This episode is presented by Mercury. When I started How I Write, I expected finances to be an absolute nightmare. I’ve got team members in four different countries. Things like taxes, currency exchange, expenses — I was dreading it. But here’s the crazy thing: four years in, banking has been maybe the easiest part. I honestly can’t remember running into a single problem! And that’s because I’ve been using Mercury.
I switched over from other, more traditional banks because Mercury is so well designed. It’s easy to get started and easy to use, while also feeling totally legit and secure. Mercury gives me all the tools to run a global company like virtual cards, unlimited users, and the ability to customize each user’s access level to exactly what they should see. And you know what: if anything goes wrong, their support line is super responsive (and actually thoughtful), which is really rare these days. I genuinely can’t imagine trying to run my business without Mercury.
David Gelb is the man behind Chef's Table and Jiro Dreams of Sushi.
He didn’t set out to make a movie about people. He set out to make a movie about sushi. But the more he filmed, the more he realized the technique only mattered once you understood the people behind it. That single idea became the backbone of everything he’s done since.
Here are the highlights:
1) Character first, always: People care about people above all else.
2) The heart of every great character is their origin story.
3) Perfection is unattainable (and that's the point): In Jiro's words: perfection is something you chase, but the closer you think you get, the farther away it moves.
4) Every scene must change the character. They should enter the scene wanting one thing and leave with something else, whether it's a new goal or perspective. If nothing changes, the scene won't work.
5) Emotion beats information every time.
Enjoy.
Transcript
01:49 Why you should focus on character
05:11 Planning a story vs discovering it
07:25 Storytelling mantras
12:41 Passion, not perfection
19:40 How to hook your audience
24:22 What makes for a great ending
26:44 Implicit vs explicit lessons
33:00 The false victory
37:54 How to write cinematically
42:42 How David spots boring parts
47:52 The limitations of feedback
56:04 Why you should cut dialogue
01:00:21 How to create a good scene
01:05:59 The trap of “being the best”
David Perell (01:49-01:56):
Tell me about character and how you’ve chosen to focus on character and bring individual people to life.
David Gelb (01:56-02:23):
The process of making Jiro Dreams of Sushi taught me that it’s character first. That’s true of all good storytelling, movies, or shows. I started thinking I would make a movie about sushi, but then I realized I was making a movie about people.
David Perell (02:24-02:27):
Were you originally planning to focus on three or four people?
David Gelb (02:27-05:11):
Yes, originally, it was going to be about different sushi chefs, focusing on how they make sushi and their different styles. But as I made test shorts, I realized the characters were the most interesting part.
Through the characters, information about sushi emerges. I’m not going to explain step-by-step how to make the egg sushi, but I will show how it took a guy 200 tries to get the master’s approval and how he wept when he finally got it right. That’s more memorable and powerful than explaining what it is. When you see that egg sushi at the end, you sense the emotion infused in it.
The heart of it is the origin story. I love comic books, and I grew up reading them. I did the Stan Lee documentary, and it’s all about the origin story. That’s where the audience gets hooked and what informs who the superhero is and why they do what they do.
In Spider-Man, the famous quote is, “With great power must come great responsibility.” He’s a teenager, and Spider-Man was the first superhero who was a teenager. Batman’s a billionaire, and Superman is an alien reporter, but Spider-Man is a nerd who wants to be cool. He gets bullied, then gets these powers, and he starts wrestling in a luchador costume. He’s doing it for himself.
The origin story of Spider-Man is that he lets a burglar rob something, thinking it’s someone else’s job. That guy ends up killing his uncle, and he realizes power means nothing without purpose and responsibility.
In the case of Jiro, the characters on Chef’s Table, and Stan Lee, the origin story is key to understanding their motivations. When you care about that, their mannerisms, craft, and other things matter more.
David Perell (05:11-05:48):
When you think about the story, the character, and what you’re trying to build, how much of that is planned versus how much emerges later? For example, in the Chef’s Table episode about Grant Achatz, a chef loses his sense of taste. How much of that is planned versus emerging as the central through line?
David Gelb (05:48-07:25):
Yes, that was it. Season two, episode one, I believe, is granted, that was a beautifully done episode. Brian McGinn directed it. His approach is so clear. Chef loses his sense of taste, what does he do about it? There’s also enough written about him that the team can research an outline that tells his life story as we know it.
In the process of Chef’s Table, all of the directors on the show, whether it’s myself, Brian, or Clay Jeter, do very long interviews. Everybody has their own style with the subject. We go through the story as they’ve told it before, as they like to tell it, and then we ask very probing and personal questions that might reframe the way that they tell the story.
We come in prepared with what we think it’s about, but there’s always room to learn more. That exploration is key. That’s also why a lot of the chefs say that being on the show is like therapy because we’re asking them more questions for longer.
Other food shows come in for an hour or so, they shoot a little bit, and then they move on. In our case, we’re there for two weeks. We’re building a real relationship and rapport. We’re asking these long questions. We’re doing these long interviews multiple times, and things just start to open up, and they start to make these connections that would be like being in therapy.
David Perell (07:25-07:44):
As you think about your style, which with Jiro, you see what emerges, and then you see how that ends up in Chef’s Table. What are the mantras that you find yourself repeating? This is my style. These are the core things that I’m always trying to focus on, the chords I’m always trying to hit.
David Gelb (07:44-09:04):
It’s origin story. It’s why do they do what they do? It’s not just about how they do it, it’s why they do it. Discovering that is the mystery of the episode in a lot of ways.
We’re trying to peel back the onion and reveal the layers of what is the reason that the person does this? What are the moments that they did it the wrong way, and what did they learn to discover the real reason, the best reason for why they do what they do? It’s this character-first origin story.
The other tenets of the show are these long, very personal interviews. All of our directors give a lot of themselves in the interview. If we want them to tell us about the hardest moments in our lives, sometimes we have to relate to those things and talk about ourselves a little bit. It becomes this conversation where what you give, that’s the energy that you get back. That’s key.
Our style of shooting goes back to Jiro Dreams of Sushi. It’s always been about elevating our craft as best as we can, and that then reflects their craft.
