Jason Bateman: the ending of Ozark is "opaque"

Believe it or not, Anna Gunn (Skyler White in Breaking Bad) won three Emmy Awards. Laura Linney (“Ozark”) has yet to win an Emmy for playing Wendy Byrde. A two-time Best Drama Actress nominee for the Netflix series (2019-20), she was the odds-on favorite to win for her banner third season in 2020, but was bested by “Euphoria” star Zendaya that year. Again, she is eligible for the show’s fourth and final season, and as of this writing, Linney is in second place in our Drama Actress odds, trailing only Zendaya. For starters, Zendaya is now a victor in a category that seems to no longer favor repeat winners. 

Coming off of her dynamite performance in the third season—especially in her highly acclaimed 2020 Emmy episode submission, “Fire Pink”—she once again has Emmy clip after Emmy clip in the show’s farewell installment. Plus, she could get extra points for making her directorial debut with the season’s 11th episode, “Pound of Flesh and Still Kickin’,” which should win her an Emmy for the road rage scene alone. Laura Linney has been on fire since the very beginning of Ozark and the way she embodies the character is just amazing. It also wouldn’t be the first time that Netflix carries someone across the finish for their final season of a show under the popular vote system. Although the show has so far nabbed only three wins—two for supporting actress Julia Garner (2019-20) and one for star Jason Bateman for directing (2019)—this savvy release strategy, coupled with Season 4 being the show’s last, could help yield more successful results, including a long-awaited victory for Laura Linney. Source: Goldderby.com

Jason Bateman’s goal to direct all of Season 1’s 10 episodes proved to be too ambitious due to time and budget, so he’d settle for the first and last two. While he says he’s now even more eager to eventually have that “full immersion” experience, his role as executive producer supplied enough daunting challenges to keep him busy, starting with winning over the only person he had in mind to be his on-screen partner in crime, Laura Linney (whom Bateman thought would fuel a dramatic counterpart to his character). Linney first met with Jason Bateman in New York, in 2016, to discuss what would arguably turn out to be the most fruitful onscreen partnership of their respective three-plus decades in the industry. Linney, already a three-time Oscar nominee, still can’t exactly pinpoint why she agreed to play Wendy, the wife of Bateman’s character, Marty—she just had a feeling that she should. Showrunner Chris Mundy credits Linney for that “huge leap of faith,” considering the focus of the first two scripts—penned by cocreators Bill Dubuque and Mark Williams—was primarily on Marty. “There wasn’t a big road map for Wendy’s character,” Mundy admits. 

“The day that Laura signed on, I really feel like me, Jason, and the writers were, like, ‘That’s a level that we’re all going to have to live up to.’ And she was pretty exhaustive in terms of building who this person is. It was the best partnership.” In a recent conversation, Bateman said, “You’re really being foolish if you don’t give Laura Linney as much work as possible inside of any show she’s a part of. To just delegate her to some cliché, traditional wife role would simply be bonkers.” “The central questions that Chris and I posed to each other as we were thinking about how to end Ozark were, ‘Should it be a cautionary tale? Should it be a victory? Should it be a failure? There’s an obvious way to state whether they got away with it or not, and then there’s a more of an opaque way to communicate whether they get away with it or not.” Bateman pauses, carefully considers his words, and continues. “I don’t think it’s any spoiler to say that we stayed consistent in keeping things a bit opaque in everybody’s mind. As far as whether this is a win or a loss, I’ll leave it up to you to decide.” Source: www.vanityfair.com

Jason Bateman has a firm and unflattering opinion about having been a celebrity kid, having been saddled with being a major breadwinner in his family. He called it an unhealthy situation, and he fired his father Kent Bateman from a managerial role as he neared adulthood. Bateman has said his relationship with his parents remains “off-and-on.” He recalls Dawn Garrett was his first girlfriend in highschool, but his busy schedule separated them. Bateman starred in his first feature film in 1987—a project he would quickly regret. The movie was Teen Wolf Too, a spin-off of the 1985 hit film Teen Wolf that had starred a very bankable Michael J. Fox. Bateman’s father produced the poorly received sequel that grossed less than $8 million in the box office. And dissolving the business relationship with his father led him to more personal and professional uncertainties. 

Bateman knew that, in a callous environment like Hollywood, playing hard to get and acting indifferent—like some cocky high school kid—went farther with industry people than being his authentic self. Bateman has offered some practical tips for a successful marriage. He believes that he got lucky because her wife is his best friend and he thinks it's important to maintain that kind of complicity; his wife Amanda Anka knows when to “bug” him. Bateman is hugely protective of his two daughters, Franny and Maple. For a man who was a successful child actor—but who really didn’t enjoy his childhood—it’s telling when Bateman says he’s “not a fan of kids acting.” 

Months before Juno was shot in Vancouver, Canada, Jason Bateman and his wife had just welcomed their first child, Francesca Nora. Jason Bateman reflecting on his character Mark Loring: "Well, the idea of making sure that you are an adult before adult stuff comes into your life, that is optimum. And I did. I was pretty good about getting a lot of crap out of my life before I got married and had a kid. Things work out better that way. This guy, Mark, the character I play, did not get that memo so he’s still sort of stuck in arrested development and his life is not going so great as a result. He finds somebody that somewhat enables that in Juno and maybe that’s what that last scene is about. That he wants to continue being a much closer friend with her outside of the relationship with Vanessa. I don’t know if because he wants to date her or just simply hang out with her. I don’t know. I begged Jason Reitman to tell me which side is it. I’ll play it ambiguous if you want me to, but let me know and he never did."

"With being an adult comes a more substantial relationship with a woman that might not be some incredible arm piece but somebody you can actually get along with longer than sleeping with her a few times. Then thinking about having a kid and maybe a better job. One you might not like as much but pays better and offers you a better future. There’s that moment when a guy's got to start becoming a man and it’s a little scary, especially if you don’t have a teacher or a father motivating you to do that. That’s a lot of self-motivation and this guy (Mark) doesn’t really have the work ethic to do that and he is somewhat a little pathetic. Mark was definitely into Juno and the way she made him feel. You can tell when he says "I'm leaving Vanessa, and getting a studio in the city. What do you think?" When Juno follows that calling him 'old' it is like he is forced to snap back into his age. When he replies "How do you see me?" it was just his way of saying "I thought you saw me as a man". I hope it’s somewhat interesting to watch as opposed to just being sort of one dimensionally just kind of a prick." Source: collider.com