[MUSIC PLAYING]
JOE RUSSO: How are you?
Thank you.
KAREN SAUDER: Welcome.
JOE RUSSO: Thanks.
KAREN SAUDER: We're going
start with the trailer.
[VIDEO PLAYBACK]
- OK, Thor.
Hit me.
- Avengers, assemble.
- Get Avengers Endgame on
Blu-ray and digital today.
[END PLAYBACK]
KAREN SAUDER: Yeah.
[APPLAUSE]
JOE RUSSO: It's a lot of movie.
I was watching that
trailer going, oh my god,
how did we ever make this film?
KAREN SAUDER: Little daunting
to bring all of that together?
JOE RUSSO: Oh, yeah.
KAREN SAUDER: Yeah, I
was going to ask you
about the obviously pretty
complex effort here,
a lot of different characters,
storylines, all that.
Is it the most complex
project you've ever worked on?
JOE RUSSO: Hands down.
I mean, no question.
I would argue that probably
was the most complex movie ever
made.
It was very, very
difficult. When
Marvel sat us down and asked
us to direct these movies,
they basically said,
hey, we're going
to make the most
expensive movie ever made,
and then you're going
to get two weeks off.
Then you're going to make the
most expensive movie ever made
again.
And so literally
back to back films--
I mean, it's staggering.
It's a real
testament to our team
that we were able to
pull these movies off,
that my brother and
I are still standing.
These movies require
6,000 people to make.
KAREN SAUDER: Yeah, crazy.
JOE RUSSO: And just
even scheduling the cast
was one of the most
complicated puzzles
that you possibly imagine.
KAREN SAUDER: Well, we have
pretty interesting jobs here
but definitely not as
interesting as yours.
What's a bad day at
the office for you?
JOE RUSSO: I mean,
it's interesting.
We love making movies.
So we're in that
fortunate category
that we love what
we do for a living.
And we're very happy to go to
set everyday and figure out
problems.
We like to do that.
And we like to set goals
and targets and hit them.
And so bad days for us are--
we love action.
We love making action movies.
But action is actually
very, very hard to shoot.
It's complicated.
It's monotonous.
It's very slow because
it has to be methodical,
because you've got safety
you have to worry about.
And there's fumes
on set and smoke
you're inhaling all day long.
So those can be the tough days.
They're just
physically hard on you.
But other than that,
there are no bad days.
KAREN SAUDER: Well, you've seen
technology change a little bit
through the years.
What do you love most
about where technology is,
and what are you
looking forward to?
JOE RUSSO: Another
analogy we've used
is that when we
make these films,
we're like kids with a
really expensive Lego set.
And you can basically
accomplish anything
you want to accomplish
now on screen.
Obviously, you need a company
like Disney and Marvel
behind you with the
resources to support that.
But anything we imagine,
we can put in the film.
These movies require an
intense amount of preparation,
but we can get to set--
our team is so good--
and literally change
our mind about what
we want the CG to be, and
they'll be like, great.
We'll figure it out.
And then we'll spend 20 minutes
figuring out the geography
of how that CG might work.
But even in the
moment, we've reached
that point with technology
where, in the moment,
we can make a
creative decision that
can cost a million dollars,
and it can be accomplished.
Irrespective of the money,
it can be accomplished,
just physically accomplished.
KAREN SAUDER: Yeah, well, that's
a good note to think about.
So going back to when you
were a kid, when the Joe Russo
universe began, when
did you know you
wanted to get into filmmaking?
Was that an early thing?
JOE RUSSO: I was a
pop culture junkie.
I consumed a lot of content.
I collected comic books.
I watched anime.
I watched reruns of all
kinds of crazy TV shows.
I went to the movie.
I mean, I was the
kind of kid who
would go see "Krull"
four times in one day.
So I just love content,
and I love genre content.
And then as I got into my
teenage years in high school,
we had an amazing
English professor
who got us into art film
and understanding thematics.
Then, we had a
cinematheque open up
nearby that played a
lot of foreign films,
so I went through a
foreign film phase.
