Some people know they’re back at work after a long break when the taste of burnt coffee hits their tongue. For others, it’s the ping of the first email alert. In the case of Ozark showrunner Chris Mundy, though, it’s the moment he starts arranging expletives into a sort of expressionistic work of art. “Every time a new season starts and you’re writing Ruth, we’re like, ‘Oh, we’re back in the show because there’s a rhythm of swearing,’ ” Mundy tells Tudum, recalling his six years on the Emmy Award–winning series.
Mundy came up as a journalist, primarily writing and editing culture stories for Rolling Stone. He cut his TV-writing teeth on propulsive dramas like Criminal Minds and Bloodline. But with Ozark, which released its final half season today, he entered rarefied territory — joining the ranks of showrunners behind today’s marquee prestige dramas.
Mundy has a knack for weaving unbearable suspense, stark culture clash and brutal violence into what is, at its core, a fish-out-of-water family drama. But don’t count out the swearing, either. Despite being both literally and figuratively one of the darkest shows on television, Mundy and his world-class cast have also, critically, infused Ozark with sharp wit and big heart — perhaps most evident in Ruth Langmore’s (Julia Garner) dirty mouth.
For Mundy, getting Garner to curse like a sailor has been one of the great joys of making the series. And while he’ll certainly miss it, when asked if he has any plans to spin off Ruth — or any of Ozark’s other characters — he demurs. “I want [these seasons] to feel like a whole, not like they were built to go somewhere else,” he says. “But it’s been the last six years of my life, and it’s been a lot of fun. So doing more inside this world would almost certainly be a blast.”
In time for Ozark’s final half season run, Mundy looks back at some of the highlights of making the series. Here, he talks about casting the Byrde children, killing off Ben, his favorite Ruth insult and more.
From Left: Executive producer Chris Mundy and Jason Bateman as Marty Byrde in Season 2, Episode 1 of Ozark.
Why do you think that audiences are so interested in these shows about people who are scamming or getting rich quickly? There is a lot of that right now. I don’t know if there’s some kind of wish fulfillment built into it or if there’s people wanting to see them get theirs after trying to cheat the system. I mean, I feel like our show was about a family and a marriage on a slippery slope. And so I didn’t think anyone wanted to be the Byrdes in any way. It was about whether or not the Byrdes could extract themselves.
To some extent, the Byrdes are being held hostage this whole time by this cartel. How accountable do you actually hold them for their actions? I mean, they’re responsible for all of it. They got in. But it’s one decision they made. You kind of see it in 108, the flashback episode. It’s borne a little bit out of Wendy’s [Laura Linney] depression, a little bit out of Marty trying to help her, a little bit out of the arrogance of believing they could get away with it. And it’s like you can get away with a crime if you just don’t tell anybody. And that starts to slide at a glacial pace from the beginning.
I think at any point they could have stopped it. You know what I mean? You could take a deal, you could go into witness protection, you could do whatever, you could go to prison. At every stage, there were things they could have done to stop it.
If you could give any Ozark character a spin-off, who would it be? I think Buddy would be an amazing time. I think the young Snells would be a great spin-off. Obviously, you kind of want to know if Jonah is going to turn out to be president someday. Ruth is the obvious character that lives on in peoples’ memory the most, and people would be most curious to follow [her]. So there’s a whole lot, but those are the first ones that spring to mind.
What are your favorite Ruth insults throughout the series? There are so many. I really loved in Season 1 when she told Russ to shut his “fuck-nugget mouth.” It was just a phrase that I’d never heard before. I didn’t write that one. It was awfully good.
And the one that has taken on a life of its own that I really love for a bunch of reasons is when she said, “I don’t know shit about fuck.” Part of it is because I think it’s just funny. But also, I have a really good friend, one of my best friends from home, named Mike Fleming, which is the name of Jonah’s alter ego. And [Mike] used to say, “I don’t know shit about fuck.” So it’s a nod to him, and he’s the fake Jonah. And it’s perfect for Ruth. And it’s become so many memes. So I kind of love that one.
From Left: Executive producer Chris Mundy, Skylar Gaertner as Jonah Byrde, Sofia Hublitz as Charlotte Byrde and director Amanda Marsalis in Season 4, Part 2, Episode 5 of Ozark.
What do you remember of the different kids’ audition tapes? God, Skylar [Gaertner] was so little. Sky turned 18 toward the end of our filming. And it’s like you just watched him change from this little boy. He was so sweet, but also so smart [in his audition]. (He is [that way] in real life.) And I remember that really clearly.
They were pretty easy decisions. We had Sofia [Hublitz] read both Ruth and Charlotte. And I remember in the room it was Jason, me and Alexa Fogel, who is our amazing casting director. And when Sofia finished her audition, Jason was like, “So do you have any plans for the summer?” And she’s like, “Well, I’m supposed to go away.” He’s like, “You might want to not make any plans.” We basically told her she had it in the room.
