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Leverage Season 3, Episode 10, The Underground Job, Audio Commentary Transcript

Marc: Hi, I'm Marc Roskin, Director of The Underground Job.

John: I'm John Rogers, Executive Producer.

Chris: I'm Chris Downey, Executive Producer. And I guess standing in for our two writers.

John: Yes, Melissa Glenn and Jessica Rieder are unfortunately unable to do the commentary. However Chris developed this episode with them so he will catch-

Chris: I'm gonna be both of them.

John: He's gonna be both of them. He's wearing a pretty little smock dress just to commemorate that. Great episode, a ton of fun, and very relevant. Of course it is inspired by the- one of the many disasters, mine disasters in America.

Chris: Yes.

John: And it was a little shocking when we started doing research on how easily safety- you can flaunt the safety regulations in this industry.

Chris: Yeah, I- you know, Jessica and Melissa are great at really digging in on a subject.

John: Yup.

Chris: It all started season one when they did the Two Horse Job, and we sent them into the world of horse racing, they befriended a jockey.

John: They went and lived at the- yeah at the stables for a week. Right.

Chris: And I believe they befriended a coal miner for this one.

John: Yes, they called the coal miner and got- all that banter from the opening scene is directly from him. Marc, how the hell did you do that?

Marc: We dug a hole in the side. We had a black up- a black in the back so it's just the entrance, just the side of a hill.

John: So the entrance was built on the side of a hill?

Marc: Yeah, it’s all fake. We had a CG explosion there, we did have a little propane mortar just to give us something to start with.

John: Well that's actually a good point, is what do you need- I know you guys do that all the time is to have like a little starter explosion. Is that to map the light? or what is that for?

Marc: Yeah, it’s to give the artist something to start with. And this time, you know, Dean just wanted it bigger, bigger, bigger. It's also a little more costly to use gas when you do explosions. You know, it’s more permitting,, so we used propane and then we just enhance it. But unfortunately that day we had a nice rainy day to open with.

Chris: Yeah, it sure gave nice atmosphere.

Marc: Nice, yeah.

John: Yeah.

Marc: Yeah, and they gave us full use of all the mining equipment like the skids and dump trucks; it was great.

Chris: Now Marc, did you look at- were there any movies, or any influences that you had when you were going into this episode and knew you were gonna do coal mining? Anything sort of interior?

Marc: Yeah, it was- well at first it was just looking at pictures, you know, with our production designer. And just going through what type of coal mines do exist, and how are we gonna create one with our frankenstein set which is used in numerous episodes?

Chris: Right.

John: That is over on- if you've been on the tour seen Con Con on the DVD you know that's over on studio E; that’s our other sound stage and it has been a hospital, it has been FBI offices, it’s been-

Chris: The vaults.

Marc: Antiquities rooms.

John: Antiquities vaults.

Marc: You name it.

John: Yes exactly and this time we turned it into a mine for this one.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Because apparently you can't bring equipment down into a real mine.

[Laughter]

Chris: And I have to say Marc, I know I said this before, but this to me is my favorite of your episodes. I thought this was a really cinematic-

Marc: Oh, thank you.

John: Really? Oh interesting.

Chris: Yeah, I mean, you know. I liked this even more than Tap Out and that’s saying a hell of a lot. I thought this came out fantastic.

Marc: What I loved about this, you know, after shooting and editing it, there’s no fat to this episode.

John: Yeah.

Marc: I mean the girls did such a great job writing it, we had such a good production quality, and our guest stars were fantastic.

John: Yeah. There is an acting moment Bruce Davison does later which is generally one of my favorite acting moments in the whole series, all three seasons up to this point.

Marc: And Annie Fitzgerald playing Deborah Pierce. Everything just clicked, and you just never felt like “is this scene gonna make it?”

John: Yeah.

Chris: Right.

Marc: Because every scene was important, and there was a little bit of everything for everybody.

John: No, good- a couple good con elements. And this actually was also born of- you finally got your Mission Impossible episode. Like you're ‘trapped in a subway’ episode.

Chris: Well we did a little bit, and the other thing is, you know, we talk about classic cons and you know, now that we're done season three, one of the all time classic cons in history is salting a mine. And it, you know, typically was done during the gold rush where, you know, people would put gold dust in a, you know, a prospectors pan and sell the worthless land.

John: With- with a shotgun.

Chris: Or salt the, you know, an empty hole, yeah with a shotgun. And the challenge here was how do we contemporize it? And more importantly, since we were starting with the premise of a mine owner, how do you find a way to sell a mine owner his own mine? How do you salt a mine he already owns?

Marc: Right.

Chris: So that became, you know, a big challenge. But I love that we’re able to do one of these classic cons that we've never done before.

Marc: Yeah. Well what's also great about this, and you'll see as the episode goes on, every cast member has something to do in the con, and no one is just sitting in a control room.

John: Yeah.

Chris: Right.

Marc: You see Gina and Aldis get to play a part here. You know, Tim follows right in. Christian with the relationship with the boy who lost his father. And Beth as well, when she has to befriend Deborah Pierce.

John: Two bad guys. Two bad guys always give you a lot to do-

Marc: Yeah.

John: But plotting it's a nightmare.

[Laughter]

Marc: Right.

John: Because, you know, you have to come up- these episodes already burn two or three cons or heists an episode, you have to double that when you have two bad guys.

Chris: And you have to make them really distinctive and different.

John: Yeah.

Chris: I mean this may sound-

John: We actually struggled with this; we didn't originally have two in this.

Chris: We didn't really have two, yeah. But I think that one of the real research stories we had, there was some element to the two.

Marc: Yeah.

John: Well, yeah the idea that the way that these mine guys dodge having to pay for all these improvements is just keeping stuff tied up in the appeals process.

Chris: Right.

John: And that led us to, you know, who could help him in that situation? And Citizens United had just gone through, so the whole idea that you could, through a shell company, donate pretty much anything you wanted through a PAC-

Chris: Right.

John: -to a candidate without worry about the individual donation limit was just- that was great.

Chris: Yeah.

John: And some people said we got a little wrong. We don’t- we didn't quite explain what this guy was doing properly, which was putting it through a PAC.

Marc: Right.

John: And we actually had a fairly- we won't say who it was, but we had a guy who could viably run for president’s lawyer on the phone, and he-

Chris: During the research for episode one.

John: Episode one, exactly.

Chris: 301.

John: And he took us through the whole difference between campaign fund and PAC. And took us through the rigorous ways the government makes sure you cannot cheat in a campaign fund, and how PACs are basically giant slush funds.

[Laughter]

John: That you can do anything with. This was a lovely sequence, by the way.

Marc: Yeah, these are nice moments when Sophie gets to coach Parker.

Chris: And then look, I love the con character that Parker came up with here. It was sort of a very nice, specific sort of southern belle.

Marc: Right.

Chris: Eager intern, who didn't need the money but just was willing to do whatever it took to work for the candidate.

John: I mean yeah, some of that was in the script, but a lot of it was Beth landing it.

Chris: Yes.

John: Landing that. You know, finding that voice and- yeah. And also, nobody quite writes Parker like the wonder twins. I mean, they really nailed the whole not quite understanding-

Marc: They really do.

John: Parker not quite understanding the goal of the grift, and why she's bad at it.

Marc: And the other thing that the wonder twins are great at, and sometimes it's complicated when you're shooting, but when you see the finished product, their flashbacks are very intricate.

John: Yeah.

Marc: But they really hit home during the story. And all of their episodes are really gifted with the flashbacks.

John: Yeah. No, they've done- yeah this one- they all fly, what are we saying.

[Laughter]

John: They are all bears to break, they've all got four plot lines and- yeah. It's not exactly just find a body in Central Park and then move on and figure out who killed them.

Marc: But it was great, that little notepad that she had as Sophie plays here and pays off at the end.

John: Yeah, exactly. And introducing her in the mirror, nice idea. Whose idea- did you come up with that?

Marc: Well yeah, I mean- it was scripted that she's rehearsing in a mirror, so we just played into that a bit.

John: Oh, I did not remember that. No, coming up with that shot, that was nice.

Marc: And this is the building that was used on many times, the city hall building in downtown Portland.

Chris: Oh, yes.

John: Portland always doing their best to make us feel welcome. We actually kick the mayor out for this. Is that- wait this is the mayor's office from the season finale!

Marc: Exactly, it was Richard Klein’s office.

John: Season 2 finale.

Chris: Oh it is, boy that's pretty good.

John: Yeah.

Chris: People are paying attention at home.

John: We stared at that for a long time. I recognized that bookshelf.

Marc: This was a fun scene.

John: No, she does a great job. And it's kinda- been kinda fun, I mean it's tricky because Beth is such a charming person.

Marc: Right.

John: It's been fun having her play Parker as someone who's bad at it. But you can look at the arc of her grifting abilities, and she'll never be good at it, but she's gotten better. You know what I mean? She's worked through it, yeah.

Chris: Yeah, there's totally an arc to it. And, you know, as the show goes into season 3 and 4 and beyond, I mean, it's credible to the audience that she will get better and better in her limited way.

John: She'll always have a fatal flaw, you know.

Chris: Yes.

Marc: Yeah.

John: She always never has some little thing. But this was great, shooting- now how'd you light this? How'd you get the spotlight to do the lighting there?

Marc: This was Dave, Dave Connell and Neil. They gave the rocks an overall blue feeling, and then we just wanted to have as many, you know, source lights with headlamps, or hanging lamps, or oil lanterns, just to break it up a bit. And this young kid, Colton Lasater, did such a great job, and this arc really, really pays off.

Chris: Yeah, I mean-

Marc: Gives some weight to the episode.

Chris: Yeah in the story breaking process, you know, we’re always looking at which character in the con gets over invested in it. And sometimes that plays out comedically, and sometimes it plays out dramatically.

John: Yeah.

Chris: And you know, seemed to make sense that the one character that would have a personal connection to mining would be Eliot. And you know, we sort of established his protective nature of young people in the show.

John: Around kids, yeah. No, this is nice also the- and the frustrated look, thats-

Marc: Right.

