WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS on FX and FX Hulu

Moderator Haley Joel Osment

Matt Berry

Natasia Demetriou

Kayvan Novak

Mark Proksch

Stefani Robinson

Paul Simms

Harvey Guillen, creator

A household of vampires living in Staten Island try to find their place in the world. For me, it’s the best comedy on television so get to it!

Haley: Thank you everyone for being with us today. Harvey, we left off Season one with a cliff hanger and an arc to the finale in season two. How did your character evolve?

Harvey: I didn't know we were going in that direction I season one and the story-line has been awesome. I don’t' think anyone expected it. Season two started with a bang killing vampires and evil from getting to my housemates. Guillermo is torn but being loyal to a T. He loves his housemates.

Haley: You had stunt work to do.

Harvey: That was fun, I didn't know that was going to happen until Season 2. I started going to the gym and working out which is good for me but all the stunt stuff I did was like a dance. In that sense it was just like doing a musical. It looked cool on camera. People have been really responding to it.

Haley: Kayvan: There are a lot of ups and down for your characters with Guillermo. Do you think Nandor has turned a corner despite that big blow up?

Kayvan: That's a good question. I would say that it’s a really dysfunctional relationship that they have. The way they have this codependency together, one hand Guillermo wanted to be a vampire and now he doesn't need to be one because he's a vampire killer. Nandor needs Guillermo so who is he going to boss around. Now that this big reveal has happened. I have no idea how this relationship is going to evolve. Nandor basically has someone that can kill him. 'm concerned.

Paul: Stephani and I have some ideas where its going but we won't say.

Haley: It's been green-lit for a third season as you write from your vampire hideouts.

Paul: We know what's happening, but we can't tell you.

Haley: Natasha you worked with a puppet version of yourself. I was lucky enough to see all the improve on set, was it hard to improvise with yourself?

Natasia: I did all the recording of the voice actually in lock-down so if it doesn't sound that good, that's why. It was easy to improvise with myself because I am a fantastic improvisor and actress.

Haley: I also did my ADR from this room; did you all do that?

Natasia: Its always been my dream to work against someone who is as good as me, so I finally got to do that with myself.

Haley: You and Matt had an extended musical episode in the club. How much was written from that episode and how much didn't make it into the show.

Matt: I don’t know because I haven't seen that episode. They are more or less 30 second long. They weren't full songs, so I don't know.

Natasia: I did see it and there were some amazing songs written in and a couple, I'm very pleased to say, that me and Matt penned in his little dressing room on a keyboard that also made it it. Yea, there were some amazing ones.

Haley: Mark, I heard you were very ill during the episode during your big promotion.

Mark: Yea, when you get sick filming and on location it sucks. You have none of your creature comforts with you. Too boot it is in Toronto Canada which is very cold. You take a lot of drugs and smile and you take the smooth with the rough. The flying was fun, it is a little painful as all the other vampires know more than I do. Yea, its work so you go to work and do it. Hopefully the episode didn't suffer.

Haley: Do you think Collin is the most powerful vampire in the house.

Mark: We all have our own specialties that we play off of each other. If he gets them all in the room and they aren't aware he can cause a lot of problems. Guillermo is very powerful now and Kayvan has his powers and Matt has his and Natasia is loud, so we all have things that are powers.

Haley: Stefani and Paul, how far in advance did you know that Jim the Vampire would be Mark Hamill?

Stefani: I felt like we had enough time, more than in the past. There is scheduling and visa issues and shooting close to the holidays its hard to lock people down. In this instance we knew ahead of time and had enough time to write the part specifically geared toward him.

Haley: Was the pool cue or light saber thing happen on set?

Stefani: That was one of those that happened on set, it was the stunt coordinators that came up with it during rehearsal and something that was designed for that specific space when they were blocking it all out.

Paul: We thought maybe they would hit pool cues at each other and on the day and we were shooting it and Mark Hamill picked up the pool cue everyone said, 'oh my gawd'.

Stefani: I never saw Matt so giggly.

Matt: I was in front of Luke Skywalker and it doesn't matter how cool you think you are or in character you are, you're not, you are seven years old with Luke Skywalker in front of you. Pretty special.

