← All Of It with Alison Stewart
All Of It with Alison Stewart
'The Girls on the Bus' Follows Female Campaign Reporters
00:23:04
The new Max series "The Girls on the Bus" follows a group of female political reporters as they cover a presidential campaign.
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- [00:00]
Informal Speaker 1
I' ma put you on, nephew.
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Informal Speaker 2
All right, unc.
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Amy Czozik
Welcome to McDonald's. Can I take your order, miss?
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Informal Speaker 1
I've been hitting up McDonald's for years. Now it's back. We need snack wraps. What's a snack wrap? It's the return of something great. Snack wrap is back.
- [00:24]
Kusha Navadar
This is all of it from wnyc. I'm Kusha Navadar in for Alison Stewart. A new TV series follows four women working as journalists covering the campaign trail for president. It's called the Girls on the Bus and it's based on real life political reporter Amy Czozik's insightful memoir titled Chasing 10 Years, Two Presidential Campaigns and One Intact Glass Ceiling. The show centers Sadie McCarthy, played by Melissa Benoit. Yes, from Supergirl. Journalist by day and hero by night kind of echoes here in the show. She's an eager young journalist looking to ask candidates the hard hitting questions while checking her own biases. On the trail, she meets the other girls on the bus. Sadie gets guidance from her friend and mentor, Grace, played by Carla Gugino, a more polished journalist who represents traditional media. There's also Lola, played by Natasha Benham, who's a content creator hoping to break the rules of the establishment. And finally, we've got Kimberlyn, played by Christina Elmore, who is a black woman making a name for herself as a reporter at a top conservative news outlet. The Girls on the Bus releases this Thursday, March 14th on Max, and it's followed by one new episode weekly through May 9th. And Amy Czozik joins us today to discuss. She is an author and journalist who previously worked for the New York Times and she's the creator of the series. Amy, welcome to all of it.
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Amy Czozik
Thank you so much for having me. It's great to be here.
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Kusha Navadar
Great to have you. So in 2018, when you published Chasing Hillary, you talked about your highs and lows covering the 2016 campaign. How do you think the experience of following Hillary Clinton shaped how you thought about your role as a role reporter?
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Amy Czozik
Oh, that's a very good question. In creating this fictional world, you know, it was very fun for me to play in fiction. As soon as the book reached Warner Brothers and Greg Berlanti, we decided, there's no Trump, there's no Hillary in this world. Let's just play in a fictional universe and focus on this chapter called the Girls on the Bus, which is about the kind of found family and unlikely friendships that form among the reporters covering the bus. So certainly all of my experiences from 2016 inform the world, but it was Very fun to play in a fictional universe where we didn't have to kind of relive all of those things. Exactly. But definitely inform the world. I mean, everything from how the bus looked. It's very hard to shoot on a bus. So there were some ideas from production about, like, maybe there should be sofas in the press bus. It was like, no, it has to look like a press bus. So everything from the look and feel press files being, like, disgusting and littered with power cords to the themes that we have about women in power and media and how we cover women in politics, I think all of that informed the world.
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Kusha Navadar
What was the moment where you thought, I have this memoir in my hands. This could be a great series?
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Amy Czozik
Well, I don't think. I thought that. I think that it landed with Warner. Even before I had finished writing the book, I had breakfast with two executives at Warner Brothers and they were intrigued by this idea. You know, I wanted to write the book less of, like a game change, like, here's what happened, and more of a very personal kind of Julia and Julia, but politics instead of cooking, you know, how this woman took over my life. And so it was very personal. And then from that moment, we started to kind of kick around ideas for how to fictionalize it and make it a television show. But certainly when I was writing it, I was just focused on the. On the book. I didn't think it was gonna.
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Kusha Navadar
It was gonna make it to the screen. When you started going through that process of adapting it. I mean, you mentioned the bus, just filming on the bus. It's hard to film on a bus.
