Director Albert Hughes talks bringing ‘The Continental: From the World of John Wick’ to life

Albert Hughes received his start in entertainment directing music videos and films with his brother. The man partially responsible for such movies as Menace II Society, From Hell, and The Book of Eli knows a thing or two about telling compelling stories that feature street level violence.

That experience is put to good use in the crime action mini-series, The Continental: From the World of John Wick. The show serves as a prequel to the popular movie franchise starring Keanu Reeves. It focuses on a younger version of Ian McShane’s character, Winston Scott, and how he formed his partnership with Charon and took over the New York branch of The Continental Hotel.

The Continental: From the World of John Wick recently released the finale. We spoke with executive producer Hughes, who also directed the first and third episodes. He discusses the process of bringing the series and the titular location to life as well as where he would take the show next if given the chance.

AIPT: You started your career directing music videos and films. More recently, you’ve been doing more TV projects such as The Good Lord Bird and of course, The Continental. What aspects do you enjoy directing for a series compared to those other mediums?

Albert Hughes: Well, the other mediums, you only have one go at it, and you have to get it right. You could have reshoots and pickups like most projects have. But when you’re doing a series, whether it’s eight or ten or three, you’re able to double back and learn things from one that you can apply to three. There’s something refreshing by their counterpunching at each other. If there’s something you missed at close up while you’re doing three, you can clean up in two or you can clean up in one. It’s a really freeing experience to see that these things can influence each other in a way.

For instance, we didn’t have the exterior of the hotel built. They told me, “Do you mind waiting until episode two?” That means I have to shoot everything for the exterior in block two. While I’m doing that, the edits are settled for one so I know exactly surgically how to put in. Charlotte Brändström has to do hers for two, and then I also have to do mine for three because they’re rushing me now at this point saying, “We don’t have much time on this set now. Dune 2 is coming in so we have to destroy it next week.”

I have to shoot my exteriors for three as well and I haven’t even started three yet. Stuff like that is actually kind of fun because it influences choices whereas if you’re just doing a two-hour movie, you have to get most of it in the can right away on the initial schedule.

AIPT: It’s safe to say that music plays a significant role in The Continental. I think I’ve heard you say it’s like another character on the show, and how it’s also your nod to your mother highlighting the songs she enjoyed when you were growing up. What’s your process like determining what song to choose and where to place it to optimize your storytelling?

Hughes: Usually it starts out on every project with a playlist. This one had 10 and half hours of music from the time period from every genre including the stuff my mother was introducing to me. Sometimes early, you know that something is going to work for a scene or you think it is so you place it in the script. I would say it’s more than 50/50. I would say editorial it’s 60/40. 60 comes in the edit. 40 comes up front. Because I could be wrong about those needle drops. I’ve been badly wrong about some. You think it’s going to match up. It doesn’t.

Then you have guys like my editor Ron Rosen who is fantastic with irony using something I never would have thought would work on that scene.  He puts something in from the playlist that wasn’t meant to be there. Then you have Kirk Ward, the showrunner, writer, and my partner in crime, who has his own ideas that he adds. It was kind of a group effort with the master playlist, which I haven’t done before. With my brother, it was just me and him and our music supervisor. We usually picked every single track unless one we couldn’t get the rights to, then our music supervisor would come and creatively give us choices.

We also had that on this with Liza Richardson who is our music supervisor. If there was something I couldn’t figure out, “Could you give me choices on this?” and she would give it. It’s an interesting thing to see what doesn’t work and what does work. That’s why it’s good to come up with a really big master playlist. We had it on Spotify at one point. 10 and a half hours of a hundred or something tracks I think, or maybe less.

AIPT: You bookend The Continental by directing the first and last episodes. You mentioned episode two is directed by Charlotte (Brändström). I know you’ve co-directed in the past with your brother, but how is it for you to complement and transition from what Charlotte did previously to lead into the finale? Particularly if you don’t have that rapport say that you have with your brother?