So we had a lot of
facets to our upbringing.
And I think it was
just purely off of--
if you're going to
ascribe 10,000 hours
and become an
expert at something,
I certainly tabulated a lot
of hours consuming content.
I think everyone could
probably say that today,
because I think everyone's got
PhDs in content consumption
now.
And then it led us down
a path that we ended up
shooting a movie on credit cards
when we were like 21 and 22,
I think.
KAREN SAUDER: But people noticed
you right away, according
to some of the articles I read.
JOE RUSSO: I mean, we
certainly got lucky.
Robert Rodriguez
made a film called
"El Mariachi" for $7,000,
and he wrote a book about it.
I think there were some
added costs in there
that Miramax had put in once
they bought the film that were
not accounted for in the book.
But it still represented
someone with no access
to the film industry taking
a limited amount of funds
and resources and making
something that turned them
into an established director.
We thought, OK, well,
we'll give that a shot.
And at the time
we did it, I think
Sundance was getting
2,000 submissions a year
because it had fed
this craze for people
making micro-budgeted movies.
We made one in Cleveland.
We didn't know anyone
in the film business.
We didn't know anything
about the film business.
We called the one guy in
Cleveland who had a camera.
And he called himself
a DP because he
was working on a few
commercials at the time.
And we read some books and
figured out how to make a film.
We got lucky because
it turned out--
it took us two years to
make it, but it turned out
good enough that it got the
attention of Steven Soderbergh.
And Soderbergh is
really the reason
I'm here, because he coached us
through our next project, got
our next movie made, which was
called "Welcome to Collinwood".
And then that led to
a show called "Lucky"
that led to "Arrested
Development" that
led to an Emmy.
And then 10 years making
television comedy then
led to Marvel.
So it's a 23-year
overnight success story.
KAREN SAUDER:
Well, you certainly
have made it look
easy for people
who would like to emulate.
Also, the lessons
here are do something
you love that you're
passionate about with people
who have big budgets, right?
Did I get all that?
JOE RUSSO: That's right.
Work with people who have money.
KAREN SAUDER: Yes, exactly.
So tell me what it's like
to work with your brother.
I have two teenage boys.
I can't imagine them
being productive,
let alone working together.
JOE RUSSO: I mean, it's
great because, one,
I don't know that a single
person could have accomplished
those two movies back to back.
I just don't think it's
physically possible.
So there's real value
in having two of us.
And we subscribe to something
called the mastermind
principle, which says
that two minds are not
doubly better than one mind.
They're exponentially better.
And so there's this
unquantifiable value
to having two brains on
something versus one.
And we get along great.
We both grew up loving similar
things, both love movies.
So it was an easy
access point for us.
And frankly, we've fallen into
these roles and have for years
where, when an idea
comes up, one of us
will just assume the
contrary position
so that we can vet the idea.
And we'll argue
about it for an hour.
And then either
the idea sustains
or we come up with
a better idea.
But I think that process has
been very effective for us,
because nothing gets
through unchecked.
KAREN SAUDER: And then, when
you disagree, one of you
says, I'm going to call mom.
JOE RUSSO: That's how it works.
I mean, we've got to that point
now where it's literally like--
people will be freaked out
because we're Italians.
We're very passionate.
We're in the room like,
no, that's bullshit.
It's never going to work.
And then five minutes later,
we're like, OK, great.
Let's go get lunch.
It's a process
that we go through
that we leave in the room.
It's because we're family.
If we weren't
family, I don't know
that the partnership sustains.
Because with family, it's easy
to just forgive and forget
and walk out the door,
because you grew up
having arguments
with each other,
so you understand what that is.
And so it's very easy
to let that stuff go.
KAREN SAUDER: And
obviously, it's working.
So let's talk about
the movie a little bit.
Who's your favorite character?
JOE RUSSO: I mean,
growing up, Spider-Man
was my favorite character.
I collected a lot of
Spider-Man comics.
Obviously I could relate
to him, being a kid.
I just find this idea
of being burdened
with such responsibility
at a young age,
and tragic responsibility,
is really compelling.