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Amy Czozik
So hard.
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Kusha Navadar
Was that the hardest part about adapting it, or was there something else?
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Amy Czozik
No, no, it was a very. It was a challenge. And also, of course, we wanted to, you know, to make a contemporary statement about journalism and politics without living in the real world. So I think crafting that was hard. It was also hard to just. You know, we had a wonderful writer's room in Hollywood. But trying to kind of have soapiness and juiciness within the confines of them being also serious journalists, you know, like, certain they can't sleep together and they can't do this, and they can't really. That was a challenge. And then, you know, we had Covid and trying to. And two strikes. So there's always a big, you know, big hurdle in getting anything made. But we're really proud that it's coming out.
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Kusha Navadar
So in the first episode, we learn about Sadie McCarthy who works for a traditional print newspaper and she idolizes the book Boys on The Bus, which is a book written by journalist Timothy Kraus. This book was about the journalists who covered the 1972 U.S. presidential campaign. What are some of the key insights from this book? How are they illustrated in the show?
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Amy Czozik
Yeah, I mean, so Sadie, I think she does. She romanticizes this era of journalism and both. It's sort of swashbuckling correspondence that wrote everywhere, and they were predominantly men. But I think something that's really interesting is that by the time the girls got this job, you know, the job has completely changed. The industry is, you know, Grace, Carla Gugino's character says in the first episode, this industry is dying. You know, I think that's interesting. And then I also think that they can't do what the boys in the bus used to do. Right. You filed once for the print newspaper, and then you were just hard charging and drinking with the candidates, and now you're filing all the time. You're on deadline all the time. I think we live in a, you know, a world of enraged fact checkers. You know, would that kind of gonzo style of journalism that Sadie romanticized fly in today's age? And I think that's what she's sort of grappling with. It's like, by the time I got my dream job, no one believes what they read in newspapers, you know, and it looks very different. And so I think that's sort of her journey. She starts out wanting to be one of the boys on the bus, and she ends realizing, no, I have to be better.
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Kusha Navadar
There's a clip that. That reminds me of that I love to play right now. In this scene, the Daily Sentinel reporter Sadie McCarthy pleads with her editor, Bruce Turner, to let her back on the trail to cover a female senator who is the front runner among the Democrats. Here's that clip.
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Informal Speaker 2
Now, the newsroom brass is still burned. They worry that you live and write in a more emotional space.
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Amy Czozik
That is such bull.
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Informal Speaker 2
Felicity Walker.
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Amy Czozik
What about her? Aside from the fact that she should be president right now?
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Informal Speaker 2
See? See, there it is.
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Amy Czozik
I'm kidding. Come on.
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Informal Speaker 2
Look, you wanted her to win, and it showed in your work. Hell, it showed on television. I mean, your crying became a meme.
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Amy Czozik
I don't think that many.
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Informal Speaker 2
The media is under attack. We cannot show even a hint of bias. Sadie, you're a great writer, but you lead with your heart, and we need you to lead with your head.
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Amy Czozik
Well, Hunter S. Thompson didn't just write what he saw. He wrote how he felt. He found a deeper truth, which is what made him a Legend.
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Informal Speaker 2
You gotta stop romanticizing the boys in the bus. Hunter S. Thompson was a legend in 1973. Today, he would be an HR crisis.
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Kusha Navadar
We talk about the idea of romanticizing what we take and then what it's actually like in reality. What was the environment and culture of the bus actually like in your experience?
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Amy Czozik
Well, I think that. I think the show really did capture that. You know, we have this perception of, like, the elite media. And yes, the job is prestigious, but it's totally unglamorous. Right. They're checking into a different Marriott every night. They're being thrown turkey sandwich. Is. There's an episode in episode six, it's called the Debate. We thought instead of watching fictional candidates debate, the bus breaks down and these women get into debates about everything. And so it's prestigious and entirely unglamorous. And I also think it's important that the show portrays these women. Their personal lives are like a dumpster fire because they've committed their lives to covering these candidates. You know, you give up your life, you're on the road all the time. And I think that's really important right now to show journalists that, you know, they are fully committed to finding the truth, the truth still matters, and they are giving up their lives to the job.
