Clint Eastwood’s ‘Juror #2’ out performs Warner Bros.’ investment; ‘The Penguin’ showrunner Lauren LeFranc talks crafting a Gotham crime boss

The Business

KCRW

Tv & Film

4.6 • 676 Ratings

🗓️ 8 November 2024

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Warner Bros. unceremoniously released Clint Eastwood’s Juror #2 in less than 50 theaters nationwide, but the mid-budget film has exceeded expectations. After a strong limited opening, the film will see a modest expansion and a light awards push from Warner’s. What prompted the studio to bury what could potentially be the last film from the 94 year old director? Kim Masters and Matt Belloni investigate.

Plus, Eric Deggans talks to Lauren LeFranc about creating the HBO mini series, The Penguin. The writer discusses the challenges of adapting a well known comic book villain into a complex, three dimensional character and she shares why her perspective as a woman writing a show about a middle-aged crime boss makes for interesting storytelling. And of course, she talks about the joys of working with Colin Farrell, who is both the star of the show and an involved executive producer.

Transcript

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0:00.0	From KCRW, I'm Kim Masters, and this is The Business.
0:05.1	When Lauren Lefronk got the call to create an HBO miniseries focused on Colin Farrell's
0:10.0	penguin character in The Batman, she found that depicting the rise of the notorious Gotham
0:15.1	criminal felt good.
0:16.8	It felt very freeing because he is an A-hole.
0:20.3	He's a lot of things.
0:21.8	But at the same time, I understand, I get it.
0:24.5	There's something really exciting about just doing it saying whatever you want, not caring what other people think.
0:31.4	Lauren LeFronk talks to Eric Deggans about the challenges of adapting a well-known comic book villain into a complex three-dimensional character
0:38.7	in her HBO miniseries, The Penguin. She shares why her perspective as a woman writing a show
0:44.2	about a middle-aged crime boss makes for interesting storytelling. And of course, she talks
0:49.1	about working with Colin Farrell, who is both the star of the show and a hands-on executive producer.
0:55.2	But first we banter. Stick around. It's the business from KCRW.
1:00.6	I am joined by my buddy in banter, Matt. Bellany. Hello, Matt.
1:04.4	Hi there.
1:05.5	So the box office continues to confound us. We just saw this weekend the movie Here,
1:13.0	which was Bob Zemeckis and Tom Hanks,
1:18.4	who did pretty well with the movie called Forrest Gump, just not do too well at all with that movie.
1:24.5	And meanwhile, there was a little movie, this is the Clint Eastwood movie, juror number two,
1:30.3	which Warner Brothers had really intended to make for streaming, which some people felt was not showing appropriate respect to a guy who's done so much over the years at Warner
1:35.5	Brothers and for Warner Brothers. But that movie was given a little limited run in some theaters,
1:41.8	and it did very well. So then Warner's just very marginally increased,
	...

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