[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome to the Cosmic, the interview podcast of thecosmiccircus.com. i'm editor in chief Lizzie Hill. In this episode, I had a chat over Zoom with executive producer, director, and writer Liz W. Garcia about her new comedy space cadet coming to prime video next month. Enjoy.
[00:00:27] Speaker B: Hi, I'm Lizzie Hill. I'm from the cosmic circus, and I just wanted to tell you so, so.
[00:00:32] Speaker A: Nice to meet you.
[00:00:33] Speaker B: I watched the movie last night. It was very, very funny. I laughed out loud a bunch of times. It's really hilarious. Had a great time.
And I also love that there was, like, the themes above, just sort of chasing your dreams and believing yourself and second chances. And there's also some lovely things about mothers and daughters and friendship. And I just thought that was, those are always good stories to get to watch.
Can you talk a little bit about what your inspiration was for this story?
[00:01:03] Speaker C: Sure.
Well, the general premise came from a news item a few years ago where NASA announced that they had their first ever astronaut candidate class that was 50% female. And that just caught my eye as a sort of historic milestone. And I started reading about what it took to get to that point. Like, who were these women who had made it into this sort of male dominated institution? And the more I read about what was required to even get to that point, the more blown away I was by how accomplished and focused these women were. Like, you know, like it says in movie, it's like, almost unbelievable that these people fly jets, have higher degrees in science or math, have full careers in science and math, are physically fit mentally, and it only gets more rigorous. But I just thought, I've never seen a depiction of how accomplished and intense and competitive women can be. Not about men, about achieving professional goals or athletic goals. And that reminded me of the people that I know, and I wanted to write roles like that.
And so I was interested in that world and that competition between those type of characters. And then in order to write Rex, then it's sort of some of my personal sensibility about how I wish the world would work and how I wish that people could, you know, not give up on themselves and not necessarily have all the right credentials, but still make it to where their talents are best used. And, you know, and just a character who, like so many of us, has life has dealt her some complications, and she's had to recover from, from that. And she does really beautifully in the movie. And that is an inspiring journey for me to write.
[00:03:23] Speaker B: I kind of connected with that because my mother passed away a couple years ago, and it made me think about things that I know she would be. She would be proud that I'm editor in chief of this website and things like that. So that kind of touched me when I, when I was watching the movie.
I also, I really enjoyed the divert. The diversity of the cast is really just phenomenal. And I really found it much more enjoyable because it was so diverse. Was that planned from the start, you think, or did it kind of come over time?
[00:04:00] Speaker C: I mean, that was planned in the sense that you, you know, I wrote Pam as a woman of color because that was sort of my, you know, so much of this is like the world as I wish it would be. And I liked the idea of a woman who was just smarter than everybody else and everybody knew it, and then woman of color. And so, you know, I was specific about that. And then, you know, like, the face of NASA really, at this point is incredibly diverse. And I wanted to represent the truth of that. That that's an institution that as difficult, as competitive as it is, like they are, it's true. It is a meritocracy. They really are taking the people who are best. And what a meritocracy looks like is what the globe looks like. It is diverse in every way.
And that's just like, it's more real. It's more interesting to watch.
[00:05:00] Speaker B: Exactly. Yes, very much so.
I found it much more interesting because of the way that worked out.
You've written some more dramas before. And what do you feel about the difference between writing comedy versus writing drama? Easier? Harder. How did you feel about it?
[00:05:22] Speaker C: Harder. I think it's harder. I think it's a lot harder because with drama, there are certain topics or moods where, you know, you can evoke feeling.
Comedy is so much more specific. And I, I was terrified. I felt like, I'm going to write what I think is funny and no one else is going to think it's funny. And if something's not funny, it's really not funny.
You know, there's no, like, semi fun. You don't want to put something that's kind of funny out in the world. It's so awkward.
And I had to really talk to a few friends who write comedy to get to the place where I realized it's not about trying to be funny to everybody. It's just about, like, what do I think is funny? What do I think is funny? I'm going to amuse myself while I'm writing this and we'll see how it goes.
[00:06:18] Speaker B: I chuckled a bunch of times. So you did a really good job. With it.
Did you have any particular actors in mind for some of the parts? It's like Emma Roberts was really good, funny, and gabrielle Union was great in it. Did you have them in mind?
[00:06:34] Speaker C: I mean, they both seem so perfect that it's weird that I didn't write with them in mind. But I try not to write with actors in mind because you don't know if you can get them. You don't know if they're going to be available. So I try to just write a full character and be open to whatever actor is right. And I just was lucky to find a lot of actors who were very right.
[00:07:00] Speaker B: Yeah, it was a great, fun cast, and I don't have any time left here. Oh, I guess I am all set and on time. But thank you so much for talking, and I'm looking forward to writing out my review on the movie space cadet.
[00:07:16] Speaker C: Well, thank you so much, livy. I appreciate it. Take care.
[00:07:19] Speaker A: Thank you for listening. You can find the companion article for this
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