Is James Bond In Crisis?

25:09And I think it's because they don't think that he's done some sort of quid pro quo. Yeah, do you know what? I hadn't thought about it, but you are 100 % right. Because it's one of those interesting things talking to every comic. And people are going, I'm not quite sure what this story is. It's interesting hearing comics talking about heckling and talking about, you know. And I was saying, what about this theory that post-COVID audiences don't know how to behave? They go, no, don't recognise that. Audiences are exactly the same unless you go to a small club where everyone's Instagram savvy and everyone's filming it.

25:35And then, of course, do what you want because that's the way that comedy is going. But most comics doing arena tours say it's the same as it ever was. If you get a heckler occasionally, you have to throw them out, but not really. And suddenly this is an enormous story. And yeah, I think you're absolutely right. Why am I on day seven of it? Sorry. There's a reason. There's a reason. Imagine just shouting out garlic bread like eight times in a row. I mean, I sort of admire it. If it was performers art, that'd be great. If it won the Turner Prize. And, you know, could do. Could do. Yeah, who knows.

26:08Right. Shall we go to some ads? Yeah, we should do. And anyone, you know, listening on a dog walker in the car, do not heckle the ads, please. Do not heckle the ads. Heckle them once. Tron Aries has arrived. I would like you to meet Aries, The ultimate AI soldier. He is biblically strong and supremely intelligent. You think you're in control of this? You're not. On October 10th. What are you? My world is coming to destroy yours. But I can help you. The war for our world begins in IMAX. Tron Ares. Rated PG-13. May be inappropriate for children under 13. Only in theaters October 10th. Get tickets now.

26:53Welcome back, everybody. Munchie? I'd love one. Right, James Bond, Richard. Yes. It has been almost four years since the... I love that you're opening some Munchies one. I'm trying to open them off mic because I'm a professional. Yeah. They're quite hard to get into. That's the thing I would say to the Munchies people. I can't make a joke about you right now, but it has been almost four years since the last James Bond film, and we don't have a new Bond. Thank you for the Munchie. Yeah. I'll eat it in a second because I'm talking. Of course, I'll eat right now and then you eat while I talk. We don't have a new Bond.

27:28Obviously, it's not going to be Daniel Craig anymore. We don't have a director and we don't have a script. This is a sort of niche and silly little sidebar, really. But last week, it emerged that a Dubai-based businessman has applied to challenge various James Bond film trademarks for merchandise. I wonder if they'll somehow link these two stories. But anyway, the man who it is is a man called Joseph Kleindienst. He is a former Austrian policeman turned Dubai property developer. He sounds great. What is not to love about that? An Austrian policeman turned Dubai property developer. You know what?

27:59One of the good guys. What I like to call one of life's hecklers. He's building a development in Dubai on some reclaimed islands, no surprise there, called something like Heart of Europe or whatever. Clever. But he wants the copyright to the catchphrase, things like Bond, James Bond. I can't remember what the other one is. 007, all sorts of things. Yeah, 007, all of those sorts of things. And he wants them to be able to apply to various things. Now, you can apply for trademark. The rights are held jointly by Eon, who we're going to be talking about quite a lot in a minute, who are the company who have the film rights to James Bond, and someone called Danjack, which is a sort of US-based merchandising firm.

28:39If you don't use trademarks, other people can apply to have them cancelled on the base of non-use, because they haven't been commercially exploited for five years. Now, I think in this case, you know, he would, this guy who probably wants them for a cocktail lounge on his dreadful Dubai horror show development. It might be a lovely development, by the way. Yeah, it's not for me. But, you know, I'm not the audience. So he wants to do that. He probably won't have much luck because they obviously will fight it beyond tooth and nail. But it does come at the same time that people are beginning to say, they're sort of beginning to question, I suppose, the supposed hiatus in Bond movies.

