Host Paul Cardall peels back the heart and purpose of Dallas Jenkins, the creator of the record-breaking, first-ever multi-season series about the life of Jesus. The film and television creator explains how the biblical story of the Feeding of the 5,000 inspired his journey to create what became the largest crowdfunded television project of all time.
Host Paul Cardall peels back the heart and purpose of Dallas Jenkins, the creator of the record-breaking, first-ever multi-season series about the life of Jesus. The film and television creator explains how the biblical story of the Feeding of the 5,000 inspired his journey to create what became the largest crowdfunded television project of all time. Dallas gets to the core of his work, as he talks about the making of the show, his life behind the screen, and his fresh approach to telling timeless tales from the Bible. In a heartfelt conversation, Paul and Dallas discuss honoring the women in the Bible, the importance of listening and humility, and allowing yourself to be led by overcoming your own aspirations and goals. All Heart with Paul Cardall is proudly a part of the American Songwriter Podcast Network. For more information on Paul Cardall, please visit or find him on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.
- Hi friends, I'm Paul Cardall. Welcome to All Heart. On the last episode we heard from Jonathan Roumie, the award winning actor who plays Jesus in The Chosen. Today, we're gonna take a closer look at The Chosen's creator, director and writer, Dallas Jenkins. There's a scene I wanna share with you before I bring him on. This is where a leper approaches Jesus of Nazareth for help. Lepers, they were despised and rejected for their disease. Now, fast forward, if you look at it through today's lens, who are the lepers among us? Well, symbolic of people who are different, who are rejected. Have you felt like a leper? Have you sought help? How have you been treated? Well, take a listen,
- It's a leper, stay back.
- Cover your mouth, don't breath his air.
- Don't come any closer.
- It's okay John, it's okay.
- Rabbi, Rabbi .
- His disease.
- Please. Please. Please don't turn away from me.
- I won't.
- Lord. If you are willing, you can make me clean. Only if you want to I submit to you. My sister, she was a servant at the wedding. She told me what you can do. So I know you can heal me if you are willing.
- I am willing. Be cleansed.
- Thank you. Thank you. I knew it. I knew it. I knew it. What can I ever do?
- Do not say anything to anyone.
- You don't seek your honor?
- Please just do me this one thing.
- But what would that be for?
- Go, show yourself to the priest. Let them inspect you and see that you are cleansed. Make the proper offering in the temple as Moses commanded. And go on your way. Where is an extra tunic? Just one of you, just one of you. That's enough.
- And so it's with that, I'm very honored to welcome to All Heart, Mr. Dallas Jenkins. How are you?
- Wow, thank you. That was quite an introduction. I really appreciate that, it means a lot. And yeah, I can tell you, my heart has been softened in doing this project. The story behind how this project has happened has changed my life as much as the content of the show itself. And I think it's been the process of making a show about Jesus and how he changes lives has matched what's been going on behind the scenes as well. So really appreciate you having me on.
- Yeah, it's an honor. And you know, I wanna get into The Chosen, but you know, Dallas, what I've read, you attended Northwestern Medical and Liberal Arts College in Roseville. When you were 25 years old you produced Hometown Legend. And later you won a award at a film festival for a small film called Midnight Clear with Alec Baldwin's little brother, Stephen Baldwin, who I used to love on that... I can't remember the show from the 80s. He was in this cowboy show about the Pony Express.
- I think it was Young Guns. It was like a young gun style show. What was it like working with Stephen? Oh, well Stephen's great. I mean, he's crazy, but I don't say that in a negative way. But no, he was great, and he was one of the first actors who I worked with. I did a short film. I mean, it was called Midnight Clear based on one of my dad's short stories. My dad's a well known author. Stephen had just become a believer probably a couple years before. And we got connected through some mutual friends. And so he was just really passionate about doing projects that reflected his faith. And so that was the first one. So, this is a side note from what we're talking about, but both Stephen Baldwin and Kevin Sorbo have been some of the most common actors and most famous actors in the Christian film space. And I am proud to say, either I should say I'm proud to say or I should apologize, but both of those actors, their first faith-based films they ever did were mine. Yeah, so Kevin Sorbo, he did a movie with me called "What If," back in 2010. And that was his first faith-based film. And he's since done a dozen. And Stephen Baldwin, his first faith-based film was Midnight Clear with me. And then he's also since down a dozen.
- Yeah.
- So like I said, I either can say, "You're Welcome," or "I'm sorry," depending on how you look at it. But yeah, it was, it was great.
- Well, you mentioned your dad there for a minute and your father wrote the series Left behind. So Kirk Cameron, we can thank him for Kirk Cameron's read. Well, the movies were different. We didn't have anything to do with the movies. But yeah, the Left Behind Project was I think the last time that we've seen something that took over, I think, the faith-based media world like it did. And I'm actually in my dad's office right now. I'm in Colorado visiting for two weeks. We just needed to get away from Illinois for a little bit during this whole quarantine. And so I'm in my dad's office. It's why you see that Cubs memorabilia behind me. He and I are both massive baseball fans and Cubs fans. So, but yeah, that's where my dad is probably right now, about 20 yards away in his other office.
- Yeah, it's tough not having baseball season. My wife is from Cleveland. So we always go to the tribe games when we're up there and not having that right now is really strange in this country.
- Have the Indians and Cubs played at all much in the last few years? I don't know, I'm just getting my batteries going.
- They'll play once or twice a year, just a game or so, but they're in the different brackets.
- Yeah, I just didn't know if there in the last four years or so, if the Cubs have broken your hearts at all.
- We have to deal with the White Sox is what, so. I wanna ask a personal question. If I hadn't met you and I met your wife, and I asked her, "Who is Dallas Jenkins? "What is his heart? "What is it that makes him tick?" What would she say?
