There’s a specific flavor to a Steve Conrad show. A little awkward. A little hilarious. A little sad. A little dangerous. Sex, lies, murder, and old smut. That tone is back in full force with “DTF: St. Louis,” the HBO Max series that follows adults who think they’re signing up for an app that's simple and transactional, only to discover that intimacy is never that clean. The ensemble includes Jason Bateman, Linda Cardellini, David Harbour, and Richard Jenkins, and like Conrad’s previous work on “Patriot,” it blends weaponized awkwardness with genuine emotional exposure.
On this episode of Bingeworthy, Mike DeAngelo spoke with Conrad and the cast about where the idea began, how you calibrate a tone that’s funny and unsettling at the same time, and what it’s like to shoot your first scene together at eight in the morning while sitting on Jason Bateman’s face.
For Conrad, the origin point wasn’t a character or a crime, it was the app itself.
“It was the brand name of that make-believe app,” he said. “It opened up everything for me, because only a sucker would believe that that’s all anybody is down for. I mean, life has its surprises, but the idea that you can have an intimate relationship with somebody, shake hands and say, now go on with the rest of my life — unlikely that that is always going to go that way.”
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