Matt Lauria as Ryan Wheeler; Frank Grillo as Alvey Kulina. Source: DIRECTV

Question: Byron, you mentioned that you followed the sport since the beginning and as it's evolved. Does your story incorporate some of that evolution, and if so, how do you get at it?

Byron Blasco: Well, our story takes place in current times, but we thread through the sort of history of the sport and the people that were the ones that really brought it to the forefront. For example, Frank's character Alvey plays a guy that was in in the early days of MMA. So I sort of describe his character as he would be carved on the Mount Rushmore of MMA fighters, but he didn't make a dime, right? So now he's bringing, shepherding the new breed in. But it's a fast growing business and there's a lot of hustle and it's a pretty wild world. MMA is the sort of backdrop of our world that we let our characters play in. But it's again, it's very important to understand that it's a family drama about these characters and how they move through this world, and the relationships between them.

Question: How does MMA function in the context of the series as it relates sort of to plot and storytelling, sort of similar to Matt's experience in FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS?

Byron Blasco: Yeah.

Question: Are these sort of like a fight per episode as a way of grounding the story, or are the fights sort of punctuated throughout as a way of sort of making major story arcs land?

Byron Blasco: It's not a fight per episode. The fights are really there to serve character and drive the story that we're telling. The idea is that if people really want to watch a fight every week, they're going to watch a fight, a real fight. So we make sure that all of ours tell an emotional story and have an emotional context for our characters. But it's really about the drama. It's not so much about the fight of the week. And we made a very conscious effort of that. So everything we have points in the season where we're driving towards fights, but they're all built to arc out an overlying story.

Nick Jonas as Nate Kulina.

Source: DIRECTV

Question: Nick, this seems like a different thing for you. Is MMA something you had to interest in? What made this interesting for you?

Nick Jonas: I first read the script last year, loved it, and really felt like it was something I wanted to fight for and something that I had to work hard to get the role. And i really sort of sunk my teeth in preparing for the auditions. And met with Byron and with Frank and the Endemol and DIRECTV team and told them that stepping forward and making a career transition, this felt like the right vehicle and that I'd be honored to be a part of it, because I really respect these characters and the stories.

Nick Jonas (cont): And as far as the fighting goes, it's something I was familiar with. I didn't have a whole lot of experience in the MMA world, but training myself and watching fights. I've definitely been really educated this go-around and fallen in love not only with the sport but with some of the stories that I've heard some of these fighters and the life they live and just trying to portray that with these amazing people.

Question: Was there a lot of training involved?

Nick Jonas: There was a lot of training. I did a little bit on my own. And then me, Matt, and Jonathan spent some time together in a fight boot camp every day up in Pomona with Joe "Daddy" Stevenson who's our fight coordinator for the show. And it was a great bonding experience for all of us, but also really challenging and really sort of gave us the mentality you have to have when stepping into the ring or the cage or whatever the environment is.

Question: Matt, where did KINGDOM fall in your interest in the physicality and training of MMA? Had you been training and building up before and then the right project came along?

Matt Lauria: Oh. Similarly to Nick, the writing was the thing that was paramount, right? And so I got my hands on the script last year as well and did everything we could to fight and try and squeeze in and get an opportunity to be seen, to delve into the character. And as an actor, to have a character that's so complex, and really all the characters are psychologically very complex. And then, when it's set against that backdrop that has this implicit sort of energy and built in fight to it, then I think it makes for compelling and challenging storytelling. So, that was the underlying thing for me. As far as the physical stuff, I mean, I had been boxing for a couple of years, not daily but fairly regularly. You know, you can throw a punch. You can be a tough guy. But then, to be a professional fighter is a whole other breed of man or woman. And so it's fascinating to try and get yourself somewhere close to that, that toughness, and try and understand that.