- Wow, that is a great question. And one that I haven't explicitly been asked before. So congratulations. But I know my wife and I have been in this journey together in the last three years. The Chosen journey has been extraordinary for the two of us. And she's as much a part of The Chosen as I am in many ways. So I think she would say honestly, that I come from a broken heart. And I mean that, I don't mean that in a sad way. I mean that in the best way, which is she and I both were broken back in 2017 more than we ever had been before. And so the last three years have been a journey of humility. I really am motivated now more than ever before, by a desire to do right by what God wants for me. And I don't think she would have said that five years ago. I think she would have said, "Yes, he loves God and he loves Jesus. "He wants to serve the Lord in his career." But if she was honest or if this wasn't public, she might say, "He's also motivated a little bit by narcissism, "by a desire to be liked, to be approved, "to make it in Hollywood," for example. I mean, that was a big goal of mine was I really wanted to... I mean, my goal for 20 years was to win an Academy award. I watched every Academy award ceremony imagining myself up there. So I think she would have, if she was expanding on her answer, she would've have acknowledged that I was motivated by some of my own personality desires, you know, to be approved and to be liked.
- Sure.
- But she wouldn't say that now. She would say, and I would say, that I am motivated by just to make sure that that day, that I am desiring to make sure that I'm giving to the Lord what he wants from me.
- I think we all, as artists, can relate to that because we want to be on that stage accepting some type of award, because it basically seems to say, "Okay, your colleagues now accept you," you know, publicly embrace you, you know. Coming from Utah, I never thought I'd end up with a Dove Award right here. I mean, I grew up Latter Day Saint. I consider myself a strong Christian, and yet I don't think without those drives, we're not able to truly get to where God needs to take us. But, I wanna know what was it that broke you to the point where you're going, "Well, and now I'm gonna create this series "that's going to generate $10 million in crowdfunding," which has never happened before. And you're gonna bring together different denominations within the Christian community. People that completely disagree on dogma, and yet find so much, everything in common because of Christ. What was it that broke you?
- Well, yeah, I'll answer that in just one moment. What's funny is you skipped a few steps when you said, what was it that broke me? And then what was it that made me think I'm gonna create a show that's gonna break the crowdfunding record and bring... All of those things, each of those elements--
- I didn't do Well in algebra, so I --
- Yeah well all of those things, none of them happened all at once and certainly none of them were my expectations. So I'll explain in a second, 'cause I think it'll really drive to the heart of your question. So what broke me was I actually had an experience a couple years ago where I got the opportunity to make it in Hollywood. I had been doing films and short films and TV films and whatnot for about 15, 16 years. And it had various degrees of success, but I hadn't really made it in Hollywood. Most of the financing for my projects had come privately and projects were pretty small and I hadn't really gotten to that next level. But I got an opportunity in 2016 or so to do a movie with some of the biggest producers in Hollywood. Blumhouse Entertainment, Blumhouse Productions is one of the biggest, most successful production companies in Hollywood. They do primarily horror films. So any of the most successful horror films of the last 10 years are most likely from Blumhouse. Whether it's Get Out, Us, Sinister, you know, Paranormal Activity, these guys are huge and they were interested in faith-based films, and long story short, they wanted to work with me. They had heard about, they had seen a short film that I had done. We had a mutual friend who they trusted. And so they, along with WWE, yes, the wrestling company, World Wrestling Entertainment, which has a film division and is pretty successful, they put up all the money for the project. And so I was currently at the time working out of, I had a job at a church in Elgin, Illinois, a mega church that had hired me to make films. I had been doing it in Hollywood for 10 years, but then I moved back to Chicago area to do it within the confines of this church. And they had the resources to do it. So very long story short, a horror film company and a wrestling company, and a church in Elgin, Illinois, all combined to make a feature film called "The Resurrection of Gavin Stone," which was set in a church. It had a strong gospel message. The cool thing was I didn't have to sacrifice any of the message. These guys genuinely wanted to make a truly faith-based film. Walden Media saw the film and got involved, Universal Studios. Well we had some major players who all loved the film and wanted to, and they not only loved the film, but the film had tested higher than any film they had ever done before. So they did screen tests like in Orange County and got feedback from the audience and it was just off the charts. And so they wanted to do multiple movies with me. So I was a director with a very bright future. The next 10 years of my life were kind of set. They wanted to do multiple faith-based films with me. And I had made it in Hollywood for all intents and purposes. And then the movie came out. The movie was released in theaters and it was a total bomb at the box office. I mean, within two hours we could tell from the numbers that it was going to fall short of even their lowest projections.
- Why?
- And, and so with that, I'm sorry?
- Why?
- Well.
- It made a bomb?
- I mean, who knows? I mean, but you know, it came out on the day of the, it was January 20th, 2017, which was the day of the inauguration. You know, I think there's lots of reasons why the movie didn't succeed. At the time, you know, all we knew was it was, it was a failure financially. And that these companies that were involved, you know, within a couple hours were like, "Yeah, I guess we don't understand the faith-based market. "I guess we're gonna go back to doing what we do best." And I went from being a director with a very bright future, to a director with no future. And I was home alone with my wife, and we were crying and we were confused because God had been so present in the events leading up to that. You know, the connection with Blumhouse and WWE and the project itself had so many wonderful God moments. And yet now here we were, and it was all taken away. And it was so confusing. And so we were praying and crying and not sure what the heck had just happened. And God laid on my wife's heart very powerfully, as clearly as though it was audible, two things. One was the story of the feeding of the 5,000, and two was the phrase, "I do impossible math." Now we don't, you know, we don't necessarily hear God's voice audibly. And I think it's very dangerous to claim that God's spoken to you. I think we're very careful about that. But we did know that that was impressed on her heart very powerfully.
- Yeah.
- So we went and we read the story of the feeding of the 5,000. We've heard it hundreds of times. And we noticed a couple things that we hadn't really noticed before, which was really interesting. Number one was, that Jesus was actually responsible for the hunger that led to that miracle.
