Calls is one of the most fascinating shows I’ve seen in recent years. Thrust into the world of a series of phone calls that all seem completely separate from each other, we’re quickly shown that the world is changing and all the stories we’re hearing are impacted by what is going on globally. It’s a fascinating look at storytelling as a whole and how we consume media, as the show itself is all auditory, with very few visual cues other than the sound waves and what the callers are saying to each other.
Talking with director Fede Álvarez about his work on Calls and the amazing cast brought to the forefront just how brilliant the show itself is, as well as Álvarez’s method to telling this sort of story.
THE MARY SUE: I absolutely loved Calls and was on the edge of my seat after every episode. So I wanted to know what drew you into this format and telling it from an auditory perspective?
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: Mostly the fact that there was nothing like it. Even though Apple approached me with this French format that was basically a Twilight Zone-y series based on phone calls, we needed to create all the stories that were going to be completely new. And we needed to create a completely new graphic language for it. And it’s rare that that happens. When you can go into a show and you can create something where there’s no playbook, it doesn’t have to look like anything else. When you can really create from scratch, it just doesn’t happen. And also coming from movies, you come up with the one concept and you have to stay there for two years with the same characters and the same idea, I think it’s great for me as a writer and director to come up with a lot of characters and a lot of- for us to borrow each one of the stories for each episode, they should feel like an idea that was good enough for a movie. It should have felt that way. Hopefully. So there was a lot of fun in creating something when there was no boundaries.
You know, even the episodes, some of them last ten minutes and some that last twenty. It didn’t matter. If I would have written an episode that was 45 minutes, it would have been 45 minutes. There’s really no restrictions or pre-existing format. It was just whatever we came up with, let’s go. It was great. Particularly working with someone like Apple who allowed us to have so much freedom creatively, it was pretty special.
THE MARY SUE: I also liked that there wasn’t a set genre. Like every episode kind of had a different feel to it. I remember the first two hit me hard and the second one was, I was incredibly depressed after. And then it goes into that hilarious Mark Duplass and Pedro Pascal one where they’re just, essentially, making fun of each other the entire time over money and I really liked how each one felt like its own story but still was connected. Was that hard trying to navigate through all these different episodes? Making them feel original but also still carrying on that thread?
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: Yeah, I would say, definitely. I mean, anything good is hard to do. If it’s easy to make then it’s hard to watch. I think, uh, Bruce Campbell told me that once.
THE MARY SUE: I love Bruce Campbell. That’s the greatest name drop.
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: (laughs) Who doesn’t? But yeah, it was—the hardest part was coming up with stories that were perfect for the format. What that means is that there were not—it wouldn’t suffer because you didn’t see it. You wouldn’t go “this would be so much better if I could see it.” If you think about “It Was All In Your Head” with Rosario Dawson and with her sister and she’s saying how something is happening to her body but she happens to be a hypochondriac so she makes up stuff all the time so you don’t know if you believe her or not.
If I was shooting it, the mystery is destroyed. You’d see it right away. You’ll know whether she’s lying or not lying. Same with the one in the desert that depressed you. Like his family is saying “it seems like every time you go for a drive in the desert something happens and you think you’re still living that day where you ruined your life but your not dude. Twenty years have happened” but maybe he’s not living the same day, we don’t know. But if I was shooting it, you’d know. So that was the thing with the stories. We wanted to create stories that were perfect for the format and not going to be better if I could shoot it. So that was the hardest part. But once we found the stories, and we could plan them and write them, it was a blast.
THE MARY SUE: I don’t want to get into spoilers because this is the kind of show that when you get into the end, it’s just so beautiful. Especially in the time of COVID, it’s very much a punch to the gut. But I do like that it has this beautiful and impactful ending and was that always your intention? To have that moment of, for lack of a better word, clarity at the end?
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: Yeah, I think it was hard to find the right ending. Always when you have a big sci-fi premise that you have to figure out a way to end where you can make the audience feel. But you have to close something without super closing it, without giving all the answers away and I think it’s good. This is a whole show about imagination where you can use your imagination all the time and I think that should apply to the story to fill in all the gaps in the story on your own. I didn’t want to give you all the answers but yeah, I think I’m an optimistic. So that’s why the ending kind of goes in the way it seems to go.
Not even the ending is 100% sure that whatever seems to have happened has happened but I’m a big Back to the Future fan so I like when things kind of end in a certain way. It’s hard to talk about it without giving spoilers away but I hope you felt good about it, that it felt right.
