We attended a conference call recently with the show runners, David S. Goyer and Daniel Cerone, of the NBC & DC TV show Constantine. Four episodes into season 1 of Constantine the show is really finding it’s feet and just beginning to scratch the surface of the shows mythology. David and Daniel discussed in depth about the progression of the show, whether Liv (played by Lucy Griffith) can or will return in the future, working with Bear McCreary on the soundtrack, creating the show from a fans point of view but for a wider audience and tonnes of other information about Season One of Constantine check out the interview below.
Thanks to NBC we’ve seen both episode 4, “Feast of Friends” and episode 5 “Danse Vaudou” of Constantine which are well worth checking out. You can read our review of Episode 4 here and here’s an interview with the shows writer to whet your appetite. Episode 5 of Constantine shows on NBC in the US this Friday the 21st of November at 10PM and will be released on Saturday on Amazon Prime in the UK.
Daniel Cerone also recommends that you should read some of Hellblazer so you can see how close they are sticking to the show. You can read it on Comixology here
Niagara Frontier Publications:
David, let me ask you. Obviously, you have no shortage of significant projects that you’re working on. What made this the right time and the right platform to be involved in telling the story?
David S. Goyer:
The genesis of the project is that I had a meeting with Warner Bros. Television. This is right after “Man of Steel” had come out and they asked if I would be interested in doing a television show based on a DC property. And so we just started having a general conversation about which one made most sense.
The first character I asked was about John Constantine. I’ve always been a huge fan. I was reading Swamp Thing when he was introduced. And, in fact, I have a letter printed in one of the early issues that he was introduced as a fan, I think when I was in high school or something like that. And there were some sort of legal things to sort out initially and then we start talking about other characters. But eventually Constantine became free and I was really excited.
And the reason for why this is the right time, I’ve done, obviously, in “The Dark Knight” film from Superman sort of kind of the (superhero thing). But one of the reasons why I like John Constantine is he didn’t have superpowers, he didn’t have a costume, and he always kind of (thumbed his nose) at those characters. So it was refreshing for me to tell a story about an anti-hero as opposed to a hero and he is someone who was really damaged and I just feel like he’s one of the great characters of modern literature and, I don’t know, it was a different change of pace
CNN.com:
I’m really enjoying the show so far. So what can you tell us as far as how far are we going to go into the Constantine/Mythos early on? Are you going to introduce a lot of familiar stuff from the comics? Obviously, we’ve seen Papa Midnite. And are there going to be more things like that?
Daniel Cerone:
We’re digging as deeply into the Constantine/Mythos as we possibly can. I mean, in fact, it really is inspiring much of our storytelling. I mean, the episode that is airing this Friday, which we’re extremely excited about, “Feast of Friends” is the title. And that’s a story that’s literally ripped from the pages of “Hellblazer.” It is the first issue from the “Hellblazer” comics and it brings (in) Gary Lester, who is one of John’s friends from Newcastle. And it’s a fantastic story that translated so well to screen and I would urge anybody who’s listening to this to try to watch it before Friday (14th of November) and get people talking about it because it is – seriously, it’s our show at its pinnacle and it just set a bar of everything that we hope this show can be and can do.
But in a broader sense, look, over the course of the season, we’re breaking 17 right now, we have a fantastic ride ahead. Before the end of the season, you’re going to meet and get to know every one of John’s friends from Newcastle that were involved in the sort of faithful exorcism of Astra that, led to the eternal torment of John’s soul.
And so you’re going to meet them all. I mean, look, Papa Midnite, I think, we have now in four episodes. Jim Corrigan comes back for a couple more. I’m reading an outline right now for Episode, 16 that includes Terence Thirteen with…
David S. Goyer:
With Dr. Thirteen from,
Daniel Cerone:
We have Felix Faust. Yes. We have this incredible source material and we want to honor it and dig as deeply into it as we possibly can and at the same time, look, we’re a weekly network show and we have weekly stories and we’re trying to present the best of both worlds in terms of ongoing mythology with the Hellblazer and DC world but wrapped around weekly stories the viewers can hook into.