- Um hm.
- So it was his fault, when you think about it, that they were so hungry. So the disciples come to him and they say, "Jesus, you know, these people are hungry. "We need to send them home for food. "You've been talking for three days and they're hungry." And he knew it, it didn't surprise him. He actually said, "Oh no, we can't send them home. "They'll faint along the way. "That's how hungry they are." So this was not a surprise to him. And in many ways, whether it, depending on your theology, you could use the term, he caused it, or he allowed it. But either way, he was responsible for the hunger. And then the second thing we noticed was just how much he involved the disciples in the miracle, meaning he went and had them go find the food. And so when they found the five loaves and two fishes, and then he multiplied it, he had them go distribute the food. He could have waved his hand and could have caused this food to magically appear in the laps of everyone there. But he still involved them. So we just thought that was interesting. Along with the phrase, "I do impossible math," what we thought God was telling us was a miracle's coming, and he's about to turn these numbers around, the box office numbers were gonna magically be restored, and we were going to teach these godless, you know, agnostics in Hollywood a lesson about how God works. Well, that didn't happen. And so we just didn't know what God was trying to tell us in this story and in this confusing time. But that night at four o'clock in the morning I was up and I was doing what I'm sure you've done and what a lot of listeners have done, which is, especially if you're an artist or if you're a leader of some kind or a CEO, when something goes wrong, or when you do something that doesn't work, you analyze it, you figure out what did you do wrong? I mean, the first thing you asked me when I told you that the film had failed, you said why? Because that's what entrepreneurs tend to do, and that's what artists tend to do is we try to figure out, all right, where did we go wrong? And I was writing a 15 page memo about all the things that I had done wrong, 'cause I think any good artist and any good leader was going to be self critical.
- Sure.
- I was willing to accept my own fault in this. But I was analyzing it. And a message comes up on my computer screen from Facebook, from someone I've never met, just a Facebook friend of mine, and we've talked maybe once a year. And it didn't say hi, it didn't say hello, didn't say heard about your movie. All he said was, "Remember, "your job is not to feed the 5,000. "It's only to provide the loaves and fish." And I honestly thought for a second that maybe my computer had been recording what my wife and I had been talking about that day. It was so bizarre that he would say that to me when that had been on our heart and mind for all day long. And so I said, "Well, why are you up "at four in the morning?" And he says, "Well, I'm in Romania. "I'm on a different time zone." I said, "Before I respond to you, may I ask, "why did you just tell me that?" And he said, "Oh, that wasn't me. "God just told me to tell you that." And that moment, which I've gone over thousands of times, that changed my life in many ways. But number one was, it did confirm that God was involved in this process. He wasn't unaware of where this was going. He brought me to this place for a reason. He was responsible or allowed the hunger that I was left with after this failure. I needed a miracle and God was not out of that process of getting me to that place. In fact, I firmly believe he brought me there on purpose. But then also, that notion that I mentioned just earlier about how he did involve the disciples in this miracle. So I didn't know what was coming next, but I did know that I was supposed to be part of not focusing on the feeding of the 5,000. Whether or not God used my loaves and fish that I brought is not up to me. He chose not to multiply the loaves and fish that I'd brought for The Resurrection of Gavin Stone. But that's not my responsibility. My responsibility is to make sure that the loaves and fish that I do bring are as good and healthy as they can be so that if they are multiplied, that they're effective, and that God uses them in the best way possible. Now that is what caused me to be open-minded to the notion of doing a short film about the birth of Christ from the perspective of the shepherds, which was done for my church's Christmas Eve service. That was a small loaf and a small fish that I just knew was what I was supposed to do next. So I did it just for my church's Christmas Eve service. There was no other meaning behind it. It was done on my friend's farm in Marengo, Illinois. And while I was doing it, I had started to have this idea of a show, of a multi-season show about the life of Christ, but I didn't know where it was gonna lead. I wasn't a popular person in Hollywood at the moment. My last film had been a failure. So when VidAngel, a streaming service, saw my short film, and heard my idea for a show, and flipped out and said they were excited to do this. And they said, "We wanna put everything behind this," I was extremely excited But then when they said, "We wanna raise the money through crowdfunding," I got depressed, because crowdfunding rarely works. It's usually for small projects, and the all time crowd funding record in film and media was 5.7 million from projects that had major audiences behind them. And I was starting from scratch.
- Why is that so unusual in the film business to do any source of funding that way publicly versus privately?
