Cate Blanchett came up with the idea for her new Documentary Now! episode
Blanchett shared Three Salons At The Seaside with the Documentary Now! team, leading to her latest starring role
Aux News Cate Blanchett
After 52 seasons (give or take) of cinematic excellence, Documentary Now! returns on October 19 with a brand-new season and a brand-new set of high-profile guest stars, including Alexander Skarsgård, Nicholas Braun, Liliane Rovère, Jamie Demetriou, Trystan Gravelle, Jonathan Pryce, John Rhys-Davies, Harriet Walter, and Tom Jones. And one of the season’s guests is a returning player who happened to spearhead her upcoming episode: Cate Blanchett.
Blanchett appeared in the third season parody of Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present as performance artist Izabella Barta. In an interview with Collider, series co-creator Rhys Thomas shares, “Cate Blanchett did Season [3] with us, so she actually brought an idea to us, which was Three Salons By The Seaside. [It] is a BBC, sort of like a 45-minute documentary that she brought to us, and said ‘Take a look at this, this could be good,’ and that was very clearly, very regional, and very British.”
“[When] Cate Blanchett brings an episode to you, it feels like you probably should do it. So that was what definitely pointed us in that direction,” he continues, revealing that all of the new episodes are set in the United Kingdom. “But in terms of the whole season […] it felt exciting to me that it would force us all to think differently, that it would give a different landscape of what we do, and maybe energize the writing and everything.”
Thomas created the series with Fred Armisen, Bill Hader, and Seth Meyers, but it sounds like Blanchett needs to be given more credit as part of the Doc Now family. (For what it’s worth, the new episode, written by Meyers, also reportedly parodies The September Issue.) If the Oscar winner wants to keep putting out impeccable, pitch-perfect documentary spoofs, her adoring public will be more than happy to accept them.
21 Comments
I wish they would do a Les Blank inspired episode about a fictional musician, that would be fun
A takeoff on Burden of Dreams just might be too much meta for anyone to handle.
their Burden of Dreams parody episode is probably their most hyped episode this season:https://www.avclub.com/documentary-now-season-four-trailer-skarsgard-herzog-1849375187
I love Documentary Now! and I would hope that it continues on for more seasons, but I half expect this will be the last one. One of the best parts of this show is not just the send-ups of films I’ve seen, but that it’s also introduced me to some fantastic documentaries I think I’d otherwise have never heard of.
I hope they do an NFL Films parody before they go off the air.
I can’t remember, have they done a 30 For 30 parody yet? The format of June 17, 1994 in particular seems rife for parody. I would also love one in the style of The U about some obscure sport nobody cares about, but with exactly the same energy. There are really so many episodes that could be parodied so easily.
The bowling one from S3 is a sports doc, but not really of the 30 for 30 form.
Like, did you watch Stop Making Sense after watching Documentary Now’s Final Transmission? If so, I’m torn between “Get off my lawn, you young punk” and being happy that Talking Heads fandom is getting passed on to younger people.
I’ve watched the Maria Abromovic documentary, Company, and rewatches of Grey Gardens, Stop Making Sense, and The Salesman. And watched a good chuck of “Wild Wild County” until I gave up because I could not rightly tell the difference between reality and parody.
It’s been on for 52 seasons, what makes you think they would stop anytime soon?
Take your star.
I’m assuming Rattle and Hum is too easy of a mark? The Blue Jean Committee and the Stop Making Sense episodes are otherworldly fantastic.
The Blue Jean Committee is my favourite. Really captures the “Sausage Sound” that was happening at the time.
Cate Blanchett could bring me 20 hours of her sitting on a toilet after an episode of Hot Ones and I’d beat A24 to death getting it made. Then I’d sell the rights to the film of me beating A24 producers to death for a couple extra million.
I love Cate Blanchett more than a lot of things, but this article boils down to “she recommended a doc she liked”.