David S. Goyer:
And I would add one other thing, too, which is we read the responses to various episodes. And I think we have three episodes so far and some people – I know that people seemed to really like the last episode that introduced Papa Midnite but some people said “Okay, so now we know what the formula is going to be week after week and we still haven’t heard much more about “The Rising Darkness” or Newcastle ” Well, you’re about to with the fourth episode.
And we think that’s the right time to do it, we’re not a fully serialized show. We’re kind of a hybrid between standalone and serialize. And we’re going to start introducing more back story elements every few episodes or so.
KSiteTV :
I was actually curious. Are we going to be getting any more episodes that might focus on Chas and his backstory at some point?
David S. Goyer:
Yes.
Daniel Cerone:
Yes. Chas is an interesting character because, when David and I developed the show and sat down to figure out what characters do we want in a continuing basis. On one hand, Chas was a natural because he’s sort of the most constant companion and long living companion. Maybe the only living companion of John Constantine’s. He’s like the muscle and he’s the cab driver and John didn’t drive a lot. I don’t think he drives at all in the comic book.
And so we want to include Chas and he is definitely the strong, silent type, very laconic kind of character we wanted to roll out slowly.
I know there’s been a couple of issues where they dig in his back story but there’s not a lot there. So we’ve really enjoyed Chas. We’ve really enjoyed opening him up. We will open him up deeper, Episode 10. You know, we came up with this idea, this notion because Chas is…
Craig Byrne:
Don’t reveal it.
Daniel Cerone:
<Laughing> I’m not going to no spoilers, promise. But…
David S. Goyer:
Right.
Daniel Cerone:
…let’s put it this way. In the pilot episode, you see that Chas comes back to life. For some reason, people started translating that to the idea that he’s immortal. We promise you he is not immortal.
David S. Goyer:
He’s not immortal.
Daniel Cerone:
There’s a very good reason that he’s coming back to life and the only spoiler I will give is that those lives are not eternal. And we do have an episode that involves flashbacks where we basically tell that story and we get to know more about Chas, we meet Renee and his daughter, Renee’s wife, ex-wife as they’re separated right now and his daughter and we kind of dig into that story and figure out what makes Chas tick.
David S. Goyer:
And I would add to that that I – I think when the first 13 episodes are done people will be surprised at how much background we filled in on various characters and even in terms of the relationship with John and Manny and Zed’s back story and it’s not just case of the week.
Showbiz Junkies
In the first episode I really liked Lucy’s character Liv. I was really into her. How difficult of a decision was it for you guys to not carry on with her story and is there a possibility that she’ll ever pop up again?
David S. Goyer:
You know, honestly, it really wasn’t that difficult. I mean, it became apparent to us and, look, we’re glad you like her. I think she (Lucy Griffiths) did a fantastic job. But I think that the character was flawed in its conception. And obviously we’re to blame for that. She was the only major character in the pilot that wasn’t from the comic books and sometimes you make these concessions when you’re trying to get a show off and running and one of the benefits of doing a pilot is you’ve got this initial downtime after the pilot before you’re filming again in which you can think about retooling some aspects. And once we saw the character in action and we started breaking Episodes 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6, we felt like we were just running into a lot of dead ends. And that’s when we decided to go back to the source material and talking about the character Zed and I will say I feel like that the vast majority of the audience seems to have felt that the Zed character was a better match for John and seems to have supported our decision.
Daniel Cerone:
Yes, in terms of whether she’ll be back, look, she’s part of the foundation of the show. I mean the mill house in which John is crashing and full of all kinds of magical antiquities and that’s her father’s place. So listen, as we dig deeper into the season, as we start talking about possible arcs for next season, there’s – I would say there’s an opening there. Whether it’s an opening we’ll step through or not, it would have to be organic, it would have to feel right and not feel like a device. But if there’s an organic reason to bring her back into the story, we’d love to.