- Well I would say because it usually doesn't work. I mean, when you're asking a group of people to put money towards something that's not even done yet, hasn't even started yet, you know, if you're an audience member, if you're at home and you're watching stuff on Netflix, or you're going to the movie theater, and you're paying money, you've seen the trailer, you know who the actors who are in it, you're excited to see it, and then you pay money. And a lotta times it doesn't turn out to be that good. So, customers tend to be pretty careful with where they're gonna put their money because they're so often wasted. You know, the money is so often wasted. So, you get a guy like Dallas Jenkins, who you don't know much about. Maybe you've seen a couple of his films, maybe not, most likely not 'cause I wasn't usually successful. And I'm telling you, "Hey, I haven't made the movie yet. "I haven't even written the script yet. "But I want you to put money towards my project." It's really hard to do so, and there's really no motivation for the audience member to do it. They're usually, they're gonna say, "Well, let me wait until I see it." Now, projects that have big audience bases already. So like the all time crowdfunding record had been held by Mystery Science Theater 3000, and then another show that I'm blanking on the name of it. They had big crowds already who were fans of theirs. And they wanted to do a movie based on their show, or they wanted to do a followup project. Well, their fans are so eager to see what's next from them that they're willing to put money towards it. But when you're starting from scratch, it's a whole different ballgame. So, I didn't think that the project would work because of that. Now, VidAngel did have an audience base that loved what they did. And I wanted to correct. One thing you said is, you mentioned that they did filtering. They don't actually do the filtering themselves. They allow the viewers at home to do the filtering. They just provide the software, which is really cool. Because that's one of the things that I said to VidAngel when they first connected with me is I'm like, "Well, I'm not a fan of filtering. And as a director, I don't like, and even though I'm a believer, and even though I like family-friendly things, I don't want you messing with my material and cutting out something that I think is important but you think is more family friendly, you need to cut it up. One of the things that they clarified that was really cool was they said, "No, no, we let the audience, when they're watching a show, "we show them, we tell them what's in the project. "If a family doesn't like to hear certain language, "they can do that. "But maybe another family doesn't care about language, "but they care about nudity, "so they're going to cut that out." That's what sold me on the fact that this wasn't as fascist as I thought it was. But all that to say, they were really smart guys. And they said, "We think that this could be crowdfunded." But here's the thing. I didn't think it was an idea that was gonna work. I thought we'd be lucky to raise $800. But loaves and fishes, man. It's not my job anymore to worry about the feeding of the 5,000. I'm just gonna provide my loaves and fish. And in this case, it was a short film that I did. And they said, "We're gonna put this out on social media "and ask people if they want to invest." And this was the other difference in this thing, was it wasn't a donation, it was actually an investment. And the minimum was a hundred dollars. So now you're really asking a lotta people, a lot of people to invest in something like this. And I thought, "You know what? "We'll see, you now, we'll see what happens." And again, as God was wanting to do, and that's when this whole notion of impossible math came into be.
- Right.
- Was when we ended up raising $10 million from 19,000 people around the world, based on a short film from my church's Christmas Eve service, when that number hit and we broke that record and my wife was sitting there with me, we were looking at the computer and she literally looked at me with tears in her eyes. And she said, "I do impossible math." Like it hit her in that moment, what that meant. It was as clear as the first time God gave her that phrase. It was like, "This is what I was talking about. "And this is the plan that I had for you." And this was a plan that I never would have done myself. So, that's why, when you asked me what led you to do a show about Jesus that's gonna break the crowdfunding record. And we're not even at the point where we're at now in our story, which, as you and I speak, how much has happened just even in the last couple of months, that's been impossible. None of this I had in my mind. I literally got on the day-by-day, like, "I'm just gonna do what's in front of me." And when you get to that point in your life, especially as an artist where you're genuinely only focused on what you're doing that day, and you're not worried about the audience, you're not worried about whether or not it's gonna be successful. You know, obviously as a provider for your home, you want to make money. But at the same time, you're just like, listen, the feeding of the 5,000 is not up to me. It's not necessarily the best business practice. If I was speaking at a conference and I came up to the audience and said, "Yeah, where you're at in five years "is none of your business. "And it's not your job to worry about the results." I wouldn't probably be considered a popular speaker at a business conference. But all I can tell you is spiritually speaking, I think it's a great place to be. And in our case, it's been the best place to be business wise, because if you tried to predict or tried to plan out what's happened with The Chosen over the last year and a half, it would have been silly because it didn't exist. There was no outline for what's gone on. So I've given a really, really long answer to your question. So I apologize. But that's kind of the backdrop of where we've been.
- So now before we go into the heart of The Chosen, obviously when we talk about a biblical film, a biblical series, people tend to think of Mel Gibson's Passion, or Mark Burnett's AD, or the Bible Series, what is it? And obviously, you know, The Passion of the Christ, they never thought that would make what it made. And that's proof right there that people are hungry for the fish and the loaves. What is it that makes it stand out? And why has it become this sensation? It's like a stone cut out of the mountain, as Daniel talks about, that's rolling forth, and it's gonna get bigger and bigger and bigger.
- Yeah, it's been extraordinary. I think that The Passion of the Christ is probably the last Jesus project that united as many people as it did, both Catholics and evangelicals. But when I've talked to some of my LDS friends, they said, yeah, The passion of the Christ was too bloody for the LDS crowd. You know, the LDS crowd and their depictions of Christ tend to be much more reverent and heavenly, you know, there's usually light beaming out of his head and whatnot.
- That's Hallmark.
- Yeah. I've genuinely, with this show, am focused solely on the stories of Christ and his followers. And yes, I've done a lot of scenes and dialogue that's not from the Bible. It's from history or from artistic imagination. But it comes from a genuine love of scripture and a genuine love of the gospels. And I'm not bringing in all of those theological differences, most of which came after Jesus was on earth. So when you look at the divide between the LDS crowd, and the Catholic crowd, and the evangelical crowd, messianic Jewish crowd, orthodox, whatever it is, most of those theological differences, and most of those arguments came, they took place after Jesus was here. When you really focus on the stories of Christ, and when you focus on the stories of the gospels, there's a lot more agreement than maybe we would've thought. And I've been pleasantly shocked and thrilled by how much, when you go to The Chosen Fan Club on Facebook, you get Catholics, LDS, evangelicals, messianic Jews, orthodox, all those people who all, they come there with this immense love for the show and this immense love for the portrayal. Of course, then of course, some arguments end up ensuing because people can't help it. But for the most part, we're finding these barriers are breaking down. And I think that's a Testament to Jesus, and the fact that I am, I'm not going to... I'm not gonna brag about my skills as a filmmaker, but I will brag on what I've been doing more than anything else in the last year and a half, and that's listen. And the reason I feel comfortable bragging about it is because it reflects a tremendous attempt on my part at humility. I'm not a naturally humble person. I think I tend to be more of a, someone who is very confident because I don't like to make decisions or say things unless I've really studied them and I've come to a confident decision. The reason I say that is I've really recognized that for this show's success, I need to step out of the way. And yes, I'm still gonna bring my loaves and fish. And yet Jesus still had the disciples involved in the miracle and he had them do their part. And I'm gonna make the loaves and fishes good and healthy as they can be. But what's happening with this show, the feeding of the 5,000, the breaking down of cultural barriers, the breaking down of religious barriers, the breaking down of age barriers, the fact that so many people are coming together with this show, all I can tell you is that I've been really trying to listen when I'm writing, and really trying my best to make sure that this show is focused solely on the stories of Jesus and not bring my own biases to it. And that's what I think is responsible for it. Because this show is way better than I am. And the affect that it's having on people is way better than anything I could ever do. There's no amount of success this show could have that would ever lead me to believe that I'm responsible for it. So, God is doing something special. When people watch it, they sit, they tend to say the same thing. They say, "I can't explain it, "but my heart was just like wrecked, "but in the best way possible. "And the Holy spirit spoke to me." That's not me. That's not Dallas Jenkins. I didn't write something going, "What I really wanna do is make sure "that anyone who watches this, "their heart is broken down by the Holy spirit." I'm not responsible for that. So, all I know is I'm gonna continue to do my best to listen. And I think if I continue to do that, and what's been happening so far in season one where God has been kind of connecting what he wants said to what the viewers are experiencing, and I'm just trying to kinda be a helpful conduit in that, I think that will continue to happen as long as I continue to try to stay out of the way. Does that make sense?