David Perell (09:04-09:14):
You could totally see that with Jiro. You’re in this guy’s presence. This guy is a master of the craft. This was probably your first big documentary, right?
David Gelb (09:14-09:14):
Yeah.
David Perell (09:14-09:17):
And now you gotta rise up to that, huh?
David Gelb (09:17-09:29):
Yeah. They’re bringing their A-game. They’re in pursuit of perfection or excellence. We want to bring in the best that we can bear. We’re bringing in all the tools of cinema to try to tell that story as best as we can.
David Perell (09:29-09:30):
So what does that mean?
David Gelb (09:30-11:01):
The tools of cinema being the cinematography, the environment and feeling of the shoot itself, and the comfort that we can let the chef be themselves in that way. It’s also in the music.
Jiro became the template for what we were trying to do with Chef’s Table, which then evolved into its own style. On Jiro, we wanted to bring in the Red One camera, which was the breakthrough digital cinema camera. We wanted to have music that is reflective of his brilliance.
We used some of the great classical standards. His sushi is compared to a concerto at one point. So we played this beautiful Mozart concerto to give that feeling. Philip Glass’s music, too.
Philip Glass is great because Jiro’s mantra is that with each day, he’s trying to improve just a little bit and elevate, or it’s two steps forward and one step back. If you listen to the music of Philip Glass, there’s a refrain that repeats and repeats and then escalates, and then it goes into a new key and it repeats and escalates.
I don’t want to butcher the interpretation of Philip Glass’s music, but he really is a genius. So we said, okay, let’s bring that kind of music. The composers have done a lot of original music on Chef’s Table to bring that philosophy as best as they can, too.
David Perell (11:01-11:04):
How do you go about describing the music that you want?
David Gelb (11:05-12:20):
I’m very fortunate that I have a team we’ve worked with for a long time. Some of the directors and cinematographers I’ve known for a long time, and our editors too. In the case of Jiro Dreams of Sushi, the editor was my high school roommate, Brandon Driscoll Lutheringer.
We love the feeling of Philip Glass’ music. In the edit, we put in temp music that feels right. If we’re aligned in taste... I saw a video of Ryan Coogler giving advice to young filmmakers about forming a squad of people at a similar level with similar taste. Then you can reference the same language, the movies that you share, even if you don’t like all the same stuff. The differences in taste are where you can stretch and grow in different directions.
We audition music. We try a track, see how it feels, and feel that energy. The first thing I do when I take on a new project is build a playlist.
David Perell (12:20-12:20):
Oh, really?
David Gelb (12:20-12:41):
I share that playlist with the editor. Some of those pieces might become temp. The editor might also be inspired by other pieces in that sonic landscape and bring some things that I hadn’t heard before, which can be really cool and exciting. That’s how we create a vibe or feeling for what the new thing will be.
David Perell (12:41-12:44):
Tell me about this mantra of passion, not perfection.
David Gelb (12:45-13:33):
Jiro aptly puts it, perfection is unattainable. It’s something you can chase, but the closer you think you get, the further away you realize you are. It’s about approaching something with the humility that there is room to grow. Anybody who says their work is perfect... I don’t know how you grow from there. That’s not the artistic approach. Great artists are always seeking a higher level.
I think Hourglass says it well: you have a taste gap. You have this level of taste, and you have to do the reps to build your skill so you can reach that level of taste. A lot of people quit because it’s painful to
David Perell (13:35-13:35):
work
David Gelb (13:35-13:42):
hard on something and it doesn’t reach your level of taste. You have to be okay with that and just do the next thing and the next thing and keep trying.
David Perell (13:43-13:51):
How do you go about increasing the scope of your palette, leveling up your taste? Is that a conscious thing that
David Gelb (13:51-15:09):
is part of your craft? It has to be. I know what I like and I love. There are a lot of movies and documentaries that I absolutely love.
For example, when I was making Jiro Dreams of Sushi, I was chasing Fog of War, which has incredible original Philip Glass music. In fact, we even licensed a piece from that. I was obsessed with The Hours and these different films. I wanted to bring some of those feelings and my misinterpretation of them, which becomes original when you’re chasing the thing and making it about something else.
Jiro was the first movie of mine that people had really seen. But I had done a lot of small shorts and various things to try to get to that kind of level where I was able to get close to the taste gap.
Therapy helps, too. It helps if you start to get down on yourself because it’s disappointing. The creative process is full of disappointment.
David Perell (15:09-15:10):
Like the emotional arc.
David Gelb (15:10-15:25):
Yeah, the emotional arc of making is like you’re shooting the thing, you have your dailies. You think, wow, these shots are awesome. It’s great. You make your little trailer and it’s so cool. Then you make your assembly where you have the full length thing laid out, and it is terrible.
David Perell (15:25-15:27):
It’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen.
David Gelb (15:27-15:31):
You’ve ever seen. And you’re like, I hate myself. I am so bad.
David Perell (15:32-15:34):
There’s no music, there’s no color correction.
David Gelb (15:34-16:16):
It just does not work. It’s not what you thought it would be. That’s where the process of editing comes in. You just have to go see your therapist and be like, you’re okay, you’re not a failure. It’s not where you want it to be now, but that’s not because you’re bad. You just have to keep on working at it.
It’s not going to be what you first set out for it to be. It’s going to be somewhere in a new place, somewhere in the middle. Then you have to finish the project and move on to another project. The pitfall is getting stuck on one project forever because it’s never good enough. You just have to accept it and move on.
David Perell (16:16-16:58):
You said that it’ll be something else. When you create a project, it’s like we, David, are the masters of the vision. This is David’s vision.
There’s a moment where the table turns and the vision is the essence of the thing you’re creating. All of a sudden, you have to start listening to that. You are surrendered; you’re a passenger on the train. The thing that you’re making is actually driving it, and you need to learn how to listen to it. It’s this crazy tables-turn moment that happens in so many creative projects.
David Gelb (16:58-17:19):
I think that’s the healthy, correct approach. If you keep trying to force your original template, especially in documentary filmmaking, and the story isn’t turning out as you thought it would, you have to be humble enough to follow that. We always say, “Lean into the truth.”
David Perell (17:19-17:21):
What’s an example of that?
