The Smashing Machine with Benny Safdie and Christopher Nolan (Ep. 570)

I remember having the conversation with Dwayne where it was like, "When I get upset, it's more that I get emotionally confused and I shut down." And so you're, I'm now watching him on the screen and his eyes are going back and forth and I'm seeing the process of his brain short circuiting and the camera's right there and he turns around because he feels the camera. He's an adressip but he feels it and he turns away from the camera. He's like he's creating this shell around himself. Hello and welcome back to the Directors' Cut, brought to you by the Directors Guild of America. In this episode, the turbulent life of an acclaimed MMA fighter plays out in director Benny Safdie's biographical sports drama, The Smashing Machine. The film tells the true story of Mark Kerr, a former collegiate wrestler who became a mixed martial artist and UFC champion during the early unregulated days of MMA. As he contends with depression, a pain killer addiction, and a volatile relationship with his girlfriend, he continues his meteoric rise in the burgeoning sport. The Smashing Machine is Safdie's solo directorial debut. His other credits, co-directed with his brother Josh, include the feature films Uncut Gems, Good Time, Heaven Knows What, and Daddy Long Legs. Following a screening of the film at the DGA Theatre in Los Angeles, Safdie spoke with director Christopher Nolan about filming The Smashing Machine. Listen on for their spoiler-filled conversation. [Music] [Applause] Man, congratulations. What did you guys think of the movie? Amazing. Who knew that in addition to being a talented actor and films like Oppenheimer and the Upcoming The Odyssey, he can actually direct as well. So let's hear all about it. I want to hear about your process. This is a DGA crowd. We really want to hear about how this project came about, how you decided on the tone of it, how you started putting it together. When did you first encounter this story? Dwayne actually came to me around 2019 with the idea of playing Mark, and he showed me the documentary. As soon as I saw the documentary, there was just something about Mark that I felt I understood, what was going on inside of him. It was mainly the idea of somebody with a deep certain amount of pain or sadness that they were hiding all the time. They would have to walk through the world and present as if that didn't happen or wasn't there. I know that feeling, and it's exhausting. It's a very hard thing to go through. I thought, "Oh, I could learn something through this." I felt that Dwayne felt the same way. It was like, "We almost looked at each other and just understood that this was the task at hand. We were going to go inside and figure something out about ourselves in this process." It wasn't until 2023 that I started writing it, but I never stopped thinking about him. Mark, I would look at pictures of him and I would just kind of get this, I would go to this place and I had made a documentary with Josh Lenny Cook, which took place, a similar time period, 2001. I became very intro, the way that that was, that documentary was basically a lot of moments. There wasn't a lot of footage. There was a lot of footage, but in a very small period of time. I realized as I was editing and looking at that footage, if you allow yourself to exist in these moments, they become real scenes. Again, there was a bus, there's a time at a bus stop. By living in that scene for a good period of time, you actually discover a lot about the character through those small things. That's kind of how I approached this was take these moments in these lives and try and magnify them with performance and then also camera placement, positioning, and just make it feel like you're there. You can understand as an audience member, I am here, I know where I am, and then even in the editing process, I was always aware of if the camera would have technically seen itself. I would edit as if there was, okay, I can't use that shot over there because I'd be looking at myself. For the fights, in order to really situate somebody as this is a real reality that they're experiencing, you can't put a person in the ring shooting it because you'd see them from all the other angles. So, really my whole process was I want to make this feel as real as possible, both emotionally and physically because that time period is a very close time period that I think people can understand and know very well. But to evoke that meant you had to do a lot of things to like, it's hard to make something feel real because it's just a feeling. And to get it on there was like with the production design, the lighting, and we shot it on 16 millimeter, which I think was part of that was a lot of 16 millimeter documentaries I love because what they do is you just inherently know that that's more difficult to shoot a documentary on film. It's just harder. And so if you see those movies, you kind of get this feeling that like there's something, there's an artifice to it. And so taking that and then on to implying that on real life, it makes it a little bit