- Yes. Yes, absolutely. Something you've done that I'd never seen in a biblical film or series, the respect that you have for women, the way that you have written the Jesus that I know you have done such a beautiful job, because he was the biggest advocate of women. And without women, we would be nothing. The relationship that he has with his mother. But the way you start with that first episode after the birth episode of Christ, and you immediately bring in Mary Magdalene. And I love that you made it clear that she was the one who was possessed of devils and that she wasn't necessarily some prostitute, really emphasized the truth of who her character was. And then like, you know, in the music world, we create these orchestras and then they crescendo to this big, you know, ending. And that's what you've seen to have done with every episode. It's this slow climb to where we are so drawn into these characters, that all of a sudden, it's like you wave this wand and here's all of a sudden boom, this powerful moment. How would you, I mean you obviously just described that's God, that's the Spirit. For a lotta people that aren't believers, how do you explain what that is, that power?
- Yeah, well, there is for sure some intentionality behind both of the things that you brought up. One is the portrayal of women. And two is this buildup that we're trying to do. I think that's what was lacking in most of, if not all of the Jesus projects that I've seen throughout my life. I've seen almost every Jesus movie and miniseries ever made. And whether you're a believer or not, I think if you're a believer and you watch those Jesus shows or Jesus movies, you're like, "Oh, this is good. "I'm enjoying seeing the scripture put on film."
- Like a Sunday school show.
- Sure. And if you're a nonbeliever, a lotta times it feels out of context. You're like, "Okay, Jesus just healed this person, "but I don't know who that person is. "So I have no emotional connection to it." So it really doesn't have... There are many Jesus movies and miniseries that have had tremendous impact on people. The Jesus Film is more of the most famous. It's been around for 40 years, and it's brought people to God all over the world.
- What the Jesus, has worked with Robert Powell?
- Well, yeah, the Jesus of Nazareth miniseries is another one.
- Yeah.
- Which I did enjoy as a kid. But I think even Christians would acknowledge that they don't feel a tremendous emotional connection to these portrayals because there's no backstory, there's no context. It's just miracle to miracle, Bible verse to Bible verse. So in this show, choosing to make it a multi-season show where we have the time to really dig into their backstories and the context of their lives, that was intentional. That was purposeful to say when we get to these stories in the gospels that are famous, whether it's Mary Magdalene having demons cast out of her, or whether it's the miracle of the fish, or Jesus provides hundreds of fish in Simon's boat when he's been fishing all night and hasn't gotten a single fish. The most famous scene in the Bible, John chapter three, where Jesus is talking to Nicodemus and says, John 3:16, which is the most famous verse in the Bible. All of those moments when they're portrayed out of context, they don't have emotional resonance. But when you've gotten to know Nicodemus and who he was before he met Jesus, and why he was pursuing Jesus and why he may have believed in him, even though all of his other fellow Pharisees did not. When you explore what could have gotten Mary Magdalene to the point of needing seven demons cast out of her, that is devastating. In the Bible it just introduces her and says, "and also Mary Magdalene was following Jesus." She had had just seven demons cast out of her. Well, the Bible wasn't a TV show. It was just trying to show you Jesus's greatest hits to prove his divinity and to prove that he was the son of God,
- Right.
- So with a show, we can explore these things. And so when you get to the moment between Nicodemus and Jesus on the rooftop, talking at night about Jesus being the Son of God, it happens in episode seven of season one. We've had multiple episodes to get to know Nicodemus and all of the circumstances surrounding that meeting.
- It rocked my world. Nicodemus breaks my heart.
- Right.
- Absolutely breaks my heart. The genius in how in one of the first episodes you show them that he's got the... His wife has the perfume myrrh. And I know later on in his life, he's the one that takes the myrrh to the tomb of Christ. And I saw how detailed that was. And I thought, here is a director who is paying attention, not to a script that's been written with the hopes of making something fascinating, but a script that pays attention to the original context. That's refreshing.
- Yeah, and I think that's because we went to the stories of the gospels and then worked our way backwards. So when we chose to make Nicodemus a main character, one of the reasons was, and then I'll get to in just a moment your original question about women 'cause I think that's really key. We see that Nicodemus at the crucifixion and ultimately the burial of Christ, that he provided what seems to be tens of thousands of dollars worth of perfumes and spices for the burial. So you work your way backwards and you go, "All right, what would have led them to do that?" Well, we saw that he shows up in the gospels at the trial of Jesus, and he kind of gives this kind of subtle halfway support of Jesus where he just says, "Let's make sure "we give him a fair trial." but he doesn't, he's certainly not out of the closet as a follower of Christ. And you work your way backwards even more to when he meets Jesus. So he knows Jesus is the Son of God. He's spoken to Jesus face-to-face, and spoken to him directly, and still was not out publicly as a follower of Christ. And I looked at that burial spices and perfumes that he provided. I apologize, by the way, there's a phone ringing in the background. I apologize if you're hearing that. I looked at that as a bit of a guilt offering. I thought he knew who Jesus was and yet didn't publicly follow him until Jesus died.
