Zibby is joined by Georgia Hunter, the author of the extraordinary, propulsive novel WE WERE THE LUCKY ONES, and Thomas Kail, the television director who produced its Hulu adaptation. Georgia shares what it was like to interview her grandmother for an English project and discover that she came from a family of Holocaust survivors. This led her on a nine-year quest spanning four continents to retrace her family’s steps. Then, the conversation turns to Thomas, who touches on his commitment to authenticity and the emotional impact of the series (especially during the early screenings attended by extended family members).

Transcript:

Zibby: Welcome. I have a amazing, double guest episode here with Tommy and Georgia, whose bios I've already read. Welcome to We Were the Lucky Ones. to Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Congratulations. 

Georgia: Thank you. 

Thomas: Thank you.

I'm very happy to be here. 

Zibby: I have not been so immersed in, addicted to, obsessed with a family since learning about yours, Georgia, which I feel like might sound creepy, but after watching the series and reading and everything, I am just over the moon, so interested in, enamored by everything. Okay, I'll stop now, but thank you for this, sharing your story.

Georgia: Not creepy at all. It's, it's, it means a lot to me. So it's, it's, you know, it is interesting to get texts and emails from audience members be like, tell me more exactly about this person. And, uh, you know, you forget sometimes that characters are real people. And then you have these moments where you're like, Oh, yeah, yeah.

Hold on. Let me go ask Felicia's daughter and I'll get an answer for you when I get back to you. 

Zibby: But it's just crazy. Okay, so explain how you came across, just tell the whole story. Start with Georgia. Tell me how you got involved, when you two teamed up, when this became the series. Let's hear. 

Georgia: For sure.

Okay, so the quick, the quick version of, I guess, What sparked this whole project was a high school English assignment. I was 15 years old, asked to go out and interview a relative. I sat down with my grandmother, Caroline, who you meet later on in the series and in the book and I actually have the paper here that I wrote from it.

I found it.

Zibby: Oh my gosh. 

Georgia: Papa's gift. I got an A. 

Zibby: I bet. 

Georgia: He had given me like a bad grade. He'd probably feel so bad. So I sat with my grandmother and that was the first time my grandfather, who's Addie Logan Lehrman plays in the show, had died the year before. And I didn't know anything about his past. So it was in that interview that I discovered that, uh, I was a quarter Jewish that I came from a family of Holocaust survivors.

I learned all about this town in Poland where my grandfather and his siblings grew up. The discovery sparked a lot of questions and a lot of curiosity. And then about five years later, I found myself sitting around a dinner table with my mother and her nine first cousins on my grandfather's side. My mom's Addie's middle child, and they were telling stories about the war, and they were unlike anything I'd ever heard before.

Babies born in Siberia, and false IDs, a disguised circumcision, a mother daughter escape from the ghetto, like, they kept coming, and I remember thinking, How have I never heard these stories before? And someone really needs to write them down. And I was 21. I just graduated from college and I didn't necessarily know at that moment that that would be me, that somebody, but I think that's when the idea was seeded and I couldn't quite shake it.

And eight years later, I set off on a mission to unearth and record the story and I flew around the world. My family is very global. We live on all the far corners of the world. So I knew it would be a big endeavor and I got the permission and support of the family and my husband, Robert, and I started flying around with my little digital voice recorder and collecting interviews and doing a bunch of outside research and then also just traveling in the family's footsteps. It was important for me to go back to Poland. No one ever went back once they left. And, um, I wanted to stand there, you know, where they once stood and see the home and experience it for myself and little by little.

The process took nine years. So it was not a, not a fast project, but the book came out in 2017 and Tommy was involved along the entire process because Tommy and I have known each other for 25 years. So right about when I started doing my research, I met Tommy through my husband again, Robert, they were camp buddies, like literally like 12 and 14, I think.

