Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. I do believe that theres a hell. Im not going to lie down until i get there. Say my name. Eisenberg. Damn right applause rose so how did this come about . You had a boy who grew up in virginia . Yes. Rose went to n. Y. U. , tisch school, made your way out to annette, chris, and worked on xfiles. Worked on xfiles. Second best job i ever had. This would be the better one. Rose and this idea. How did it come about . This idea the best way i can answer it is that i remember when it occured to me. Im not sure exactly where it came from but i was talking to a good friend of mine who wound up being a writer and producer and director on breaking bad. He is someone i met at n. Y. U. Film school back in the mid80s and he and i just finished up our stint writing for the xfiles and we were concerned about what was coming next and he we were not cut out we were not fit out for much other than the specialized world of television writing, i fear. So we were joking about what we should do next. We thought perhaps we could greet people who entered walmart. Direct them to the you know but he mentioned a New York Times article he had read that concerned children whod gotten sick because their mother or their father or someone like that had put a meth lab into their house and he suggested why dont we put a meth lab in the back of an r. V. And cook crystal meth and see the country. And hes got a you need to meet him to understand his sense of humor. laughter but when he said that to me this character and i very seldom had this experience of a idea sort of eureka like kind of rose you knew right away there was something there . I yeah. I was because i think in hindsight what it was was we were both he and i despite the crazy stuff we talk about doing, we dont actually do that. Were very boring lawabiding citizens and i think rose no, no, no. If youre that you couldnt create this kind of television program. laughs rose theres something dark there, vince. laughs its fun to write about things that you are too scared to do. Not to say that even if i did not have the fear of prison and Authority Figures i would want to cook something as terrible as crystal meth or be a criminal but its fun to write about things you wouldnt otherwise do and so thats when the idea hit. Rose and the term breaking bad, which became the title . Now, this is something id like to ask you because youre from the south, youre from north carolina, im from virginia. Rose we grew up about an hour apart. Right, right. Serve i told when they first asked the question why are you calling this breaking bad the sony folks who were the first folks to read it and the a. M. C. Folks, both Wonderful Companies responsible putting the show off the air, they said about the title, what does it refer to . I said its aba southernism that means to raise hell. The other night i broke bad, i was at the end of the bar and i had one too many, i wound up going home in the back of a squad car. Rose exactly right. Absolutely. Because ive met so many folks since then rose went off the deep end. Deep end, that would have been a good title. laughter rose laughs so you put together a team and people say as ive suggested that this is a very collaborative place. How does that collaboration work . Well, i and, by the way, i will probably do this all through the night. I tend to speak in the present tense because im still getting my brain wrapped around the concept this that this is over but this is all past tense. Rose but it was very hard for you. I guess you had to, on your computer, write the words the end. Yes, i had to write the words i wrote the final episode. I do not write most of the episodes of breaking bad. I had six excellent writers who wrote rose but you wanted to write the final episode in i very much did. I took that prerogative for myself. Rose and what did you want to do and achieve in the final episode . Im not going ask you what it is obviously. Id like to know, though. laughter for myself, for my writers, for our wonderful cast and crew and for the fans i wanted to i wanted us all this is very much back to your initial question. This was always from day one to today, to the last day a very collaborative effort and a very collaborative medium that i enjoy working in very much because you surround yourself with excellent people in front of the lens and behind it and if youre lucky, if youre extraordinarily lucky like i was Everyone Wants to pull the rope in the same direction. Everyone wants to make the same show. And what i wanted to do with that final episode what we all wanted to do, i think we can speak for all of us is end it properly. Rose but youre conscious of the fact that the sopranos, theres some controversy about the final episode. I thought it was very interesting and i thought the final the sopranos was great. I loved the ballsyness of that ending. But it has been done and done well and breaking bad was always much more of a finite construct. It was much more of a finite story. Most t. V. Shows are designed by their nature to be openended, to be indefinite, to in other words go on forever because its hard to get a t. V. Show going and once you get it going you dont want it to end and i didnt want breaking bad to end but i knew creatively when you set out when your selfimposed franchise as was the case in breaking bad was to take your protagonist and turn him into your antagonist, that is a continuum you have just described for yourself. You have just set out for yourself. And theres only so bad that bad can be. Ending things right, ending things so that people again, not a monolist i can audience, there will be people no doubt who say i wanted it to end a different way. But it pleased us in the writers room. We said to ourselves, how do we satisfy ourselves . What do we want to see being the first fans of the show . And it was a long hardfought series of questions we ask ourselves for the better part of a year and i think that we came i will just say it, im very happy with the ending. Rose thats all that matters to me. If the writer is happy, the creator is happy its got to be good. Lets talk about