29:15Well, that's the point, isn't it? you can only apply for these sort of copyright things if no one has used them for five years. There is a bit of a use it or lose it. Yes, we are now almost five years since the last Bond film, almost seven years since when it was filmed. The biggest gap ever between Bond films is six years, which is between Licence to Kill, Timothy Dalton's final one and GoldenEye, which is Brosnan's first one. In the 12 years in which we'd have had two Bond films, the first nine Bond films came out. So Bond films used to be every year or every 18 months, something like that. We are now at a stage where Bond is being almost constantly delayed.

29:51And I think there's quite an interesting story as to why that is. There definitely is. As a bit of background, E.ON, who Barbara Broccoli, the legendary Bond producer, Carby Broccoli's daughter, and her stepbrother, Michael G. Wilson, they sort of run E.ON and they have the film rights to James Bond. Amazon recently, and they sat under MGM. and by the way incredibly protective of the brand incredibly protective of all of it well there's a lot to say about that I think it's really interesting how they protect their brand but they are very much in charge of it and own it and Amazon bought MGM a few years ago and so now everybody sits under Amazon and there was a sort of interesting Wall Street Journal report at the end of last year that was very well sourced and people who are I've spoken to some people who are vaguely connected with the Bond franchise over the past couple of days and they say the same sorts of things, which is that things were not in a great place.

30:50There was a meeting with Amazon Studios and with Eon and I think they referred to James Bond as content. Jennifer Salker, who's the head of Amazon Studios, somebody else said, I have to be honest, I don't think James Bond's a hero. Okay, we'll come to that in a minute. Shut up. Someone else on the Amazon side of things. Yeah. And another thing that they were sort of suggesting, Amazon, is that we obviously we live in a franchise era where, you know, what about there's a money penny spinoff for TV? What about there are alternate bonds? So Amazon now, to be clear, have because of owning MGM, have some say over where bonds might go.

31:29Or more importantly, anything that bond does will have to go via Amazon. Will have to be put out by them. They're stakeholders now in this, but Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson still have the ultimate power. And they are so careful with this particular property. It's interesting. You can sort of see Amazon's point of view. Oh, for sure. Because, OK, let's look at the literary side of the Ian Fleming estate and the bond. The literary stuff is incredibly well monetized, spun off, whatever. Super classy. Exactly. To a very high quality. You've got Charlie Hicks' book. You've got... Sebastian Falk's William Boyd has done a Bond novel.

32:08It's very, very... Anthony Horowitz's book. She's Kim Sherwood's 00 books. Yeah, very classy. They've got Moneypenny comic books. They've got Q Mysteries. There is actually a literary universe, and Amazon can see that. Now, in terms of sort of visual thing, the only other thing there is, really, is that... You know that thing, which I didn't make a huge cultural impact. It was called 007 Road to a Million. Yeah. Well, that's coming back. It is coming back. It's all chump change to Amazon. It's a game show. Brian Cox sort of plays a kind of putative, like kind of boss type figure and people go on sort of crazy missions around the world.

32:48I will say if I'm being polite, it looked great. If you want a big hit format, it's just got to have a bit more to it. It was, I absolutely get why they did it. I absolutely respect the people who made it and say it looks amazing. But who's ever heard of it? And there's huge amounts of money being spent on it. But as we've said before, they're a tech company. There's nothing to them. They're doing that for a reason. They bought that back for a reason. They've got to make something to do with Bond. Yeah. Something. Well, that's the thing. Okay, Barbara and her stepbrother, Michael G. Wilson, they took over during the Pierce Brosnan era.

33:25But she's really visionary. The Daniel Craig hire was incredible for their franchise. getting Sam Mendes which I think Skyfall is an absolute masterpiece it's so, so good. I'm more of a Quantum of Solace man. No one has ever said that. Quantum of Solace is like the Mango Watsits of the Bond franchise. No, I've got to watch a super spy haul his grief around five continents no thank you. Not even attempt to have sex with Olga Kurylenko no thank you. Mango Watsits would be the name of a baddie in Quantum of Solace. Maybe, okay. Well, they have got, as I said, they've got other things. They've got Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, which they also own.