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Kusha Navadar
How real were the friendships that you show in your own experience? Like, was that the core part where you said, oh, man, these are friendships that I'm going to have for the rest of my life? This is what the story's about?
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Amy Czozik
Yeah, I didn't. I don't think I would have had. I don't think I had exactly the same friendships, but certainly there were people like Andrea Mitchell on the bus. Normal life. I would have never come into contact with her. She became such a lovely friend and mentor to younger women on the bus, and she was such a legend that we often, like, turned to her for advice. Abby Phillip is a. Is a consultant on the show. She was a dear friend on the bus. So I think it was the idea that, like, when you're together and forced together, suddenly you know, you can get past your differences and suddenly just, you know, see each other. And the other thing that was very interesting to tell, to tell writers and to communicate is like, these are women who we shared everything with. They knew about my wedding. They knew about drama. I knew about all their home decorating projects. The one thing you didn't, what you're working on. So it was interesting that we were still competitors. It's like, oh, Annie is my best friend, except she better not be Looking at my screen to see what I'm working on. So that was very fun to play. And you see in the pilot, Carla's character and Melissa Benoist's character are like, they're dear friends, but we're not gonna talk about our scoop.
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Kusha Navadar
How competitive does the campaign trail get among these reporters? And how do you kind of separate that professional from personal when you're just together, basically, 24 7?
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Amy Czozik
Yeah, I think that's hard. And it's a really fun tension that we play with in the show. I mean, you're definitely competing. In episode two, Sa gets really mad at Kimberlyn because she asks an assertive question in a press conference, and then the candidate runs off, and she's like, you ruined it for the rest of us. So those tensions are definitely there. I think what's really beautiful throughout the season, the women eventually have to work together because there is a story so big that it pulls them all in.
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Kusha Navadar
So in the first episode, we start off with a big. But we don't know what happens. And so there's something that will be revealed or they'll have to work together.
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Amy Czozik
Exactly. Yes. And we actually, this was important to me to make it realistic. Cause, you know, there were a lot of, like, maybe they work on the story together. And I was like, no. But we did find, like, the Pentagon Papers, The Panama Papers, ProPublica investigations, times, when the news is of the public interests and news organizations have worked to get that out together.
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Kusha Navadar
You're listening to all of it. I'm Kushan Avadar, and we're talking to Amy Czik about her new series, the Girls on the bus. It premieres March 14th on Max. We're talking about the main characters. Another thing, Amy, that stood out to me was the different reporting styles and personalities of all of these characters. But how they have to find common ground is kind of. You're referring to the character. Lola is sort of representative of new media. She's the influencer journalist. What are the main differences between Timothy Krause's experiences on the bus and your experience on the bus in 2016 versus how journalists report stories today? Because I imagine that the character of Lola is, you know, post 2016.
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Amy Czozik
Yeah, completely. Lola wouldn't. And it's funny because we were obviously rewriting these scripts right up until the last minute. But, for instance, Lola has a very lucrative substack. You know, I don't think that's a word we would even used when we started writing the show in 2019. You know, so this was like Especially Lola was. Grace is sort of like old school Washington Post style reporter. That didn't change so much. But certainly the Lola character, we were like, updating in real time and also seeing more journalists who emulated her and seeing, you know, a majority of young people getting their news from TikTok. So there were all of these things that we incorporated into Lola. I mean, look, the guys on the bus, the boys on the bus had it easy, right? They filed once for the paper, they were done. They called their desk from the payphone. And I also think that they were. There were news outlets, of course, on that bus that sadly don't exist anymore. So the. The. And. And then there are. There were news outlets when I was on the bus. Buzzfeed was on the bus and Politico and kind of news, new outlets then. But I even think in 2016, there was less, like, viral. There was, you know, of course the candidate would be concerned that we caught something and it went viral on Instagram, but it was. It was. I think it was even less than now in terms of, like, TikTok and digital media and candidates going, like, directly to, like, circumventing the press, which Trump has obviously done. And then, yeah, as we were crafting Lola, we really wanted to tap into, like, as Grace says, the brave new world of political reporting.