John: This was nice, this was a nice- and they did make a lot of progress this year but it was good to kinda reset that they’ll never be really comfortable with them no matter how long they work together.

Marc: Right.

John: Too much talking!

[Laughter]

John: And a kicky little wrap on Hardison there, that's a nice scarf. Yeah, I'm trying to remember how we came up with what was in the mine? Was that just- that was the girls?

Chris: Which one?

Marc: The coltan? The girls came up with the coltan?

Chris: No, I’ll take a little credit. We actually- Alana Binker, our casting agent, is very good friends with a woman who’s an activist who wrote a book about the Congo. And I wish I remembered the name of her- her name and the name of the book, but it's a book that's out right now. And we were talking about what's going on in the Congo, and the- not just conflict diamonds but there's conflict minerals that are tied up in these horrible abuses. And one of them is coltan, which is this element that- a metal that is used in every microchip cell phone in the world.

Marc: Right.

Chris: And it sorta made sense that if you were going to try and con a coal miner into believing that there was something valuable in his mine, you would want to take him out of his comfort zone.

John: Yes.

Chris: So his comfort zone is coal.

Marc: Right.

Chris: So let’s convince him that there's this thing that's valuable that's sort of exotic. And that's where coltan came in and it also makes sense that if there was a domestic source of coltan, it would make sense for the audience that this would be something that an American company would want.

Marc: Right.

John: Yeah, and the- I'm sorry, I was distracted for a moment from the giant faux bows on the front of both of those outfits.

Marc: They’re fantastic.

Chris: Sorry, my long rant about coltan.

John: No, I was just saying Nadine Haders did another great job, and it's like those dresses are perfect and not over the top, but yeah.

Chris: Yeah.

John: No, that's the thing when we talk about - you never know what's gonna pay off on the show. That's one of the reasons that we have writing stuff. You never know who read what that's just gonna toss in-

Chris: Yeah!

Marc: Look at all that red, white, and blue.

John: Yup. And your great fake mine there. So is that just a frame?

Marc: It- we built it in. So it goes back about thirty feet. So in that opening scene when we had all the miners coming in and out we were able to get the camera back and see some distance.

Chris: That’s great. But it's an actual mine? I mean-

Marc: No, it's a rock quarry.

Chris: It's a rock quarry, ok.

Marc: It’s a rock quarry, we just dug into a side. This is an actual mobile trailer that we had dragged out and set up there. And then just dressed it. This is actually the Carver Cafe, which is from Twilight so when we were shooting this scene, and had all our production gear, all these people came because they thought we were filming.

[Laughter]

John: They thought we were filming Twilight.

Chris: Oh that's not a good thing.

Marc: I think Gina is fantastic in this scene.

John: Yeah, well I actually- this is one of my favorite American accents that she does before the con is revealed.

Marc: Right.

John: And then when she flips, it’s just perfect. It reminds me a little of the pilot, actually, the Nigerian scam. The voice she does.

Marc: And Tim was really influential in blocking of this. He really helped out a lot. And then they just went for it.

Chris: Bruce Davison is so great.

John: I know it's really- it is one of those guys where it's like, ‘And you don't have an oscar, why?’ You know?

Marc: Right.

John: He just had great performance after great performance.

Marc: Yup.

John: And he just grounds them. I mean, this is really tricky. We wanted to take this episode fairly seriously because, you know, the mine thing is serious. You know, you don't want to seem like you're making light of people's tragedies, so you need someone who can play a villain but would be utterly grounded. And Bruce was available, and he's a friend of the company, and he's great.

Marc: He's fantastic.

John: I mean, he's charming as hell, you believe him, you believe in the relationship with Pierce. No, it’s- big win on this one with Bruce Davison.

Chris: Yeah.

John: And again, also making sure he seems reasonable. The villain is never a villain in his own head.

Chris: Right.

John: He's just a man trying to, you know, make a dime, or do a good thing, and he really conveys that.

Marc: Here's Gina saving me an insert, as she did in the previous shot with the card.

[Laughter]

Marc: Thank you, Gina.

John: Thank you.

Chris: Those of you budding filmmakers saving an insert is hours-

John: Well that's usually a second unit guy's problem but, yeah. Yes, that is a big deal. And now- and by the way, because we're a con and heist based show we do a lot of inserts on screens and information to make sure everyones tracking everything. Most shows do not do the number of inserts we do, in any way, shape, or form.

Marc: That's correct.

John: No, they just- the actor waves an object past the screen and tells you what's on it and you just move on. We're full service here. Look, and I love watching this with the sound off because just watching Bruce sorta modulate his performance. You can tell confrontational, then amused, then, you know. When you cut back to him here you'll start to see him get hooked in, but he's never boring, you know, he's never not making a great choice.

Marc: And I love using Gina in these scenes. And the twins use her well cause even in Double Blind with Michael O'Keefe, was the Gina mano y mano.

John: Yeah.

Marc: That sets it up.

John: And you know, trying to touch the hair, that's a lovely bit.

[Laughter]

John: Yeah, I mean it's interesting, you think at some point you'll get bored of just having these scenes where Sophie seduces the mark. No. As long as the mark’s always different and the con’s always different, it's a little competence porn. It's like watching Parker break into a safe; you’re never tired of it.

Marc: Right.

John: Or I'm never tired of it.

Chris: No? And you know here you get, you know, two grifts going on simultaneously that have a different tone to them.

John: Yes.

Chris: And yeah, I mean it's true, there's so many threads to this story, inside the mine, you know.

John: Yeah, it's three storylines. And then, you know, this great little bit about politics. I mean, Pierce doesn't see herself as a bad person. Pierce is a politician. I mean, you know, there's interesting stuff now they're trying to talk about campaign reform, and they can't get it off the ground because even though everyone who runs for office hates raising money, they're better at it than everybody else so why give up that advantage, you know?

Chris: Yeah.

John: And this is the- oh burying paperwork on a busy person's desk. This was- we had originally a much more complicated bit for this that wound up going away. The bit with the box.

Marc: Right.

John: Yeah. Turns out just sliding stuff into people’s piles is a lot easier.

Chris: Yeah.

John: And that's it, like watching Bruce there, he's not furtive. You know, this spiking a competitor is just something you do, this is part of his work day, may as well be on his iCal.

[Laughter]

John: And down.

Chris: There it goes.

Marc: Buried.

Chris: And by the way, I think you certainly buy that a busy attorney general has a desk full of paperwork.

John: Yes.

Marc: Absolutely.

Chris: I don’t think there’s any stretch there.

John: Who is he calling on this?

Marc: Gina.

John: Oh there you go, Gina. Going back to Gina. God, this one just flies.

Marc: Yeah.

John: Gina looks great in this one, by the way.

Chris: Yeah.

John: I love that trench coat. That's just- yeah.

Marc: There's just no fat in this episode, it just really moves.

John: The-

Marc: And a lot of different locations.

John: Yeah. And I'm trying to remember what- besides salting the mine there's another classic con we reference in here and I cannot remember for the life of me. Yeah, cause we wound up having to stack this one pretty deep.

Chris: Well it kinda, you know, by the end it becomes a gaslight.

John: Yes! That's right. Oh we're always trying to do the gaslight episode; we can never do it so we spot welded it in.

Chris: Yeah, yeah it is a little bit. The not the- we may be burning it by saying it right now, but, you know, the classic Mission Impossible in the fallout shelter.

John: Yes!

Marc: Right.

Chris: That's the fallout shelter episode.

John: You’ve woken up and everyone’s in like the tattered clothes.

[Laughter]

John: You know, charcoal on their face, this is the end of the world. I think they look through a periscope? The periscope that shows them the post apocalyptic earth. And it's not cool gamer world post-apocalyptic earth either, it's very depressing.

Chris: And by the way, a very simple way to show a test here.

Marc: That’s right.

Chris: Test tube and the colored water.

Marc: Scrape, scrape. Colored water.

John: Yeah it's pretty- everyone knows what green is.

Chris: Yeah.

John: But again, this is another thing that shows you this research gives you a story. Trying to figure out how you salt the coltan, the girls had done so much research they found out that's what you do to keep the dust down, you know, they had a full file.

Chris: Right.

John: Of, you know, just the life of the mine. And then we dove in there for the story ideas.

Chris: Boy that mine looks great.

John: Yeah.

Chris: Really, I mean-

John: They built that how fast? Two, three days?

Marc: You know, like every show episode they don’t get many days.

John: Well sometimes you get a little more time on B because we’re over on A, but yeah.

Chris: And that, you know, credit to Paul Bernard, our line producer, too.

John: Yeah, cause it was getting hairy by this point.

Chris: Well no, but I think just when we- you know, sometimes when we’re in the writers room and discussing things, you know, we’ll spike stories early in the process if we think there's no way we can do it, and he right off the bat, we said “We wanna do a coal mining episode.” He said “Oh, you know, it’s just like Eight Legged Freaks.” Which is a movie the company made.

Marc: Which I think we had more set than they did almost. I mean-

Chris: Really?

John: Oh really?

Marc: Becca, our production designer, and Randall just gave us so much with turns and chambers and then we, you know, we used one little tunnel just- and we just changed the background a bit.

John: Well that's the great thing about that, that frankenstein set is built to be corridors. So as long as you put another right hand in it, you have no idea where you are.

Marc: Yeah, they give us more than we ask for. And this, Dave just lit beautifully.

John: Yeah, this is gorgeous.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Half a million bucks. It is amazing- it’s always amazing to me when you get down to local politics how little money it takes-

Chris: Yeah.

John: To swing these races.

Chris: Well you had that great line about how much it costs to buy a senate seat. Less than a house in-

John: It's blown now because of the mega millionaires who ran this year. But at the time it was the average senate campaign cost 8 million dollars.

Chris: Right.

John: And the average house in sort of the ritzy section of Beacon Hills is 10 million.

Chris: Right, yeah.

John: Yeah, buy a Senate seat cheaper than you buy a house.

Chris: I also like- is this where we set up the lunch pail?

