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Did you know that Ted Lasso was originally belligerent?
The runaway sensation of a series featuring the American football coach who knew nothing about soccer before he took over a European team was supposed to star a tough, mean man. Then it all changed.
The star of the series, Jason Sudeikis, did not want to play that character as the nation and the world were changing for the worse when Donald Trump ran for president and won in 2016. Instead, he became a lovable, folksy coach.
Sudeikis said the culture that he found himself living in was not what he wanted to support with the new Apple TV series; the growing political tension inspired him to take Ted Lasso in a new direction.
He said what Trump unlocked in people upset him so much that he went to the producers at Warner Brothers Television and told them he preferred to reverse his role because the country was becoming so binary with people no longer listening to each other.
He was also a new parent, and against promoting that kind of behavior to his own family. He said to himself, “I don’t want to add to this, I just didn’t want to portray it.” Lasso became warm and affable, a positive quote machine that viewers came to love at the height of the pandemic. What was needed, he believed.
“Be the change you want to see in the world,” Sudeikis said. “How about, ‘Write the change you want to see in the world.’ Part of this job is wish-fulfillment. Not just playing a character, but what do you want to put out there in the world.” Ted Lasso has won eight television Emmy’s with more to come.
The series, now in its third season, has become a nationwide hit. Sudeikis and some of the cast recently visited the White House that he had lampooned often on Saturday Night Live and retold the story to members of the Biden administration while igniting a discussion regarding mental health in America.
The hugely popular series is hilarious but also a case study on being nice and decent. It began as a sports comedy about an out-of-work coach who got the job through a head-hunter and took over the fictional English Premier League football team, AFC Richmond.
But Lasso has grown into a more ambitious outspoken personality who, he hopes, will resonate with an ever-swelling audience and help change the cynical world we live in. To that end, he taped up a blue and yellow sign in the Richmond locker room that says “BELIEVE!”
Featured image via Apple
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“The runaway sensation of a series…”
Never heard of it.
“…the nation and the world were changing for the worse when Donald Trump ran for president and won in 2016.”
LOL, as opposed to having a vegetable in the WH, starting wars and destroying the economy. I guess that’s change for the better…