True Detective

[Sachiel]

Nic Pizzolatto Denies Casting Rumors

“Literally, not a single rumour about casting that has been printed anywhere has any truth to it whatsoever,” Pizzolatto said at a press conference at the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel. “I mean that literally. I’ve seen entertainment reporters say ‘My sources say . . . ‘ There are no sources. There’s me and two other guys and they don’t even know what I’m doing.”

To be clear. No one has been cast?

“No!,” Pizzolatto says with a laugh. “I’ve talked to one person about it, possibly, and that has been it. We haven’t cast anybody. I have a secret list and that’s it.”

Pizzolatto also dismissed rumours that the second season will have a female-led cast.

“Again, it’s a rumour with no basis in fact,” Pizzolatto says. “There is a strong (lead) female character. But I wouldn’t say it is female-led or anything like that.”

For now, Pizzolatto says he plans to start meeting with directors before any casting is done. There will be four main characters.

True Detective’s first season became a sensation for HBO. Starring Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson as mismatched detectives searching for a serial killer in Louisiana. The series became one of the talked-about shows on television, with a complex, decades-spanning plot rife with literary allusions. It ran for eight episodes. The next season, which Pizzolatto hopes to begin shooting in the Fall, will have a different cast and storyline.

In these days of social media, intense viewer engagement in a series is nothing new. But True Detective took it to a new level, with bloggers, columnists and critics offering detailed theories about how the mystery would resolve.

“I stayed away from most of it,” Pizzolatto said. “I sort of put up a wall between myself and any kind of interaction with that sort of speculative theorizing. On one hand, it’s great to see the show engage people and it was meant to engage a viewer on multiple, multiple levels. On the other hand, I think there is subsets of internet people who had their own agendas with regards to speculation on the show. A lot of times people were trying to get clicks on their website. And there is a difference between engaging in a show and hijacking it.”

The attention the show and Pizzolatto himself received was a little unnerving. Afterall, he is a relative newbie to the world of television. A novelist and teacher of creative writing, he wrote two episodes of the AMC series The Killing before putting together True Detective.

He has already written the first two episodes of the second season and says he has some vague ideas for a third season. But he admits the idea of each season being an independent, self-contained story is a little daunting.

“Every season, I’m essentially creating a brand new TV show,” he said. “It can’t have any growing pains like a regular first season. If it works it has to work right out of the box. That’s incredibly exhausting. I mean, the job is exhausting to begin with, but it’s doubly exhausting and I’m writing every episode. I can’t imagine I would do this more than three years. I mean, I’d like to have a regular TV show. We’ll have some fixed sets, regular actors and I could bring in people to help and I don’ t have to be there every second. It’d be great.”

 

[CollectorNC]

That's why this brilliant idea of having a new cast and storyline for the same series is rather lame. It IS a new series every season. Would have been better to keep the cast or phase out some, bring others in, and keep the story going or add other related stories.

 

[batfan08]

At the same time, though, I think the brilliant format is part of the reason why we got the cast we did in the first place. I'd love nothing more than several seasons of McConaughey and Harrelson badassery and philosophy, but, at the end of the day, those guys aren't TV actors. Well, not anymore, in the case of Harrelson. Especially with McConaughey coming off winning his first Oscar; he's going to be more in demand than ever, and I just don't know if those guys would've committed to several seasons of TD. Though, it would be nice if, perhaps, Pizzolatto had a change of heart after season 3 and decided to revisit their characters. It was a great ending, but the fact that, in that interview a few pages back, he talks about possibly bringing them back in a book or something, it seems like he still has a few ideas on where he can take those characters, and, if he does, I'd rather see them executed with McConaughey and Harrelson than not.

 

[CollectorNC]

well, without them, it's just another new show. Even shows like Law & Order, didn't change whole casts and still call themselves Law & Order. They'd replace one person, then two seasons later another, etc. Also, the wait is going to make some not even interested as you have to kind of keep your product in people's minds.

 

[devilof76]

I don't think this show is directed toward the kind of carrot following donkey audience that needs to have their hand held from one season to the next.

 

[CollectorNC]

I don't think this show is directed toward the kind of carrot following donkey audience that needs to have their hand held from one season to the next.

Who said that?

 

[Devil_666]

Even shows like Law & Order, didn't change whole casts and still call themselves Law & Order. They'd replace one person, then two seasons later another, etc.

That's different though. People would leave Law & Order (to do other stuff) so that's the only reason why there were cast changes. It wasn't something they did intentionally as far as I recall. It was a necessity.

