"Boardwalk Empire" provided an incredible backdrop
which we could tell stories about politics, race relations,
and, really, the formation of modern America.
The beauty of doing these shows
is exploring characters over the course of,
hopefully, three, five years.
We told the story of Nucky as a leader and as a person,
seeing through his eyes and with the backdrop of the prohibition years.
That's exactly the story we set out to tell
and I'm really proud of the way we did it.
I certainly feel proud of the work that we've done,
and I feel like we're leaving the audience with something
that they can enjoy for years to come.
- sync and corrections by Zac - - www.addic7ed.com -
- Background. - Sound.
Camera.
Somewhere back in 2007, I had been given the book "Boardwalk Empire"
by an executive at HBO,
who told me Martin Scorsese was attached to this project.
It was a history book, basically.
It was the history of Atlantic City.
The Eureka moment for me came
when I read the chapter about Nucky Johnson,
who we, of course, fictionalized as Nucky Thompson.
This guy was a TV series waiting to happen.
In less than two hours,
liquor will be declared illegal by decree
of the distinguished gentlemen of our nation's congress.
To those beautiful, ignorant bastards.
The period we chose to focus on was the prohibition years...
1919 to the early '30s.
And they were an incredibly tumultuous time in the United States.
In terms of the casting process, you know,
first and foremost, we needed our Nucky.
We wanted to know who the guy was
that we were going to be building this series around.
I got a call from Terry Winter and he told me that I had the part.
I said, you know, "we'd like to cast you in this role."
I said, "I know you're still considering other actors",
but I just really appreciate you thinking of me."
He almost talked himself out of it.
But I said, "no, this is the call. We want you to do it."
And he says, "no, Steve. I'm offering you the part."
- What do you want, Mickey? - Come on, Nuck.
I come to youse hat in hand.
When I auditioned, I did the thing
that I kind of do as Mickey Doyle...
With the voice and the laugh.
As I was leaving, Ellen Lewis, the casting director,
said, "can you come back in and do it again?"
And this time, they want you to try...
Just don't do any of that that you just did.
So I did it and, I mean, it was awful.
I mean, it was terrible. Or at least I thought it was awful.
As I approached my first day with Mr. Scorsese,
I wasn't totally sure
which character had gotten the part.
And no one told me.
- My pal Meyer. - Mickey Doyle.
How do you do?
I had an audition for an 18-year-old,
tough, Jewish kid
from the Lower East Side of Manhattan.
And I thought, "I'm 30, I'm from London",
and how am I gonna pull this off?"
- Mr. Thompson. - Torrio's man.
I was at home when the phone went and it was Marty.
He just went to me, "hello, kid. How you doing?"
I was like, "yeah, I'm okay."
He was like, "look, I've got this thing.
'Boardwalk Empire.'"
I was like, "oh, okay." And he went, "I'd love you to play Al Capone."
I went, "yeah, sure. Okay."
I went in. I read.
They said, "we'd like you to meet Marty."
This is all the same day.
Spent about an hour and a half
talking about growing up Italian in New York.
At which point I said, "Marty, do you want me to read for you?"
And he said, "yeah, yeah. Read."
I read for him, he said, "go to wardrobe."
First I auditioned for one of the boat captains.
And then I heard that they were thinking about me for the brother.
And so it, uh, you know, got kicked up a notch.
You know, the peculiar thing is that
at the same time the feds are raiding Mickey,
this shit's happening three miles away.
Ain't that a coincidence.
Is there anything you want to say or should I?
- Background. - And action.
The first day on set was a good first day for me
'cause I didn't have any dialog.
The Winter of '88, a blizzard of biblical proportions.
Martin Scorsese was directing and I thought,
"okay, I can get through the first day."
I had on this costume... Very tough to wear
in front of all these people you didn't know, you know?
And then I had to leap up into his arms
and I just heard this...
All the way up the back.
We all had to go in another room and sew it up.
It was just sort of horrifying.
My first day on set was actually that scene with Michael.
One of the crew members, Charlie, he sort of took me aside and said,
"you know, you need to work on your accent a little bit."
And I was like, "but I'm shooting in a minute."
So I asked Marty if I could have 10 minutes.
He went, "yeah, sure, sure, sure."
And Charlie sat with me and I really listened to Charlie's accent.
And I went in and I had to... you know,
I had to shake hands with Michael and say, "I'm Al Capone."
- Nice talking to you. - You, too.
- Jimmy Darmody. - Al Capone.
All right, Al.
It was one of them moments where my sphincter
was going about 90 Miles an hour.
I remember the first table read.
I was dressed in my audition suit and had worn a bow tie.