casting quickly. Bryan. When he said he saw the script, he called his agent and said get me in there and get me in there early. Well and he is a wonderful guy. I yeah. It was a mutual you know, one of those you think shus hollywood love fests there because this is a guy i had worked with, had cast him on an episode of the xfiles in 1999. And hes such a chameleon as an actor that when he walked into that room on the xfiles i do not realize id seen him many times before. I didnt realize id seen him on seinfeld or saving private ryan. This gentleman came, in i was casting an episode where it was a very dark, disturbing, scary character, he was just a real creep and you didnt you had to be scared of him for the whole hour of the episode yet at the end of it spoiler alert when the character dies you had to feel bad as a viewer otherwise it wouldnt work. And that was a hard thing to cast. Bryan cranston, first time i met him, 1999, he had the ability to do all those things and it was it just you either have it or you dont. And i dont know where he gets it from. I dont know how he was able to pull it off but a year and a half later after that episode, in my opinion, went along very well because he was so good in it, a year and a half later im watching t. V. And i see a commercial for a new show called malcolm in the middle. Rose yes. And im like who the . That guy is familiar. Oh, my god, thats the guy i didnt know he could be funny and i literally had to say that outloud to no one. I was alone in the room. laughter rose laughs did no one agree with you . And it was all of that long way of saying that when i sat down to write the pilot for breaking bad, you know, im so glad, obviously, goes without saying, im so glad bryan was so interested and wanting to get in the room but i was thinking of him before he ever read the script. Rose you were thinking of him . I was, indeed. Because i knew that i wanted to work with that actor again. I held that off for seven years. Rose he could go from mr. Chips to scar face. This was a man who could do that and thats not an easy task to pull off because you need to one that whole continuum. You need to be kind november that First Episode as you saw the clips a little bit, smart and yet dopey not dopey, but you need to be an effective whats the word . You need to be someone that no one would you have to in other words from someone who know one would notice if they walked by on a sidewalk to being someone who you would cross the street to avoid. Having that kind of a range from start to finish is not easy. Rose quickly about the other cast memberers. Aaron as jesse. Aaron paul, a wonderful young actor who i only realized later in my meeting with him in the audition had been in an episode of the xfiles that my friend tom had written. He played a bad guy in an episode of the xfiles. I didnt recognize him. I had wonderful casting directors, sherry and they brought i always knew i wanted to work with brian again but sharon and sherry brought us all these other wonderful actors and made my life very easily because there were good people to pick from but the people we picked were the best. Rose a couple interesting stories. First of all, aaron, you thought you were going to kill him off at the end of the first year and you decided maybe not . Well, i decided it very quickly and we were on the set of probably the First Episode after the pilot and there was time to kill because our director of photography we changing lights and i said hey, aaron, sit down man. I want to tell you a story, i was going to kill you off. And he got these big bug eyes and he was very upset and i was not toying with him. I was telling him what i thought was a flattering story. My point being theres no way i would do that now. But he got very nervous. But, yes, the initial intention was that the character of Jesse Pinkman would be walter whites entree into the world of illegality and having served that purpose would come to some really, really awful end as a plot engine to further walts to full his to fuel a certain level of guilt and a certain need for revenge. But very quickly it was like im not going to cut off my nose to spite my face. This Al Qaeda Kidd is fantastic. Theres no way im getting rid of him. Rose and skyler. Is anna gunn in the audience he . Rose i think so. Where is she . There she is applause rose speaking of breaking bad the gorgeous, gorgeous anna gunn whos gracing with us her presence. So glad to see you. And sharon and sherry are casting folks and said you need to see anna gunn. And i say she was great in bedwood, lets see her. Anna had been sick the week we were casting and sharon and sherry called her and said please come in for this. So i owe them everything because there could be no better skyler white than anna gunn. Rose you bet. applause thats so much good acting but i want you guys to understand the casting. Then you have to cast hak whos going to be your provide the yin and yaing. We wanted Michael Chiklis very badly and so we had to find someone who looked a lot like him. laughs dean norris is a wonderful actor. I use a lot of superlative bus i feel them very deeply. A wonderful actor whose work i was really mupl like bryan cranston, before i cast him i only realized in hindsight that for instance id seen dean in whats that good movie with steve carell and yeah, little miss sunshine. He plays a Police Officer who pulls them over in their van at one point and he came in and he nailed it. He was fantastic. I have to stress, we saw a lot of good actors and actresses for all these parts. Really good folks. It was a wealth of great choices but the folks we went with was just perfect. Just stood way, way out. Rose so here youve got a great story, great idea, great actors, good writing. laughter so you go to these networks. They must have all wanted it at one time, didnt they . Everybody knew how good it was going to me. They all said me, me, me, me. laughs it was a feeding frenzy, charlie. laughter rose so what did they say . Those that turned it down, what did they say . And who were these bad boys . laughs there were there were we had we had quite a range when we speak of