of season, or episode two of Chad Powers, that when they're in the basement. Yeah. And Russ is really sad. I was like, it's the Mad Men pull out. I was like, we gotta go further. I was like, they pull into another room and we're on the stage.

35:18They're like, we're gonna be on the fucking stage. I was like, we gotta build another room. Oh, man. True show. But it's just that amazing of, because the whole episode is about, you know, there's, you go and you eat with a family or whatever, and it's Don, Pete, and Peggy as their own little family, and it's, they're framed in the window. That's the one that comes to mind, because it's just like, I just love, I mean, I just love those characters, and it's so amazing. I'm due for a rewatch. Let's do it. Sign me up. Okay. Twist my arm. Yeah. Let's stick on yearning. Let's stick on romance. Ricky's come up a few times.

35:59This is often true when I ask a question, but this time I'm going to concede it in advance. There's not really a question here. Just going to work through something in real time with you. Perfect. Okay. So Ricky and Chad slash Russ, I have really, really, really loved watching their relationship and have found myself like, I was having one of those physical experiences in the closing scene of the season two finale where you realize you're like, actually, I shouldn't lean away from the mic. It's the Fleabag season two. Yeah, exactly. Oh, that's, by the way, yearning.

36:30Joanna Robinson:Fleabag season two, lean. That's what I call it. That's the yearning. Let's get a fox into Chad Powers at some point. I had that homily read at my wedding. Oh my God. It was so brilliant. Fleabag season two. It's Andrew Scott season. Elsinore, get ready. It always is. It'll pass. It's always Andrew Scott Simpson. Okay, so like, we know that there are problems, right? We know that it's bad. We're women watching this show, and there's a part of my mind that's just like, Ricky is going to be held to a certain standard here as a woman in sports, and that's like not something I can stop thinking about as I'm watching it, right?

37:10Also, Ricky is a coach, and Chad, despite secretly being a 30-year-old named Russ, is her player, right? So all of that's there. To me, the key is that the show is hyper-conscious of all of that and the characters engage with that. That's not, there's no disconnect between the show and us as viewers, right? The characters are like, what do we do about all of these variables that are very present in our lives because we like wanna fuck each other or we're falling in love with each other. And you're just so swept up in watching that. And when Russ finally says at the end, can I say something? I love you.

37:43And then they kiss. It's just like magical. and all of the parts of your brain that are running through the reasons why it's not something that's, like, wise just cease to matter. And so I find myself incredibly invested in their romantic relationship while very concerned about what that means for them. Yes. As characters, you have the obvious, like, additional delicious elements of Ricky's dad, you know, the door opening at the end there, the fact that like Ricky has made this decision, go Orange, to go to Q's. But then we have Jay and his like, you know, guiding puppeteering hand there. So I don't trust it because fuck that guy.

38:24He's the threat to Ricky and Chad. Right. And then we have Coach Hudson saying, I'm going to step away and here's how it's going to go. Ricky QB coach. And there's a part of me that's like, I want them to be together. And then there's a part of me that's like season three, She needs to be in Syracuse or somewhere else. And then they meet up like, oh, let's do the heated rivalry. It's OK to fuck at the All-Star game. Get them at the Heisman ceremony. You know, moments like that where there's like a way to make it possible when it shouldn't be. Incredible year.

38:55Joanna Robinson:Also, no question. Yeah, that's a good one. Audiences want yearning. They're just getting it on TV right now. And so that's why it's like blowing up. So which of those variables, all of which are present, is like most dominant, right? The desire for them to be together, certainly. Well, I mean, first off, I guess maybe I'll answer that question without an answer. Great, because it wasn't a question. Because it wasn't a question. Perfect. I'll answer that non-question with a non-answer. The conversation about just how complicated it is, that it's like, forget the fact that he's a guy. in a mask and that he slept with her dad's wife.

39:38That's right, shout out Wendy. Yeah, it's like forget, you didn't even mention that in your laundry list of reasons this is fucked up. He didn't know. Okay, sorry. But that she is his coach and she is a woman in sports. We talked about that in the writers room. Sure. And we were like, do we go there? And I kept having this intense feeling of we have to. It's like it's there. And so we were like, how do we make sure we go there and we don't sell her out? And we were like, we just have to play it out realistically. Like it's just in the tragedy of that scene and when all that happens is she is put in this situation where in order to keep up the lie, she has to just let her dad think that she has been letting something romantic go on.

40:36So it's like that is preferable to the awful truth. And that's great. To me, that's delicious. And that's kind of the name of the game with the show. I've talked about it plenty, that it's trying to do what they did in Breaking Bad, which is just like if there's a problem, that seems impossible for us to get out of in the writer's room, I'm like, we have to do it. Like that, whenever we're like, well, we can't do that because that's impossible, it's always like, that's what we have to do. Because then you've got the audience in free fall and they're not ahead of you. That's what I've loved most about it, other than the fact that they just have wonderful chemistry and it's very compelling to watch.

41:25I feel complicit in a good way. Like, I want the thing they want, and I know the path to that is not clean. Yeah.