MingleMediaTV.com:
How does the fan base help you develop the storylines you want to produce?
David S. Goyer:
Well, I mean, it’s interesting. I’ve adapted quite a few comic book properties now. And it’s a – it’s tricky because I think you have to be really attentive to the fan base.
What we talk about is – but at the same time – I mean, I’m poorly quoting Steve Jobs here. You can’t give the market what they say they want. You want to give them something that they haven’t even thought of. If you give them exactly what they want, they become disappointed by the same token.
The way that we’ve always tried to measure it is that we’ve tried to dip in with the fans and be aware of what are the issues that are most important to them, what are the core concepts that are most important, with the characters that are the most important. But we are also cognisent of the fact that if the show is going to flourish and broaden its audience, we need to be able to respond to an audience greater than just the core comic book fans. And so it needs to work for both audiences.
Daniel Cerone:
I know I speak for David in this, too. I mean, one of the nicest things this is that David and I came at this as fans of the (character).
David S. Goyer:
Yes.
Daniel Cerone:
I mean, that’s really the bottom line, like, we were – we fell in love…
David S. Goyer:
We weren’t new to the character.
Daniel Cerone:
Not at all. We fell in love with all the things about John Constantine that the fans did. And – or at least based on what I’ve read of the fans. But look we needed that smartass, wisecracking, gallows humor, scruffy blonde-haired, trench coat-wearing, cigarette-smoking breath with a fatalistic attitude and this deeply humanist point of view for reasons that he doesn’t even understand. I mean, we like that character. That was someone that just appealed to us. So we’re going to be true to that no matter what.
And then when you start – and we wanted to stay true to the world and the characters. And then you take that foundation and you have to figure out, “Okay, how can we pour that into a show that can last and sustain itself on a weekly basis” and NBC had certain desires for the show. They wanted stories that were told every week. So as David mentioned before, this is a bit of a hybrid. I mean, for us, it was “Okay, how do we figure out how to both, as fans, tell the story we want to tell about the evolution of this character and his relationships as well as some closed-end stories to broaden out the fan base?” So yes. I mean, we came into it as fans.
David S. Goyer:
And I’ll give you – to build on what Daniel said, because we were fans of the character, when we first met with NBC, we said “Look we know that the Keanu movie is out there and he wasn’t British and he didn’t have blonde hair” and I think that that movie had a lot of great attributes but because we had fallen in love with the John Constantine as depicted in the comic books, it was our mission to try to bring to life the character that accurately reflected the character we had fallen in love with as possible. So when NBC says “Well, does he have to be British? Does he have to wear skinny tie in a trench coat? Does he have to be blonde? Does he have to smoke?” we said “Yes.” And they said “Why?” And we said “Because that’s the character we fell in love with.”
Daniel Cerone:
And I’ll say there every step of the way, they did ask those questions, too, like, they were very open and accepting and loving and they wanted to embrace the fans, too, but at a certain point, like when it came to casting, Matt Ryan does not have blonde hair. And initially, they’re like “Do we really need to lighten his hair” and we’re like “Yes we do.” They got the first draft of the script and they saw sort of all of the kind of British euphemisms and colloquialisms written into his dialog and they’re like “That might be off-putting. Does he really need to be British?” And we…
David S. Goyer:
We said “Yes.”
Daniel Cerone:
…he does. So at every step of the way, we fought for that. And to their credit, they were very open and they understood our passion and I believe the fans’ passion for the character.
David S. Goyer:
But to put a bow on it, how does the fans how does the hopes and desires back burn to it, it’s important because we were fans of the character and have been fans of the character for decades ourselves. So we were really determined to try to bring to life a version of Constantine that was accurate.
TVLine:
I was struck by this, especially in the first episode, but as it had gone on as well, how scary Constantine is as a drama. And I was wondering if there’s anything NBC had asked you to tone down or change in what you showed so far.
David S. Goyer:
Not really.
