Episode Transcript
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shopify.com/ offer23. You
1:02
seem very earnest. What
1:05
are you talking about? Peggy's
1:09
work at the Globe. That's very important of course.
1:11
But I think
1:13
tonight we should just admire the bridge
1:17
and give thanks for what man has achieved
1:19
in our lifetime. Hello
1:24
and welcome to the official Gilded
1:26
Age podcast. I'm Tom Myers from
1:29
the Bowery Boys podcast and sitting
1:31
with me is Alicia Malone from
1:33
Turner Classic Movies. Hi Alicia. Hi
1:36
Tom and hello to all of
1:38
you fellow Gilded Age enthusiasts. Can
1:41
you believe that we're up to episode
1:43
seven of season two, the second to
1:45
last episode? No. Don't
1:49
worry. There is plenty more to come before
1:51
the big finale. Last week,
1:53
Tom, there was a tense standoff involving the
1:55
striking workers at George Russell's Pittsburgh
1:58
mill. Dashiell proposed... Marion
2:00
in a very public way and
2:02
Luke Forte revealed that he has
2:04
cancer. That was a lot. And
2:07
this week we're focusing on the
2:09
grand opening of the Brooklyn Bridge. We'll
2:11
be throwing a party and watching the
2:14
fireworks with awe and talking
2:16
about this major historical event
2:18
with co-producer Luke Harlan and
2:20
the talented head of the
2:22
Gilded Age Hair Department, Sean
2:24
Flanagan. Julian originally had the
2:26
idea of a rags to riches story for Jack
2:28
and that really, we all got really excited about
2:30
that and then the research team came back with
2:33
a lot of different historical examples of rags to
2:35
riches and there was all sorts of things, bicycles
2:37
and but the one that Julian
2:40
and all of us really found
2:42
exciting was this clock idea that
2:45
Jack could actually invent something.
2:48
This is Season 2 Episode
2:50
7, Wonders Never Seize written
2:53
by Julian Fellows and Sonya
2:55
Warfield and directed by Michael
2:57
Engle. The
3:07
episode begins with Bunting being rolled out
3:09
to celebrate the opening of the Brooklyn
3:11
Bridge. In real life this happened on May
3:14
24, 1883 and Tom, just like we see here, the whole city
3:18
was abuzz with excitement. Oh,
3:21
the city had been waiting for this
3:23
moment for years. Construction
3:25
on what was then called the East River
3:27
Bridge had actually started 13 years
3:30
before in early 1870. So
3:33
for more than a decade
3:35
residents of both Brooklyn and
3:37
New York City had watched
3:39
in awe as this massive
3:41
neo-Gothic suspension bridge rose out
3:43
of the East River. And
3:45
nothing like that had been achieved before. That's
3:48
right. Yeah, it's central Spanish, nearly 1600
3:50
feet. Nothing
3:52
that long had even been thought possible. And
3:55
it also straddles the East River
3:58
connecting two separate cities. I
4:01
mean, yeah, because now we think of
4:03
Manhattan and Brooklyn as being two
4:06
different boroughs in New York
4:08
City, but back at this time, they were
4:10
two separate cities. Yes, and would
4:12
stay that way until 1898. New
4:16
York City was the largest city in
4:18
the US, right? And it was comprised
4:20
of today's Manhattan and parts of the
4:22
Bronx. And it had a population of
4:24
about 1.2 million people in 1880. And
4:29
Brooklyn was the country's third largest city
4:31
in 1880 and had about 600,000 residents.
4:36
So this bridge, which was
4:38
architecturally beautiful, right, and was a
4:41
fine feat of engineering, it also
4:43
literally linked these two super important
4:45
cities for the very first time.
4:48
It created a super
4:50
city, or what Emma
4:53
Lazarus in her 1883 poem,
4:55
The New Colossus, called, quote,
4:57
the Twin Cities. And
4:59
as we saw in season one, Brooklyn residents
5:01
like Peggy had to go back and forth
5:03
across the East River via a
5:05
ferry, which was not at all
5:07
convenient. No, no, and much less
5:10
predictable. Many Brooklyn residents
5:12
worked in Manhattan, of course, but those
5:14
ferry commutes could get really long in
5:17
bad weather or even worse, they could
5:19
stop indefinitely, you know, if the river
5:21
froze. We've seen this
5:23
happen on the show before. Yeah,
5:26
I remember in the very first episode
5:28
of the show, Peggy couldn't cross because
5:30
of bad weather. So she came to
5:32
61st Street with Marion. But
5:34
now this new bridge would make commuting
5:36
a breeze. And the same
5:39
year that it opened in 1883, cable
5:41
car service started whisking passengers back and
5:43
forth on the bridge as well, which
5:45
further sped things up. And in this episode,
5:47
you know, we see the sense of wonder
5:49
the characters have for the bridge. We
5:52
just heard Arthur remark that they should
5:54
give thanks for what man has achieved
5:56
in their lifetime. Yeah. Remember
5:58
last season? We saw Edison do
6:01
the impossible. He brought a kind of
6:03
daylight to the streets and the buildings
6:05
at night. And we
6:07
saw the wonder on everybody's faces as
6:10
they absorbed that change. Well, here in
6:12
this episode, we see a similar
6:14
sense of awe, right, as our
6:16
characters appreciate how nature
6:18
has been tamed and how these
6:20
two magnificent cities have been forever
6:23
tied together. And they're here
6:25
right in the middle of it. And their lives
6:28
are changed for the better because of it. Absolutely.
6:30
But there was sacrifice and
6:32
tragedy along the way. There
6:35
was a sense of tragedy that had been linked
6:37
to the bridge for years. At
6:39
least 20 workers died during
6:41
its construction, and another 12
6:45
died in a stampede that occurred one
6:47
week after the bridge opened. And
6:49
we see, you know, Chief Engineer Washington Robling
6:52
in this episode. But we
6:54
don't see or hear about his father,
6:56
John Robling, who was the mastermind behind
6:58
the bridge and originally designed it, and
7:01
who in 1869 suffered a freak accident while doing
7:04
survey work and died. And
7:07
so the role of Chief Engineer then
7:09
passed down to his son, Washington Robling,
7:11
who had been working for his father.
7:14
And Washington was married to Emily Robling,
7:16
who is a big part of this
7:18
episode. That's right. As
7:21
we heard back in episode five, when
7:23
they were married for their honeymoon,
7:25
Washington and Emily actually toured Europe
7:28
visiting suspension bridges and construction
7:30
sites. A very romantic
7:33
honeymoon. So once
7:35
Washington took over as the
7:37
Chief Engineer of this bridge project,
7:40
what happened then? Well, he got
7:42
right to work on the sinking of the caissons. Caissons
7:45
are the pressurized chambers that dug down
7:47
into the riverbed, right, to lay the
7:49
foundations for the towers. However,
7:52
many of the men were digging
7:54
down in those pressurized caissons, soon
7:57
began getting sick with what was called
7:59
the bend. or caissons
8:01
disease and soon that
8:03
included Washington roblin as well and so
8:06
then just a couple of years here after
8:08
taking over the project from his father Washington
8:12
largely had to remain in his home
8:15
in Brooklyn Heights still directing the
8:17
project but really unable to visit
8:19
the worksite often he would
8:22
then watch the towers take shape
8:24
through a small telescope from his
8:26
home and he really relied on
8:28
his wife Emily then for the
8:30
day-to-day management of the project and
8:33
the whole world was watching including
8:36
the president of the United States
8:38
Chester Arthur who we see in
8:40
this episode yes president Arthur was there
8:42
on the opening day of the bridge May 24th
8:44
1883 there was an elaborate procession
8:49
including 14 platoons
8:51
of the 7th regiment and marching
8:53
bands and dozens of carriages the
8:56
descended 5th Avenue picked up president
8:58
Arthur at the 5th Avenue Hotel
9:00
along with governor Grover
9:02
Cleveland of New York State and mayor
9:04
Edson of New York City along
9:07
with you know several cabinet members and
9:09
city aldermen anybody who was important and
9:12
they made their way down to the bridge
9:14
and walked all the way across to the
9:16
Brooklyn side of the bridge followed
9:19
you know by throngs thousands of
9:21
people and when they
9:23
reached the Brooklyn side of the bridge the
9:25
Brooklyn mayor Seth Lowe stepped forward
9:29
and linked arms with New York mayor
9:31
Edson and the president was standing
9:33
there cheering them on and the crowd screamed
9:35
their approval it was like
9:37
a literal linking of the two
9:39
cities there yes indeed so
9:41
did the president then go to the robling
9:44
house in Brooklyn you know as we see
9:46
in the show well yeah after several long
9:48
speeches had been given on the
9:51
Brooklyn side then the entire presidential
9:53
party moved through the streets of
9:55
today's Brooklyn Heights to the robling
9:57
home on Columbia Heights Washington
10:00
and Emily sat in their
10:02
parlor, shaking hands with the
10:04
president, and countless other dignitaries.