So I knew Tommy and, um, he was, he was cheering for me, you know, along the way and the research process, and then when the book came out about a year later, he called and said, um, Hey pal, how would you like to partner up and try to bring this story to the screen? And I'll let you talk about that a bit more Tommy, but like that just, I was a little bit nervous about floating it out to, to, to Hollywood and to have it, you know, land in the wrong hands.

But, but to have a dear friend who also happens to be a little bit talented. And, and so. You know, so passionate about what he does and chooses projects from his heart. I just couldn't have found a better partner and it felt like a dream come true. So, so yeah, we partnered up and he introduced me to Erica Lopez and then.

Like Tommy says we push the rock up the hill and here we are. 

Zibby: Oh my gosh amazing. 

Thomas: It's all true. All I can say is once again, Georgia has told the truth. 

Zibby: Well, the most important question, where did you go to sleepaway camp is. 

Thomas: I know for me? Let's be honest a Jewish story starts at a summer camp. So I I grew up in northern Virginia in Alexandria, Virginia and Roberts Georgia's now husband grew up in Richmond And this camp was called Camp Greenbrier and it was not affiliated with the nice old hotel.

It was in this town called Alderson and it was, it was an amazingly important and formative place for me. It was also, you know, rustic and by rustic, I mean, you know, like three people in a platform tent and mess hall and, you know, and all of that. So I started going there in 1988. And I became friends with Robert's older brother and then met Robert a couple years later.

So like in 93 or something like that. And then, uh, George and I were trying to figure it out, but we think we met in 99. So somewhere around 99 when, when she was in college and I was visiting Robert's, uh, I had a chance to meet her there. So, so yeah, that was, that was the genesis of it and as George and I like to say, that's not where most Hollywood stories start, but I, I am proud to wrap up the West Virginia Hills.

Zibby: Amazing. This might be fodder. My kids are like. Kicking and screaming about going to sleepaway camp this summer. So I'll just be like, you never know. I mean, this could be your big movie moment, right, the big scream. 

Thomas: That's right. That's what, that's what we were dreaming about as we were canoeing and trying to fish.

Zibby: Yeah, exactly. I think I'm still recovering from like the poison ivy and you know, like just the missing of the family. I feel like I used, I used to wait for the packages and just like, you know, they would sneak in m and ms and I would just, you know, , 

Thomas: We might have gone to the same camp because. That's precisely what we were waiting for at the mess hall, to please just say my name so I can get a smock.

Zibby: I know, the allure of the package has dimmed a bit since then, but it still always makes me very excited to get one. 

Thomas: Absolutely. 

Zibby: Okay, so when did you realize, Tommy, that this book would be a project for you? 

Thomas: You know, George and I did this book event at a Barnes and Noble in New York City on Valentine's Day of 2017.

And, you know, I had read the book, obviously, leading up to that. And, you know, I was just there to support George in any way that I could, of course. And it really was over those next few months, you know, a big part of the story for me is, you know, I'm always trying to, find something to do that I haven't done that that's quite appealing and and occasionally in our business once you climb the hill they're like, oh, here's a hill that looks just like it.

Do you want to climb it again? And I was like, oh, no, not at all but one of the things that thematically is obviously really present in Georgia's book is it's the story of family and transition. It's a story of sibling love. As George just heard me say, I'm in the middle of two sisters, which I think is an enormously definitive part of my being and essence.

Zibby: And I know, I know Nikki. 

Thomas: And you know, and you know, my sister, um, as, as most people probably in the world do. I'm Nikki's younger brother to more people than I am anything else and so I think that there was something about that at the core, um, that struck me. I myself am from Polish and Russian Jewish immigrants.

This was a chance to through telling Georgia story, investigate my own story. And one of the things that I believe in is if you tell a story with specificity, it transcends and becomes universal. So that's something I've thought about a lot. There's a writer named Donald Margulies who, you know, said that in a talk that I heard in the early 2000s and always stayed with me.

And the other part of the story is Georgia's father. Georgia's father was a wonderful actor and acting teacher and screenwriter and writer and just like I've all around renaissance man. I think you also like build houses and paint. I mean, it was, it was a little embarrassing for the rest of us, but he was really, you know, it was a very impressive human.