And, of course, I was the only one there dressed up.
I felt ridiculous.
My first table read was, um, nerve-racking.
The main thing that stood out to me
was that I was the only black in the room.
I was just like, "wow."
I had never been the only black in anything before.
My first day on set was like a 14-hour day.
And they were like, "okay, it's time to go."
And I remember Mr. Scorsese was like, "we're done? We're done?"
Like, that's it? That's all we got?"
I feel like I'm back in the '70s.
I found out what it was to work with Marty.
It's like 2:00 in the morning, he comes in, he goes,
"great! Perfect! Really good! Perfect! Let's do a few more."
Fine town, Chicago.
Yeah, well, it ain't New York, that's for sure.
New York ain't New York now with prohibition.
It will be if I have something to say about it.
It sounds to me like it brings us to the business portion of our meeting.
In light of recent developments,
I thought it might be a mutual benefit for you boys to meet.
I don't recall having had
a more satisfying experience
with the words that I've been offered to act with.
I like this room.
One looks down in secret and sees many things.
- You know what I saw? - Nah.
A servant pretending to be a king.
It's just been deeply satisfying every episode.
Terry Winter, of course, leading the charge.
Howard Korder as well.
I had been a fan of Howard Korder's
for a long time before I actually met him.
I had met with Terry and Tim when they were
starting to put things together and looking for writers.
He read the pilot, I offered him the job, and he said, "no."
And I called him and I said, "well, that's not the right answer."
That's not how this is supposed to go.
"It's supposed to be yes, of course."
I had worked on a TV series decades earlier.
I really didn't think it was for me.
I said, "I assure you it'll be completely different."
And just give it a couple months,
and if you hate it, great, no harm, no foul.
"If you like it, you know, stay."
And so it seemed like a better idea to say yes than no.
Do you have a suspect?
Waxey Gordon comes to mind.
- Naturally. - But it's not Waxey.
Because Waxey would have to clear it with you and you would've said no
because you're in business with me.
That could be what I want you to think.
It could, but I doubt it.
How can you be sure?
Because if you were trying to be obvious,
you'd never be that obvious.
This is why I enjoy our conversations.
The larger narrative arcs
are incredibly well-considered.
But then the detail that's added
once, you know, you receive the first draft,
then you'll receive something that you slightly tweak.
If it's the night before shooting,
and sometimes the morning of shooting, sometimes during shooting,
if there's a better line of dialog, it'll go in.
In one episode,
um, Howard Korder came back
with a little tweak to a side scene.
- And the line was... - The negro in question.
And I read...
And I read that
and I just laughed out loud
because it was so...
It was just the perfect accent
to the scene that had preceded it.
And it was also so wonderfully authentic.
And I said to myself, "wow."
Howard must be a negro in disguise
"to have written this."
It is not an exaggeration to say
I could not have done this show without him.
The show would not have been half as good
without Howard Korder's involvement.
We've been on the road for 18 hours.
I need a bath, some chow...
And then you and me sit down
and we talk about who dies, huh?
The best thing that can happen when you're writing
in this serialized world
is you discover things you had no idea you were going to do.
We're creating this series as it goes along.
So very often I don't share with the cast where their characters are going
or where the story arcs are going because we're not settled on it.
I think part of the process
of not showing the actors what they're going to be doing next
provides a surprise for them.
And it certainly keeps you in the moment.
Margaret always surprised me.
I thought I knew what she was all about
and she gets the job in the dress shop
and then she steals something.
And I was like...
"She's not a thief. This can't be."
- Good evening, Madame Jeunet. - Bonsoir.
And so many things that were a shock to me...
I thought, "well, that's quite good
'cause it'll be a shock to the people watching."
Early on, there have been debates with actors about...
They want to know what's gonna happen.
I said, "well, if it turns out that the actor
you're playing in a scene with"
in three episodes is your mortal enemy,
I don't want you to know that now.
I don't want you to play that even subconsciously,
"so you really shouldn't know that."
You've had your last meal in this place.
Looking very respectable, James.
- What did he promise you? - More than you ever did.
I keep my promises. And I'll make you one now.
I will ruin you. All of you.
It was all very cloak and dagger, which I thought was brilliant.
Why should we know everything that's going on
if we don't know it as a character?
So I was very happy to sort of watch it as an audience member,
as a sort of... as an avid viewer when it came out.
I watched him
from a blind for three days.
He lifted it to scratch his nose.
I put a bullet
one inch below his eye.
It's really hard to pick a favorite Chalky scene.
There are so many beautiful moments
that I'm so proud of the way they turned out.
But I would go with the scene
with him and the ku klux klan member.
I ain't building no bookcase.
