Exclusive Interview: Dallas Jenkins Discusses The Chosen's Exciting Future Plans

0:00 Dallas Jenkins, thank you so much for taking the time out of your busiest schedule to talk with me about the great things that are happening with The Chosen. I mean, coming up to the CW, getting everything out there is really powerful. Yeah, thanks so much for having me on. I appreciate it. And you look great, by the way. That's a very nice setup and clothes. I'm feeling a little underdressed for you now. But I like that color though. It's good. Yes. Yes. It is our color. But thanks for that. Yeah, it's really exciting. Seeing the show on the CW last year, they did seasons one through three, and the ratings actually improved as the seasons went on, which was shocking to me. I actually figured the show's available free. It's available on multiple streamers. You know, once people watch an episode, they can go catch up and watch them all anywhere they want. And yet they were faithful to the CW, which is really great to see the Jesus story told in the way we tell it and unabashedly the gospel. And yet to see it on national television is really exciting. And we love our relationship with the CW. It's been great. Yeah, that's wonderful. And I love the fact that people, a new audience that is unaware of The Chosen previously is becoming aware of it. And just seeing everything that God has been using, how God has been using you to get things out about The Chosen. And I love how you have been so purposeful with communicating with

1:30 the audience about everything that has been going on and the continual updates. It has made me feel like I'm a part of this, even though I have contributed in the past. And I can I plan to do that again in the future, too. But like it is so exciting to see that I get to be a part of this just by watching and kind of being a part of whatever initiative you might have at that time. What are some things that you've got that you're excited about that, you know, trying to promote season five and season four with with the CW now? Yeah, I mean, that's the cool thing. And I'm so glad you said it the way you said it is from the beginning, we said we're going to pull back the curtain and you're going to be part of the process. I think that that's I think that that's actually an obligation that we have. It's a privilege for sure. And it makes for a good relationship and it makes for good promotion and all of that. And it's worked out very well for us.

2:24 But I think that we actually have an obligation for two reasons. One, if we're going to say to people, look, this is a free show. But we do survive because of your donations. We have an obligation to to let them know where their money is going and why and what our what our motivations are. That doesn't mean we make decisions based on what the audience wants. And we say that all the time. Like we're not blowing in the wind here. And we're not going to just be people pleasers. And there will maybe times when you don't love everything we do. So we say that up front, because I don't think they'd want us with a Jesus story to be swayed by popular opinion or even unpopular opinion. But two is when when I'm telling the story of Jesus and the Gospels in a way that isn't a verse by verse reenactment, and I am taking artistic liberties. I think you as a viewer have a right to know, especially if you're considering contributing, that I take this seriously and that I'm doing my homework and that I'm wanting to honor God and the character and intentions of Jesus and the Gospels for me to kind of hide behind the the curtain, and not only claim as I do, it's a TV show, it's not the Bible. And I say that all the time. And that's true, but just kind of go, hey, take it for what it is. And you don't need to know anything about me. I think would be a little bit too cheeky and unfair. I think that I think that you have a right to know that I love Jesus love the Bible. Take, take these characters and take the stories very seriously.

3:58 And you need to know what my motivations are, so that you can feel confident that there's not going to be some massive left turn in a future season that's going to completely obliterate everything we've built. Yeah, there's I'm guessing that there's not going to be any surprise endings that you know that are that are that are against what we've been reading for thousands of years. Now, as always, we will surprise you and how we do it. Yes, we will surprise you with the emotional connection into these stories. But no, we're not rewriting. We're not rewriting history by any means. Speaking of the emotional connection, I absolutely love how you have been able to work the deeper character stories behind people like Peter and how he and his wife, Eden, had this miscarriage in chapter and not chapter, but season three, and just everything that led up to that kind of redemption moment in the the walking of the water, the walking on the water at the end. And it was just like, I know you've spoken about you're not going to get caught up in the miracles, you're not going to get caught up in the the CGI and all the things that need to go into that, because you want to always connect to the human element and the story that what are some of the challenges that you've had with keeping focused on the human element? Yeah, you don't want when I talk about the miracles, there's two things that I always want to make sure that we avoid. One is a supernatural CGI VFX driven scene that is so much so heavy in the in the CGI and supernatural that you're

5:35 spending more of your time trying to figure out how we did it. And thinking whether or not it's high quality or not, as opposed to focusing on the spiritual, intellectual, emotional, as you know, human aspects of it. And second is, we don't want a miracle to just mean, this isn't good drama for a miracle just saves the day. Like, you know, just any anytime you have a dramatic problem, there's just a miracle that saves a day, because that's not necessarily how life always works. And also, for the purposes of a TV show, with with character arcs and story arcs, story arcs, you just don't want you know, and then just Jesus fixed everything because he did a miracle. So the challenge is always all right, we've got this great miracle moment. How do we make it human? How do we make it that you care? How do we make it that this actually is related to something that's personal in the show or a storyline that we've been developing? And so we look for we look for, you know, miracles that we think actually can have a real strong human connection with the people that we've developed. So for example, you've got walking on the water. Now we know that for a lot of Peter Simon at the time, that, you know, yes, it's a little bit about faith, clearly, he's willing to walk on the water, and clearly, he's willing to take that step of faith. But what would have made him, you know, desperate, what would have made what would have made him actually start to lose his confidence while he's on the water. And so we work our way backwards. And yes, we, we invent