And I think we like the
more Shakespearean elements
of comic books.
I like when there is flawed
characters dealing with loss
or trying to overcome
their own humanity.
I love that Tony
Stark in the books
was dealing with an
addiction problem.
And these are things that
everyone can relate to.
And it's ultimately, I think,
why you go to the theater,
is you're there for
the character moments.
Because your brain can only
handle about 30 seconds
of action or spectacle without
some semblance of a narrative
or thrust to it.
And those character moments are
what provide that structure.
KAREN SAUDER: Well,
and your films
are amazing at bringing
that humanity into life.
So clearly, failure was a
big theme for this movie.
Can you tell us about
a time when you failed?
I mean, it seems like
you've had a ton of success.
Did any of that fuel this--
JOE RUSSO: Yeah, certainly.
I mean, I think you learn
more from your failures
than you do from your successes.
That is absolutely,
100% true, because they
stick with you more.
A success is something that
you can package and go, great,
I did it.
Everyone's happy.
What's next?
A failure is something that
haunts you every day that you
wake up, and you go, what
were the mistakes I made,
and how do I do
better next time?
That's where the
real lessons lie.
And so I think it's
valuable to have failure
because I think it's
important to know what it's
like not to succeed and also
to know what it feels like not
to succeed, because
then you don't
want that to happen again.
And so what we learned,
the one thing that I think
is most important
to us, is that we
learned to try not to
predict what people want.
You can't predict it.
Nobody knows what they want, and
they all want different things.
You get on the internet
and read comments,
and everyone wants something
different from these movies.
So if we were
trying to anticipate
what it was that
the audience wanted,
we were bound to failure.
We use our own internal
metric, our own sense of taste,
our own desire because
we've got to live
with the story every day.
I've got to care about it.
I've got to be
emotional about it.
And I want to get out of
bed to tell it every day
and spend the time on it.
So that's the most important
thing we've learned,
is make sure that
we tell our story
and then hope that
other people like it.
And the last point
I'll make on this
is if you try to anticipate what
people want, and you make that
and it doesn't
work, you're going
to get up every day
feeling like crap
that you didn't listen to
your own internal voice.
But if you make something
that you care about
and that you love
and it doesn't work,
you're going to wake up feeling
a lot better about yourself
every day.
And that's the hard lesson that
we learned from our failures.
KAREN SAUDER: That's
a great lesson.
I wish I had been a lot more
comfortable with failure
earlier in my life.
Because if you're
not failing, you're
probably not pushing yourself,
not trying hard enough.
JOE RUSSO: That's right.
You're not taking enough risks.
KAREN SAUDER: It's a
benefit, not a negative.
Do you ever go to
the theater and just
try to see what
people are feeling?
Do you love to watch somebody
like me crying in the corner?
JOE RUSSO: We do.
I mean, that's an
important part of it.
I mean, if you want
a closed medium,
you can write books and
then get them distributed,
and then people
all over the world
can privately read your stories.
We make these because
it's a public medium,
and we did grow up in
a big Italian family.
And part of our
experience of growing up
was sitting around a dinner
table, entertaining each other
and telling stories
to each other.
And that's where I learned
how to tell stories.
And so sharing that
experience with people
is critically important to us.
Also, we're paying it forward.
We grew up going to the theater
as kids, watching "Star Wars,"
watching "Empire Strikes Back,"
"Indiana Jones," "Jaws," being
moved in theaters and being
moved by the spectacle
and walking out and
thinking about that
and having it affect
us and change us.
And now we want to do the
same thing for other kids.
And we hope that one day they'll
become the new storytellers.
And so ultimately, for us,
sneaking into a theater
every now and then is really
a reward for all the hard work
we've done.
Because when you
can sit in there
and have people respond with
joy and passion and pain,
and they can be surprised and
engaged and cheer and yell at
the screen, that is really the
pinnacle of being a filmmaker,
is engaging the
audience in a way.
And I think with
"Endgame," we saw, I think,
one of the more unique
moments of movie history,
because we've never had anything
like the Marvel universe
before, where you have 10
years of really, really
successful, multiple
franchises interwoven
into one big narrative.
