"Dirty Sexy Money" talks

ABC's "Dirty Sexy Money" was one of several first-season shows that took a big hit from the writers strike last season, both in the ratings and creatively. It started strong, but the strike hit before it could pick up any momentum. And later episodes seemed to slip into a different tone, which ABC execs didn't like. Two were even shot and shelved. But still, "DSM" has a hot cast and premise - Peter Krause as Nick, the family attorney/factotum/whipping boy for the insanely rich Darling family, most of whom were also just plain insane and hiding various secrets. Now Lucy Liu is joining the cast as the show rolls out Wednesday night for its second season.

In Beverly Hills at press tour, producers Greg Berlanti, Craig Wright, Jon Harmon Feldman  and Matt Gross were joined onstage by cast members Glenn Fitzgerald,  Natalie Zea, Blair Underwood, Lucy Liu, Peter  Krause, William Baldwin,  Seth Gabel and Zoe McLellan to talk about the show...

Question: Can you talk about how the tone will change this year, because (ABC Entertainment President) Steve McPherson was saying yesterday that it got a little too serious for him at times last year?

Wright: Right. Well, the show is now a musical. (Laughter.) Sort of a musical comedy, a frothy comedy.

Gabel: And I can bring back the dead.

Wright: I think, you know, to me a lot – the show has always been about ambivalence and ambiguity. I mean, the title is a perfect sort of tattoo of that issue that money really represents — it’s dirty and it’s sexy. You want it, but it creates messes. Right? And I think almost inevitably that meant that the show called “Dirty Sexy Money” was always going to be a very unique blend of tones, and I think what we learned last season is that we wanted to strike – sometimes we would make episodes early on that were a little too — a little too serious without any of the satirical fun and without any of the over-the-top extravagance, and then we would boomerang back and make an episode maybe that was, you know, way too serious without the other stuff, and we go back and forth...

The fictional world exists now. We want to just let the people be who they are. I think rather than sitting with a chemistry set and trying to figure out what’s the proper tone for the show, I think what we want to do is work with people like Jon to find great stories and let the characters be, and that’s, I think, the plan. Does that make sense?

Question (to Liu): Will you be romantically paired with anyone?

Liu: I hope so. I think I’ll be romantically paired maybe with all — everyone that’s up here, including the women.  (Laughter.) It’s going to be a real — it’s going to be colorful. That’s all I can say.

Question: What was the approach made to you for this? Did they lay out the character for you entirely? Or  how exactly did you come into this?

Liu: Well, I got a call from Steve McPherson saying that “Cashmere Mafia” was most likely not going to come back and that he still wanted to work with me and keep me in the family. And I told him that I was a huge fan of “Dirty Sexy Money.” So then he called these guys over here to my left, and we talked on the phone. I mean, they were really excited about it too. So we sort of came up with this idea to work together on the show. So for me it was kind of a really very easy transition because of that because I had been here before.

Question: So did your signing on precede the actual character created for you? Or was there a character presented to you?

Liu: There wasn’t a character. They were very open. I mean creatively, they thought about bringing something onto the show to add a little bit of color, a little chaos, a little — you know, mix it up a bit, and then it sort of was just kismet really how it all turned out, I think.

Wright:  At the end of last season, there were several balls up in the air and issues remained unresolved. So when we started the conversations with Lucy, we sort of laid it all out. I don’t know what the other actors would have to say about this, but I think the life of this show is, I think, kind of unique in the sense that we’re very conversational and collaborative in the way we make the show all together. So we weren’t about
to change that. So we talked about where all the storylines and everything were, sitting with Lucy, and she shared her ideas, and we talked back and forth and gradually realized the inevitability of what was really the perfect fit. So you know, my point is we weren’t handed Lucy Liu and then had to make up a story. We had plenty of stories we had to figure out, and what’s great is she’s such a perfect fit for what we decided to do with her.

Question: For the producers, your show is historic for its inclusion and depiction of a transsexual character. As the show progresses, is there anything — first of all, what is her future on the show in terms of what can she do and what can’t she do? In terms of any restrictions that you would feel placed on you by either network standards or just your audience’s taste for what they will accept?

Wright: Right. I think we’ve — no one has ever — we’ve never bumped up again any resistance about the way we’ve worked with that character. The only bump in the road that ever came up was in the initial pilot where we actually felt we hadn’t been open and affirming, so to speak, enough about her personhood. So it’s like we’ve never met any resistance — the network and the studio and the audience. Maybe people aren’t showing me the terrible hate mail we’re getting about our use of this character, but I don’t think it’s coming in. So A, we’re all for it and no one has ever asked us to do anything but continue doing what we’re
doing, which is use this show as a way to increase a sense of inclusivity — right? — in the world. So that’s the first question. Secondly, yes, you’re going to see Carmelita. At the end of last season, you’ll remember she had vanished. Right? They came to her apartment, and they found she was missing. So when we come back at the top of the season, undoubtedly Patrick (Baldwin's character) will be hot on the path of trying to locate her after a number of troubling months without her, while, meanwhile, his marriage has gotten complicated, and she will return. And she will play a part in Patrick’s public life that will be very, very dramatic.

Question: When you created Mr. Baldwin’s character, did he seem more out there in terms of a New York politician than perhaps he seems now? (Laughter.)

Feldman: I think it’s par for the course now.

Krause (explaining for the slow-witted): It’s an Eliot Spitzer reference. (Laughter.)

Question: It's been a while since you guys have been on the air. What do you
do — even for people who are regular fans — what do you do to remind us what happened and where you are and where you’re going?

