How close is ‘The Studio’ to real life in Hollywood? Seth Rogen has answers

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LOS ANGELES — Apple’s new star-studded satire The Studio is being hailed as one of the best comedy series of the year.

But even though it manages to get laughs by having many celebrities playing fictionalized versions of themselves, star and co-director Seth Rogen says its brutally honest take on the movie industry is mostly all true.

In the 10-episode series, the first two episode of which hit Apple TV+ this week, Rogen plays Matt Remick, a newly-appointed head of a fictional movie studio who is trying to navigate his way through the worlds of celebrity, art and commerce.

After his boss (Bryan Cranston) turfs his mentor (Catherine O’Hara), Matt takes the job pledging to make critically and commercially successful films. But flanked by his team of executives (Kathryn Hahn, Ike Barinholtz, Chase Sui Wonders, Dewayne Perkins), one of the first things he is forced to greenlight is a Kool-Aid Man origin story.

Also on his plate? Killing Martin Scorsese’s plans for a drama about the Jonestown Massacre and finessing a trailer for a Johnny Knoxville-led horror movie where zombies infect their victims with projectile poop.

During an interview at the Los Angeles premiere this week, Rogen and his longtime artistic partner Evan Goldberg, who together have written and directed films like Superbad, Pineapple Express, This Is the End, Sausage Party and The Interview, said The Studio (which they co-created with Frida Perez and Veep veterans Peter Huyck and Alex Gregory) has been influenced by their own experience in Tinseltown since they moved to Hollywood from their childhood homes in B.C. more than 20 years ago.

“I think it’s unfortunately pretty accurate,” Rogen told Postmedia. “We wanted it to really hold up to our own bulls*** detectors for us to really portray Hollywood as we see it. We obviously heightened the comedy and what my character does, I don’t think there’s anyone as aggravating in all of Hollywood as maybe my character is. But everything that happens in the show is very much based on our real lives.”

“We always do best when we make something based on our real-life experiences, and this is what we’ve been doing for the last 20 years,” Goldberg added. “The stories kept mounting up and, quite frankly, we were just waiting for Seth to get to the right age where he could play a boss. Finally, he has enough grey hairs that we can make him a studio head.”

James Weaver, who co-leads Point Grey with Rogen and Goldberg, said the show is “90%” accurate.

“These are stories that came from our experience, and we’re trying to be funny and entertaining. But people (who work in the industry) will find this to be a pretty truthful and funny representation of Hollywood reality,” he said.

In one scene, Matt is forced to tell Oscar-winning director Ron Howard a fictious drama about a dead relative stinks, prompting the Apollo 13 filmmaker to launch into a vicious tirade.

In real life, as a producer on The Boys and Preacher, Rogen has had to deal with giving constructive criticism of his own, but it’s a task he shies away from.

“I try not to give too much advice,” he said, laughing. “I don’t want to get blamed for giving bad advice. I stay out of people’s way. Work your hardest, that’s my advice.”

Goldberg has his own strategy for telling actors and directors news they may not want to hear.

“You say the bad news very bluntly, and you leave very quickly,” he joked. “Good news you say slowly and reiterate it a few times.”

Canadian actress Sarah Polley, who plays a frantic version of herself caught in the midst of directing an ambitious one-take, says the series captures the dread many filmmakers face working in Hollywood. With so much at stake, one box office bomb can effectively end a career in what is essentially a profit-obsessed business.

“It’s very real,” Polley said of The Studio’s depiction of mainstream moviemaking. “The pressure cooker of it and the intensity of it and the emergency room vibes and the ridiculous behaviour and the disaster of commerce and art trying to hold hands and make something good … it’s all very accurate.”

Polley, who directed Rogen in 2011’s Take This Waltz and won an Oscar for writing 2022’s Women Talking, said she has managed to avoid much of what happens in The Studio by sticking close to home.

“I live in Toronto and I don’t have a lot of friends in the film industry. I think that helps,” she said. “You are what you eat, and I’m conscious of who I’m around.”

Goldberg thinks he and Rogen have bucked the trend and managed to achieve sustained success in Hollywood because they share a friendship that goes back to when they were kids growing up in Vancouver. Rogen moved to Los Angeles first, landing a role on Judd Apatow’s Freaks and Geeks.

Later, the two scored writing jobs on Sacha Baron Cohen’s Da Ali G Show.

“I got crazy dirt on that dude. I know all his darkest secrets,” Goldberg jokingly said of the pair’s longstanding collaborations. “We’ve been friends since we’ve been 12. I’ve known him longer than I’ve known my wife. I’ve had a whole first marriage with him before I even met her … We’ve been doing it for so long that we’re co-dependent. But in a good way.”

The first two episodes of The Studio are now streaming on Apple TV+. New episodes drop every Wednesday through May 21.

mdaniell@postmedia.com