7:06 some things that weren't necessarily factual. But I do believe they are capital T truthful. And I think that's the challenge, but also the privilege is, what can we do that is going to illustrate a biblical truth, even if it's not a fact from history or scripture. And I think, I think there are people, of course, who would disagree with some of our choices over the years. But I think overall, I feel very proud of and confident that we have accurately captured the character of Jesus in the Gospels and the character of God, even when we weren't factual in some of the stories that we're telling. And by factual, I just mean, you know, we don't know that they happened. And so it's a challenge, but also a privilege. And it's what makes the show unique. It's what, you know, for, so I always tell people, some people who might go, Oh, I didn't agree with that choice. I'm like, that's fine. There are choices you loved that other people didn't agree with. That's going to happen in seven seasons, but directionally, I believe that we are, we are, we are accurately capturing the character of God. Yeah. Now in season four, you had a character die in this, and not just, not just Lazarus, who was raised back up to life, but Ramah and seeing the relationship with Herr and Thomas, and we know that Thomas gets known to be doubting Thomas later on. That's kind of his nickname later on, but I love how you're developing this. And we're, I'm sure we're going to see this come out over a few seasons now of why that's going to be so powerful. And so I appreciate

8:39 the foreshadowing. Thank you so much for that. And I can't wait to see how you continue to tell that part of that story. Yeah. And that's, you brought up, of course, probably one of our top two or three most controversial scenes because it was so shocking and because obviously it's not from scripture and it includes Jesus. And what we're saying about Jesus is risky, although I believe it's true, which is, you know, did he heal everyone? Did he, did he resurrect everyone that he was, you know, that we've, we've had some people who've literally said, you know, Jesus never attended a funeral or Jesus, no one ever died in front of him. And I, you know, I, I obviously disagree with that, but I think that in this storyline, not only did it develop because yes, how are we going to set up the encounter between Jesus and Thomas from the gospels where Thomas says when he's not with Jesus, I need, I need to see it to believe it. Why would he need to see it to believe it when Jesus had predicted what was going to happen. He had told the disciples, I'm going to die and I'm going to rise again. And we forget that, but he actually said that to him. And Thomas had seen miracles.

9:53 Why was Thomas struggling to believe? And then when he did encounter Jesus, that scene, that moment in scripture, which is of course very powerful, what would have led to that? How can we, as, as, as dramatists and as storytellers set it up so that when we get to that point, it really matters and you really care and it's really powerful. And, and this storyline from this season, it was a big part of that. And is it factual? No. Is it capital T truthful? I believe it is. I believe it does reflect our own experience as well that God does not on this side of heaven, make everything bright and rosy and fixed and yield on this side of heaven. He heals our hearts spiritually. But he does not heal us physically all the time and knowing that he can, what happens when he doesn't?

10:47 And I think we explored that in a very intense way. But I think it will, as you said, foreshadow, I think it is going to make some of the Bible stories that we see in later seasons have even more resonance. That's awesome. You know, Dallas, I love the extra features that you're always adding. I mean, I've been following the YouTube channel for years and I actually had the opportunity to interview you, I think between episodes four and five of season one. Yes. So it was, you know, I've been following this for a long time and I actually got to see the shepherd way, way, way back whenever the friend sent that to me saying, you got to check this out. This is, this is coming. And I knew it was going to be big at that point, but you are always putting out this content on the YouTube channel and on the app and you have these round table discussions. And so I love these because it really gives us the opportunity to see kind of inside your mind, but how you're wrestling with making some of these decisions. And it's not just, this is what Dallas thinks, you know, this is what's going to be on the screen, but you actually, you have great people involved with this. Tell me about some of these round table discussions and maybe some things that have actually changed because of that. Yeah. So we always tell people that the best way to experience the chosen is holistically. Meaning you're going to watch the after shows, the round table discussions and, and hopefully read our Bible studies and devotional books. Not everyone's going to do that.

12:13 In fact, the overwhelming majority aren't. And I, I admit that TV shows and movies that I watch, I'm not reading all their ancillary products and I'm not always following them on social media. So I get it. But we do want you to understand that if you have a question, if something is confusing, if you watch the show and then read your Bible and for millions of people are telling us the Bible makes more sense to them now, but we want you to have, you want, we want you to be able to be disciple that if you have these questions, if you have these struggles or confusions that you're going to, that you have, excuse me, that you have a place to go to check it out. The Bible round tables are where we collect our Bible experts, Catholic priests, messianic Jewish rabbi and evangelical scholar who get together. They read our scripts, they read our books together. They read our scripts before every season. They give feedback. They have, you know, red, yellow and green, you know, red means don't do this. I can't put my name on this.