Byron Blasco: Just to build on that, we put all of these guys through a pretty intensive camp that was designed and organized by Greg Jackson, who's one of the top MMA trainers, if not the top in the world. Frank had a longstanding relationship with him and introduced me to him. And Greg has been a really valuable consultant with training these guys and really giving them top level professional training to get them ready for this. It's not just about throwing a punch; it's really about a fighter as a character and how they move through the world. How do they pick up a fork? How do they walk into a room? So we've really spent a lot of time getting all of that down, because it's not just about being in shape and learning how to throw a stunt punch. If you can't sell that and these guys can't be believable as fighters, then it's a problem. And it's really blown me away how incredibly these guys have adapted and taken it on.

Group workout inside KINGDOM's Navy St.

Source: DIRECTV

Question: Byron, I don't know what MMA is. What does MMA stand for and what makes it unique?

Byron Blasco: MMA is mixed martial arts. So it kind of started out as this question that a lot of people probably asked, which is "Who would win in a fight, a wrestler or a guy that was good at karate?" And so they would do it. But as the sport'ss evolved, it's become all of that. So it's fighting. So say somebody was a wrestler in college. Well, now they learn jujitsu and they learn striking and they put all of these things together and they fight. And it's sort of evolved now into a much more more of a sport than it used to be.

Byron Blasco (cont): But don't worry if you don't know what MMA is, because the show has something for everybody. And really, the goal of the show -- and why I wrote it on spec as opposed to going out and pitching it to the networks -- is that I really wanted to show people that this is not just what you see used to promote fights. It's actually a real world with real people, and we want to tell the human side of that story and the people that are sacrificing so much in their lives. And again, you can watch this show and not give a damn about MMA and I think that you'll still very much enjoy it and get hooked.

Frank Grillo: Yeah. A lot of people don't cook meth, but BREAKING BAD seemed to have been a very popular show.

Kiele Sanchez as Lisa Prince.

Source: DIRECTV

Question: Kiele, can you talk about stepping into a whole different mind set, genre, attitude than we usually see you?

Kiele Sanchez: I think the process is the same for me as far as an actor. You do your homework and you dig deep for what connects you to this character. What she's going through in her struggles are, I think, pretty universal. Her ex fiance from the past comes back into her life and what does that bring up.

Question: Were you surprised that KINGDOM came up? Were you actively looking for something really different from what you'd done before?

Kiele Sanchez: I'm always looking for something different than the thing that I did before. And I read the script and fell absolutely in love with it. And I had worked with Frank. I was working with Frank at the time on a movie called THE PURGE.

Question: Nick, what is it like to step into a blue collar story and everything else? What does it feel like to be in a different setting?

Nick Jonas as Nate Kulina.

Source: DIRECTV

Question: Is there something about the MMA world that in the craft of making TV that was attractive, because of better visual shot or angles and things like that that wouldn't work as well in other sports?

Byron Blasco: Well, I would describe the sort of the style of the show visually as sort of a polished vérité. And I think MMA really lends itself to that in the sense that so much of the action is close. It's close quarters. It's things that maybe wouldn't show up as well on a movie screen, because TV's often played so close that you get to see all of the techniques and the moves and the sort of emotional journey during a fight. You see the fingers gripping into the ribs and the shifts of the weight and the breath that these guys catch and the way that they try to read each other that was really exciting for us to shoot. It's close combat where you really get a lot of character out of it, and I think that lends itself to TV.

Byron Blasco (cont): And again, we try to shoot every fight a little bit different. We don't have a one way that we do it. We try to shoot the fights so that it makes sense for the story we're telling and what the character's going through and how that resonates with them. Because every fight's different and every fight has its own emotional tenor.

Joanna Going as Christina Kulina.

Source: DIRECTV

Question: Joanna, can you talk about your character and what drew you to this project?

Joanna Going: Yeah, I play Christina Kulina. I'm the estranged wife of Alvey, Frank's character, and I'm the mother of our two sons who are fighters. But she's going to go astray, so she has drug issues, emotional issues. And it was a really amazing thing for me to be considered for this part, because it's not what I usually get to delve into. So I was really pleased. When I auditioned, I only had read the first episode, and there was just a little wee bit. And I didn't quite know where it was going to go, but it's gone to pretty amazing places, and it's been very, very exciting.