34:04And I think some reboot of that's going ahead with Amazon. But they look after this thing so carefully. I don't want to say they're out of their time because it's lovely to see someone do this. Agreed. Because in an era where if you're not growing and you're not like building off 15 spinoffs, then, you know, are you actually dying? But people are starting to say, is one movie every five years enough? Now, I sort of love them for this, by the way. And the quality is she has been labelled difficult because of this. I love it that she doesn't really want people to refer to James Bond as content or product or whatever it is.

34:35Yeah, and she doesn't want a James Bond cinematic universe like Marvel. She doesn't want the Star Wars thing. There's a million spin-offs. And it happens all the time. If this was owned purely by Amazon or owned by a venture capital firm, there is an alternative universe in which every three years there's a Bond movie, but in between there is a spin-off series every single year. It would be so big it would have replaced the actual universe. There would be so many things happening. It would be absolutely non-stop. All the different characters, Felix Leiter, Moneypenny, as you say. There'd be a Q spin-off.

35:04I mean, it's almost endless, the things that you could do with this. And the fact that she hasn't, or Barbara and Michael G. Wilson, yeah, honestly, I love it. I love them for it. Love it. And the search for the Bond, it still becomes a sort of cultural talking point. That person, that Amazon executive who said, I don't see Bond as a hero. Well, okay. He has always been a sort of cultural lightning rod, including, by the way, when Ian Fleming was writing the books, because people had all sorts of views about him. The books, by the way, are insane. Yeah, and people had a lot of views about that and what this person was like.

35:39But she understands that he has to be a talking point, and Barbara Bockely, I'm talking about, has to be a talking point, has to be a debate. The sort of genius of that character is that it's great that we don't sort of fit him into a, oh, I don't see him as a hero. William Bockely is a villain. And it's good that it's not this kind of binary thing because he is neither good nor evil. He is an outsider. Yeah. He is essentially what's up with masculinity at any given time. Yeah. But his question, which is how do I fit into the modern world, is it's a question that actually lots of us, all different types of us, different types of people ask themselves all the time.

36:15And that's the relatability of the character because it's certainly not his job or the things he can do. We relate to him for that particular reason. I think almost the crucial quality of Bond in so many ways is that he is elusive and he leaves us wanting more. And, you know, you never find out everything about him. And so in a way, you never know quite how he'll return. We're not saturated in him. People always want more of him, even his bosses or the women he sleeps with, whatever it is. And in a way, Barbara Boccoli's stewardship of the character is at one with the character, is that she tries to sort of, you know, to not saturate us in him.

36:54To hold him back. Yeah. And I think it's so interesting. And I think she's done absolutely amazing. I think she's a sort of creative mastermind. I agree. I think I love the basic theory of less is more. I suspect that this Amazon thing maybe has made even less is more. And she's thinking, you know what, I was going to start it now, but I'm going to leave it another year or so. I think there's a bit where they're digging their heels in, which I absolutely get as well. I was just thinking the gap. We're going to get to the stage where after, you know, when Daniel Craig said he was going to quit and people are saying, well, Aaron Taylor-Johnson is the big favourite.

37:28And people are saying, I think he's a bit too young. And we're going to get to the stage now where he's a bit too old because there's going to be such a big gap between these movies. The movies have become more and more and more expensive. So people are always trying to have these extra income streams. And part of that is things like trademarking and other types of spinoff. And obviously Amazon are eyeing the way that the literary side of the estate is monetized and thinking, well, why can't we do something similar here? But it's so unusual in our culture. I love it. That someone is that classy.

38:01And Bond is fascinating, Bond, because it's been around for such a long time. It's such a weird part of all of our collective DNA. And I like the fact that Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson are standing against the times and just saying we do not have to monetize everything. Because, you know, they don't have shareholders in the way that some of the franchises do. We can shepherd this through. You know, this is, I was dealing recently with someone who's in charge of another very big literary estate. And a TV company had come to them with a reality show idea. And he was asking my view on this.

38:34And I looked at the idea and there wasn't a lot in it. And he just said, I have zero interest in doing anything that is just cashing in. Every single thing I do is I want it to improve the legacy of these books. And they said with absolute truth that it was not interested in a payday and would have made a lot of money for this thing. But it was and that's the same with Barbara Broccoli. When you've got the right people in charge of something who really, really care about what it is, then, you know, our culture is enriched because we don't have to have 15 money penny spinoffs, some of which might be great.