For this show, the only reason why McConaughey and Harrelson signed up was because it was a short run. That's the intent. To get big named actors who don't normally do TV stuff because the commitment. The actors they get is the draw, since they don't really release much info on the plot beforehand.

 

[devilof76]

Who said that?

Attribution on the quote seems to indicate that I said it.

 

[CollectorNC]

That's different though. People would leave Law & Order (to do other stuff) so that's the only reason why there were cast changes. It wasn't something they did intentionally as far as I recall. It was a necessity.

For this show, the only reason why McConaughey and Harrelson signed up was because it was a short run. That's the intent. To get big named actors who don't normally do TV stuff because the commitment. The actors they get is the draw, since they don't really release much info on the plot beforehand.

TD is not unique with having A-list actors on network/cable television. It's been happening for years. The novelty of a hard R show due to cable that had a good story and good actors is what made people watch. There's very few well-written TV shows, so when one pops up, it is noticed. I'm just saying that whatever the 2nd season is, it might as well be called something else as it will be completely different.

 

[devilof76]

The basic premise will be identical.

 

[batfan08]

TD is not unique with having A-list actors on network/cable television. It's been happening for years. The novelty of a hard R show due to cable that had a good story and good actors is what made people watch. There's very few well-written TV shows, so when one pops up, it is noticed. I'm just saying that whatever the 2nd season is, it might as well be called something else as it will be completely different.

Last time I checked, "Eye of the Beholder" and "Living Doll" are pretty different, but "The Twilight Zone" kept the same name. TD is an anthology series, and anthologies have been around...a long time.

 

[Devil_666]

TD is not unique with having A-list actors on network/cable television. It's been happening for years.

I never said it was unique, just that it's the main draw of the show.

 

[SnakeDoctor]

Last time I checked, "Eye of the Beholder" and "Living Doll" are pretty different, but "The Twilight Zone" kept the same name. TD is an anthology series, and anthologies have been around...a long time.

"True Detective" is also a generic enough title to fit a lot of stories. Like "The Twilight Zone". And "American Horror Story". Kinda wondering about "Fargo", though ... that's fairly specific.

SnakeDoc

 

[batfan08]

I firmly believe HBO should invest in Rustin Cohle greeting cards.

"Happy Birthday!

It's been 16 years since, in my hubris, I yanked your soul out of non-existence and into this meat.

Sorry,
Mom"

 

[pturtle]

 

[karamazov80]

I got this last week and watched it through. Really excellent show. Performances were the highlight, but the show was well written, well shot, paced very well, and was a logical and fulfilling exploration of the development of the primary characters for the most part. I've lived most of my life in Louisiana, and think the show did a pretty good job of representing certain aspects of the state that don't get a lot of attention in popular movies and TV shows. I thought this was a very disturbing show in the ideas it explored, and I really don't see myself wanting to see it again for that reason. The near death experience by Cohle at the end felt a bit forced, but I get the feeling that the writer himself is looking for a bit of hope of this sort. Anyway, I'm very curious to see what a season 2 might bring.

 

[Rdeezy]

Cohles ending makes perfect sense, after watching the show through again especially, but even if you only see it once its not like the guy found Jesus or something that would've been forced. His Experience mirrors the same thing he told the detectives about his own daughters death, as she was in a coma and after his NDE Rust said he wanted to drift off into the darkness, but then he woke up, it seemed a pretty bleak ending with just a slight glimmer of hope thrown in by Rust's accurate metaphor of the light winning. Pizzaltto said he wanted Rust to end by finally saying something positive even if it is only something unsentimental and scientifically accurate as "the lights winning".

Im glad you got around to watching it , and enjoyed the show Sam.

 

[karamazov80]

Well I mean it feels forced in that his pessimism is just gone, in a way that's not very different than a religious epiphany. But if it didn't happen, this character would have been a sad ******* at the end as he was throughout the series, and the audience wouldn't be as happy with that, so I get it. I actually expected him to die, and think the story would have had a more fitting conclusion for the character if that had happened.

 

[Rdeezy]

Well I mean it feels forced in that his pessimism is just gone, in a way that's not very different than a religious epiphany. But if it didn't happen, this character would have been a sad ******* at the end as he was throughout the series, and the audience wouldn't be as happy with that, so I get it. I actually expected him to die, and think the story would have had a more fitting conclusion for the character if that had happened.

You should read some of Pizzalato comments on Rust's ending. His pessimism is still there, but hes just a little more open to not being so black and white on the subject of the universe.

 

[batfan08]

I chalk it up to him having so little to believe in that even the slightest flicker of a thought that "maybe this isn't all there is" was something to latch onto.