The Big Picture

The cast of
The Franchise
stopped by the Collider Studio at NYCC for a delightfully fun interview about the series.
Billy Magnussen discussed his own experiences with his production company, HappyBad Bungalow.
Himesh Patel and Lolly Adefope shared their thoughts on their characters Daniel and Dag.

On the second day of New York Comic Con, before the cast and creatives of The Franchise took to the stage to discuss their hit Max series, Himesh Patel, Aya Cash, Daniel Brühl, Billy Magnussen, Lolly Adefope, Isaac Powell, and Darren Goldstein stopped by the Collider Studio to dish on all things franchises, superheroes, and the film industry.

The Franchise offers a very refreshing take on the superhero industrial complex by shifting the focus away from the glitz and glamor of the cast, to reveal the grueling and thankless jobs that crews are tasked with. Himesh Patel stars as Daniel, the 1st AD on Maximum Studios’ Tecto: Eye of the Storm, which faces studio meddling, courtesy of Pat (Goldstein) and the film’s newest producer, Anita (Cash). Daniel is accompanied into the chaos of the set by Dag (Adefope), the film’s titular star Adam (Magnussen), director Eric (Brühl), and the assistant to the studio’s head guy Shane, Bryson (Powell), to name but a few of the series’ star-studded cast members.

During the wide-ranging and delightfully upbeat conversation, Cash compared the way that The Boys and The Franchise tackles superheroes; Patel discussed his own goals within the industry, and his time on the long-running soap EastEnders; Brühl spoke about his experience within various franchises; Adefope revealed her backstory for Dag; among many other topics.

A highlight of the interview was Magnussen’s particularly insightful answer about his experience in the industry with his production company HappyBad Bungalow, and combating the impulse to turn projects into franchises. You can read the full transcript of the interview below, and watch it in the video player above.

The Cast of ‘The Franchise’ Is “Extremely Talented”
Image via HBO

COLLIDER: Something I really love about The Franchise is that it does focus on the people who are below the line. For those of you who are playing characters that are different from what your typical roles are on set, has this now changed your experience in looking at the people around you when you’re on sets?

BILLY MAGNUSSEN: Being the lead of a show is… No, I’ve never done that! [Laughs]

DARREN GOLDSTEIN: I think we were all very much aware of how hard these people work. From the second you walk onto a set, it’s very, very clear that the real workers are below the line. Even calling them “below the line” is almost as obnoxious at times as just calling us “the talent.” We’re called “the talent,” which is embarrassing at times.

HIMESH PATEL: We are extremely talented.

Contrary to what some people have said today.

MAGNUSSEN: Ooh, Maggie! Throwing some daggers! Let’s go! Shots fired!

[Laughs] I did have a very serious question, Himesh. American audiences may not know this, but you were on EastEnders for nine years and you also co-wrote an episode of that series.

PATEL: It was like a spin-off.

In the show, we see that Daniel has goals that are so much bigger than being a first AD on a superhero movie, and I’m curious, did you find any commonality in those goals beyond what you’re currently doing and looking into in the industry?

PATEL: It’s a really great question. I’ve definitely had experiences, I am glad to say not on The Franchise, on things where I’ve been there as an actor going, “This isn’t right.” In my inexperienced opinion, I’d look at something and go, “I think it just needs this, or this is what needs to change,” but you’re just beating your head against a brick wall because you’re an actor — who’s going to listen to you? So, I’ve definitely had that experience. And yeah, I have ambitions to do things behind the camera eventually. I’m writing a film at the moment and that sort of thing. So, yeah, I definitely related to that.

I have a similar question for you, Lolly, because we see that Dag also has goals outside of being a second AD on a superhero movie, but we don’t really know much about her life outside of set. What sort of character work did you put into what Dag wants to be?