39:08But then some of which you just think, oh, enough Jones Bond now. And it makes you yearn for more. I mean, nobody could be yearning for more different phases and multiverse versions of Marvel when they reach complete sort of saturation. Yes. I wonder if we could do another Star Wars spinoff. That's what I tell you what I really fancy. Yeah. Yeah. Another Star Wars spinoff. Yeah. It's I think hats off to them. But it'd be nice at some point to have another Bond. And there will be one. There will be. Yeah. Yeah. And she'll make another great choice. You know, you have to creatively back these people.

39:38And I'm sure that Amazon realised this and will try and sort of, I think there have been sort of certainly public warm words to say not to worry. But behind the scenes there has definitely been some friction. Shall I tell you who I'd like to be Bond? Who? Will Poulter. Oh, he's, yes. That'd be fun. I think he's too sweet looking. But I think that would be the interesting thing. Barbara Broccoli has said that Bond has got to be a man and has got to be British, which will be news to George Lazenby and Pierce Brosnan. I don't think James Norton's too old. James Norton. I don't think he's too old.

40:10Oh, no, James Norton's not too old. And Aaron Taylor-Johnson is not too old. That was a bit, really. Yeah, but it has to be a man. It has to be British. So No Time to Die was 2021, but actually filmed in 2019. So it's been a long time. As you say, there is currently no script, no cast, no director. Can you give us an idea of if they started today, when that might start filming? OK, first of all, we don't know that there is no idea of a script. Some directors, someone like Sam Mendes is mega involved and basically sort of came up with a story. And so in that case, you couldn't have had the script without the director.

40:46We don't know what's going on behind the scenes, but it would be a struggle for it to come out now before, I mean, it's 2027. Even then, I think we would have an idea if there were a script being made because there's only a very small amount of people who would be writing that script. And you would have an idea of that being one of the projects that they were doing. But yeah, that's a long process. There will be a lot happening behind the scenes, but you're not going to be seeing one before then, no. But they're so good at keeping, once someone has been chosen, that person becomes, if they thought they were famous before, they become massively more famous and their every move will be followed and then it becomes, they've just always been very good at keeping the period between movies.

41:31The interregnum. Yeah, keeping it all going and keeping the idea of it and the notion that it's somehow linked in some weird way to our health as a nation. I think up or down. I think they've been very good at that. So yes, it will be a while. But it's not crazy to think there might be 10 years between Bond movies. I don't think there will be 10 years, not for a minute. They've asked you to do a punch-up on the script. They certainly haven't. But no, there won't be. Are you available, by the way, if they did want you to do a punch-up on the next Bond? You'd be amazing at writing Bond. No, I wouldn't be.

42:05I would love that, Marina Heitzbond. No, I wouldn't be. I would love it, but I wouldn't be. Something that is back, though, is White Lotus, which started last night. It's the third season of White Lotus, the masterpiece of Mike White. It's sort of quite an unusual show as far as US TV is concerned for lots of reasons. I remember during the pandemic, I might have told this story before, which case apologies, everyone was doing all their meetings by Zoom, and I was talking to Amy Gravitt, who's the head of comedy at HBO, and you could see she was in her house and I was in my house. And I was like, oh, you can't have anything going on.

42:39She said, no, we have actually got this one thing. Mike White is doing a show that's based on, you know, it's on a sort of, it's in a luxury. I said, sorry? She told me the whole premise. I was like, sorry, there's people who are living a completely normal life in a sort of bubble, so they don't have to have any regulations because it's a bubbled island, basically, in Hawaii right now. She said, yeah, I mean, the only thing is they have to make a television show, which is quite demanding. But other than that, they were in this sealed thing. But yes, the idea of the resort, which is in so many ways the perfect place.

