‘Bad Monkey’ Finale: Vince Vaughn and Bill Lawrence on the Death of [SPOILER] and If Season 2 Would Adapt ‘Razor Girl’

Jim Halterman

October 10, 2024 at 9:30 AM·12 min read

SPOILER ALERT: The following interview contains spoilers from “We’re in the Memory-Making Business,” the season finale of “Bad Monkey” now streaming on Apple TV+.

The case is closed on the first season of Apple TV+’s series “Bad Monkey,” the Florida Keys-set comedic crime series based on the Carl Hiaasen novel of the same name. And while more than a few characters didn’t make it out alive (RIP, Dragon Queen! Bummer, Nick! Good riddance, Eve!), the good guys prevailed.

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Among the victors was suspended detective-turned-health inspector Andrew Yancy (Vince Vaughn), who, as he sat looking out at the ocean during the season’s final moments, seemed to have found a sense of peace — even if he was still suspended, and his romance with Dr. Rosa Campesino (Natalie Martinez) didn’t fall into place as he would have liked.

To recap the season finale, executive producer Bill Lawrence and star Vince Vaughn talked to Variety (in separate interviews combined here) about finding the right comedic tone in the series, how much Hiaasen was involved in changes made from his book and whether “Razor Girl” — the book sequel to “Bad Monkey” — is next.

Getting a first season of any show to the finish line is a lot of work. But now that all the “Bad Monkey” episodes have aired, how are you feeling, Bill?

Bill Lawrence: I’m going to make sure I don’t sound cocky. I’ve taken my lumps, had some wins, had some losses. And I’m such a Carl Hiaasen fan. I started reading his books when I was 15, and he made me believe in a lot of ways I could be a storyteller because I wasn’t a guy that read the classics.

So I essentially went to my favorite author and was like, “Can I write like five extra chapters to your book, and do it as a TV show? I know you don’t love Hollywood …” The coolest thing he said was, “Look, my books, there’s so many weird, funky characters — it’s more of a vibe than anything else.” I really thought the ending cemented that vibe, especially when you’re kind of bouncing around to where everybody was. I felt both relieved and hopefully excited if we get to do more.

This isn’t your first television role, Vince, but how did it feel being in Andrew Yancy’s shoes for these 10 episodes?

Vince Vaughn: It was a blast. It’s such a unique piece and has such a fun tone that you don’t see very often. I’ve known Bill for over 25 years. We used to play in a poker game together, and it was more joking and laughing than it was serious poker — but he always made me laugh. As time went on, I got to be a fan of what he was doing, so when he came to me with the Carl Hiaasen book, I was excited. I saw Yancy as that kind of classic trickster on a journey. Despite the obvious odds, he’s not gonna stop. Something’s pulling him and he’s just gonna keep moving forward even though it probably doesn’t feel like the best idea for his own self-interest.

Narrators don’t always work in shows, but this one is an example of when it does. Was that a big talking point to use when shaping the show?

Lawrence: It was a huge talking point, and I’m very grateful that some journalists, like yourself, pointed it out as an asset. Still, people are going to go like, “Why do you need voiceover? Why do you need narration?” The decision behind it was slightly different. You use it normally for exposition, and I would tell you that we probably could have gotten by without it. But when Matt Tarses and I, the other head writer, got done writing the scripts and looking at the cuts, there wasn’t enough of Carl’s stuff in there.

We stole as much of his dialogue as we could, and some of the things that really make me laugh about his books are just the one-line, descriptive things of what’s going on. So [Matt] started to go, “What if it was all supposed to feel like a fishing story, and that local fish captain really is a local guy [played by Tom Nowicki], and he couldn’t believe he was doing this.” We went back through Carl’s book and highlighted our favorites, and just put them in the voiceover. One of the reasons the show works is it feels more like reading one of Carl’s books than it would have otherwise.

Vince, talk about the comedy tone in the show. Did you have a say in that — or did that come from the scripts or the book?

Vaughn: It was innately in the book, and it’s something I really was trying to make sure I was fitting into what Bill was doing as the showrunner, because tone is everything. This is a very fun ride, but not a tone that everyone could pull off where you’re taking the crime serious but also enjoying the characters and saying, “It’s OK to laugh sometimes.” It’s always more enjoyable when you’re not telling the audience, “Don’t be afraid, no one’s going to get hurt.” The edge of knowing that something can happen is valuable, and then being able to laugh and change gears and have it be entertaining is really fun as well.

There were also some finale choices that differed from the book. When you changed some things like Eve (Meredith Hagner) choking on a baby carrot and falling to her death, was that something you talked about with Carl?

Lawrence: He gave me a lot of liberties. Carl’s very matter of fact, and he just kind of killed Nick [Rob Delaney] and Eve [in the book]. I mean, it as an afterthought that she drowned her husband, and then died herself in a boat crash. The coolest thing is in Carl’s books, the intricate plotting doesn’t go to a conclusion that you expect. I told him that I wanted to do some stuff about magic and whether or not you believe in Obeah religion or the spirit of nature, and he kind of dug on that and let me do it.

The biggest change we made in the book is that Carl based the character of the Dragon Queen on a real person who is much older in the book, and very obviously a conwoman from the start. We talked a little bit to him about that. One of the main ways we expanded the novel is that we changed that character that Jodie Turner-Smith plays, and we wanted to do a redemption story for her.