And those franchises reach
different kinds of people
all over the globe and
pull them together.
And so no movie's ever had that
kind of momentum behind it.
And I don't know
if anyone in here
went to opening weekend
or the second weekend,
and you had a really
active and engaged crowd.
But that is very rare for a film
to get that kind of response
in theaters all over the world.
KAREN SAUDER: Well, what
a cultural moment, too,
that you were able
to bring together
all of these different
characters in a very
inclusive way and from all
different parts of the galaxy.
it just felt to me like it
was a really important message
at this time in history, too.
JOE RUSSO: It is
critically important.
And we don't hide
the fact that we
infuse these movies
with thematics
that are important to us.
Part of our process sitting in a
room when we break the scripts,
they're talking for two or
three weeks about what's
going on in the world and how
we feel, my brother, myself,
and the writers
Markus and McFeely.
And we talk about what
is making us anxious.
And then we figure out how
to turn that into a story.
And traditionally,
we'll give that anxiety
to the villain's plot.
If you look at
"Winter Soldier," it's
about the surveillance state.
How much should the
government know?
How much control should
the government have?
Can we trust the government?
And it's not asking the
simplistic questions of can
you trust the government.
It's, can you trust
the apparatus?
Because the apparatus can
allow for things to happen that
are contrary to
community-oriented goals.
And then Snowden
came out while we
were in the middle
of a post on that
because it came out of
our anxieties and other
people's anxieties
about what was going on.
We're not hiding
the fact that Thanos
is a thinly veiled
metaphor for climate change
and where this planet's
going and limited resources.
I have four children.
They have to inherit
this earth at some point.
What are they going to get?
So it's all worked
into those films.
And I think because
those movies are--
they're pop culture
films, you can
digest those ideas in a way,
and you can process them.
And also, what I
think is fascinating
is that you can reach
audiences around the world
with those messages.
And for us as artists,
that's critically important.
KAREN SAUDER: Well,
and you've clearly
done that with this
movie, so congratulations.
JOE RUSSO: Thank you.
KAREN SAUDER: You have a
production company, AGBO.
JOE RUSSO: We do.
KAREN SAUDER: And what's
next on the horizon for you?
JOE RUSSO: So for
us, I mean, what
was really nice is
that we're able to take
the branding that we built
off of these Marvel films
and parlay it into our own
films and television studio.
It's called AGBO.
We're self financed.
And again, we're artists
paying it forward
because Steven Soderbergh
held the door open for us
all those years ago.
We're now trying
to hold the door
open for other new voices
that have something
really compelling to say.
So that's really the
function of the studio.
We're calling it a
storyteller's studio.
Markus and McFeely are our
partners in the studio.
So the process that we learned
where Kevin Feige would
pop his head in
the door and say I
need "Civil War" by April
of 2016, we go, great.
Give us four months, and
we'll come up with a script.
That's a very focused
and disciplined process
that is required to execute
in a time frame like that
under that kind of pressure.
And so we're taking what we
did on all four of those films
under pressure, and
we're converting that
into a very thoughtful process
for developing scripts.
KAREN SAUDER: That's great.
And did I read that you're doing
something with "Poltergeist?"
Was that real?
JOE RUSSO: I mean,
that was something
we were talking about.
I don't know that
that ultimately
ever came to fruition, but
something I loved as a kid.
KAREN SAUDER: I
was going to say,
it brings back a
lot of memories.
JOE RUSSO: I was
interested in turning it
into a television series.
KAREN SAUDER: Oh,
that's interesting.
Do you have favorite
actors to work with?
Do you make
relationships on set,
or is everybody
part of the family?
JOE RUSSO: I mean,
certainly it's a family.
There's no question.
And we were really spoiled.
I mean, you have Oscar winners
that are showing up to day plan
your movies.
That's absurd.
And again, that just speaks to
the uniqueness of the Marvel
universe and its
place in movies.
We love all different processes.
