- [announcer] funding for overheard with evan smith is provided in part by the alice kleberg reynolds foundation and hillco partners, a texas government affairs consultancy. and by klru's producers circle, ensuring local programming that reflects the character and interests of the greater austin, texas community. - i'm evan smith, he's been a familiar face in the movies and on tv for decades, with credits ranging from do the right thing, and the usual suspects, to homicide and breaking bad. his latest film as both an actor and director is this is your death. he's giancarlo esposito, this is overheard. (happy organ music) let's be honest, is this about the ability to learn or is this about the experience of not having been taught properly? how have you avoided what has befallen other nations in africa ... not to say that he made his own bed, but you caused him to sleep in it. you saw a problem and over time took it on ... let's start with the sizzle before we get to this state.

are you gonna run for president? i think i just got an f from you. (audience applause) giancarlo esposito, welcome, very nice to see you. - thank you so much. - happy to have you here, congratulations on the film. - thank you. - i have lost sleep after seeing it. - it can be a disturbing film. - and i mean that in a way that i hope you know is positive, the intent is to have an impact on all of us who see this film, and there's no way to walk away, beginning with the fst scene thifilm, there's absolutely no way to experience this film and not have some bad feelings or loss of sleep or ... it stays with you. - i feel like the film, it's a comment, it's a statement on partly the way we live, but also our viewing habits and what we watch on television. i was told when i was working on this script that people will either love it or hate it, but it will give them something to think about. - no one will have no reaction. - that's right. - let's set it up for the benefit of people who don't know about it, or haven't seen it. so we begin with the last episode, as it were,

of a bachelor-like reality show. - exactly. - it is the last episode of the season. - precisely. - you have the handsome man, deciding among two women and it's ... marry a millionaire, is basically the premise of the show. - yeah, exactly. - and how else to say it except there's ... - a tragedy happens. - a terrible tragedy. - these things have been happening in our world for a number of years now. there's a newscast down in florida. karen, i forget her last name, who shot herself on camera. - [evan] on camera. - and then a few years ago in washington dc, a disgruntled worker came and shot one of the hosts on television. - so the losing contestant on the show, the handsome guy in the tuxedo decides to marry woman a, and woman b ... - who he's obviously had some relationship with, and probably whispered in her ear, "i'm gonna marry you". she obviously gets very upset and can't deal with that. - [evan] on camera, pulls a gun ...

- and shoots him. - and shoots him to death, and then shoots herself. - correct. - so the upshot of this, i'll sort of leave the middle part of this out, is that the network realizes there's so much interest in the public in what happened, and the host of this reality show becomes kind of a national celebrity, or a figure, as a result of all of this. - becomes a hero from his actions, he covers the other woman and prevents the jilted lover from shooting her. - [evan] from shooting her as well. - and with no ... and it's the natural thing that he does with no regard for his own life. and so it's a very brave moment, but he refuses to accept that that is bravery. that was an instinctual reaction, he feels like he would have done that for anyone. he becomes, as opposed to ... he gets called into the network, and they propose ... - thinks he's gonna be fired. - thinks he's gonna be fired. - they propose a show on which people take their own lives. - exactly. and this is an unflinching look at reality television. they go on television to become

sort of the winner of the week, or the month or the year, and they have the opportunity of winning half a million dollars. - yeah, it's as simple and as complicated all at once, as that. and of course we live in a reality show universe, we have a reality show president. - exactly. - let's be honest, right? - we do. - the ultimate realization of the reality show culture is that we now have a reality show president. but the fact is reality shows are a thing, have been a thing for some time. what's amazing to me about this movie, honestly, is not how implausible it is, but how plausible it is. - this is what ... - you can almost see a network going there. - absolutely. we have our links to social media, we have a president who also is very active on social media. the film on a whole is a statement and comment on how we are so connected to our devices, as opposed to really connecting to each other. - and you're in the film, you play a significant role in the film. you're a guy who has several jobs, including a job working at the network. and so you encounter these characters, and we're gonna leave the last act of the three acts

to people's imagination, let them see where this film goes. but you become an integral part of the telling of the story. you've directed yourself in this case. - i have. - this is really for all practical purposes your first time as a director. - well no, it's my second. my first film was gospel hill, back in 2007. - oh right. - limited release. - oh, limited, yeah. - but it had a wonderful cast and sam jackson. - second. - second film. - but really, you've spent your time primarily as an actor, not as a director. - i certainly have, i've wanted to direct for number of years, and when this particular script came to me, i couldn't pass it up. not only because it had a slightly outrageous subject matter but because of the content that comments on our viewing habits, and how we're told what to do. - did you go looking for something to direct, or did it just happen to come to you with the idea that you direct it? - i'm always looking, but these producers found me after seeing my first film. - after seeing gospel hill. - exactly, and they thought it'd be a perfect fit to have me direct this. i felt like the script needed some work, and i went through seven re-writes with the original writer, and then hired someone to come in and polish it,

