Ted Lasso’s Artisans on Casting Hannah Waddingham and ‘Fought & Lost’

When Emmy-nominated songwriter Sam Ryder was brought on to pen an original song for Apple TV+’s “Ted Lasso,” one of the first lines he wrote for “Fought & Lost” was “Go take a bow, the audience is waiting.”

At a special Variety Artisans the Nominees Event, in partnership with Apple TV+, artisans from “Ted Lasso” and “Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie” gathered for two conversations to discuss the process behind their respective Emmy-nominated series.

Moderated by Variety’s senior artisans editor Jazz Tangcay, the “Ted Lasso” panelists included casting director Theo Park, director Declan Lowney, songwriter and composer Jamie Hartman and songwriter and vocalist Ryder. The event took place on Aug. 21 at New York’s Roxy Hotel.

Said Ryder of the soaring ballad, “It’s taken from the point of view of someone who has given everything but it hasn’t turned out the way that they’d have hoped. So they’re watching the person leading this position that they were envisioning them being in and cheering them on from the sidelines, but having that gut-wrenching feeling of defeat.” The song plays towards the end of episode seven titled “Mom City” as Ted (Jason Sudeikis) has a heartfelt confrontation with his mother Dottie (Becky Ann Baker). The next day, he’s in his office to reveal a “truth bomb” to Hannah Waddingham’s Rebecca, but the end credits roll before audiences get an answer.

The show’s composers Tom Howe and Hartman collaborated with Ryder. Hartman explained the song came together in one day, adding that “96% of what you hear is what was recorded that day.”

In casting Zava, played by Maximilian Osinski, Park said the role was loosely modeled off of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, the Swedish soccer player. “If anyone knows him, he’s six-foot and five inches. The hope that he would have some sort of weird European accent was really Jason.”

Park thought she would never find such a person. But Osinski sent in an “amazing tape. I thought ‘we found him.” His commitment to the scene was out of the park. He had a top on, and was doing kick-ups and he was unbelievable.” Park added that Osinski had never played soccer in his life, but his tape had wowed everyone.

Park recalled her first time meeting Waddingham. She had first encountered the actress while she was eight months pregnant and auditioning for “Game of Thrones.” However, Park credits actor Brendan Hunt for Waddingham ending up on “Ted Lasso.”

“It was annoyingly Brendan’s idea. He said, ‘Have you tried Hannah Waddingham?” And Bingo,” she said. “That often happens. You go through a long process with lead female characters, and sometimes you can be searching for a very long time until you get the right person.”

Park continued, “As soon as she walked in, it all made sense. We flew her out to L.A. to meet Jason, and that was it.”

Lowney, who directed Waddingham (she went on to win the Emmy for best supporting actress in 2021) in Season 1’s “Make Rebecca Great Again,” recalled, “The first scene I had recorded with her she was sitting behind her desk. We were a bit strapped for time, and it was a mid-shot with the cameras pushing into a close up, and she said, ‘Hang on, I haven’t got my shoes.’ I told her not to worry about it. She said, ‘I’m not doing it unless I have my shoes because I’m not Rebecca unless I have my shoes on.’”

“She knew what she’s about and she knew exactly what she was doing,” Lowney said.

Following the “Ted Lasso” conversation, Variety’s Brent Lang moderated a conversation with editor Michael Harte and director and producer Davis Guggenheim from “Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie.”

Michael J. Fox had only one request for “Still”: no violin.

“It was the only thing he ever told me, and it was basically, ‘I don’t want to be an object of pity,’” said “Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie” director Davis Guggenheim.

At a special Variety Artisans the Nominees Event, in partnership with Apple TV+, “Still’s” Emmy-nominated director Guggenheim and editor Michael Harte sat down with Variety’s executive editor Brent Lang to discuss the making of the documentary, which follows the actor’s life and struggles with Parkinson’s disease.

In addition to watching Fox’s entire filmography, Harte combed through multiple episodes of sitcoms “Family Ties” and “Spin City” for archival footage.

“‘Spin City’ was the Everest,” he said. “We’re forensically going through those clips because we’re looking for not just funny moments, we’re looking for moments where he’s trying to hide his Parkinson’s.”

When asked whether or not they were fans of Fox’s work before filming, Harte said he “grew up obsessed with ‘Back to the Future’” and “watched it 150 times.”

“Throughout my childhood, I would go to a video shop in Donegal, Ireland — where I was from, it’s kind of a quiet place — and I would rent Michael J. Fox movies over and over again,” he recalled. “The reason I’m an editor was because of his movies.”

On Fox’s openness during the interview process, Guggenheim emphasized that “Michael was just there, and that was his gift to us.”

“I think maybe if we made the film 10 or 20 years earlier, that would not have been the case. But I think he was at a moment in his life, 61 with Parkinson’s for, at that point, roughly 32 years. What am I gonna hide?” Guggenheim continued. “I pushed him and prodded him, and he was in.”

The director described “Still” as a “love letter to [Fox’s] talent,” which he admitted he “overlooked as a consumer” before working on the film.

“We think all funny people, because they’re funny, they’re not a serious actor. But when you look back, you realize how gifted he was the way he moved in his comic timing,” Guggenheim explained. “He was great before, and I really didn’t know it.”

Following the conversation, the audience was treated to a special performance by Hartman and Ryder where they performed “Fought & Lost” in an intimate setting.

Watch a clip from the conversations above.