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For a show that counts Hollywood mainstays David Gordon Green and Steven Soderbergh among its contributors, Amazon’s Red Oaks has stayed thoroughly under the radar during its first two seasons. Under creators Greg Jacobs and Joe Gangemi, the Hughes-ian, New Jersey Country Club-set comedy set the stage so admirably in its first two years, its final season mixes things up by setting its cast of characters great distances apart.
In Craig Roberts, Red Oaks was afforded the luxury of an instantly relatable leading man from the very start. As David, a tennis pro with a not-so-secret affinity for film, Roberts portrays a character not entirely different from himself; besides appearing in films like Neighbors, Submarine, and The Fundamentals of Caring, the Welsh actor also heads up his own film production imprint, Cliff Edge Pictures, where he’s been developing his second film, Eternal Beauty (his first, Just Jim, was released in 2015).
Just ahead of the third and final season of Red Oaks, we caught up with Roberts in NYC’s NoMad Hotel, as he dove into the duality of playing a character who so longingly aspires to become a director, and being someone living those aspirations in real time.
DECIDER: Throughout the first two years of Red Oaks, viewers have learned that David is really into film. In Season 3, he really dives into the industry. For you, as an actual person in the film world, what did you apply from real experiences into David’s storyline?
CRAIG ROBERTS: I think frustrations are a big thing. Expectations and… I don’t know. There’s a duality of life where I’m actually pursuing directing in real life, and so I know, like, wanting to have a voice, and wanting to do something. Weirdly, directing is a very strange thing where you can say you can do it, but there’s no way of proving it unless you actually have all the money in place, and everything’s going.
I completely relate to the frustrations of wanting to do that. Also, having the anxiety of older people and knowledgeable people telling you should be doing something else, but, really, your heart resides in a different place, and ‘I want to do this’. But, I think, always follow heart as opposed to head. Because head just is too logical. If you think about anything too much, you’ll never do anything.
Maybe it’s more of a coincidence than anything, but I’m guessing you connected to the character more this season than ever before. I mean, he’s always wanted to be a director, but this season it really starts to happen.
Yeah, and especially the end. There’s a final scene in it, which we filmed as the final scene. It was weird ending with that scene, and then going on to try and make my own second film. I mean, I remember in the pilot, there’s a reference to like Éric Rohmer movies, and I remember being like, “Oh shit, they’re referencing French New Wave films. This is so fucking cool. I love this.” I can definitely relate to that, and I love cinema, so the fact that he does only makes it easier to do.
This is the third year that you’re working with many of the same directors. David Gordon Green is back. Amy Heckerling and Hal Hartley are both back. How did that affect you as an actor, knowing how they work, and as a young director, did you learn a lot from them?
It really is like film school, being on set with those guys. Just because they all work so, so differently. I mean, Hal comes from an independent film background, where he probably didn’t have huge budgets and a lot of time to shoot movies, so that’s still in his DNA. We don’t do many takes when Hal’s doing episodes. You could have a four-page scene, and he’ll cover it with two shots and three takes and we’re all left going, “Did we get that? Are we in the dark?” But it works so well, because he’s from that.
David Gordon Green, on the other hand, will keep you there until the sun goes down. He likes going, and going, and going, and he loves improvising, and completely changing the script, and throwing the script out the window. Amy Heckerling is like a mixture of both in a great way. I learned a lot—I learned a hell of a lot from them. And as an actor, it’s just really enjoyable too, because it changes the energy and the DNA, and the grammar of the show. Having different directors come in every two episodes really does change the energy for better.
How important was it for you as an actor, and someone with a background on the directing side, to be able to end the series on your own terms?
I’m just very, very happy that [Creators Greg Jacobs and Joe Gangemi] got to end the show the way they wanted to end the show. When they create a world like they have—and, I mean, they live in that world and they love that world—for it to end all of a sudden would be a terrible, terrible thing. And the ending is positive, and it’s like, “Oh, what’s going to happen next?” It’s like the Sopranos ending—like, you could have never killed Tony Soprano, because we loved him so much. But we knew he was doomed, so the only thing they could have done was to cut to black. That made so much sense. I think the ending’s great.
TV Shows, in the past, were longer almost by default. Something like Friends was ten years long. Seinfeld was like nine years long, but now shows like The Leftovers and Red Oaks are three years by design. As a TV viewer, but also as a TV participant: did three years feel right for this show?
It does feel right for Red Oaks, yeah. I think everything is completely different. I mean, some shows you want to go a long, long time.
I don’t think I’ve ever wanted a show to go a long, long time. Maybe Catastrophe—I could just watch that for ages, but that doesn’t mean that the arc of the story is keeping me. And that’s why it’s good, because things are meant to be what they’re meant to be. To push things beyond their limits and beyond their boundaries would only spread things thinly.
I think Ricky Gervais, with his earlier stuff, with The Office and Extras, he did it right: two seasons and a Christmas special. I just loved that—it seems very neat and it seems like they know exactly what they want.
You’ve been in the business for a long time, but you’re still very early on in your career, and this has been a long-term project. What’s been your biggest takeaway, your biggest learning experience from working on this project?
I’ve learned not to take things for granted, because now it’s over, and it’s kind of like, oh fuck—that was a really great experience. One thing I’ve learned… VOD is good. I think what Amazon has done with the show, and what they’ve allowed everybody to do is really fantastic. I’ve probably learned how to do an American accent by the end of it. And, I don’t know, I think I’ve learned to prep myself for the real world, I think, with this directing thing. With what he’s going through.
With David?
Yeah. That if you’re really going to do something, you’re going to spend a lot of time thinking about doing it. You’ve got to follow through with it by the end of it. Get rid of any coward within. And, I think, listen to yourself. Opinions are good, and advice is good, but what good is it taking that advice if it’s not your own? I mean, it’s like, you may as well be that person.
I think you’ve got to really listen to yourself a lot of the time, and it’s a hard thing to do, because you don’t know if you’re right a lot of the time. But I think that’s the only way to make mistakes.
Is David the character that you’ve related most to that you’ve played?
In a weird way, just the fact that, yeah, he is doing exactly what I’m trying to do, while I’m doing what he’s trying to do. Yeah, I think it’s the most me I’ve ever been doing a role as well. I think it’s very similar.
Is that something you like doing, as an actor?
It’s usually a worry, because the only time you’re ever good or better than what you’d expect is when you’re doing something that makes you feel uncomfortable. So, when you’re comfortable, you feel that it’s just going to be mediocre. Fortunately, I was surrounded by people that are amazing, so as much as I am, it still looks okay. So that’s pretty good—yeah, I kind of like playing myself.
Evan Romano is a Brooklyn-based freelance writer. He was previously an editor for Brooklyn Magazine, where he once sat in a Las Vegas diner with Hannibal Buress. Follow him on Twitter at @EvanRomano and check his work out here.