And when I was first starting to think about doing this, which was about, you know, my junior or senior year of college. So I didn't start, Becoming interested in making theater until then in a more formal way. And that's when I got to know Georgia and there were many occasions where I would find myself consciously trying to sit next to her dad and just ask questions.

He was one of the first professionals that I knew. And so, so that was very present. And when, when Georgia's father passed, I just felt this confluence. And so I think we figured out that I reached out to her in January of 2018, somewhere around there, maybe January 9th, Georgia, my Swiss cheese brain, uh, serves me and started talking to her about it.

And I didn't, I didn't have a television career or company to speak of at the time. It's not like, uh, you know, I was, I was working on this Fosse project, but it was just something that I thought, Okay. That story and the canvas of the limited series felt like a match and then Erica Lopez, the wonderful Erica Lopez and I had met in 2011 2012 doing a play that she wrote that I directed and I just, I had a hunch I had a feeling that Erica, could be the person for it and could also be the person for Georgia because I knew that that would be a bond that needed to be deep and fast and true. And, and Erica is, is all of those things. And the two of them really just fell for each other immediately after Erica read the book at 23 hours and 57 minutes.

Zibby: Oh my gosh. She timed it. 

Thomas: She says 24 hours, but I think she was rounding up. 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. And did you know that it would be a limited series? Is this, did we ever think it was going to be a movie? And Georgia, did you have a view about it one way or another? Did you ever conceive of it as a play since you have so much experience there as well?

Like, how did, how did the form come? And then also, as you thought about the form, how you picked the moments. I mean, there, there's so many moments in the book that are like specific scenes, like how to pick which ones to translate and which ones to leave out and which ones to maybe fictionalize. 

Thomas: Well, really quickly.

And then sort of G is, um, for me, content dictates form. And so there was something about the spread and the sprawl and the muchness of this family that felt like telling all of the story was the only way in. And so for me, that took it out of the And then when I thought about two hours and 12 minutes, You know, trying to make the feature version of it just felt like what what's going to be compressed and distilled and and left out on.

So there was something about this idea of 50 minutes, eight times, you know, a seven hour film and could you break this into chapters like that? And that was that was the immediate thought. And Erica felt the same way. And then Georgia, you obviously can speak to your initial thoughts. 

Georgia: Yeah. I mean, I don't even, the story has so much breadth, you know, it's like, you know, nine years and four continents and really 12 protagonists.

And so I can't even imagine trying to tell that in the, in the format of a, of a movie. So I think that limited series is just like felt right to all of us. And I just have to say that I was so lucky and again, and that Tommy was, you know, really open and Erica in the beginning just to how involved I was in the project and they said, would you like to be involved every step of the way?

I said, absolutely. I would love to be. And so I sat in the writer's room every day. I think it was like a five hours a day for five months, maybe. And, um, these writers, are phenomenal. So the, the, the practice of the adaptation itself and of which scenes to include, I mean, it was just, first of all, being a writer, you know, you're alone in a room a lot at your computer and type it in.

So to be in a collaborative space like that with some of the brightest minds and, and also just most compassionate humans I have met was incredible for me. And, and I love going through and rewatching the episodes and really they're so so little that we left out. Like, it's amazing how much we were able to include.

I mean, if you read the book, it's what 14 hours or something, you know, so it's like we did have to compress here and there, but we even started the show a year earlier than the book opens. So we really wanted to show Addie at the table with his family. So rather than have that in a memory or retrospect, like, you know, I give so much credit to Erica and to our phenomenal writers, um, for that process and for kind of, you know, choosing what to include here and there, what to fictionalize.

