Hiro Murai Ditches Spy Story in Millennial Drama

“Do you want to kiss me? Not as dogs this time, but for real…” It’s Maya Erskine as Jane, who’s ready to back out of a “no romance” agreement she made with her fake husband, John (Donald Glover), in “Mr. & Mrs. Smith.” But that was before the semi-amateur spies accidentally killed billionaire John Turturro after he subjected them to his dog sex fetish. Now Jane and John forget their platonic vows and go all out, drawing each other against the backdrop of a saccharine TV cartoon blaring madly in the background.

It’s an inventive piece of staging by Hiro Murai, who was nominated for an Emmy for directing the pilot of Prime Video’s “Mr. & Mrs. Smith.” (Murai also received nominations as an executive producer for “Smith” and “The Bear.”)

Speaking from his home in Silver Lake, the USC-educated filmmaker, whose previous collaborations with Glover include “Atlanta” and Childish Gambino’s music video “This Is America,” talks about mastering the sad comedy/funny TV drama to craft a millennial-friendly interpretation of what it means to be a spy in 2024. (He also explains what happens when a spy cat goes rogue.)

“Mr. & Mrs. Smith,” officially a drama, has a lot of comedy. Do you like to mix and match when it comes to tone?

I think the most interesting thing about a TV show is that genres are in between, so I’m very careful about challenging expectations in anything we do. With “Mr. & Mrs. Smith,” the expectation is probably like a Brad Pitt-Angelina Jolie popcorn movie. We were trying to figure out, “How do we take what’s inherently incomprehensible about the spy genre and make it something that’s tenable?” Me, Fran (co-creator Francesca Sloane), Donald, Maya — we’re all the same age, so we have a similar perspective on millennial adulthood and what it’s like to be in a couple our age. In that way, “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” became an exploration of modern intimacy.

Looking at the classic spy genre as NOunderstandable, because…

Because I think the spy genre is a wish fulfillment for highly capable people who are equipped with gadgets and act effortlessly. My experience as an adult is that NO This is a very labor-intensive matter. (Laughter.) The essence of our program became, “OK, you’re dressing up as full-fledged adults, but you’re actually insecure and you’re pretending to be someone you’re not.”

Director Hiro Murai talks to actors Donald Glover and Maya Erskine and a woman with her back to the camera.

How did you set up the visual language for Mr. and Mrs. Smith?

It’s about two lonely strangers forced into marriage and living in this big tenement house, so the image that immediately came to mind was two cats trying to sniff each other out in the same house. I naturally gravitated towards (framing) John and Jane as little characters within this rich, cold space where the only place they can find human connection is with each other. Especially in the pilot, it’s this subtle push and pull of our characters trying to get closer to each other without revealing themselves too much.

“Mr. and Mrs. Smith” have a mission for each episode, but they are there no real villains, no visible boss, no higher cause. Why was this kind of plot omitted?
For me, the most fun part was showing how little John and Jane know about their jobs. Who’s giving them orders? Why? Fran and I talked early on about a Japanese show we like called Terrace House, about people moving into an empty house. We realized that the whole concept of Mr. & Mrs. Smith is like a reality show. John and Jane are randomly chosen; they have no idea why they’re doing what they’re asked to do, they’re probably being watched—there’s something terrifying and absurd about their life situation, so it just seemed right to lean into the paranoia and limit our characters’ understanding of what’s happening to them.

And then there’s the cat “Max” who appears in the first episode and almost will survive until the end. Have you worked with a well-trained cat actor?

(Laughs) It’s never easy because the animals don’t know they’re on a TV show. One time, a cat escaped and ran under our set, so we were basically locked in for an hour while the animal trainer crawled around trying to find him. (Guest stars) Paul Dano and John Turturro were there that day, so we all just sat on the set in the living room, listening to the scratching (sounds) underneath.

How did you feel finishing production on the first season?

It was satisfying because we didn’t know at first what the outcome would be. We knew the people involved were interesting, and we knew the spy genre wanted to be flashy, saying the right thing at the right time. Part of our job was to find the two awkward “norms” in that world and show the awkward reality of the way John and Jane interact, which feels more meandering and less presentational. To see this complicated experiment unfold with trusted collaborators—I feel very happy.