John: Yes.

Chris: That's another great little moment.

John: Great little character beat.

Marc: Yeah.

John: Great little physical artifact. If there's any- yeah. If anyone's reading- pardon me, if anyone’s listening to these and they're thinking about trying to do television or anything. It's tricky, you can fall into words very quickly, and then- just remember it's a visual medium. Using props, using physical objects to link storylines is crucial. It- also because the audience doesn't have to process it, they recognize it.

Chris: And it helped in a story point later because then he sees-

John: He knew where he was.

Chris: Knows he's in there when he sees the lunch pail.

Marc: That’s right.

Chris: And I think the idea here, that his dad had been in the explosion, I think was kinda late to the writing process.

John: Yes it was. Yeah, we were trying to figure out how to link him, and then I think we were just going over the dialogue and the act was already written, which was the kid’s birthday party. And wound up making it that kid.

Marc: But it also- it was- put it well cause it gave Eliot a little stinger.

Chris: Yes.

John: Yeah. There's a lot- and also the thing I like about this, too- and we try to lock on this - Eliot’s not gonna send this kid to Harvard.

Chris: Right.

John: You know, it’s make your life a little bit better, that's all you can do.

Marc: Right.

John: Conceivably, you know. We try to do that a lot, it’s like give people the next thing up.

Chris: And we are not saying that- we don't make a statement that coal mining is bad and we need to bring organic farming to this community.

Marc: Right.

Chris: I think it's pretty set early on, coal mining is how they make their living and they just want it to be safe.

John: And that was important, when the girls called the- they’re women now, we should stop calling them girls even though they are our baby writers. When the young women, when the wonder twins, called their coal mining source that was a big concern of his, you know.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Everyone makes us look bad and they're like “No, we're gonna show it's a valuable part of the American economy; somebody has to do it.”

Chris: Oh, they’re so great.

John: Oh I love this scene! Love this scene so much. Because they're playing the sexual subtext here and the audience doesn't know it yet.

Marc: Right, no.

John: You know, and that's a little flirty look. I mean, you know, it makes sense when you go back and watch the second time.

Chris: What do I know Annie Fitzgerald from? I feel like is she- I mean, boy Bruce Davison-

John: Yeah.

Chris: Did a ton of stuff.

John: She's done a lot of television. I mean, you know, American television has its own sort of, you know, it’s like British theater in the 40s, it has its own collection of just really great actors who are kinda kicking around from show to show.

Marc: Yeah.

John: Oh that’s it. The beat where he goes, ‘Here we go’, and then dials the phone. What was that? That was a- we couldn't have scripted that in a million years. It was just really- a great moment of duplicity, and just that you saw the moment where he decided to do it.

Marc: Right.

John: And it was kind of almost sexual, it was just a weird choice.

[Laughter]

John: Oh great, in the elevator!

Marc: In the elevator! We went for it.

John: Nice.

Chris: That’s great.

John: Moving background.

Chris: Yeah, could've been a little static shot.

Marc: All in the city hall building, and Gary got in there with her, did a couple runs.

John: He’s pretty close to her, yeah; you have to be close to her. I think also this was the original act break. I think we cut out on this.

Marc: I think so.

John: Yeah.

Chris: I think there was a little trim here, yeah.

John: Yeah, there was another- the first scene in the next act is the act break or something like that. Cause I remember that- I remember- this is, you know, also people don't know, not only do you have to do the number of acts that the network asks you to do- they have to be certain lengths.

Chris: Yeah.

John: And so we have a traditionally short fourth act. And so you have to- sometimes we shoot the show and it's like oh that not where that commercial’s gonna go, and you have to jigger it a little bit.

Chris: Another tricky story point here was because we knew that we were salting the mine, and then we were gonna ultimately trap them in the mine and do our gaslighting. The question- the challenge was, how are we gonna get him in his own mine-

John: Right.

Chris: -at that moment when he's already decided to blow it up?

Marc: Right.

Chris: You know, that was a bit of a tricky writing and plotting that we-

John: We originally had him call and tell him that he won Yankee tickets, that he could collect at his own mine.

[Laughter]

Chris: Exactly.

Marc: This is a great location that we never shot at. It was like a private club-

John: Is this the golf club from Tap Out?

Marc: No, it’s a private club in downtown Portland. And it's been there for years, and they just gave us so much free rein in the place.

John: Gorgeous. Oh and picking them up on the stairs and bringing them down.

Chris: That’s great.

John: That's a nice shot Marc.

Marc: This is nice to see both of them in the con playing their parts.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Which we don’t- again, just because we're very new at having Parker's character do the grift, we haven't really had a chance to do before.

Marc: Right.

John: And that also there's- if you go back in third season and watch the Parker-Sophie scenes, that when there's just the two of them and you compare them to the first and second season, you can see that evolution. And you can actually see that comfortable emotional vibe that they've set up. You know, from a writing standpoint Parker is the happiest that Sophie’s back.

Chris: Right.

John: Yeah.

Chris: No, no, I mean, it's a pairing that we don't do enough.

John: Yeah.

Chris: The two of them. Because I guess story-wise-

John: They have different skill sets.

Chris: Yeah, yeah exactly. She's usually, you know, dangling from a building.

John: Rigged up. Yeah, exactly.

Chris: But it just occurred to me that this is another party scene that is similar to the one in Double Blind.

John: Yes.

[Laughter]

John: We all have- there's only so-

Chris: Champagne flute party scene.

John: There's only so many places to put- you know, if we oppress the man, the man hangs out in champagne parties, you know!

[Laughter]

John: That's where he hangs out, that's where you gotta go.

Marc: Yeah.

Chris: That was another thing, too, with this episode in sort of conceiving it, was to give it a, at least in a political setting, give you kinda an upscale, rarified world that you could juxtapose with the grittiness of the mine.

Marc: Mine, yeah.

Chris: Rich swells, as we like to say.

John: Rich swells. Lush, rich swells.

[Laughter]

John: 1920s types. Also late to the party, the fact the attorney general is a woman.

Chris: Yeah. Well part of-

John: That was- we started with a woman because we were like, we haven't had a female villain for a while, and there's a whole rash of- when we did research, for whatever reason attorney general is a big, sort of, upscale position as female politicians enter the race.

Chris: Yeah, that's true.

John: It tends to be- a lot of them are female in America.

Chris: But as a practical matter, also, you know, it’s hard when you have two bad guys that are- sort of have equal weight.

Marc: Right.

Chris: You don't want the audience to be confused. You don't want two guys that look similar and the audience is saying, “Wait a minute, is that the mine owner, or is that the attorney general?”

John: Yeah.

Chris: If you quickly decide that it's two genders, then you're pretty safe.

John: And then we had them sleeping together.

Chris: Yeah, and then that opened that up as a storyline.

John: When we talk about it, it makes it sound really chaotic how we write these things, but actually it's a well-oiled machine.

[Laughter]

Marc: Well-oiled. But it's also- when you shoot these scenes, you have to shoot both sides of the conversation twice.

John: Yeah.

Marc: I mean, here we were at the party, we were in the mine, we were in the van. So you really do it- and you have to pay attention to so many things of how you shot that scene, which way was Hardison looking, which was Eliot looking.

John: Yeah, then again that's something we do that not every show on earth does.

Marc: Yes.

John: I mean we actually match eyelines across locations.

Marc: Right.

John: That's crazy.

Chris: Right. Well, but it helps, right?

John: It makes a difference when you have three people on intercoms.

Chris: Now how do you keep that- I mean, do you keep that straight Marc?

John: That’s Suzie.

Chris: Do you have a pad or-?

Marc: I mean there are times that I will do it and there are times I won’t, but yeah, Suzanne will keep a score.

Chris: Keep score.

John: That's our script supervisor, and you know, we’ve talked about this job before, that's the person who keeps track of every shot and all the continuity on set.

Marc: Yes.

Chris: No, I think it makes a big difference. I mean, you wanna get- when people are in different locations you wanna get- feel like they’re talking to each other.

John: Yeah. We tend to intercut simultaneously more than other shows do, so we kinda-

Chris: I like them when they're walking in different directions, too. I like when one’s walking downstairs and one’s walking upstairs; I like all that stuff.

John: I like motion. I like to see things moving on the screen. No, lovely scene, lovely little screw you scene between Annie and Gina.

Marc: Yes.

John: The ever present American flag pins. Always amuses me.

[Laughter]

Marc: Always good to have those.

John: Yup.

Chris: Oh!

John: That’s a great shot.

Chris: What a great shot!

Marc: Oh yeah.

Chris: What a fantastic- these are some of the things that just make- that's a cinematic shot right there.

Marc: Yeah.

John: And it gives you depth, real depth.

Chris: Yeah!

John: I mean, look how far back on set you can see.

Marc: All those practical lights.

John: Yeah, and now this makes it look huge because he looks like he's in a different location.

Marc: Right.

John: Yeah, and this was the- this was a variation of the reveal the con bit. This was like the implied double-cross. It’s-

Chris: Right.

John: We’re deep into con world at this point.

[Laughter]

Marc: These guys did such a great job with this.

John: Yeah.

Marc: Tim- I mean, Tim was all over this scene.

John: Yeah. He plays- well this is the character he kinda enjoys the most, is this kinda surly asshole, is really the only way to say it.

Chris: Yeah.

John: And he'll be the first to admit that's what the character is.

Marc: Yeah.

John: But yeah. It's a little Jimmy Joe Meeker.

[Laughter]

John: It's a little- you can go back to the Rockford touchstone.

Marc: There's the lunchbox he saw.

Chris: There's the lunchbox!

John: Oh shit now I've gotta go kick somebody’s ass with a pickaxe.

[Laughter]

John: He might not be thinking that but, you know.

Chris: We make a contract with the audience. I feel like when we send Eliot into the mine, I feel like the audience says, “When is he gonna fight a guy with a pickaxe?”

John: Yes.

Chris: And if you don't give them that, I feel like we've broken our contract.

John: We have not necessarily delivered that which we promised to deliver. And that was- there is the card- the various cards on the wall of things Eliot hasn't fought with.