Haley: About the directors, you can tell there is a different approach from directors so how do you work with that?

Paul: I'll jump in, the interesting thing is that Kyle is great and our editor Yanna directed two episodes for the first time, but it was a really funny experience. She has seen every bit of film and knows how everything goes together and knew what we needed and what we didn't need. You don't usually get that from a first-time director.

Matt: You'd never know she was a first-time director

Natasia: No matter who the director is I send little bits of paper to the cast saying, 'don't f**k it up'. So, there are lots of directors but I'm always directing.

Haley: From this point on didn't you say, 'I refuse to be directed!'

Natasia: That was an actor that I worked with that said she was self-directing. She was so upset with production that she was self-directing like, 'and action', 'camera one on me and action'.

Haley: This show as I found out in the few days that I was there was very nocturnal like its characters and cold when you are shooting. That is real snow you are working in, how challenging is that working through the nights and trying to sleep all day. Added to that all the time in the makeup trailer.

Stefani: A lot of Captain's Oil.

Paul: I'm a nocturnal person so it doesn't wear on me. I start at 6 pm to daylight, I can't imagine being an actor doing it.

Natasia: It makes you made, but it makes you like a vampire but sometimes you are human and think 'oh, I think I'm gonna die'. It's a very surreal experience but it works for the show.

Stefani: There are waves and stages to it. It's like a long-extended sleepover at a theatre camp with your friends, but there is a point where your body is shutting down and your body turns colors and you've only eaten deviled eggs.

Matt: It doesn't help when they dye your hair black because you look even more withdrawn.

Mark: As much as we love Toronto, filming in a cold place doesn't help when it’s the seventh week and your doing an outdoor night shoot and you can't feel your feet. The crew isn't as babied as the actors and they start falling and getting sick.

Paul: It doesn't.

Haley: One thing that does make it on the screen is working in the vampire house. I have never seen so many lit candles on a set before which lends to the atmosphere. What is it like working in that environment?

Matt: Yep.

Natasia: One of my favorite parts of the show, I still can't believe it that it’s a weird vampire house. I want to take it on the road to have people visit.

Mark: I've never in any of my shows worked in such an elaborate and really beautiful set and it lends itself to your creativity which helps a lot.

Matt: I was asked this afternoon, its not only the best set I've ever worked on but the best set I've ever seen. We have a music room that was built and only on the scnee for like 11 seconds and it was incredible.

Natasia: The only issue with lit candles is you can't stop and take a photo, or you will set yourself on fire.

Matt: The terror in their eyes was hilarious.

Natasia: Setting yourself on fire is so embarrassing.

Haley: Is there a policy about taking something from the set.

Matt: That's from the Necromancers hut.

Paul: No one informed me about the policy, so I didn't get anything.

Haley: I remember one night that someone's teeth were misplaced. Do you forget they are there?

Matt: That's not the issue, its forgetting to put them in before a scene.

Natasia: Forgetting to put them in after lunch and they can't use it because I'm an idiot for not putting my teeth in. Matt tried to pull a prank on me putting red stuff on his teeth. To this day I don't know what it was.

Haley: Harvey, how has your podcast with the show been with fans.

Harvey: It started off like a onetime thing and then after the first episode aired fans asked when  will the next one air. So, I really just did it because the fans were asking for it. Sharing the videos and having fun and Natasia shared clips and to give fans something. The show is a 30 minute show and people want more so I did it as a 'here's something' and I think we shot 14 episodes and we had the writers, directors, producers and Paul and hear the stories. I didn't know where Paul grew up and we had a whole conversation like that. It was time consuming though. I was a five day a week thing with jokes, artwork from fans and my sister jumped on and produced it. We were working to stream through all social medias at the same time. It was a lot of work. I'm glad we did it.

Haley: We are doing this remotely so to talk about it, how has everyone's quarantine been?

Natasia: I've been busy with a show called What We Do Before What We Do When What We Do In The Shadows.

Paul: Stefani and I have been busy editing and learning how to do things remotely and get everyone loop and ADR lines remotely and get Mark's voice to sound like it wasn't in a big echo-y room.

Mark: It was fine for everything else but for this it echoed.

Haley: Then I'll throw this to everyone, most of our characters have had successful and romantic adventures. Can Nandor fine love in season 3?