because my inspirations as a boy were, meet john doe, a fabulous film, and also network, of course, was such a brutally honest film about the television industry. - well and the fact is, network was the first thing that came to mind as a reference point for seeing this movie because of the idea of network television and the idea that we're gonna give people a spectacle that ultimately may result in death, i mean, that's the ... right? what happens at the end of network? - exactly right. - there were overtones of network, but also, (muffled) black mirror has been used as a reference. - it has been, and it's been interesting for me. i do love that show. and i'm honored that they would reference my movie in the same paragraph with that. but there's another film, andy griffith, 1958, written by budd schulberg, directed by elia kazan: a face in the crowd. charting the rise of one man who basically he's a down and out drunken guitar player who then becomes a spokesperson for a number of different products, but because of his home-spun hillbilly attitude,

he tells the truth, and people really respond to it. - [evan] yep. - the character of mason washington in my particular movie, which i really relate to this character. - you (muffled). - he's an everyman. i love films that are about everymen. - and candidly, he's a decent person. - he really is. - i think you find something empathetic about him immediately when he comes on screen. - absolutely. and so i wanted to represent those folks out in the world who feel like they really can't support their families, and they're trying desperately to do so in a society that might be handcuffing them in some ways, because of their social status. but someone who really desires to work hard. now normally you meet people who aren't doing so well, but you notice that the breakdown is that they don't have the desire. mason does, he still can't make it, and he eventually winds up in the clutches of this show, unfortunately. - so this is both a warning and a question. this is a graphic film. - it's a graphic film. - the way that the reality show plays out, there are scenes that you kind of have to look away from,

but you can't look away from, you know? - absolutely, it is that ... - and it was a conscious choice. - it was a conscious choice. and certainly, adam rogers, in my movie, who was our host who makes this transformation from good, to bad to ugly, certainly says, in his own character voice, that "i would like this show to allow people to value life". and so part of my reason for making the movie is for us to really take a hard and cold and fast look at, not only our viewing habits but how we live our lives. - so speaking of how you live your lives, you seem to be a very happy, continuing along this path of doing the work you choose to do, you make very interesting choices. the fact that you're directing after so many years of being an actor, now twice as we said over the last couple of years. this all seems to elate you, you love this work. - i love this work, you know. - it's hard to fake the enthusiasm you have for it.

- it really is. i say if you don't like what you're doing, then change it, because there is something that will connect with your passion, and then if you are connected to your passion, you don't work a day in your life. i love acting. after my first film, i thought, "oh, maybe i won't be doing this for a while", because directing had taken the forefront. and i had such a wonderful time directing. as an actor, you have ideas, you are all about you. and my personality is growing where i wanna be more in service to, culturally and personally, to others. so i make films, because that's my talent. and it is with a great respect that i make them, because people look at them and they're looking either for inspiration, or just entertainment. i like to make films that have a bit of both. - and you've also had the opportunity over the years to work with extraordinary people, from whom i assume you've learned the formulation of your ideas about film, have been in part through the experience you had with a number of directors. - absolutely, i've had a really wonderful run in the film world, and have learned so much from robert benton,

who is just a famous photographer and a wonderful direct as well. i worked with him in a film called twilight, with paul newman. i've bridged the gap in the business that allowed me to be with folks who are not only probably much more talented than myself, but also smarter, and old-school hollywood people. - well you've straddled, haven't you? - i have. - one of the things about doing for as long as you have is that you've benefited from working with the previous generation, and now you're getting to work with this generation. - absolutely. - which is great. i always think about you in the context of spike lee. so it's four spike lee films: it was mo' better blues, it was school daze that was actually the first? - yep, school daze. - do the right thing, and malcolm x. - that's correct. - you were in those four. he is an extraordinary director, and i worry that because his productivity over the last couple of years seems to have slowed a tiny bit compared to that spate of spike lee films that the current generation doesn't fully appreciate what a transformational film-maker. you understand. - i do understand. - the impact of his work. - it's difficult to stay current.