10:07
Yes, and on the show, he's arrived with
10:09
Mrs. Astor along with several other faces we
10:11
know. So, you know, I have
10:13
to ask, in reality, was Mrs. Astor there? Because
10:16
she talks a big game in this
10:18
episode about helping Emily Roebling. Did
10:21
she introduce the president to the Roeblings? No.
10:24
In fact, according to the next day's
10:26
New York Times, that introduction
10:28
was done by Agnes van
10:31
Rijn. What? Wait. Oh
10:33
no, sorry. Just joking. Mayor
10:36
Seth Lower Brooklyn, Alicia, was the
10:38
one who introduced the president to
10:40
the Roeblings. That makes more sense.
10:43
But on our show, Bertha, who is
10:45
also at the Roeblings, watches in horror
10:47
as Mrs. Astor introduces the
10:49
Duke to the president, and she
10:51
realizes that Mrs. Astor has stolen
10:53
the Duke from herself, who actually
10:56
stole him from Mrs. Winterton. This
10:58
Duke gets around. I mean, where
11:01
exactly do his loyalties lie? Right?
11:04
But get ready, because we have
11:06
another surprise moment when at the
11:08
Roebling party, Norman Tate makes a
11:10
speech and invites Mr. Russell to
11:12
address the assembled party, but he
11:15
ends up with Larry Russell instead
11:17
of George Russell. Yeah.
11:19
Larry thanks Mr. Roebling for his
11:21
vision, and then he drops his
11:23
virtual mic by revealing that
11:26
Mrs. Emily Roebling took over this project
11:28
from her husband, enabling the construction of
11:30
the bridge to continue in his
11:32
absence. And Larry asks everyone
11:34
to raise a toast to Emily Roebling
11:37
for her enormous contribution to the
11:39
Brooklyn Bridge. Hear hear. I
11:41
would raise a glass to Emily Roebling. Yes.
11:44
And to Washington Roebling, and to his father,
11:46
John Roebling. And there were a
11:48
lot of glasses raised to them that night. Yeah.
11:52
So we've already spoken a bit about
11:54
the real Emily Roebling. Of course, this
11:56
is a TV show and Larry Russell
11:58
is fictional. speech didn't
12:00
happen. No, there was
12:02
no Larry Russell, but Emily Warren
12:05
Roblin was mentioned in flowery speeches
12:07
on the bridge. The first speech
12:09
was actually given by Congressman Abram
12:12
Hewitt. And in front of the president, he
12:15
sang the praises of John Roblin,
12:17
then Washington Roblin, and
12:19
then Emily, whose name, quote, will
12:21
be inseparably associated with all that
12:24
is admirable in human nature and
12:26
with all that is wonderful in
12:28
the constructive world of art. So
12:32
beat that, Larry. I'm
12:34
so glad that she was actually
12:36
recognized at the time. That's lovely.
12:38
She was. And by the way,
12:41
she also held the distinction of being
12:43
in the very first carriage to ever
12:45
cross the Brooklyn Bridge, like ever.
12:48
Washington Roblin had asked her
12:50
to cross it to help
12:52
understand how trotting horses affected
12:54
the bridge. And turns out
12:56
they're not a big deal. Luckily. But
12:59
a little bit later, Larry approaches Mrs.
13:01
Roblin, who predicts that they will print
13:03
that I was a wonderful wife who
13:06
served her husband to the best of
13:08
abilities. They will ignore the true nature
13:10
of my contribution. So
13:13
how was she talked about in
13:15
newspapers and in the press at
13:17
the time? Well, the day before the bridge opened,
13:19
on May 23rd, the New
13:21
York Times published an amazing article
13:24
titled Mrs. Roblin's Skill, How the
13:26
Wife of the Brooklyn Bridge Engineer
13:28
Has Assisted Her Husband, which
13:31
went on to actually claim that she had
13:33
functioned basically as its chief engineer.
13:36
Well, so she was really the chief
13:39
engineer. Well, like
13:41
most things in history, defining her
13:43
exact role is complicated. In
13:46
the 2017 biography of Washington
13:48
Roblin, chief engineer, author
13:51
Erica Wagner lists this
13:53
remarkable day-to-day list of
13:55
responsibilities that Emily was
13:57
charged with, but maintain...
14:00
pains that Washington, quote,
14:02
while he was badly affected by his
14:04
sickness, his mind was as sharp as
14:07
ever, and he was never not in
14:09
control of the work. And yet, Emily
14:12
wrote later in 1898 to her
14:14
son John that quote, but
14:16
for me, the Brooklyn Bridge would never have
14:18
had the name of Robling in any way
14:20
connected with it. Your father was for years
14:23
dead to all interest in
14:25
that work. Hmm. Well,
14:27
yeah, that really does sound complicated. Very
14:31
complicated. However you want to define
14:33
her role, I think that everybody
14:35
agrees that Emily was
14:37
absolutely vital to the bridge's completion.
14:40
And she would get more recognition over the
14:42
years. You can find her name on a
14:45
plaque dedicated to the builders of the bridge
14:47
and the South Tower that was placed in
14:49
1951. And in
14:51
2018, a part of Columbia Heights near
14:54
the old Robling home was renamed
14:56
Emily Warren Robling Way. Oh,
14:59
good. Okay, so let's switch back
15:01
to New York now, because Borden
15:03
asks Mrs. Bruce if she would
15:06
like to join him to watch
15:08
the fireworks. As he says, the
15:10
paper has noted this will be
15:13
the largest fireworks display ever. Yeah,
15:16
indeed. I mean, crowds were gathering
15:18
on both sides of the river
15:20
on balconies, on rooftops, packed
15:22
into the streets and boats on the river. Anywhere
15:25
they could see the bridge. And even here,
15:27
it's on mansions. And this
15:29
is developing into a sweet little
15:31
romance, isn't it? Yeah, I mean,
15:33
I have to say, I like them together.
15:35
It's quite sweet. And we
15:37
see here the crowd gathering ready to
15:39
watch the fireworks. I mean, this really
15:42
must have been an unforgettable evening for
15:44
both New Yorkers and for Brooklynites. Unforgettable.
15:47
The New York Times wrote that the
15:49
first rockets shot up at 8 p.m.
15:52
from the center of the bridge and
15:54
lit the sky for a full hour
15:56
ending at 9 p.m. when quote, 500
16:01
rockets illuminated the sky. The
16:03
riverfront was one blaze of
16:05
light. That must have been
16:07
beautiful. And now we'll
16:09
have to go back to the drama
16:12
with Mrs. Astor and Bertha because Mrs.
16:14
Astor's Duke stealing was in retaliation for
16:16
something that happened earlier on in this
16:19
episode. Mrs. Astor pulled a
16:21
lot of strings and pushed others
16:23
aside to offer Mrs. Russell
16:25
her own box at the Academy, which is
16:27
what she always wanted. But
16:29
Tom, this feels like a bit of
16:31
a last ditch attempt for Mrs. Astor
16:34
to ruin the Metropolitan's opera's plans. Yeah,
16:36
there's something a little desperate, right, about
16:39
how obvious Mrs. Astor's plan is
16:41
here. When George and
16:43
Bertha are talking about it later, George
16:45
tells her to not even consider the
16:48
offer. I like how he
16:50
called the Academy, quote, too
16:52
small and unambitious. And
16:54
you know, I mean, let's face it, Bertha
16:56
ain't unambitious. Exactly.
