This is How ‘Dave’ Got Brad Pitt and Drake For the Season 3 Finale – Armessa Movie News

Editor’s note: The below contains major spoilers for the Season 3 finale of Dave.

The hit FXX comedy Dave is no stranger to pulling in some superstar guests. Even before the show was an established favorite, Dave Burd, aka Lil Dicky, was using his connections and landing major names from the music industry and beyond including Justin Bieber, Charlamagne tha God, Tyler “Ninja” Blevins, Gunna, and Marshmello among others. Season 3 took things to even greater heights, however, as it reached the finale. Collider’s Steve Weintraub spoke with Burd to discuss how he managed to use his magic to pull in all those A-listers to send off the season with a bang.

Before the finale, Burd had plenty to be proud of in terms of his guests. Don Cheadle, Megan Fox, Machine Gun Kelly, Demi Lovato, Usher, Rachel McAdams, Emma Chamberlain, and so many more showed out to be part of Dave’s out of control tour. Then, the finale pulled out Brad Pitt and Drake, one of the biggest stars in Hollywood for years now coming off of Babylon and Bullet Train and a modern rap and R&B icon who stands as one of the most popular artists to ever live. It may boggle the mind of neutral observers as to how major movie stars and rappers at the top of the world are taking time out to appear in a little FXX comedy, but Burd says the explanation’s quite simple – “They just love the show.”

“Look, people are asking me, like, “How did you get all these people?” And it’s like, really, I hate to say it, but– I don’t hate to say it, I’m honored to say it: they just love the show. I think it speaks to the greatness of the show that it doesn’t take a lot of insane maneuvering to get these people to do it. They all just independently – Drake, Rachel McAdams, Brad Pitt – watch the show, they love the show, they watch all the episodes. I had run-ins with Drake and he talks my ear off in a really positive way about how big of a fan he is of the show and how it’s one of the more important shows of our generation. And Brad Pitt, I heard that he liked it, too. I had never met him, and I took that knowledge of the fact that, “Oh, Brad loves the show,” [and] I figured, “Maybe there’s a shot here.” I sent a really thought-out email that took days to write, and got a really cool email back, and he was in. Rachel McAdams, same deal; she watches the show with her husband, and they love it.”

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There’s a Method Behind Dave‘s Cameo Madness

One thing Burd wanted to make clear is that he didn’t simply pick his cameos because he admires them or because he believes they’d be fun to have aboard. There’s a method to who he selects for the series, from McAdams to Pitt to Drake. Dave tells the story of a white rapper’s search for fame and fortune, battling his own emotional immaturity in the process and stumbling his way onto bigger and bigger stages despite his flaws. Season 3 is a real “be careful what you wish for” season as he steps into the spotlight and away from some of the friends that helped him get there. Burd felt the introduction of these bigger stars made sense as Dave reaches his peak thus far and eyes the top of the mountain:

“They’re not just, like, random celebrity, ‘I want you in this because you’re cool!’ Each of them are kind of representative of the main themes of what the show is all about, as far as Rachel McAdams is like, you know, our generation’s dream woman. She’s anchored some of the more important romantic pieces of cinema for my entire generation. Brad Pitt is the preeminent representation of movie star, Hollywood, he’s like the biggest icon, I think, of our time as far as cinema, and Drake is obviously that of music and hip-hop. And so, for the themes that we’re going for, I feel like all these characters aren’t just coming in and being like, ‘Hey.’ They’re just representing the top of those major thematic temples. When I’m working with Brad Pitt and I’m giving him direction and I’m seeing him trust me the way he must trust, like, a Tarantino, or you know what I mean? It just is very validating for me as a filmmaker to get that type of trust from these iconic pillars of entertainment, so it’s very rewarding to get them onboard, and then also to not have to do anything crazy to get them beyond just having made a show that they all really love and respect.

The Risks for Dave Got Bigger as the Guest Stars Did

As the guests for Dave got crazier, it was starting to get to a point where the writers were a little spooked by Burd’s promises. For every instant yes he received like with the Boston Dynamics robot, fears were mounting as episodes were written with major celebrities like Pitt in mind without first hearing from them. “I took a lot of risks this season, and a lot of people in my writers’ room were like, ‘Man, I hope that you’re right that these people are just gonna say yes,’” he told Weintraub. “People thought I was really– even in the writers’ room, they were like, ‘What are we doing writing this entire episode around Brad Pitt without having ever communicated with him at all?’ I just believed, and I was rewarded for my belief, and yeah, it’s a chicken and egg thing.”

Music, however, worked out a bit differently. As a real-life rapper, Burd’s work on music never stops, and he’s always looking for good fits for the show among his material. That happened to be the case with the catchy “Mr. McAdams” verse he wrote about the beloved romantic film lead which he already had in the bank. It inevitably worked out like a charm when he was able to actually land McAdams for the season and employ the verse in a more meaningful way than he otherwise would have:

“In between seasons, I’m always working on music. Sometimes I’ll make a song that wasn’t written for the show, but I’m just like, ‘Man, this scene needs a good rap. This scene needs a romantic song,’ and sometimes I’m like, ‘Oh, this song I did like a year ago really could work.’ Obviously, the verse that I wrote when I wrote it, not thinking of the TV show, doesn’t work as well as if I rewrote the verse and made it about, like, Robyn, you know what I mean? And made it about more of the specific themes of the season. So it’s a total chicken and egg thing, and everything varies.”

The fact that Dave is a heightened semi-autobiographical series meshes perfectly with his career. Keeping his nose to the music grindstone allows Burd to find a use for the music he creates that otherwise won’t make it into an album:

I’m fortunate enough… In between the seasons, I’m working my ass off on music, and a lot of times it’s not all for not in the sense that, even though my fans are obviously craving an album, – and of course, I wish I could deliver that and I’m working as hard as I can – there is a fortunate reality to this whole thing that the show is about a rapper and I can take a lot of music that I made independent of the show and get it into the show in an organic way.”

All episodes of Dave Season 3 are available now on Hulu. Check out the trailer below. And look for more from our interview with Burd soon.