A Combination of Comedy and Tragedy at All Times: A Conversation with ‘Platonic’ Creators Francesca Delbanco and Nicholas Stoller

Platonic follows a platonic pair of former best friends approaching midlife (Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne) who reconnect after a long rift. The duo’s friendship becomes all consuming—and destabilizes their lives in a hilarious way. 

Adult friendships are sacred. And ones that come with a storied past, that only you two intimately know – it’s difficult, at times to bring that to your own romantic relationships with a life partner. But sometimes it works – most times, they don’t. In Francesca Delbanco and Nicholas Stoller’s Apple TV comedy series, Platonic, they hit all those notes, and then some. They tackle big-picture life and career-defining moments into digestible comedy morsels.

Both Francesca Delbanco (Friends from College) and Nicholas Stoller (Neighbors) spoke with Script about the development process of their show that stemmed from Francesca’s personal experience, to casting Rose Byrne and Seth Rogen and how their friendship influenced their fictional characters, creating their writers’ room, and so much more!

This interview has been edited for content and clarity.

Sadie Dean: I really appreciate the character work you collectively do on the show. It’s coupled with lots of comedy and vulnerability in the mix, and how these characters are dealing with their own low self-esteem and insecurity of adulthood. And these two characters, there’s kind of a juxtaposition of Sylvia and Will, but they're also like a mirror image of each other without wanting to face the facts. What was it like tapping into those characters and diving into that world?

Nicholas Stoller: Just to start off, the idea was Francesca’s - it was started the concept and came from stuff that she had kind of experienced in her life. But once that idea existed, we developed it and the person we wanted to go to first was Rose [Byrne]. And we approached her and pitched the idea. And she really liked it. And then we asked her who she would want to do it with. And she immediately said, ‘Seth.’ So then we approached Seth [Rogen] and…he instantly was like, ‘That sounds fun. Let's do it.’

In terms of the two characters, we knew we wanted them to have insecurities, wherein that we needed them to, as you said, to be different in different places in their lives. She's a stay-at-home mom, she's happily married, and has three children. He’s single, he's newly divorced. But they're both insecure about different things in their lives, and the only person that they feel they can safely turn to is each other. And that was something that we knew we wanted to have in there.

Francesca Delbanco: They're old friends in the show. And we felt like it was important, because you always have to answer that question of, ‘Why now?’ That they had sort of like been on very different life trajectories, and we're coming back to be friends with each other. We didn't want them to be people who were like, in lockstep in their lives, in the exact same place, because we felt like both the conflict could be greater if they were in totally different places in their lives, and the judgments could be stronger. And also, their ability as friends to see each other clearly is somehow stronger when someone's just in a totally different world than you are sometimes and to call it out, honestly.

Sadie: And speaking to that, there's a line from I want to say it's episode eight from Johnny Rev, he says, ‘Partnerships only works when everyone is being honest.’ And I feel like for the two of them, it's just a big smack in the face. While the focus is this friendship, you’re also weaving in and highlighting the outside relationships and what that feels like being the outsider to your partner's friendships.

Francesca: I think that that is one of the things at the heart of the premise of the show is how intimate can you be with someone who is not your husband, but who is a straight man? [laughs] Obviously, there is nothing romantic between Sylvia and Will in the course of the show.

Will: Nor will there be.

Francesca: Nor will there ever be, but there is something very intimate about the two of them about how well they know each other, how closely they can anticipate each other's reactions to things, and how they can tell each other things that they can't tell their life partners and that can be destabilizing in a marriage whether or not somebody is having sex with somebody else. There's a kind of intimacy that can feel like too much.

And in trying to think about the basic genesis for the show, we were like, there is a reason these friendships kind of drift apart when people couple up and then kind of get into this phase of life that we're currently in. And it's sort of sad. It's sort of inevitable, but it's sort of sad and what can any of us really do about it? 

And it's one of those things where it feels reactionary, and maybe conservative and maybe not like my politics to say, ‘I don't want my husband to have a best friend who's a woman.’ I want my husband to have a best friend who is whoever is the person who should be his best friend. But I also can see a world where it's like, ‘You two or going out again? You two or going to this concert?’ A lot of the things that my husband does with his male best friend that I'm just like, ‘Great, go have fun.’ It's hard to know if I would really feel that way if it were a woman, you know? And so that's really what this show is trying to get at through Sylvia and Charlie and Will's relationship.

Sadie: The chemistry between Rose and Seth, how much did that help shape their characters in that world and playing in that sandbox of ‘TV friendship’ because it truly does feel like they’ve been friends for a long time. But also with both of you directing and setting that tone together with their voices – what was that collaboration like?

Nicholas: We directed all of them and it'd be very hard for us to hand off these episodes to someone else a direct - we just know that tone so intimately. And the final giant piece of making anything that's TV or movies is directing it and shooting it. And Seth and Rose are just a delight to work with. They're so funny, they have such good chemistry. They're so collaborative. They bring a lot of great ideas to the table. 