Daniel Cerone:
Yes. I got the same. And they – it’s funny, Kimberly, because they pushed us not so much anymore now that we kind of understand – and, look I was a show runner the first two seasons of “Dexter.” David has done a ton of feature films where pretty much anything goes.
But we’ve also done network shows over years and we’ve kind of self-censored ourselves in the beginning. And at every step of the way from the network be it in the outline phase of the scripts or the cuts that the network were seeing they’re like “Go further,” like “Push it further” like they – I don’t – I’m not sure what changed the network landscape.
David S. Goyer:
Yes, I don’t know if I could think of any instance in which they said “Tone it down.”
Daniel Cerone:
Yes, there wasn’t one. They have pushed us to go bigger. They have pushed us to go darker. They pushed us to go scarier. There’s constantly – if I had a broader note down to one, it would be “Just make this as big and scary as possible,” like, that’s what they want to see. So it’s been really framed for us. I mean, look, we have to do what we do with them but budgetary limitations and capabilities. But no, they have not censored us at all.
ohsogray.com:
So for Constantine kind of along the lines of what you’ve been discussing a little bit, he’s not like Arrow, he’s not like The Flash, he’s kind of a different kind of hero/anti-hero. So how does that factor into your writing and the portrayal of this character in order to still make people want to root for him? How do you make your anti-hero the hero?
David S. Goyer:
First of all, I would say, I mean, there are heroes and there are anti-heroes. And they’re both a lot of fun to write. But in some ways, anti-heroes are more fun to write for because they’re not bound by the same moral code that the heroes are.
And in some ways, anti-heroes are more human because most of us have variables. Most of us are imperfect. And he’s doing what he’s doing for fundamentally noble reasons but he doesn’t really have a code of conduct.
I do think that audiences also like anti-heroes. I mean, if you look at House, if you look at Luthor, if you look at Sherlock, I would categorize these characters more properly anti-heroes than heroes. They can be fun and different and they’re not aspirational. People don’t want to be them, people want to be Superman. I don’t think people want to be Constantine because he’s kind of a miserable sod. But he’s also fun. And it’s fun to it’s irreverence and it’s just a different way to go.
Daniel Cerone:
A lot of characters that are out there are doing what they do because it’s their job or because I have a badge or because I have a calling. As David said Constantine is doing the right thing but he’s doing it for totally humanist reasons It’s one of those fascinating aspects of the character to me is if you ask him why he’s out there helping humanity, I’m not even sure he can tell you.
David S. Goyer:
Yes.
Daniel Cerone:
You know, is he doing it because he wants to save lives? Is he doing it because, frankly, chasing demons is a bit of a fix for him and he’s just (jonesing) for the next kill? Is he doing it, as he said early in his career, for the women and to get laid? Is he doing it to because it’s kind of self-empowerment? You know, it’s just never really clear.
And what’s great about him is I don’t even think he’s clear. But yet, he keeps doing it and he keeps fighting this fight. And yes, as David said, one of the funest things is that there’s no code of conduct that he operates by. He’s doing the good things that all the cops and lawyers and whatever kind of other heroes are out there doing. But there’s no checks and balances for him. And that’s where he often gets into trouble.
And that – I think when you ask what makes him relatable, I think that’s it because he’s his own he has a self-sense to himself and he frequently goes over the line and he frequently makes bad calls and the fact that Constantine, anyone who gets close to Constantine dies. I mean, that has proven itself true for years in the comic books. Very early in our series, you’re going to see that, too, where he makes the hard calls and he loses friends over it, sometimes literally.
And so that’s kind of his curse and it makes him, hopefully – hopefully, that’s what makes him – it’s easy to vote for him.
David S. Goyer:
I would also add that I think that these things are cyclical and I think that they come in waves and maybe it’s a common – a broader commentary on where we are in society right now. But the television landscape right now is it’s flourishing with the really flawed characters.
And for whatever reason, audiences are responding and fascinated by these flawed characters. I think if you look at the television landscape now, it used to be that there were a lot of – the black hats were the black hats and white hats were the white hats and it was very clear who is who but there are a lot of shades of grey right now and that seems to be kind of what’s happening with the right guise in terms of the role.