And I think that's
part of what's
fun, is having so many
great actors on these films,
is that they all bring a
different process to it.
And it keeps it
exciting as a director,
because every day someone
else is showing up,
where Chris Evans and
Scarlett Johansson
are very technical, very gifted
on a technical level, where
Scarlett's a one-taker.
I mean, you could
literally say to her,
OK, here's what the
intention of the scene is,
and I need you to cry somewhere
between these two lines.
And take one-- she can turn
it on, and you're like,
well, I don't know what
else to ask for from her
after that take.
We just got it.
And there's other actors
who like to try six, seven--
Mark Ruffalo.
You could shoot
him all day long,
because he just likes to
keep trying different things.
Downey will never say
the same line twice.
He's got a really unique process
where he has an earwig in,
and he has an
assistant who's been
working with him for years.
And what we'll do
is, on a Sunday
before we shoot his
scenes for the week,
we'll get in a room
with him and the writers
and pitch out alternate
lines, because he wants
to keep it alive every take.
So then he'll do
a take scripted,
and then his assistant
will feed him the alts.
He'll do the scene
again with the alts.
His assistant will feed
him the next round of alts.
He'll do the scene again
with another round of alts.
And what's great is
that, after four takes,
we can look at
everything he's done,
and we can pick and
choose and rebuild it.
And then he'll do it one
more time with everything
that seemed to work the best.
That's a very different process
than, say, Scarlett's process.
So it's exciting to work
with such a range of talent.
KAREN SAUDER: Yeah, what an
incredible group of talent
for this one in particular.
OK, so now that you have
the highest grossing film
of all time, are you going to
go to your high school reunion
in Ohio, be like, hey, I'm Joe.
JOE RUSSO: I feel
bad I haven't been--
KAREN SAUDER: What
have you been up to?
JOE RUSSO: I haven't
been to one in years.
But I mean, the thing
about these films
is that you can never target how
they're going to be received.
The fan base is fickle, to say
the least, and very passionate.
And we've been very
grateful, because we
have told four stories that
were very personal to us
and that we were very
passionate about.
And people did respond to them.
And that's the most
gratifying aspect to it.
KAREN SAUDER: Definitely.
Thank you.
All right, we're going to
take a couple of questions.
But first, I'll take
one from the Dory, which
is, how do you find
your comedy directing
background on
"Community" and "Arrested
Development" influenced
your approach to these?
JOE RUSSO: Well, certainly
with both those shows,
we were working
with a lot of cast.
And there's real
discipline in TV comedy
because you have 21
minutes to tell a story.
And both "Arrested"
and "Community"
were very ambitious shows,
from a character standpoint.
So sometimes we'd have 20
characters in 21 minutes,
and you try to track
six or seven of them
through an episode.
And that just teaches
you a process of, one,
developing to be able to
achieve that, so developing
your script correctly,
and two, when
you execute on set, what
is required to do that
and the amount of time
it takes to do that.
So certainly there
was carryover,
and we learned a lot from
TV that we brought to film.
KAREN SAUDER: What
about time travel, now
that it's been introduced?
How do you raise the
stakes from here?
How do you help audiences care
about the heroes of the MCU
when they know that there may
be infinite of alternate copies
out there?
JOE RUSSO: I mean,
ultimately, I think
that you're paying attention to
the story that you're watching
and that there are stakes in
the story that you're watching.
I guess you can get into
theoretical or philosophical
conundrums.
But I mean, I think ultimately
when you sit in a theater
and you're engaged
by a narrative,
you're going to
feel the narrative.
You can leave the theater
and think about, well, I
guess there's an infinite
amount of stories
that could've played out.
Sure, but that's not the
one that you watched.
I think it's
compelling because I
think it offers a
lot of opportunity
for really unique storytelling.
And I think when I said
earlier that we all
have PhDs in content
consumption, this young lady
right here, that young
man right there can
get 10 minutes into
a commercial movie,
and you can lean over and ask
them what's going to happen,
and they'll tell you because
they've seen the same narrative
structure over and
over and over again.
Part of the reason that
our movies worked at Marvel
was because we had a
very simple formula,
and it was about disruption.