David Gelb (17:21-18:00):
Let’s say I had a story about what I thought the origin story was really about. Then you discover it’s not exactly that. If you’re going to edit the dialogue and try to shoehorn it, try to fabricate it into what you needed or wanted it to be, the authenticity of the project goes away. The audience can see through it, and it’s not satisfying for them.
If things aren’t what you thought they were, you just go into what it actually is. You discover what it is, and then you make the movie about that.
David Perell (18:01-18:16):
How do you think about what you’re getting in shots when you first do the shot versus creating space later on for going back and getting more B-roll after you’ve done a first edit?
David Gelb (18:17-19:41):
A great saying from cinematographer Cesar Charlone, which is part of one of our mantras, is quantity first. You have to shoot a lot and don’t just do the same takes over and over. Shoot a great variety of things, and then you’ll have more choices in the edit. Then you start to see what’s working, and then you’ll know where the holes are.
You might think, “I wish I had a shot of this.” You find a list of things and discover the style that’s working. Then you go back out and do that.
Jiro was shot in two different stages. I shot what I thought was going to be the whole thing in a month. Then I went through the despair of the assembly and found where the real holes were: the things that were missing, the types of shots that were working, and the types of shots that were not working. Then I was able to build the second half of the movie.
The key is to shoot a lot and give yourself lots of choices in the edit. When you look at directors who do things in “oners,” where they shoot the one shot throughout the entire thing, it’s a gamble. It’s a big risk because the pacing of the moment you have on set, the timing in your mind when you’re filming, is completely different from how it actually plays in the editing room.
David Perell (19:41-19:58):
From doing all these episodes, how have you refined your sense of what makes for a good introduction, how to pull somebody into a piece? One thing that’s nice is you’re not on YouTube, so you don’t have to do it in ten seconds, but you definitely have to do it in ten minutes, right?
David Gelb (19:58-20:10):
We’re not on YouTube, but we are on Netflix. The competition on Netflix is easy. It isn’t like there was a Blockbuster or Hollywood video where you go in and rent your movie.
David Perell (20:10-20:16):
Hollywood video. You rent your movie, and you’re going to watch that movie no matter what. Because that’s what you have.
David Perell (20:17-20:19):
We rented the same four movies every time.
David Gelb (20:19-20:52):
You got four choices, but if something is boring, you’re going to switch to the other thing. In the case of Netflix, it’s so easy that if you’re bored for one second, you’re going to switch it. On YouTube, I’m sure the attention span you’re trying to grab is even shorter term.
A great example of grabbing attention is in the James Bond films. You’re going to have a complex plot, a weaving of deception, and the reveal of who the real bad guy is, the mystery of it all. But in every Bond movie, there’s a cold open. They drop you into the action.
David Perell (20:53-20:53):
Immediately.
David Gelb (20:54-21:07):
Yeah, immediately. It’s some crazy action scene, and you’re gripped by the character and the action. Somewhere in that action, there might be something thematic.
David Perell (21:07-21:07):
Yeah.
David Gelb (21:07-22:44):
James, our dear friend 007, will usually achieve his goal, but at some kind of cost. There’s some thematic thing that happens. Then, every time with the good ones, it takes you into the opening credits sequence.
That’s how I came up with the format of an opening hook, then the opening credits, and then we start the episode in earnest. We did that on Jiro.
When we first open on Jiro, you see peaceful shots of the fountain, and he’s writing his name on a piece of paper. It’s not exactly Bond action, but he’s posing a philosophical question of what is deliciousness. He dreams of sushi. We’re giving you a hook into the character, a theme that makes you want to know more about this guy.
For each of the Chef’s Table episodes, we try to open with a hook. In the Massimo Bottura episode, we immediately open with the earthquake that destroys all the Parmigiano Reggiano wheels in Modena. Then you see his journey to create a recipe that will inspire people to buy as much Parmesan Reggiano as possible so they can try to make money off the broken wheels and move on.
It’s a hook. It doesn’t even necessarily have to fit into the overall episode, but it gives you something to grab onto with that character. We allow for a minute or two on that, and then it hits you with the opening credits.
David Perell (22:44-22:52):
When it’s over the top and doesn’t work, and it’s cheesy or trying too hard, what do you think is going on there?
David Gelb (22:52-23:23):
It means we’re not leaning into the truth. It means we’re trying to force something into it.
Ultimately, the thing that I think hooks an audience is interest in the character, especially for our show. Every episode is about a specific character.
If you look at the Stan Lee documentary, it’s about a guy. The idea of Spider-Man, where does the idea come from? Immediately hook them with that, and then build the story.
David Perell (23:24-23:31):
Where does the idea of Spider-Man come from? Super simple, instantly intriguing.
David Gelb (23:31-23:32):
Yeah.
David Perell (23:32-23:40):
It also reaches a lot of people. It’s not like this obscure person, it’s Spider-Man. Everyone knows.
David Gelb (23:40-23:46):
Yeah, you can’t say, like, Stanley is very much an oral history because he’s done so many interviews. We pieced it together.
David Perell (23:46-23:47):
He died.
David Gelb (23:47-24:22):
He died before the film, but he left a trove of his oral history. He has done so many interviews over the years that we can have him tell his own story.
You can’t just start with, I was born in an apartment on the Upper West Side. Grab the audience, give them immediately the reason for why they’re watching this. I need a reason to continue watching.
David Perell (24:23-24:29):
We’ve talked about beginnings. What matters for endings as you think about tying the knot?
David Gelb (24:29-26:44):
What does it all mean? What is the conclusion? Landing the ending is the most important thing.
Figure that out as early as you can in the editorial process, so you know where you’re going. In the case of Jiro Dreams of Sushi, we had a story about the greatest sushi chef ever.
His son was working in the restaurant, and that was a discovery we made in the first phase of shooting. There’s a great story here about living in your dad’s shadow. How are we going to fill those shoes? That’s something very personal to me in my family over generations.
My grandfather was the managing editor of the New York Times. He would say, “You can do anything in the world you want, just be the best at it.” So my dad became the general manager of the Metropolitan Opera. Now, here I am, another generation. Where am I going to find my place in this family?
