Duplass Brothers On Filmmaking, Siblings And Parenting's 'Fugue State'

Transcript

TERRY GROSS, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. The HBO series "Togetherness" starts its second season Sunday, Feb. 21. Our guests, Jay and Mark Duplass, co-created the series. They also write and direct it. And Mark is one of the stars. The Duplass brothers started making films together when they were kids in the '80s using their dad's VHS camera. They have become known for their low-fi filmmaking style and have written and directed five feature films, including "Jeff, Who Lives At Home" and "Cyrus." Both brothers also act. Mark was a series regular on the FX comedy "The League" and starred in the films "Humpday," "Your Sister's Sister" and "The One I Love." Jay co-stars in the Amazon series "Transparent" as Josh Pfefferman. Their series "Togetherness" is about four people in their late-30s living in Los Angeles. The characters cope with children, marriage, their work lives and a general sense of feeling lost.

The Duplass brothers spoke with FRESH AIR producer Ann Marie Baldonado. They started with a theme from the show. The main couple in the series has just left a marriage counseling session. And the wife has decided they should do something fun - spend the day at the park with adult friends, no kids. The husband, played by Mark Duplass, agrees to do it, but it's the last thing he wants to do. He's sitting alone in his car, outside the park, when his sister-in-law, played by Amanda Peet, comes to the car to fetch him.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "TOGETHERNESS")

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) Yes, I'm coming. I'll be there in a second.

AMANDA PEET: (As Tina Morris) Let's go.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) Wait, hold on. I'm not ready yet. I'm taking - I just need like a second.

PEET: (As Tina Morris) Don't do this.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) Don't do what? What are you...

PEET: (As Tina Morris): This whole mood-killer thing. She is so [expletive] psyched. And she really needs this day. And she really needs to party and have fun.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) I...

PEET: (As Tina Morris) And if you're going to be like this, it's going to ruin it for her.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) OK. I am trying to get myself ready for that, but it's a little hard for me, OK. Do you understand that?

PEET: (As Tina Morris) Yeah, I mean, I do. But just fake it. I mean, do you see this smile?

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) Yeah.

PEET: (As Tina Morris) I'm dead inside.

ANN MARIE BALDONADO, BYLINE: Jay and Mark Duplass, welcome to FRESH AIR.

MARK DUPLASS: Hi.

JAY DUPLASS: Thanks for having us.

BALDONADO: Why did you choose to make a TV show about these four characters living in Los Angeles all in different stages of life but all kind of lost and searching for something?

JAY DUPLASS: We hadn't made a really deeply personal television show or movie in awhile. Our first feature we made was called "The Puffy Chair," and it was sort of about what our life really felt like in our '20s when we were all kind of dating people for a year or two. And when we came to make "Togetherness," we thought, you know, we're hearing lots of conversations about people who are either in their late-'30s and married and they are just an inch from drowning in the sea of their children and their jobs and make everything work or they haven't found that person yet or haven't even found that traction in their work life.

BALDONADO: So one of the things you explore is a marriage. And Michelle and Brett, two of the main characters, they are married with two children. One of them is just kind of out of the infant stage. Why was that something that interest you in particular?

JAY DUPLASS: Mark and I both have kids the same age that are now roughly 7 and 3. And at that time we were entering that phase. And there's something very, very specific about when your last baby starts sleeping through the night where you come out of this fugue state of parenting. And in our case and in the case of the family on "Togetherness," it was a seven-year process. And you feel like, oh my god, that was wonderful. We've come out of it. But now it's been seven years. I don't really know who I am. And you're looking at your spouse and you're like, I don't know who you are. I don't know really what I like anymore because all of my needs have been subjugated for the good of these babies and our family unit. And you kind of have to re-figure everything out.

BALDONADO: Now, there's a part of an episode that I want to ask you about. It involves, Mark, your character Brett. It's a common scenario that any parent might have experienced where everybody's in a rush to get out of the house. You know, your character's yelling at your daughter to get ready. She doesn't want to put her shoes on. You're trying to drive her to school. When you go to the back of the car, she doesn't have her shoes on. And let's take a listen to that scene.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "TOGETHERNESS")

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) All right, let's - why are you not wearing your shoes?

