In “Black Rabbit,” which is currently streaming on Netflix, Jason Bateman and Jude Law play Brooklyn-born brothers who reunite and get in business together. However, the two soon spiral into destructive patterns as they contend with their estrangement. To date, the show has earned nominations at the Golden Globes, Producers Guild, Writers Guild and Screen Actors Guild awards.
Bateman says what drew him to starring in the show, and directing the first two episodes, was how unafraid the writers were to craft unlikable characters. “That is kind of a no-no in network television,” Bateman tells Variety‘s executive TV editor Michael Schneider during the “FYSEE Unplugged: Jason Bateman Retrospective” conversation in partnership with Netflix. “It’s kind of tough to find that there’s no one to really root for in this show because everyone starts so broken and so flawed and so ethically flexible.”
Bateman also managed to get Laura Linney, his Emmy-winning “Ozark” co-star, to direct Episodes 3 and 4: “[Her manager and I] strategized, ‘How do we talk to Laura and convince her to take on the responsibility of directing?’ It is a different part of the brain and you are working, you’re first in and last out, you don’t have days off. It’s a lot and no would have been a very easy answer for Laura. I was really, really happy and proud of her.”
The “FYSEE Unplugged” conversation also allowed Bateman to reflect on his career highs, from his first acting gig on “Little House on the Prairie,” his short-lived tenure on “It’s Your Move” to, of course, “Arrested Development.” Bateman explained how Netflix, which released “Ozark” and “Black Rabbit,” saved the beloved show after Fox cancelled it.
“‘Are you talking about the company with the red envelopes and the DVDs?’” Bateman recalled asking “Arrested Development” creator Mitchell Hurwitz after Netflix showed interest in picking up the show.
He continued, “During the time we were thinking about it, that huge announcement that David Fincher just got $100 million in a two-season guarantee for ‘House of Cards’ was like, ‘Fucking David Fincher is saying yes to Netflix?’ That was just good enough for me and the rest of the industry. And off we went!”