and spike has a voice, not only in the film world, but also politically. - politically, right. - culturally, in our society. and i respect him greatly for speaking out. it's a difficult thing to thread the needle, or have one foot on one street and one on another. sometimes i feel that the old schoolers of the writers from the 40s and 50s and 60s, they said everything through their art. and they were ... but now, that separation ... it's a smaller separation between what you do and what you believe, and how you're gonna try to share that with people culturally. i'm moving to that point because i have a lot of causes that i do like, we're in a caused-based society right now. - the world we're in right now. - that's the world we're in. but i'm hoping that my film, this is your death, will allow people to see that i'm speaking through my art, and it's just putting it out there for you to be able to make a decision about. but i love what spike does, and i love the work i've done with him. - what did you learn from him as a director? - i learned from him to have courage,

and to be brave. and i learned from him to write. people ask me, young actors come up to me, and, "what should i do? how do i deal with my career? how do i get a job?", and they've never done anything. i say, "you have to write for yourself". we're in an age now where you can do everything on your iphone. so if you're able to make small movies and put it out there in the world, you have the ability to really give your point of view. and that's what directing ... directing is a medium that tells the complete story from your visionary point of view. - now if you go back and look at your work, as i have, considered the totality of it, it's a lot of films, but it's also a lot of television. it's a lot of episodic television, it's one-offs, it's roles that play out over time. and i wonder if you ever thought we'd be living in a time when television was considered as much as an art form. i mean you go back on television for so many years. - i do. - tv was tv. - that's right. - and now tv is, as the cliche goes, the new movies. - the new movies, it's the golden age of television, and certainly i've been in the rooms pitching projects about such great americans like john brown, who has been mis-aligned,

and certainly did something that maybe people think was reprehensible. he raided harper's ferry, historical character, his friendship with frederick douglas, i'm trying to do a piece on him, to allow people to know where he was really coming from. he was really trying to change this country in a way that he thought would be better. i have a project about bass reeves, the first black us marshal in indian territory, who was an absolutely wonderful man who was the right-hand man of hanging judge parker. so i like to tell stories that really relay and relate to some of what people don't know, that of our history, and much of what people might like to know. - and tv is a receptive medium as far as those kinds of projects go, more so that it used to be? - here's the thing, in television, say for example, i've done a number of shows recently, and one is called breaking bad, which you all know. we do 13 episodes. so within those 13 episodes, if you ... we used to do 26 episodes on a network channel, and in cable we do 13 which allows you to be much more focused, and to make mini films

every single week. - yup. - and that allows a little more creativity, and a little more time to focus. when you're in the television world, on a network show, you're shooting probably five to six pages a day. when you're making a movie, you're shooting one, maybe at the most two pages a day. so you're able to give it much more of your attention creatively. - from a production standpoint, it is just more cinematic today. - [giancarlo] much more cinematic. - and then of course, the extra part of this is that there are more venues today for television, and different types, differentiated venues, so there are actually some streaming services, and some cable channels that are approaching it more like making a movie than they are like making ... - precisely, i worked with a director named john favreau. i came to this town in austin, and was really happy to have taken this role. - a lot of peoe knew him as an actor first, and then he became a very accomplished director. - very accomplished director. - swingers was the film he was famous for. - [giancarlo] swingers was his film. - that's right, yeah. - [giancarlo] but he's a terrifically intelligent guy, and when i speak to him, he says, "the system of delivery is gonna be changing incrementally as the years go by".

but very soon, there'll be a bank where we can just go and press whatever we want to see, television or movie, and it will show up on our home screen. - show's up right there, and i like what you said about the means of production being available through iphones and other technologies. in some ways the business has become democratized. a lot of the barriers that existed before no longer exist. - there's no doubt, i have four daughters, and my youngest daughter goes to school here in austin. she is now 13, she came here at nine years old, at 11 years old, she won the austin youth film festival for a documentary film that she made on mental health. great opportunities were afforded her from her iphone, and at nine years old, ten years old, i gave her a camera. and she was the youngest sister to get a rebel video camera, and she's taken that and she's able to put things on vimeo, put things on youtube, and have people see her work immediately. - well this is something that she might not have done and would not have been able to do just a generation ago. - and my goodness, i'm so proud of her, but the tools are readily available. - yeah, are all there. so i've waited long enough to mention gus fring. i have to talk to you about this. very few people agree on everything, right?

no-one doesn't love this character. and over time, in the long history of television villains, even cinematic villains, gus fring is up on the top three, top five? - absolutely. - your character, or their character? was it your character, as you created it, or their character? - well i'll tell you a funny story. vince gilligan called me to be reprieving my role of gustavo fring. - which you are about to do on better call saul. - better call saul. and he stared by saying, it took a phone call from him after many phone calls, and me saying, "i don't wanna go back if it's just gonna be a tease". - you turned the studio down, didn't you? - i turned the studio down. and so he calls me, he says, "we're gonna maintain the integrity with which you created gus", and i said, "vince, you created gus, you wrote him, i just breathed life into him". he said, "no, no, you're responsible". so after we got through ten minutes of that back and forth, i said, "okay, i'll take responsibility". - take responsibility, right. (audience laughter) (giancarlo laughs) if you're gonna take credit, take credit for that. - take the credit. - they come to you, as you talked about, you're writing this is your death. i suspect you're probably an iterative, i don't know this, but that you're an iterative artist.