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Kusha Navadar
When we first meet Lola, and I might get this wrong, so correct me, but does she speak Farsi when we first meet her?
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Amy Czozik
Yes. She's Natasha Benham is Persian, and it was really important to her to have that be authentic to her. And there is an episode in episode eight, she goes home to see her family and they are all speaking Farsi as well. Yeah.
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Kusha Navadar
So that choice came from Natasha. Yeah, I mean, yeah, talk me through that.
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Amy Czozik
Natasha is incredible. I love her so much. We watched, actually, we watched. She sent in a tape to audition, and we literally didn't watch anyone else. Immediately, she cracked us up. She had heart, she had depth. As you watch the show, Lola has a very. Lola started out in our minds like an Emma Gonzales, like, when the media has moved on to the next tragedy. And these kids who got very famous for surviving something so awful, like, suddenly, what do they do? So we thought, okay, well, Lola channels that into activism in the form of journalism. And yeah. So Natasha, when we sat down to speak to her, everything from, you know, Lola's name, Rahai, it became very molded in what was important to the actor in that case. And I think it was really beautiful. I love that she seems like this super fun, independent girl with her vibrator. And then her dad comes to help her with her luggage. So that is all adding, hopefully, layers to Lola. But, yeah, it was important to us and her.
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Kusha Navadar
Speaking of layers, one thing that stood out as well in this is how you were able to unveil what goes on behind the scenes on the trail, while also making it interesting to the average person who's not a reporter, does not work in politics. Where did you draw that line? How did you balance the two?
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Amy Czozik
Oh, good. And actually, I would say Lola is super useful for that too, because she doesn't understand how journalism works. Right. So, like, there's this great. In episode three, they're in Las Vegas and Lola gets invited to be in the pool, right? So she shows up thinking she's gonna be in the bikini, thinking she didn't know what the press. So Sadie has to explain to her. And then she, like, explains to her what OT off the record means and background means. And so I thought it was. It was a great vehicle, her learning as, like the. As a conduit for the audience learning. I mean, look, I think one of the things I loved about the West Wing or medical shows is like, I might not understand what they're talking about, but I know that the characters know what they're talking about. So we did have. Sometimes we're like, you know, people would watch an editing and say, I don't know what she's saying. And it's like, it's okay because she sounds smart and she sounds like she knows what she's saying. But for Lola to help us explain, hopefully taking viewers along into this world.
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Kusha Navadar
There's one scene in the first episode where Christina Elmore's character, Kemberlin, gets a drink thrown on her at a college campus because of the students detested the conservative news outlet she works for. Can you tell us about this scene a little bit? We can listen to a clip right after.
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Amy Czozik
Yeah, of course. So, yes. Christina Elmore plays Kimberlin Kendrick, reporter for Liberty Direct News. And this was a character that was very much. A lot of research went into this character from one of a very wonderful staff writer. Her father was a very prominent black businessman who is not a Trump Republican, but a fiscal Republican. So her experiences, like around Thanksgiving dinner tables, kind of informed her worldview. Everything from that to listening to Clarence Thomas and Condoleezza Rice's memoirs. All of this kind of shaping this sort of black intellectual conservative that Kimberlyn is. The campus protests sort of happened, I think, before our current era where we're hearing so much about that. But we just thought it would be very interesting to have Lola, who's on the opposite side of the spectrum, there to cover the socialist sort of AOC like candidate confronted with this angry mob attacking Kimberlyn. So what do you do in that moment? Lola just helped her without thinking. Oh yeah, your views are completely polar opposite to mine. And Christina Elmore was on Insecure and she is just a brilliant actress and she just brings such empathy to the character. I have some friends who are like, I'm really liking the conservative. I was like, I know. Because Christina, it's hard not to like Kimberlyn.