I was born in Elgin, Texas.
My daddy taught himself the carpenter trade
doing for the black folk there.
The ancestral energy
that I tapped into for that particular scene
was real intense for me.
These here are my daddy tools.
What are you gonna do with them?
I ain't building no bookcase.
One of my favorite scenes was the scene
where I pick up Eli from prison 'cause I got to drive a car.
How, big chief.
Which way to the little big horn?
How, big chief.
Which way to the little big horn?
No luggage, right?
Anytime I got to wind people up, it was good.
The fight scene that Nucky and his brother had,
I think, was one of the highlights.
It took us two days to shoot.
I slapped Shea.
He's that kind of actor that says, "no, just do it."
I said, "are you sure?" He goes, "yeah, just do it."
You come crawling back here because you don't have the balls
to finish what you started.
We did quite a number of takes of me slapping Shea
and I think it was very painful for him.
Deborah. Hannah.
I always enjoyed the moments
that were the more humane moments.
Like he's trying to name his daughter.
Abigail.
I thought that was interesting.
My favorite scene was in season four
when Ron Livingston's character lifts the veil
and she's just so blindsided.
You and I are here.
Together.
That's all that matters.
When she discovers that he was playing her...
You get that?
That look of sheer shock and horror
that was in her face broke my heart.
And the way they shot it, sort of up above
when she runs down the stairs
and then sort of almost like an animal trapped...
I'll never forget it.
One of my favorite scenes is
Gyp's scene in season three
when all the gangsters are sitting 'round
and he verbally destroys everyone.
You smug, kike midget.
Creeping around like a fucking dentist with the ether.
Why don't you watch your fucking step?
Why don't you go sit in the corner, short pants?
And then there's you.
Fucking breadstick in a bow tie.
I really enjoyed that.
So what are you saying, Mr. White?
About what?
About my buying, let us say,
1,000 cases of spirited...
Liquor directly from you to our mutual benefit.
Cut out the middleman.
A lot of the fun in getting cast on this
was the fact that Terry Winter was involved.
You're not gonna turn down the chance to work with Terry.
It just was a no-brainer.
When Terry comes down to set, it's like dad coming down.
Everyone's so well-behaved.
When I think back of working with Terry,
I think of him as a proud father
and his children are his words.
You do understand
I'm the only thing keeping you from a lynch mob?
You ready...
For what happens here?
I turn up on the end of a rope.
When you work with Terry, be in for some really intense writing.
Of course, I had already been a fan of his work on "Sopranos"
and the script of "Wolf of Wall Street."
I was really impressed with his clear vision
for what "Boardwalk Empire" could be.
And with his enthusiasm and his vision and insight,
it was pretty obvious he'd be the right showrunner.
Terry writing at the height of his talent
and then Tim Van Patten, who is a maestro...
It's as good as it gets.
Tim Van Patten was the first person
I spoke to about joining me
as we embarked on "Boardwalk Empire."
Gangsters and history
and, you know, ensemble.
There was no way I wasn't gonna do it.
Tim, like Howard,
is so incredibly responsible for how terrific this show is.
It wouldn't be a quarter of what it is, you know...
Or wait, I said a half for Howard... Also, Tim's the other half.
Okay, it would not be half of what it is without Howard.
So the two halves of those guys make up the whole.
I don't even need to be involved in this. It's really... it's them.
Tim is everywhere at all times. And thank goodness.
He's just one of those people that you just know is keeping everything going.
Hey, enough with the bohunk cracks. Name's Duffy now.
- What? - I changed it.
I ain't Mickey Kuzik no more.
- Who's after you? - Nobody.
- Then why Duffy? - It sounds better is all.
A rose by any other name.
When you think of a TV show,
you pretty much think of, you know, being in a studio
and occasionally going out to a location.
"Boardwalk" was the exact opposite.
My favorite location was John's restaurant.
There we were, dressed as Meyer Lansky, Lucky Luciano,
Arnold Rothstein, and Joe Masseria sitting in the back of John's
as they might have done, you know, those many years before.
Knowing that these characters actually inhabited that space
and it was Joe Masseria's headquarters, it was just fun.
Four deuces. That was me favorite location.
It was really this beautiful mini estate
in bedford-stuyvesant that was once
the country home of F.W. Woolworth.
It was just always fun in there, do you know what I mean?
Not the fact that there was scantily clad women everywhere,
but it was just a fun set, it was a really fun set.
I really liked being in Babette's.
I thought that was fun when there was entertainment.
It was hard to concentrate on what you were meant to be doing.
It's a very distracting show to work on.
The sets have always been perfect in the detail.