16:59
And Mrs. Astor is so sure
17:01
that Bertha will say yes, that
17:04
in front of all the women
17:06
attending Aurora Fain's charity meeting, she
17:08
announces that Bertha now has a
17:10
box at the Academy, which confuses
17:12
everyone until Bertha clears things up. I'm
17:15
sorry, but I've thought about it and I
17:17
want to stay loyal to the map. You'll regret
17:19
it. In fact, I
17:23
feel sorry for you making a fool of
17:25
yourself in public like this. It was
17:27
you who decided to do it in front of an audience. Because
17:29
I could not have imagined you to be
17:31
so deluded as to turn me
17:33
down. Good day, Mrs.
17:35
Fain. But we
17:37
haven't started the meeting. Well, I cannot stay.
17:40
Can someone fetch my carriage? Of course. Mrs.
17:44
Astor, I'd hate to embarrass you. That's the
17:46
last thing I would want to do. I
17:49
really have a funny way of showing it. OK,
17:54
something surprised me here. When
17:56
Bertha said, I hate to
17:58
embarrass you. I thought that Mrs.
18:01
Astor would shoot back with something sassy,
18:03
but instead she says, well, you have a funny
18:06
way of showing it. And
18:08
I realized, wow, Mrs. Astor was actually
18:10
a little bit vulnerable. Yeah,
18:13
she, she definitely looked hurt and, you
18:15
know, a little embarrassed. And Bertha's way
18:17
of saying no was, was rude, but
18:19
I do think she's made the right
18:22
choice in sticking with the met. Yeah.
18:25
Even if this made everybody uncomfortable.
18:27
Did you notice Mamie Fish staring
18:30
inside her teacup? I mean,
18:32
even she was speechless. And
18:34
that's tough, you know, to make Mamie Fish
18:37
speechless. But I'm
18:39
curious, you know, Tom, what would you
18:41
have done if you were in this
18:43
predicament? Would you risk being at a
18:45
new upper house or would you, you
18:47
know, switch to the tried and true
18:50
academy? I might have tried to
18:52
get boxes at both of them
18:54
and then hide it from Mrs. Astor. And what
18:56
about you, Alicia? Where would you go? I
18:59
think I would stay at the Met
19:02
and, you know, just incur the wrath
19:04
of Mrs. Astor because
19:06
the Met seemed more modern and kind
19:09
of like a progressive choice. Yeah.
19:12
And definitely less stuffy. That's
19:14
right. Well, speaking of
19:16
taking a stand, in the last
19:18
episode, George stopped the National Guard
19:21
from firing on his striking workers.
19:23
And in this episode, we hear
19:25
that he's agreed to several of
19:27
their demands, safeguards, medical care, a
19:30
children's park and a pay rise.
19:32
And Clay is disgusted. But
19:35
George reassures him that it's all
19:37
part of this master plan to
19:39
divide the workers between skilled tradesmen
19:42
and unskilled laborers and in many
19:44
cases, then dividing between the native
19:46
born against the immigrants. He's
19:49
just going to pit everyone against
19:51
each other. And Bill Henderson is
19:53
on to him. George shakes hands
19:55
with Henderson. They have their photographs
19:57
taken together. But Henderson says the
19:59
only reason... and he accepted this deal
20:01
was because George stood up for the workers
20:03
when they could have been fired upon. And
20:06
Tom, during all of this, George
20:08
mentions the railway strikes of 77.
20:10
What happened then? Well,
20:14
that strike was massive. It
20:16
was the nation's first large-scale
20:18
industrial strike, and it
20:20
lasted six weeks. It involved about
20:22
100,000 workers on strike across the
20:24
country. And during the
20:26
strike, in July, militia men opened
20:29
fire on strikers around the country,
20:31
killing more than 100 people. A
20:35
federal judge then ordered national
20:37
troops to protect the railroads,
20:40
and the fight went all the way to
20:42
the top, as President Hayes called
20:44
in the U.S. military to end the
20:46
strike. Well, that sounds
20:48
really dangerous and violent. And
20:51
very dramatic. And later we see
20:53
how angry the other industrial titans are
20:55
that George has gone out on his
20:57
own and made this deal. You know,
20:59
they feel as if they've been forced
21:02
into following suit. Yeah.
21:04
Well, it's clear that George Russell plays by
21:06
his own rules. Yes,
21:08
he does. And so now let's take
21:10
a trip downstairs, because Banister has organized
21:12
a meeting for Jack with Mr. Shubit,
21:15
who is the secretary of the Watchmakers
21:17
Association of the City of New York.
21:19
Or, you know, Tom, why don't you
21:22
give us the German name? I
21:25
think you mean Alicia the Urmacherwein der
21:27
Stappen, New York, which
21:29
had been founded in New York in 1866 by
21:31
German-born watchmakers. Yeah,
21:35
thanks for that, my Germans. A little rusty. But
21:39
anyway, Mr. Shubit is impressed
21:41
with Jack's work. And later
21:43
Jack receives a letter inviting him
21:45
to be a member of the
21:47
Association, which means, Tom, he can
21:49
proceed with his patent. I love
21:51
it when Jack gets mail. It's always,
21:53
you know, interesting. The mailman
21:55
does this little, this one's for
21:58
you move, you know, and Jack rips in. to
22:00
it like a kid opening up a college admission letter.
22:03
And he's thrilled, you know? And
22:05
he brings, let's face it, this episode of
22:08
Jolt of Good News. He does,
22:10
and there is another piece of
22:12
good news though. Over the road
22:14
at the Russells, Watson gets a
22:16
visitor, his daughter Flora McNeil. So
22:19
just to recap what we've seen this
22:21
season with Watson and the McNeals. After
22:24
Mr. Robert McNeil learnt that his
22:26
wife's father is now a valet,
22:28
he made Watson an offer
22:30
that he would pay him a
22:32
pension on the condition that Watson
22:34
moves to California and never tries
22:36
to see his daughter or grandchildren
22:38
ever again. Which, come on, let's face
22:41
it, it's terrible, right? Or
22:43
is it somehow generous? I
22:46
mean, it sounds terrible to me, although on
22:48
the other hand, I mean, it's an offer
22:51
to live rent free with a manservant in
22:53
San Francisco. So
22:55
yeah, Watson is conflicted. But
22:58
Church tells him to wait and
23:00
hear from his daughter in person, you know, just
23:03
to make sure that this is really what she
23:05
wants. And so finally Flora arrives
23:07
to speak to her father. And as
23:09
it turns out, she doesn't want him
23:11
to be sent away. She wants Watson
23:13
to be in her life and her
23:16
children's life. But she does request that
23:18
he leave his job at the Russells
23:20
to live as the retired banker, Mr.
23:22
Collier. Which is after all his real name.
23:25
But wow, what a whirlwind. And I
23:27
found this scene, you know, between father
23:29
and daughter to be quite poignant. I
23:31
mean, they were tucked down there in
23:34
Church's office, especially when she says to
23:36
him, we'll be all right, you
23:39
and me. You know, and then
23:41
Watson tells the others afterwards, it
23:43
seems I'm to have a life
23:45
after all. Yeah, that was sweet. You
23:48
saw a real sense of hope on
23:50
Watson's face. And this brings
23:52
to an end the whole mystery surrounding Watson.
23:54
I didn't know what to think of him
23:57
in season one. Remember when he was standing
23:59
outside Flora's? house just trying to catch
24:01
a glimpse of her. But this
24:03
dedication to her and the life
24:05
he's made for himself away from
24:08
her warmed me to him.