[Laughter]

Marc: Right.

John: That was fun. And the in the King George-

Chris: Bowling trophy? No, he's fought with a bowling trophy.

John: King George: belt fu. Belt fu is something I've been wanting to do for a while.

Chris: Oh look at that!

Marc: This was fun to do.

Chris: That was great.

John: So how'd you do that?

Marc: Air mortars. The guys pretty much took their own fall.

John: Wait, that's Bruce and Tim?

Marc: Well we had stunt guys do it, and then they would- then they took a crack at it. And that rock pile, we had some come down and then Mark Franco and company added more rocks.

Chris: He's our special effects-.

Marc: To really establish that they are closed off.

John: Yeah.

Marc: But this is great. I mean, these guys just got down and dirty and wanted to play it. You know Tim was ready to play it down and dirty. It was great.

John: And also this was- I remember this was a bear. I was working on that other episode and came in and you guys were wrestling what this was. We don't usually lie to the audience this blatantly.

Chris: Yeah.

John: We have to- and that was the trick, we dont lie to the audience, so how do you write these scenes so that they are concerned because they've lost contact with Nate, but you can read it as concern for the fact that the mine has collapsed?

Chris: They’re in a collapsed mine.

John: Super- I remember long conversations about that.

Chris: Yes.

Marc: This is just another- the same hallway that we just redressed with some other things.

John: Put a minecart in.

Marc: And changed the background just to give us new locations.

John: And- yeah.

Chris: Oh that's great.

John: That's another great shot, look at that.

Chris: Look at that shot.

John: And then- did you- are those digital? No, you stacked those.

Marc: Those are stacked foam, yeah.

John: It’s- yeah, the two- you’re looking at two great actors just having an enormous amount of fun with these scenes.

Marc: Yeah.

Chris: Now you're waiting for him to do math. How much air is there in here?

John: And I'd actually prepped that movie, remember?

Chris: That's right! That's right.

John: I had prepared to direct a movie that wound up not going, but one of the conciets was two guys trapped in a safe. And I had to do the math on cubic air. And so that was again, that's why you have writing staff, you never know who's got a note in their notepad. Yeah, and then all this, the tone of the confrontation scene went up and down a lot.

Marc: Right.

John: Yeah, how crazy would she get. And then when Annie really plays it in control, which is great.

Marc: Well, that's like Parker’s so naive about it. And Sophie totally gets it and uses it to her advantage in the con.

John: Yeah, just like a knife. Just twisting it in. That was also another thing, the- how they had not heard that before. I forget what we were talking about. We were talking about the fact that they just have people whose job it is to go through wire taps. Just the hours and hours and hours of wire taps. But when you were a lawyer you had done some of that.

Chris: Oh, sure.

John: Because they regularly recorded phone calls in these places.

Chris: Oh, in brokerage houses. Phones are always recorded, and those are all kept.

John: Yeah. Somebody has to actually go through that stuff. The great Bourne fade.

Chris: It might've been- there was a good disappear here. I feel like in some early version she decked her.

[Laughter]

John: Yeah, I think we had that originally and then were like eh, is it a punch? Is it a- and then Gina doesn't really punch.

Chris: She doesn't really punch.

John: In the season finale she hits somebody with a champagne bottle. But that's good. That gives her an edge.

Marc: Yeah. This guy was great, he was a local actor. Geno Romo. And he wanted to do his own stunts.

John: Oh, that's great.

Marc: And he tried out with Kevin, and he was great! Because Kevin said, ‘he's not trying to impress me.’ You know what I mean?

Chris: Right, right.

Marc: Cause that's when actors get hurt.

John: Yeah.

Marc: And he worked with Christian, and I said “Christian are you up for it?” He said, “Yeah, he's got skills; it's gonna be a great fight.” So-

Chris: Now how long-

Marc: So we had two actors, we had Christian and Gino doing their actual fight.

Chris: Now how long did it take to film the pickaxe part? I know it was done in pieces, right?

Marc: It was done in pieces, so probably half a day over all.

Chris: Wow.

John: And then the oxygen saturation stuff is from, again, the research. You know, being able to talk. And that's the other thing, and Chris, you're always on about this cause you used to be a journalist. If you're writing your spec script or writing your movie or whatever. Just call people!

Chris: Yeah!

John: Just cold call them. Nine times out of ten they love to talk about their job.

Chris: People- no matter- rule of thumb, no matter what people say I hate my job, they love talking about it.

John: Yeah.

Chris: And here we go, now he’s just got a bat.

John: Now he's lost the- that's actually a lesson-

Chris: Oh I love that shot, too.

Marc: Yeah that's a good commercial break.

[Laughter]

John: I think was the commercial break intended-

Marc: Yeah.

John: And then when you actually like timed it out- that's a 13 minute act four, we can't do that. Yeah. That's not gonna work. And here we are now trapped in the classic science fiction story, The Cold Equations.

[Laughter]

John: Other people might phrase it differently, but I always go to The Cold Equations.

Chris: And just he's so great at just- you totally buy all the things he says here.

John: Yeah.

Chris: Cause he sees his life ending. He's just got that fatalististic vibe to it and then he's just able to turn it on. Turn on the menace.

John: Well, and that's the Nate character. It's important, it's always tricky when you're trying to get these confessorial scenes. If you ask another character a question, and they give you the answer, that is boring. And they wouldn't fall for that.

Marc: Right.

John: If you argue with them, and you get exposition as refutation, it feels organic.

Chris: Yeah.

John: You know what I mean? That was also- that was tricky, too, hitting him with the board.

Marc: Yes.

John: Cause outline- we did a reset. That's right, I forgot we did a reset at the end of this. Just to-

Chris: You know, sometimes people were getting a sandwich and they missed it. You gotta make sure they understand what's going on.

John: I like a reset!

Chris: I like it.

John: Here's the thing, I think it was also we didn't want to- if we're gonna cut back to this, you didn't want to think that Bruce Davidson is in the other part of the mine beating Nate to death. Like, just taking the two by four to him.

[Laughter]

Chris: Yes.

John: I think that was also- that was, originally we had him strangling him. And it was like, well why wouldn’t you just not stop strangling him?

[Laughter]

John: Like oh, oh yeah.

Chris: Right how do you con somebody-

John: Into not strangling you. Yeah. that's no, hit him, hit him with the board. This is great. This is of course the scene in the The Lathe of Heaven where he is imagined- he has dreamt that he is a lathe- that's really obscure.

[Laughter]

John: It's like eight people who are gonna get the Lathe of Heaven reference.

Chris: I'll take Ursula K Le Guin for 200.

John: Take Bruce Davidson's minis series when he was 20 something for five hundred, Alex.

Marc: That's a great shot by Gary Camp.

John: That's a beautiful shot.

Marc: A little 360 steadicam.

John: Where the hell- wait where's the crew? What the-

Marc: They're hidden!

John: They're hidden. We do- when we do those 360s we hide behind trees and trucks.

Chris: Yeah, that's right.

Marc: Another great flashback sequence that the girls wrote-

Chris: Oh! Look at that!

Marc: This was cool. That was Gary running through the whole mine, so that's actually the full length of the set from beginning to end.

[Laughter]

John: That's great. Oh man, I did not know that. Oh yes, and Eliot screwing with Hardison.

Marc: Yeah.

John: A lot of fun.

Chris: And you know, I think-

John: And to see the little look he gives just for a second before he does it.

Chris: That’s great. Yeah. And to make sure showing you don't need a giant bomb in a mine. A mine is-

John: A mine is a bomb waiting to happen.

Chris: It's a bomb waiting to happen.

Marc: Right.

John: Now that- remember, I worked on the natural gas pipeline-

Chris: That’s right.

John: When I quit university. And yes the ever present threat of just blowing up sometimes. No, this was- oh and this was the header. Yeah, the flashbacks in this one are tough.

Marc: Yes.

John: There's a lot of story in these flashbacks.

Marc: You really gotta wrap your head around these when you're shooting them.

John: We’ll try to give you easier ones for next year, there you go.

Marc: Perfect.

John: Do the ones in real time where there's no flashbacks. Like Rashomon, something easy like that.

[Laughter]

Marc: Right, yeah.

John: Yeah.

Marc: There's the X of course, that we set up.

John: Oh yeah. And it was interesting, too. You do a lot of this in post. The flashbacks have to have different luts on them. They have to have different lights- different color schemes so you understand you're not happening concurrently and they happen in the story.

Marc: Right.

John: No, this is a nested flashback.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Yeah, this- he actually changed locations in the flashback, this is tricky.

Marc: Oh, yeah.

John: We’re in three different places. And both light comedic exposition and dramatic ‘you're gonna die’ exposition. Aldis Hodge does it all.

Chris: Yeah.

Marc: That's right.

John: He conveys urgency.

Marc: Our M.A.S.H. speaker.

Chris: And here's your undoing. Oh that's great!

John: Oh the zoom around.

Chris: Great zoom around too!

Marc: Give them a little something.

John: Yeah. And then push in, do you do a push?

Marc: I think that was done in post.

John: There you go. There's the push.

Marc: There it is.

John: Yeah, the world’s just kinda closing in on her. We don't mention-

Marc: And this of course, now we're back in the car.

John: Yeah. What, like four minutes later? I don't always like-

Chris: Yeah, wow that's right, they've been in the car for a while!

John: This is like a four minute flashback.

Chris: What's the deal? Is the battery running out? Did they leave the lights on?

John: No, remember Inception! Time is different in your dreams! So, you know, you have more time in the flashback.

Marc: Always good.

Chris: What a great gloat!

Marc: The make them suffer look!

John: Yup.

Chris: Look at all the different looks we got on this gloat.

John: The villain must suffer, we must have the gloat. Disdain.

[Laughter]

John: Rage.

Marc: Another flashback.

John: And now! We do a flashback in the gloats! Oh my god! This is brutal! God, no this one is tough. I can't believe we pulled this one off. Yeah, and the whole- and again this was crucial, you know, how you move money around and just spook her into hiding it.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Yeah, no- and that's a big thing is that it all boils down to Irene Adler, really. You just have to scare somebody and they'll give up the information that you need. Move it somewhere safe. Yeah, multiple gloats. And also a little victory moment for Parker.