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Kusha Navadar
Well, let's listen to a clip. In this scene, Kimberlyn is trying to get a candidate who's been nicknamed the freshman, as you were mentioning to answer a question as she's leaving a campus building.
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Amy Czozik
Candidate, how are you? Excuse me. I'm sorry. Excuse me. Congressman. Do you really believe that redistribution will benefit the poor when capitalism has lifted. Thank you. So nice to meet you. Do you really believe that will benefit the poor when capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than any other economic system? Why are you afraid of Liberty Direct News?
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Kusha Navadar
Maybe because you're the devil.
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Amy Czozik
Says the party that's supposed to stand up for free speech.
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Kusha Navadar
Your network's words are literally violence.
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Amy Czozik
Words are not violent. Get out of here.
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Kusha Navadar
In the Girls on the Bus, you talk about politically divisive issues that could cut across audiences. How do you handle that?
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Amy Czozik
We do. One of the wonderful things about putting these arguments into the girls mouths is that we really don't. I don't know the answer. Right. I mean, you saw in the pilot there's this big debate about journalism, whether authenticity is more important than objectivity. These are debates. Both what happened in that scene on college campuses, whether it's that or whether it's in journalism. These are debates that are sort of happening in the ether and we put them into these girls mouths. And it's like every time Lola would make an argument and say objectivity, you know, it only existed when white guys covered other white guys and they had no skin in the game. When you're coming for my rights, it's impossible to pretend to be objective. And like we'd write that argument for Lola and be like, yeah, I can understand that. And then when Grace would say, if you're saying I can't be objective, I can't do my job. And we were like, yes, Grace has a point. So I think that scene was one of those is like. And then I love that Lola ends up losing sponsors and Sort of getting like semi canceled for helping Kimberlyn. And it starts like she starts questioning her mind, she yells at her manager. Black Lives Matter doesn't just apply to people with our same politics. Like I think we're starting to see like Lola's evolution to accepting Kimberlin as a friend and as a human. Not just as a right wing news outlet. But yeah, certainly we wanted to play in those, in those debates.
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Kusha Navadar
It's interesting to bring that up and to mention the West Wing before because you know, some people might describe that show, the West Wing as maybe an idealized version of what it's like to work in government. Do you think the Girls on the Bus is an idealized version of what it's like to work in journalism or a realistic view or something in between?
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Amy Czozik
No, absolutely. I mean one of the things I'm most proud of about this show is that I think it has the trademark heart of Greg Berlanti shows. Right. So my partner in running the show, Rena Mamoon, worked on Everwood, if you remember Everwood, Dawson's Creek, Jack and Bobby. Like these are shows that had had big heart and idealism. And I do think we are idealistic. I certainly think there's no way you can watch our fictional primary and not think, oh, this is, this is an escape. Right. Like it's fun. Scott Foley does a fantasy magic Mike striptease in episode three. You know, it's fun, an escape. And certainly I was actually drawn to the, to the data showing how many people streamed the West Wing during the Trump presidency because it was an escape and I think that motivated us. And there is an idealism I don't think. You know, certainly there are characters and moments when there's cynicism, grace in particular, but that is not the world that we're playing in. I think we wanted an idealism and a hope and an escapism.
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Kusha Navadar
Can you put a finger on what is idealistic about it or what is the if I had a magic wand, this is the way it would be?