24:10
I was so relieved that Flora wants
24:12
her father in her life and
24:14
Borden and Mrs. Bruce are also very
24:16
happy for him. Yeah, it's been nice
24:18
watching their friendship develop, all three
24:21
of them. You know, I feel
24:24
like Watson is going to really be missed. Okay,
24:27
well, let's go to the Scots now
24:29
because they are continuing their push to
24:31
stop the black schools in New York
24:33
from being closed by the Board of
24:35
Education. Mr. Fortune is there
24:37
and reassures the crowd at their meeting
24:39
that the Globe will publish articles praising
24:42
the teachers, though they worry that won't
24:44
be enough. As Sarah Garnett points out,
24:46
to keep the schools open, they need
24:49
to increase the numbers of their pupils
24:51
and specifically, they need to involve white
24:53
students so that the board actually cares.
24:56
Some parents are upset about the
24:58
idea of desegregation, which from what I
25:00
understand, Tom, is true to what actually
25:03
happened. Yes, in real life, as
25:05
we mentioned last week, New York State
25:07
was preparing in the 1880s to
25:10
integrate these segregated black schools into
25:13
the city school system. And
25:16
this was controversial, even with black
25:18
parents, you know, some
25:20
of whom were wary of sending
25:22
their children to integrated schools. How
25:25
would their children be treated? Right? Maybe it
25:27
was safer to keep them
25:29
at a black school where they didn't
25:32
run the risk of being talked down
25:34
to or disrespected by their teachers or
25:36
their classmates. So, yeah, some
25:38
parents and teachers were asking if they could
25:40
at least preserve some
25:42
of these black schools, give
25:45
them an option. And in this
25:47
episode, there's a realization that they
25:49
may need to enlist the help
25:51
of white teachers, which gives Peggy
25:53
an idea, the idea of involving
25:55
Marion. Marion speaks at a board
25:57
meeting, lending her support to the
25:59
courts. and Mr. Patrick Ryan, an
26:01
unemployed teacher of Irish heritage, says
26:03
he would like to join them.
26:06
And then Tom, amongst all of this, Dorothy
26:08
remains concerned about Peggy's relationship with Mr.
26:11
Fortune, and Peggy is also a little
26:13
worried when they share a toast, declaring
26:15
down with the Board of Education, and
26:18
the chemistry between them is bubbling.
26:21
Yeah, they both clearly admire
26:24
each other, you know, professionally and
26:27
personally, obviously. And
26:29
when Peggy drops something on the ground, and
26:31
she's leaving, and voila, you know, the two
26:33
of them wind up in this very kissable
26:36
position, Peggy actually
26:39
squirms away. You know, I feel like
26:41
in this scene, Peggy could hear her mother's
26:43
voice, you know, and Peggy decides to
26:45
get herself out of there. Yeah,
26:47
she's tempted, but she resists. And
26:50
okay, Tom, I've been putting
26:52
off talking about the next storyline, but there's
26:55
no way around it. We have
26:58
to get to Reverend Luke Forte's
27:00
story, really the end of Reverend
27:02
Luke Forte's story. At
27:04
a luncheon celebrating Marion and
27:06
Dashill's engagement, Luke collapses, and
27:09
Agnes insists that they set up a bed
27:11
for him. And Agnes calls for
27:13
the family doctor, Dr. Lewis, who
27:16
admits to Ada and Agnes that
27:18
Luke is in really bad shape, and
27:21
shouldn't leave the Van Ryn house. When
27:24
Luke wakes up, he sees Agnes
27:26
by his side reading the Bible.
27:28
And here we have another touching
27:30
moment, right, between Agnes and Luke.
27:32
When Luke tells Agnes that he now
27:35
thinks that he was selfish to marry Ada
27:37
at his age, Agnes disagrees with
27:39
him. Yeah, she has really
27:41
changed her tune since their wedding announcement,
27:43
and has seen how much happiness and
27:46
love that Luke has brought to Ada's
27:48
life, although his life will
27:50
be short. He has changed Ada
27:52
forever. And he asks Agnes
27:54
to look after Ada, to which she replies,
27:57
Well, of course I'll help her. She's my
27:59
little friend. sister. I mean this is
28:01
a lovely scene. Agnes is
28:03
still the big sister. She
28:06
even tells Luke to go back to sleep. They
28:08
somehow find a way to have a little chuckle
28:11
together before Agnes pauses and
28:13
you see her take the whole thing
28:15
in. It's quite a moment. Later,
28:17
the church curate, Timothy, arrives to
28:19
pray with the whole group and
28:22
starts crying. He obviously
28:24
cares deeply about Luke and I was
28:26
wondering, you know, what is a curate?
28:29
I have no idea. What do they
28:31
do? Well, in the
28:33
Episcopal Church, a curate is an
28:35
assistant to the priest or the
28:37
rector. Remember that it was Timothy
28:39
who married Luke and Ada. And
28:41
so while everyone else is out partying
28:43
for the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge,
28:46
Ada keeps vigil at his bedside and
28:48
gives Luke permission to let go. Hi.
28:54
My darling, it's
28:58
all right if you go now.
29:05
I'll be fine. Being
29:08
loved by you has made me strong. Thank
29:12
you. For
29:15
what? For
29:18
loving me back. How
29:22
could I not? It's
29:26
so tender and sad. So
29:30
sad. Yeah, I still can't believe that
29:32
we're losing Luke. We only just got
29:34
him. Yeah, it's not what anybody expected,
29:36
including us, you know, the audience. But
29:40
it also underscores that these were volatile
29:42
times at all levels of
29:44
society. And as this incredibly sad
29:46
situation is playing out, we're also
29:48
watching the Brooklyn Bridge festivities, you
29:50
know, the parties and the fireworks
29:52
filling the sky and the exuberance
29:54
and hope and life, all
29:57
of it playing out at the same time. But
30:00
Ada is consumed with sadness, you know,
30:02
keeping watch over her dying husband. By
30:04
the way, in fact, there is a
30:06
very memorable moment when a shot of
30:08
the fireworks dissolves into
30:10
Luke's bedroom. You know, we
30:13
literally are going from
30:15
life to death in one second. It's
30:18
poetic. And, you know, the moment that
30:20
really kills me is when Ada wakes
30:22
up to find that Luke has passed
30:25
and she leaves the room collapsing into
30:27
Agnes's arms. No words are spoken.
30:30
Everyone is distressed, including Marion, who
30:32
bumps into Larry arriving home after
30:34
the Brooklyn Bridge party. He
30:36
offers to take Marion on a walk and, you
30:39
know, whenever I see these guys together, I
30:41
just think I like them. They
30:44
work. Yeah. And
30:46
here he is showing himself to be a really good friend.
30:49
It also struck me that this scene
30:51
starts with Dashal leaving, you
30:54
know, and with Marion holding everything
30:56
in. But when she
30:58
sees Larry and starts talking to him, she
31:00
opens up and she actually cries. They
31:02
have an honesty in their
31:05
friendship. It's a real bond. That's
31:08
so true. And there was one
31:10
member of the Van Rijn household who
31:12
missed both Luke's passing and the opening
31:14
of the bridge, Oscar.
31:17
He bumps into George Russell on the
31:19
street. He says he hopes things won't
31:22
be awkward between them. Oscar seems to
31:24
believe that he's shown up George Russell,
31:26
that the company he invested in has
31:28
outbid George's company. And perhaps,
31:30
you know, he's hoping that George would now
31:32
second guess turning Oscar down as a prospective
31:35
husband for Gladys. But
31:37
poor Oscar, George kind of looks at
31:39
him like he's crazy. He's
31:41
never heard of Castor Bridge Pacific Company
31:43
and says that if he hasn't heard
31:46
of them, they mustn't be
31:48
of any consequence. Oscar
31:50
immediately rushes over to Mr. Crowther's
31:52
office, barges in past a lonely
31:55
security guard, only to
31:57
find the office empty. spooky
32:00
Twilight Zone empty. Yeah,
32:02
and you know, very quickly Oscar realizes
32:04
that he's been had. And
32:06
when he goes to talk to more beaten,
32:09
she's disappeared. Oscar has
32:11
lost his entire family's
32:13
fortune. And Tom more beaten
32:15
was not who she said she was. She was
32:17
a con artist. Such a
32:20
good twist. This you know, this
32:22
was a wild couple of minutes
32:24
and quite a reveal. And it's
32:26
based on fact. What do you mean?