When you show up in the morning and you see the amount of work
that's been put into that, it really gets your blood pumping.
'Cause your blood's not always pumping really hard at 5:00 in the morning.
The set design has been quite amazing.
The detail and the sense of place
and mood through place has been really spectacular.
I'm always very cautious of sort of
not overdesigning something or overdoing something
'cause that isn't the point.
The point is to support the story
and help reinforce the characters.
By far my favorite set was the Onyx Club.
That was another time I would just pinch myself.
Just be like, "this is for me?
Really? I'm a part of this?"
Wallpaper from England, curtain hand-painted in New York.
- These chandeliers? - Sconces.
They custom-made in Paris.
I don't think the audience will ever really know
the amount of detail they put into making that Onyx Club.
It was beautiful.
Step right up, friends. What you waiting for?
Lovely ladies direct from Paris, France.
- Don't be afraid, fellas. - That original boardwalk set
that we only had for three seasons was pretty magical.
For the first two years, every time I would turn the corner
and look up and see that thing, it would take my breath away.
It was, I believe, the largest standing set
in New York film history since 1915.
When it was finished,
Terry and I were walking down this thing
and we're going, "holy shit."
If we don't pull this off, we're in trouble."
So...
I'd turn up on the boardwalk and there'd be an elephant there.
Crazy, amazing extras.
Rudy the Congo creep.
Hoppy the frog boy.
Every time I was there, it was such an experience.
When Marty first came to the boardwalk,
started at one end... It was like 300 feet to walk.
And I was there throughout the building of
the whole thing from the very beginning,
so I know where all the secret spots are.
And he's going down the set and he's looking and says, "oh, that's lovely."
That's lovely. That's a good angle there."
I'm going, "oh, he found that angle."
And then, "oh, that's lovely. That's a lovely angle, too."
Went right to every spot.
I'm thinking, "what am I gonna do?
I think so, too."
While you were on that boardwalk, you were there.
The Ferris wheel, the lights,
the children running up and down.
So beautifully designed, created, painted,
and filmed exquisitely.
There's a broad looking to see you.
She's been waiting for over an hour.
She says it's urgent.
She's pregnant.
What?
- You met her last night. - Last night?
She saw you talk or something.
Ah, ah, the "temperaments" league.
One of the more exciting things about starting a new season of "Boardwalk"
was seeing what suits you had for the season.
We fit every leading character and every background person.
Every... every single one was fit to a T.
John Dunn has people in undergarments, period undergarments.
We're not gonna see them, but they're in them.
They're in them.
Costumes are very, very important to me,
as most things are in film,
but costumes I have a special attachment to
in creating character and time.
Sometimes I would be on set
and I would maybe be feeling like,
"do I really have the right, you know, Nucky vibe here?"
And then I would catch just a glimpse of myself
in a reflection and I wouldn't see me.
I mean, I would see the character.
I was like, "oh, I'm okay. I'm okay."
- I ran the odds on the way down. - On what?
Whether you'd attempt to kill me.
- What'd you come up with? - 14-1 against.
We have wardrobe people all helping dress
and tie the ties and do the cuff links
and adjust the suspenders.
And Michael really took it upon himself
to learn to do all of these things.
Here I am in my room
and I'm using the time to get dressed
as a way to get into character.
And then all of a sudden you get a knock on the door,
"can I tie your bow tie?"
You know, my world is blown.
So in order to keep that momentum and keep that vibe going,
I learned how to tie a bow tie.
Michael Stuhlbarg tied a bow tie,
which is almost impossible,
during a take, perfectly.
I am lucky to remember my lines.
The collars, the spats,
the cuff links, the bow tie, the hats.
You dress for battle
in a way that I don't today.
I have a friend, a judge.
His daughter's wedding's in a week.
I'd like to be able to accommodate him and...
The 700 guests.
You haven't stockpiled?
Mm, all sold already. I'm coming up short.
Obviously, there have been many features
set during the prohibition period.
But there have been very few television series
and none which really dealt specifically with Atlantic City.
As the new head of prohibition enforcement in Atlantic City,
I do intend to take my duties with the utmost seriousness.
- What? - That was a joke.
I was joking. I thought you might all appreciate that.
The scope of "Boardwalk" was amazing
in terms of taking it from the beginning
when there was no organized crime,
through when we leave off, the beginning of the syndicate.
There's a kind of depraved warmth
that emanates from the show
and this strange comfort that you find
in exploring this dangerous world
through the lens of these characters.
Most stories will take fictional characters
and have them be the witness
to historical characters
whereas "Boardwalk" does a kind of reverse.
- Meyer. - Nucky.
- Hello. - Been a while.