And if you look at
all of our films,
they're very disruptive
to the main narrative.
"Winter Soldier" takes the good
guys, turns them into bad guys.
"Civil War" takes your
heroes and pits them
against each other in a fight.
"Infinity War--" we kill
half your favorite heroes.
At the end of "Endgame,"
we kill your favorite.
These are disruptive
choices that
surprise you, make you feel,
engage you in conversation.
These are critically important.
So I think that what I
like about the time travel
is that it offers an incredible
amount of disruption.
There's a lot of directions that
the story can go in from here,
and they don't
have to be linear,
which I also think is deadly
to traditional narrative
storytelling.
KAREN SAUDER: You've
definitely figured that out
with "Endgame."
It's great.
If you'd like to
ask a question live,
there's microphones
on either side here.
AUDIENCE: Hi, Joe.
Thank you for being here.
First of all, the
movie was amazing.
The fact of being able to
cry and laugh and get excited
at the same time was amazing.
I wanted to ask a question,
and it goes really
in line with time traveling.
If you could travel back
in time for this movie,
what would you change?
JOE RUSSO: It's interesting.
People ask us that a lot.
These projects are so
iterative, and their resources,
to a certain extent,
are almost unlimited,
that if we regret
anything by the end of it,
we did not do our
jobs correctly.
And our process
is really vigilant
as we're making the film.
We're shooting for a year.
So something we
shot two months, we
can watch three months
later in the edit room
and decide we don't
like the performance,
we didn't like the tone, we
didn't get the joke right,
we didn't get the emotion
right, and we reshoot it.
And so all the way up until
we deliver these movies--
the famous "I am Iron
Man" line was literally
shot two months before
this film was in theaters.
It's an exceedingly
iterative process.
And its only limits
are how much sleep
you need to get at some point.
So I don't know.
We really don't regret
anything about it.
We're very happy with
how it turned out.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
KAREN SAUDER: That's a benefit.
And that's a nice thing to say.
So actors are interested.
Fans are waiting.
Harmon is willing.
Have you considered taking
on the "Community" movie?
JOE RUSSO: I mean,
as I said, I think
it's a real tragedy if we don't
complete the "and a movie"
to six seasons and a movie.
So I'd love to see it get done.
I think it just requires
wrangling everybody.
People are on projects.
Donald's very hard
to get on a phone.
So it would just
require some strategy.
But I think it can be done.
KAREN SAUDER: Well,
you've demonstrated you
can do a lot of great things.
So I think we heard it here.
Expect it.
Another question from the group.
At Google, we take
on ambitious projects
that involve hundreds
or thousands of people
working towards a single goal.
This is a good example.
Can you share tips on how
you deliver your projects?
You said you had 6,000
people working at one time.
How do you do that on time,
on budget with that quality?
JOE RUSSO: There's a
couple of key ingredients.
One is that you need to
be a great collaborator,
because there is no universe
that my brother and I could
have accomplished making
those movies alone.
We had key, key collaborators
through all four films
that we worked with,
from our VFX supervisor
to our editor to our DP
to Markus and McFeely.
These are critical
collaborators that you
have to empower and give
emotional ownership to
so that they are just as
invested in the project
as you are every
step of the way.
And then those key
collaborators then, in turn,
have to do that to
their silo of crews.
And I think that's an
incredibly important part
of it, collaboration
and emotional ownership.
And then, as a
leader, I think what
is most important
is being decisive.
You have to make decisions.
You have to make them
quickly under pressure.
And I always say this
to young filmmakers.
I say, make a decision.
If you find out 24 hours
later it's the wrong decision,
figure out how to make it the
right decision by retrofitting
and pivoting until you get
to where you need to go.
Once you make a
decision, you have
to be able to communicate
that to people.
So I think
communication skills are
incredibly important and
being concise in the way
that you communicate.
So in two sentences,
being able to tell someone
what it is you need from
them for the next week
is really important as well.
KAREN SAUDER: And how do you
think about that with feedback?