32:28
Well, Maude was based on a few famous
32:30
female con artists of the day. Most
32:34
notably on Cassie Chadwick, who
32:37
really conned a list of bankers
32:39
into giving her millions of dollars
32:41
because she very effectively played the
32:43
part of a glamorous society woman
32:47
who had a secret. She
32:49
was, she whispered, the illegitimate
32:51
daughter of Andrew Carnegie. And
32:53
also just like the rumors that
32:55
you know, Maude was Jay Gould's
32:57
daughter. Exactly. Yeah. I
33:00
just finished a new biography of Cassie that
33:02
came out last year called Greed in the
33:05
Gilded Age by William Elliot Hazelgrove. And
33:08
the author really underscores how
33:10
relatively easy it was for people to
33:13
construct brand new identities for themselves at
33:15
this time. No social media.
33:19
It had its benefits. Yes. People
33:22
were untrackable. And like Maude, Cassie
33:24
was brilliant. And she had this
33:27
alluring quality that seems to have
33:29
made men, in this case bankers,
33:32
believe her and write her checks, you
33:35
know, just believing that Carnegie's fortune was
33:37
always right behind her, which
33:39
of course it wasn't. Very similar
33:41
to here. And you know, Paul Oscar
33:43
is devastated. He visits John Adams and
33:45
he tells John that he'll report this
33:48
to the police, but that it's unlikely
33:50
he'll be able to prove that a
33:52
crime has been committed. So
33:54
do you think there would have been any
33:56
type of legal action that Oscar could have
33:58
taken to get it? his money back? Well
34:01
if Maud was anything like Cassie, that
34:04
money had probably been spent. Right,
34:06
and the Van Rinds have really
34:08
suffered. This is not long after
34:10
Lucas passed away and Oscar arrives
34:12
back home to deliver the news
34:14
to Agnes. He tells her that
34:16
he invested their money in a
34:18
company that doesn't exist and that
34:20
more beaten also doesn't exist. Agnes
34:23
stares at him in disbelief.
34:27
Go and get our money back. I can't. There's
34:31
no recourse. The money is gone and
34:33
so is she. How
34:35
much did you lose? Nearly
34:39
all of it. You've
34:45
just got a feel for Oscar here. He has
34:47
been duped and now he has to sit there
34:50
in front of Agnes and the rest of them.
34:52
I mean he is
34:54
humiliated. Yeah, I mean Oscar
34:56
made a poor decision but he liked Maud
34:58
and so essentially he lost all of his
35:00
money and his second
35:03
chance at marriage in one fell
35:05
swoop. It's brutal. And
35:07
I have to say I really liked the music
35:09
in this scene because it creeps
35:11
up and it feels haunting underneath
35:13
Oscar's reveal. It's just like building
35:16
and building to the end of
35:18
the episode. And what an
35:20
episode. I mean that was a
35:23
big, big episode. I have so
35:25
many questions for our special guests.
35:27
Oh, me too. So join us
35:30
here on the official Gilded Age
35:32
podcast as we chat to co-producer
35:34
Luke Harlan and the head of
35:36
hair, Sean Flanagan. Well,
35:53
Mr. Trotter, I will
35:55
see what I can do in terms of your membership. My
35:58
membership, sir. of the
36:00
Urmakavreinde Stadt, New York. You
36:03
clearly know more about clocks than many of our
36:05
members. Hooray
36:07
Jack! Let's give that moment
36:09
some tiny applause. Welcome
36:12
back to the official Gilded Age podcast.
36:14
I'm Alicia Malone with Tom Myers and
36:17
Tom Jack is now a member of
36:19
the the Urmak, the Urmak, I don't
36:21
know how do you say it, the
36:23
clock, the clockmaker. You mean
36:26
the Urmakavreinde Stadt, New York
36:28
Alicia? Yes very well done. Well
36:30
our guests will be able to fill
36:33
us in on the kind of research
36:35
that went into Jack's storyline plus the
36:37
Brooklyn Bridge scenes and all of the
36:39
incredible hair we see on the women
36:42
of the show. They are Luke Harlan
36:44
and Sean Flanagan. Luke is a director
36:46
and producer for film television and theatre
36:48
and as the co-producer of the Gilded
36:51
Age he's responsible for overseeing all of
36:53
the storylines and the team of historical
36:55
researchers and Sean is the head of
36:58
the hair department on the Gilded Age,
37:00
a very big job and he's been
37:02
working in the hair department of films
37:04
and television shows for over 20 years.
37:06
You may have seen his work on
37:08
Mad Men, Rock of Ages and The
37:10
Irishman among others. Luke
37:12
Harlan and Sean Flanagan, thank you so
37:15
much for joining us today. You're
37:17
welcome. Thank you for having us. I
37:19
get to do this with Luke, I'm so excited. And
37:24
Luke we just want to thank you for
37:26
being a friend to this show. I know
37:28
you and Tom have been in touch over
37:30
the past two seasons and you've really helped
37:33
us with a few of the historical details.
37:35
So I'm interested to learn from you about
37:37
your job as the co-producer, how you oversee
37:40
and keep track of all the storylines. I mean
37:42
what is that like on a show like this
37:44
that has so many stories? Yes,
37:47
there are, I can't even
37:49
count how many stories there are. How many
37:51
storylines, how many characters, how many characters intersect
37:54
and how many different stories come and go.
37:56
It is kind
37:58
of mind-boggling and baffling. the
38:00
kind of theme of my job is to make
38:03
sure that the story, every single
38:05
moment, is being told so that
38:09
there is the journey from beginning to end for
38:11
not just the entire story, not just the
38:14
arc of the season or the arc of the show itself, but
38:16
also each character storyline as
38:19
well. So that when we're in pre-production and
38:21
the writers are working and we're kind of
38:23
creating story, we make big charts and all
38:26
sorts of graphs and things that really kind of show
38:29
you or show us kind of, oh,
38:31
this is where we need to be at this point or at
38:33
the end or this is where this is going. And then when
38:36
we're actually shooting, it's about
38:38
every single take, every shot to make sure
38:40
that what's happening in that moment is actually
38:42
telling that greater story. And
38:44
then in post-production, it's about making
38:47
sure that that full arc of the thing is
38:49
being told all the time. It's especially true in
38:52
season two when there's so many storylines like Oscar
38:54
and Maude. And it's like we have to be
38:56
so careful about what information is given at what
38:58
time so that no one gets ahead of it.
39:01
There's also a lot of history
39:03
in these stories too. So how
39:06
do you supervise all of the
39:08
historical research? Well,
39:10
we have an amazing team
39:12
of expert historians. And
39:15
if we see as we're working with Julian
39:17
and Sonia on kind of storylines and what
39:19
we want to talk about, different
39:22
events that are happening during the year that we're working on this,
39:24
then I can go to our researchers and say, hey,
39:27
can we get some more information about, say, the Brooklyn Bridge?
39:30
And then those researchers who are amazing come
39:32
back with loads of information, first
39:34
source material stuff, stuff that's
39:36
like amazing information for us
39:38
to have, especially for Julian to look
39:41
at. And from that material
39:43
that our researchers are able to gather
39:45
for us, that we can
39:47
figure out where the entertainment is. The
39:50
drama. The drama, exactly. What inside
39:52
of this real story of these real
39:54
people, what can we take out that
39:56
actually is the meat of that drama, right? you
40:00
in here, you are the head
40:02
of hair for the show. So for people
40:04
who are not familiar with that role, could
40:07
you tell us more about your
40:09
role on the Gilded Age? This
40:11
job was kind of a gift and it's like my
40:13
role basically is to
40:16
facilitate the design process
40:18
that Michael, our director wants, Julian wants, and
40:21
as well as the producers in the stories.