Fanboy Nation:
I was interested in finding out how much of the Pre-52 influenced the series as well as the Post-52 and how difficult is it to ride that line of horror and suspense without crossing over to get the censors on your case?
David S. Goyer:
I would say as the sort of the resident comic book nerd, I would say that the show is almost exclusively influenced by the Pre-52, the Hellblazer comics. If for no other reason then Hellblazer ran for 300 issues and the new Constantine is – I know it’s less than 20. I’m not quite sure where they’re at now, 15, 16. They’re just not the body of work that exists in terms of what we’re influenced by.
So without question, and I know this is really inside baseball, but the show is primarily influenced by and inspired by the Pre-52…
Daniel Cerone:
Yes. If I can jump in on that part, David is completely right. We have the whole sort of Constantine cannon at our disposal in terms of storytelling. We do look to the newer issues to see if there’s interesting story ideas for us or stories that we can use or adopt.
But, look, the Web described what we’re doing on the show as Constantine is this amazing mythology. And there’s this amazing character and it’s just like this fantastic car that we’ve been given the keys to, to take it for a spin and we’re doing that on network television. And the writers of the new 52 Constantine, they’re doing the same thing as we are. They’re basically rebooting the franchise. We’re rebooting for television. They’re doing it for sort of a new generation of comic book readers.
So we’re kind of charged with the same task in terms of taking what was there, the foundation of what was there and just try to honor it and do the best that we can with it for our medium.
So yes, it’s all as cool. I mean one of the most fascinating things about Constantine to me is that it was the longest-running comic book series. According to my understanding of any imprint of any comic book publisher in its 30-year run, it was never rebooted, it was never renumbered, it was never reissued. It just stayed in continuous publication as a guy who can – who aged on the page in real-time. And I just think that makes him such a unique character.
And what we’re doing on our show is we’re going back to beginning. We’re basically meeting roughly the same time that you met him in Hellblazer in the very first issue. So our timeline when people are like “Wow,” you know, in terms of the cancer story and all the great arcs that he has we just hope and pray that this show has legs because we’ll get to him like we love those arcs, dangerous habits and all the arcs that everybody else is excited about, we’re excited about. And what’s great is that we’re choosing an entry point where the character is young and all those adventures are ahead of him and we hope to dramatize as many of them as we possibly can.
Fanboy Nation:
How difficult is it to ride that line of horror and suspense without crossing over to get the censors on your case?
Daniel Cerone:
If you read the network’s standards that we get, it’s like “Can we please not hear him urinating? It’s okay to urinate on screen but as long as we don’t hear it.” Or there’s a shot where Zed is like painting this young guy and he’s nude – like a nude model and it’s like “He can be nude but can we see him from the sides so we don’t see his butt crack because it’s like – it’s okay he’s nude but we just – we can’t see the crack.” So it’s – those are the kind of – those are the censorships…
David S. Goyer:
It’s not too bad. Yes.
Daniel Cerone:
No, it’s not at all. It’s not at all.
TV Megasite:
I was wondering since there are other shows where someone hunting demons like “Grimm” and “Supernatural,” is there anything that you do to make sure that you’re not inadvertently copying them or do you have someone watching for that kind of thing or just do your own thing and hope for the best?
David S. Goyer:
Well, first of all, let me just say that, taking nothing away from those shows, I think what’s fundamentally different about our show versus like “Oh, well, just show people the Supernatural” is the John Constantine character. He’s an amazing character.
And with all due respect to those shows, he was around a lot longer – a lot earlier than they were. And I know there’s, some people have said “Oh, this is the character on Supernatural” that character was influenced by Constantine, not the other way around. And he’s been around for 25, 30 years.
So I think once people see a few more episodes under their belt, particularly the episode that’s going to air Friday night (A Feast of Friends), It’s a very, very, very different show than those shows. And I also think there’s room for all of that.