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Amy Czozik
Yeah, I mean for one, Sadie is confronted. All she ever wanted to do her whole life is write for the paper of record, for her words to matter, to write something that would live in history. By the end of the season she's confronted with this very antagonistic source who says like wake up Sadie. The truth left the building a long time ago. Right. So she's confronted with this reality that like are we living in a post truth world? And rather than I think saying God, you're right, it's so dark. It's so depressing. The industry's dying. No one believes what we read. She does the opposite. Like, she dives into this investigation that gets her, as you saw at the beginning of the pilot, in trouble with the law. She brings in the girls to help her. So I think there is this idealism that, like, she pretends that that that doesn't exist and she just kind of buckles up to do. To do her job. But there's like, there's a dark turn too. We tried to, you know, there's a dark turn in the presidential race that catapults her into this. Into this awakening, if you will.
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Kusha Navadar
When you think about all the different characters that are at the forefront of this all women, what unique pressures do these women face in balancing their personal and professional lives because of their gender?
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Amy Czozik
Oh, completely. I mean, if you go back to read the Boys on the Bus and it's a masterpiece. But the women in that book are like, picking up their husbands after a long swing in the primary or a debate night and they've got meatloaf in the oven and they're like, they come home and they're like, hailed as heroes who were out on the road. I mean, it's so different. These women's lives are all completely. Their personal lives. Well, Sadie can't even really have a relationship, but she tells her mom, the road is my home. And her mom's like, okay, Jack Kerouac. But she, you know, she can't even have a stable relationship. And then there's like, Grace, who kind of chose the job over mothering her entire career because women in that generation had to choose. There was no. She says to Kimberlyn in the finale, there is no such thing as work life balance. And now she's faced with like, her daughter's in college and like, really needs her. But. But no, I certainly think all of these women face unique challenges that the boys on the bus did not have to face.
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Kusha Navadar
And for you, that's part of your own experience, right?
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Amy Czozik
Yeah, certainly. Like my. And I wrote really, you know, really personal ways about, like, deciding when to have a baby and timing it around the presidential camp. And these are things I don't think meant thought much about in the one.
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Kusha Navadar
Minute that we have about left. What are aspects of this season that you think are most reflective of where we are now in society?
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Amy Czozik
Well, my partner, Reena Mamoun has been inserting women's issues into television her entire career. There was an abortion episode on Everwood when she ran that Greg Berlanti put the first gay kiss on television with Dawson's Creek. And I think there is an episode and one of the characters is pregnant. They are campaigning in a. A state that does not allow abortion, and she has to take a road trip to get her abortion pills. And the only reporter that can drive her is Kimberlyn. And so I'm very proud of that episode. And actually, it was so current that in the writers room, we had to take out a map of the US and say, okay, this state just changed their laws, so she can't drive there anymore. And, like, we had to actually post Dobbs, look at the map and figure out where to set this episode. So I think that is very relevant. And also, by the way, you know, when we started writing this show, we thought, oh, no, well, how is politics gonna. How's the real world gonna change it? Still no woman president, right? So still no woman president. So the themes that we explore that we get to in the finale are very relevant because sadly, still no woman president.
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Kusha Navadar
Amy Czozik is the creator of the new series the Girls on the Bus, which premieres this Thursday, March 14, on Max, followed by one new episode weekly through May 9. Amy, thank you so much.
- [23:02]
Amy Czozik
Thank you so much. It's great talking to you.
- [23:03]
Kusha Navadar
You too. Emline Klein's on the way on all of it. Her new collection of essays explores her relationship with disordered eating and the societal failures to properly address it. She joins me to discuss the book titled Dead Weight Essays on Hunger and Harm. That's next, right after news headlines.
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Informal Speaker 1
I'mma put you on, nephew.
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Informal Speaker 2
All right, unk.
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Amy Czozik
Welcome to McDonald's. Can I take your order, miss?
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Informal Speaker 1
I've been hitting up McDonald's for years. Now it's back. We need snack wraps. What's a snack wrap? It's the return of something great. Snack wrap is back.