- [giancarlo] absolutely. - you're constantly revising and improving and revising and improving. - absolutely. - so theoretically this character came to you in some fashion, but you did take ownership of it. - i certainly did, and it was one line that vince wrote. and i'd like to feel as when you're ... film is a collaborative effort and so is television. but you're sticking with that one character. the difference between film and television, in one character, and you're doing it for a number of years, how do you make that character real and non stereotypical? one line vince wrote, "hiding in plain sight", and that line was an inspiration to me. because i thought, how many of us are looking at our neighbors from day to day, going to get the mail, coming in and out of our homes, and do we really know our neighbors? we don't really know who each other are. and that led me to really think about, "oh, gus is hiding in plain sight, he's a model citizen". and does it really matter that he has an illicit business? so it was fascinating to me to build the building blocks of gustavo fring. because underneath it he has probably some of the same morals that we do. and he could be selling toothpaste, but he happened to be selling meth, fascinating character, really have loved being him.

- and ruthless. - ruthless. - it's hard to play ruthless so convincingly, it makes me worry whether you're ruthless. (audience laughter) - well, you know, a part of me can be very ruthless. - you're hiding in plain sight. (audience laughter) - i'm hiding in plain sight. - maybe you have to go to places for that character that you had not gone ... you've played bad guys before, you've done every conceivable role in the world. i just wonder if that role caused you to look for something in yourself that you didn't know was there. - wonderful question, i was digging deep to find a non-stereotypical menace inside of me. and i realize that menace came out of just having an intimidating aura and feeling. what is that? that's to get really dropped. that's to leave space, for people to feel the delivery. it's not to rush. i'm italian, i gesticulate, i speak quickly, i get a lot of ideas out there in a short period of time. gustavo fring is very deliberate.

and he looks people in the eye, and one hand, he's very kind, he can be very cordial, but on the other hand, underneath it, he is manipulating. he knows what he's doing. and when people are manipulators, and have done it and practiced it, they get what they want. so very specifically, it changed my life. (breathes in) - [evan] it did change your life? - my breathing habits changed, my posture changed. - yoga was a big part of your work on this. - a big part of it. - on this show, right? it helps you get yourself in the right frame of mind. it being ... you're scaring the hell out of me right now. (audience laughter) i just wanted you to know. - if people don't answer when you want them to, you feel like, "what's wrong with this guy?". - yes. (giancarlo laughs) i think i know the answer in this case. so this was a several season run that ended with one of the, well i think it was one of the most spectacular deaths in the history of television, both as executed and as presented. - absolutely. - and i think the image of you at the end is never gonna leave my mind.

people must talk to you about that all the time. - all the time. and my conversations with vince, he called me in 401, came in to his office, and he said, "sit down", and we were chatting, and i said, "have you see my movie? when will i direct? blah, blah, blah". he gets up to close the door, and i said, "vince, don't close the door". (audience laughter) - that can't be good. - and he, "haha", he sits back down, and we go through another five minutes of conversation, he gets up, "just let me close ...", i said, "no, vince, don't close the door". and the third time, he got very uncomfortable, just as you did, and then he said, "we're gonna kill you off". and so in that moment, the discussion came, "how would we do it?". and he said, "if it were an explosion, if the possibility of that, what would that look like and feel like to you? do you approve of that?". and i said, "it would be a wonderful and great death". so a lot of conversation went into it, "however, i don't want it to drift off into sci-fi". i was concerned, because breaking bad is a very realistic show. - right, hyper realistic. - hyper realistic. and to have this happen would have to be done in a certain way for the audience to really believe it.