Stefani: Good question Haley.

Paul: Yea, Nandor is lonely and if there is a preview of season 3 they are searching. Nandor is searching for love, there might be new duties - I'm giving too much away.

Haley: I'll plow ahead, we saw a big broadening of the magical world and the creatures who live in it, what sort of creatures are still out there for the characters?

Paul: Yes there are. I'm trying to think of one to say that won't spoil anything.

Stefani: There are creatures who live on edifices.

Natasia: Can you come up with some vampire puppies and kittens.

Paul: I will say the vampires get a hell hound to protect them.

Natasia: You thought we were going to get our animal guy back.

Mark: I felt like I was doing something wrong just standing next to him.

Haley: Have there been live bats on the set or is that CGI?

Paul: We've had a goat.

Stefani: I live raccoon and a gecko.

Matt: A Small dinosaur of some sort.

Natasia: the bat quite often is a rubber bat on a stick and I'm always like very good, and they say 'no, no that's the bat'.

Haley: It’s been great to see your faces, Harvey, Mark, Natasia, Matt, Kayvan, Stefani and Paul take care.

Searchlight Pictures ANTLERS

Director Scott Cooper

Producer Guillermo del Torro

Mod Steven Weintraub

This is the story of the Wendigo, translates to a diabolical wickedness that devours mankind. When the English settled they left the Native Americans to starve and this is the of horror.

What TV series would you like to guest writer/direct?

Guillermo: Night Gallery, Kojak, anything that I saw as a kid. The fantastic tv and movies in the 70's. It was a beautiful time.

Scott: Godfather or Jaws, every time I turn the tv on they are on and I stop to watch regardless of where the film is at. I'd watch THE CONVERSATION.

Guillermo: CREATURE FORM THE BLACK LAGOON, FRANKENSTEIN, ROAD WARRIOR, CATCH ME IF YOU CAN, they are in constant rotation and BLADE RUNNER. I see fragments of 10 movies everyday.

Favorite ride at Disneyland?

Guillermo: Haunted Mansion

Scott: Sadly for me, I've never been.

Guillermo: Wow.

Scott: I've just never found myself at Disneyland.

Guillermo: You can still do that, you're my guest, lets do it. I beg for people to come.

Scott: You have invited me.

Guillermo: I'll go at the drop of the hat. I'll go anytime you want. The strange combination is the three filmmakers that influences me the most are Disney, Hitchcock and Bunuel. Strangely, the three of them intersect somehow.

Scott: They intersect in your work. Now that you mention that I can absolutely see that.

Guillermo: I think Hitchcock and Brunel have a lot in common like MARNIE and VERTIGO.

What project would you make if you had the funds?

Scott: My wife thinks I'm commitment phobic, there is a film that I've wanted to make for several years that I've written about a series of murders that take place at West Point in the 1800's and a cadet who is unlike all the other cadets. He is poetic, he's irrational, he's extremely passionate and the world would come to know him as Edgar Allen Poe.

Guillermo: I'd produce it. I'd do FRANKENSTEIN as a two or three part story. In order to encompass the book you have to deal with points of view. It’s a complicated exercise. It's like you begin making the movie and think you should be making any other movie than the one you are making.

Scott: We know what it takes to get the film mounted and to marshal all the forces.

Guillermo: If you start a movie without absolute dread, you are not a filmmaker. You have to have all the preparation in the world. It's like launching a spaceship, the moment the countdown goes 4,3,2…and you think 'this is going to explode, we are going to burn' something and that moment elongated in a few days or weeks is what it is like being a filmmaker. You prepared everything but this thing is alive now.

Scott: I didn't go to film school so my education is watching lots of movies a lot of director commentaries and interviews. All of the directions I admire the world over have said their least favorite part of making a film is shooting. They like the writing and cutting but there is so much pressure.

Guillermo: The editing is you are typing with the most expensive typewriter in the world. It comes with words already formed but it cost millions of dollars depending on what you are doing. No doubt you are typing with image or sound. The thing that I do miss is the audio commentary because I believe in the physical medium of DVD's and Blu-ray, I have and alphabetized over 7,000 movies that I love to access like a library. Every day we try to watch three movies.