THE MARY SUE: Yeah, I was very surprised because when the information came out about Calls, my editor sent it to me and said “did you come up with the cast” because I’m a huge nerd so I love Parks and Rec and I love Doctor Who and Pedro Pascal so it was very person I love and it was like “here, would you like to watch?”
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: Those are all the people I selected based on the same taste. I should have brought Bruce Campbell, which I was about to do. But I couldn’t. I didn’t have a character that was perfect for him. He’s very specific. Bruce is very specific.
THE MARY SUE: Yeah, you gotta give Bruce Campbell the right character. But so you’ve kind of played in this sci-fi horror genre because you’ve done Evil Dead and now this feels like it sort of fits in that. Because there are those scarier episodes of Calls. And so is that a genre that you kind of flock to or is it just where you find the most interesting stories?
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: I think naturally we all gravitate towards the thing we like, even if we don’t realize that. I think that there’s no…I think it’s like you said, with this show there’s no particular genre. Apple wasn’t saying “We want you to do a horror show”, they were hiring me. So I guess they had some expectation of what I was going to do. But there was no rules, so it didn’t have to be one thing. That’s why we had the chance to play around and, with a common thread obviously with this kind of sci-fi element of it. But then the genres would change a little bit. I always say that I don’t do comedies and then suddenly the Pedro Pascal one was one of the ones I had more fun doing.
THE MARY SUE: It’s so much fun, I laughed out loud multiple times.
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: Yeah, it’s just…the cast is so perfect. Because, again, I think it’s a testament to the stories and the format and that everyone wanted to be a part of it and when we were inviting them, everyone was saying yes. Which is pretty unique as well. Pretty special for something like this to have such a cast. But I think great artists always go for the new and they want to do things they haven’t tried before and they want to do the scarier stuff, creatively scary and just not knowing how it’s going to turn out or what it’s going to be. Because when they did the voice recording, maybe we had some visual ideas of how it was going to be but the show was not there yet for them to know what they were getting into. They just read scripts and said we want to do this. So yeah, obviously, it’s dope that it ended up that way.
THE MARY SUE: Yeah, I think that episode has one of my favorite comedic lines ever because he says like “Is that funny?” and then Pedro Pascal responds like “Well, do you find it funny?” and it’s just like…yeah, that’s great! A perfect line. And just as a final question, which this show specifically and we kind of talked about the ending message and everything, what do you hope audiences take away from Calls when they finally get to watch it?
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: I hope they rediscover the power of their own imagination. It was something that happened to me even when I exposed myself to the first episode. Even if someone tells you exactly what it is and describes it, you go “yeah yeah yeah, I get it. I get it” but when you get through it, you go “wow” and it’s suddenly like something…your brain is tickled in all these different ways and you come out of the end thinking “wow, I feel like I just saw this whole thing.”
But more importantly it will put you through emotions, hopefully, that sometimes a massive $250 million dollar movie won’t. You might watch it and go “meh nothing happened eternally to me” and this show, which is very simple in many many levels and minimalistic might suddenly put you through those emotions you were looking for. And I think that at the end of the day, that’s what this thing is all about. We all chase emotions. We want to feel things, we want to-especially with a show like this, it gives us a range and it will make you feel scared and emotional and it will make you laugh and I think there’s something very special about that. Just trigger and tickle those parts of your brain to make you feel that way and just you discovering and reconnecting to your imagination.
For me, it really put me back to when I would start reading as a kid and you would read three pages and go “wow what happened” and travel to this world after reading a few pages and it was amazing. And then we get used to it and we know how it works but I think stop using imagination that way because TV is so good lately and so big as well, budget wise, that you’re given everything. You don’t have to imagine so much anymore, it’s just—everything is in front of you. So I think—I hope that’s something the audience takes away. Just rediscovering and appreciating the power of imagination.
It’s something that I always felt for me, as a filmmaker is crutical. To be able to picture the things and to use your brain to really enjoy. Just you and your imagination is all you need really a lot of the time. So I hope that’s what happens.
THE MARY SUE: Yeah, I hope audiences love this as much as I did and now, next season, please put Bruce Campbell in a role.
FEDE ÁLVAREZ: (laughs) We’ll have to now.
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You can watch Calls on Apple TV+ now!
(image: John Lamparski/Getty Images)
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