That parallels directly with Yoshikazu Jiro’s son, being like, how do I fill those shoes? We discovered Yoshikazu served the Michelin stars. We have proof that the transfer happened, that Yoshikazu is worthy of the mantle. We built that kind of ending.
The real lesson in Jiro Dreams of Sushi is just keep going, and the journey is the destination. It’s worth the effort itself, more so than Michelin stars. It’s about living a life where you chase an unattainable dream. That in itself is a beautiful life.
David Perell (26:44-27:29):
How deliberate are you about lessons? When are lessons important in a documentary-style film? When do you want to take your hand off the wheel and say, “I don’t know what the lessons are?”
I just watched Spirited Away. Maybe there’s a lesson in there of the little girl, she’s super optimistic about everything and constantly happy. Then there’s the no-face spirit.
One thing that’s nice about that movie is I don’t know that the lesson’s super clear. When do you want a super clear lesson, and when don’t you?
David Gelb (27:29-28:46):
I also love Spirited Away. It’s a movie that I’ve thought about a great deal. I love the Miyazaki movies. That one in particular is really interesting.
I’ll challenge a couple of your assumptions. Chihiro is not happy in the beginning of the movie. She’s pissed because they’re moving, and she’s depressed. She’s going to have to make new friends and go to a new school. A lot of young people can identify with that.
She’s anxious about it. They find a shrine, and the parents are excited, but she’s anxious. She’s like, this is new and weird.
Then she’s thrust into being a cleaning lady at a spa for spirits and demons. She has to accept that she’s not going to get what she wants and has to do the hard work to work through it. That’s my interpretation.
Other people will say other things about it. A great filmmaker can layer it in this way, where it leaves it up to the audience. There are enough clues that we can understand what it is in that movie.
David Perell (28:46-28:59):
I guess what I was trying to get at is there are all of these moments in the movie where other people are terrified, and she’s just like, “Come in.” Even with no face, people are scared, and she’s like, “Come on the train and behave yourself.”
David Gelb (28:59-29:20):
That’s right. That’s the special power of being the outsider. She hasn’t conformed to the power dynamics of that place. Her outsiderness becomes a special power. I think that’s true for Alice in Wonderland, which is a new version of that in many ways.
David Perell (29:20-30:10):
Back to the theme. You don’t want to be too explicit. I think we could talk for another hour about it because Miyazaki is not saying, “This is what the movie is about.”
Art is better when there’s an ambiguous theme that people can chew on for themselves, like a Zen kohen. It doesn’t just have a clear thing. At other times, with Jiro, it really is a story of persistence, dedication, and craftsmanship that is uniquely Japanese. I think that’s part of the reason why it resonated so much for me. Some people in America were saying, “I’ve never seen somebody work this hard on one thing in my entire life.” It’s a clear theme that works, but it’s very different.
David Gelb (30:10-32:59):
Yeah. The other great thing about Miyazaki movies is that the plot goal is very clear. She’s stuck in this crazy place. She needs to get her parents back and get back to the real world, which she’s not going to take for granted anymore. She’s now equipped to face the challenge of going to school, which doesn’t seem that scary anymore.
The challenge in a lot of the Chef’s Table episodes, and particularly in Jiro, is what is the goal? It’s not like they’re practicing for the sushi competition, like the World Series of Sushi, and they have to train. It’s not like a sports movie. We have to lay it out clearly that the goal is to seek perfection, even though you’re never going to get there. How can a person have the patience to do that? You just get to watch it happen.
I think that’s one of the things we aspire to. But there’s also a whole thing about parenting, where he’s absent for the kids growing up. There are great sacrifices in this life of craft. Some people see it as sad at times.
There was a part where Jiro says, “One time, I was back on a Sunday, and Takashi, the younger son, woke up. He was like, ‘Mom, mom, there’s a strange man in the house.’” It was his own father. He just didn’t recognize him because he was gone at work all the time.
He tells it like it’s a funny story, and it is funny, but it’s also sad. The nuance is the sacrifice of choosing that life. Jiro grew up, and his dad was an alcoholic and died at a young age. He doesn’t know how to be a dad.
The overarching goal is, I want to make the best sushi ever, and I want to be better and do better. There are journeys and lessons along the way, and they should just come out naturally. Each act has a lesson.
Somewhere in the midpoint of the movie, there might be a false victory. In a lot of great films, and I don’t look at documentary structure any differently than feature film structure, the midpoint is something where you think that we’ve done it, but actually, we’ve done it the wrong way, or we’ve overlooked the whole point.
That is going to be what propels us toward the end of the movie. That pitfall, that false victory, is going to make the protagonist feel at rest for a moment while things swirl and build against them. Then they have to get through that. They have to discover the true meaning of the lesson of the movie.
David Perell (33:00-33:05):
Oh, that’s fantastic. So tell me more about the false victory. Where does that show up in feature films?
David Gelb (33:05-33:24):
What’s a good example of that in Titanic? It’s like you’re rooting for Leo, and she is not happy in this rich person’s world. They’re having fun under deck, and everything is going swimmingly.
David Perell (33:24-33:25):
Floating on life.
David Gelb (33:25-34:06):
Yeah, because they’re not supposed to be in this world together. Here they are falling in love, and then they make love in the car. The hand on the thing, and it’s like, “Draw me like your French girls.” It’s beautiful.
Meanwhile, the iceberg is about to hit the boat. The audience is lulled into a sense of, “Oh, it’s working.” That’s the false victory. The victory is a personal victory for them, but ultimately, things are about to get a hell of a lot worse. Things go downhill. Not spoiler alert. That’s the kind of arc that I think works in a lot of films.
David Perell (34:08-34:25):
Well, in Train Dreams, which we were talking about right before we started, I remember I was at the theater and there’s a narrator, and it’s about 35 minutes into the film, and the narrator says, “Little did he know that he would look back on these years as some of the best of his life.”
David Gelb (34:25-34:27):
Yeah, that’s foreshadowing.
David Perell (34:27-34:42):
It’s another ten minutes before the big event happens. You know that something is going to go wrong. You can feel it in your stomach when you’re watching a movie.