Hughes: In TV for 10 episodes, they bring in several guest directors. In which you would hope for an elevated series is that there is a certain tone and style that you set up in episode one. What I did was come up with a style guide. A very definitive list of the rules. You have the same crew and same DPs so hopefully it works. If they veer off too much in style or tone, you talk them back onto the path. Because I do have to do episode three, I’m very much keeping my eye onto them to make sure it stylistically stays in the same tone.

She’s been around forever and she’s very capable. But it doesn’t matter who you put in that position; they have their thing where their natural instincts take them where they want to go. It’s our job, Kirk Ward’s job and my job as the EP too to keep it all in the same trainline basically, which is not difficult because you have the same crew.

What I do love about it, that is very refreshing, is I get to see what somebody else would do with the same material, and think to myself, “Oh, I wouldn’t have done that but I’m glad I didn’t do that because I think this version of it is better or that choice is better than what I would have done.” I’m happy I didn’t do that episode because I get to recover and respond off of that episode and prepare for three.  

Originally, I was offered all three, and thankfully I didn’t do all three because I don’t think I would have made it. I love the refreshing part of her stepping in and doing that. I can watch the dailies. I can watch live and then I can watch the edit and go okay, here are the adjustments I have to make now for three.

Or I might happen to make adjustments because she would do things like Dutch Tilts. I’m not really into Dutch Tilts anymore. That’s not part of the style guide, but now that she’s done them, let me put a couple in episode one and episode three so the style seems consistent.

AIPT: The Continental is also about the development of the building itself. It’s in the finale that we probably receive the best peek within with its secret passageways and operations room. What’s it like developing and adding to the mythology of an iconic place in pop culture?

Hughes: It’s fun because if you tally the number minutes in all three films and the time you spend inside the Continental, it’s not that much. They weren’t there to explore it where we were. There were three wants from the producers of the film series: explore the mythology or mysteries of the hotel and ground it a bit more in the time period we were in.

With Kirk Ward and the production designers and everybody involved on the team in Budapest, it was quite easy. I won’t say easy in the easy sense but you know what I mean. What are you excited about? What are we excited about? I think the most excitement came in episode three with the control room. And then after that, was that escape pod pulling up. We knew what it was going to be. We talked about it. We saw sketches. But the day we came on set, the crew stopped for 15 minutes because that thing was real working.

We had to lay down train tracks. Real train tracks. That thing didn’t have brakes. There was a guy, the driver hid behind the seat, who had a video tablet that would have to take his foot off the not gas, but the electric gas pedal whatever it was and have to roll in to the shot and hope not to roll off.

But to see that in person was like, wow the power of movie making and production design and props and what they can do along with that control room, we were all stunned in a way. Like little giddy kids. It’s one thing to read it in a script like control room or escape pod, it’s another thing to see these people build it.

AIPT: In the ending, we find the Continental under suspension. There is also still a lot of time from then to when we are reintroduced to Winston in John Wick. It seems there could be more stories to tell in this era. If given the opportunity, what direction would you take Winston and this rag tag group next?

Hughes: It’s something Kirk Ward and I daydream about. Oh, if we had to go past the story, where would we go. Not that we’ve been asked. Not that it’s been discussed. Only us fanboys. Well, based on what happened in episode three, there’s some judgement that needs to be passed down on a few characters obviously. One of them being Winston because he made a very bold move in the very end of episode three that could have ramifications and repercussions as they say.

You’re doing something that is quite dangerous in that world, and how does he survive that. We know he survives it but how does he survive it. Is there a punishment handed down? Do you stay in the late 70s and start to go into the early 80s?

Does absolute power corrupt absolutely? That old expression. You see what it did to Cormac. Does Winston go through the same thing? Does power go to his head? Does he have to learn a hard lesson for the future. There’s a lot of questions just as fanboys that we have and I’m sure that viewers have that could surely be explored. It’s a big world. It’s a big fun world.

Watch the three-night special event The Continental: From the World of John Wick now on Peacock.