Nicolas Cage was adamant about not doing television – until his son sat him down and showed him ‘Breaking Bad’ during COVID: “I saw Bryan Cranston staring at a suitcase for what seemed like minutes. I couldn’t take my eyes off him, and it occurred to me: you can’t do that in movies.”

"I was adamant about not doing television, because I didn’t want to do anything that was too homogenized or that was like everybody else. And my son sat me down during COVID, and he showed me “Breaking Bad.” I began to see that the actors in that show were afforded the luxury of time to tell their story. I saw Bryan Cranston staring at a suitcase for what seemed like minutes. I couldn’t take my eyes off him, and all he was doing was staring at a suitcase, and it occurred to me that you can’t do that in movies: You don’t have the time. I thought, maybe with an eight-hour narrative I can start planting seeds for a character that can bloom into something that I don’t have the luxury of time to do in a movie. That was the main attraction."