43:11How many times, you know, when you're writing something, do you think, how can I keep getting them back together? How can these people interact? It's like, oh, they could just be lying next to the pool. You're never going to leave because you're in paradise and it's luxury and whatever. So Mike White, who writes it, is such an unusual story in American television because he writes alone. Interestingly, another pandemic thing, really, which is firstly, it's set somewhere where you can film in a pandemic. And secondly, given you can't really have writers rooms, the fact that here's a guy just writes everything by himself and wrote it very quickly.

43:41The first season was kind of was perfect for its time. And it's interesting that when the WGA recently went on strike and I'm in the WGA and they have the Writers Guild of America. The Writers Guild of America. And they had this big thing of, you know, we must be allowed writers rooms. and mini rooms are bad even, even small amounts of writers. But they had to make, because it's so part of their entire culture that everything is written by lots and lots and lots of writers. And they had to make one exemption for writers who truly work alone. And everyone would just call it the Mike White rule because he's like the only one.

44:13He's just on his own doing this thing. But he says he would hate to be scrutinised in that way and whatever. He is amazing. By the way, he also directs it. He's the showrunner. I think it is completely, I don't know how he does it because it is completely exhausting. but the new one is in Thailand and you won't have any spoilers here so don't worry. One of the things that really interests me about him is that he, and you know I've talked about this before, is that he absolutely loves reality television. He's obsessed with it. I mean, even more than being obsessed with it, he's been on it. He's been on two mega formats.

44:43He's been on Survivor and he's been on Bear Race Across the World. Amazing race. Just as a punter, by the way, not as a celebrity, not as Hollywood script writer Mike White. As a contestant. As a contestant, yeah. He came second in Survivor. He did really quite well in Amazing Race. With his dad. With his dad. He was also an interesting character. Oh my God, please, can you talk about the dad? Which we will get on to. Yeah. The dad is a very interesting story. His dad was a sort of ghost writer for really hardcore conservative right preachers. Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, he would write their scripts and they were the real fire and brimstone preachers.

45:19And then his dad came out. Yeah. Then his dad was like, oh, you know, I was secretly gay all of this time. So that's an interesting household to grow up in, I would say. A household of secrets, definitely. As I said, there are so many writers I know who are really good writers of drama who are obsessed with reality TV. And I think it is because people are put in these heightened, often very stylized situations where you're out of the norm and you're required to do, you know, much like a holiday in lots of ways. But also, as you say, one of the key things about being a writer is how do I contain all of my characters?

45:52How do I put them in one place? How do I find a situation where they all have to be somewhere? What's my mansion? You know, like, what's my island? But that's all reality TV is. Here's a group of people and they have to be in this place. And for a writer, that's like the dream. Normal rules are suspended. It's really unclear whether people are having trivial discussions or almost sort of existential discussions. Relationships are sped up. So, you know, any relationships that would develop slowly, develop very quickly in those environments. Things have to matter. Rather like, and in many ways, you know, like a holiday, people work all the time and then you go somewhere and you become a different version of yourself you've got a wardrobe that you're going to wear I might wear it on holiday women often say I wouldn't wear it at home but I might wear it on holiday and then you get home and you're like do you know what I am actually going to have a pineapple pina colada but why don't we drink pineapple pina colada all the time it's a heightened reality a holiday so it's perfect for a Mike White drama and the stakes it has to matter because it's your time off and it's anyway funnily enough Adam Curtis said something funny to me but he said to me people go to work all week and they do a thing and they get money for it but their actual job is going out and spending it in the economy and that's why when you go around a shopping mall the weekend everyone looks so miserable because at some subconscious level they realise that's their actual job.

47:02They're working. I actually had to go to Westfield which is a big shopping mall in White City this weekend and I thought as I always do of Adam's particular point I was like I love this take I love your many takes. Everyone looked obviously incredibly depressed as they walked around because they were at work. Yeah. Stay or a work. In that, God, the queue for Westfield is always crazy. That's your commute. And you're not quite sure, but you feel like you have to do it. Anyhow, as a satire, White Lotus is really interesting because, first of all, he said, I have to feel personally indicted, Mike White, because he's not like, oh, look at these rich people doing all this.

