Eastbound & Down: A Southern Punk on Hollywood Boulevard

"In a lot of ways he's been the guiding light for me," Hill says of Green, whom he would call for advice when he was depressed while working on reality-TV shows in L.A. after film school.

For those familiar with Green's work, it might be hard to believe he has the same cinematic sensibilities as Hill and his posse. Green laughs at this assumption. "We all lived on the same floor of the dorms together," he says. "The first day [Hill] moved in, we became good buddies. We just really have a common sense of humor, and just laugh at things that aren't jokes."

Danny McBride, getting up to "crazy shit" in the second season of Eastbound and Down

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• Jody Hill
• Observe and Report
• David Gordon Green
• Crime Movies
• Arts, Entertainment, and Media

In fact, when Hill's responsibilities to finish Observe and Report became too overwhelming for him to direct episodes of Eastbound last season, it was Green who stepped up and took his place. The process was invigorating for Green.

"They want to make crazy shit," Green says, "and if someone is going to write a check to let them do it, great; if not, they'll figure out another way to get it done. There's a risk in that, but that's the adrenaline. If you're just doing paint-by-numbers Hollywood moviemaking, why deal with the pain in the ass of making a movie?"

Now Hill, McBride and Green will take that crazy-shit mantra into their new production company, Rough House Pictures (they have a first-look deal with Mandate Pictures). Season two of Eastbound will be under their banner, and they're in development on a number of projects, including one for Hill to direct titled L.A.P.I., a dark comedy noir starring McBride as a private detective.

As Hill puts it, how he works — his loyalty to his friends and the freedom to develop bizarre stories — is all part of a plan that has been in place for years. "After The Foot Fist Way came out it was like, 'Oh, this is the new comedy guy,' and that was never my goal," he says. "So then I went and made Observe and Report, kind of to play with people's perceptions. I'm just trying to create a bubble so everything that I do is like Eastbound, where it's just me and my friends and not having to deal with the extra level of people. Just keep everyone out and keep doing solid work."

"Jody has a great punk-rock attitude about authority, about tradition, about the system," Green says. "He does things his way."