But I will say I was just bowled over by how, how true we stayed to this story. And I think that was always the intention too, right? With Tommy and Erica, we're like, you know, we're not going to try to fictionalize anything that doesn't exist. Doesn't need to be fictionalized, you know, like maybe if we don't have time to tell everything we had to create a bridge to get from one event to the next, it makes sense in the narrative, but nothing was made up, you know, so it was and I felt the same way in, you know, as the granddaughter writing the story, like that responsibility was huge for me.

It was it was half of it was telling the story in a way that honored the family members and that did it justice. And I think that was the refrain throughout the writer's room, as well as every single person who touched the project, uh, from the top down on the call sheet. I mean, it was like the designs, the set design and the costumes and the hair and the makeup.

I mean, I can't tell you how many people came up to me on set over and over again and say, thank you for bringing us this project is the fact that it's a true story and it's your family and you're here means so much to us. This is why we make television and we're going to do everything we can to do it justice.

And that just meant everything.

Zibby: Oh my gosh. Well, I watched the whole thing within a week, which is saying a lot because I always say I like don't have time for anything and I was like, I don't even care what I'm not doing right now. I'm doing this. Like, I guess I came into the sleep piece of the, of life cause I just could not stop.

What was it like when you two watched it? I mean, I'm sure it was different since you were part of the scenes and everything, but did you watch it with your extended family? Like I'm imagining some Hallmark moment where I shouldn't say Hulu moment where, you know, we were all together, you know, watching with the cousins and was there anything like that or?

Georgia: Yeah, there was. We had, Hulu was amazing. They put together so many screenings. I think we had three major screenings before the show even launched. And one of them, of course, we did L. A. in a premiere and it was amazing to be able to watch with the entire cast was incredible because we'd all fallen in love with each other.

They are my second favorite. Second family now just have them all back in the same beautiful room and beautiful space is incredible. But another screening we did was at the U. S. Holocaust Museum, and we actually had an opportunity to donate our quartz family artifacts while we were there. So we had this incredible, where 32 relatives flew in from around the world.

And so just like. France, Israel, Brazil, Switzerland, Columbia, the States, California, Miami, Vermont, you name it. And we all came together with little bits and pieces of the family's past, whether it was a passport, a false ID, my grandfather's snakeskin wallet, a piece of music. And we had a ceremony where we like kind of a private ceremony, just with our, with our family.

Close team and the family and then we all sat and watched the pilot together and that kind of brought it all home for me I mean it was just it's such a beautiful episode and to see the the cousins and the family members with tears coming down their cheeks and then afterwards them meeting they met Logan.

They met Joey and and telling us Again and again, like, thank you. And this is just how we imagined it. You know, I've had cousins of my generation who didn't have a chance to meet their grandparents. That's just how I imagined my grandfather Adam. I feel like I got to know him. I get to meet him now. And so, yeah, it's, it's been quite overwhelming.

I think I'm going to be processing all this for a very long time. But, uh, but they've been so kind. So supportive and, and they're so grateful and, and then, and then after that, they all came to New York and then half of them came to an event in New York and then half of them came to my house and we watched episodes two and three together.

So I actually sat in my living room with Jose watching the scene of his birth in Siberia. 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. 

Georgia: Yeah, it's all pretty mind blowing. It's, it's, it's, it doesn't get any more surreal than that. 

Zibby: I mean, the most surreal is, is the story itself and how unlikely all of it is. I mean, I keep replaying in my head the scene in the field where she has, you know, Felicia goes ahead of her and she gets into the, I'm like, I, how did that happen?

How did she get out of that moment? So it's like all these moments that shouldn't have ended the way they did. And I also feel like in the movie. Like I didn't know what was going to happen, right? You didn't know. So, and I didn't want to like fast forward, you know, to see, so the suspense of it all. And then of course, the parallels to today are terrifying, right?

And people who deny and this and that and, and how you, you captured a time before it got, You know, like, what happens in those, in the, like, the shoulder season of the war, so to speak, and what decisions people make, and to go here and there, and, I don't know, sometimes I feel like, are we in that moment again, and what do we do?

Do you feel like that at all, or how do you feel about the show versus now, and the timing of, of everything? 