faker. But then this is like a real thing. It's based on reality, but I'm doing a lot of fake stuff and trying to pretend like it's real. And so all of that kind of went into this kind of mindset of trying to kind of cook up this feeling of, oh, that actually is happening right in front of me, only one time. You know? Wow. Well, I mean, what role therefore does the specific documentary, the smash machine plan you, for example, you're writing process and then moving it to you working with people like James Chandler and who is the designer? Yeah. Were you referencing the documentary continually or did you leave it behind at a point? I was at some point I did leave it behind, but I was referencing the documentary and there's times where I was like, I want to see if I can hit the bar of reality. Did I get there? So I would put things in there as like a test. You can compare them side by side and see like, did that? Like there's a shot of a scooter that he has in the documentary that we went out of our way to find the scooter and get the shot of the scooter because and when you're and it was very strange when we were filming that moment, it like it felt like we were traveling back in time because everything about the movement of the camera, it just felt like that's what was happening. But a lot of the times I would do things like if he was talking to the camera, I would take that conversation and give it to a character. And so I would say, okay, this is a conversation. He's clearly struggling with his emotions here. I'm going to give that to Dawn because that's clearly their central struggle is not being able to communicate how they feel with one another. And so now that scene in the locker room, Dawn wasn't there, but now I put her in there and I have this scene where she's on the outside looking in having to take a picture of it. And so it's figuring out ways to kind of amplify because I have the ability to change things and move things around the ecstatic truth, you know, that idea of it. So yeah, I mean, other than I mean, her it's August, but it would be a frame of reference. The only other one I could even think of was maybe Ken Lohch. I didn't know if he was an influencer. No, I haven't seen much Ken Lohch actually. Well, I was struggling to find any kind of real precedence for this idea of achieving increased intimacy by pulling the camera back by longer lenses. I mean, I've read you quoted as talking about how it feels like you're spying on someone therefore you're violating their privacy and that giving you a feeling of intimacy. But that's a very unusual, it's very counter intuitive thing. Normally as directors, we feel if we go closer with the camera, we become more intimate. In this case, I felt you want to look away, but then at the same time, you're like, I'm being given access to something that I shouldn't be able to see. So you kind of look at it, even though you know you're not allowed to. And I think part of it is that like when you're in the fights and everything, you're on the outside looking in, when you get into these more intimate moments in the house, there's not a lot of places to really hide. So you're a lot more present and you kind of lean in a lot more into those moments. And then a lot of it also I think goes into the performance because the performance is then what pulls you in because there's times where it feels like the camera's zooming, but it's not. It's just the person is so present in their like ability to feel these emotions because that's really what like I was trying. I was I really wanted it to feel like this was really happening and I wanted these emotions to feel as raw and confused as possible. And so when Dwayne and Emily are having that fight at the end, it really does have of there's a messiness to it that I've been trying to see. I realize actually when I shot the fights, you shoot them chronologically, section one, section two, section three. I then said, I'm gonna take that and do that on the fight at home, section one, section two, section three, so that you start, where you start and where you end up is so disconnected by the time you get there that when you're finally in the, 'cause that's what happens in one of these kind of arguments, is you don't remember where you've been. You know, you just kind of, it starts with a small thing, and by the end you're talking about really deep, intense parts of your relationship. And so doing it that way allowed us to really focus on the rounds of that battle, you know. - How did the actors respond to that approach? 