ABBY RYDER FORTSON: (As Sophie Pierson) I hate my shoes.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) You picked these shoes out. No, hey. We do not say hate, OK? And no kicking. No, OK.

(BABY CRYING)

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) I know. I know, Frankie. I'm sorry. We're going to school and I need to get your socks on.

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) I don't want to go to school.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) Stop. Do not kick me because I - ow.

(BABY CRYING)

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) All right. OK, Frankie, OK.

(CAR DOOR SHUTTING)

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) Why are you so upset right now?

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) I don't want to go to school.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) You don't?

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) No, I already told you that.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) OK. Why don't you want to go to school?

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) Because I want to stay with you and Frankie.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) You do?

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) Yes.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) What would you like to do instead?

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) I want to go to the beach.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) You want to skip school and go to the beach?

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) Yeah.

MARK DUPLASS: (As Brett Pierson) What makes you think that I would let you skip school and go to the beach?

ABBY: (As Sophie Pierson) I don't know.

BALDONADO: Now, I think that's a common scenario for anyone with small kids when you sort of have the presence of mind you know not to kind of escalate it and, like, yell and yank your kid out of the car to keep going on with the day. But at that moment, the father is able to sort of take a pause and talk to the daughter. Can you talk about writing this scene or moments like this that you based this scene on?

JAY DUPLASS: Yeah, I mean, this is where the show gets really personal for us. And these are the kind of things that we talk about with our friends who are parents. And - we're just idiots. We get caught up in our own rules. And we think like, oh, I have to teach her this lesson that she has to get her shoes on when what does this really matter? But you end up digging your heels in, and you end up yelling, and you feel like a terrible parent. And it's just awful. We hate that stuff. And yet we can't stop ourselves from doing it. So in that scene in particular, you know, it was a little bit of probably wish fulfillment on our part that like we could catch ourselves before we go to DEFCON 4 and be that really great, understanding parents.

BALDONADO: Mark, you have said - well, you have both said that you were super close growing up and you continue to be. But growing up, you guys shared a room and even shared a bed? What was your relationship like when you were kids?

JAY DUPLASS: Single bed.

BALDONADO: Single bed.

MARK DUPLASS: Yeah, we - I was extremely dependent on Jay. He was my spiritual leader. He was my god. He was just - he was everything to me. And he was sweet enough to let me play with him 'cause, you know, what brother who has a four-years-his-younger little brother wants to hang out with him? So I was really lucky to have that. And, yeah, we would spend the night in the same bed together. I was scared of the dark. Jay would hang out with me. We would talk about how when we grew up we were going to, like, get a house together and, like, kind of thought that our wives would just, like, move into the house with us, which is emotionally still kind of how it is to a certain degree. And then something really interesting happened which was when I was like 14 and Jay was 18, he went to college and had a really hard year and felt very disconnected from home. And then the tables kind of shifted a little bit where I was able for the first time to be strong for Jay and exhibit some level of leadership by just being young and naive enough to just say, it's going to be OK, you're awesome, it's going to be OK. And then we built, during those years, a truly impenetrable bond.

BALDONADO: What kind of movies and TV did you like when you were kids?

JAY DUPLASS: We were in a very specific situation where cable came to our neighborhood in like 1982. And so at that time HBO was uncuriated (ph), so all these movies were coming down the pipeline. And we were watching - like our friends were really into "Star Wars" and "Empire Strikes Back," but - I don't know - we just didn't go to movies that much. And so we were just watching whatever showed up on HBO. And at that time you'd come home from school and, like, "Ordinary People" would be on or "Kramer vs. Kramer" or "Sophie's Choice" or like not just a hard-hitting dramas but even, like, adult sex comedies like "Manhattan" and "Hannah And Her Sisters" and all this great adult fare. And our parents did not limit us at all. And Mark and I just, like, went deep on it. We were just obsessed with these movies and honestly weren't that into "Star Wars." It seemed a little silly to us even at the time.