Scott: No body has the film knowledge that you have Guillermo:

Guillermo: What you say you learn. I was texting with a filmmaker I admire and he said that he loved that I keep the physical medium and I told him its because I watch the extras and the commentaries. Sometimes I listen to it twice because I forget. It's been great, we've been texting during the quarantine and others asking what they are watching and why they are watching it. This indoor quarantine has been a fantastic learning experience.

Scott: In many regards, it certainly makes you realize what is important. If anything it makes you think about how important time is. If you are going to make a film you better really want to make it.

Guillermo: If you really study a filmmaker you admire, you can break down their use of the lens, their composition, movement of camera and action. If you put the time that's a new tool in your toolbox, you do it different but as a tool. In THE DEVILS BACKBONE I put  dolly in the middle of the group and with a mini jib I was told to get a techno crane to push without even touching the floor I repeated the move in another sequence. That's a new tool that you keep and learn to use that.

Scott: That is how I self teach. I mean with the Coen Brothers.

Guillermo: The Coen Brothers are the best filmmakers right now. They are superb story tellers but they are the ones that hold the most mystery for me. Some of the things they do go beyond, they are pure faith, pure poetry and I've interviewed them a couple of times at Caan and I can tell you things they do but their instincts are all their own.

Scott: An utterly mysterious, not a wasted movement with camera or dialogue.

Talk about Antlers.

Scott: I would say that its really about, the film looks at the heart of what it means to be an individuals and all the crisis we are facing. Climate crisis, our treatment of Native Americans, abject poverty without feeling like a message film wrapped into a horror film.

Guillermo: The texture of the movie is based on a short story, you made it very different making it a Scott Cooper universe. People say why do you produce and I saw to learn from the filmmakers. I told you this, I was watching your dailies religious and I would say 'this is a beautiful moment or this is a beautiful movement'  but there was a certain energy between the spaces that your film has. I said where is that in this one and you showed me your first assemble and I said oh, there is a Scott Cooper movie. To me, it's a continuation of your preoccupations but it’s a proper horror tale.

Scott: This is my first immersion into the supernatural. With each movies I want to be on unfamiliar ground because I think risk is one of the great pleasures of making art and making films. I think horror films are for people who are interested in the darkness inside themselves who don't want to face it or confront it directly. I think it can provide and environment for people to escape. I recall my brother who is much older taking me to see John Carpenter's HALLOWEEN for the first time in a theatre and I left utterly terrified at realizing what film could do to you. Even at a young age. I think anytime you can do that you can move the audience whether it be a gangster movie or a film about an aging country musician or OUT OF THE FURNACE or even a western, I think that's the goal. For me, this genre allowed me to do it. Because I said to Guillermo, first of all I wouldn't have made the film if Guillermo wasn't producing it firstly, I said to Guillermo that my goals for this film is for it to be disquieting, for it to be tense and human at its center but also terrifying. The audience will be the judge. Those were the goals!

The film has a message without having a message.

Scott: I'm not a fan of message movies and my hope is that if people happen to see my films more than once, they will see that there is something very subtle that you didn't see the first time. In this particular film, while I wanted it to be really quite horrifical and terrifying and certainly in moments it is, I wanted us to really feel like what it is to be an American today and also to show the world as it really is. You have a young boy who is in a great deal of pain who is dealing with a lot of familiar issues and that is one of themes in the film but you also understand that the Wendigo figures into the film and we know that that is Native American, well, as I thought somewhat of an allegory or some type of folklore but as it turns out my Native American advisors really, really believe in it. So the Wendigo figures into the story. The Wendigo is this murderous spirit that is summoned by nature against a callous mankind. Its clear we are abusing mother earth as I mentioned we are abusing Native Americans. We have since we first came to the shores of America and then also abusing drugs and the

opioid crisis and so that hovers underneath the surface. The Wendigo represents greed and colonialism.