'Cause that's pretty radically different, I think, from the way most directors would approach the all-coming argument. - I think it was interesting because they, it was freeing in a way, because what I found was when you're doing the fights physically, you're able to move on from those moments and kind of breathe aside the relief, okay, I did those, now we're focusing on this. And then you focus on that intensely, and then you leave it behind and move on to the next thing. And specifically for this fight, that's kind of how it happens, you know. The first part is very kind of not saying what you're feeling. The second part is one person's trying to get it into an argument, the other person's actively trying to avoid it. So it has these kind of solid kind of chunks that I thought would work for that, to the point where then when you get to the end, we did that only, that final thing was only done one time. And just 'cause I saw it, and I was like, well, that's it. You know, I learned that there's a lot of, from you I learned there's a lot of confidence in moving on. You know, when somebody get, when you get it, okay, you know it, you know. - Well, I'm glad it worked. But so tell me about casting, because I heard a rumor that when you were supposed to be learning your lines on a my set, you were actually canvassing various people to be in your films. So I wasn't aware of that at the time, but it seems to have worked out great for you, but that is how you met Emily, right? - Yes, that's right. So we were, I, when she was, when she was on set. - When we were on second, where's Emily? - Yes, I was in the process of telling her, so did Dwayne ever get the sweater I sent him? And because I had got, I got him a sweater, and I, and I, 'cause it was the version of that nautica sweater, 'cause it was a very interesting character decision for him to get this kind of fashionable piece of clothing. And so I got it and I sent it to Dwayne with the hopes they said, I don't know what's gonna happen if I'm gonna be involved in this or not, but whenever you decide to become Mark, put this on and it will help you become that character. And 'cause I just found that would, that's helpful sometimes, you know, for me. And he never got it. And so I didn't know what happened, but then when I said, I'm like, you're friends of them, right? Did he get it and then he turns out he didn't? And then she connected us and then we really kind of built from there. It was that we started it, the whole new kind of conversation about the thing. - And when did you start talking to Emily about playing Dwayne though? - That was, so I had started writing, and again, I'm so sorry. It was, I started talking during a Q&A for Oppenheimer. (laughing) I sent her the script and so it was in New York. And, but it was just, I could tell that there was a really deep connection and friendship between her and Dwayne. And that was something I knew would be very important to show this kind of relationship, because it's a very complicated relationship. And it's one that they don't, you wish they get along, but they're never gonna get there. And it's very, you root for it, and you're trying so hard to see them connect. And they'll never get close. But that requires actually believing that there is a reason to be there. You know, there is a, you need to feel that there's a true foundation. And so it's just used the kind of built-in friendship and support that they have for one another, but then have them screen the most horrible things that one another, but then you also know that that hurts them. And you could see that on their faces when they have to be mean to the other person. Did you read that in one or your little books? Is one of the meanest things he could say to her in that moment. And she feel, it's so sad to see her say, yes, I did, but it's how I feel. You know, and we would have these conversations about these arguments and I would just say, well, I'm gonna be completely honest about times I've had arguments like this and I've said things that I feel embarrassed about. And let's all just talk about that. So that when we get to the moment, it's open and there's no shame in it, you know? - Well, I think it's interesting you mentioned that moment as sad because I actually thought it was quite strong on her part. I thought it was an excellent cost. And I think she, I mean, Emily brings such force to everything she does. But how was it exploring that character with her? I mean, where were you getting, obviously not a lot of that is gonna come through in the documentary. - They weren't, they didn't, none of that is in there because that relationship is actually in a way it's more, everything is blamed on her, you know? And part of it with Emily was, there's, it's very clear that Mark is very difficult to deal with, you know? He's addicted to drugs. He's uniquely focused on everything he wants to do. And so what we talked about was, what is it that she's trying to get out of this? All she wants is his attention. And maybe she comes in at the wrong time. But you're right, I find it really sad and I meant sad in the sense that it's a mean thing to say to somebody and it's sad to hear that. But you're right, she doesn't back down at all. And that's what I think was so important is, she is standing face to face with somebody who we know could destroy anything, you know? He is that, he is that strong. And I think that play was very important, you know? The fact that she was willing to stand up to it and had the force to do so. - Yeah. Did you spend a lot of time with the real Mark and the real dawn to research it? - I had a lot of conversations with Mark, just to get to know him, you