Feldman: I think, hopefully, the first episode will allow — it will work for returning viewers, but it also will work for new viewers. I don’t think there is any hesitation. I mean, people who come to the show as if it’s a new show will be up to speed immediately. There’s no learning curve to come back to the show, and I think that will work for — you know, we will very quickly, the audience will be there.

Question: I know you guys shot a couple of episodes that were sort of rushed right before the writers’ strike last year (and not aired). Is there anything you can pick and choose from them whether it’s scenes or stories that you can see through the rest of the season?

Wright: Yeah, definitely. I mean, while some of that material, you know, obviously, like you say, was written in a hurry, there’s some great stories in there and some great footage that we don’t want to waste. So we’re finding places to use it in the upcoming season, and we’re looking for creative ways to make it as seamless as possible.

Question: So there are two episodes that are not going to air?

Feldman: They will exist in some form in the new season, but they’re not going to air in their entirety as they were originally assembled.

Question: What I most like about the show is Nick because he’s the focus, frankly. He is the entry point for the viewers to get into this crazy family. But your cast is getting larger, not smaller, and it’s huge. I was just wondering are you worried about that focus, you know, dissipating over time, because your cast is so huge and you’ve got so many characters to juggle?

Feldman: Well, I think it’s important, you’re right, that we tell stories through the person who basically represents the eyes into this world, so that’s something we’re going to continue to do and work hard at doing. And I think having this wonderful group of actors allows you to tell varied stories and stories that explore different parts of this family and the City and this world. And so the goal is always the same, is to come to this world through Nick.

Wright: I’ll say this, that this season, as a way of talking about what the sort of tone of the new season is compared to last season — I’m not talking about comedy versus seriousness, but that, you know, this season a lot — a phrase we use a lot around the writers’ room and around the show is if you’re going to be part of this family, it’s going to cost you. And I think last year Nick sometimes was dealing with a lot of ambivalence. And this season, rather rapidly, Nick is going to sort of dig into being an active part of this family in a way that he wasn’t last season, and it’s going to happen in a number of very concrete plot ways. So that in the past season a good episode of “Dirty Sexy Money” was one where Nick was sort of given an errand, you know, by Tripp, but now, I think a good episode this season is when Nick is on his own mission up the staircase and into the home where this money and this power and this intrigue is housed, and Nick’s on his own journey. And he and Lisa both are very much drawn in — into the family in active ways. Lisa with her pursuit of her gallery and her dream of being a giant in the New York art world, and Nick on his continued mission to try to locate the killer of his father, but also to maybe achieve some of the things within the family that his father wasn’t able to because his father was crippled by a lack of integrity. Does that make sense to answer the question? I think Nick’s centrality is, to coin an uncoinable phrase, is “now more than ever.” Okay? Cool.

Question: For Mr. Krause, to sort of follow up on their description of Nick’s journey for this season, how do you feel about being sort of the standard bearer for relative sanity in this situation? And do you ever wish that Nick could be a little crazier, or are you having enough fun playing the balance?

Krause:  I certainly enjoy Nick exploring this world, because, you know, he was a part of the family, but he was also the little boy with his face pressed up against the glass, looking into this wealthy family. When we started this show, we all talked about why does Nick take the job. There were many reasons. One was the unspoken desire to be close to the only family he’s ever known, and we never really hit that on the head in the first season. His mother abandons him. His father works for the family. He’s estranged from his father later, and yet he wants to find out who killed his father. Now, the logical set of suspects are the Darling family.

So he’s — without saying too much – he wants to find out who killed his dad even though he’s estranged from his father. He wants that $10 million a year to give away charitably. He wants that extra income he’s going to get working for the Darling family. And in the coming season, we’re going to see what happens to the George family with this extra income. The most important thing, I think, is psychologically that he wants to be close to his family, and I think we have to also remember he is in love with Karen as much as he doesn’t want to admit it. As much as it’s the wrong thing to do to give into that desire, it’s there, it’s always there. And they — and we, I should say — we avoid leaving them alone together except at certain times. And when they’re left alone together, pretty quickly we notice that whatever the job is at hand quickly sort of dissolves and they’re staring at each other.

In terms of the path in the upcoming season, I mean, this is a hackneyed thing to say, but frequently I’d
go to Craig’s office and I’d say, “You know, I know when I came into this, we wanted to make this a
Faustian tale, and I still do.” And I was — you know, I was leery of the soap opera of “Dirty Sexy Money.” Now that time has gone on, we’ve been making this show, I’d go in and I’d basically be saying to Craig, “It needs to be dirtier. It needs to be sexier. Nick needs to have some dirt on him. Nick needs to be sexualized.” And so while I enjoy the ambivalence of what world am I in and how can I maintain my integrity, I think that we need to see Nick give into some more temptation, and that, I would say, is the change of course for the character of Nick, that rather than standing back from it and seeing it and weighing it, there’s going to be a few times when he makes the choice in a direction where it’s going to make him a little dirtier - and it’s going to cost him.

Wright: I think there’s this sort of — I don’t know if it’s the proper word, signatory speech that occurs in the first episode of the season where Lisa says to Nick, “I know when you took this job you thought you could walk this razor’s edge all the time between their values and our values, between their family and ours. But the day is coming when you’re going to have to choose, and I hope, when that day comes, you choose us.” And that really is the story of the season and Nick is much more activated in his — he’s offered temptations more often in the upcoming season, and we’re going to track his moral and cognitive development.