Actor and executive producer Vince Vaughn, left, and creator and executive producer Bill Lawrence of the Apple TV+ series “Bad Monkey” pose for a portrait at the Four Seasons Hotel in Los Angeles, Tuesday, Aug. 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
By ALICIA RANCILIO
There’s an old saying, “Don’t meet your heroes,” but for TV creator and showrunner Bill Lawrence, it was a dream come true. Lawrence’s new series, “Bad Monkey,” for Apple TV+, which premieres Wednesday, is based on a novel by Carl Hiaasen, one of his favorite authors.
“I started reading Carl Hiaasen books when I was 15. There’s a direct connection from Carl’s surreal satires and wildly wacky character portrayals to ‘Scrubs,'” explained Lawrence, who also created Zach Braff’s long-running sitcom. “The guy helped me tell stories. He turned out to be as cool as I hoped and such a nice guy.”
Bad Monkey stars Vince Vaughn, whose observational humor and quick-witted one-liners make him a good fit for Hiaasen and Lawrence’s writing style.
Vaughn plays Andrew Yancy, a former Miami police detective who now lives in the Florida Keys and works as a restaurant inspector. (One scene where we see Yancy at work leads to a running joke about him having lost his appetite for the foreseeable future, and is Vaughn at his most reactionary.)
A friend asks Yancy for a favor: to bring a human arm that washed up on the beach to a coroner (played by Natalie Martinez). When he later meets Eve (Meredith Hagner), the widow of the man who owned the arm, Yancy can’t shake the case. The story unfolds, touching on themes of greed and power.
“He can’t quit something where he knows something is wrong,” Vaughn said of Yancy, who he describes as “like the Energizer Bunny.” “He can’t do anything about it. And no matter how many times he falls down, gets punched in the face, or things don’t go his way, he just keeps marching on. That’s just such an inspiring trait.”
Vaughn and Lawrence have known each other for over 25 years – they used to play poker together. “He always made me laugh. Just watching from afar how his career was so successful was easy for me,” Vaughn said of his acceptance of the role.
Lawrence said Vaughn’s 1996 indie film “Swingers” “shaped a whole generation of writers. When he came on the screen and said, ‘You’re so rich you don’t even know it,’ everyone wanted to write that kind of dialogue.”
Michelle Monaghan plays Bonnie, Yancy’s quasi-girlfriend who flies in and out of his life. She has only a minor role in the novel and Monaghan thanks Lawrence for fleshing out her story.
“She’s equal parts very delusional but also very naive,” Monaghan said, laughing. “When we first meet her, she’s very funny, playful and aloof, but as the show goes on, we see that she’s also quite predatory. … Bill creates characters that do outrageous things.”
When it came to trying out alternative approaches and improvising, not everyone was as confident as Vaughn.
“Vince encouraged the other actors, saying, ‘I’m going to trick you if you say that. It’s going to be funny,'” Lawrence recalls.
Ronald Peet, who plays a fisherman named Neville whose storyline runs parallel to Vaughn’s, said he had to get used to the freedom to deviate from the script.
“Every day I came to work, I was doing something where I thought, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to do this,'” Peet said. “That’s how you grow and that’s how you develop, and I’m grateful for that.”
The episodes were filmed on location in South Florida, so the cast experienced the pleasant humidity that slows the pace of everyday life.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me. When I’m in a comfortable soundstage, I don’t like it. When it’s hot, I’m not so sane. And I kind of love it when I think, ‘I don’t think,'” Hagner said.
“I think my hair needed a little more hairspray,” Vaughn recalls. “The Keys were spectacular. The nature, the ocean, the wildlife. I really enjoyed it.”
Martinez is from Miami, so the job gave her the opportunity to reconnect with her family.
“I’ve been in Los Angeles for 20 years, but I was born and raised in Miami. My whole family is there, so it was nice that my goddaughter or my aunt could come to the set and see what I was doing. I had a break… and I could go to my grandmother’s house and have lunch with her.”
While filming Bad Monkey, Lawrence had the valuable opportunity to work with his daughter Charlotte, who has a recurring role as Eve’s stepdaughter Caitlin. For Charlotte, a singer-songwriter, this was her first acting role.
Charlotte is well aware of the controversy surrounding the Nepo baby and said she is grateful for the “huge opportunity” she has been given.
“I was in musical theatre and plays as a child, but I always loved performing. I never really made the connection or imagined that I could make that my career,” Charlotte said. “I think because my parents were so involved, I kind of wanted to rebel and do my own thing and not be tied to them. But it couldn’t have been more fun.”
“If you can work with your kids, do it forever,” Lawrence said. “That’s my advice to everyone. And who cares what other people say. It’s great.”