David Gelb (34:42-35:24):
I wonder if that was in the original script or if they were trying to keep the audience engaged. Otherwise, if everything seems so nice and happy, where is the dramatic tension? In Titanic, we know the boat is going to sink.
Lord of the Rings is a great example of a false victory. Each one has its own arc. If you’re just looking at the Fellowship of the Ring, the Fellowship is formed, and they all have their skills. They are able to fight the Orcs, but ultimately the ring will divide them. Boromir gets all ringed out, and things really go badly.
David Perell (35:25-35:26):
Or they’re
David Gelb (35:26-37:06):
They’re going to make it through the Mines of Moria. It seems like they’re going to be okay. There’s this beautiful moment where young Frodo says, “We must make the best of the time that we have been given.”
We’re feeling pretty good, and then oops, the helmet goes down. It’s an insane chase, and then we lose Gandalf. We feel like we’re safe, and then things just go bad.
A lot of screenwriters are going to hate this, but I love the book Save the Cat by Blake Snyder, which lays it out in the most clear way. It even has page numbers of when these things should happen. He is over prescriptive, but he breaks down movies in a really interesting way. You can see all of the moments that the movie requires that break us into the second act or propel us into the third act.
This moment, the dark night of the soul, is so important. That’s when all is lost. We’ve had this false victory or this midpoint, and things get a hell of a lot worse. We’re down in the lowest part. All is lost. The hero has to look within him or herself and figure out what is the lesson that they were supposed to have taken from that character that died before.
Then they are able to look at the situation in a new way. That’s what propels them into the third act and that final action that will get us to the ending.
David Perell (37:06-37:17):
It’s interesting that you mentioned two principles: a fake victory and then this sort of darkness and despair. But not all is lost. There’s still this glimmer of hope.
David Gelb (37:17-37:19):
The last piece is the hope.
David Perell (37:19-37:20):
They’re almost perfect.
David Gelb (37:21-37:54):
It’s like all is lost. That’s what makes a movie fun to watch. The most simple way of putting it is that the character goes into a story wanting something, but what they want is not actually what they need.
The process of the film is them discovering that what they thought they knew about themselves was actually wrong. Through the process of the movie, they actually learn about themselves and accept who they truly are. That’s where the kernel of hope comes from. With that self-acknowledgment and acceptance, they can make it to the end.
David Perell (37:54-38:07):
We’re talking about cinema here. What makes a documentary cinematic versus a YouTube documentary?
David Gelb (38:07-38:18):
It’s information versus emotion. That was a journey that I took when I first started making Jiro Dreams of Sushi. I thought this is going to be all the information about sushi. It’ll be so interesting, and it’ll have the cool cinematography.
David Perell (38:18-38:19):
You’ll learn so much.
David Gelb (38:19-38:48):
You’ll learn a lot. But I realized that that actually was not what I wanted to watch. I wanted to watch a movie with a story.
Character and emotion are much more important than information. In Chef’s Table, you will not learn anything about how to cook. But you will learn about why they cook. That’s why the show has lasted because it’s about character journey. It’s not about facts.
David Perell (38:49-38:50):
People care about people.
David Gelb (38:50-39:02):
People care about people, and that’s what hooks you, and that’s what makes you remember things. We remember information because of the emotional context of it.
David Perell (39:02-39:03):
Right.
David Gelb (39:03-39:12):
That’s what separates a cinematic documentary from something that is just purely informative.
David Perell (39:13-39:19):
How much writing do you do in advance of an episode?
David Gelb (39:20-39:56):
Writing on a doc happens throughout the entire process. First, it’s in the casting of the character and the selection of the character. Then, what are you able to read or surmise about the story that brought you to that character?
That’s written in the form of an outline that will guide the questions that you ask during the interview. In the beginning, we usually want them to say the outline as we know it. Then, they’ll add in additional things. That gives us a biographical backbone that we can build the movie around.
David Perell (39:57-39:59):
So say the outline is, this is what the story...
David Gelb (39:59-41:33):
The outline is: they were born here, then they did this, then they did that, they loved Grandma’s cooking, they got a job in a restaurant, it was really hard, they almost quit, but then they gave it one more try.
We’ve chosen these chefs because we see that hero’s journey arc, that conventional arc of a character who has talent, discovers it, uses it the wrong way, learns a lesson, and then uses it the right way. That may or may not work out the way they thought it would. Then they discover who they truly are and what their purpose is.
That’s the first stage of the writing. Then, when you’re shooting it and conducting interviews, you discover new things, and you’re writing it by deciding what you’re going to film. We know we’re going to build this schedule, film this interview, film them cooking, they’re going to go on a trip to this farm, and we’ll go back to their hometown so they can reflect on their life.
As you’re doing it, you might discover another location. As prepared as you are, you always want to leave room for that moment of improvisation.
The real heavy lifting of the writing is in the edit. When you’re editing, you’re writing it by choosing which words are going to appear on screen. It happens throughout the entire process, but in doc, the heaviest writing is at the end.
David Perell (41:34-42:14):
I’ve been thinking a lot about doc editing: what if you only think of this in terms of visuals, and they only think of this in terms of words? If you only think of it in terms of one, but not the other, you see different things.
Brian Eno, the music producer, used to come into a studio, and if people got stuck, he’d put blue painter’s tape right in the middle of the studio and say, “This side of the studio is off limits. Now you have to only make a song on this side of the studio.” You’re basically making all these constraints to unstuck yourself.
David Gelb (42:14-42:15):
Oh, wow.
David Perell (42:15-42:19):
And so you’re basically. You’re making all these constraints to unstuck yourself.
David Gelb (42:19-42:43):
That’s interesting. That’s one of the things that also works with doc: you never have enough money, so you have to work with what you have.
It’s interesting because, going back to James Cameron, when he can literally create anything he wants at any moment, there are too many choices. That’s really intimidating. I don’t think we have to shoulder that burden.
David Perell (42:43-42:44):
How do you think about pacing?
David Gelb (42:45-42:46):
Make it not boring.
David Perell (42:46-42:47):
Make it not boring.
David Gelb (42:47-43:42):
You have to watch it with people. Even when you have your assembly and your first cut and you think it’s pretty good, sit in a room with a couple of people you trust who aren’t going to be cruel.