well, did he ever pull it off? - yeah, he did. - and it took about 26 or 27 takes to get that reveal that he wanted, but i'm very pleased with the way that happened. - yeah, it was amazing. and so you will come back, you were resistant initially to do, and let's be clear that the better call saul series is itself a prequel. right? - it is, a prequel to breaking bad, and my eldest daughter shayne-lera has told me, and her words are resounding in my head, "you're not the star of the show!". (laughter) - but in some ways, just as this is an origin story for the bob odenkirk character, jimmy mcgill before he becomes saul goodman. this is an origin story for gus. - absolutely. - right, so we learn more about the gus we come to know later on breaking bad. i love the sequencing of this being so thrown up in the air. - well, in the sequencing of television, it's a very intricate brain, and a great group of brain trusts and writers who are able to go back to any episode out of breaking bad and sort of catch you up and allow the characters who are coming back

to exhibit some of the qualities or be in a situation that reminds you of what you had already seen. that's some really great tracking. - well i'm excited to see it, by the time people see this interview, this will be out among the episodes in which you're appearing on better call saul will be seen. but how exciting to have you back. - thank you so much. - it's absolutely great. so we have a couple of minutes left, so after this is your death goes off and does his thing in the theaters and people get to see it and all that, your next film, it sounds like maybe the maze runner is what you're filming right now? - yes, i'm shooting the maze runner, but before we leave this is your death, just know that this is a acquisition title, so we're here at south by southwest and really hoping to sell the movie. - with the hope that the film ... - with the hope that it will get a feature release and be in the theaters, i think it will. it's a film that people should see. - and again, maybe because there are so many new venues out there that there are more opportunities for people through creative means of distribution to get the film in front of people. - absolutely. and so currently in south africa, doing maze runner 3: the death cure, six novels by james dashner. this is the third one. it is a young adult title, and it is a fabulous story.

again, we're in a dystopian world, trying to find and keep our lives and trying to right a wrong. but these are young people, i love young people because young people bring fresh ideas. and they're able to really think out of the box, and we're gonna need them to be able to right our world that we're in right now. - as i said earlier, you have a joy to you about the work that you do. the fact that you're doing it, and the choices that you make that is clearly sincere, you still love doing this work after all this time. - i really do, it lets me know that i'm really am a creative artist inside. look, i've had three rises to stardom. when i was young, in 17, 18, in new york theater, i started on broadway. - you started as a stage guy, right. - yeah, and then i wanted to be a star, and then i thought what's better than being a star? because i noticed that a lot of celebrities and stars were just that. they play the same role over and over, and i didn't want that. i'm a character actor who loves what he does, and i decided, hey, whether it comes to me being a star or not, a movie star, or television, it doesn't really matter. what matters to me is to really serve up good story. i've been blessed. - so stage was the first moment,

film was the second, and then you actually put the ... is it breaking bad specifically, or do you put sort of just the emergence as a regular television personality as the third? - so breaking bad happened at a time when i was doing a show called once upon a time, and revolution. so it's the culmination of hitting all these different audiences, all these different demographics, it sort of lifts you up. and now i can't walk down the street without someone saying, "hey, how about a selfie?". (audience laughter) - is it primarily, "yo, hey gus"? - yeah, many times, okay so ... acting's a way of healing your personality. one of the things i'm extremely jealous about is that guy gus is more famous than i am. - [evan] than you are. (audience laughter) you know what ... - what you gonna do? - own it! - yeah i own it! - that's all you gotta do. what do you wanna do that you haven't done yet? in the last minute we have. - you know, i wanna do ... i love literature. and i'd like to one day play pushkin, who was mixed race, russian, great wonderful poet. i really think that his life was an exemplary one. and i'd like to be able to tell that story

at some point in time. i love stories that are a blend of history and personal struggle. and also struggle against the regime that exists, and how do certain people get their voices out there and affect so many other generations of people, and that voice is hopeful, but also encompasses change. - it might be an opportunity to go back to broadway, but go back to doing, that is a play. it sounds like something that would be a good play. - it's so interesting that you're saying this because we got our material from books many times, but i recently spoke to someone who said, "start looking at plays. we have many play rights that we can develop a film from a play". so i think it's a great idea. - there you go. congratulations on your success, good luck with continued success. thank you so much for being here. - thank you, what a pleasure. - giancarlo esposito. thank you very much. - thank you. (audience applause) - [evan] we'd love to have you join us in the studio. visit our website at klru.org/overheard to find invitations to interviews, q + as with our audience and guests, and an archive of past episodes

- i wanted to have an effect, and i didn't want to live as a color. because i'm half italian and half black, it allowed to be able to have the best of both worlds, and i truly believe that. now when i say that to spike lee, he's like, "no man, you're black, you're black". (audience laughter) or he says to me, "you're an afro-european". i said, "whatever the label is, i prefer to think of myself as a human being". so i wanna effect other human beings. - [announcer] funding for overheard with evan smith is provided in part by the alice kleberg reynolds foundation and hillco partners, a texas government affairs consultancy. and by klru's producers circle, ensuring local programming that reflects the character and interests of the greater austin texas community. (electronic jingle)