41:34Joanna Robinson:Even though this is a Michael Waldron interview, I have a Mallory Rubin question, which is, how did a horny prosthetic rip rate on your scale of 1 to 10 of horniness on screen? Thanks for asking. Yeah, you're welcome. So when we think about taking somebody's clothes off, if that person were wearing a home coach prosthetic mask, you would start there. It's funny because I did actually think, do I want their first kiss to be with the mask on or off? And I was very tortured about it. I'm like, I think rip it off right away. But I was glad I was glad that didn't happen. You know, we have kind of the like Chad into Russ emerging from the cocoon.

42:17I don't know if I should do this while we're talking about it. I mean, that was like, you know, there's like a major reset when we tear that on his face. So when we were shooting that, we really just got like two bites of the apple. And it was like, we're going to do it one time in a close-up and one time in our like two shot. And so it's like we do several takes where it doesn't rip. and then finally, and then I was gonna call, I'm tucked away in a corner calling face and it was like time for her to do it. Very sexy. But in the one that's in the show, in the one that's in the show, Perry just, she just did it.

43:05She like jumped the gun and did it. And I think that that, it feels, it feels like there wasn't like a pervert in the corner being like, here's what to do. You can't schedule the yearning. Yeah. But they're, I mean, yeah, it's amazing. I really love that moment. It was very thematically like, okay, she fell in love with Chad initially, but it is like working to Russ. And also it was hot.

43:29Joanna Robinson:Just worked across the board. I was trying to remember what, I'm just going to keep circling back to yearning. I was trying to remember what show it was that like really unlocked the you can't touch yearning and it's Pushing Daisies, of course. Right? Wow. Do you ever know Pushing Daisies? No. I mean, you... Anna Friel, Lee Pace... You would love it. They're deeply in love. They literally cannot touch. And so what are the solutions around? Because one of them will die. Those are the stakes. Those are the stakes. It's road. It's road. It's road. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so you mentioned Rick and Morty.

44:04Joanna Robinson:You mentioned Community. You mentioned Heels. We've talked about Loki. across all of these TV experiences you've had, what do you feel like was the most instructive to you on this is how I want to run a show? I mean, probably Heels, just because it was my first and it was the one where I had no idea what I was doing. I mean, I was like 29 maybe and running that writer's room with a bunch of brilliant writers and had no clue how to do it and had to really like fumble my way through it and wrote the season. Show kind of got put on a shelf and that's I went back to Rick and Morty as a writer and a producer and then then got the Loki job.

44:53And then when I got Loki, I was like, okay, I'm gonna learn from all my mistakes. You know, just all of the like, not having a strong enough point of view on things. And so I think Heels is the most instructive just because it was the first and I was an idiot. But that's, you know, now it's like you, you know, what you realize is that these things, they need somebody at the top, you know, and everybody wants it. They want it to be your vision. You know, that's your job.

45:28Joanna Robinson:Anything else you want to ask? Do you want to craft one perfect doomsday question that Michael Waldron might actually answer? Tell us everything about doomsday. Leave nothing out. Fade in.

45:42There's an animated graphic of the Marvel logo. Have you seen this?

45:48Joanna Robinson:Oh, the sound of pages flipping, maybe? That's great. For anyone who's listening to this or watching this who wants to get into making television, what's your one piece of advice watch Mad Men watch find things that you love find the show I mean it could just stop there I was hoping that's what you would say I feel like the Michael Waldron answer is watch things yeah it's watch things and then read them if it's not Mad Men if there's a show you like more fine Chad Powers or Heels or Loki But find a show that you love that the pilot script is available online. And download that script. Watch the pilot.

46:37Read the script. Watch the pilot. Read the script. Understand, you know, this is just from like how do you start writing TV. But understand how something, you know, makes it. Because, you know, the Game of Thrones pilot was just pages. You know, it's like that's all these things are. and anybody can write something.

46:57Joanna Robinson:That they completely reshot. That's right. Yes, yeah. And perhaps you don't write a day. So, yeah, that's, you know, watch Mad Men or watch Chad. If you watch Chad Powers, it's really everything you need. It's the same as watching Mad Men. Yeah, it's honestly very similar text. Same, same. Ultimately. Yeah, excellent. Mike Waldron, thank you so much. Thank you all for having me. What a treat. Yeah, what a treat. Go dogs, go fish. Go fish.

47:32For a limited time, you can get a Big Mac meal for just$8. That's a burger, fries, and a drink. They don't call it an extra value meal for nothing.

47:41Joanna Robinson:Get a Big Mac meal only at McDonald's. Price and participation may vary. Promotion pricing may be lower than meal pricing. Labor Day savings are happening now at the Home Depot with select appliances starting at$399. plus save up to an extra thousand dollars and get free delivery on appliance purchases of$998 or more get a Whirlpool laundry tower featuring industry first UV clean technology designed to reduce bacteria in the wash without fading fabrics plus with great prices at the Home Depot you can save on select appliances designed to make laundry day easier shop Labor Day savings at the Home Depot today offer valid August 27th through September 16th USNAC store online for details