"The Death of Robin Hood" director Michael Sarnoski

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
This message comes from NPR sponsor, Raymond James, a firm where wealth management, banking, and capital market solutions start with the connections between people. That's the power of personal. Disclosures at raymondjames.com.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:16)
Bullseye with Jesse Thorn is a production of maximumfun.org and is distributed by NPR.

**Jesse Thorn** (0:37)
It's Bullseye, I'm Jesse Thorn. There's a new movie coming out called The Death of Robin Hood. And you don't have to read much into the title to know what it's about. Robin Hood is played by Hugh Jackman brilliantly. And the legendary folk hero is kind of getting up there in age. He's tired, his beard is long and gray. He looks almost like God in a far side comic. The decades of running, fighting, being beaten and slashed have taken their tolls. Robin, badly hurt, ends up in a priory, a small community run by a nun. And there he confronts his legacy. He thinks about the lives he's taken, the lives he's ruined, the wake of violence and blood feuds that trails behind him. And he reaches a pretty reasonable conclusion.
Robin Hood, Robin of Nottingham, was not a good guy. So here in the priory, staring death in the face, how does he reckon with that?
The Death of Robin Hood is not about prancing and shooting arrows. It alternates between brutal violence and meditative, almost serene thoughtfulness. It's written and directed by my guest, Michael Sarnoski. Sarnoski is also responsible for the movies, Pig and A Quiet Place Day One. So glad to talk to Sarnoski about the movie. Let's get into it.
Michael, welcome to Bullseye. I am so happy to have you on the show.

**Michael Sarnoski** (2:16)
Thank you so much. I'm honored to be here.

**Jesse Thorn** (2:17)
Did you get the idea for this film because you were just hanging out, reading the lyrics of 15th century songs or whatever?

**Michael Sarnoski** (2:23)
Yeah, it's just what I do to unwind kind of, so. Yeah, that's pretty much. No, mostly it came from Love and the...

**Jesse Thorn** (2:29)
You're like, ooh, an S or an F, I don't know.

**Michael Sarnoski** (2:31)
Yeah, no, it was just from watching the animated Disney Robin Hood. That was where that love started. But the poems helped too.

**Jesse Thorn** (2:38)
How did you discover the breadth of the story of Robin Hood?

**Michael Sarnoski** (2:42)
Yeah, I think it was sort of one of those, it was at a perfect time in my life where I loved the Disney animated Robin Hood movie as a kid. Like I would watch it with my dad. And the full story is that when my dad passed away, our neighbor who kind of became this mentor or father figure to me, gave me a copy of his childhood school book Robin Book.
And it had all the old stories in it, like the finale of it being The Death of Robin Hood story. And I think there was something about being a child, losing a parent, having seen the sort of childish version of Robin Hood, and then being exposed to the sort of more mature version of, not just the mature version, but like the idea that this folk hero could die, that that was like part of his story when you think of him as this just kind of immortal dancing fox. And then I think having to like grapple with that as a kid at a really formative moment kind of stuck with me. And then I was just like always fascinated by that Death of Robin Hood story. And this was just kind of the result of 30 years of thinking about that.

**Jesse Thorn** (3:38)
What is the story as it exists in folklore and on paper?

**Michael Sarnoski** (3:42)
Yeah, the classic story is Robin goes to this priory because he's sick or injured, and he asks the prioress to take care of him to bloodlet him. That was like a medical technique back then. Turns out she's an evil prioress who's up to no good.
Blood lets him to death. And then the part of the story that everyone kind of knows is, I mean, not everyone, but some people know is little John comes to see Robin as he's on his deathbed, and Robin says, give me my bow. And he shoots his arrow out the window and he says, wherever it lands, that's where you're gonna bury me.
So there's a lot of lore around that. People say his grave is over there by Kirkless Priory and all that. But yeah, that's the very basic idea of it. And then this story kind of takes its own spin on it, mostly based on the idea that what if the prioress wasn't this evil lady and what if Robin wasn't the good guy? And what if their relationship was a little more complicated and had more history and nuance to it? Because I always thought it was a little simplistic, like she's the bad evil nun and he's the goodly Robin. And I feel like the times back then were a little more complicated than that.