Thomas: You know, I, I think. You know, when Georgia set out to write this and investigate this in 2009, and then when the book came out in 2017, you know, one of the things that we talked about, and I, I often think about this, this play, uh, Wit, by Margaret Edson, who wrote one play, she wrote the play, this gorgeous play, and it was about a woman struggling and dying of cancer, ovarian cancer.

And she said, I hope this becomes a period piece. So, you know, when Margaret Hudson wrote that play and wrote about that play, she said, I hope this becomes a relic. It becomes a thing about a time when this was a reality and then it's not a reality. And I think that's what you always hope when you're, when you're writing about a time of, uh, I love this kind of extremity and this and dissension.

And Intimacy and hate. And so we made this as, uh, as a way to to tell this family story and see if it could refract and reflect anything back to the viewer. And then, you know, we finished filming the show in June of 2023. And then the world changed over, you know, those, those next, you know, few months in such a profound way.

But it also felt like, you know, the shows, you know, Design was to honor the book and to honor the intent of the book and tell the the true story of this family and and one of the things that that eric and georgia and the rest of the team and we all spoke about Deeply was that because the family is centered and to center a jewish family in a jewish Experience in a story like this with women at the front.

These are things that have not often been part of this genre and And we never know more than the family So this experience that you had is something that's certainly in the book and it's something that felt as honest as it could be to the people experiencing it. They couldn't see over the wall and couldn't see around the corner.

So there's, there's no 20, 20 hindsight and us reflecting back. There's no trying to wrap something up and with a sort of. A context that is anything different from what the experiences of these people we've invested in and so I you know, I think it's remarkable how Intelligence and thoughtful audiences are and how many stories they can follow.

We actually talked a lot about game of thrones As a as something that would it would leave a character for a whole episode and then come back heavy and we do that as well, you know throughout the course as we're You know through through the experience of making it and so that was the offering, you know, and I think the job of the maker is to, is to offer in that way.

And then the thing that's been enormously meaningful for me, and I know George and Eric and I talked about this a lot, is how many people we hear about, either that we know or that reach out to us, that are watching the show with their kids. They're watching the show with their teenage kids. They're watching the show with 20s in college, whose relationship to this time is being layered by the conversation that comes out of what, what Georgia's book inspired.

Zibby: Yeah, that was actually something that I found particularly poignant because there aren't that many. in depth sort of chronicles of what happens when your kids get just a little bit older, right? And the love that this family had and how close they were, just because your kids are in their twenties. And I mean, I have teenagers and also little kids, but it's not so far away for me at least.

And you don't lose that desire to still protect and congregate and all of it, even though they're older, like you can't. And I felt like this was such a, You know, especially Addie, who just is longing for his family and not knowing for so long what was going on and feeling so adrift because being part of his family meant so, so much to him.

And then to have you here also, I mean, crazy, but I think that time of life is so formative and we're, they're not quite over that, the hump of, you know, it's, it's still matters so much. And I feel like any parent eight kids who are a little older or not can relate to that as well. 

Georgia: Absolutely. I agree. 

Thomas: It is interesting, too.

I was just talking to somebody this week about, you know, who has, you know, a kid in their twenties and they reached out to them about this small thing. And I just said, like, you did it right. Like, there's still, you know, the desire doesn't dissipate. And once you experience that, it makes you both understand and not understand things about your own family.

Like, some things make perfect sense, but some things become more confusing. But there's also just, there's something to this idea, like the simplicity of the story was, can we get back around the dinner table? 

Zibby: Yes. 

Thomas: Can we have dinner together one more time? And, and that, that's what, you know, that's really the frame of this story.

And so when we went out with this pitch. And and everybody said, Thank you. It's beautiful, but it's not for us. We knew that in this was in summer of 2019. We knew that just wasn't the right time. But but at that point, the book had made its way into the world with, you know, with with real impact. So we knew that there was something about the story.

