SPOILERS WARNING! This post details the first two episodes of David Season 3.
“In a Sea of Lil Dicky Fans, Can Dave Burd Find True Love?”
David Co-creator Jeff Schaffer asked the question while discussing the themes of the FXX series’ third season, which debuted Wednesday. For the past two seasons, the comedy series has featured a fictionalized look at Burd’s exploration of his relationships with himself, as well as with his friends and associates. Now, David will focus on Burd’s relationship with his fans as he embarks on his first tour.
“What does his real music say about his real fans? What does that say about him? And can he change it? Thin? Is he now trapped in this thing he made? Now he is becoming more and more famous. Will he be as famous as he wants to be?” Schaffer versus Deadline. “We’re not doing it as some kind of allegory. He really talks about it, which I find strangely brave and responsible in a strange way.”
Episode 1 only dives into these questions when it comes to Burd meeting a fan. After his half-hearted attempt to win back his ex-girlfriend Ally last season, it’s clear that he’s looking for a deeper connection, only to find that this new woman is more interested in showing off her sexcapades with Lil Dicky in front of her friends bragging than before her. to actually get to know the man behind the persona.
During a tour stop in Texas, he is again fooled by the prospect of true love when, before one of his shows, he meets a woman who claims she doesn’t know him. After chatting in the parking lot, she invites him to a house party, where he eventually finds out the woman made a bet with her friends that she could bed Lil Dicky.
“He rushes towards it with his unbridled enthusiasm. It’s like, ‘Man, nothing is real on this tour. You are here to see Lil Dicky. You won’t find a soul mate,” Schaffer said.
Until then, it was only a matter of time David began to struggle with fame. Burd and Schaffer loved these stories from the moment they started working on Season 1 until the right time to bring them to the big screen.
“There are all these stories that happened to him at the time when he had a certain notoriety that didn’t make sense in season 1 and even season 2 … because TV Dave’s notoriety converges with that of the real Dave [at that time]Schaffer explains.
It takes some skill to wrestle with that storyline in the same episode where Burd tries on a Scroguard for a sexual encounter (“Yes, Dave does have a Scroguard. Yes, that’s the real ad. And yes, it is they’re out of business,” Schaffer confirmed.) But somehow the comedy series manages to have a tone that allows it to be both hilarious and, at times, quite profound.
“Authenticity has been the main star of the show, and he’s often using things he’s taken from real life, but he’s looking at it in new ways while also growing as a person,” Schaffer said, referring to the second episode of Season 3 shown as an example. “You can see the character grow as a person because Dave was willing to look at that event from a different perspective.”
The episode follows Burd and his crew as they film a music video in Philadelphia, mostly at his childhood home. The song tells the story of his best friend and first love, Brittany, who broke his heart as a teenager. Burd’s version of events ends with him being the 33rd wheel at a school dance. He arrives expecting to take Brittany on his date, only to find out that she has left him for another man.
It doesn’t really stop, though, because after Brittany comes to see the production and is tricked into acting herself, she realizes he’s making her the villain. She calls him out and reveals that the couple is real done Date after that prom, although the relationship ended within a month. Brittany finishes the music video and Burd has an epiphany that completely changes his perspective on this romance, prompting him to rewrite the ending of the song.
As it turns out, the writers’ room moment went the same way, according to Schaffer.
“Dave always wanted to do the story about the 33rd wheel and it was a story about how he was basically the victim and the martyr and everyone laughed at him and he felt awful,” he recalls. “And he talked to us about it. And it’s like, “Wait, did you guys go out after that?” It was like that revelation that he wanted to explore in the writer’s room that became the DNA for the script.
But we must not forget who we are dealing with here. This is Dave Burd aka Lil Dicky. The somewhat egocentric and always clumsy rapper who made a career out of his weaknesses. At the end of the day, he’s always ready to be the butt of a good joke, which worked to his advantage as the series progressed, Schaffer said.
He insisted that Season 3 was “probably our funniest season” after a Season 2 filled with tension and fear when Burd hit a creative wall.
“He was just a stress monster,” Schaffer said. “We led everyone down a pretty dark path, which I think paid off a lot in the end, but it’s still a dark path. This is a much more entertaining season. There is no fighting between gangs. They are all in this together and going places they have never been before. Now is the right time for his career, his art and the right time to do it emotionally for our gang.”
Season 3 also features a cast of powerful guest stars, including Usher, Rick Ross, Demi Lovato, Don Cheadle, Machine Gun Kelly, Megan Fox, Killer Mike and Travis Barker.
When asked how exactly they would have convinced someone like Usher to appear on the show, Schaffer pointed to the show’s favorite punchline: Beard himself.
“I think everybody knows when they come because we’ve got two seasons of proof, they know they’re not going to be the one who looks stupid. Dave is more than ready to fill that gap,” he said.
It’s worth remembering that the series was inspired by Burd’s own life. In the end, everything becomes a bit.
Example: Episode 1 was filmed primarily in Piru, California—a small, unincorporated town in the southern part of the state that Schaffer swears has “only four buildings” on Main Street. As they prepared to shoot the episode’s final scene, when a naked Dave jumps a fence and sees the massage parlor where he’s seeking help (and a happy ending), things took an unexpected turn.
“Just before we can shoot, we get ready and a man is stopped by the police. There are four buildings in Piru. He is reserved for us. This is the longest and slowest DUI,” Schaffer said. “We’re waiting. We can’t do anything. You can’t ask the police to just walk through the store. And he’s just sitting there drunk and he’s saying, ‘I must be drunk because it looks like there’s a film crew here .’
Maybe this meeting ends in Season 4.
New episodes of Dave will debut Wednesday on FXX and be available to stream on Hulu the next day.
Source: Deadline
Joseph Fearn is an entertainment and television aficionado who writes for The Fashion Vibes. With a keen eye for what’s hot in the world of TV, Joseph keeps his readers informed about the latest trends and must-see shows.