Guillermo: I think there were two things that I was really compelled by and the myth is the Wendigo, the more it eats the more hungry it gets and the more it eats the weaker it gets. It is a metaphor for the deprivation and a lot of family rage in the movie. Every character in the movie is enacting or suffering from family rage of some kind. Ultimately it is a bunch of broken characters attempting to get together. I think that was one of the things that I loved about what you did. I mean we worked very close, and it has been one of the great pleasures producing with you and I was really very happy with the wave you wove that rage ultimately 'if you love something, would you be able to kill it?'. That is the central question of the movie. Or even 'would you preserve it alive?' and in a strange way it is something that is very personal for me too because it is the first question I asked in KRONOS. The girl keeping the vampire grandpa in an attic and I thought 'this has echoes of that for me'. Obviously I didn't mention it so you could come to that alone.

Scott: And look at PAN'S LABYRINTH, it is clear that it touched a nerve with you in a great way. One of the pleasures of working with Guillermo is that when you have a producer that is also a director, and I've had Ridley Scott and Tony Scott produce and Robert Duvall, its not the first time I've had a director produce. They really understand what you are going through on a daily basis, through shooting, through cutting. Guillermo is always available and is extremely generous with his time and any time that I would have a script question, certainly when I was shooting at night, I would email or text him, in the creation of the Wendigo, there is no one better than Guillermo at that. That is why I said I would only make this film with him. It is really wonderful to have someone who really knows what you are going through in the most difficult of times I have to say.

Using Native American consultants.

Scott: If we go back one film before this, HOSTILES, a film that I made with Christian Bale, it was really important for me as someone who is a white, Anglo-Saxon, protestant, Episcopalian raise guy, if I'm going to discuss the Native American folklore or any themes that course through Native American life, I want to have people who know much more about it than I do and I want to get it right. So I had consultants from HOSTILES come to work on this film, his name is Chris Eyer who directed SMOKE SIGNALS which was recently admitted into the Library of Congress.

Guillermo: Yes, fantastic movie.

Scott: He is a good guy and a close pal of mine and has really helped me understand Native American causes and then I reached out to Grace Dillon who is a Professor of Indigenous Studies at Portland State University and considered to be the foremost authority on the Wendigo in America. She was the one that really educated me that 'oh no, Native Americans, First Nations, its not folklore for them and it is not a myth. They truly believe in it because it represents greed and colonialism when we first came to the shores of what is now America pillaging all their resources and forcing them to cannibalism'.  That taste for human flesh and out of that rose the Wendigo. So just on a psychological and social level and just understanding Native American plight because those causes for me are incredibly important and no mistake that two films in a row for me deal with Native Americans. So Grace Dillon and Chris Eyer were incredibly helpful.

The creature?

Guillermo: The Wendigo have very specific cues for you to follow in the way it is described and you have to follow those precepts. The antlers, for example, I said you have to remember we are not creating a monster, we are creating a god. The designs must have effects that are completely unnatural that are almost surreal or abstract. I said the bones need to look more like coal like in the mines. We approached it without any fear and approach it with some glee and that allowed everyone to bring to the table their best game. We said very clearly we can not have a monster we have to see him and say he looks ancient, powerful and one with nature. So those were the things that we were doing.

Scott: Yes, it was an incredible learning experience for me obviously never having worked with a monster or even a concept artist Guy Davis who works with Guillermo quite closely, he would sketch concepts with continual refinement. Guillermo thought on a much, much deeper level which is if we are talking about what this murderous spirit is doing to the earth, it comes from the center of the earth, its crust, ore, its ember. The Wendigo looks like that and its an incredibly beautiful design. They took what Guy, Guillermo and I put on page and made this in record time with no a lot of money, an incredibly compelling god. Guillermo and the folks at Legacy created something that I think is unique.

Guillermo: We knew it from the start, we said Mr. X is going to be 50-50 and we are going to have the monster physical but we going to enhance it which is what I have been doing since MIMIC, since 1997 I've been doing this. I take a practical creature and little portions of it become digital. In the case of THE SHAPE OF WATER, the eyes would blink and the micromovement of the face, in the case of BLADE II the upper portion was make up and the upper jaws were digital most of the time. We did the same approach here. We said lets base it on the puppet and then have the arm completely digital or the mouth is completely digital. That is what I think keeps the eyes distracted.

Directing adult material with kids.

Scott: Well, I remember when Guillermo and I were working together in Vancouver and he said there are two things you shouldn't do is worth with kids and monsters. I have two children and a monster but in this particular in this instance as I'm sure it was with PAN'S LABYRINTH, the actors in this film was their first part. Was that the case?