LOLLY ADEFOPE: I spoke to Jon [Brown] early on, and he mentioned that she has probably been to film school, did a degree in film, and then life kind of passed her by. We all think that she’s Gen Z, but she’s unfortunately 35 [laughs], in a lot of debt, and has come to this industry quite late, where it seems to be in this dying state. So, she’s just extremely ambitious and wants to shoot straight to the top, but wishes that she was on a more interesting film and has probably written a script herself that she would love to make one day. But I think that she has no respect for superhero movies, initially, and then slowly starts to have some fondness for them.

‘The Franchise’ Is Taking on More than Just the Superhero Genre

I see that kind of journey for her throughout the season. Aya, this isn’t the first time you’ve been in a series that pokes fun at the superhero genre. What was it like coming from The Boys to The Franchise ?

AYA CASH: Better hours, for one. The Brits do it so well. It’s a 10-hour day. That means 12 hours for hair, makeup, and actors, and then, of course, more hours for transportation. They add up. But a 10-hour shooting day on French hours, and that’s very lovely. With something like The Boys, there are just so many big set pieces, and things take a lot longer to shoot. It’s a much faster pace on something like this than The Boys.

I can’t remember how many days they do per episode, but we do quite a few less, and no 19/20-hour days. That’s the biggest difference. Then, with everything else, sets are sets. I know we wanna equate the two because of the superheroes, but the truth is, sets are sets. It’s more about time.

Daniel, I have a similar question for you. A lot of people know you as Zemo in the Marvel movies, but you’ve worked in a lot of franchises. You worked in the Bourne franchise, you worked in the Kingsman franchise, the Cloverfield franchise. Is there a certain degree of catharsis in getting to poke fun at the franchises out there in the universe and playing through the situational comedy of the series?

DANIEL BRÜHL: Of course. Laughing about yourself and being self-deprecating is something that I always find very healthy and fun. There’s always that moment on a movie set that can feel so incredibly dramatic and painful and existential. My wife, for example, is a psychologist, so I remember so many conversations when she then went, “Well, I was dealing with this patient today…” And I thought, “Was it really so hard, my night shoot on this or that film?” So, put it into the right perspective.

But the pain is real, though, because you believe in the story. As Darren said before in an interview, it’s like at the beginning, there is that excitement, and you want to make the best film or series in history. But then, if that goes wrong… I had this experience once that was really, really painful because there wasn’t even a week, it was just the moment I arrived, it was a sinking ship, and there was no way back for three months. So, I was thinking a lot about this film.

It definitely puts things into perspective, though. I often have joked on sets, “We’re not curing cancer.” Billy, I have a question for you. I’m sort of haunted by something Jon said at the press conference about how so many of the industry’s greatest minds are trapped within the franchise model. I know you are a producer, you have a production company, and you’re working on a lot of things. As a producer, do you find people who are in that franchise mindset who are expecting major blockbuster hits? What are you experiencing from that side of things?

MAGNUSSEN: Thanks for asking this. The big thing with HappyBad Bungalow is we do not operate with the idea of the franchise aspect. We really are trying to give the talent back to the artists that make the thing. I think franchises have stolen and sucked up so much creative energy that we can’t celebrate the true artists out there and the unique perspectives, or give the equipment and the tools these artists need to tell the stories that you really care about.

Even our show, it’s about a superhero movie, and that’s the hook to bring us in, but it’s a show about people trying to do their best. You have this great cast of characters, and what everyone craves are relationships and human struggles. It’s not an explosion. It’s really the intimacy between people, and that’s what I think our show is good at, is the interrelationships with each character that we follow. I think that relates to artists now, too. We wanna go back to that place in cinema. “Back” is not right, but I wanna celebrate the artist again because it’s just becoming about the bottom line.

CASH: Hire us all, Billy. Hire us all.

New episodes of The Franchise drop every Sunday on Max. Stay tuned to Collider for more exclusive interviews from New York Comic Con.

A team trapped inside the dysfunctional hell of creating franchise superhero movies, at the end of the day the question they face is: is this Hollywood’s new dawn or cinema’s last stand? Is this a dream factory or a chemical plant?Release Date October 6, 2024 Seasons 1 Network HBO Max Streaming Service(s) Max Showrunner Jon Brown Expand

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