47:39He had a house on Hawaii. I think he's got two houses on Hawaii. I bet he has now. About six houses now. but he has to feel like it works because it's not like I hate these people are the worst people in the entire world. I mean, they are quite bad but he has to feel like they're sort of like me as well. Oh, you know, it's such a... The setup, by the way, if you don't know the setup it is essentially lots of rich Americans in a resort but we see the underbelly of the resort we see the people who work at the resort and we see sort of the contempt in which some of these rich Americans are held. It's much cleverer than that.

48:12And the contempt in which the reciprocal contempt for the people who service them and the country in some cases or the culture that they visited. So much more nuanced than that makes it sound. But that's the basic principle is the sort of engine room of a resort and the Americans who are there and the problems they bring with them into this slightly different culture. And it's essentially the sort of interaction between those two groups and between the rich Americans, which is such a great place for drama to happen. I wonder if you have, I think it's so interesting, and I should say there is a murder in every series.

48:44It's very interesting that why does murder mystery lend itself so well to social satire? Or why does social satire so often make us think this is somewhere where homicide might occur? Well, I think, and certainly in my books, I like to write about the world and I like to write about people. And if you have a murder, you know where you're headed. You know that you're ending somewhere and readers and viewers like that. So the very start of all the white lotuses, the body turns up. You're not sure whose it is. You're not sure what's happened. But you know at the end you are going to find out. Now, almost everything that happens in between bears no relation to it really.

49:20But as a viewer, you can sit back because you go, okay, I get it. I'm being cradled here. And if you have that cradle, you are not having to worry about anything other than how entertaining is this journey and telling any story you want within it because you know where you're going already. So you're not having to make some point. He's not having to lecture about, you know, when you watch White Lotus, of course, you think a lot about how you interact with the world. And which one of them you'd kill. Which one of them you'd kill. You're never, ever having to be, to lecture, you're never having to sort of ram home points.

49:54You can literally write the satire you want to write because it's been cradled in something that makes people comfortable. But again, it is that heightened reality where you might almost feel homicidal in a ridiculous way. Often, you know, we set our murder mysteries in beautiful Adilip villages. Someone's been so insufferable in one way or another that they've had to be offed. And there's something about that particular thing. It's amazing how it has become such a marketing opportunity, but they've all been in Four Seasons hotels. Four Seasons now have a partnership with HBO. First of all, you can get, and I really wanted to get these for you and Ingrid, HBO sell them on their website.

50:32It says one size fits most, and I wonder if it'd be quite small. it's a white lotus bathrobe oh really yeah it says white lotus resorts it's like a fluffy you know fancy hotel thing the resorts themselves have done incredibly well out of this the one in Maui they said they had a 425 percent year over year increase in website visitors and they had a huge surge in bookings because people want to go to the specific four seasons properties which are featured the one in Sicily and then now one in Thailand they are beautiful it tells us something very very interesting about our culture that these are satires about tourism and satires about the way that tourism can suck things from an economy and satires about you know luxury lifestyle and yet they massively increase traffic for tourists and people wanting to live that luxury lifestyle i mean massively increase it we all know what we're watching we all understand a complicity we might have in it but at the same time we go oh god it looks lovely this is why This is what people watch The Thick of It and are like, oh, my God, this is so cool.

51:33It's like, no, you know, this is about how bad politicians and, you know, spads and whatever behaving like this. It's so aspirational. Everyone's favourite day in Westminster is when The Thick of It trends on Twitter because people think, oh, it's, you know, it's just like that. People are like, oh, my God, these people are so awful. This is so awful. I want to go there. I want to go there because I'm not awful. I would really appreciate that swimming pool in a way that they're not appreciating it because of their backstories. Yeah, because why can't they just appreciate what they have? Yeah, and then you're like, hold on, maybe I've got a backstory.