know, to understand his perspective on life. But I also wanted to let him know that like, and I did the same thing, I told him everything about myself because I said, you're trusting me, so I'm trusting you. And I'm not gonna do things that are gonna be hard to talk about and they're gonna be hard for you to watch. I said, but I want you to understand that I'm doing it out of the service to try and get at the feeling of what you did in life. And I wanna put that into the audience. And that's like to get back to what you were saying before. I wanted this to kind of be like, you were in his head. And in a way, it was like, by physically being present in that world. And then when you cut to the end and you actually see this guy, the goal was, and I said to Dwayne, I said, I want people to not have any idea that we're looking at the real person, that on that one cut, the line completely disappears between what your performance will be and what he is. And you will just think, oh, I've just experienced everything that went on in that guy's brain. You know, and it's a hard thing to say, you know. - Very hard. It's fully achieved though. I mean, my experience watching the film and obviously I can't speak for the audience, but my own personal experience was I felt always inside it, always very, very connected with them. And that's why I'm so fascinated by the long lenses, the sort of objective distance and things, because I felt, unlike your earlier work on the curse, for example, where you're doing a lot of kind of long lens observational things that, for the purpose of alienation, are not dissimilar set of techniques as entire of the opposite effect in this film. You feel very in tune with these people. You feel very in tune with Mark's struggle and his gentleness. Obviously that's a testament to the performance, but also the entire tone and everything that you're doing with the world and bringing people into the world. - Yeah. And it's definitely, it was interesting because it's, again, I'm set, in a way, maybe I'm setting obstacles for myself to try and see if I can overcome them, but like, so can you get close to somebody from far away? Like, is that possible? And it's like, when you see him, like, for example, like, I've had experiences when I've seen a fight or fight, and I've been all the way in the back, but because I knew everything about them, I was very connected to the person in the ring. And so it was like, okay, how can I replicate that experience in like physical form? And it's like by actually putting you on the outside, but then being closer to them when they are in their home, and when you're around them. So you really do feel like you know them, and now you don't have the same access because you're further away when you're watching them actually physically fight. But again, I think it's also, I realize that maybe there was something in really leaning into the kind of point of view of the cinematographer in the house. And so, Meseo has a very good sense of movement. And so he was, he's one of the operators, main operators on the movie as well. And so he really knows how to kind of, move around, specifically another is like when he's in the elevator and he, I remember having the conversation with Dwayne where it was like when I get upset, it's more that I get emotionally confused and I shut down. And I don't know why I'm crying. It's just like your brain malfunctions. And so you're, I'm now watching him on the screen and his eyes are going back and forth and I'm seeing the process of his brain short circling and the camera's right there and he turns around because he feels the camera, isn't aggressive but he feels it and he turns away from the camera and Miseo tries to get around and he feels that too and he tenses up and it's like he's creating this shell around himself. And so that kind of interplay is what I think kind of hopefully brings you in where you want to kind of feel connected to the character. Which is very different to everything I believe about how you make films and it's quite unsettling to see how well it works. I mean truly. Yeah. Thank you. That's just the honest response. But no, I think there are so many things about the film that do take you into a kind of very meditative state. It's not a conventional sports movie by any means. It's not an addiction movie by any means. Talk about the music. Talk about your composer. So Nala Senefro, she is a jazz artist. She's never made music for movies or anything other than for her own self. And so I knew that going in, it was going to be like working with an actor. There were going to be things that I wanted that maybe she wouldn't give me because this was how she wanted to say it. And so it was, it was a certain level of control that I had to be able to give up. But at the same time, I told her all about the character. And then I actually witnessed the jazz sessions happen. And it was very exciting for me because I was like, wow. There's this kind of interplay. It's not dissimilar to how it feels when you're making a movie. You know, there's one person who everybody's looking to and they're