Having recently lost his job and his girlfriend, 30-year-old Tom Chadwick has a rather unsure sense of his own identity. But when he inherits a mysterious box of belongings from a great aunt he never met, Tom starts investigating his lineage and uncovers a whole world of unusual stories and characters, acquiring a growing sense of who he and his real family are.
Written and created by
Christopher Guest and
Jim Piddock, the new comedy series FAMILY TREE is a single-camera, documentary-style show in the manner of Guest's acclaimed feature films (such as "Best in Show," "Waiting for Guffman" and "A Mighty Wind"). Chris O'Dowd ("Bridesmaids") stars as
Tom Chadwick in the
HBO presentation, along with
Tom Bennett and Nina Conti. The series also features appearances by Carrie Aizley,
Bob Balaban,
Ed Begley, Jr., Maria Blasucci, Matt Griesser,
Christopher Guest, Don Lake,
Michael McKean, Lisa Palfrey,
Jim Piddock, Kevin Pollak, Amy Seimetz,
Meera Syal,
Ashley Walters and
Fred Willard.
Christopher Guest recently took a break from production on FAMILY TREE, which debuts this spring, to discuss the series.
Q: You are well-known for feature films such as "Best in Show," "Waiting for Guffman" and "A Mighty Wind." What led to your conceiving a TV series?
Christopher Guest: I thoughtabout doing it as a film, but because there is no end to the story, television seemed the right format.
Q: Many of theactors on FAMILY TREE - including
Ed Begley, Jr.,
Fred Willard,
Jim Piddock,
Michael McKean, Nina Conti and
Bob Balaban - will be familiar to fans of your films. What is it about this repertory group that makes you continue to work with them from project to project?
CG: I work with actors who can improvise, and they do it brilliantly. Therefore, the same actors are seen in most of my projects.
Q: How did you end up casting Chris O'Dowd, who is not a veteran of your films, as the star of the series?
CG: I was looking for an actor who was funny, smart and appealing. The audiencemust be able to relate to him. That's Chris.
Q: The premise of the show - a young man investigating his lineage - seems to allow the kind of wide-ranging possibilities for stories and characters that have characterized your feature films. Was that your intent, or will you stick to a tighter storyline than you might in a longer format? Can you talk about the importance of improvisation in this show?
CG: All of my films have an incredibly strict story line. Every scene is mapped out and that is also true for this show. The dialogue is improvised, which is the way I usually work, and I think it results in very spontaneous scenes.
Q: Are the challenges of working in a half-hour episodic format different from feature films?
CG: The challenges I face for television are different from the standpoint of editing. On a film, I take a year to edit. That doesn't work for TV.
Q: Why did youbring this show to HBO? Could it have been staged as a traditional broadcast network comedy series?
CG: This is not a show that would work on a traditional network.
HBO is the perfect place for it.
Q: The exploration of ancestry holds strong appeal for many people, perhaps more today than ever before. Can you talk about your personal interest in this subject?
CG: The search for the details of my own ancestry was the thing that motivated me to do a show around the subject. I have an interesting group of relatives, apparently, and the research continues. The show doesn't reflect my own path, however.
Q: Did you meet with any genealogists or experts in the field in the process of preparing the series?
CG:
Jim Piddock and I metseveral genealogists in London when we were developing the show.
Q: What has shooting part of the series in the UK added to the process?
CG: The first four episodes of the show take place in England, where
Tom Chadwick, our hero, lives. I wanted to show him moving around to different areas in his search. The nextfour shows take place in the United States. It can go anywhere from there.
FAMILY TREE will debut on BBC Two in the UK this spring.
FAMILY TREE is a Lucky Giant/HBO co-production in association with NBCUniversal and the BBC;written and created by
Christopher Guest &
Jim Piddock; executive produced by
Christopher Guest,
Jim Piddock and
Karen Murphy; directed by ChristopherGuest.
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