We just need to find the partner. And we repitched effectively the same story about a family trying to have dinner together. But it takes them nine years, six months into the pandemic, 

And Hulu and, and Hulu. Understood in a way that's, you know, interesting the, the context of the world. Then let us all have this universal experience of, of the, the desperation and the longing to, to, for the, for all of the things that we thought would, would just be there.

And that's what's threatened in our story in a different way. And, and obviously we all experienced as we were making this and, and making this coming outta Covid, you know, there, there was something that got circulated the other day. Pictures of us all on set were all masked. You know, I, you know, but, you know, I mean, like there we weren't like making this thing, you know, late 22 into 23, um, in Bucharest, Romania and Spain and, you know, and, and then we could sit together with Georgia's family.

With the Holocaust Museum opening their doors to us and we can all be in the room together experiencing it and there's something about that that community that is, you know, I remember many times as someone who has, you know, spent a lot of time in the performing arts and, you know, live experience. I said, like, I didn't know if it was coming back either.

And then there we were in D. C. together and there we were in L. A. together and New York and, and, and I was with, you know, and I was with Georgia and Eric and like, and I just looked around, it's like, you know, like, this is it. Like there's, there is nothing, like the family said we did it right. The museum opened it's, you know, you know, it's embraced to us.

Like there's, what else is there? 

Zibby: Wow. And Georgia, you know, I'm much more familiar with book marketing at this point in my life. I have, you know, family and film and all that, but, uh, how have you, how have you found marketing the series and having to get the word out about that versus going on book tour and having to do the things to get a book out into the world.

Georgia: It's a good question. I mean, I think the teams at Hulu have been remarkable in their efforts to get it out. Um, I think social media has played a huge part. There are billboards up all over LA in Miami and some other key cities. And that's a really fun to see. I don't know. I, the book, I think gained momentum a little bit slowly.

And I think I think it became a word of mouth book. And so I'm curious. I think we came out with a, with a bang with this show and a lot of people watched it, but I'm getting more and more and more and more watchers reaching out to me now. And I think the word of mouth is happening with the show as well.

And I think that's the best compliment you can ever have is like, if you give someone a book that you really liked, right? Like you should read this. When someone watches a show and says, Hey, you should watch this. Uh, I think you'd love it. So, you know, I, I, We've done we've done quite a few events. There's been the marketing effort from the teams that has been I'm so impressed by everything they who's put together these incredible side by sides with like real footage from family reunions next to footage from the show.

So I think one thing I really appreciate and love with the way they approached how they talk about our show is it was never this like Holocaust thriller, you know, it was Story. Yes. And let's lean into that. And it's what makes it different. And, and I think they've done such a good job and put together the most beautiful material around it.

And to me, that, that's so important that that's the aspect that they're kind of. Promoting and the way the cast talks about it to I mean, they've been doing so many interviews and I don't know where they find time, but they talk about the show in the way in in a way that feels different, I guess, from from other shows to in the way it's touched them in the way it's It's changed their lives.

So and the other thing that I think has been really moving for me is that the like we talked about families watching together. Schools have really embraced so many invitations from schools to come and meet with students. The Beverly Hills High just assumed assigned it to 500 kids, you know, like it's their summer reading.

I'm going to be out there in September to talk about it. And to me, I mean, that was one of my biggest takeaways when I, when it came out was, you You do spend a lot of time imagining, you know, as an author and, and the writers in the room, like what was life like back then? And then you see this cast and again, all the departments bringing it to life in the most detailed way, the specificity that Tommy mentioned, I mean, it's just remarkable.

And you lose sense of history. You're living it right there with them. And I think for kids, especially. You know, whatever the age, like middle school, high school, college, to be able to watch in a way that they can react, relate to this very ordinary family. And they weren't the military family. They weren't the pristine, you know, they, they were a family that I think all of us can relate to.

And there are so many of them that you probably relate to at least one of them, right. Or some part of a dynamic, whether it's a sibling or a parent child, or so I love that schools are embracing it and that Hulu is embracing that new connection as well. So I don't know, Tommy, what would you say about the marketing of it?