I've known Seth since he was 18, And I’ve worked with Rose, starting with Get Him to the Greek and then worked with both of them on Neighbors. We just have a shorthand at this point in terms of how we work together. They're both very funny, but they're both really good actors, they will also have good instincts on the script. So, they give really good notes on the scripts. And it's always stressful when they give notes because I know they're always right. [laughs] And it's a great collaboration in terms of that.

And in terms of building the characters, they kind of understood what we were doing from the get-go. That's why I think, you know, if people have different kind of artistic ideas of what's happening, that can be stressful, but we were all on the same page from the beginning.

Francesca: I think you're also right, that you can feel that they are friends who've known each other for a long time in the show. I mean, obviously, they're amazing actors, and that's their job is to make it seem that way, but it's just true that they are friends. And it's true that they make each other laugh really hard. And it's true that they enjoy being around each other in a way that I feel like really does shine through.

Sadie: When putting together your writers’ room, what kind of voices were you looking for?

Nicholas: We're lucky in that we have a group of writers we've worked with for years now at this point, like starting with our Netflix show Friends from College, and then into this. So, there are people that we've known for a long time. And we wanted to read specs that were funny but grounded. The show is like a hard comedy, this isn't like a dramatic half-hour. This is a hard comic half-hour. So, we wanted to make sure there are people who could write something that was grounded. That wasn't super broad, but that was funny.

Francesca: But the truth is that because we've done TV for a long time now, we do have an amazing group of writers who write their own things and run their own shows when they're not working with us, but who we all have a kind of common language, I think, and kind of can jump in knowing where we want it to go.

Sadie: With you two being creative partners and of course, life partners, how much are you guys tapping into your own inner world and vulnerabilities? And are there ever any breaking points where it’s like, ‘Pump the brakes’ or ‘Hey, that should go in the script?’

Francesca: I would say our visions align 95% of the time. And in the time that they don't align, we have just been fortunate enough, where it's like, 'It mattered more to one of us.' And the other one says, ‘OK, let it be then.’ [laughs]

Nicholas: I always say, ‘I care so much and don't care at all.’ [laughs]

Francesca: Sometimes we'll be in the room, and I'll be like, ‘I don't know why this is funny, and I don't care about it, but I trust you, and it's important,’ and it goes in. And sometimes you'll be like to me, ‘This is just a throwaway bit of comedy, but if it really bothers you, and you really don't want to see it fine.’ Sometimes we can concede when someone is super passionate.

Nicholas: The main thing with all of this, right, whether it be comedy or drama, is that the story makes sense. That it emotionally makes sense. And we're always kind of aligned on and you can kind of just know it when you read it or when you're telling the story again, as we're constantly talking about these stories - that's really the only thing that ultimately matters. Like, I always say, ‘Jokes are free.’

Francesca: Also in everything that we've ever collaborated on, there are strong male points of view and strong female points of view. And sometimes these discussions go with, 'Just trust me, this is real for women, and it has to be there' or 'Just trust me, this is a guy comedy, and it will be very funny to the guys who are watching the show.' And I don't know if that sounds old-fashioned, but if one of us played that card, we're like, ‘OK, yeah.’

Nicholas: It's the fun of the show. It’s a show that plays to a co-ed audience.

Sadie: There's definitely a nice balance. Over the evolution of your careers, why did you choose comedy? Is there something that you’re able to say through comedy that just registers for you?

Francesca: I feel like life is a combination of comedy and tragedy at all times. And when you're doing comedy, you can have both of those elements. And when you're doing drama, you can have both of those elements. And to me, it isn't necessarily a preference for one over the other. It's the feeling that both have to be involved, no matter what the form is. And just like as a viewer, and as a fan of television or novels, I tend to not be that drawn to things that are so intensely dramatic, that they have no levity or comedy in them if that makes sense.

And also, from the other end, I tend to not be as drawn to comedies that are just crazy over the top wacky comedies. I need some human stakes, that feel real. And I need something that is sort of light, because I feel like, it's just the tone I love the most. And it's the tone I respond to as a reader and as a viewer. So, it's the tone I try to work in.

And I also feel like it's a really hard tone. I mean, everything is hard. I'm not trying to say it isn’t hard, but you know what I mean? It's just like, even in life and death stakes, even in the darkest moments in your own life, even when things are really bad, even when you're in the hospital - it doesn't mean you don't smile about anything and it doesn't mean that it isn't a relief when someone makes you smile about something. And so, I feel like that's kind of the North Star, in real life, things can be horrible and funny at the same time.

Nicholas: [laughs] Yeah, I would say the same. I would agree. To me, it's my view of the world. And it's the most honest view of the world is a view that's comedic. It’s what I've always loved. Even something like a movie that I love that I watch every year is The Shining, and that movie is terrifying. But it's also honestly pretty funny and it's not just scary. It's not just dark. A show like The Sopranos, one of the greatest shows ever. It's hysterical. It's so funny. It's also very dark. And I would say the dramatic moments that we're excavating from their friendship and from Sylvia’s marriage and from Will’s relationships, I think, are best exemplified through this combination of comedy and drama. It's just how I see the world.

Platonic is available to watch on Apple TV+.