Guillermo: Relatively, she had done other parts but no standing roles.

Scott: I think we saw 900 to 1000 young boys and there was a quality that I was looking for that I wasn't quite finding. Other child actors are groomed by their parents to becomes stars. I wanted to find a kid that had never seen a film camera, searching we found him. Because I have two young daughters I knew how to communicate with him. After a time he felt safe around us. I think some of the reactions you are seeing form him are genuine reactions because the film is filled with a great deal of shadow and he's dealing with some familiar rage and the breakdown of the nuclear family. It was not an easy shoot for him but you have to make sure they trust you and never put him in a situation that is frightening. Psychologically it is a tough part for him. His performance, Jeremy Thompson, is one of the best I've seen.

Guillermo: Remember sometimes you are seeing a two minute scene and it took all day to shoot. The boy is going to see the monster sitting around eating a bagel and drinking some coffee and there's a lot of that energy down. As long as you treat the actors with respect and care, no matter what age, that they are in good and intelligent hands. They become great partners.

Scott: At one time I was an actor with an unremarkable careers and I tend to write for certain actors and have certain actors in mind. I had it with Jeff Bridges in CRAZY HEART and Christian Bale. I work with Jessie Plemmons in this film, this is our third film together and I had Kerrie Russell in mind for a long time because she is such a relatable actor and someone who is really open with the audience but with all the filmmakers and actors and completely put you at ease. It seemed really fresh as a teacher coming back to this small town in Oregon, leaving for reasons that will come out in the film, to reconnect with her brother played by Jessie Plemmons. Because I had been an actor I felt like I spoke the same language.

Use of coverage.

Scott: I generally don't shoot with more than one and everyone once in a while I'll use two. I don't shoot a lot of coverage or a lot of rehearsal. It’s a live wire of getting it between action and cut. With each film I'm learning to tell the story with the camera than dialogue. Guillermo is much more experienced than I am making as many films as he has.

Guillermo: I'm most single camera films because that brings position but you can use multiple cameras with great positions. There was a sequence in BLADE II with 13 cameras for a single take. We couldn't do it twice. CRIMSON PEAK, THE SHAPE OF WATER, those were single camera. You do them more like a melody. In a movie like PACIFIC RIM you are going to need them for the action films. If you are going to shake the whole set you want the positions to be the same. Shooting with kids sometimes you need two cameras because you are going to get something that is unrepeatable. I don't do what you would call overage. Coverage is for directors that find the rhythm in the editing room. That is a certain type of editor. I like to find the final form in the editors room.

What is the process for the camera.

Guillermo: I write 'Maria is at the door…she steps in' , every dot and dash is a camera. You have a storyboard and then you have the actors and you either throw the one before out the window or you preserve it. I think the beauty of camera is that the lens and camera are brush strokes. It is not style, its substance.

Scott: In the writing stage for me, it is through adjectives or I write camera moves in or we will talk about what a character will do in the scene. Once you get there and rehearse it with the actors and unless you are locked in it you will know where you are going to place your opening shot in that particular scene. Then we are motivated by the movement or the crux of the scene whether the camera is pushing in or pulling back.

Writing now?

Scott: I can say Christian Bale who is my closest pal and collaborator we have a couple of films we are going to make pending time. I've written a piece for Elizabeth Moss and I'm not quite sure what will be next.

Pandemic changes.

Guillermo: We have been going through more schedule changes than ever. I was saying the other day that the blessing of having this cast is amazing but the difficulties are rescheduling. Everyone is on demand and going everywhere. I think that one of the things I'd like to think is that for every problem there is one simple and graceful solution. You might not see it right away but I think we've found the silver bullet to make it work. It's not easy, its not easy also to simple anticipate how the set is going to work. You are operating a large surgical theatre. You have to be sterile, everyone in conditions that are almost clinical. The way you approach and stage with the extras, the way you hire them and now have to buy them out for many, many weeks. You have to have them be monogamous to the film. There are dozens and dozens of pages of questions. My feeling is that this is going to go on for another few months and shooting is going to be interesting. Filmmaking is the art of extracting beauty from diversity.