Daniel Cerone:
I will say this, though, as a storyteller, you can’t pay attention to what other people are doing on similar shows. I think that’s where you get into trouble, frankly, because if it’s in your head, “Oh, they did this creature” or “They did this scare” or “They did this sort of legend or mythology.”
You know, then you start comparing yourself and, look, we’re just trying to channel the character John Constantine as clearly as we can. I mean, funny, one of the first shows that I came in on as a young writer was “Charmed” and I spent, like, the first four years of my career on “Charmed.” You know, we’re doing this on “Charmed” before they’re doing it on “Supernatural.” “Supernatural,” you know, “X-Files” is doing it before us. “Buffy” was in the middle of it all. You know, all you can do is trust your characters. That’s, hopefully, what people are tuned in to every week and, within that framework, we try and tailor it, we might do a vampire story or a zombie story. In fact there’s elements of a zombie coming up for us but filtered through the world of Papa Midnite. So it’s voodoo zombie. It’s more old school, raising and bringing, recently-deceased humans back. It’s not the sort of zombie – apocalyptic zombie virus that we’re all accustomed to.
So, we’re always going to spin it through our filter but you can’t worry about what other people are doing and really tell good stories.
Three If By Space.net:
I love Constantine. I’ve been really enjoying it. But I was not familiar with it. I had never heard of it before the show. So obviously…
Daniel Cerone:
Great.
Three If By Space.net:
…I’m not, one of your comic book fans…
Daniel Cerone:
That’s good, though.
Three If By Space.net:
You know, looking at The Devils You Know section of the Web site and that kind of thing, what are you doing to really help the non-comic book fans, how could they best get into the show because you’ve got to have – and you talked about this a little bit before, you’ve got to have that contingent in order to make this show a success on the network.
David S. Goyer:
Sure. Sure.
Daniel Cerone:
Yes. Look, I actually think in the whole wide spectrum. I actually feel like we’re tipping closer to creating the show for the non-fan than the fan, truthfully, because there isn’t a single episode or story we tell where we’re just not seeing down to tell a cohesive story and every week introduce a danger and characters that you can relate to and care for and, at the same time, we’re trying to spin out this, the central character of John Constantine as someone who is full of aches and pain and guilt and torment and is going about doing something because he feels personally compelled to do it.
I feel like everything we’ve served and talked about this phone call is, it is a little inside baseball. I mean, for anybody who knows of this, you don’t have to know of the character Papa Midnite. You don’t have to know about The Newcastle Crew. You don’t have to know about Felix Faust or the Doctor Fate Helmet or any of these elements that we’re using to enjoy the show. I mean, every week, we’re just trying to tell the most sort of honest and accessible and humanistic stories that we possibly can.
But there’s an added layer on top of that for the comic book fan where if you know the world, if you know John Constantine, if you know Hellblazer, if you know some of the iconic images and people on the DC world, it’s value added. It’ll provide that much more entertainment and fun hopefully.
David S. Goyer:
And I would say one more thing let’s talk about, for instance, the introduction of Jim Corrigan, who’s a character the comic book fans will know. You know, the working rule of thumb that we’ve gone by is, as fans, it’s exciting for us to introduce a character like that and we know it will be to the comic book fans but he becomes another DC character called The Spectre a supernatural figure ultimately. But the point is it’s fun for us as fans to say “Hey, let’s get this character in there.” But we don’t want to do it just as a stunt casting and we won’t do it unless it’s organic to the story and we can introduce the character in a way that people who never read the comics will understand who he is and won’t be lost without his backstory.
So we have to make sure that every time we introduce a character or a plot element like that, we can do it in a way that stays true to the source material but doesn’t alienate the broader audience and they feel like they’re missing out or they don’t understand the story because they haven’t read the comic books.
Daniel Cerone:
And, Jim Corrigan is a great case study. I mean, if I can sort of present for an instant how the Jim Corrigan character came into being on our show, for Episode 5 it’s called “Danse Vaudou.” It airs on Friday the 21st of November. We did an episode where we’re like “alright, let’s start it with urban legends”. let’s serve a thematic urban legend episode.