Even without any feedback, just sitting in a room and watching it with another person is totally different. You can feel when it’s slow. I feel responsibility that I’m taking this person’s time, and if they’re bored, it kills me. I also have a pretty short attention span. I don’t want to be bored when I’m watching it.
Things can be as long and paced as it is interesting. That becomes a real feeling. But you have to watch it with someone else. Once you watch with someone else, you’ll learn so much.
David Perell (43:42-44:11):
It’s astonishing. It’s like reading something out loud. Your brain just knows how to edit. I notice the same thing if I’m watching something that I made with somebody else.
I don’t know if it’s that you’re really sensitive to when they’re bored or excited, or if it’s just your brain behaves differently when you feel that there’s somebody there. But your sensitivity dial to pacing, boredom, and excitement just goes up.
David Gelb (44:11-44:31):
Immediately, you’re like, “Let me fast forward through this part and get to the good part.” Even if you’re reading something that you’ve written to somebody, you actually start jumping ahead in your own text to get to it. You might feel that impulse, and that’s a great way to sense the pacing.
David Perell (44:31-44:54):
What’s an example of something where you’re like, “No, we’re going to pump the brakes. We’re going to be slow here?” A lot of advice about pacing is faster is better, but so much of cinema is about comfort, oxygen, and space. Be a little slower.
David Gelb (44:54-46:10):
Knowing where to put that, my process is that the assembly is way too long. I’m so pained by how bored I am or how nervous I am of the person being bored that my second cut is way too fast. Then I know where there can be some space and I can breathe a little bit.
First, I overcorrect, and then there’s something in the middle that starts to feel right. So much of this is intuition and based on your own taste. We want to make something that we want to watch and be in tune, to be able to watch something that you’ve made as an audience.
That’s a skill that requires time. As the creator, you have so much context that the audience does not have, which might make you think that something is more interesting or less interesting than it is. That’s why it’s so important to watch things with other people and get feedback from people you trust who are not mean.
David Perell (46:10-46:12):
Yeah, yeah.
David Gelb (46:12-46:12):
I had.
David Perell (46:12-46:27):
I had David Zucker on the show, who made Airplane and Naked Gun, total legend. Those movies are joke after joke every 15 to 30 seconds.
David Gelb (46:27-46:27):
Yeah.
David Perell (46:27-46:55):
They pioneered the approach of starting with live skits to get used to audience laughter. Once they made their first movie, they showed it to a bunch of people and took note of when people laughed.
The reason those movies are so funny is they got all their friends together, and if there were 30 seconds without a joke, they knew they had to add one.
David Gelb (46:55-46:57):
They knew what jokes to cut because they test.
David Perell (46:57-46:58):
Exactly.
David Gelb (46:58-47:52):
That’s amazing. I just want to pause a moment and say, you’ve talked to so many geniuses. What am I doing here?
Thank you for having me. I wonder, especially for a comedic director, how painful that first assembly or rough cut must be when people aren’t laughing, especially when you’re trying to be funny. That must be really hard.
But that movie works because the pacing is exactly right. It’s an onslaught of jokes. They make it work.
Testing comedy must be a painful process, but it really shows you what is working and what isn’t. There’s no other way.
David Perell (47:52-48:03):
Talk to me about feedback. Without getting into specific examples, we made this pilot, and I got a lot of feedback from other people that we’re not going to use.
David Gelb (48:04-48:04):
But you know what?
David Perell (48:04-48:10):
People are very good at diagnosing when something’s wrong, but they’re not always good at diagnosing what the solution is.
David Gelb (48:10-50:03):
That’s exactly right. When you do test screenings for a studio movie, there’s an impulse amongst people who are being tested to suddenly become directors and writers, and they will prescribe to you what the answer is.
You don’t want to overcorrect or get insecure about something that somebody may not understand but you feel is right. You don’t want to cut something because you’re afraid.
The important way to look at it is like a doctor-patient relationship. A patient goes into the doctor’s office and says, “My back hurts. I think I need 25 Vicodins.” They will be able to tell you what the problem is, but they’re not the ones who should be prescribing the solution.
I think what’s important is separating the symptom they are reacting to, and then through your own taste, you can choose to address that symptom. You’re not going to prescribe them a bunch of opiates or whatever, because that’s what they think they want.
That’s the difficult thing here, figuring out what is the symptom. The questions I ask are, “What did the movie mean to you?” Or, “What was the story?” Or, “Was there any part of it that you did not understand?” I want to know where I’m losing the audience.
David Perell (50:03-50:04):
What does the movie mean?
David Gelb (50:04-50:05):
What did the movie mean? Yeah.
David Perell (50:05-50:06):
And was there any part that you didn’t?
David Gelb (50:06-51:35):
Yeah. Were there parts that you didn’t understand?
I may even lay out the conflict or ask if they understood a particular point. They may tell me things about that they may have a solution for or not. But I realize they’re giving me a solution because they didn’t necessarily understand this moment.
The solution has to come through the taste of the filmmaker. If you start making a bunch of changes trying to make other people happy, you’ve lost the thread, and then the movie will stop meaning anything. If you’re creating a thing, you have to understand it yourself, and you have to know why you’re doing it.
Listening is important, but doing has to be based on still going with your gut and your own intuition. This is where we can kind of close the gap between what you and the filmmaker know, the extra context that you know, and where the audience is not enjoying something. It isn’t always about making sure the audience enjoys it, but you want to make sure that they understand it.
There are things that you’ll know that the audience doesn’t know. You might realize they didn’t get something because it’s something you wrote. Maybe it wasn’t clear that the character has this issue that is making them do this later.
David Perell (51:35-51:37):
The word that was coming to mind for me was coherence.
David Gelb (51:38-51:38):
Sure.
David Perell (51:38-51:48):
If you have your vision and then all of a sudden you’re taking a little bit from here, here, here, here, here, it becomes like a fragmented piece of art.
David Gelb (51:48-51:48):
Right.
David Perell (51:49-51:51):
Have you heard this word? Gustempa?
David Gelb (51:51-51:51):
Work?