I hadn’t seen Julia’s work in The Americans when I [auditioned her]. So the first time I ever saw her was on tape, and then in the room. We’d obviously been talking about that character a lot. And that was one of those things where you feel so lucky that you’re watching something that’s better than you imagined it. And then it just opens up a whole world that you can write towards. So I’ll be thankful to Julia forever for lots of reasons, but definitely for that.
Going back to Season 3, I’m curious about the decision to kill off Ben. Was that something that you knew would happen when you introduced the character? Yeah. We knew it the whole time. The first conversation I ever had with Tom Pelphrey, it was great because I could tell him from the start, “Here’s the end. You’re dying in Episode 9.” So it’s not one of those things where someone is in and they’re having fun, and then you have to make the phone call [that they’re getting killed off].
That character was originally going to be introduced in Season 2. We spent about five weeks in the room building a story that was pretty similar to what we ended up doing. And then we realized that the whole show was kind of overstuffed, and it wouldn’t do enough of a service to the Ben story, and it would do a disservice to the other stories we were building. So when we went into Season 3, we knew a lot, [including that he was going] to die.
From Left: Julia Garner as Ruth Langmore and Killer Mike as himself in Season 4, Part 2, Episode 1 of Ozark.
Killer Mike shows up this season. How did he get involved in the series? We approached him. It’s funny. When I was writing that episode, somebody in the room, it wasn’t me, said it’d be cool if [Ruth] ran into — it wasn’t Killer Mike at the time, [it was someone else]. And it was just contextualizing for her this kind of big, deep past that she’s going into.
And Killer Mike is just such a thoughtful human in general. But also, we used a Run The Jewels song at the end of Episode 3 in Season 1, right after Ruth tells her uncles that she’s planning on killing Marty [Jason Bateman]. Even though this is a new song, and she mostly listens to old-school hip-hip, it really helped plant that character and sort of embed hip-hop in the show. And we also used a Run The Jewels song at the end of Season 3 coming on after Helen got shot. So for us, he was already in the show. And we’re all huge fans. So it just seemed like a no-brainer. And then we were just praying he would want to do it. And he was great.
Had you noticed that New York boom-bap hip-hop had actually migrated to the Ozarks, or was that just purely a Ruth character choice? That was purely a Ruth character choice. And I think in her mind it’s because there’s a true authenticity to it, and it’s just legit and it’s [aligned] with her worldview.
From Left: Killer Mike as himself and Julia Garner as Ruth Langmore in Season 4, Part 2, Episode 1 of Ozark.
Was there one song that you guys used that was special for you in particular? There’s so many. In Season 1, Episode 9, Garcia [Joseph Melendez], the guy from the cartel who’s watching them, is driving to the Blue Cat at one point, and he’s playing the song “Jackie Blue.” And it’s a guilty pleasure just because it’s by the Ozark Mountain Daredevils. So it was an inside joke. But it also fits, in that everything in cars, unless someone is listening to their own stuff, is like ’70s AM pop. And we just [use that] because it plays kind of sweet and can cut against things that are darker.
And the other example of it that I really love is when Cade [Trevor Long] gets killed, and he’s listening to Brandy, “You’re a Fine Girl,” and we play that whole song out and then he gets killed. And I really like the way that that plays in there. And I must say that that song is a guilty pleasure. It makes me happy.
From Left: Executive producer Chris Mundy and Julia Garner as Ruth Langmore in Season 4, Part 1, Episode 4 of Ozark.
Someone from Vulture did this piece trying to figure out how much time has actually passed throughout the course of the show. So I was wondering: Do you know how much time has passed? It’s funny. I did see that piece. And we always joke, “I hope no one tries to add up how much time has actually gone by.” And then someone did it, of course. They were pretty right, more or less. There’s always one storyline that needs to be picked up right away and another storyline where you want to push time. And then, of course, people like Skylar who plays Jonah keep growing, and Zeke, the baby, stays a baby for a fair amount. And also, that was part of a product of COVID. We suddenly couldn’t act with babies or small children. So all of a sudden it was like, “Oh, they just need to be wrapped.” We tried to trim babies out of scenes because we couldn’t physically film it.
But I mean, the first season is more or less a summer, and then you get to the second season, and it’s a direct pickup. And you advance them into the school year, and then we’re at the beginning of summer for Season 3 again. So by the time Season 3 is over, it’s the end of the next summer. So we’ve kind of only gone a year. And then Season 4 is a direct pickup because we’re picking up from when Helen died. So by the time we’re all said and done, if you want to be literal, it was about a year and a half. And Jonah aged five years.