Marc: Yes.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Very nice. Very nice the- you know, she's learned a new job skill.

Marc: That's right.

John: Won't be using it all the time, but yeah.

Chris: Tomorrow's women. That's right, a little- just a little throwaway line seemed like the thing to sell her con.

John: Her character.

Chris: Now this is something we never do on this show. I remember this was like a late addition to the script, just a little character-y moment here.

John: Yeah.

Chris: And it's great. I mean it’s, you know, in a show this packed and busy to find a little time for this.

John: That's what I said in the Rashomon commentary, I love watching them just hang out in the bar cause that's what they talk to each other like when they're not on the job.

Marc: Right.

John: This is- the vast amount of Hardison/Parker interactions actually sound like this.

[Laughter]

Chris: Right.

John: You know, when they're not doing urgent stuff, you know.

Chris: Yeah, ‘smells like bubbles.’

John: She's kinda spaced and he's trying to figure out the hell- smells like bubbles, yeah. And the- touch the chin a bit.

[Laughter]

John: That was great. And it all rides on his reaction there.

Marc: This scene was great.

John: Yeah. Well he plays it with the right amount of betrayal.

Marc: Yeah.

John: It's like what? Clark, you're Superman?

Marc: It’s very-

Chris: Yeah.

Marc: Gary giving us a 180.

John: Yeah. Just land into it rather than pop into the cut. No, it's nice. It- this was a great location.

Marc: Oh, yeah.

John: This is the rock quarry?

Marc: Yeah, same place.

Chris: Is it raining right there?

Marc: No, this-

John: Man it rained a lot during this episode.

Marc: It rained a lot. But when we first set up that mobile trailer, we actually had to pump out the surrounding area cause it was about a foot of water.

Chris: Wow.

John: And camera-

Marc: But they were great!

John: Camera and power cords don't really-

Marc: The rock quarry, they were giving us all- ‘you want this tractor?’ They'd move things, they gave us everything we needed.

John: Well it was like in The Three Days of the Hunter.

Marc: Yeah.

John: The national guard- the reserve, pardon me, the state reserve guys they really gave us everything we could possibly want.

Marc: Exactly.

John: And hence we were able to bring filthy Hollywood money to their state. It’s a great relationship.

Marc: And it was in close proximity.

John: Yeah. Really nice.

Chris: And now we get-

Marc: This is our little closer with Timothy Whitcomb and Tim and Christian.

Chris: Now due to the miracle of receivership were able to-

John: Oh receiver- sweet receivership.

[Laughter]

Chris: We were able to both make our victim whole again, our client, and actually bestow the title in some way to the- instrument of their acting.

John: I learned more about corporate bankruptcy on this job than I could possibly ever want to know.

[Laughter]

John: Various and sundry conditions and states wherein, and yeah.

Chris: No, but I think it's also a result of research and-

John: Yeah, it's based on that company- down in Central America, the auto company. The guys who took over their own plant.

Chris: Yes.

Marc: Yeah.

John: Yeah. Evidently doable. Not always heard of-

Marc: Yeah.

John: But, you know. The stories where the workers take over the means of production? Not a big play in America.

[Laughter]

Marc: This we graded darker in here, cause this was shot on one of the clearer days.

John: So you had to match the rest of the rain.

Marc: But of course we did the exterior-

John: And it's raining.

Marc: And it's raining. This is the shot where Dean goes, “how come you get all this moving gear?”

Chris: Oh, I know, look at that!

Marc: Mine is back.

John: And pull up to reveal the mine! Oh.

Marc: People are back to work.

Chris: And a perfect, you know, we started it on the mine, there's people coming in and out and exploding, and now they're going into a safe mine.

John: That's American work right there.

Chris: Beautiful bookend.

John: That's America at work.

Chris: Beautiful piece of work.

John: I think you’re our most patriotic director, Marc.

Marc: I am.

John: More shows should hire you to combat the liberal agenda.

[Laughter]

Marc: Amen.

John: That was Underground Job, stay tuned for a lot of great episodes and Marc Roskin thank you so much for giving us this episode. It was great.

Chris: So great.

Marc: Thank you, my pleasure.

#Leverage #Leverage TNT #Leverage Audio Commentary Transcripts #Audio Commentary #Transcripts #Parker #Alec Hardison #Elliot Spencer #Nate Ford #Sophie Devereaux #Season 3 #Episode 10 #Season 3 Episode 10 #The Underground Job

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phenakistoskope · 6 months

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i shall enjoy science fiction as a literary form with no theoretical concerns whatsoever, i tell myself, as i download john rieder's colonialism and the emergence of science fiction.

#short book!#only 150 pages #phenakistoskope.txt

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pinatafarm · 27 days

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Euro 2024: danh sách cầu thủ 24 đội tuyển

24 đội tuyển hàng đầu châu Âu đã công bố danh sách cầu thủ chính thức cho giải đấu, hứa hẹn mang đến những màn so tài mãn nhãn và những khoảnh khắc lịch sử. - Lịch thi đấu mới nhất và bảng excel theo dõi Euro 2024 Trận khai mạc Euro 2024 giữa Đức và Scotland diễn ra vào 2h sáng ngày 15/6 (giờ Việt Nam) trên sân Olympiastadion tại Berlin. Nhìn vào danh sách cầu thủ khủng của 24 đội tuyển, có thể thấy Euro 2024 hứa hẹn là 1 mùa giải cực kỳ sôi động với những màn toả sáng và ganh đua của các tài năng trẻ.

Bảng A

Danh sách đội tuyển Đức Danh sách tuyển Đức (nguồn skysports.com) Goalkeepers: Oliver Baumann (Hoffenheim), Alex Nubel (Stuttgart), Manuel Neuer (Bayern Munich), Marc-Andre ter Stegen (Barcelona). Defenders: Waldemar Anton (Stuttgart), Benjamin Henrichs (RB Leipzig), Joshua Kimmich (Bayern Munich), Robin Koch (Eintracht Frankfurt), Maximilian Mittelstadt (Stuttgart), David Raum (RB Leipzig), Antonio Rudiger (Real Madrid), Nico Schlotterbeck (Borussia Dortmund), Jonathan Tah (Bayer Leverkusen). Midfielders: Robert Andrich (Bayer Leverkusen), Chris Fuhrich (Stuttgart), Pascal Gross (Brighton), Ilkay Gundogan (Barcelona), Toni Kroos (Real Madrid), Jamal Musiala (Bayern Munich), Aleksandar Pavlovic (Bayern Munich), Leroy Sane (Bayern Munich), Florian Wirtz (Bayer Leverkusen). Forwards: Maximilian Beier (Hoffenheim), Niclas Fullkrug (Borussia Dortmund), Kai Havertz (Arsenal), Thomas Muller (Bayern Munich), Deniz Undav (Stuttgart). Đội tuyển Scotland Goalkeepers: Zander Clark (Hearts), Craig Gordon (Hearts), Angus Gunn (Norwich), Liam Kelly (Motherwell). Defenders: Liam Cooper (Leeds), Grant Hanley (Norwich), Jack Hendry (Al Ettifaq), Ross McCrorie (Bristol City), Scott McKenna (Copenhagen), Ryan Porteous (Watford), Anthony Ralston (Celtic), Andy Robertson (Liverpool), John Souttar (Rangers), Greg Taylor (Celtic), Kieran Tierney (Real Sociedad). Midfielders: Stuart Armstrong (Southampton), Ryan Christie (Bournemouth), Billy Gilmour (Brighton), Ryan Jack (Rangers), Kenny McLean (Norwich), John McGinn (Aston Villa), Callum McGregor (Celtic), Scott McTominay (Manchester United). Forwards: Che Adams (Southampton), Ben Doak (Liverpool), Lyndon Dykes (QPR), James Forrest (Celtic), Lawrence Shankland (Hearts). Đội tuyển Hungary Trung vệ Dominik Szoboszlai của Liverpool có tên trong danh sách tuyển Hungary vai trò Đội trưởng Goalkeepers: Denes Dibusz (Ferencvaros), Peter Gulacsi (RB Leipzig), Peter Szappanos (Paks). Defenders: Botond Balogh (Parma), Endre Botka (Ferencvaros), Marton Dardai (Hertha Berlin), Attila Fiola (Fehervar), Adam Lang (Omonia Nicosia), Willi Orban (RB Leipzig), Attila Szalai (Freiburg), Milos Kerkez (Bournemouth). Midfielders: Bendeguz Bolla (Servette), Mihaly Kata (MTK), Laszlo Kleinheisler (Hajduk Split), Adam Nagy (Spezia), Zsolt Nagy (Puskas Akademia), Loic Nego (Le Havre), Andras Schafer (Union Berlin), Callum Styles (Sunderland), Dominik Szoboszlai (Liverpool). Forwards: Martin Adam (Ulsan Hyundai), Kevin Csoboth (Ujpest), Daniel Gazdag (Philadelphia Union), Krisztofer Horvath (Kecskemet), Roland Sallai (Freiburg), Barnabas Varga (Ferencvaros). Đội tuyển Thuỵ Sỹ Goalkeepers: Yann Sommer (Inter Milan), Yvon Mvogo (Lorient), Gregor Kobel (Borussia Dortmund), Marvin Keller (Winterthur), Pascal Loretz (Luzern). Defenders: Ricardo Rodriguez (Torino), Fabian Schar (Newcastle), Manuel Akanji (Manchester City), Nico Elvedi (Borussia Monchengladbach), Silvan Widmer (Mainz), Kevin Mbabu (Augsburg), Ulisses Garcia (Marseille), Cedric Zesiger (Wolfsburg), Leonidas Stergiou (Stuttgart), Aurele Amenda (Young Boys), Albuan Hajdari (Lugano), Bryan Okoh (Red Bull Salzburg). Midfielders: Granit Xhaka (Bayer Leverkusen), Xherdan Shaqiri (Chicago Fire), Remo Freuler (Bologna), Denis Zakaria (Monaco), Michel Aebischer (Bologna), Fabian Rieder (Rennes), Uran Bislimi (Lugano), Ardon Jashari (Luzern), Filip Ugrinic (Young Boys), Vincent Sierro (Toulouse). Forwards: Breel Embolo (Monaco), Steven Zuber (AEK Athens), Ruben Vargas (Augsburg), Renato Steffen (Lugano), Noah Okafor (AC Milan), Zeki Amdouni (Burnley), Andi Zeqiri (Genk), Dan Ndoye (Bologna), Kwadwo Duah (Ludogorets), Joel Monteiro (Young Boys).