- A.R.'S funeral. - Sad day.
Rest his soul.
This was a great opportunity to explore characters
that people knew, but didn't necessarily know as younger men.
You know, the opportunity to meet Al Capone
as the guy who's driving the other guy's car was irresistible for me.
I really loved them little scenes where he's at home
with his boy or with his wife or with his mother,
with his brothers around the table eating dinner
and fighting on the floor and stuff like that.
I really enjoyed that.
No, ma, they're horsing around.
What?!
What makes it work for me as an audience member
is that it's not just about gangsters.
It's about a whole world.
Along with all the beautifully presented
explosions and machine-gun fire,
we actually have shown a lot more of American culture,
American history than maybe people have noticed.
The dynamic between men and women
was highlighted in a number of different ways.
I come from a country where women already have the right to vote.
Well, in this country,
we're simply trying to protect women from the hard truths of life.
By denying them the right to take a meaningful part in it?
I would hope that people really appreciate
that world of early 20th century
African-American history that was explored.
How we worked with each other
and how we interacted with the white community.
- Chalky White, the proprietor. - Welcome.
I'ma shout out to chicken bone beach.
My hope always is that we are delivering
smart, dark entertainment for adults.
Thou hast fulfilled the judgment of the wicked!
Part of doing a gangster show,
sadly, is that characters die.
And when characters die,
the boss has to call the actor portraying that character
to tell them that they're written off the show.
I was lying in bed next to my girlfriend at 1:00 in the morning
and I got the sides and I turned to her and I was like, "yeah, I die."
She was like, "what do you mean?" She goes, "does it say that?"
I go, "no, it doesn't say it. I just know I die."
A couple of days later,
I got a message on my phone saying, "can you call Terry?"
And that's the phone call everyone knows.
So I was like, "I definitely die."
He goes, "Mike, you know, it's that inevitable call that I hate making."
I says, "how does he go?"
He says, "trust me. It's going to be beautiful and graceful."
I said, "that's all I can ask."
I think Terry felt worse for me than I did.
He said, "it's just the way we were moving the script."
I said, "okay, thank you. I appreciate it," you know.
And I drank two bottles of scotch and a gallon of...
No, I didn't do any of that.
When I called Bob Clohessy,
who played ward boss Jim Neary,
I said, "Bob, it's Terry Winter."
He said, "oh, I guess I'm dead."
I've always been a little worried that he's gonna say,
"I think now, you know, finally,
it's time that you made this call."
But fortunately that has not happened.
One day I did get a message
from Terry Winter's assistant saying...
Asking if I could call back, and he never called.
And I was like, "oh, okay."
I remember one time I didn't answer my phone
and I get a, "hey, it's Terry. Give me a shout."
And I turn to my wife and I said,
"it's been a nice run. It's done."
Before I phoned him back,
I told my husband, you know, "I think that's us done."
And I think I held the phone, like, "hey, Terry"...
Went in my upper register, "how you doing?"
And I called back and it was something completely...
I think he was inviting me to something.
I think he said, "you know, listen, we'll do a steak."
Why don't we get a steak?"
"Yeah, a steak would be great, man."
"You all right?" "Yeah, yeah. I'm good. I'm good."
I don't think he had any idea, you know, what...
What was happening at the other end of the phone.
I wasn't sure, actually,
whether I was gonna go or not.
I may not be able to be killed by a bullet,
but I could certainly be killed by the pen.
Vinnie Piazza and, you know, Stephen Graham would say,
"well, you can't kill me, I'm Al Capone, I'm Lucky Luciano."
And I said, you know, "until we do the episode where we reveal"
that you're actually an imposter and the real Al Capone comes in and..."
I kind of was met with these blank looks.
There have been a couple of times when I arrived to set
and one of these scripts that I'm not allowed to read,
I'm certain of it, there have been
some dead Mickey Doyles in there that have been rewritten.
Could you ask him to put the gun away?
Please?
The first rule of show business is to get off
the stage while people still want more
and I think we're there.
It's really bittersweet
because it's been such a huge part of my life for five years.
You must please come this way.
You can just feel it in the air on set
that it's, you know, very intense and very emotional.
I am really sad about it,
but I'm incredibly grateful that I got to experience this
in the trajectory of my own career.
I'm gonna miss it. It's been such a great ride.
All good things, you know?
You look up and five years...
Five years of your life. The end of an era.
It's part of your life and it's been good.
Could be worse.
The ability to tell the story over 56 hours
gave us the incredible luxury
of being able to explore our characters,
their relationships to one another, obviously,
and as a storyteller, this is as good as it gets.
- sync and corrections by Zac - - www.addic7ed.com -