00:00We're very working, working class.
00:02Be honest.
00:03I am being honest.
00:06She was very embarrassed and nervous
00:09because clearly he's been watching
00:10and I was mortified myself.
00:12He totally flipped the scene on its head.
00:15This interview changed everything.
00:17So it was kind of great he was there in a way.
00:19And it was a great moment for the movie, clearly.
00:21But it pissed me off.
00:30Hello, this is Fisher Stevens.
00:34Hi, I'm Michael Hart.
00:35I'm the editor on Beckham.
00:37And you're watching Variety's Making a Scene.
00:40There was something there that just straight away,
00:44I was just like, okay, this is it.
00:46I was in a van in Brooklyn on my way to work
00:50as an actor on Succession and my phone rang
00:54and it was DiCaprio's office saying,
00:57David Beckham wants your number.
00:59His people, are you interested
01:01in doing a documentary about him?
01:03I'm like, what?
01:05Out of the blue.
01:05I pretended, of course, I'm open at first,
01:07but no, I was not interested.
01:09David Beckham, I didn't know much about him.
01:11Jesse Armstrong, the creator of Succession,
01:13loves Man United.
01:14I said, Jesse, what do you think of David Beckham?
01:16He goes, he's a legend, he's brilliant.
01:19I was like, really?
01:20Yeah.
01:20I said, well, I got this weird call.
01:22He goes, you have to do it.
01:23And it wasn't until I met him and had dinner with him
01:25in London where it was like, okay.
01:27I mean, I met him.
01:28His ass was in the air.
01:29He was looking at a restaurant.
01:31He was looking for his wife's earring that had dropped.
01:33The wife was in the bathroom.
01:34And I was like, excuse me.
01:36And he like, almost like one of those bumped his head.
01:38He's like, sorry, I'm looking for the earring.
01:40And he says, that's just fine.
01:41And that's how I met him.
01:42I'm like, he's just a dude.
01:43He's just a normal guy.
01:44The fact I went to the games really was just to kind of,
01:48some would say stalk him, I would say see him.
01:51Story-wise, I made a big blunder at the beginning.
01:55And I thought, I'm gonna do a story
01:56about working class England and get very much
02:00into the working man and football and the parallels.
02:03And I went and did all these interviews
02:06with these footballers that he started with
02:07who didn't make it or who made it, but not really big.
02:11And I went into their houses and I did a few interviews
02:15and I went into these pitches like that you've never heard
02:17of in Cheltenham and Preston
02:19and these rough and tumble places.
02:22The pivot really occurred the third,
02:25second or third interview with David.
02:26I realized anytime I went away from David,
02:29the story was just like bullshit.
02:31It just was like, what am I doing?
02:33And then David also, to be fair, as he says, to be fair,
02:37he started to really open up to me much more.
02:40And the interview started getting much more intricate
02:42and deep and then I was like, oh fuck,
02:44I don't need any of that stuff.
02:45I just need him.
02:46I realized this is a love story about him and his wife,
02:48him and his dad, him and his ex-manager,
02:51Alex Ferguson or Alex.
02:53And it was like, oh, that's what this is.
02:55Unfortunately, I had to cut some people out of the movie,
02:58the series, which I hate doing,
03:00but I got to see a lot of England.
03:04That first time that I speak to her, I just fancied her.
03:10I just fancied him and it was as simple as that.
03:13I knew who I wanted to edit this film.
03:15I mean, the first time he called me, he just said,
03:16hey, it's Fisher.
03:17I didn't know who Fisher was.
03:19And I cold called Michael Hart.
03:21I'd never met him.
03:21He goes, hey, it's Fisher.
03:22And proceeded to talk about David Beckham.
03:24And I was like, Fisher, I was a Fisher.
03:27And then I recognized his voice and then it all clicked.
03:29And Michael was like, yeah,
03:30I'm making a movie about Michael J. Fox.
03:32I'm not available.
03:33And I was like, oh no, I just had a feeling though.
03:36And the truth was he didn't have faith in me
03:39making a Beckham film.
03:40Like who is this fricking American?
03:42So I said no.