David Perell (51:52-53:15):
So, it means total work of art. Here’s the definition: a comprehensive art form that synthesizes music, drama, spectacle, and dance into a single, unified aesthetic experience. It was popularized by composer Richard Wagner to describe his operas. It also refers to architecture and design, where all elements—structure, decoration, and furnishings—are harmonized.
You see this a lot in architecture. If you have buildings where the architect was involved in everything, you can actually see different motifs show up all over the place. For example, if you go to the Guggenheim, you think of a big, round, rotunda-type thing swirling around and around. That’s Frank Lloyd Wright’s obsession. You see the exact same shape on the water fountains. The little water fountain that you drink out of on the third floor when you’re a little bit thirsty and need somewhere to park for 10 seconds is the same motif as the whole building at scale.
I think that’s a lot of what leads to a work of art. Something about that really works. It comes from the creator. But the real subtle point that you’re making here is the answer isn’t, “I’m the creator. I know what’s right. I don’t listen to anyone else.” It’s this subtle thing of you have to listen to other people and say, “Okay, this isn’t working in this way. It isn’t working that way.”
How do you maintain that total work of art?
David Gelb (53:15-56:03):
You know, you’re still putting in the water fountain in a way that still fits within the art. There’s that great scene in Amadeus when Mozart, you know, performs one of his great pieces. The patron, I guess he’s like the Duke or the Count, is like, “Too many notes. It’s too many notes.” It’s Mozart!
This is actually a reason why some of the greatest filmmakers are known as very difficult. People like David Fincher or Cameron or just throughout history, a lot of the great filmmakers are known as being very tough or sometimes being jerks. But it’s because they are so persistent to their own form that they will not budge on things. If they’re right and their intuition is spot on, as these filmmakers often are, that’s why the movies are able to be so good, especially when it comes to a big-budget kind of movie.
The pressure to make the adjustments and to change to please the audience because it’s art, but it’s a commercial product. It has to make money. The pressure is very high.
There’s this great story—I guess I’m obsessed with James Cameron right now—where the studio was like, “You got too much of this flying. They’re all learning how to fly together. They’re flying too much. You’ve got to cut it. Each minute costs $10 million. You’ve got to cut this.”
He’s like, “No.”
They’re like, “Why? It doesn’t do anything historic.”
He’s like, “Because I want to see it.”
He followed his intuition, and Avatar makes a billion dollars because his intuition is what broad audiences want to see, whether it can be explained or not. Sometimes you have to be tough on these things. If you really believe in the thing and if you’re making something that’s new and something that’s different, you’re gonna get a lot of notes of people being like, “Well, it doesn’t feel like what I’ve seen before,” but maybe that’s why it’s good. So there’s a certain amount of courage that has to come into that.
A lot of people, including Jiro himself, were like, “You’re making the most boring movie of all time. Literally nothing is happening in this movie.” But I believed that I wanted to see that octopus get massaged for a long time. And we did it.
There were other moments where, especially when watching with an audience, I could feel like, “Okay, I’ve done four different scenes about rice. We have to pick one.” It’s true. We have to pick one. Being flexible and being able to change is an important part of just being a functional human being, able to process new information and then make adjustments, but without losing yourself. I think that’s key to being a good person and a functional artist.
David Perell (56:04-56:08):
As you’re thinking about editing dialogue, what are the things that you would focus on the most?
David Gelb (56:08-56:41):
The most simple, actionable thing is, “What are the fewest words to get the idea across?” Especially if you’ve shot some really in-depth scenes or you have some really wicked dialogue that you love that you’ve written, you don’t want to lose that stuff. That’s where they say, “Kill your babies.” You have to be okay with losing some things in the service of clarity and moving the story forward. Each scene has to move us forward. We always want to be cutting to something and not away from it.
David Perell (56:41-56:42):
What does that mean?
David Gelb (56:42-57:59):
Cutting to something? It should never feel like we’re repelling over here, and then we’re cutting to over here, and then we have to rebuild a moment or rebuild the momentum.
How can I get out of the scene and then be cutting to something that advances us and pushes us forward? When it comes to dialogue, let’s cut to the response. Let’s not cut back to a reaction or cut to the reaction so that we’re moving forward into the scene.
I really do think it’s about what are the least amount of words that we can do to get through this. Sometimes a great actor can convey the intention of the scene without needing to say all of the words. You’ll find that you’re able to cut things based on actually how it’s shot.
If you’re making good choices as a director, you can feel like, “Oh, wait, actually, this scene was about this character trying to do something and then realizing that she needs to change her strategy.” As soon as that change happens, maybe you can then actually get out of the scene without having to explain it.
David Perell (57:59-58:25):
I love a scene without words.
In Before Sunrise, there’s a really cool scene where they’ve just gotten off the train and they’re trying to work out if they’re going to have their first kiss. They go to this record store, pick a record, and go back to the listening booth. The whole scene is maybe 40 or 50 seconds, and it’s all body movements, facial interaction, and eye contact.
So much is said, but nothing is spoken. It’s flawless.
David Gelb (58:25-58:26):
That’s amazing.
David Perell (58:26-58:32):
It’s flawless.
David Gelb (58:32-58:59):
That’s the hardest thing to do, and it’s the best. I remember one of the best things at USC Film school was that the early student films weren’t allowed to have dialogue.
You were forced to tell the story only through the visuals, the characters’ looks, or interactions. To show without saying, that’s the dream.
David Perell (59:00-59:22):
What’s your pitch for reading books like Save the Cat and following these principles? The obvious critique is that I don’t want to be formulaic in my storytelling.
I don’t want to be like anybody else. I’m a unique special snowflake. Yet, here you and many other people are saying, “I’ve read these books, these principles. They’re true, they’re consistent.”
David Gelb (59:23-1:00:21):
It’s about knowing the conventions so you can break them. You want to know the rules before you do something crazy and different. By defying conventions, you can lead an audience’s expectations one way and then flip it back on them in a new way.
Knowing the conventions works. A lot of screenwriters don’t like Save the Cat because it’s overly simplistic. My favorite thing about it is that it gives me a skeleton to follow. I love how it breaks down the big movies into chunks. You understand why the sequence of events happens the way it does, and how the theme stated at the beginning of the movie pays off later on.