- Let's take a minute and listen to a scene from The Chosen where Nicodemus finally meets with the Jesus.
- The eastern suns. Many wandering preachers have succeeded in gathering crowds, with their rhetoric and fiery tone.
- I've heard a few of them over the years, myself.
- So you know the type. But I have never heard anyone tell the paralytic to get up and walk. Much less, it actually happened.
- So what is your conclusion?
- I believe you are not acting alone. No one can do these signs you do without having God in him. Only someone has come from God.
- And now as they believe going over in the synagogue.
- I wanted to earn... We were thinking several seasons down the road. So what really good shows, some of the shows that I've loved, they have the ending in mind when they're writing so that they can earn that moment. And so I want that moment when Jesus is on the cross to break the hearts of the viewers in a way that it broke the hearts of those who were there. And to do that, we need to earn that moment and justify why it would be so emotionally resonant. So the things you're seeing in season one are not only set up to make sure that later episodes of season one are powerful, but to make sure that moments in season six, season seven, season eight, are powerful. And so we really do have some intentionality behind that. Now, bringing up specifically women, the gospels don't have a lot about women. Of course during that time women were subjugated in many ways and they were second class citizens, or considered to be second class citizens in many ways. And yet, some of the most powerful moments in the gospels were the result of, or included women at the forefront. So for example, of course, the most famous being, who's the first person Jesus appeared to after he resurrected? It was Mary Magdalene.
- [Paul] Right.
- The birth of Christ came from of course, Mary, Jesus's mother, and the beautiful song that she sang, that she spoke when she heard the news that she was gonna be giving birth to the Son of God. Who did Jesus kind of first announce his messiahship to? It was the woman at the well, a woman that was scorned by society because she'd had multiple husbands. She was out at the well in the middle of the day, the searing heat, by herself, even though most women would come in the morning to get the water from the well. She wasn't welcome among those women. So she came in the middle of the day, in the middle of the worst heat imaginable because she didn't have friends. She was outcast and Jesus chose her to announce that he was in fact, the Messiah. And she was the one who went and told others. So those kinds of moments I think are... I don't think you have to have some sort of agenda, which I've been accused of a few times even though I'm... I've never been accused of having a radical feminist agenda before in my life, but I've been accused of that for this show by a few people because of the fact that I believe I am honoring what was clear in the gospels that Jesus specifically and intentionally chose women for tasks and for moments that you wouldn't otherwise expect. And the reasons who knows, you know, maybe he was like in many other cases, trying to upset the applecart and intentionally change how people viewed women for the same reasons he intentionally changed how people viewed others who were lowly and who were disliked. People like tax collectors, who were the most hated people in the region. And Jesus chose to follow him and be part of his team. I think all of those things are worth exploring in a show like this.
- One of the elements about the women that you created that I think existed was they had no doubt. It was the men who had the flaws and were nervous to go and do what they were asked to do. And yet the way that you wrote in Simon Peter's wife. And we know he was married. It says it very clearly in the scriptures. These were very young men. They were probably teenagers, I believe. And you didn't live too long in those days. And yet he was married. And the way you wrote her, I thought the scene where he was going in to say he is in trouble and you know, he's in debt, and then he's gotta go take off and follow the guy that redeemed him. She was gonna say "What?" And when you watch the season everybody, and you watch that episode, her reaction, it says it all, and we're not going to reveal it 'cause you need to see it. But what she does is the greatest lesson. It is so powerful.
- Yeah, I think that women have a unique... I think women and I've experienced this in my life with my wife and with my mother and all the great women that I know. When a woman hears something, or sees something that is either off or is wonderful, either one, they sometimes have a sixth sense that I think men don't often have.
- That's right.
- And what you see with the Simon's wife in the first few episodes, is she can sense something's off with him. And he's trying to solve problems. He's trying to fix their tax debt, their oppression from the Romans. He's trying to fix it. And she knows that something's off with him and that it's taking him from where he should be with God. And so we used her character as the voice of reason saying, "You know, Simon, "you are not who I married. "You are far from God right now." And so then, like you said, when he goes and his life is radically changed and he's decided to give up everything and follow Jesus, how is she going to react to that? And I have found that women not only have a sixth sense when something's going wrong, but they have a sixth sense about when something's going right. And it's usually not related to what we men sometimes value. And what Simon, I think valued at the moment was safety and security and providing for his family. And he assumed she felt the same way. But she, like my wife and like my mother cared much more about the heart of her husband than she did about whether or not he was coming home with the sizable paycheck. And so, again, like you said, people should see that and they'll see that in the episodes. But again, we wanted to develop a marriage relationship that felt real and felt relatable. And I remember when I was filming some of the scenes between them, there's arguments, there's times where they kiss. And I remember thinking to myself, "Boy, I've never seen a marital argument "in a Jesus show before." And then I realized I've never actually seen a marriage in a Jesus project before. And so you see both Nicodemus and his wife contrasted with the relationship between Simon and his wife.
- Right.
- Two different men and two different women. And I think that's one of the things we were trying to explore in a show like this is to show the different types of people that ended up experiencing and encountering Christ so that the audience can find someone that they identify with as well.
- Well, these characters in this show are very diverse and absolutely incredible in the range of cast members that you've been able to assemble. How did you pull off getting such a unique, talented group of people and what led you to Jonathon Roumie who plays Jesus? 'Cause obviously picking Jesus, the person to play the Son of God, that is challenging. And he looks more middle Eastern than every other Jesus I've ever experienced in any. And I was kind of like, this is different. And then he began talking.