continuums, we had quite a continuum of reactions from very poker faced rose like whats going on here . To i have to say one of the best meetings i ever had was with two Network Executives who turned this project down. Rose what did they say in i pitched it to them. Its not a natural thing for me but you have to go in and pitch the First Episode and you say okay, we open on red rocks of whatever, new mexico and here comes an r. V. And a pair of pants flying through the air. See, im already messing it up. You get the flop sweat going. I pitched it to a network to two Network Executives who were the best audience i ever had aside from you guys. The best audience i ever had. These two people are leaning forward, closer and closer leaning forward in their seats. Then what happens . Then what happens . Yeah, thats great and i felt so good about the pitch and then when it ended they looked at each other and they said were going ask the question we hate to ask, we feel stupid asking it. Does it have to be meth . Could it be, like, counterfeiting money . And they werent a couple idiots. They said to me they were good guys a man and a woman. They were great. They said pretty much this exact quote we love this thing. We would love to buy it right in the room. If we bought it, we would be fired. Rose laughs we have a specific we have a specific plan. And they were wonderful. And, by the way, if theyre not going to buy it in the room, a surprisingly close second is a quick no. A quick and respectful no because most folks will not give you that. Most folks you pitch it, theyre stone faced, doing this the whole time. Looking at their watch. And then they stand up and limply shake your hand and youre out the door and you never hear from them again. You dont even hear no half the time. Rose did more than one say yes . We we f. X. Bought our pitch. The f. X. Network and this was before a. M. C. Was involved and they bought it and i developed it with them, wrote the pilot script for them and the man who runs the network is a wonderful i said wonderful again, but its true. Hes a wonderful guy. When they ultimately turned it down it was for a good reason. No one in this industry has a crystal ball and, b, they could only make one pilot that particular year that breaking bad was up. They had breaking bad and a show called dirt. And dirt was no, they had a mandate from their bosses make f. X. X. More femalecentric. Request sots they had this script dirt and a bona fide t. V. Star already attached to it. They had courteney cox. When i was working with them we didnt have Bryan Scranton attached. On painer they made a decision based on factors. I would have made the same exact decision and they very respectfully said we cant do this, we can only do the one and its going to be dirt. And ive talked with john since then, hes a great guy and he says i keep saying, no one has no one has a crystal ball. But to his credit i will always respect that gentleman because he let it go. Because they owned it and he let it go to a. M. C. And a lot of these executives wont do that and he was a standup guy. He was a real mench. Rose so you went to a. M. C. And. And the rest is history. Rose five years later were waiting for the next eight episodes which will tell us what happens. All right. So one last thing before we talk about whats happening within the five years of this series. While albuquerque . I hate to admit it, but money. Initially. I wrote the original pilot for riverside county, california. Riverside i was thinking in terms of that because i had a friend who was a Drug Enforcement agent who was working out of the riverside district office. He was nice enough to let me buy him lunch and he told me stories for an entire afternoon, he and his partner, about meth interdiction out in riverside and i thought why not shoot it 30, 40 miles from my house and sleep in my own bed at night and thats, indeed, the very first version of the pilot script reflected. And the sony folks in charge of the money came to me and said, hey, what do you think about shooting in albuquerque, new mexico . I said why . They said because the state of new mexico has this wonderful rebate that will save us all a lot of money and allow you to put much more on the screen. And it was that was the initial impetus. Having said that, albuquerque, i think, is as important a character to breaking bad as walter white or skyler white or Jesse Pinkman is. Rose because . You know what it is . First of all, i love shooting there. We had the best crew, great bunch of people. The skies there, unlike typically the case in Southern California, the skies of Southern California, is its beautiful weather in Southern California but its either a nice blank blue sky or the marine layer comes in its whitish gray. But in albuquerque typically they have these astounding clouds that really give you a feel for the scope of the distances that exist out there. So these amazing i dont know the latin term bus the fluffy sort of cumulous clouds going into infinity and you have everything every theres a feeling as great as Southern California is for many reasons and wonderful crews work there, but you cant point a camera anywhere that hasnt been filmed before. Not so albuquerque. It felt like virgin territory for cinematography and it really allowed us allowed me to realize what the show could be, the missing element that was not an idea they had in the pilot script but what we came up with was kind of a postmodern western and we started to use the cinematic language of john ford we mimicked we didnt john ford, sergio leoni. Rose see, thats fascinating. I never knew that. You were thinking like spaghetti western, thinking about john ford, thinking about a modern western. White hats, black hats. Yeah, although so many folks on the show maybe guys wear the black hat, some guys on the show wear gray hots, but nonetheless, yeah. Rose it is that. So when did walter white break bad . Everybody has a different idea. Thats a very good question. I had great engaging arguments. Not heated but i was talking to bryan cranston, he thinks its the very First Episode and he has a very smart rose what does h