And Eve is such a sociopath — both in the book and in our world — that kind of dying off camera works in a book, but in a movie or TV show, you want to see it, and have that gift. But we had also kind of made a huge arc for our hero learning to let go and not have to his own detriment, bury himself deeper and deeper because he’s chasing justice. So we have to do the story that he lets her go off into the sunset and loses.

I was rooting for Yancy and Rosa (Natalie Martinez) to live happily after, but in the finale she’s not ready for a commitment and leaves. Is Yancy OK with, that given he’s mentioned how people tend to leave him?

Vaughn: We’ve all had those moments of being there for friends or family, and saying the right things and encouraging and sometimes not really focusing on our own self. Then you’re left at the end of it sometimes going, “I’m not really moving ahead as far as I could in certain areas of my life.” That’s what’s kind of interesting is being left with a little more self-awareness than where he started.

Lawrence: In Carl’s book, Rosa’s journey was needing to latch on to this guy that’s not right for her. And at the end she’s like, “Peace out. I’ve got to leave this job and this world and go do my own thing, man.”

Vince, in the finale when you’re in the water holding onto the rope attached to Eve’s runaway yacht, even if there are stunt people for some of that, you were also clearly doing some of that stunt. What’s a day like that for you?

Vaughn: I’m pretty good at that stuff, and I like the physical stuff. You really like to be prepared, but I find it fun to do the different aspects of it. Some of the physical stuff was fun, and then the conversational stuff was fun. I like the variety that the show has.

When we see Yancy reading Richard Russo’s “Nobody’s Fool” novel in the finale, were those character details in Carl’s book or one of your touches?

Lawrence: That was me. And I’m a huge Richard Russo fan. But Bonnie [Michelle Monaghan] having that Richard Russo book was me but Bonnie being somebody that made Yancy begrudgingly read books was Carl. We definitely overlapped on that stuff in a super fun way.

Whether from those books or from his father Jim (Scott Glenn), Yancy’s regularly dropping pearls of wisdom throughout the season. What do you think that says about him?

Vaughn: He has his own personal code of things that come from experience, and his father’s well-versed in life. I think as he’s doing it, he’s evolving. There are areas where he feels wise or has a good point of view, and then there’s other areas where he’s learning. One thing that’s great about him is he does have a sense of justice, of fairness, of what’s right and what’s wrong.

Bill, the fact that Rogelio (John Ortiz) and Monty (Victor Turpin) were partners in work but also in a romantic relationship is something I almost missed in the show. Was that intentional?

Lawrence: You might have missed it just because they were very subtly established as a couple. But there’s a scene in the middle [of the season] that Yancy says to Rogelio, “When you left your wife…” so I think that’s what confuses people. But we added that element because one of the cool things about the Keys, besides being so diverse and eclectic, is it had the first elected out and gay police chief in any city. Matt and I based him on someone we knew that was married and had children and then realized later in life that’s not the life he wanted to live.

There’s a lot of Tom Petty music in the finale. Is that a Bill Lawrence thing or…?

Lawrence: My mom’s whole family lives in central Florida, and my parents live outside Orlando. So not a lot of people know this, but I’m such a Tom Petty guy from my roots from Florida. And being a music nerd, every episode of “Cougar Town” was named after a Tom Petty song. And so when we were trying to think of a distinct music thing for this one to make it feel really Carl Hiaasen and really Florida, we said, “What if we did all Tom Petty songs?” And the first one is Tom Petty, and the rest are covers by bands. I’ve never put out a soundtrack album before, but we’re doing it.

Yancy says in the finale that bad people always get what’s coming to them. Did the bad people truly get taken care of?

Lawrence: I want to believe. And you know this from your connection to Hollywood: I want to believe bad people aren’t happy, man. I want to believe, even if things seem to be going their own way, that deep down inside they aren’t happy. Not only people are like, “Bill, your shows are usually different than Carl’s stuff.” And I go, “Where we overlap is, believe it or not, even though we both see that he sees the underbelly in a lot darker way than I have, we both are fairly optimistic guys that feel like goodness often prevails, and that people get what’s coming to them.” One of the things I’ve always loved about Carl’s books is it’s pretty rare that the villains ride off happy into the sunset.

Vaughn: It’s interesting because, like in a morality tale, there’s definitely consequences to that. And then it’s shadowed by Yancy’s own journey and growth and the recognition of some more self-awareness where he’s concerned, which is not completely complete. He takes a step, I think, in a direction that’s good for him — but it’s not as if everything is all wonderful.

I know there’s at least one other Hiaasen book with Andrew Yancy, “Razor Girl.” Are you up for more if that book is next for a series?

Vaughn: It’s definitely stuff that we’ve talked about participating in. And what I liked is that [“Bad Monkey”] works as a one-off but it could be fun to revisit the character and follow him on the next Carl book.

Lawrence: This is an Easter egg for you. People have asked me if I’m such a Carl Hiaasen fan, what made me pick “Bad Monkey” over “Skinny Dip” or “Tourist Season” or “Native Tongue” books? The reason I picked it is because it’s one of the only books he wrote a sequel to, “Razor Girl.” And Rosa is in it and Yancy is in it and the characters that are still alive are in it.

The trick for me is it’s very hard with a Carl Hiaasen novel to let any streamer know that it’s an ongoing series, because you want to end the mystery. But for me to go. “Yeah, there’s another best-selling book with the same character in the same world — so I’ll just make sure I hint at the end that there’s another adventure to go through.”

This interview has been edited and condensed.

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