GROSS: We're listening to the interview FRESH AIR producer Ann Marie Baldonado recorded with Mark and Jay Duplass. Their HBO series "Togetherness" starts its second season a week from Sunday. We'll hear more of the interview after a break. This is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. Let's get back to the interview FRESH AIR producer Ann Marie Baldonado recorded with Mark and Jay Duplass. They co-created the HBO series "Togetherness," which starts its second season a week from Sunday. Mark stars in the series. Jay's co-stars in the Amazon series "Transparent."

BALDONADO: Now, Jay, when you and Mark started making movies together, Jay, you are often the director and Mark was often the actor. And, Mark, you've also acted in many movies and TV shows. I think that, Jay, people were surprised and very pleased when you became one of the co-stars on the Amazon series "Transparent," which...

JAY DUPLASS: I was surprised.

BALDONADO: (Laughter) Which released its second season recently. Can you talk about how you became involved in the show? I kind of always assumed that you were reluctant to be an actor.

JAY DUPLASS: I wasn't necessarily reluctant to be an actor. It just never occurred to me, honestly. It was more a case of I was our primary camera operator on everything that we've made except for "Togetherness." And so I basically met Jill Soloway at a party for directors where directors sometimes get together because we don't - we don't work together on set. It's a way to talk about our process and maybe try and figure out which actors are nice and which actors are mean. And so she was telling me that she had this TV show ready to go and she had the whole family, but she couldn't find the son. It was really troubling her. She needed a mid-30s wildly insecure-slash-charismatic Jewish guy. And I was like, oh, man, those are all Mark's and my friends.

We know all the actors in town who fit that bill, and I went through a laundry list of guys and she had considered them all. And then she stopped me after about a half an hour of talking and she said, it's you. She's like, I think you're him. And I would like you to come in and read. And I was reluctant because Mark and I were just starting our show, "Togetherness," and I was nervous. It was the biggest thing that we'd ever undertaken. Also I was like, I'm not really an actor. She said why do you come in tomorrow morning and read with Gaby Hoffman and Amy Landecker, and I did. We improvised the barbecue dinner scene that's in the pilot of the show. And sometimes and - when you're on set, like, magic happens and lightning strikes and it did happen that day (laughter). And I felt like I was Gaby and Amy's brother, and we looked alike and we talked alike and we were not afraid to mess with each other and feel that that love underneath it all was still going to be there.

It was a very strange and magical experience, which I've come to understand is part of what happens when you work with Jill Soloway. But even when I agreed to do it, you know, most pilots don't go to show. It felt like a small web show, honestly, that was being made like an independent film on the east side of LA. I had no idea that it would become, you know, the phenomenon that it's become, much less a piece of art at the forefront of a civil rights movement.

BALDONADO: There are so many great things about "Transparent," but one thing I think it gets really right is something you were just talking about - the relationship between the siblings. I think it gets the way that siblings know each other, know each other's secrets, which can mean, like, you know, siblings can be really supportive of each other. But it also means that they know what might hurt the most.

JAY DUPLASS: Yeah.

BALDONADO: And they can be - you know, how to be the most brutal. And also siblings, no matter how old they are, can sometimes revert to old patterns, act like they did when they were kids when they're hanging out with each other. And I want to play a scene from the first season. Josh, your character, has just found out that your parent, who's known as Mort, identifies as a woman named Maura. And Josh is still in shock about the whole situation. The three siblings are in the backyard of their family home, hanging out on playground equipment, and your sisters are played Gaby Hoffman and Amy Landecker. OK, let's take a listen.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "TRANSPARENT")

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) I think Dad's losing his mind. I went online and looked up his symptoms. The first sign of dementia is a changing personality.

AMY LANDECKER: (As Sarah Pfefferman) Oh, my God.

GABY HOFFMAN: (As Ali Pfefferman) Dementia.

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) Like, he has to be the center of attention, you know? Like at Zacky's (ph) third birthday when he showed up in the beekeeper costume.

LANDECKER: (As Sarah Pfefferman) That was hysterical.

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) No, it wasn't. It was inappropriate. You guys think it's real.

HOFFMAN: (As Ali Pfefferman) It's definitely real.

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) OK, so what does this mean? Everything Dad has said and done before this moment is a sham? Like, he was just acting the whole time?