Thomas: Well done, Hulu, uh, you know, there's, there's a, there's a couple of things that spark and hearing you say that, Suji, one is, you know, the solowness of the writer on the book tour and how you are bolstered, right? You know, we have a cast of You know, 12 in the main cast. There's, you know, there's Erica by her side there, you know, whenever I can, you know, do anything to advocate for this.

It's such a, it's such a joy. And so there's the kind of the teamness of it, which I think is quite lovely to go and talk about something. I've made a bunch of stuff. I realized. That came from books. I a fair amount of work that I've done and what I've said to the authors, whether Sam Lawson and Fosse or Ron Chernow with Hamilton or David Marinus wrote this book about Insulin Barty that I made a play out of with my friend Eric Simonson with the play that I directed, you know, Cheryl Strayed wrote this book called Tiny Beautiful Things, which really rocked me and I just, I became obsessed with the idea of a community experiencing that together.

And so with, with my friend, Nia, we reached out to Cheryl and made a play out of that. When I said to all of those, you know, those inspirations for these projects was, this is something to be a companion. My hope is whatever we do leads people to the book and they live alongside the book will always be the book and I think that's, that's what, and look, Georgia's book has legs, right?

Like there's, we're still talking about this book came out in 2017, we all know how impossible that is, like it's the unlikeliest of things and the way that Georgia's book, that sort of gift economy of the book, when you, I always say like, you know, the reason musicals run longer than plays, Is when you see a play and it's really good you say oh you should go and see it When you see a musical you say i'm going to take you there 

And so like you have the and so what that means is like there's more tickets So, you know all those things last with the book.

It's the same thing like every book that you know, I buy a book and then I buy it for four people or I give them my copy. You know, there's something about that as it just got into the world. And so the fact that people are continuing to find the show, I mean, you're a really perfect example of that. Like you found this thing, however you found, however many things, I mean, you, you watched this series, which is eight episodes.

I mean, you host a podcast about how you don't have time. You know what I mean? Like, so it's like, that's very meaningful for us. Like, we, everyone that's listening, like, we're all, you know, we all understand that. And so it just, it's, it means so much when people take the time to do it. And there's also, there's barriers to entry.

Everybody says, oh, it's a, it's a. It's a story about that. I know that story or the world is what the world is. Do I really want to go through that? It's a story about a family that does make it through but there is loss, you know, obviously commingled with that It's a story that has romance and love and all the complexity what it means to be young In the midst of this because life continues on even within like this this horror um, so all of that is there and and people are are now someone told me about it and oh like Here I am. Here I am. Here I am. We're, we're seeing that happen. And that's what's so lovely about getting a chance to talk to you about this, just to continue to, to advocate for, you know, for anybody to find Georgia's family. 

Zibby: Oh, well, I'm sorry I came so late to it. I don't know how I missed it. 

Thomas: It's not that late. It wasn't late at all.

Weeks. 

Zibby: Well, no, the show, but the book. I don't know how I missed the book. I, I don't know. Anyway. Here I am. And it was great. And actually, the show kind of scared my dog because of some of the scenes were very loud. She's very, she's very sensitive. So I ended up finishing it like on my phone, like watching it quietly.

Anyway, it was very, very, very meaningful. I can't stop thinking about it still. And I always will. And it just is so important and uplifting and all. All the things that are important in life, right? Love, connection, family, community, tradition, customs, connection in this completely, you know, bifurcated world.

It's just so wonderful. And the two of you and the whole team involved did such a good job. And the book too. I mean, oh my gosh. So thank you for bringing this family, your family to life and bringing them to me and my own, you know, changed the fabric of my life in those ways that that really inspiring productions can do and books and stories.

So thank you both so much. So very much. 

Thomas: Really appreciate it. Thank you so 

Georgia: Thank you so much. We love being with you. Thank you. 

Zibby: Thank you.