40:23
I basically oversee the design
40:25
process. I literally will pull
40:28
reference photos. I work with Kasia and Patrick,
40:30
our amazing costume department, who usually are ahead
40:32
of the game with me as far as
40:35
design process. So I take my lead a
40:37
lot from where the costumes are
40:39
going, which entail they are
40:41
working a lot more with
40:43
Michael and the story because they're having
40:46
to produce the look prior
40:48
to us coming in. So
40:51
with my team, I generally will give
40:53
them a guideline of what the design
40:55
process or what I see the show
40:57
looking like. And I let
40:59
my team like Christine, Tim, Jonathan, my
41:01
main team, if I didn't have those
41:03
people, I wouldn't have the show. This
41:06
job, we all were very cohesive and became
41:08
a very tight unit. And I think that's
41:10
what the magic of the show was for
41:12
us. Everyone got to put their
41:14
artistry on it, but we kept it within
41:16
a frame line. So everyone kind of understood
41:18
the vision. And we were allowed, we allowed
41:20
everyone to do their craft. And once we
41:23
understood each other's language, they
41:25
let us run. Well, it's interesting because
41:27
Luke was just talking about doing all
41:29
this historical research. So you and your
41:31
team are also doing all of this
41:34
research and you're pulling all these ideas
41:36
together. And then are you
41:38
like sketching something and presenting the director
41:40
with different ideas of what the characters
41:42
could look like? Not generally,
41:44
you know, there's historical references that will
41:46
pop up. So we'll actually have images
41:49
sometimes of these characters, which
41:51
I would always run into Luke's office sometimes. And he'll
41:53
pull out a book and he'll be like, Oh, yeah,
41:55
here's this storyline. Here's this. So this is where this
41:57
character comes from. But I went to a lot of
41:59
Harper's Bazaar magazine. magazines, all the old magazines
42:01
from the time, and there were these beautiful
42:03
pencil sketches of like the costumes and the
42:05
hair, and they're all pencil sketches. So all
42:08
those magazines had such a beautiful sculpture
42:10
and style to them. So they may
42:12
not be completely accurate to what people
42:14
think the period is, but we actually
42:16
have the references from the costume sketches
42:18
and fashion images, and we went that
42:20
direction, which made it a lot more
42:22
glamorous, which was really, really fun for
42:24
our crew. And so much
42:26
fun for all of us to watch.
42:29
I mean, there's so many impressive, intricate
42:31
hairstyles for the women of the Gilded
42:33
Age. And what about wigs?
42:36
How do you decide who gets a wig? Well,
42:38
the women all get wigs mostly because
42:41
I need the length. Like in episode
42:43
seven with Mrs. Roebling, her hairstyle is
42:45
her hair, but there's also a ton
42:47
of pieces that I colored
42:49
to match her own hair. So it's her hair incorporated
42:51
with a lot of pieces to give me the volume
42:53
and length. So all
42:55
the women need to have some sort of length or pieces
42:58
put on because a lot of
43:00
women in this period had hair switches or
43:02
braids or extra hair that they would build
43:04
into their hairstyle. So that's where the
43:06
size and the volume and the shape comes from. We're
43:09
all storytellers, you know, every single person
43:11
on this show. And so
43:13
I love watching Sean work because there's ways
43:15
that hair tells the story. Like
43:17
the way that women show their
43:19
hair in public says something about themselves and
43:22
says something about what they're trying to make
43:24
society feel about them. What
43:27
Christine, like my assistant, she's my right hand. I couldn't
43:29
do this job without her. What she
43:31
does with Carrie's hair, I just love. I
43:33
mean, it's like we've originally, we've said, let's
43:35
play with Carrie's hair being a little more
43:37
sophisticated, not so overly curled in
43:40
style. So she's got more of a wave
43:42
to it. We kept Carrie much more smooth
43:44
and sophisticated feeling compared to the Van Rinds
43:46
because they're much more
43:48
original to the period. So we've got
43:50
more texture and curl. So it just kind of
43:53
separated that group. So
43:55
there's those little tweaks that we play with
43:57
in the design process that just naturally develops
43:59
because that we get to know the characters, you get to
44:01
know the story. What you mentioned,
44:03
Carrie Kuhn, Bertha, and I'm thinking of
44:06
the scene in this episode,
44:08
in episode seven, where Bertha and George are
44:11
quite intimate. It's late at
44:13
night, she's in her nightgown, they're kissing
44:15
and cuddling. She's talking about striking workers
44:17
in Pittsburgh, but it's intimate. Tom,
44:19
that's a really unique example because that
44:22
scene actually wasn't originally supposed to be
44:24
in the bedroom at night. And
44:26
it was due to just logistical scheduling
44:29
issues and likely because of COVID. And so
44:31
if I remember correctly, that scene was actually
44:33
supposed to be kind of an evening scene
44:35
in the drawing room, but because we couldn't
44:37
have that set that day, we moved it
44:39
tonight in her bedroom. And actually, now that
44:41
I watch it, I'm like, that scene should
44:43
always hit. Like that is that scene now.
44:46
But it speaks to the flexibility and collaboration
44:48
on set that like, in last minute, we
44:50
were able to say, this has to move
44:53
here. And we all gather forces and figure
44:55
out how to make it work.
44:57
And not just make it work, but
44:59
now you can see how that challenge,
45:02
that problem in quotations actually created something
45:04
that I think works so much better
45:06
and really lets us in to Bertha's
45:08
vulnerability. Like, we
45:11
don't always get to see Bertha being vulnerable.
45:13
And it's really wonderful when we are able
45:15
to. Well, Luke,
45:17
in this episode, number seven, obviously, there's so
45:19
much history in it. But I
45:21
just want to talk about the big
45:23
moment that this has all been leading up to
45:26
the opening celebration of the Brooklyn Bridge. And it's
45:28
a scene that is interesting because it seems
45:30
like it touches nearly all of the
45:33
other characters and storylines at that moment.
45:35
Can you tell us what went into
45:37
crafting that storyline and why it's important
45:39
to you? Yeah.
45:42
And you talk about this moment when kind
45:44
of all the storylines converge. And that's something
45:46
that we try to look out for whenever
45:49
we can. You remember in season one,
45:51
there was a lighting ceremony, Thomas
45:53
Edison. That was when so many storylines converged.
45:56
And it's also, logistically, it's just a moment
45:58
when we can actually... have
46:00
a lot of characters together. It
46:03
didn't exactly work in the same way
46:05
for the Brooklyn Bridge because it's fractured. And
46:07
so that becomes really important storytelling-wise because
46:10
not only does it link all our characters
46:12
up, but it also grounds
46:15
us in a certain moment in time and
46:17
not a fictional moment. This was a real
46:20
event. And the opening of the
46:22
Brooklyn Bridge, it was the biggest celebration New York
46:24
had ever seen, literally. There were, I
46:26
mean, hundreds of thousands of people that were
46:29
arriving by boat, by train, by everything
46:31
into the city. And there was so jam-packed that
46:33
day that you could not move around. The
46:36
accounts of the river on that day were that there were so many
46:38
boats that no one could move. And it
46:40
was just, this was the
46:42
moment of New York City. And
46:45
so it felt so right to us that this was
46:47
going to be kind of a moment that, of course,
46:49
everything has to stop because
46:52
everybody in the world, it seems,
46:54
was watching the bridge that day.
46:57
And so when we talk about kind
46:59
of grabbing everything out and getting all
47:01
these storylines to converge in this moment, it
47:03
does, you have to kind of work backwards
47:05
almost, right? If we're at the end of
47:07
episode seven and we want everyone to be
47:09
there at the same time, then that means, okay,
47:12
we have to make sure that Oscar
47:14
can't get a cab on that day, and
47:16
that works into his storyline. We have to
47:18
make sure that Peggy's going to Brooklyn because
47:20
there's a rooftop party, but it's not just,
47:22
we can't just say, we need
47:24
to have a rooftop party. It's like, why?
47:26
It's not just because of the bridge, but
47:28
also because Peggy needs to reconnect with her
47:30
parents. And then same thing with downstairs.