Question: How do you feel about the roles of women on this show? And what are you doing with your characters to break out of stereotypes?

Joanna Going:Well, I feel like this is a very gritty world, and these are people of a certain class, so to speak. These are people who are scrambling and struggling -- and have their whole lives. And, hopefully, we'll show how Christina ended up on the street doing what she does. Even though she's in a certain situation, I think she feels very empowered because she's she doesn't feel sorry for herself. She's just being where she is and doing what she has to do, whether it's taking care of herself in addiction or taking care of herself with how she relates to her family. It's a fractured family, and she's not a very good mother. It's how she's dealing with that and dealing with these two men who are in front of her now who were her babies and the fallout from that.

Question: But there won't be fights with the women?

Matt Lauria: We have some really talented female fighters on the show. And actually, that's another thing to just toss in there. We're so privileged to have background actors who are real fighters. And there are women in there who I would never disrespect, because they would whoop my ass. [Laughter].

Jonathan Tucker: And Emily Nussbaum from "The New Yorker" had that article talking about strong female characters in cable dramas. And that article came out, I think, like, in January or December. And when I went into the writers' room, we all had the opportunity to meet with the writers. All of the writers had read that article and were moved by that article in terms of writing for women. And I think it's been seen. Now we've we've read up to script 109, and the female roles are really exceptional and something I'm very proud to be a part of.

Chris Long: When you get into the story, Kiele's character almost is the matriarch of the gym. If you watch the show and how it evolves, she's the only person thinking in an adult manner on how to handle the business. So I think you'll see that Kiele's character is the constant mind-set of "How do I keep all of this together?" All of this is on her shoulders, especially handling the love triangle that she might be in or might not be in when her fiance comes back. So these female characters are strong female characters. They're not just a backdrop of an MMA show. Wouldn't you agree, Byron?

Byron Blasco: I would totally agree, yeah. And I would also add, in terms of Kiele's character, it goes beyond even holding the gym together. Because so much of this world is striving and pushing and trying to accomplish something in a very visceral way that I always think of her as a hustler. She's not just trying to keep the lights on there. She wants to grow and get bigger and survive. And the whole world itself is really based in conflict, which is good for us because that's good for drama -- and these are people that live in a very raw way. So this conflict plays out very directly a lot of times. And there's transgressions between the characters that maybe some people might find, like, "Wow, I can't believe they did that." But it's very real to the world. You have to understand these people live in a sort of different state than we do. It's very human, but it's also a subculture. It's very stripped down. It's physical. And so the physicality plays into the emotion. But really, I always like to think at the core of all of these guys' struggles is an intense need to feel and to give love. And that comes out in all kinds of dysfunctional ways, but it also leads to a lot of really beautiful moments between our characters.

Jonathan Tucker at Cedars-Sinai

Source: Jonathan's Instagram

Question: As you trained for this, who took the worst injuries, and who proved to be the most athletically adept?

Frank Grillo: Jonathan has a great story about injuries.

Jonathan Tucker: Teeing that right up. You know, not oftentimes can you say you've got injured on set in a fight scene. And to say it comes from a stunt guy, that's oftentimes a sign of bravery. But I get to say that Jay "Thoroughbred" Hieron, 185 pounds of Brooklyn smash, held me down in a mount, which is a specific position, tagged the ceiling with that elbow, and came right down and opened right up here about ten days ago. So you learn that super glue really does fill up a cut.

Matt Lauria: Well, it's funny because Joe "Daddy" Stevenson, who is this kind of iconic, amazing professional fighter.

Byron Blasco: He choreographed our fights.

Frank Grillo: He won THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER.

Matt Lauria: Season 2. Went on to become a notable professional fighter and then is also a well known coach. He was on set, and his suggestion was...

Jonathan Tucker: "Where's the super glue?" I'm like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on a second. Super glue?"

Matt Lauria: He had to get ten stitches.

Jonathan Tucker: Yeah. So I ended up at Cedars [Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles].