03:43So I started editing with other editors, great editors,
03:46but we were struggling a bit,
03:49to find the essence of the film.
03:51But I just had a feeling about this guy and I hounded,
03:54I stalked Michael Hart.
03:56Cause I just knew no matter where we were,
03:59I wanted him to come in.
04:00And then he came back a year later
04:02and I still wasn't sure even though I was free
04:04because I had just done a celebrity bio doc
04:07and Michael J. Fox was just kind of all in
04:10on the authenticity.
04:11And I just wasn't sure if the Beckhams were gonna go there.
04:14I didn't know.
04:15Fisher kind of cleverly said,
04:18well, let me send you a couple of clips.
04:19And I was like, all right.
04:21And so he sent me some of his backstory stuff,
04:25various things to do with his football career.
04:28And then the last clip,
04:29and I think he strategically sent it to me last,
04:32was the scene, the be honest scene.
04:35Oliver, do you wanna come be in it?
04:37Make me look like a nice person.
04:39I'll just pat you every now and then.
04:42She was quite nervous the first interview.
04:45Getting her to sit down and talk about her husband.
04:48She wasn't like so excited to tell me all this,
04:51but we found a day when David was out of the house away
04:57and we were very excited that we could do it at the house
04:59where she's comfortable.
05:01So we're at their house.
05:02We had hair and makeup for her.
05:03No one else did in the whole movie,
05:05but she's Victoria, of course, fine.
05:07And she was very nice, very nice.
05:09And we start the interview and yeah,
05:12I think she's a bit nervous
05:13and I'm feeling like, God, she's really sweet
05:16and she's really open.
05:17And the next thing I know,
05:18I ask her this question about how she was raised
05:21and I know how she was raised.
05:22I mean, I did a lot of research with Billy Shepard,
05:25my story editor, producer.
05:26We both come from families that work really hard.
05:30Both of our parents work really hard.
05:32We're very working, working class.
05:35I remember specifically she said we were working class
05:38and I thought to myself, oh, here we go again.
05:40I know this.
05:41I've seen a lot of films where that,
05:42people say that line and then they go and tell their story.
05:46And all of a sudden David pops his head into the scene
05:49and I was like, what's this?
05:51What's happening here?
05:52And he totally flipped the scene in his head.
05:55And then David opens the door and he goes,
05:57be honest, be honest.
05:59Be honest.
06:00And thank God Damien Drake,
06:02who's a cameraman I work with a lot.
06:03I don't use tripods, which is another thank God moment
06:06because all my interviews are handheld,
06:08which is really tough on a cameraman
06:09because we shoot with these very heavy cameras.
06:12But he just knew to get up and swing the camera.
06:15I am being honest.
06:16What kind of did your dad drive you to school with?
06:18I have an iPad that I'm communicating with Billy
06:22in the other room, you know, checking questions
06:24or where, you know, she sometimes goes, ask about this.
06:27I'm going, what the fuck is David doing here?
06:30She was very embarrassed and nervous
06:34because he, she clearly he's been watching
06:36and I was mortified myself.
06:38So you saw what we shot, you know,
06:40and she's like, oh God.
06:42So my dad, my dad, it's not a simple answer because
06:50it depends.
06:51And I said, what is he doing here?
06:52We had a deal.
06:55And he said, I just wanted to make sure, you know,
06:57she was really, and he's like, Victoria,
06:59you can be honest, really.
07:01Just tell Fisher or whatever, be open.
07:03Okay, in the eighties, my dad had a Rolls Royce.
07:07I was like, okay, you got to go, man.
07:11And she went, David, you've got to go.
07:14And so he did leave.
07:16I made sure I didn't start again
07:18until I heard the door close.
07:20Saw his beautiful car bail out.
07:25And then we continued.
07:27I'd done like three interviews with him by then,
07:29but I think he realized like that we're going to do this.
07:31Let's fucking do it.
07:31This isn't the typical Beckham interviews.
07:35This is like something different.
07:37Ironically, I think it's one of the most honest scenes
07:40in the series because you get a true insight
07:43into their relationship and the way they interact,
07:45like they forget the camera's there.