52:02So Four Seasons have got this whole thing, this brand. They've now formally made a brand relationship with HBO over it, and they're going to do exclusive screenings in all their different hotels. They've got pop-up escape cabanas in Palm Beach. I mean, that's amazing. It's genuinely hilarious. Anytime you try and do a brand hookup on anything, brands are incredibly conservative and incredibly worried about being shown in a bad light. And, you know, everything has to be absolutely above board and they'll sanitise everything. And this is the absolute opposite of that. I mean, the four seasons look nice, but the content of the show is fairly brutal.

52:39It's withering, yeah. You know, satirically brutal and physically brutal. And yet, four seasons... But the traffic doesn't lie and the bookings didn't lie. And so they saw after that first season... The traffic doesn't lie. Well, they saw after that first season in Maui that people just thought, but I want to go there. And so it's an incredible sort of advert for it. I'm interested as to why this era, this show, why it really grabs this era. By the way, I should say that this is a show that is incredibly talked about. It trends on everything just after it's aired. People talk about it all the time.

53:08It's real like chatter-arty conversation. The finale of season two, HBO said, got 4 million viewers, which is like less than what an episode of the weekday episode of The Chase would consolidate to. I would say that's half a Call the Midwife. Yeah, which is really interesting. And yet it's a bit like Succession. It gets written about everywhere. It's talked about. But Succession, again, another sort of satire on super richness. And we talked about Triangle of Sadness, all that sort of stuff. It's a sort of about America's place in the world. But it completely catches fire. And I think it's one of those things that dominates the cultural conversation.

53:45Also, it's a library property and it's great. And lots of people go back and watch season two of White Lotus. And now people who've never watched White Lotus will watch the first two seasons because they can. I'm going to controversially say I didn't absolutely love the first series because you could tell it was shot during lockdown. Yeah, there was a lot of interstitial stuff. So all the way through, I'm like, where's the staff? There's only like two people in this entire resort. And like, where are all the other guests? The second series is much better. There was a lot of interstitial stuff of the water or whatever, which filled it all up.

54:12But to make that during lockdown was an incredible achievement. Yes, I think it's interesting that there are certain shows that just catch light in a certain way. But what's interesting, talking about that weird hotel deal that they've got, is that the Four Seasons guy said, oh, Gen Z and millennials are our next generation of luxury customers. And this is a way of getting them in, because this is a way for us to reach them, because they haven't necessarily known how to reach those audiences before. And it's really interesting. You can see why. And all you needed was a satire on the horrors of mass tourism to bring that generation into it.

54:46And how there is trouble in paradise. The cast all live out there for the last seven months of filming. They're living at the Four Seasons, all together, all in luxury suites, which sounds like an amazing job, but because it's filming, you can't have the air conditioning on and stuff like that, so it's boiling hot. But imagine, I would watch the documentary behind the scenes of the actors of White Lotus. The hearts of darkness of it. filming White Lotus it'd be amazing but they all every interview you see with anyone who's been in any of the seasons and a couple of people sort of go across seasons Jennifer Coolidge is in two but mainly it's a whole new cast but the one thing they all seem to have in common is they all seem to love Mike White it all flows from him they all seem to say he's a genius which is great and it's amazing that thing we talked before about where hits come from and how you never know and Mike White's always been around and there's a movie called Chuck and Buck which if you like White Lotus I sort of wouldn't recommend because it's very difficult.

55:40You sort of see it as by the same person. But White Lotus is such an absolute, the top line of it is so simple and it's got a murder so it makes people feel comfortable. Chuck and Buck does not make you feel comfortable. Did you ever watch Enlightened, which I love? Enlightened was his... I think that was a hard yard for him. I think Laura Dern's not the easiest. Oh, is it Laura Dern? He wrote School of Rock. Yeah. You know, so he's, I mean, you wouldn't have gone, this is the guy who's going to give us the next... He started on Dawson's Creek. Yeah, I mean, you know, There's so many different routes to success.

56:10And the fact is that he seems to have always done the thing that he wants to do. And I think that's the message, isn't it? But it's like that tone. It's a little bit like Inside No. 9. Jennifer Coolidge was over two seasons. But that was because they thought that they were making a limited series. It was such a hit. They thought, oh, it could be a returning series. And so she appeared across both. But she's not in the third one. But what he's really done is you're buying, to sort of misquote Barton, think that Mike White feeling because it's a completely different new thing every series. It reminds me of Inside Number Nine in that you're buying those two, but he's not on screen, which is a hard way to do it.

