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 Reza Vranitzky and Astra Thivierge's apartment was sparse and filled with Chinese food containers. Neither women seemed to notice or mind that fact at all. In fact, they seemed to care about very little in the time before the interview begun. The two women chatted in French with each other, occasionally laughing and lightly touching each other's shoulder - in the way that good friends do - before they finally turned to me and asked if I was ready for the interview to begin. I had hardly even begun to set up. They two women were so enchanting, it was difficult for me to focus on anything else, even when all they were doing were speaking to each other in a language that I didn't even begin to understand. The way they held themselves, the way they spoke and gestured, the way they looked at each other and then back at me. I felt as though I were watching a scene from a movie - they both seemed so relaxed and genuine in everything they did. Astra Thivierge - the Belgian-French actress and director - I had met before, although I doubt she would remember. It had been such a quick passing - just a few questions and then she was whisked away by some manager or PR representative. This had been when she had just started acting a few years before, when she was sixteen. Reza Vranitzky, however, I had never heard of before talk of Everything's Fine began circling around the world, although her resume was vast and expansive. Reza had written and produced for several artists, indie folk vocalists Carmen Grant and Evangeline Wolfe being two of the bigger names. She had also done some writing for television as well, writing several episodes of different shows in her native country of Austria, such as German soap opera Sie Bleiben Fast Getötet, and French drama Que Ce Soit. But how did these two women come to meet and create Everything's Fine, a show with so much potential and hype behind it? I was here to receive and share those answers with everybody. As I took my seat on the couch across from the one Reza and Astra were sitting on, we began.
Well, ladies, thank you for taking the time to sit down with me so we can talk about these ambition plans. I think it's pretty easy to make the accusation that you're planning on taking the world by storm pretty soon. (Reza Vranitzky)Oh, I wouldn't say we're trying to take the world by storm, love. More just trying to make our mark on it. (Astra Thivierge)Like the way a meteorite makes it's mark on the world. (both women laugh)
Alright, alright... Take me back to the beginning then. Take me to the moment one of you said, 'Let's make a TV show.'
Alright. It was 2011--
Oh, god, it was. I was only twenty... And you were-- oh man.
Yeah, I was only seventeen at the time. Pretty weird. (they laugh) I was living in Antwerp because I was working on a movie - Törichte - that took place there when I met Reza at a bar...
That's right. And we just sort of... hit it off. (giggles) We met, drank a little--
A lot. We drank a lot.
Yeah, a lot... and somehow we got off on the topic of things that we really wanted to do with our lives. I already knew who she was because I was a fan of a lot of her movies, but then she started telling me that she really wanted to write movies and television, and that was her real dream. And I had been writing for years already - since I was seventeen, in fact. Not professionally then, of course - not at the caliber that I am now - but I had always been interested in writing and when she told me that, it was like a light bulb went off in my head. It was right there at the bar that we came up with the idea for our television show.
We wrote down all the ideas on one of those thin bar napkins.
Yes! I still have the napkin! It's in my apartment in Leoben.
Alright. So you meet, you have this idea for a television show... then what?
I was very good friends with a man who worked in television at the time, and we got him to let us pitch him our idea. It just went from there.
And that's how Zimmergenosse started?
Exactly how. It ran for one season - twelve episodes - and then they pulled the plug. (she lets out a small laugh)
That must have been rough.
It was, but... not as bad as you'd think.
We realized right before we found out that we were going to get cancelled that the show wasn't going in the direction that we wanted it to go in. Zimmergenosse was different than Everything's Fine. The cast of characters were older, the show was a bit lighter, it ran in a sitcom-style format. We thought we were making something really funny, but it actually just looked like a train wreck. So when it got cancelled, it was upsetting, but we knew it was probably for the best.
Alright. So you have one show that gets cancelled, you're back to square one. Then what?
Honestly, then, we took a break.
Yeah. We really didn't even talk about writing together again until early 2013.
What did you do between that time?
I went back to writing music. I worked with some pretty great people, got some experience, made some connections. Even wrote a little bit for television here and there. Nothing big, but everything counts.
And you, Astra?
I did a couple of indie movies. One of them, Dénudé was nominated for a César Award. The other one was Mauvaise Voie, starring Vincent Cassel. Both were great experiences. I grew a lot professionally with them.