all playing different instruments. And she's telling them little things to change here and there. But again, what the way she approached it was, she felt very connected to Mark. She felt like she understood him. So she created this kind of psychoanalytical score in a way where it's not necessarily telling you how to feel. But it's, it feels like how he feels. It's not telegraphing the emotions, but you kind of understand what's happening in the character's brain by listening to it. Well, very much like the performance. I mean, to weigh into performance doesn't tell you how to feel at any point. There's nothing demonstrative about it, but you understand it fully. Yeah. And that's, it's like, that's like, so I like being in an environment where there is no net in that way. Where it's like, I know, I just have confidence that it's going to work. You know? And when I, so I had, I would cut all these things together. For example, like in the first fight scene, there was a lot of electric guitar that she had done and recorded. But then she comes back and she has that kind of droning sound and then that loud, right after he opens, right before he opens the door. And I was just like, oh my God, this is unbelievable. She's just so in tune with what's going on. And then the other thing was I originally had the idea of like, oh, let's have free jazz drums or something during the fight. And she made the decision to say, no, it should be in time. It should be actual jazz rhythms. And I thought this is really special because she's looking at it and seeing these fights as these improvisations, which is what they are. Get down. Now one person has the, the, the, the upper hand, but then it can completely switch. And so she's really playing with that, you know? But I want to jazz over the fights for that reason, but she really made it music. And that's what was really beautiful. And different for me, really, because a lot of the times there's like sounds that I would work with or things like that, but she came in with sheet music and some of the best musicians. And it was really amazing, you know? And it was beautiful to watch, but like in air studios with this like giant orchestra. And then when you see dawn on the plane, that's dawn's soundtrack. That she created. There was like, we, she created different kind of themes for when he's doing drugs. And when dawn has certain things and it's like, so that when he gets up to go into the bathroom, I don't need to show what he's doing. That song plays and you know exactly what he's about to go do. And then when he's on the couch, there's just that dead stare, which is just so frightening to see, you know? And the star-stangled, spangled banner. Yes. That's a hell of an interpretation. Oh my God. Yeah. How did you get that out of her? Or what was the? So the, the, it was very important to me to have the star-spangled banner because the meaning behind it is very special, you know? Land of the free home of the brave, the site, the ideas of it were very important. And they can get tied up with certain things. But I wanted, it's core to come through. And she's not from America. So it was very hard for her to kind of attach to that. But I did want her to perform this kind of, like I don't think there's ever been a harp version of the, of the star-spangled banner. But I wanted to have this kind of gentle, evocative, almost ghostly feeling to it. And just, yeah, it also just speaks to the fact that there are these two people who are American fighting overseas. And just like they're in Japan. And the sound comes on. And that's their only connection, you know? And it really does the two, it just kind of, it just made sense. And, but it was, it was definitely a process to get her to, to really like, key in and understand what it was that I was trying to say with this. Because it wasn't, it wasn't like a, it was, it was a, it was a complicated statement that, yeah, it's not ironic. It's not a huge shock. Exactly. It's very sincere, as is so much of the film. And, you know, time's getting on. So I really want to talk about the central performance. We're spoken a little bit about Emily and how incredible she is. The two of them together are brilliant. But I don't know if you're as big a fan of the first, the furious movies as I am. But what, what convinced you that Duane Johnson had this performance in him? As soon as I met him, I just knew. Like it was very, I don't know how to explain it, but it was the way that he spoke to me, the way he was asking questions. And just there was something behind his eyes that I saw. And it was also the fact that he was so adamant about wanting to tell this story that I could tell he was so connected to it. He knew Marker personally? Yes, he had met Marker early on like, because they had crossed paths at one point while he was wrestling and Mark was fighting in pride. And then they connected later on. It was really just, I could just tell that there was a deep connection of an emotion that he wanted to explore. And it happened to line up with things that I wanted to explore. And that's the best, you know? And it