The ‘Office’ showrunner talks about reteaming with Carell and why he’s got his eye on the moon.
I immediately started thinking of ideas.
It is a really good idea for a show.
Aaron Epstein/Netflix
[Laughs] Everybody around the world was so excited for Neil Armstrong and one giant leap for mankind.
There was definitely a feeling of more world unity.
What did the real-life Space Force represent to you?
AARON EPSTEIN/NETFLIX
Why was it perfect fodder?
Part of it is looking at it through the lens of Steve Carell running it, you know?
That’s partly what makes it comic.
[Laughs] And it’s kind of cool because it hasn’t been defined what it is.
For instance, we had a logo already.
We had our moon fatigues.
When they released their fatigues, we released a photo of our fictional Space Force fatigues.
And you know, the whole notion of camo fatigues for Space Force is comical.
They are opposites in a lot of ways.
And part of the show is about them learning how to work together and influencing each other.
You know theMaster and Commanderseries?
And it’s a constant struggle.
You dont show the president in your series, but we hear references to his tweeting.
And you have your versions of Nancy Pelosi and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, among others.
How did you decide how closely to wink at our current political landscape?
Strangelovea good bit in the beginning.
Do you remember Mad Dog [James] Mattis?
And there was some worry.
And Steve’s character has a lot of positives.
He’s a little bit inflexible and his scientific education isnt up to the task of running this thing.
But on the other hand, he’s got a lot of good qualities as well.
[Our character named] Petosi you never know how much people are aware of politics.
You don’t want to go too deep into it.
I don’t think there’s any enormous point-scoring trying to happen here with these characters.
Steve called the show surprisingly patriotic.
But I don’t think there’s anything wrong with enjoying the inspirational aspects of it.
We hadn’t written anything yet; we had just talked about the concept with Netflix.
The Joint Chiefs is the meeting of all of the heads of all the service branches.
And the other thing is, of course, Alison Jones is a wonderful casting director.
Steve was really thinking about that from the beginning because we didn’t want to repeatThe Office.
That kind of informed everything, including the music.
We got [composer] Carter Burwell and a live orchestra.
Space exploration is just a subject matter that’s big.
So I think that’s where you’re getting a lot of these bigger names.
What other movies or shows did you talk about in the early stages?
A lot of the Ron Howard-scope movies likeApollo 13came up.
There have been a lot of movies about different aspects of our history in space.
We read Gene Kranz, who was the head of mission control.
There was a good bit of research for it and its a great topic.
It’s not hard to do research.
It’s easier than researching the propane business.
What was the biggest challenge in building this world?
“What were we going to build?”
Because you have to build a set and you might’t be out on location every day.
So we have done a lot of thinking about cool production design.
He was actually the production designer forDr.
That was a very big build and it’s this two-story set with all these different screens.
So probably the hardest part was really nailing down what the set was going to be like.
Your show has a chimpstronaut.
[Laughs]
And that scene apparently required some acting on your part.
The first thing that we tried was getting stock footage, and it was getting kind of frustrating.
So one night, I took my iPhone and the editor filmed me doing the chimps part.
Looking at early cuts, we gradually replaced all of my acting with the actual effects.
When you started writing this show, how convinced were you that the real Space Force would happen?
And how do you feel now, given the global pandemic?
I mean, who could have anticipated a pandemic and recession, right?
So I don’t think necessarily everything needs to be about the pandemic.
All of the issues that are in the show are not really pandemic-oriented .
There’s a bit in there about the funding
of the U.S.
Postal Service [which happened in real life]!
Now that your show is premiering during the pandemic, how do you think it will play?
Which is not to say that it has to pick a side.
What was it like to reteam with Steve after all these years?
Had you guys been frequently bouncing ideas back and forth over the years?
It’s very easy to write for him.
Not every actor can play a bunch of things at the same time.
To me, the magic of him is that you might see everything he’s doing.
Well, based on where he’s at, I would say that’s a question for him.
I love to work with him.