56:47But you love Steve Edmonton and Reese Shearsmith and you don't really mind and they make you care about them all over again really quickly because the tone, it's the tone and that feeling that you're kind of buying into. It's the fascinating thing for all creatives and I think about it a lot because of my background in quiz and game and things like that, is Mike White has not changed the way he writes or the things he writes about. What he's changed here is the hammock in which he writes. And he's got a hammock that people feel very comfortable with. And people immediately go, oh, rich people and they're on holiday in a resort.

57:21And it's a murder mystery. And they're worried that, you know, the person who's serving them drinks hates them. And everyone goes, yeah, OK, countless in. Yeah, the murder mystery goes, OK, I guess we'll get where we're going in the end. and then Mike White writes exactly everything he's always written, but it's in such a way that people feel so utterly comfortable and they go, where's this guy been? And you go, oh, he's always been here. He's always been writing this. But he finally found the thing that everyone at the same time just went, oh, yeah, I want to watch that. But he's always been brilliant.

57:47I think he's just a complete phenomenon, a really interesting character. To tie this podcast together like we produce it, three actors in season two of White Lotus. I love season two of White Lotus. is the one that's Cicely who could all be James Bond Theo James he's a certain type of Bond Leo Waddell who I love who's also in One Day but Will Sharp who I think would be amazing have you seen A Real Pain he's so brilliant in that I love Will Sharp I think Will Sharp wants to do and he also is a creator himself and he writes he's amazing I think he might find it too limiting I think the idea of coming back repeatedly to the same things is not what Will Sharp wants to do I think he's so talented and he gets very buff in White Lotus 2 as well He's got it all.

58:29He's got it all. Someone who can be that buff and put in the performance he does in a real pain is someone I'd like to see as Bond. Yeah, you're right. He doesn't want to be Bond. He's too creative and he wants to write and direct his own things as well. And I think there's just not enough space within the juggernaut of being Bond. Within the juggernaut of being Bond. Sorry, that does not work as an expression at all. My apologies to everyone. So White Lotus is available right now on Sky. If you watch the first two, you're going to be watching this one. If you didn't watch the first two, yeah, go.

58:57but I'd almost be tempted to say start on season two but maybe watch the whole thing but remember that first one, give them a break because it was written, filmed, the whole thing done during lockdown and you can slightly feel the emptiness of it but you'll get the idea of what you're watching and if you want to be a completist, watch the whole lot. Any recommendations? Yes, I mentioned it briefly earlier. Talking to Sky, they've done a documentary about Boyzone called No Matter What and when someone says they've done a documentary about Boyzone that could go one of two ways, couldn't it? And it's gone in such a brilliant way.

59:28It is, I just thought it was extraordinary. It's an amazing story. You don't think it is, but it is. And, you know, very sad with Stephen Gately. And it's just very interesting. Just these five boys whose lives were utterly changed by being chosen for this group. And his lives could have gone in completely different directions. And the different ways all five of them have dealt with it. And all five of them dealt with it in very, very different ways, which is the fascinating thing about it. It is really, really, really worth watching. One of the key things about it is it's not very often you see five working class guys having to really, really talk about their feelings and find a way to come to terms with things that have happened to them as a group and as individuals.

1:00:11And it's very, very moving in that way. There's plenty of tears in it. And it's a really, really great documentary. I found it genuinely fascinating. Right, and with that, I think we will leave you until Thursday. Do please keep sending your questions in, therestisentertainment at gmail.com. And, of course, if you wish to become a member of our club, you can join that at therestisentertainment.com and we will have a bonus episode for you on Friday. All about Bergerac. Which is being rebooted. Which is being rebooted. I'd like to say thank you to Munchies. Not sponsored. Not sponsored. And, yeah, see you on Thursday.

1:00:47See you on Thursday.

1:00:51Thank you.