So when did the idea to rehash Zimmergenosse start?
Reza was the one who first started the conversation. She called me one day and said, "I was just looking at this old napkin... I think we could make this work if we tried it again."
She didn't want to at first.
No, I really didn't. I told her, "We already tried, and we saw what happened. The German stations didn't like us."
And I said, "Then we just won't take it to the German stations..." And after some talking, she agreed that we should give it one more shot.
It's hard to say no to Reza sometimes. She's very convincing.
It's one of my strengths.
What changes did you make to the show to make it into what Everything's Fine is now?
We started with the cast. Zimmergenosse's cast was mostly people in their early thirties, which was difficult for us to write for since we were both much younger than that. So we decided to make the cast younger - college students.
Write what you know, right?
Exactly.
We also made the show much heavier. In Zimmergenosse, the worst problem any of the characters dealt with was annoying in-laws or something along those lines. The characters in Everything's Fine deal with real issues, like death and addiction and things of that caliber. It's not all sad, but it's not all funny either. Like life.
Like life.
And the format? It's definitely not a sitcom anymore.
Hah, no. I don't think Starz would pick up a sitcom on their network.
We changed the format to a mockumentary type to give it more of a real feel. That was one problem that we were having with Zimmergenosse is that we constantly had to ask ourselves, "Is this something that could really happen, or is this just something that could only happen on television?" When we were writing for Everything's Fine, we were thinking realistically about the everything, so the writing process was much smoother than before.
Okay, so tell me about the casting process. You have a lot of big names in this show.
Yeah, we do. It was a little overwhelming originally, actually.
Really?
Oh, yeah. We were actually a little worried that the show itself would be overshadowed by all the big names in the credits.
We don't want people to think that the only reason why we cast certain people is because we needed their names to boost the legitimacy of the show. Their names do help, but that's not the reason why they're part of the show now. Every member of our cast has been supremely dedicated and fantastic with their roles. We genuinely love every one of them.
Tell me how you came down to these names exactly. Tell me about the auditions.
Some of the roles were a lot easier to cast than the others. Vara Gallo as Clara Oswald, for instance, was very easy. Reza and I both have been friends with Vara for a while, and when she auditioned for the role, both of us said, "Perfect!"
I hope she doesn't get angry by me saying this, but she really is perfect for the role of a manipulating, cheating bitch. (they both laugh)
We love you, Vara, but you have to admit it's true.
What about Nadia Berry? How did you decide that she should be cast?
When we were writing the rewrite, we had this Emily character who the main character - Ronan - has a crush on. When we were starting to flesh out this character in our writing, we said, "She's the girl next door with a dark past. The type of character that Nadia Berry could play."
You really said that?
We really did.
When Nadia stepped into the office for her audition, I actually grabbed Astra's hand and squeezed.
We wanted to tell her right there, "Don't even audition. You have the part," but that wouldn't have been fair... It wouldn't have mattered anyway, though, because she ended up being the best person in the end.
Alright. What about Ansley Bates and Veronica Carter for the roles of Delilah and Molly?
They were a surprise. Delilah and Molly were really hard for us to cast just because those are two characters that we really love, and we wanted to make sure that they were done right.
Right. We wanted to have the actors who played them already have a sort of sisterly bond, because that's a main part of the story is this friendship between Molly and Delilah, and how no matter how much they fight, they really do love each other and need each other.
We were auditioning the roles of Molly and Delilah on the same day. We had four areas blocked off: The audition room, the waiting room - where all the applicants waited to be called into the audition room - and then two spaces where we were sending all the people we liked for Molly, and all the people we liked for Delilah. Then we would bring in one girl for the Molly group and one girl from the Delilah group to audition together so we could see if they had that chemistry. We were still calling in women from the waiting room when Veronica Carter walked through the door. Astra, who is much more of a fashionista than me, immediately recognized Veronica and asked her, "Is Ansley out there?" Which, of course, she was so we auditioned them together right then.
They were perfect together. We actually stopped the auditions and sent everybody home after them. We couldn't imagine anybody else doing as well as they did.
Amazing. Now tell me about some of the male characters in the cast. What about Ethan Plyth?