47:33
You know, this is the moment when
47:35
Borden is, we're
47:37
trying to like develop this relationship
47:39
a little bit more. And so we
47:42
move that up to the roof and all of these things,
47:45
it's fun, right? Because there's individual
47:47
story reasons to get everybody
47:49
to converge on a certain moment. And then there's
47:51
the greater story reason of that
47:53
this is, a New York
47:55
City moment. and
48:01
Reverend Forte. Yeah. Julian wanted
48:03
to have these things happen
48:05
simultaneously. And it's, it actually,
48:07
when I'm watching the episode,
48:09
I kind of, I'm moved
48:11
so deeply at Luke's death
48:14
because it's coinciding exactly with
48:16
this huge celebration. That juxtaposition
48:18
actually makes it hurt more.
48:21
That scene with Agnes and
48:23
Ada, when she comes out of the room,
48:25
it just, it gives me the chill still
48:27
because it's like watching them live, doing it.
48:30
There were crew people crying, just because you
48:32
become so attached to the characters and
48:35
you forget the cast is so brilliant
48:37
because they can suck you right into the character.
48:39
And that's what I find so amazing about watching
48:41
some of these actors. And they're no words. Yeah.
48:43
She doesn't even panic. They break my heart. No,
48:45
nothing. Yeah, because Agnes is such
48:47
a cold woman, but you really, she isn't.
48:49
There's a softness to Agnes, which I just
48:52
find beautiful. I'm interested to
48:54
hear about creating the
48:56
look of Mrs. Astor and her hair.
48:59
What went into that? Because I believe that
49:01
she had a wig that was quite famous.
49:03
I don't know if it was at this time. She
49:05
was wigged, but she'll, I mean, also colored hair.
49:07
She colored her hair very dark. We've got photos
49:09
of Mrs. Astor. So we do know that that's
49:12
accurate. Donna is such
49:14
fun because she's very particular what she likes and she's
49:17
got an idea what she likes. And so it kind
49:19
of takes some of the pressure off of us trying
49:21
to make the actor happy because we know what she
49:23
wants. And it's accurate because it looks
49:25
so great on her with the curls and the
49:27
tight front. And that's something we don't change on
49:29
her. And it just elevates her level to a
49:31
little bit more polish and class. We just kept
49:33
her very, very clean because we're doing
49:35
a drama and entertainment piece. We want to make
49:38
it look beautiful. And so we just cleaned everything
49:40
up. We took the style and just polished it
49:42
all. And for each of the characters, do
49:44
you have a series of wigs
49:46
already set in hairstyles or
49:48
do you recreate new every time?
49:50
The wigs are always set the night before.
49:53
There's a whole process of cleaning the lace
49:55
and getting it all set. But
49:57
because the styles are so tight.
50:00
to the side of the head. We, I
50:02
personally found it very difficult to get
50:04
that really tight, clean line without
50:06
actually dressing the hair on the actress every day.
50:08
So we'd get the wig prepped, we'd get the
50:10
actor's hair wrapped up tight under a wig cap.
50:12
I would send them off to makeup, makeup would
50:14
do their magic, they'd come back to me, the
50:16
wig would go on, and I would probably spend
50:18
another 20 to 30 minutes with each
50:20
character redressing the hair. So
50:23
we put the hair up every single day. Yeah,
50:25
there was a great interview with Morgan
50:27
Spector who said during the first
50:29
season, he was saying
50:32
like, I usually hate my face, but Sean
50:34
Flanagan and Nikki Lederman, the makeup department head
50:36
you mentioned, have created a look for this
50:38
guy that makes me feel at home. So
50:41
what is it like for you to
50:43
see these actors transform into their characters
50:45
once they have everything set, the costumes,
50:47
the hair and the makeup? The
50:50
first couple of times you put a wig
50:52
on an actor and especially this period, they're
50:54
so dressed up, you look at them in
50:56
their street clothes and think, oh, what
50:59
have I done? And
51:01
then they get to the costume and then they get
51:03
on the set and then you're like, wow, it works.
51:06
And that's what I think has been really fun
51:08
about this job. Like Christine Baranski, God love her.
51:10
She's a character, she'll come in, she'll
51:13
get her hair prepped, she is a dream to work
51:15
with, she sits down, she doesn't bother, she looks up,
51:17
she's just like, wow, this is fun. And
51:19
then she'll pop on her aviator
51:21
glasses and she'll walk out in her cool little
51:23
clothes, and you're like, oh my gosh, the same
51:26
thing with Louisa. She decided to color her black,
51:28
so almost dark, dark brown. And
51:30
of course, I'm like, okay, you're a blonde, I got a wig, how
51:32
am I gonna hide this? But when you
51:34
start doing it, then it's just hysterical to watch
51:36
them in period, in contemporary and you're like, okay,
51:39
this is gonna be fun. But once they get
51:41
into their costume and on set, it
51:43
all just magically just becomes it. I
51:47
mean, it's just fun to watch. Another
51:49
story that we've been following for
51:51
weeks now is this developing romance
51:53
between Oscar van Rijn and Mod
51:55
Beaton, which he mentioned before. episode,
52:01
you know, from the audience's perspective, we
52:03
almost feel as if we'd have we've
52:05
had the rug pulled from under our
52:07
feet, right? We have been had by
52:09
Maude. Can you
52:11
tell us about constructing that that
52:13
storyline and how you sort of
52:15
baited us along over many, many
52:17
episodes here? A
52:21
team effort. I mean, it's even just you
52:23
saying right now that it feels like you
52:25
had the rug pulled out and that you've
52:27
been had makes me so happy because
52:29
so much work right from from
52:32
so many people goes
52:34
into making sure that that moment
52:36
will land because what will
52:39
happen hopefully is the audience gets to this
52:41
spot. This happens. We feel this
52:43
way. And then maybe we go back and
52:45
watch again all the interactions with
52:47
Maude beaten. And the
52:50
fun of that will be to see, oh, right.
52:52
Maude never did come out of
52:54
that house. Yeah, she always waits out the
52:56
front. Yeah. Or like, you
52:58
know, the little hints about where's Maude
53:00
right now? She's oh, she's visiting a
53:03
sick aunt in Newport or something like
53:05
this. Every single moment and
53:07
every single line and every single
53:09
look really from the actor Nicole
53:11
too is calculated to make
53:14
sure that the story
53:16
being told up until this moment is that
53:18
Oscar is going to take this woman for
53:20
a ride. And that's going
53:22
to be that's going to be what it is. It's going
53:25
to be Oscar being Oscar. And so there
53:27
was a lot of moments where like David
53:29
Crockett and Michael Engler and I and Julian
53:31
and others would sit, be kind of be
53:33
together and try to literally
53:36
go through every single one of
53:38
these moments and think, wait, are
53:40
we giving anything away here? Should we
53:42
actually move these scenes into
53:45
different spots? Or should this actually go
53:47
to episode four that so that when
53:49
we get to this moment in episode
53:51
seven, no one in the audience hopefully,
53:53
right, is ahead that no
53:55
one suspects that there's not something that's
53:57
going to get in the way of this moment of the rug.
54:00
being pulled out because that's where
54:02
the joy of this storyline
54:04
is. We've just been sort of led
54:07
along for several episodes that Sheila,
54:09
they say that she's Jay Gould's
54:11
illegitimate daughter. It's like we're following
54:13
that and then you do something
54:15
completely different with her. There's
54:17
quite a few different examples of con
54:20
artists that we looked at. The one
54:22
particularly was a woman who went by
54:24
Cassie Chadwick and the whole
54:26
idea of being, of posing
54:29
as the illegitimate daughter of a rich
54:32
robber baron was her thing.
54:34
Of Andrew Carnegie. Yeah, Alicia and I
54:36
were just talking about Cassie and
54:39
the amazing parallels here. So it was
54:41
Cassie then a direct inspiration for Moll.
54:45
Yeah, absolutely. Some people call it the
54:47
greatest bank heist in all of history.
