IR Interview: Ted Humphrey For "The Lincoln Lawyer" [Netflix-S3] - Part II - video Dailymotion

The Inside Reel

Showrunner/Series Director Ted Humphrey talks to The Inside Reel about environment, characterization and humo in regards to the 3rd season of his series: "The Lincoln Lawyer" on Netflix.

Transcript

00:00I'm going to find who did this, I'm going to find him and I'm going to bury him.

00:24The essence of the character is almost, which it's funny, I talked to Michael about the

00:30Wonderland documentary he did a couple of months ago, and it's always about geography.

00:36It's interesting because him being a crime reporter for the Times, but also you being

00:41trained in law, I think that's the perfect marriage of understanding how environment

00:47and geography play so much into how people react.

00:51And this is true of season one, season two, and obviously season three.

00:56Could you talk about the essence of environment as a character reflection?

01:03Obviously it's called The Lincoln Lawyer, so the Lincoln's part of that.

01:05But the entire geography of Los Angeles, the fact that I love using the Roosevelt, using

01:10these back alleys of the valley, all these things paint into what, even Coles, the use

01:17of Coles in that specific scene to show the meditation and the moment of silence in Mickey's

01:23brain is so key.

01:25Can you talk about that sort of conglomeration of environment and how it affects character

01:30specifically in the series overall?

01:33Sure, environment has always been incredibly important to me in my work.

01:43Really going back to the earliest things I've ever written.

01:47What was that?

01:48What was one of the earliest things you wrote?

01:49Well, I'm talking about things that you would never have seen.

01:52It's like those scripts that you write when you're first starting out that never get made,

01:56but that help you along your way to whatever you're becoming basically, right?

02:05And it's clearly very important to Michael.

02:07I think it's interesting, Michael is like me, a transplanted Angelina, like most Angelinas

02:11I think.

02:12Michael does not come from here originally.

02:14He moved here many years ago because he worked for the Times.

02:17He was born in Philadelphia, I think, and then grew up in Florida.

02:23And this city has an interesting hold on people, and it's such an interesting geographic place.

02:30I mean, literally just the physical landscape of the city, the hills and the valleys, and

02:36this idea that like, to some extent, like the lords of the universe live up in the hills

02:40and look down on the rest of the city.

02:43And to me, it was a very romantic place.

02:47I've always felt that LA is so much more romantic at night than during the day.

02:50During the day, it can be kind of washed out, and at night, it really comes alive with all

02:54the glittering lights and seeing the lights up in the hills and everything.

03:00Proud of yourself, counselor?

03:01I was happy to get out of here in time to pick up my kid.

03:06Excuse me.

03:07Your client's a killer, and you know it.

03:10You should have thought about that before breaking the rules.

03:13That's on you, detective, not me.

03:15And you follow the rules?

03:18All you lawyers do is bend them to get what you want.

03:21Yeah, well, I'll mix two of us.

03:23Now, please get the f*** out of my way.

03:26These tricks you play, Hauler, somebody's going to end up dead because of you.

03:32Maybe you should think about that.

03:38So, we definitely try and make use of that.

03:42The books, LA is such a character in the books, and the books draw on this rich history of

03:46LA noir from Philip Marlowe and Chinatown and, you know, whatever examples of that you

03:55want to point to.

03:56I love, personally, that we have cast Elliot Gould as Legal Seagull because it harkens

04:02back to The Long Goodbye and, you know, that, again, a great example of that LA, you know,

04:09sort of sun-baked LA noir tradition, right?

04:11And these books very much live in that tradition.

04:14And having a character who works out of his car is a huge part of that as well because

04:20it gives you this vehicle, literally, to traverse the city and see all these different nicks

04:24and crannies of it.

04:25And we do that with food.

04:28You know, the character, he writes a lot about food in the books, and we've expanded that

04:32in the show.

04:33We actually have a line that we're playing with that, you know, working out of your car

04:39gives you the opportunity to eat all over the city.

04:43And so we take very seriously the responsibility to show the city, and it's not just a responsibility,

04:47it's really a privilege and it's fun, to show the city, you know, this incredibly diverse

04:54city, majority Latino population, but also tons of other ethnicities and groups of people

05:00represented here, and to show all these different neighborhoods and all these different types

05:04of people and their different cultures and their different foods and their, you know,

05:08and here's this guy who kind of fits in everywhere, a criminal defense attorney, in a weird way,

05:13it's a passport to going to any neighborhood because of who you are, you know, you could

05:17be representing Trevor Elliott, who's like sort of an Elon Musk, like incredibly wealthy

05:23tech titan sort of guy in season one, or you could be representing the chef in season two,

05:29or Julian Lacoste in season three, or the many sort of like, you know, bottom of the

05:33rung people that Mickey represents along the way, and you fit in just as well with any

05:38of them, and in any of those environments.

05:40Wait, wait, hold it.

05:48Wait, what the?

05:53Son of a...

05:59It's just four fights in four inch heels.

06:02It's fine.

06:03Everything's fine.

06:05And my last question, thank you so much, Ted.

06:07I mean, you know, you were talking about like, obviously, the food defines it, the environment

06:12finds it, but it's interesting, because having lived in LA myself for a long time, it also

06:16has to do with the aspect of how you interact differently with each character, obviously,

06:21the way that Mickey interacts with Elliot, you know, as Siegel is one thing, but then

06:26with Cisco, with Lorna, with Maggie, with Izzy, all these people, they, it's, it's,

06:32it's interesting, because you have to create this tonal balance.

06:35But also, it has to do with the humor, the humor with Gould is so different than say,

06:40how it plays with Cisco, or even how Cisco plays with Lorna, or Lorna with, with Mickey,

06:47could you talk about finding sort of those character notes in the writing, but then overall,

06:51when you when you're not writing or directing, to supervise the other writers, and make sure

06:56it goes can get goes across the board, where it plays like that.

07:02So it's really an organic process that I mean, first of all, humor is the, I would say it's

07:08the secret weapon of our show, and it's not, it's not really secret.

07:11I mean, we don't hide the fact that there's humor in the show.

07:14But it is it is such a huge part of what makes the show engaging, I think, because a show

07:18like this could become very plunderous otherwise.

07:21Well, stakes, it balances the stakes, it balances the stakes, and it balances, you know, what

07:26are otherwise obviously very dramatic, you know, I jokingly say, Mickey is the most dangerous

07:34attorney in the world, right?

07:36There's somebody who's always trying to harm him in some way.

07:40And so you have to balance that.

07:41But the process of extending it across the different characters is very organic.

07:45And it's this great thing that happens in TV on on any show, where you cast someone,

07:51and then you start to write to that person's strengths and write to that person's voice.

07:55And so Elliot Gould has a very specific voice, and, and it's perfect for that character.

08:01And so you just sort of write to that and Mickey, you know, as kind of the lead in the

08:05show, I was saying that a criminal defense attorney has a passport to go anywhere, Mickey's

08:08kind of a chameleon, he can he can interact in different ways with these different people,

08:13because it's his job, and it's also sort of who he is.

08:17So that's, that's a process that I've had a lot of fun with in my career, not just on

08:22this show, but on other shows, which is that that that feedback loop that comes when you

08:27cast somebody, and then you start to instead of just writing words, you start to hear their

08:31voice in your head, and you write to them.

08:34You're dealing with people that play a very dangerous game.

08:38We're not backing down without a fight.

08:43This is a war, Hollywood, and you have to choose which side you're on.

08:47The job is to find out information one way or another.

08:53If you go for it, you better not miss.

IR Interview: Ted Humphrey For "The Lincoln Lawyer" [Netflix-S3] - Part II

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