From KCRW, I'm Kim Masters, and this is The Business.

Tony McNamara's viciously satirical Hulu series, The Great, follows young Empress Catherine's

adventures in her adopted country, 18th century Imperial Russia.

McNamara's version is one with a lot of swearing, sex, and violence.

The series is now in production on its third season.

As it's typical for a streamer, Hulu doesn't tell McNamara much about who's watching,

but he's fine with that.

You sort of assume it's going well because they renew it, but you're not locked into,

what's the ratings this week or what's the data?

So there's a freedom in that.

You are just like, we're creating 10 hours and in a year, everyone's going to see it,

and that'll be exciting for all of us and hopefully exciting for the audience.

Tony McNamara talks about his fascination with Catherine the Great

and transporting the world he created for the stage to the small screen.

But first we banter. Stick around. It's the business from KCRW.

I am joined by my partner in banter. Matt Bellany. Hello, Matt.

Hi there.

So we are actually bantering from New York this time, not our usual purchase.

We have been in town

partly because of the up-fronts, which are, as you well know, the ritual annually, where

what used to be very simple, there were three networks basically or four. They would gather

advertisers in these giant venues. You know, CBS took Carnegie Hall and ABC took

...