Group B

Đội tuyển Tây Ban Nha (Spain) Goalkeepers: Unai Simon (Athletic Bilbao), David Raya (Arsenal), Alex Remiro (Real Sociedad). Defenders: Dani Carvajal (Real Madrid), Jesus Navas (Sevilla), Aymeric Laporte (Al Nassr), Robin Le Normand (Real Sociedad), Nacho (Real Madrid), Dani Vivian (Athletic Bilbao), Pau Cubarsi (Barcelona), Alejandro Grimaldo (Bayer Leverkusen), Marc Cucurella (Chelsea). Midfielders: Rodri (Manchester City), Martin Zubimendi (Real Sociedad), Fabian (Paris Saint-Germain), Mikel Merino (Real Sociedad), Marcos Llorente (Atletico Madrid), Pedri (Barcelona), Aleix Garcia (Girona), Alex Baena (Villarreal), Fermin Lopez (Barcelona). Forwards: Alvaro Morata (Atletico Madrid), Joselu (Real Madrid), Mikel Oyarzabal (Real Sociedad), Dani Olmo (RB Leipzig), Ferran Torres (Barcelona), Nico Williams (Athletic Bilbao), Lamine Yamal (Barcelona), Ayoze Perez (Real Betis). Đội tuyển Croatia (tiếp tục cập nhật) Goalkeepers: Dominik Livakovic (Fenerbahce), Nediljko Labrovic (Rijeka), Ivica Ivusic (Pafos). Defenders: Josip Stanisic (Bayer Leverkusen), Marin Pongracic (Lecce), Josko Gvardiol (Manchester City), Martin Erlic (Sassuolo), Borna Sosa (Ajax), Domagoj Vida (AEK Athens), Josip Juranovic (Union Berlin), Josip Sutalo (Ajax). Midfielders: Lovro Majer (Wolfsburg), Mateo Kovacic (Manchester City), Luka Modric (Real Madrid), Marcelo Brozovic (Al Nassr), Nikola Vlasic (Torino), Mario Pasalic (Atalanta), Luka Ivanusec (Feyenoord), Luka Sucic (Red Bull Salzburg), Martin Baturina (Dinamo Zagreb). Forwards: Ivan Perisic (Hajduk Split), Andrej Kramaric (Hoffenheim), Bruno Petkovic (Dinamo Zagreb), Marko Pjaca (Rijeka), Ante Budimir (Osasuna), Marco Pasalic (Rijeka). Đội tuyển Ý (Italy) Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Gianluigi Donnarumma (Paris Saint-Germain), Guglielmo Vicario (Tottenham), Alex Meret (Napoli), Ivan Provedel (Lazio). Defenders: Francesco Acerbi (Inter Milan), Alessandro Bastoni (Inter Milan), Raoul Bellanova (Torino), Alessandro Buongiorno (Torino), Riccardo Calafiori (Bologna), Andrea Cambiaso (Juventus), Matteo Darmian (Inter Milan), Giovanni Di Lorenzo (Napoli), Federico Dimarco (Inter Milan), Gianluca Mancini (Roma), Giorgio Scalvini (Atalanta). Midfielders: Jorginho (Arsenal), Nicolo Barella (Inter Milan), Bryan Cristante (Roma), Nicolo Fagioli (Juventus), Michael Folorunsho (Verona), Davide Frattesi (Inter Milan), Lorenzo Pellegrini (Roma), Samuele Ricci (Torino). Forwards: Federico Chiesa (Juventus), Giacomo Raspadori (Napoli), Stephan El Shaarawy (Roma), Mateo Retegui (Genoa), Mattia Zaccagni (Lazio), Riccardo Orsolini (Bologna), Gianluca Scamacca (Atalanta). Đội tuyển Albania Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Etrit Berisha (Empoli), Thomas Strakosha (Brentford), Elhan Kastrati (Cittadella), Simon Simoni (Eintracht Frankfurt). Defenders: Berat Djimsiti (Atalanta), Elseid Hysaj (Lazio), Ivan Balliu (Rayo Vallecano), Ardian Ismajli (Empoli), Arlind Ajeti (CFR Cluj), Naser Aliji (Voluntari), Mario Mitaj (Lokomotiv Moscow), Enea Mihaj (Famalicao), Marash Kumbulla (Sassuolo). Midfielders: Amir Abrashi, Kristjan Asllani (Inter Milan), Nedim Bajrami (Sassuolo), Medon Berisha (Lecce), Klaus Gjasula (Darmstadt), Qazim Laci (Sparta Prague), Ernest Muci (Besiktas), Ylber Ramadani (Lecce). Forwards: Jasir Asani (Gwangju FC), Armando Broja (Fulham), Mirlind Daku (Rubin Kazan), Arber Hoxha (Dinamo Zagreb), Rey Manaj (Sivasspor), Taulant Seferi (Baniyas).

Bảng C

Đội tuyển Slovenia Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Jan Oblak (Atletico Madrid), Vid Belec (APOEL), Igor Vekic (Vejle), Matevz Vidovsek (Olimpija Ljubljana). Defenders: Petar Stojanovic (Sampdoria), Jaka Bijol (Udinese), Miha Blazic (Lech Poznan), Jure Balkovec (Alanyaspor), Zan Karnicnik (Celje), David Brekalo (Orlando City), Erik Janza (Gornik Zabrze), Vanja Drkusic (Sochi), Zan Zaletel (Viborg). Midfielders: Timi Max Elsnik (Olimpija Ljubljana), Jasmin Kurtic (Sudtirol), Benjamin Verbic (Panathinaikos), Miha Zajc (Fenerbahce), Sandi Lovric (Udinese), Adam Gnezda Cerin (Panathinaikos), Jon Gorenc Stankovic (Sturm Graz), Tomi Horvat (Sturm Graz), Adrian Zeljkovic (Spartak Trnava), Nino Zugelj (Bodo/Glimt). Forwards: Josip Ilicic (Maribor), Andraz Sporar (Panathinaikos), Benjamin Sesko (RB Leipzig), Luka Zahovic (Pognon Szczecin), Zan Celar (Lugano), Jan Mlakar (Pisa), Zan Vipotnik (Bordeaux). Đội tuyển Đan Mạch (Denmark) Tiếp tục cập nhật - GK: Kasper Schmeichel (Anderlecht) - GK Frederik Ronnow (Union Berlin) - GK: Mads Hermansen (Leicester) - DF: Simon Kjaer (AC Milan) - DF: Joakim Maehle (Wolfsburg) - DF: Jannik Vestergaard (Leicester) - DF: Joachim Andersen (Crystal Palace) - DF: Victor Nelsson (Galatasaray) - DF: Victor Kristiansen (Bologna) - DF: Elias Jelert (Copenhagen) - DF: Jacon Rasmussen (Brondby) - DF: Mads Roerslev (Brentford) - MF: Christian Eriksen (Manchester United) - MF: Thomas Delaney (Anderlecht on loan from Sevilla) - MF: Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg (Tottenham) - MF: Mathias Jensen (Brentford) - MF: Mikkel Damsgaard (Brentford) - MF: Morten Hjulmand (Sporting Lisbon) - MF: Matt O'Riley (Celtic) - MF: Gustav Isaksen (Lazio) - FW: Yussuf Poulsen (RB Leipizg) - FW: Kasper Dolberg (Anderlecht) - FW: Jonas Wind (Wolfsburg) - FW: Rasmus Hojlund (Manchester United) - FW: Mohamed Daramy (Reims) - FW: Anders Dreyer (Anderlecht) Đội tuyển Serbia Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Vanja Milinkovic-Savic (Torino), Djordje Petrovic (Chelsea), Predrag Rajkovic (Mallorca). Defenders: Strahinja Pavlovic (Red Bull Salzburg), Nikola Milenkovic (Fiorentina), Srdan Babic (Spartak Moscow), Milos Veljkovic (Werder Bremen), Uros Spajic (Red Star Belgrade), Nemanja Stojic (TSC Backa Topola). Midfielders: Sasa Lukic (Fulham), Nemanja Gudelj (Sevilla), Nemanja Maksimovic (Getafe), Ivan Ilic (Torino), Srdan Mijailovic (Red Star Belgrade), Sergej Milenkovic-Savic (Al Hilal), Dusan Tadic (Fenerbahce), Lazar Samardzic (Udinese), Vejko Birmancevic (Sparta Prague), Filip Kostic (Juventus), Andrija Zivkovic (PAOK), Filip Mladenovic (Panathinaikos), Mijat Gacinovic (AEK Athens). Forwards: Aleksandar Mitrovic (Al Hilal), Dusan Vlahovic (Juventus), Luka Jovic (AC Milan), Petar Ratkov (Red Bull Salzburg). Đội tuyển Anh (England) Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Jordan Pickford (Everton), Dean Henderson (Crystal Palace), Aaron Ramsdale (Arsenal), James Trafford (Burnley). Defenders: Jarrad Branthwaite (Everton), Lewis Dunk (Brighton), Joe Gomez (Liverpool), Marc Guehi (Crystal Palace), Ezri Konsa (Aston Villa), Harry Maguire (Manchester United), Jarell Quansah (Liverpool), Luke Shaw (Man Utd), John Stones (Manchester City), Kieran Trippier (Newcastle), Kyle Walker (Manchester City). Midfielders: Trent Alexander-Arnold (Liverpool), Conor Gallagher (Chelsea), Curtis Jones (Liverpool), Kobbie Mainoo (Manchester United), Declan Rice (Arsenal), Adam Wharton (Crystal Palace). Forwards: Jude Bellingham (Real Madrid), Jarrod Bowen (West Ham), Eberechi Eze (Crystal Palace), Phil Foden (Manchester City), Jack Grealish (Manchester City), Anthony Gordon (Newcastle), Harry Kane (Bayern Munich), James Maddison (Tottenham), Cole Palmer (Chelsea), Bukayo Saka (Arsenal), Ivan Toney (Brentford), Ollie Watkins (Aston Villa).

