It's not that often that you get to see a show about two women from different generations with a shared passion go at each other, and that's just one of the reasons why the new HBO Max comedy Hacks is so special. The other reason is the electric chemistry between Jean Smart and Hannah Einbinder as two comics — one an industry legend, the other struggling to get her career together — who end up building a sometimes combative, sometimes fond bond as they learn to collaborate together.
In the below two-on-one interview, Smart and Einbinder told Collider about how they originally got involved with the project — including what it was like for Smart to sign up for a show that, unlike her other recent TV work on shows including Watchmen, Mare of Easttown, and Fargo, could potentially last for seasons. They also discussed the kind of research that Smart did (and didn't do) to play a veteran stand-up, and why the show was known for so long as "Untitled Jean Smart Project."
Collider: So what was the process of joining the show? What was your first exposure to it?
JEAN SMART: Well for me, my agent called me up and said, "They're interested in you for this role." I thought it sounded very intriguing. The executive producers who were connected to it were incredibly talented and it was HBO, and it was a character that sounded like an enormous amount of fun to play. So we had a couple of meetings and we all got on like a house of fire and then went. So then I, they sent me some videotapes of some young actresses, who would they were considering for Ava. Then I narrowed it down to a handful, or I guess some were unavailable physically to come. Then we met on a big soundstage, big, giant, empty soundstage.
Hannah was saying how it was kind of creepy because it looked like a scene out of a movie where they torture people, because you couldn't even see the edges of the room. It was so big and so dark. There was just like this one stand with a light bulb and two chairs about 30 feet apart. It was like, "I remember the night of January 17th." That's how we did the scene. The scene that we did was the scene where they first meet at Deborah's house. That was the audition scene.
That's a fun one to do. For you Hannah, what was your first exposure to the material?
HANNAH EINBINDER: I, like every eligible young maiden in the land, received the sides, and I got the character description. I have never... It's not even close. I have never read anything that I've gotten audition-wise and felt this interested in it, connected to it, excited about it.
From there, I auditioned right before the pandemic, truly March 9th-ish, I want to say. We had the lockdown and then March 13th and then, I'm a comic and stand-up went away, and I had no idea when it would come back. So I kind of became obsessed with this project because it was my only way to engage with a piece of comedy in a way that could feel real maybe, at the time.
So I just became really obsessed with this and it was all I thought of, really, for the duration of the audition process. I mean, I am tired because I have just been struck and struck and struck again by this show. So, yeah. Then as Jean said, she called me the night before that the terrifying, into our dark massive empty space. She made me feel so comfortable. I certainly owe my feeling of ease on that day to Jean. So I think from then on, it was the rest is history, as we say.
Jean, you've done plenty of TV work, but nothing in a while that potentially could go on for multiple seasons. Is there something about the premise that you looked at and were like, "I would do the show for a long time"?
SMART: Yes. I would be pleased if the show has a future like that. Maybe not 10 or 11 years, but I mean, I'm going to be very curious to see where they take it because we don't want Deborah to go too far afield from the person that she is, because she's rather entertaining. We don't want her and Ava to change each other completely. We kind of like them the way they are and the way they spar and they become much closer during the show. It's going to be... Because I'm very hopeful with the show will have a second season, and I'm really curious to see where it takes us.
For you Hannah, this is kind of the same question, but in reverse, since this is your big first series regular role for you.
EINBINDER: Yeah. I mean, come on, it'd be a dream. That'd be a dream. There are a lot of firsts [for me] contained within this show. This experience was insane. I mean, such a dream come true. I would be thrilled beyond. I would be thrilled in a way I can't articulate if we all got to be together again, the whole cast and the whole crew. I really just hope it's that group of people and we're able to be together because with stand-up, I know I'm going to see my friends all the time for the rest of my life. Because I know these people go to this bar on this night and with TV it's different, people got to go to other gigs and the show, this and that, whatever, so many factors. But I'm really in love with our family. I just think it's a blessing.
That's lovely. Hannah, was there anything tricky about taking the patterns and the rhythms you've learned as a standup and applying them to a scripted comedy?
EINBINDER: I think that rhythm is a great way to look at comedy. I think that because I felt, at least, so in sync stylistically with Paul, Jen, and Lucia's comedic timing writing and their rhythm. That it felt like they completely set me up to execute it. They also, once they booked me, they started kind of figuring out Eva's voice through different rhythms that I brought. So it was so collaborative in terms of the style and that cadence that I felt we were able to really work that out together.
SMART: They were so open to us ad-libbing and you could tell that they really listened to us, because like Hannah said, you could feel that more and more, how they picked up some of the rhythms that we were bringing to it.
The show had not a formal title until pretty recently, at least one that was publicly known. When did you find out that the title would be Hacks, and what was your reaction to it?
SMART: I think we all found out around the same time, right? We were ecstatic, because that was the working title when I first read the script and I thought it was perfect. So when they told me that there were legal issues with that, I was really disappointed. So we were all trying to come up with names constantly. One I had was, "The Gig." I can't remember some of the other ones.
EINBINDER: "Humor Me." He had "Humor Me," right? There was...
SMART: Finally, I think they went back to one of the networks who owned the rights and just begged.
EINBINDER: Truly.
SMART: They weren't developing with that title. They finally, I guess decided, maybe it wasn't going to happen. So they said, "Okay, fine. You can have it." But it was after something like, I think they sent over 150 suggestions to HBO.
With the character of Deborah, there's a ton of backstory to her life and to her career. How much of building that was a collaborative experience?
SMART: That was all pretty much there when I was sent the script, in terms of her family and her marriage and all of that. Even her relationship with Marty, her boss, all of that was pretty much set. But they're so good, but they have absolutely no ego about us suggesting things and asking things and trying new things.
Were there stand-ups that you looked to as examples — not necessarily to mimic in terms of performance, but just to look at in terms of the history of their careers?
SMART: I honestly didn't, because I wanted it to be uniquely my take. In this situation is Deborah is good, but she's been doing it a long time, the same way. So it's not maybe as inspired as it should be. She kind of resting on our laurels, so to speak, and just kind of taking it easy. I mean, Marty accuses her of being on cruise control when she's up on stage when she takes great offense at. She says she isn't, but I think to a certain extent, she is. She knows her audience real well. She knows who buys the tickets to her shows. She knows the kind of things that they'll laugh at, things they won't laugh at. She discovers that she kind of misses the danger of not feeling that way.
It's a fascinating response. It speaks to how well the show captures that element of creativity, where you feel like you get comfortable in a certain zone and that can also become a rut.
SMART: Obviously there are comparisons to Joan Rivers in the sense of, how long she's been doing it. The fact that she started out, the way she did it. Now she completely kind of changed her image and changed her style a little bit. I prefer to her early work. I don't think people appreciate how brilliant she was, who always saw her trashing people on the red carpet in a very amusing way. That wasn't her genius. Her genius was when she was first starting out. She was one of those rare female comedians who did extremely well. It was just rapid fire machine, gun delivery, so funny. Just a quick, quick mind.
Hacks is streaming now on HBO Max. New episodes premiere Thursdays.