- Yeah, yeah.
- How did you pull off this cast?
- Well, I'll start with Jonathan because he actually came first. I met Jonathan about six years ago when I was casting for a short film about the death of Christ that I was doing for my church's Good Friday service. And we were having trouble finding someone to play Jesus. That's extraordinarily important and challenging. And I was casting for the two thieves on the cross who were the main characters of this short film. Jesus actually doesn't show up until the end. And Jonathan had auditioned for one of the thieves and did a beautiful job. But the people who I was auditioning for Jesus, there was no one who was any good. But I saw something in Jonathan when he auditioned for the thief that I thought, "I wonder if he could pull off the tenderness of Jesus "that's lacking in some of these other portrayals." so I had him audition for Jesus, and within 10 seconds decision was made. And I remember when we were filming that short film, I thought to myself, "This is the best portrayal of Jesus I've ever seen." He combines masculinity with tenderness and gentleness. He combines kind of the human side with what looks divine. Jonathan would be the first to tell you, he's not divine obviously, and he's not Jesus. And he's a sinful flawed man. And in fact, at the time that I met him, he was probably as far away from God, as he'd ever been in his life. Playing this part multiple times over the next couple years with me doing other short films and vignettes started to draw him closer than ever to Jesus and to his Father. So when it came time to cast for the show, that was the easiest decision. Finding the other cast members was challenging primarily because I wasn't looking for stars. I wasn't looking for famous people on any level. Erick Avari who plays Nicodemus was the only one who we cast, who was recognizable. And he was my first choice for Nicodemus. That's it's own story, how he had retired, which I didn't know. He'd retired from the business. And I didn't know that when I sent him the script and a letter. He loved the script so much he wanted to be involved. But anyway, when you're casting and you limit the number of factors, that makes it even more challenging. So when you're casting for a show and you're just like, I'm looking for, you know, someone in their twenties. Well, that's gonna limit you a little bit. But if you don't have an ethnic specificity, then you actually are casting with a wider net. Well we were looking for, sorry, specifically for people who looked middle Eastern, for people with olive skin or dark skin. And so now you're limiting your talent pool even more. And it's hard enough to find great actors, hard enough to find people right for the role, even when your net is wide. But when you're looking for someone between the ages of 18 and 25, specifically an ethnic look. We're not necessarily looking for famous actors. It becomes challenging, and I think we just, you know, I think we just found people who loved the script and who, boy, I mean, it's, you know, I think back on it, it's hard to explain because in each role it was like, there was only one right person for it. You know, we would see 50 people for a particular role, and like 48 of them were clearly not right for the role or weren't very good actors. And that in many ways made the decision easy. But each time it was, I don't know, God would just give us someone that at the last minute who was just amazing. The casting of Mary Magdalen, I mean, she's just miraculous in her portrayal. And we didn't cast her until two weeks before shooting because we couldn't find anyone who could pull that off. But I just, again, I was in that loaves and fishes category, like, it's not my job to worry about this. It'll eventually emerge and it did each time. As the director I sometimes find myself being like a fan boy when I'm watching the scenes or when I'm directing the scenes because the performances are so beautiful.
- Well, we have a couple minutes left. I have to ask. You've brought together a lot of different scholars from different denominations. And one of the things we really appreciated, my wife is Catholic. And for years, we've been concerned that people have believed that Catholics pray to Mary and worship Mary and don't worship Jesus. And so it was interesting. You created this podcast where you're able to tell more people about what's going on behind the scenes. But you have all these different scholars that are diverse, that have come together. How did you assemble these individuals? And do you think that's key of why you've been able to bring in the different denomination groups?
- Yeah, it's interesting. You might be surprised by this answer, but I don't think it was key in connecting the denominations. Because as I said earlier, when it comes to the stories of Christ, there's a lot of agreement already. And I wanna make it clear. And I think this has been clear in the round table discussions that we had. We have a Catholic priest just to answer your question. We have a Catholic priest, a messianic Jewish rabbi, and an evangelical scholar. It sounds like the beginning of a joke, I know. We gathered those three and we have them, I have them read the script. Now I'm an evangelical. I'm not a Catholic, I'm not LDS. I'm not a messianic Jewish person. I'm an evangelical. And we've made it clear that the show is coming from that perspective. But I wanted to know from Father Guffey, who's a Catholic priest that we brought on. We had some mutual friends. I wanted to know if there were any red flags from some of these denominations that I could avoid unnecessarily. Meaning if there's something that I disagree with, with a Catholic. So for example, real quick. In the portrayal of the birth of Christ that I did in the short film, I show Mary experiencing great pain as she's delivering. And there is a segment of the Catholic population that believes that Mary experienced no pain in childbirth.
- Right.
- Because they believed that she was sinless. And I passionately do not believe that. So I portrayed Mary as having pain in childbirth. And if it comes to a point in time in the show where I disagree with some of my Catholic brothers and sisters about this, I'm not going to change something that I feel strongly about just because a Catholic priest or a Catholic friend of mine disagrees. However, what I don't wanna do is offend a large group of people for something that's an extremely minor issue. So I just wanna be aware of any red flags. And I do respect Father Guffey's background and his love of scripture. I think it is important to hear Bible consulting and Bible expertise from people who come at it from slightly different perspectives. So Rabbi Jason who's the messianic Jewish rabbi, is an encyclopedia of Jewish history and Jewish biblical history. And that's of course extraordinarily important for this show. And the show is very much kind of a love letter to the Jewish roots of our faith. But again, I also have an evangelical scholar because I want his perspective as well. So I do think that's probably contributed to avoiding some of the, maybe the little things. Like Father Guffey can say, "You know, this piece right here "is going to upset a few Catholics because of XYZ." And there's been times where I've said, "Yeah, I'm not worried about that." And he said, "Great, that's up to you." And there's been other times where I've thought, "Yeah, I can make that tweak. "It's not that big of a deal. "And there's no reason to distract my Catholic viewers "because of this particular thing." So that's been a beautiful thing to see is how much alignment we do have. And I think also if you watch those round tables, which are available on our app, and some of them are available on our YouTube page, you'll see, I'll ask questions of like Father Guffey and say, "Listen, I've been told that you guys believe this. "Is that accurate?" And sometimes it's not accurate. And I think it's good for people, even if they disagree with another denomination or a faith tradition, to at least be accurate in what they think those people believe. And Mary is the key one, Mary, Jesus's mother. And when I portrayed her in episode five, I wanted to know from Father Guffey. "So, you know, from a Catholic perspective, "you guys think of Mary maybe differently "than evangelicals do. "How did I do?" Not because I need their approval, but because I do think it's good if Catholics and evangelicals can come to the same page. He happened to love episode five, and Catholics have loved our portrayal of Mary, which is a great bonus. When I write I'm not seeking to the approval of the Catholic church.