13:09 If you do it, you know, yellow means it's going to cause some questions, but, but, you know, be careful, but we, we, you know, we don't find it blasphemous. And then green is, this is, this is great. We've only had one red the whole time. And that was in season one with Peter fishing on the river. And breaking those rules, our Jewish scholars said that there's just, that just wouldn't happen. Now what we, what we changed to make them okay was we made it a big deal. We made Peter or Simon at the time doing it because his life was at stake. We made his wife and his brother respond to it as though this was an egregious thing. So that made them okay. But otherwise there's multiple yellows of just like, this is a point of contention. Let's talk about it. And we talk about it on the round tables. We debate sometimes. I talk about the things that we got quote unquote wrong, because I want people to know that we take seriously accuracy and truth. And that sometimes for the sake of a TV show, we'll combine locations or we'll, we'll mess with the timeline a little bit.

14:16 We'll cut a few things. We'll add a few things, but directionally, we want to be pointing towards the truth and character and intentions of Jesus and the gospels. And so there are safety net. And, and so the Bible round tables go over really well. They're available in the chosen app, totally free. And people really love them because they really do allow you to get some insight culturally, historically, and yes, biblically, that a TV show as a unifying agent of all of those things can be really cool. It can be a really fun, interesting way into those things that maybe you didn't get, or you couldn't quite follow in school or even in church sometimes, because you couldn't quite picture it. So Bible round tables are where we really go deeper. That's cool. Another thing that I love is the audience interaction and how you've had the, like the feeding of the 5,000.

15:03 And I love on your shirts, the five and the two, the, the lows and the fish is there. And, you know, I'm sure that's available at the, the, the chosen.tv or the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the chosen.tv. Yeah. The chosen gifts.com. I'm a chosen gifts.com. Sorry about that. It's been a little while, but whenever I did the podcast with you a long time ago, it was the chosen.tv anyway. But you did, you have had a lot of people involved with that. Do you have any other scenes that you're planning on getting the fans involved in, in a way like that? Well, in season five, what we just filmed, we had instead of, you know, 4,000 people in one day, we had a few thousand people over the course of three weeks, 600 to 800 a day. Cause we were filming some really big scenes from the, the triumphal entry to the turning of the tables where it was going to take us multiple days to shoot. And we didn't necessarily need 4,000 people, but we needed enough to fill the screen. And we didn't expect people to do it for three weeks, you know? So we brought them out in, in, in, in groups. Now there are a couple of people who did it all three weeks and God bless them. But season, season five for sure has a lot of that. Season six is going to require that again, no doubt, because it's, it's the, the crucifixion season. So when he's going through the streets, when he's on the cross, there were crowds and it just is a really beautiful experience. We had when we were doing the trample entry. I mean,

16:36 I can't tell you how many people, it was hundreds per day who were weeping because they felt like they were part of something really special. And for them, they were acting out what they wish they could do 2000 years ago and worshiping Jesus. Now they know Jonathan's not Jesus, but they get a chance to act out. And for them, it was very real and, and singing Hosanna and, and doing it for 10 hours in a day over and over and over again, they never lost their excitement. I gosh, I get emotional remembering it, but it was, I mean, the actors, the crew, we were all very overwhelmed and emotional because for these people, it was, it was real. It was an opportunity for them to be part of something special. And it's going to pay off in the final version of it because it really is something. Amen. Amen. I can't wait to see all these, all these scenes in the coming seasons, but I would just want to remind everybody right now that on the CW on September 1st is season four is going to be premiering on broadcast TV. They've, they've done seasons one, two, and three, and now they're doing, they're going on with, with a, with season four. And this is exciting because you want to tell your family and your friends that they can tune in even if they haven't downloaded the app and they don't know how to do an app. There's a lot of people that don't know how to do that, but they can tune in because that's what they've been doing for a long time.

17:59 They tune in to the CW to see the chosen on their TV screen on broadcast. Dallas, any closing words before we wrap up today? Yeah, thanks for all that. Yeah. I mean, look up where the CW is in your area. You can Google it. It's easy to find. And then also, even if you've seen the season, it's good to just turn on the TV to that channel, leave it on for a bit or tell friends about it because that kind of stuff does matter in the ratings. And we're not motivated by numbers, but numbers are what allow these networks and streamers to keep the show there and to keep doing more shows like it. And so when they see the success of it, it helps and that makes, it does make a difference. So the ratings help, you know, recording it on your, on your DVR makes a difference and spreading the word. If you, if you have the time or the inclination, when you see the sponsors to even like write a note and say, thanks for sponsoring the chosen. We love it. That kind of stuff makes a difference. Most people don't do it. I admit I rarely do it, but it's, it does make a difference and it encourages more of that. So that's, that's the biggest thing. That's why, why it's good to support these kinds of efforts. When, when, when people outside of our ecosystem take the show and expand it, let's make sure that they're rewarded for it. And if you want to get a great shirt, like Dallas is wearing, go to www.thechosengifts.com. I got it right this time. So, yes sir. Yes. Thank you so much for being here today on charisma. Yeah. Appreciate it.