Creating The Queen's Gambit

What really struck me about The Queen's Gambit

was that it wasn't at all about chess.

It's not about a game. It's about the cost of genius.

It's a story about how you survive in a world

when you have a very specific gift that makes you harder to understand.

I think she looks to chess as very much an escape.

Although it tells that story

about a child genius working up to a world level,

it's actually still more about her demons.

That's right, I can still… Can I still move another piece?

- No, it's touch-move. -

Scott sent me the book to read before I met him,

and I devoured the book in about an hour.

I fell in love with Beth immediately, and there was a really strong kinship.

This character is, you know, essentially, her own antagonist,

and I was fascinated. I'd never read a character like this.

Somebody who is so brilliant and so self-destructive,

and in a world that she was already kind of not a part of.

-Are you sure you wanna do this? -I'm sure.

We don't have a women's section.

Back in the 1950s, there were very few females turning to chess.

They weren't given the opportunities.

Beth trying to make her way in a male-dominated discipline and world

is something that's quite distinctive and unusual.

Tevis was writing with an understanding of the next century, almost.

It's quite brilliant.

How old are you?

Never mind. Don't answer that. It'll just depress me.

-Mm. I'm 36. -

She's so centered in how intelligent she is

that she doesn't necessarily think of herself as a woman first,

and I do think that there is something to that,

because you're experiencing the '60s through her

in the way that she just automatically assumes that she is equal.

Am I good enough now?

To tell you the truth of it, child…

you're astounding.

Mark-up.

And action!

Almost ten years ago,

Bill Horberg had brought up the book to me as something that I might wanna do.

We briefly flirted with doing it as a feature,

and Allan Scott had written quite a nice script,

and nothing ever came of it.

It was very hard to get a movie like that made at the time.

Then, right after I finished Godless, I had this revelation,

and I said to him,

"What about The Queen's Gambit as a miniseries?"

The overriding interest I've always had is to make it powerfully emotional.

And I think when you extend something,

you get the time to follow all kinds of paths

and all kinds of themes.

What I really wanted to focus on,

and the challenge in turning it into a miniseries, for me,

was making sure that what you're really invested in is her.

Someday, you're gonna be all alone,

so you need to figure out how to take care of yourself.

She's come from a home life, and just a lot in life,

that has left her feeling very unstable.

She doesn't really know where she's going to end up.

What's that game called?

It's called chess.

Will you teach me?

I think Beth's first true connection

is with Mr. Shaibel.

It's with somebody who she feels understands

not only her gift, but how her brain works.

Also, somebody who can tell her "no."

-You have resigned the game. -You didn't tell me that in the rules.

It's not a rule.

It's sportsmanship.

And then I think she's got a wonderful friendship with Jolene,

and that comes from a place of both understanding

that they're very different, and yet, have come from the exact same place.

Most of us are lifers.

Been here a long time.

I would say she's kind of like a mother to Beth,

in her own little way.

They're not adopted for the majority of their lives,

so they kind of do need to depend on each other in that place.

Green's to even your disposition.

Orange and brown's for building a strong body. Take 'em both.

In the early '60s, late '50s, it was very common to give…

children in orphanages tranquilizers

to make them easier to handle.

So, yeah, she becomes addicted to tranquilizers

and sedatives when she's nine.

Well, the trick with addiction, with drinking or drugs or anything,

is making sure that you empathize with the character,

and still tell a compelling story.

Sleight of hand, for me, was humor sometimes.

There's a long sequence where she steals the pills,

and that was as funny as it is harrowing.

Elizabeth!

As she gets older, she forms many addictions.

She discovers alcohol when she's about 15.

It's good.

And consummates that relationship.

Anybody who's dealing with problems of addiction is their own worst enemy.

She keeps self-destructing along the way.

There's a moment when she's been on a particularly tough bender,

and she meets the first person that she ever played,

who's another girl called Annette Packer.

I-- I knew you were going places, and that meant something to me.

That whole exchange was really, really tricky and rough to do,

because I just had to be in this state of "everything is falling apart."

"And you looked up to me, and now I have to carry that shame."

Like, she was just-- She was an angry bird.

I'm worried about you.

What on earth for?

For me, the whole story is organized around that.

Is she gonna lose hold of herself, or is she gonna be able to make it?

"She shows the assurance of a player twice her age."

That's national recognition, dear.

She's also addicted to winning.

She's addicted to feeling like she is in control.

Chess is the one thing she feels like she can control,

that, on that board, she's in charge.

Whenever she's moving those pieces around, she's at home.

I'll win.

I have every confidence.

You do feel for the relationship

that both Mrs. Wheatley and Beth have together.

And Mari played her with deep empathy, and, I think, sympathy.

For the role of Mrs. Wheatley, I had been telling Bill Horberg

that it's someone like Marielle Heller,

and Bill said to me, "Why don't you just cast her?"

And as you can see, she's extraordinary.

Things are beginning to happen.

Beth is very obsessive, full stop.

Like, I think that is just something that is intrinsic to her.

Harry, it'll be check once the pawn moves and the knight trades.

-Can't you see that? -No, I can't.

-I can't find it that fast. -Well, wish you could.

When your brain works that quickly, it can drive you a bit mad.

But I also think that she is aware that her gift makes her special.

Sometimes, people find patterns or meaning where there aren't any.

What does that have to do with me?

Well, creativity and psychosis often go hand in hand.

I do think she's, like, consistently worried that she's a bit crazy.

Beth has visions of seeing a chess board on the ceiling.