So you enroll
everyone in the vision
and give them the
autonomy to do it.
But then do they need
a lot of feedback?
Do you provide a
lot of feedback?
Is it sort of real-time?
JOE RUSSO: We do.
We have check-ins where
we'll get everyone
in a room for a group
meeting, the heads of state,
and feedback comes out.
And you're like,
that's a great idea.
Let's incorporate that.
I really like that idea, but
that would send us backwards,
and I don't know that we
have the time to go backwards
and execute, or the money.
It's an idea farm.
And our number one
motto is best idea wins,
doesn't matter
where it comes from.
And people also have
access to us 24/7.
So if they have a question,
they need something from us,
they can call us,
email us, text us,
and we're incredibly responsive.
Within minutes,
they'll get an answer.
KAREN SAUDER: Back to
your lack of sleep.
JOE RUSSO: That's it.
That's what you sign up for.
KAREN SAUDER: We have another
question from the audience.
AUDIENCE: Hey, Joe.
Thanks for being here.
Obviously, "Endgame"
was an amazing movie,
culmination of a
10-year storyline
that either met or exceeded the
wildest expectations that we
had.
There is another series
that just recently finished,
"Game of Thrones,"
which actually
followed a very different path,
did not meet any expectations.
Where do you think
you went right?
JOE RUSSO: That's your opinion.
KAREN SAUDER: I was just going
to say, that's one opinion.
JOE RUSSO: That's your opinion.
AUDIENCE: I'll call it out.
JOE RUSSO: I just want
to make that clear.
That is not my opinion.
AUDIENCE: Where do you think you
went right with the "Avengers"
storyline, and where did
"Game of Thrones" go wrong?
JOE RUSSO: This is 20,000
headlines for the next three
weeks if I answer this question.
Look, it's interesting being
an artist in today's world
with social media, because
it's an unprecedented level
of ownership that the viewer
feels over the material.
When I grew up, Ernest Hemingway
wanted to write a book,
he wrote a book, and you
read it and you went,
that's great and amazing.
And thank you, Ernest Hemingway,
for writing an incredible piece
of literature.
And you were very
grateful for it.
Today, rightly or wrongly,
there is an intense amount
of ownership and opinion.
And opinions fly
fast and furious.
And I've learned this
about social media,
that there's a minority of
opinions that are very loud.
And they tend to drive
the media cycle in a way
where it's not healthy
because you're not
getting a true sampling
of everyone's opinion.
It takes energy to go online
and bitch about something.
And not all of us have that
energy or care to do it.
There's also a little
bit of narcissism
that's involved
with getting online
to complain about something.
So you have to have the
combination of those things
in order to do that.
And I don't think that that is
evocative of a large segment
of society.
And I'm sorry I'm not answering
your question directly.
KAREN SAUDER: That's OK.
I'm trying to give you an out.
JOE RUSSO: I'm trying to give
you a version of an answer.
They made the choices that they
wanted to make with that show,
and people felt that they--
I think what they felt was that
they didn't feel that it was
seeded properly
throughout the series,
that some of the choices
seemed unexpected.
They were very
disruptive choices.
I loved all the choices.
I thought they were
crazy and unexpected,
and that's what I want
out of a narrative.
But I see where people
feel like they were upset.
And I think that,
ultimately, that
just goes down to an
artist saying, well,
here was our intention.
And if you go back
and look at it,
we think it's very
carefully woven throughout.
It may be very subtle,
but it's in there,
and a viewership going, well,
we thought it was too subtle,
and we're not following it.
So it's a unique circumstance.
But I'm glad we
didn't get as beat up.
KAREN SAUDER: We'll
take another question.
AUDIENCE: Hi, Joe.
Thank you for being with us.
So as you mentioned,
there were a lot
of emotional moments within
"Endgame," ones that made
the crowd cheer, laugh, cry.
I'm curious, was it as emotional
when you were filming it,
or was it more like, we film
it, done, or does it really
build up emotionally?
JOE RUSSO: It's emotional.
I mean, scenes I still
tear up when I watch.
