Mark Duplass is Trying to Figure Out Why 'Animals' Makes People Crazy

Ever since their lo-fi indie flick The Puffy Chair debuted at Sundance back in 2004, prolific actor/filmmaker brothers Mark and Jay Duplass have enjoyed a largely uninterrupted streak of strong reviews and goodwill from critics and in-the-know audiences. It’s been a blessed decade of positive feedback, which has only made the very polarized reactions to their new animated HBO sitcom Animals all the more astonishing to them.

“Animals is the first time in history that people have gotten angry with us about something we’ve made,” Mark Duplass says, “and it’s been really fascinating to try and figure out what’s happening.”

After seven years of writing, directing, and starring in their own films, the Duplasses have shifted their focus to both making television (they have a live action HBO comedy, Togetherness) and producing the work of young up-and-comers (Duplass says they don’t plan on directing another film any time soon). Animals was created by Phil Matarese and Mike Luciano, two former advertising industry creatives who started making shorts about foul-mouthed street animals in their free time. Success at a New York Television Festival event eventually put them in touch with the Duplasses, who moved them to LA and gave them the resources to make the show.

“The reason it is the way it is, and the reason you haven’t seen anything like it on HBO, is that it wasn’t developed there,” he says. “We made it independently and sold it to them as a fully formed thing. That’s one of the interesting things about this show and how it was able to be made with its weird, spiky edges and strangeness to it. Anytime you have a commodity such as a talking animal show, it’s normally going to be developed to be as broad as possible. And this is one we made independently so we can do it our way.”

This is typical of how the Duplasses operate: Spot talent, develop low-cost projects themselves, then attract networks — including Netflix (where they have a movie deal) and HBO — with fully realized projects that require minimal development. They screened two episodes of Animals — one about a sexually yearning rat, and another about a gender-bending pigeon — at Sundance last year, and HBO snapped it up. The first episode aired last Friday, and the series has a 54 percent “Fresh” rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes — but a 93 percent positive reaction from viewers.

“I do think that it being an HBO show, it coming from the Duplass brothers, there are certain expectations of that might be,” Duplass says, noting that a slacker-stoner comedy about talking animals doesn’t necessarily line up with those expectations. “I think that the most natural place you would imagine a show like Animals would show up is Adult Swim. But I think part of the fun of this for us, and what’s been interesting to watch people respond to it is, ‘Wait, this isn’t an HBO show. Where’s the late-30s relationship ennui? What’s happening here?’”

Reviews of the show make clear just how polarizing it has been, right off the bat. Yahoo TV’s Critic-at-Large Ken Tucker called Animals “barely aninmated” and noted, “I can’t say that I laughed.” Variety’s critic, Maureen Ryan, was harsher still: “It is unfunny, its animation is unexceptional and the studied banality of its dialogue is excruciating.” On the other hand, Entertainment Weekly critic Melissa Maerz raved that “it might be the best Adult Swim cartoon that never aired on Adult Swim” and added that the show “makes the loneliness and exhausting competitiveness of the city feel all too human.”

Part of Animals’ appeal is just how human its animals are, whether they’re dealing with relationship insecurities or racial privilege (Molly Shannon voices a swan who sleeps with a “black swan” (aka a goose) voiced by Adam Scott in the third episode). Maybe scenes featuring pubic lice talking about the spiciness of a man’s blood turn off some critics, but most of the discomfort seems to come from the species of the characters, not necessarily what they’re saying.

“We didn't’ set out to make something so incendiary that you’d have to wash your eyeballs out,” Duplass explains. “And I’m actually kind of a prude. And that’s what’s confusing about some of these hot-headed reactions. To me, it’s a really artsy-craftsy, fun, slightly irreverent, shaggy weirdo show that shows the promise of two young guys who are going to be making great things.”

Regardless of the mixed reviews, Duplass says that they don’t plan on making any huge accommodations for the second season, which is already in development. Meanwhile, the brothers’ other show, Togetherness, debuts its second season next weekend. That half-hour dramedy, which stars Mark alongside frequent collaborators such as Steve Zissis and Melanie Lynsky, was very well-reviewed — though, ironically, just as concerned with the minutiae of life as Animals — and Duplass suggests it should be a more plot-driven experience this time around.

“I would say that we realized that once you’ve laid the kind of track that we’ve laid, which is all the character exposition, how they relate, and the super-subtle interpersonal dynamics of the show, we realized oh my god, this whole machine is built. We don’t have to do any of that stuff anymore, we can literally kick off episode one at a sprint,” Duplass said. “And that was really exciting to us. So if there’s any difference in the product in terms of how we approached it, season 1 was more about slowly building the powder keg and then we put the fuse in in the finale, and season two is about lighting it and letting things explode.”

Animals airs Friday night at 11:30 pm. Togetherness returns on February 21 at 10:30 pm.