Bảng D

Đội tuyển Hà Lan (Netherlands) Virgil van Dijk trong danh sách tuyển Hà Lan Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Justin Bijlow (Feyenoord), Mark Flekken (Brentford), Bart Verbruggen (Brighton), Nick Olij (Sparta Rotterdam). Defenders: Nathan Ake (Manchester City), Daley Blind (Girona), Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool), Denzel Dumfries (Inter Milan), Jeremie Frimpong (Bayer Leverkusen), Lutsharel Geertruida (Feyenoord), Matthijs de Ligt (Bayern Munich), Ian Maatsen (Borussia Dortmund), Micky van de Ven (Tottenham), Stefan de Vrij (Inter Milan). Midfielders: Ryan Gravenberch (Liverpool), Frenkie de Jong (Barcelona), Teun Koopmeiners (Atalanta), Tijjani Reijnders (AC Milan), Jerdy Schouten (PSV), Xavi Simons (RB Leipzig), Quinten Timber (Feyenoord), Joey Veerman (PSV), Georginio Wijnaldum (Al Ettifaq). Forwards: Steven Bergwijn (Ajax), Brian Brobbey (Ajax), Memphis Depay (Atletico Madrid), Cody Gakpo (Liverpool), Donyell Malen (Borussia Dortmund), Wout Weghorst (Hoffenheim). Đội tuyển Pháp (France) Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Alphonse Areola (West Ham), Mike Maignan (AC Milan), Brice Samba (Lens). Defenders: Jonathan Clauss (Marseille), Theo Hernandez (AC Milan), Ibrahima Konate (Liverpool), Jules Kounde (Barcelona), Ferland Mendy (Real Madrid), Benjamin Pavard (Inter Milan), William Saliba (Arsenal), Dayot Upamecano (Bayern Munich). Midfielders: Eduardo Camavinga (Real Madrid), Youssouf Fofana (Monaco), Antoine Griezmann (Atletico Madrid), N'Golo Kante (Al Ittihad), Adrien Rabiot (Juventus), Aurelien Tchouameni (Real Madrid), Warren Zaire-Emery (Paris Saint-Germain). Forwards: Bradley Barcola (Paris Saint-Germain), Kingsley Coman (Bayern Munich), Ousmane Dembele (Paris Saint-Germain), Olivier Giroud (AC Milan), Randal Kolo Muani (Paris Saint-Germain), Kylian Mbappe (Paris Saint-Germain), Marcus Thuram (Inter Milan). Đội tuyển Ba Lan (Poland) Tiếp tục cập nhật - GK: Wojciech Szczesny (Juventus) - GK: Lukasz Skorupski (Bologna) - GK: Marcin Bulka (Nice) - DF: Jan Bednarek (Southampton) - DF: Bartosz Bereszynski (Empoli) - DF: Jakub Kiwior (Arsenal) - DF: Matty Cash (Aston Villa) - DF: Tymoteusz Puchacz (Kaiserlsuatern) - DF: Bartosz Salamon (Lech Poznan) - DF: Pawel Dawidowicz (Verona) - DF: Pawel Bochniewicz (Heerenveen) - DF: Sebastian Walukiewicz (Empoli) - MF: Kamil Grosicki (Pogon Szczecin) - MF: Piotr Zielenski (Napoli) - MF: Przemyslaw Frankowski (Lens) - MF: Sebastian Szymanski (Fenerbahce) - MF: Jakub Moder (Brighton) - MF: Damian Szymanski (AEK Athens) - MF: Nicola Zalewksi (Roma) - MF: Bartosz Slisz (Atlanta United) - MF: Jakub Piotrowksi (Ludogorets Razgrad) - MF: Taras Romanczuk (Jagiellonia Bialystok) - MF: Dominik Marczuk (Jagiellonia Bialystok) - FW: Robert Lewandowski (Barcelona) - FW: Karol Swiderksi (Verona) - FW: Krzysztof (Istanbul Basaksehir) - FW: Adam Buksa (Antalyaspor) Đội tuyển Áo (Austria) Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Tobias Lawal (LASK), Patrick Pentz (Brondby), Heinz Lindner (Union Saint-Gilloise), Niklas Hedl (Rapid Wien). Defenders: Stefan Lainer (Borussia Monchengladbach), Stefan Posch (Bologna), Max Wober (Borussia Monchengladbach), Philipp Lienhart (Freiburg), Kevin Danso (Lens), Phillipp Mwene (Mainz), Flavius Daniliuc (Red Bull Salzburg), Gernot Trauner (Feyenoord), Leopold Querfeld (Rapid Wien). Midfielders: Marcel Sabitzer (Borussia Dortmund), Florian Grillitsch (Hoffenheim), Christoph Baumgartner (RB Leipzig), Konrad Laimer (Bayern Munich), Florian Kain (Cologne), Nicolas Seiwald (RB Leipzig), Romano Schmid (Werder Bremen), Alexander Prass (Sturm Graz), Matthias Seidl (Rapid Vienna), Thierno Ballo (Wolfsburg). Forwards: Marko Arnautovic (Inter Milan), Michael Gregoritsch (Freiburg), Andreas Weimann (West Brom), Patrick Wimmer (Wolfsburg), Marco Grull (Rapid Wien), Maximilian Entrup (TSV Hartberg).

Bảng E

Đội tuyển Ukraine Mykhailo Mudryk trong danh sách đội tuyển Ukraine Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Andriy Lunin (Real Madrid), Anatoliy Trubin (Benfica), Heorhiy Bushchan (Dynamo Kyiv). Defenders: Yukhym Konoplia (Shakhtar Donetsk), Valeriy Bondar (Shakhtar Donetsk), Mykola Matvienko (Shakhtar Donetsk), Oleksandr Tymchyk (Dynamo Kyiv), Vitaliy Mykolenko (Everton), Maksym Taloverov (LASK), Illia Zabarnyi (Bournemouth), Oleksandr Svatok (Dnipro-1). Midfielders: Taras Stepanenko (Shakhtar Donetsk), Oleksandr Zubkov (Shakhtar Donetsk), Heorhiy Sudakov (Shakhtar Donetsk), Andriy Yarmolenko (Dynamo Kyiv), Volodymyr Brazhko (Dynamo Kyiv), Mykola Shaparenko (Dynamo Kyiv), Serhiy Sydorchuk (Westerlo), Ruslan Malinovskyi (Genoa), Mykhailo Mudryk (Chelsea), Viktor Tsygankov (Girona), Oleksandr Zinchenko (Arsenal). Attackers: Artem Dovbyk (Girona), Roman Yaremchuk (Valencia), Vladyslav Vanat (Dynamo Kyiv). Reserves: Dmytro Riznyk (Shakhtar Donetsk), Danylo Sikan (Shakhtar Donetsk), Vladyslav Kabayev (Dynamo Kyiv), Vladyslav Buyalskyi (Dynamo Kyiv), Denys Popov (Dynamo Kyiv), Yehor Yarmoliuk (Brentford). Đội tuyển Slovakia Tiếp tục cập nhật Goalkeepers: Martin Dubravka (Newcastle), Marek Rodak, Henrich Ravas (New England Revolution), Dominik Takac (Spartak Trnava). Defenders: Peter Pekarik (Hertha Berlin), Milan Skriniar (Paris Saint-Germain), Norbert Gyomber (Salernitana), David Hancko (Feyenoord), Denis Vavro (Copenhagen), Vernon De Marco (Hatta), Michal Tomic (Slavia Prague), Adam Obert (Cagliari), Matus Kmet (AS Trencin), Sebastian Kosa (Spartak Trnava). Midfielders: Juraj Kucka (Slovan Bratislava), Ondrej Duda (Hellas Verona), Patrik Hrosovsky (Genk), Stanislav Lobotka (Napoli), Matus Bero (Bochum), Laszlo Benes (Hamburg), Jakub Kadak (Luzern), Dominik Holly (AS Trencin). Forwards: Robert Bozenik (Boavista), Lukas Haraslin (Sparta Prague), Tomas Suslov (Hellas Read the full article

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ithinkibetterfollowyouaround · 5 months

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Nonexistent Night - "In The Middle Of A Boiling Sea"

Nonexistent Night has announced the release of their debut album “In The Middle Of A Boiling Sea” out January 26th via Three One G. TRACKLIST:1. Unofficial Soundtrack to the Unconscious2. One Year3. Tessellations4. Prelude in Terror5. Metaphysics Becomes Physics Becomes Dead Language Today they’ve shared the song “Metaphysics Becomes Physics Becomes Dead Language”. John Rieder shared this about…

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xtruss · 1 year

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The Rebranding of MDMA

Ecstasy used to be known as Therapy. What kind of drug could it become next?

— By Rachel Riederer | July 13, 2023

Illustration By Maria Chimishkyan

When I was in college, I took MDMA with a few friends. It was 2002, and we thought of the drug as Ecstasy, or Molly, and associated it with raves. We weren’t really rave people, so we piled into a dorm-room bathroom and sat together on the floor. We were blissed out on one another’s company, deeply appreciating the cool, smooth nature of the wall, when John, the roommate of one of my friends, opened the door. He seemed unfazed to find us staring up at him with the big pupils you’d expect from an anime character. But something about his demeanor made us think that he was upset. When we asked him what was going on, he told us only that he’d been hanging out with some friends. On an ordinary day, we probably wouldn’t have inquired further. But we were on MDMA, which has been called an “empathogen,” because it intensifies feelings of empathy and connection, and we were curious to the point of pushiness. Was he sure that everything was fine? Did he want to tell us what had happened?