I mean, we put in moments that
are emotionally profound to us.
That's the way that
we make these things,
because we feel like if they're
emotionally profound to us,
that they may translate
emotionally to an audience.
So Hawkeye losing his
family at the beginning--
I've got four kids.
I don't know that I
could process that.
I don't know how I
would process it.
That just felt like a
really compelling way
to open the movie.
And every time I watch
that scene, it gets me.
Tony Stark having to
sacrifice himself knowing
that his daughter's
going to lose a father
and his wife is going
to lose a husband--
that is very complicated
for me to think about.
But I also know that's
good storytelling,
and it's challenging
storytelling.
It's another thing
today, is I find
that people tend to view death
as a negative in storytelling.
I look at it as a
positive, because I think--
and we were talking
about this earlier--
we live in a world where you're
either for the individual
or you're for the
community right now.
And I think that what's
compelling about Tony
making that choice is making
a choice for the community.
And it's a personal sacrifice,
and that's what heroes do.
That's the very definition
of what a hero is.
So I don't know that the movie
could have ended any other way
because a hero has to be willing
to make the greatest sacrifice.
That is why we
commend them, and that
is why we always think
of them as the greatest
amongst us, because they
make those choices that
are very difficult to make and
that not all of us could make.
KAREN SAUDER: Well,
and I loved that you
had Pepper tell him that
it was OK, like, go,
and we're going to be fine.
JOE RUSSO: It is a group moment.
It's a group decision.
She says the same thing
to him on the couch,
is that, I know who you are.
I know that you can never
rest until the job is done.
And that's why I think Tony
Stark was always fated to die,
is because he is a
hero who can never
rest until the job is complete.
And that mission
required, ultimately,
him losing his life.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
JOE RUSSO: Sure.
KAREN SAUDER: One last question.
AUDIENCE: Karen asked
the question of how
you work with your brother.
So I was going to ask
some additional questions
about that.
The first one is, there
are a lot of tasks
that directors have to do.
Do you gravitate
toward certain things
while he gravitates
toward other things,
and is it always consistent?
And the other question is--
JOE RUSSO: That's a
good question, yeah.
AUDIENCE: --do you ever
get lost in idea sessions
with him, where you just
keep throwing ideas around
and you never know
which one to execute?
JOE RUSSO: No, we
ideate all the time.
And I think that you have
to put a limit on that,
because at some point you
have to make a decision,
like I said, move forward.
Doing this for 25 years,
you develop an instinct
about when it's time
to move on and when
you have the correct idea.
So it's hard to ascribe any
kind of formula to that.
And then as far as us
working together, I mean,
we try not to divide
up, because we
feel like the true value
to the mastermind principle
is that you want the
exponential brains on everything
because that's where you get
the exponential secret sauce.
And when you divide
up, you lose that.
However, we have been doing
this for so long together
that we now know how
each other thinks.
And we can check ourselves
if the other one isn't there
and go, no, Anthony would
say this in this situation.
I need to think through
this, because this is
where he would come at it from.
And so we have a little
voice inside our head
that represents the other
one's point of view.
But I do think that if you're
working a group dynamic,
it's always important
to maintain that group
dynamic at least for
critical check-in moments.
It's OK to let people go
off and dream on their own
and then come back.
But I think you always have to
come back to a group collective
where the group can contribute.
That's the reason you
have a group dynamic.
KAREN SAUDER: Well,
Joe, on behalf
of billions of fans
around the world,
thank you for all the joy, all
the tears, all the laughter
that you brought in "Endgame"
and the other movies.
And thank you to Marvel
and Disney as well.
It's really been a pleasure
having you at Google.
JOE RUSSO: Thank you.
I want to take the
opportunity to thank the fans
and thank all of you.
I mean, really, we make
these movies for you,
like I said, as a public medium.
And we're very, very
grateful that people
have responded to this movie
the way that they have.
And it's very important to
us that these films-- the way
that we brought our family
together around a dinner table,
that these movies can bring
people around the world
together to have
shared experiences
is, without question,
their highest value.
KAREN SAUDER: Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