54:50
Our day and age it would be hundreds of millions of dollars that
54:52
she got. And so it's
54:55
fun to bring in this person into our story.
54:57
Even if we don't follow that story along and
54:59
know what happened, we'll never know what happens to
55:01
Mon Beaton. Does she come back? But
55:03
to have that character pop into our
55:06
story and pop out and then the
55:08
audience, if they want to, can go
55:11
look into this woman or think more about what
55:13
that is. But it's fun to kind of have
55:16
these real people or these people based on real
55:18
people infuse the story a
55:20
bit. Yeah, that's true. And
55:22
it's so fun to learn about
55:25
the real history behind these characters.
55:27
I'm also enjoying Jack's storyline this
55:29
season. He's becoming an inventor. And
55:32
I know that, Luke, you do a
55:34
lot of research yourself. So what went
55:36
into making that storyline believable? Yeah,
55:38
I really took this one on because I
55:41
am a nerd. So proclaim.
55:44
And you know, Julian originally
55:46
had the idea of a rags to
55:48
riches story for Jack. And
55:50
that really, we all got really excited about that.
55:53
And then the research team came back with a
55:55
lot of ideas of just different
55:57
historical examples of rags to riches. And there was
55:59
all sorts of things. bicycles and any
56:01
other kind of invention. But the one
56:04
that Julian and all of us really
56:06
found exciting was this clock
56:08
idea that Jack could actually
56:11
invent something. And so I got
56:14
connected with the Horalogical Society
56:16
of New York, which Julian
56:19
actually put into the script, the
56:21
Ermacher Herinderstadt. And
56:24
so I asked some of the experts
56:27
there, like what's actually a historical example
56:29
of something that someone like Jack could
56:31
have created. So we found an example
56:33
in history of this escape wheel. It
56:35
was something that someone like
56:38
Jack, if Jack, say,
56:40
was exceptionally brilliant at this
56:42
without even knowing it, right,
56:44
then that's what the story becomes is that Jack
56:46
has this innate ability that he
56:48
didn't know that no one knew about. And that's
56:50
what's so beautiful about it is that
56:53
he kind of he kind of on accident comes up
56:55
with this. But in order
56:57
for us to really kind of figure
56:59
out what that actually meant, the actor
57:01
Ben, Alders and I got to actually
57:03
go to a clockmaking class at the
57:06
Horalogical Society. We sat there together, the
57:08
two of us and actually put a
57:10
clock together. Wow. So that we could
57:12
understand what actually an escape wheel
57:14
is. It's really not easy to understand unless
57:16
you're sitting there putting one together and really
57:18
trying to understand what makes a clock tick.
57:21
Literally, yeah. Literally. And so then when
57:23
we're on set, and we're doing that
57:26
scene, we're not guessing at anything. This
57:28
is the actual thing. I geek out
57:30
about it. Yeah, I would
57:32
too. And you know, earlier,
57:34
Tom and I were talking about the
57:36
sad death of Luke Forte, which I
57:38
definitely did not want to happen. Luke,
57:41
how did you work with the producers
57:43
and the writers to introduce his illness
57:46
without giving anything away? Right. It's
57:48
another one of those things you
57:50
have to be careful about. Because I remember
57:52
again, sitting down with everyone and kind
57:54
of mapping this out. I think part of it
57:57
was making sure that in every episode is at
57:59
least And
58:01
that, as you go, there's not only more of
58:03
it, but it gets more intense. So
58:06
the first episode, it might be very mild
58:08
lower back pain. Then it's, you
58:10
know, oh, I hard to sit down. And then
58:13
it's, oh, when I carried Ada over the threshold,
58:15
that really hurt. Oh, you should go see
58:17
a doctor about it. No, no, no, it's nothing. And
58:19
then the next episode it's, okay, I saw a doctor.
58:22
He said it was nothing. And it's so that we
58:24
keep, we keep that story moving all
58:26
the time. And we keep that concern moving all the
58:28
time. But we also are
58:31
showing the characters perspective on it. Luke
58:33
thinks it's not a big deal, but Ada is
58:35
always like pushing a little harder because Ada might
58:38
have a sense that there's something more there. Okay.
58:41
Well, we have to talk about all
58:43
the opera drama. Okay. This whole season
58:45
is building to a battle
58:48
between Bertha and Mrs. Astor over these
58:50
two opera houses. No
58:52
spoilers, please. But can you just
58:54
talk about your research into the
58:56
opera wars? What drew you to
58:58
this particular conflict? That's all
59:00
Julian when it comes to this wanting to set up
59:02
the opera war as a big thing
59:05
for season two. And you might
59:07
remember from season one, I think it's
59:09
in episode six maybe, when it's just
59:11
Agnes and Ada and others sitting around
59:13
and someone just says, oh, what about
59:15
the opera war? Right. And
59:18
everyone throws it off and kind of says, oh,
59:20
that's not going to be a big deal. That
59:22
was a Julian set up in season one for
59:24
a season two. And so
59:26
it's always been on his mind. And
59:29
so when we started all doing
59:31
research and gathering research for season two,
59:33
what the research team and I found
59:35
that was really exciting when we found
59:38
it was that
59:40
these two opera houses opened on the
59:42
same night. And that
59:45
just felt like one of those things you find
59:47
in research that's like, it's a guess. What? Are
59:49
you serious? That's real.
59:53
Too good to be true. And
59:55
then something I take that information and I give it to you
59:57
and it's like here, Julian, what did you
59:59
know this? And he's like, oh my goodness. And
1:00:02
so of course that it just seems
1:00:04
like, of course, that becomes the thing that becomes
1:00:07
the way that you set these two
1:00:09
sides up against each other is it's
1:00:11
not just about, it's not
1:00:13
just about an opera house, if it's going to succeed
1:00:15
or not. It becomes about what side are you going
1:00:17
to be on? And
1:00:19
that's good. And
1:00:21
that's good storytelling. Well, this has
1:00:23
been really fascinating. So Lou Carlin and
1:00:25
Sean Flanagan, thank you both for your
1:00:28
time. Thank you. Thank you. Tom,
1:00:34
that was so interesting. Can
1:00:36
you imagine Lou Carlin and
1:00:38
Ben Arliss attending a clockmaking
1:00:40
class? How cool. They
1:00:43
really got deeply into their research, you know, and
1:00:45
I'm just thinking of all of those plot lines
1:00:47
that Luke and his colleagues were staying on top
1:00:49
of and how to make them all converge on
1:00:51
this one night that we saw in the show.
1:00:54
Not to mention all the hair. All
1:00:56
the hair. I mean, Sean talking about how he
1:00:58
first saw the wigs with the cars while they're
1:01:01
wearing their modern clothes and how he was worried
1:01:03
that it wouldn't actually work. But of course, once
1:01:05
you get them in the costume and the makeup
1:01:07
and on the sets, it's beautiful.
1:01:09
Absolutely. As is everything that you can
1:01:12
see in the new episodes of the
1:01:14
HBO original series, The Gilded Age, Sunday
1:01:16
on Macs. And then be
1:01:18
sure you tune into our podcast, also
1:01:21
available on Macs or wherever you get your
1:01:23
podcasts. Thanks for listening.
1:01:25
Bye, everyone. This
1:01:36
has been the official Gilded Age
1:01:38
podcast, written, hosted and produced by
1:01:40
Alicia Malone and me, Tom Myers.
1:01:43
Our supervising producer is Andrew
1:01:45
Pemberton Fowler. Our editor
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1:01:49
thanks to Michael Gluckstadt and
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Pod People. Hi, everyone. This
1:02:25
is Tom. For more information on
1:02:27
the Gilded Age in New York City,
1:02:30
I invite you to check out
1:02:32
my podcast, The Bowery Boys, co-hosted
1:02:34
with Greg Young. On
1:02:36
The Bowery Boys, we talk about
1:02:38
Gilded Age society and culture, as
1:02:41
well as architecture, immigration, politics
1:02:43
and the events that shape
1:02:45
the city. That's The Bowery
1:02:48
Boys. Listen wherever you get
1:02:50
podcasts.
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