And we basically decided to do three of them. One was like the vanishing hitchhiker. One was the slit-mouthed woman. That’s like the woman who carries a surgical mask in Japan. And the third was it’s the golden paw. What is it? The monkey’s paw basically…
David S. Goyer:
Yes, yes.
Daniel Cerone:
Somebody’s loved one comes back.
So we decided to have three ghost stories and all based loosely on those urban legends. And they all end up being ghosts that are brought to life by Papa Midnite unknowingly because of The Rising Darkness. So within the context of the episode, we realized we needed a cop character. There is a cop that, was coming across various dead bodies that were connected to his ghost. And so we’re like, “All right, we’re going to expose a police officer to the supernatural world here.” And so right away we’re like “All right, is there anyone in the DC world that we can plug into that could, sort of” – again, it’s a value added. Kill two birds with one stone and we thought “Well, Jim Corrigan is this cop, very much like Constantine, kind of takes the law in his own hands, really hard charged, will do anything, for the arrest and he ultimately is killed and comes back as The Spectre character.” We’re like “What if we meet him now as a cop. He can come into this case. He can see those” – you know, we’re sort of seeing like a bit of the origin story of Jim Corrigan where he sees the supernatural world open to him for the first time.
And so, A, we’re introducing Jim Corrigan; B, we’re giving John Constantine a friend of the force for future episodes, and that’s just sort of how that happened. But it came from very organic story, different place. It wasn’t about servicing DC fans. It was literally about just trying to tell a good story.
Derek O’Neill of Gotham TV Podcast:
Another one of the characters for the show really for me so far is the music. Can you have talk about working with Bear McCreary about the inclusion of the Sex Pistols and the Punk music so far?
David S. Goyer:
I’ll start. I mean, Bear – this is the third time I’ve collaborated with Bear. Most recently, he does the score for my other show, “Da Vinci’s Demons.” He actually won the Emmy last year for it.
And so as soon as Constantine, the pilot was going, I think I just said to everyone Bear is doing it. There’s not going to be a conversation. He’s doing it.
Bear is also a huge, huge Hellblazer fan. And one of the things that’s great about Bear is he’s incredibly versatile. I mean, his score for “Walking Dead” is nothing like his score for this. There’s nothing like a score for “Battlestar (Galactica)” nothing like “Da Vinci’s Demons.”
We also used, which is unusual, a full orchestra on the show. A lot of people just go with synths and might have one or two instruments. We have a full orchestra.
And if you want to handle the Punk thing, Daniel, it’s sort of part and parcel. That speaks to a character when John Constantine was introduced in the 80’s he was part of that Punk scene. He used to be part of a Punk band, which we referenced in the last episode and we thought even though it’s bit anachronistic, it would be fun to still utilize a lot of that Punk music whenever we’re using, source pieces.
Daniel Cerone:
But, look, here’s the deal. I mean, John Constantine was Punk. I mean, it’s as simple as that. I mean, he’s – you know, it just so that ecstatic just so embody his, that of rebellious ecstatic, free-thinking completely embodies who John Constantine is and, look, I have a 15-year-old daughter who just – that’s all she listens to is Punk. So, I mean, I don’t even think it’s throwback really. I think it’s just, it’s such a part of sort of culturally now, the music scene and there’s so many shoots off it. So to bring that into the show as a flavor just felt like a really honest thing to do.
Like David said when John left home in the comics in his timeline, I think he went straight into the London’s underground Punk scene and yes, that’s all long gone but that doesn’t mean that, as a character, that can’t be a music and that can’t be his musical style because it just feels honest to who he is. And for us, it’s a lot of fun to try to find cuts that we can use for the show.
Episode 5 of Constantine shows on NBC in the US this Friday the 21st of November at 10PM and will be released on Saturday on Amazon Prime in the UK.
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