Learn the rules of the game before you break them.
David Perell (1:00:21-1:00:28):
Do you process scenes in that way?
David Gelb (1:00:28-1:00:28):
Like, if...
David Perell (1:00:28-1:00:34):
If there’s an episode, do you think of it as seven or eight scenes? What is the role of a scene?
David Gelb (1:00:34-1:02:07):
How do you create a good scene in Chef’s Table? The show has existed for so long, and many different people have worked on episodes. We still need to ensure that the show is still the show.
We call them “buckets.” There’s a cold open, then an opening credits, and then a critic’s analysis, like, “Here’s the chef. Here’s why we’re watching the episode. Here’s what they do, here’s how they do it.”
There are certain types of scenes, like going to a farm or their hometown. There are various types of scenes that we know work. Then there’s nuance in how we connect them.
A scene is just a moment. There are moments happening in the present that we’re filming. There are scenes described through their biographical interview, which are moments in their lives. We intersperse them and weave them together. The visuals then come after, whether it’s archival photographs of them or whatever it is.
A scene is a moment in time. Something is attempted that causes some kind of change or change in perspective. A scene is where you lay out a moment, and then something changes. There has to be something, otherwise where are we going?
That’s where the turns and twists of a movie take place, from scene to scene.
David Perell (1:02:07-1:02:28):
That’s interesting.
If you were watching a movie with me and trying to teach me how a good movie or a good story works, what questions would you ask me at the end of the scene to say, “Did you understand this?”
I’m hearing from you, “What changed there?”
David Gelb (1:02:28-1:03:26):
What changed for the scene? What is a character coming into the scene with, and what are they leaving with? It cannot be the same.
A character has to come into a scene with an expectation or a goal. Ideally, in every scene, your character is trying to do something or get something, and then there is some kind of obstacle. They’re not getting what they want. Then they have to make some kind of adjustment, or they can just be hitting that wall.
The rest of the audience is like, “Whoa! What are they going to do?”
In the next scene, they’re taking in that blockage, and then they might be discovering some path, some new way of doing the thing to get through that.
It’s all about what the character is bringing in and what the character is leaving with. That’s one of the things that great actors ask directors, especially when a movie is shot out of order. “What am I coming in with? What am I leaving with?” It has to be different.
David Perell (1:03:28-1:03:45):
If you were to zoom out to the scope of a movie and you wanted to help me understand Spirited Away, what are some of the questions that a movie watcher who wants to write better movies should be thinking about?
David Gelb (1:03:46-1:04:44):
What is the character coming in with? What are they leaving with? The character is going to come in. You don’t always get what you want, but if you try, sometimes you get what you need.
That lyric has stuck with us because the character has a view of the world, exists in the setup of this world. They think that they know what they want and what they’re striving for or what they think they are supposed to be. They think that they know who they are, and then something happens that turns that world upside down.
At that point, the character is on a journey, in this upside down world, still struggling, grasping, to get back to that version of themselves that they thought that they knew. Through the process of the film, they will discover that the thing that they wanted actually was an illusion, and that they need something that is completely different.
David Perell (1:04:45-1:04:46):
All the time.
David Gelb (1:04:46-1:05:39):
That works for everything. It’s such a broad idea, but that’s what makes it a story instead of just a description.
Anything that applies, not only for docs, actually, there’s one more level, because the audience thinks that they know what the thing is about, and then it becomes about something else. So the audience is actually a character that’s going on the journey because they are learning things.
Information docs that are based on information, like Planet Earth and various stuff like that, they still have a story. There still is a nuance. We want to surprise the audience. The audience is coming in expecting to see this kind of thing, and then they’ll learn something different.
A great example is Exit through the Gift Shop. You think the movie is about Banksy, but then it actually becomes about Mr. Brainwash. The audience thinks that they’re going to get one thing, and then you’re going to give them something else that is what they actually needed.
David Perell (1:05:40-1:05:45):
What’s funny about that is what they think they’re gonna get has to be immediately appealing, because then they’re signing up to say, I want that.
David Gelb (1:05:45-1:05:46):
Right.
David Perell (1:05:46-1:05:57):
The other thing is sort of like, wow, that’s why this is worth watching, because something is gonna be revealed that gives it a feeling of satisfaction.
David Gelb (1:05:57-1:05:57):
Right.
David Perell (1:05:59-1:06:19):
Earlier you mentioned your grandpa’s line, and I’ll let you say it. But when I read that as I was prepping, I was like, wow, that is a very positive, liberating thing. But when you mentioned it earlier, it seemed like it was sort of a constricting idea. I saw a little jolt of fear or something, a discomfort in that quote. What’s going on there? So let’s go back to it.
David Gelb (1:06:19-1:07:57):
Sure. This is my journey of change in the way that I look at things. This is kind of in the story of my life. I’m 42 now.
My grandpa famously said to my dad, and that was repeated to me, that you can do anything in the world that you want, just be the best at it. It sounds like it means you can. Anything that you’re passionate about, it’s like, go for it. But the idea of being the best at it is actually kind of a trap now, because what does that mean, to be the best at anything?
The best in itself is kind of a problem. That would mean that no matter what you do now, you’re looking at what everyone else is doing, and like, am I better or am I the best at that thing?
Ultimately, maybe it should be, you can do anything in the world that you want, just do your best at it, or just be yourself and achieve, trying to go after that thing, which makes it a little bit more flexible.
There can be a real fear where your identity becomes predicated on am I the best or not at that thing? I think that it’s a healthier approach to just do the thing rather than worrying about if you’re the best at it, because then no matter how far you go and how good you do, it’ll never be enough, because nobody’s the best at anything. That’s totally subjective.
David Perell (1:07:57-1:07:59):
And if you are, you won’t be the best in 20 years.
David Gelb (1:07:59-1:08:04):
If you think you’re the best at something, then I can guarantee you that you’re not, unless you’re Roger Federer.
David Perell (1:08:06-1:08:09):
He’s just that cool. Good to meet you, man.
David Gelb (1:08:09-1:08:11):
Thank you so much, man. Appreciate it. Thank you.