HOFFMAN: (As Ali Pfefferman) No, it just means we all have to start over, which is why I am going back to school. Syd told me about a program at SMC that sounds perfect for me.

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) Here we go.

LANDECKER: (As Sarah Pfefferman) Ali's got an interest.

HOFFMAN: (As Ali Pfefferman) Here we go where?

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) Oh, yeah, she's going to sign up.

LANDECKER: (As Sarah Pfefferman) Yeah, I mean, Dad's going to pay the registration fee.

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) Oh, yeah, she's going to need a new wardrobe.

LANDECKER: (As Sarah Pfefferman) Dad's going to get her some school shoes.

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) School shoes.

LANDECKER: (As Sarah Pfefferman) Daddy's got to buy some clothes. Remember when Dad got her the loom?

JAY DUPLASS: (As Josh Pfefferman) Loom.

LANDECKER: (As Sarah Pfefferman, laughter) Loom - the loom, loom, loom.

BALDONADO: That's a scene from the first season of "Transparent." I'm not sure if you agree with my assessment of how the show treats siblings, but was that something that interested you in the series?

JAY DUPLASS: Yeah. I think that was a huge part of it and probably also part of my conversation with Jill - before she said it's you - was we talked about Mark's and my relationship because Jill has an older sister. And they came up in their own little magical world, and it just so happens that, you know, Mark and I are kind of like twins. And Gaby is incredibly tight with her sister, who's significantly older than her, but it was kind of like a mother-sister figure with her. And Amy also has a sister that she was incredibly close with. So that was something that I think was critical to the process is that we all understood that we had to be brutally honest with each other.

And I think - I do agree with your assessment and I would probably just add one thing to it. One thing that you do with your siblings when you love them more than life itself is your cruelty can often come from trying to force them to be who they truly are. Sometimes that's nefarious because you may be mistaken about who they are, but you also want them to be the best version of themselves. And so particularly for Josh, a lot of his difficulty and confusion in life comes from the fact that, you know, he did come up in a household full of incredibly strong women. And I think it was hard for him to find his identity, but also it's probably why he has so much trouble dating is that he holds everyone to the candle of his sisters, who he worships.

BALDONADO: Oh, that's - I really like what you just said there about siblings. I think that's so spot on about sort of wanting more for them than sometimes they see for themselves.

JAY DUPLASS: Yeah, I think your siblings are kind of like the holders of the candle for your ultimate potential.

BALDONADO: You do such a good job with Josh. Do people often confuse you, Jay, with Josh and think that you might be very similar to him?

JAY DUPLASS: I think it's weird sometimes - yes, when people see me in public because, you know, I'm - I've been with my wife for 15 years and we have two kids and I'm a family guy and I'm quiet and reserved, you know? So I am playing a character who is very, very different from me. More than anything, what's interesting about playing Josh is because the Pfeffermans feel so real and are so specific to the east side of LA, which is where I live, that a lot of times I have people - they'll just start talking to me like they know me. And then they start to realize within a minute that they don't know me and that I'm inside their TV because the show is so fluid. I mean, I've even had people ask if I'm really Gaby's brother, which is insane. It's like, don't you know how TV works (laughter)? But people just are really taken by the show and really believe and feel this family.

BALDONADO: Jay and Mark Duplass, thank you so much.

MARK DUPLASS: Thank you.

JAY DUPLASS: Thank you, appreciate it.

GROSS: Mark and Jay Duplass spoke with FRESH AIR producer Ann Marie Baldonado. The Duplass brothers created the HBO series "Togetherness." Season two begins a week from Sunday. Mark stars in the series. Jay co-stars in the Amazon series "Transparent." The Duplass brothers are also the executive producers of the new HBO animated series "Animals."

Tomorrow on FRESH AIR, is political polling good or bad for democracy? We'll talk with historian and journalist Jill Lepore who explores that question in her New Yorker article "Politics And The New Machine." And we'll talk with Nate Silver, founder of the blog FiveThirtyEight, which reports on and analyzes polling data, aggregates polls and predicts outcomes. I hope you'll join us. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.