07:46And that just freed her.
07:47And then everything changed.
07:50Because then the next interview,
07:52that's when she was like, ready, go.
07:54The biggest challenge with this scene was
07:57where do we put it?
07:58What we had here was this incredible moment
08:01that wasn't driven by story.
08:02It was pure character.
08:04It wasn't revealing anything
08:05about the events of the past.
08:07It was like, it was just an insight
08:08into them as characters.
08:10And wherever we use it, it's going to slow it down.
08:13And can we afford to do that this day and age?
08:16It's horrible to say, but it just,
08:18that was always the battle.
08:19It has to be in their introduction
08:22because it's actually really,
08:23it's the audience's entry point into their relationship.
08:26And we all realized that if we play it right at the top,
08:29let's be brave that the story can just stop.
08:32And we meet our characters for,
08:34I think it's like a minute scene
08:36where nothing happens but character development.
08:39Oh, thank you.
08:39Does anyone use this kitchen?
08:41It looks like it's never been used.
08:43Of course.
08:44I was cooking here last night.
08:46Having my voice in the documentary
08:48was my decision at the jump
08:50because I didn't know shit about this guy
08:53or his family or his wife.
08:54And I thought, I want the audience to understand
08:57that I'm like a lot of them.
08:58Fisher was really funny,
09:00the way he would interact with them,
09:01that back and forth between him.
09:04And so I really kind of fell in love with that.
09:07Look, he's straightening the chairs.
09:10I know, well, that's.
09:11David and I had a funny kind of good rapport
09:14and I wanted to add a little humor to this thing.
09:16And I think through me being in it,
09:18I could, David comes out funny sometimes,
09:22especially the Verite stuff.
09:23Sometimes I didn't want to be in it
09:25and Mike was like, you know, go, we need you here.
09:27Wasn't popular with all my editors at the beginning,
09:30but Michael got it.
09:31I was struck by how relaxed they were
09:36and how open they were to talk about
09:40kind of what they'd been through.
09:42And more than anything,
09:44it felt like it was the first time they told a lot of it.
09:46And ultimately they were just really funny.
09:49The way they told their story was refreshing
09:51and I had a sense of what they were
09:53before I got the material.
09:54It was almost tongue in cheek.
09:55It just felt refreshing
09:57and it felt like exactly what I wasn't expecting.
10:02You're going to work?
10:03I'm heading off to the fashion factory, Kate.
10:06No, where are you actually going?
10:07Facial.
10:08There you go.
10:09We have the interviews, we have the archival,
10:12we have the Verite, which is a whole other thing
10:15because we don't have very much Verite with David,
10:18but we have the beekeeping and we have the making the coffee
10:20and we have the closet and then we have the iDirect.
10:23So those are the four languages that we're working with.
10:27And it's like, where do we speak French?
10:29Where do we speak Italian?
10:30So where do we use those different elements
10:33and how to tell our story?
10:35Almost like those were our tools.
10:37And Michael, we just found that language.
10:39You don't want to do too much.
10:41And my instinct is always, ah, please.
10:43No, subtle, subtle, subtle.
10:46That was not easy, but eventually we found it.
10:49I remember when I told my friends,
10:50they'd say, I think I know this story.
10:52I know how that's going to play out.
10:53And I'd worked on a lot of documentaries
10:55where nobody knew the story.
10:57So like, Don't Fuck With Cats
10:58or Three Identical Strangers, where it's like this,
11:01how did I not know about this before?
11:02Whereas the Backup Story is the complete opposite.
11:04Everyone knows the story.
11:07But weirdly, that's your secret weapon
11:09because you can play with the audience's expectation.
11:13I was in shock when it released.
11:16Shock.
11:18How, in this country especially, how people responded.
11:22Because it was number one in America for like six weeks,
11:25which was like crazy.
11:27I mean, I'm sort of shocked I'm sitting here right now
11:28talking to you about it still,
11:30a year, nine months, 10 months later.
11:52I mean, I'm shocked I'm sitting here talking to you about it still,
11:53a year, nine months, 10 months later.
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