John closed the toilet lid, sat down, and began to talk. He was a serious musician who played in both an orchestra and a rock band; he said that, earlier that day, a friend of his had asked why he bothered with the band. As he told us about it, he started to tear up. Her comment, I sensed, had pricked a tender spot in his idea of himself. At the time, I thought of John as a friend but not necessarily a close confidant—but I was on empathy overdrive, and it felt intolerable to see him hurting. We got to work trying to help him sort things out, reminding him what a talented musician we knew him to be.

John’s dorm-room bathroom didn’t have much in common with a therapist’s office. Still, I’ve always thought of our encounter as a sort of informal therapy session. Some key elements of therapy were involved: we listened, with focussed attention, while John told us what was bothering him, and we asked why the remark had hurt so much. When he confessed his anxieties, we tried to validate and reassure him. In my memory, John left the bathroom feeling better, and so did I; I remember that conversation as a turning point in our friendship. Strangely, a chemical seemed to facilitate this connection. If not for MDMA, we might not have been so invested, or have invited John so earnestly to open up.

In recent years, growing numbers of scientists have been asking whether MDMA could become a recognized, official part of psychotherapy. Rachel Yehuda, who runs a lab at Mount Sinai focussed on post-traumatic stress disorder, or P.T.S.D., says that MDMA “produces a substantial change in mental state that increases people’s ability to engage with traumatic material in psychotherapy.” Although the drug has been illegal since the eighties, the F.D.A. considers MDMA one component of a “breakthrough therapy” for the treatment of P.T.S.D., and could soon consider an application for its prescription use during therapy sessions. Such a development would force us to change our idea of the drug. Many people still think of MDMA as a chemical that makes you feel good when you go out dancing all night long. But what if its greatest power is an ability to inspire empathetic conversations? The meaning of MDMA is changing. What kind of a drug is it going to be?

MDMA takes its name from its chemical formula: 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine. In “I Feel Love: MDMA and the Quest for Connection in a Fractured World,” a new book on the history and resurgence of the drug, the journalist Rachel Nuwer writes that it was first synthesized in the U.S. in 1965, by Alexander Shulgin, a gifted chemist at Dow Chemical. Shulgin, who taught at the University of California, Berkeley, and consulted for the Drug Enforcement Administration (D.E.A.), was part of a community of psychedelic enthusiasts who “tended to think of MDMA as a cherished and respected medicine,” Nuwer writes—“something to assist with transcendence, growth, and healing.” The drug became popular among therapists of a countercultural bent, who administered it to patients and sometimes took it themselves. But, as others began to synthesize and share it, Shulgin feared that it would become known as a recreational drug and the D.E.A. would criminalize it.

Illustration By Maria Chimishkyan

MDMA’s reach grew in the early eighties, when a former Catholic priest named Michael Clegg introduced it to the Dallas club scene. It proved successful enough there that, one day, he visited Bob McMillen, who had been a major marijuana distributor in California. He told McMillen that he had been using a drug that was going to be a big deal, and he wanted to sell it on the West Coast. Clegg even had a name for the molecule: Therapy. After some cajoling, McMillen agreed to sample it. He put on an album by the New Age instrumentalist Deuter and sat on his couch, under a sheet. “I floated off in a wonderful euphoria,” he later recalled. “Then I threw the sheet off, sat up and said, ‘Sold! How much can I get?’ ” But McMillen insisted on a rebrand: Therapy was too corny a name to move any product. He chose the name of the Deuter album, and in four days he sold five thousand units of Ecstasy.

MDMA was gaining a sort of split personality, as a potentially therapeutic chemical on the one hand and as pleasure in pill form on the other. Shulgin hated the name Ecstasy; when Nuwer visited his widow, she called it “penicillin for the soul.” On the party scene, however, it was becoming commonplace for clubbers to go to a bartender and order “a beer and an Ecstasy,” one of Nuwer’s sources recalls. Users didn’t necessarily know what they were getting: Ecstasy is often cut with other drugs, such as fentanyl. In part for this reason, in 1985, the D.E.A. named MDMA a Schedule 1 controlled substance—a classification reserved for drugs “with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.”

In the decades that followed, a research and advocacy organization, the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, or maps, tried to make psychedelics acceptable and accessible to the public. But not until the two-thousands did studies of MDMA’s therapeutic potential start to gain wider traction. In a Phase 2 clinical trial started in 2004, a hundred and seven people with a P.T.S.D. diagnosis received several weeks of talk therapy; during two of the sessions, about a month apart, participants received either MDMA or a placebo. When the study concluded, fifty-six per cent of those given MDMA and therapy no longer met the diagnostic criteria for the disorder, more than twice as many as those in the placebo group. One downside of such studies is their small size; another is that they do not test MDMA without therapy, making it difficult to disentangle the impacts of the drug from the sessions.

Nuwer argues that the effort to recontextualize MDMA as a treatment for trauma is both “the latest installment in a long history of hype that’s surrounded this unique molecule” and a return to the drug’s roots. “The pendulum is swinging back to where MDMA began,” she writes. Recently, an Australian law made MDMA and psilocybin, the compound in psychedelic mushrooms, available by prescription; an Australian biotech company raised $2.5 million to develop a program for psychiatrists to provide MDMA during therapy. In 2021, a psychiatrist associated with maps, Michael Mithoefer, published a Phase 3 trial—the first late-stage clinical trial involving MDMA—with promising results for patients with severe P.T.S.D. Now that Mithoefer and his colleagues have completed an additional Phase 3 trial, his team plans to submit an application for prescription use to the F.D.A. Nuwer writes that some psychiatrists are skeptical about whether the drug is ready for “widespread clinical use,” but many experts think that it could be approved as soon as this year.

We’re used to thinking of psychiatric medications as working separately from therapy, with the former making physiological changes to brain chemistry and the latter helping patients understand their emotions, adjust their thinking patterns, or change behavior. But MDMA doesn’t fit that model of psychiatric medication; it’s fundamentally different from the drugs that currently treat depression or anxiety. No one is suggesting that patients take MDMA every day, like Wellbutrin, or as needed to combat acute distress, like Xanax. Instead, MDMA is a drug that one might take in combination with therapy, during sessions—less a treatment than a treatment enhancer.

The exact mechanisms through which MDMA works are not well understood. During the last four decades, most research on the drug has focussed on whether it damages the brain; studies are ongoing, and Nuwer’s expert sources are convinced that it doesn’t—although, she writes, it is clear that “high, repeated doses can inflict major changes” on the serotonin systems of lab animals. One of Nuwer’s important contributions is dissecting two seriously flawed studies of MDMA that have been corrected in the scientific literature but have nonetheless shaped public opinion. In one, researchers mistakenly administered methamphetamine to subjects, yet reported the results as coming from MDMA.

Gül Dölen, a researcher at Johns Hopkins, has found that MDMA and other psychedelics reopen what neuroscientists call a “critical period” in the brain—windows of time, mostly occurring during childhood and puberty, during which neural connections can change and reorganize. It’s unknown whether this has anything to do with the feelings of empathy and social connection associated with the drug. Dölen points out that individuals receiving MDMA-assisted therapy need to be treated with particular care, not just during their sessions but afterward; even after the drug’s acute effects have worn off, patients will “continue to exhibit heightened sensitivity, malleability and vulnerability during the open state.” (One woman who had participated in a maps-sponsored trial, in Canada, continued treatment with two therapists who had conducted the trial; she later accused one of them of sexual assault during sessions. He claimed in legal filings that the relationship was consensual; maps cut ties with both therapists.)

Illustration By Maria Chimishkyan

If the F.D.A. approves MDMA for use during therapy, this will represent an unprecedented development both for psychedelic drugs and for therapy. A substance that has long been associated with parties could be mainstreamed and medicalized; many more people might try a new category of mental-health care, which could come with new kinds of risks. There could come a day when MDMA is associated less with feeling good than with trying to get better. As patients in Mithoefer’s studies have told him, “I don’t know why they call this Ecstasy.”

In the late nineteen-nineties, a psychiatrist named Charles Grob published a study showing that MDMA could be safely administered in a medical setting. His researchers administered the drug at a hospital to volunteers who, per the F.D.A.’s requirements, had prior experience taking it. The only person who had a problem with the tests, he reported, was the head nurse. She was annoyed that her nurses were neglecting their duties, instead choosing to spend time with the study participants. “The subjects were so empathetic and interested in the lives of the nurses,” Grob wrote, that the nurses gravitated to them, eager to talk. One of the peculiarities of MDMA is that it turns its users into listeners. Back in college, during our “session” with John, it was our MDMA-heightened empathy that helped the conversation along. John didn’t need to take drugs to benefit from its effects; he just walked into the room.

Nuwer writes that, when she tried MDMA for the first time, at a warehouse party in Brooklyn, she was worried that the drug would cause her to “spontaneously start making out with everyone.” But the sexiness associated with MDMA might not be one of its intrinsic properties; instead, the drug might work more broadly to deepen our interest in others. Therapy is a social pursuit: a good therapist provides not just insight and tools but a relationship in which it’s possible to change. When someone takes MDMA in the presence of a therapist, they might feel more supported and secure in this bond, and more able to dredge up painful feelings or hard memories without being overwhelmed by fear or shame. When I took it, I felt my bond with John a little more powerfully.

It could be that MDMA simply intensifies something that’s already present in successful therapy. Therapy helps, in part, because human connection is good for us. It matters when someone listens to you, and when you listen. Recently, I reached out to John to ask him how he recalled our encounter in the dorm bathroom. On the phone, our old rapport quickly reëstablished itself; the longer we talked, the better I felt. When I asked about that day, he laughed and told me that he remembered our conversation as a soothing one. But he never suspected that we were on MDMA. “You guys were my friends,” he recalled. “I knew you were empathetic people.” That had been enough. ♦

#Drugs | Ecstasy | Therapy | Mental Health #The New Yorker #Rachel Riederer

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