When we were casting for Adam - the character than Ethan is playing - we really wanted somebody who had that 'good guy rocker' kind of look. We really had no plan to make Adam English before Ethan auditioned, but we liked Ethan as the character so much that we said, "No, that's perfect. Be British." We even rewrote some episodes specifically for this new character development.
Oh, yeah. The writing in Everything's Fine has been so flexible ever since the beginning. We told the cast members on the first day, "These scripts have lines on them, but you don't really need to say the lines word for word. If you feel like your character would say something else, or react a different way, then do it, and if we like it, then we'll keep it."
Some of the best moments in the show have been because the actors said, "Actually, I think my character would be more likely to do this..." and they were absolutely right. Like the way that Ethan said, "I think Adam would be better British." And he was right.
He didn't really say that... but the character is better British.
And what about Isaac Lovelock?
Leo was a tough role to cast, like Molly and Delilah were, just because it was a role that we really loved and really cared about. Isaac is--
Isaac is attractive. We like him with his facial hair.
God, we love the facial hair.
We're in love with his facial hair.
So he auditions, and then we brought him back to read with just Ansley - who had already been cast as Delilah at this point - and they had this really great, really awkward tension between each other.
We know that sounds weird, but it's true. We explained to them what the characters were like and how their relationship was - that Leo had a crush on Delilah, but was far too nervous to admit it, and that Delilah was oblivious to it - and they immediately knew how to react. The scene that they read was where Isaac is trying to be a little flirty with Delilah, and Delilah is unknowingly shooting him down every time, and it was so uncomfortable that Reza and I were literally grinding our teeth. That's when we knew they were perfect for the characters.
And, last but not least, your leading man, James Urie.
James was another huge surprise for us. His character, Ronan, is this gawky film studies major that can't manage to ask how the girl that he has a crush on no matter how many hints she drops that she wants to be asked out. Meanwhile, during the casting, James Urie is this hotshot rockstar who's married to Gemma Kane - easily one of the more attractive women on Earth - and just a super attractive guy.
Yeah, when he came into the audition office, I thought, "Okay, this is cool. James Urie is here. We get to meet him, take some pictures, let him audition, and then we'll tell him later that he just wasn't a good fit."
It's not that we thought that he would be a bad actor, or that we didn't like him. It's just that the character of Ronan is so geeky and awkward that we didn't think James would be able to pull it off. And even if he did pull it off, we didn't know if the audience would be able to see that transition between James and Ronan.
But when he read for Ronan... Wow.
He completely blew us away. For a moment, I totally forgot that he was James Urie, the rockstar, and really thought that he was Ronan Rabenstein, the San Jose State University student.
So you've finished filming, you're getting ready to air your first episode... what's the plan?
Well, before we air the first episode, we're going to do some more to jazz up the fans.
Right. We've started making short films - about five or six minutes long - that each focus on a different character in the show. So there's one for Ronan, one for Delilah, one for Molly... so on and so on. We're going to start posting those on our website in next few weeks so that the fans have a better feel for the characters and the show before the show actually starts.
Exactly. Then we'll put up the first fifteen minutes of the first episode on our website a week before the first episode airs, and then... it's showtime!
We're so ready.
The ladies left me some final remarks, telling me how great Starz had been to them as a network, and how much they already loved the things that fans were telling them about how excited they were for the show. It was hard for me to say my goodbyes to these two wonderful women, who had seemed so inviting immediately after meeting me. Their warmth and charming personalities had been so welcoming that I could now understand why not only they took so much pride in each other's accomplishments, but why we should as well. As I left, both ladies walked me to the door and gave me hugs before sending me off with delightful goodbyes and waves, and for a moment afterwards, I sat in my car and thought about them. They treated their show like it was their child, and talked about their cast like they were their family. In this world, it's difficult to find people who are so magnetic the way that Reza Vranitzky and Astra Thivierge are, and it's people like that who find so much joy in their work that will succeed in the end. Even before the first episode is out, I'm willing to bet that Everything's Fine will go far because of all the love and work that the two women have put into it over the years. They're strong, loving young women, and that's something that deserves to be celebrated. Edited by user 15 May 2014 20:53:23(UTC)
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