really was though, like, this idea of you need to become this person. You really need to just be them. And the scenes are such that like, there's really not, you can't hide behind anything, you know? That you have to, it's very, it's your it is. Like when he, like just little things of like, use the skim milk, right? Like that line is, he knows that it's not the skim milk, but it doesn't want to let her know that he knows that it shouldn't be skim milk. So he's trying to get the confirmation about if she did use the skim milk to prove that she made a mistake. And so all of that has to be layered into that very nicely. And he says it. So kind of, oh, you use the skim milk, right? Yeah, of course, just like last week. I knew it. And it's like, wow. So it's prison. How much did you talk with Wayne about these things? Or how much did you leave to him to intuit? We talked to all the time. And it was basically just, it was a constant conversation about our own feelings and are also just about the feelings of what Mark had. And seeing how he internalized those conversations was what was kind of so incredible to me was because I could, I felt like I could ask him anything. And he would come out with some way of that. Like for example, in the hospital scene, I remember just saying like when, when, because I've dealt with addicts in my life. And the, for me, the only thing that they're trying to do is get away with it. They're trying to get away with not being found out. And so I remember just saying to Dwayne like, this story, that's your lifeline. You know, and then you see him build his confidence as he's getting it straight to the point where then when he finally thinks he has it, it's like he, if Mark Coleman didn't call him out on it, he would have walked out there and it would have had no issues at all. And so, and then and he's able to instantly break down, just like that. And again, that's like a really difficult thing to ask to do, you know, but it really was from this moment of just like pure happiness, laughing to, oh my God, I've been found out and all of it gone. - Well, there's something about seeing somebody that big try to hide behind, you know, the sheath. - Yeah. - Though it's heartbreaking, I think it's an incredible performance that I don't think you'll see a better performance this year or almost other years. And tell me about being in Venice watching the film with Dwayne with Emily, but also with the real life people with Mark and Dorene, they were there, right? - Yeah, Mark was there for that. Don was there in Toronto, but Mark was right next to me and I remembered this argument coming on. And these are this is stuff that he, I don't think he, we had seen an earlier version of it, but this was like the final version. And he's seeing this with an audience and it's a very raw personal moment for him. And in the conversation, I didn't know what happened. I made that up, you know, like what the conversations were and how it would lead there, but I said, does this seem about right? And he's like, yes, it does. Like, 'cause I would have the, I would just like, use my own kind of experiences to kind of into it what he was feeling. And, but in that moment he just started, he was hysterically crying in the seat right next to me. And then I started crying and I just reached down and I held his hand for the rest of the movie. And we just watched it like that. And it really was a very beautiful moving experience because I did want him to have some kind of closure on his life and I knew that this maybe could do that because he said to me, I felt forgotten and discarded onto the side of the highway by life. And that's a terrible thing for somebody to feel. And so I didn't want that to happen for him. And so really it was, but then, so that's where there was a lot of kind of, I want to do right by his feelings. But I don't want that to dictate that I'm gonna take any, not take any risks in the movie, you know what I mean? But it was definitely a very beautiful emotional experience for all of us because here we are exploring his life through and then feeling our own things. And watching it in Venice with him was just, it was like one of the greatest things. Yeah. - Well, culmination and extraordinary experience. And for those of you who don't know, Benny was awarded the best director prize at that festival, very well deserved. - Thank you. - Congratulations on that and congratulations on the movie. It's a really remarkable and radical piece of work that will be understood more and more over time. And I'm very proud to know you. I'm glad to be here talking to you. And thank you everybody for coming to see the movie. - Thank you, Benny. - Thank you so much. This is the best. (audience applauding) - Thanks for listening to another DGA Q&A. The director's cut is available wherever you listen to podcasts. And please share, subscribe, rate and review. We'd love to hear your feedback and you can help fellow foam buffs find the show. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you next time. This podcast is produced by the director's Guild of America. (upbeat music)