- Sure.
- But, it's certainly nice if we can come to agreement on this thing and worship the same Jesus.
- Is there any denomination that's more particularly forgiving in the way they've accepted the show? Is that a tricky question? Yes. Yes. And it's a controversial answer I would imagine. But I would say that the LDS community has been the most forgiving, which is interesting because they've also been the most attacked. There are some LDS folks who work in the distribution company, like who work at VidAngel, who've been, you know, more responsible for the distribution of this show to every country in the world than anyone else. So when I've got evangelical or Catholic friends who are like, "Well, wait a minute, "why are you working with people in the LDS community?" Or, "People in the LDS community are heretical" or whatever it is, I like to say two things. One, "You don't know half of what you're talking about." So I'm not gonna get into theological differences.
- We have a great example in Ravi Zacharias who we lost. He spoke, I think four times in the tabernacle. And many people asked him what he was doing in going to Utah. And he said, "I will take the message wherever I'm invited." And I thought that was really beautiful.
- Yeah. I don't get into in this show, nor do I get into outside the show, the theological differences. I'm not LDS, and that's for very specific reasons. I'm not Catholic for very specific reasons. I'm evangelical. But I have found that the LDS community and my LDS brothers and sisters who have been part of this show have been far more accepting of the evangelical approach to this show and when they come into the fan club for example, there's much more attack towards the LDS community then the other way around. There's exceptions, and we've gotten criticism from LDS folks who don't like our portrayal or whatever. And again, I'm certain that there are people listening right now who go, "Well, there's reasons why the LDS community is attacked "and they should be attacked." I'll just say that they know that. And my friends in the LDS community have been so, I don't know what the word is, but resilient. And even some of my people who I'm working with on the show who are LDS have said, "Yeah, yeah, "we know that we're gonna get attacked and that's fine. "And we're used to it." And so I find myself being actually more defensive of them, of my LDS brothers and sisters. Not necessarily theologically. I'm not sitting there going, "No, wait a minute."
- Sure.
- "This is what we believe." They can handle that on their own. That's not my job. And I disagree with the LDS community on many things.
- Sure. But I'm gonna defend my friendship and their contributions to the show, the distribution of the show, especially. And, and also, I just don't find that it's helpful to see in a public forum, people attacking others, that they don't even know, all under the guise of "Well I'm a discernment police. "And I need to make sure you know whenever you're wrong." And I'm like, "How about you do that "in the context of relationship. "That might be the first step in doing this."
- Overall, I mean, you've just come out of the war room working on season two. You've already mentioned season seven and eight, and the big buildup. This obviously is going to be your life's work. Do you expect to do any projects outside of this? Or is this your purpose, your calling? Is this what you feel you've been led to do?
- Yeah, I mean, I think right now, again, when I'm coming from this daily manna perspective, I'm for sure, you know, just trying to concentrate on what's in front of me. But I have other projects that I've been developing for several years, that I've been excited about that may or may not. This is my mother in the background.
- Hi mom,
- I am on the air, mom, just FYI. But I do have other projects that are in development, but I don't know that there's gonna be too many projects that I'm able to actually direct full time because, you know, God willing this show is gonna be lasting seven or eight years, and we're gonna be filming a season per year. And that's a big task. It takes a lot of time, a lot of energy and time away from my family, of course, that I don't like to do. So, there are other projects in the books, but probably not that I will be writing and directing, like I am with The Chosen. This is my life's calling for right now. I feel like I'm more in my wheel house than in anything else that I could do. And so if this is the only thing I do for the next five or six years, I'd be perfectly content with that. But I do have some other ideas and projects that I love that I'm excited about. One of which actually is my dad's Left Behind books, which, you know, have never been portrayed in a way on screen that he's been really thrilled with. And I'd love at some point to maybe do a multi-season show based on Left Behind. That's a gift I'd love to, you know, to see him experience at some point in his life. So, we're actually developing that as well. We're not sure exactly what'll happen, but yeah, there's certainly room for other projects. But more than anything else, I'm only concentrating on what's in front of me for today.
- Well, on behalf of everybody at All Heart, and my family who has enjoyed The Chosen, we're hooked, we're anxious. I think this is one of the best series to come out because it's authentic, it's real. It is all heart. It's lighting the world. It changes you. It's not just something you watch and go, "Oh, that was good." It makes you want to be a better person. So thank you, Dallas, for the work you're doing, for the struggles you're going through on behalf of millions of people who will be changed.
- Well, thank you. That means a lot. And yeah, this project has been a ride that I feel like I'm fortunate to be part of. I love partnering with people like yourself, because again, getting the word out about this show is not just about promoting the show so that the show can be more successful. It is about introducing people to the authentic Jesus in a way that hasn't been done before. And whether you're a believer or a nonbeliever, I'm hoping that you can just enjoy the show and enjoy this experience of being taken back 2000 years ago. So thanks again for having me on and for your part in all of this.
- You're welcome.
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