Kiele Sanchez: I would also like to say that Jonathan didn't tell anybody that he was cut.

Frank Grillo: He wouldn't stop. He wouldn't stop.

Kiele Sanchez: And didn't stop. He continued working.

Jonathan Tucker: Well, you know, we spend so much time rehearsing. We put in so much time in training. Almost all of us have been a part of this project since January, which is one of the extraordinary luxuries and things that separates this show apart from other work that I've been a part of -- and I think we've all been a part of. We've had a lot of time to build these characters and to train. And the training doesn't just entail learning jiujitsu and learning how to kick and strike. But it really gives us the opportunity to learn about what who these fighters are. All these fighters go into the cage with demons, whether it's addiction to alcohol or drugs or family issues or children that they're trying to support. I mean, it's very real. And they're sometimes getting in the cage to feed that addiction or sometimes to literally feed their family. So this training has been extraordinary. But I didn't want to have the scene where Frank would have kicked my ass if he was seeing the back of my stunt double the entire time every time. I said, "I want to be able to at least have worked on it, to be able to have the camera see it." So yeah, it's tough. The plastic surgeons couldn't figure out at Cedars what was real and what wasn't. Because I was in the fight, I am totally bloody. And there's some great photos on Instagram at jonathanmtucker.

The Kulina family.

Source: DIRECTV

Question: Can you talk about how much the platform and who's going to see it factors into your decision to take on a project like KINGDOM?

Joanna Going: It's huge for me. I mean, the freedom that you're afforded and the creativity you're allowed. Having been on network things and alternative network things, you just find it's not so much by committee. So you can sort of have a clearer vision of your story and your artistic vision is what I've found, just having been on a couple of satellite projects.

I just feel it's very exciting, as an actor, that you get to be included more. It was very inclusive just to be brought into the writers' room and be able to sit down with them and talk about your ideas and hear what they have to say, and it's been wonderful.

Chris Long: There's so much content, that you have to build something that differentiates yourself from everyone else. And I think, with the intestinal fortitude of the actors -- I mean, Matt and Kiele worked until four o'clock this morning and turned around and came here. Because of the actors being so invested in it, I think people will find this and will be able to watch it. And we are really proud of that.

Frank Grillo: I just want to add one thing. A testament to everyone sitting up here, including Byron, is all these people have made a lot more money on other shows. And again, a testament to the writing and what these actors and these producers and these networks want to do is it's not about worrying about who is going to show up, although that's the goal; otherwise, you can do this in your garage for friends. But the reality is everybody signed onto this because of this guy [pointing to Byron] making something that was amazing that I don't think anybody has seen on television at all. So it's a great thing when everyone comes together for a single cause, which is to do beautiful work, and not about the money, which in this town a lot of times it's always about who's getting the most. And that's not what this show is about. I think that's why we kind of caught lightning in a bottle, because everybody is here, and they're not thinking about money; they're just thinking about the piece. Again, a little piece of me dies to compliment him every ten minutes, but the writing was that beautiful that you just you had to be a part of this.

Matt Lauria: It's one of those things where you just can't pass it up. And I think that that sort of passion, that fight, the fact that it's lower budget, and that goes across all departments. These makeup artists are going to have to work even harder to apply all these tattoos and then take them off at 4:30 in the morning. But that commitment and that passion and that fight, it pervades the whole thing. We're also shooting in this former youth correctional facility, and there's this built in fraternity and camaraderie. And I know this sounds like boilerplate shit, but I've never been stretched so much as an artist ever. It's a small cast, as you can see. So the responsibility is heavy on each character. It's just requiring more of me than anything I've ever done physically and emotionally and characterwise. How you could ever pass up an opportunity like that that could make you a better artist, better person, that could make you so proud?

Jonathan Tucker: When Matt and I have finished a 15-hour day, we're at the gym -- Easton Gym on Laurel and Beverly -- running lines at 11:30 p.m. while he's doing leg workouts and I'm doing a chest workout and talking about how blessed we are. If we were in New York City in the '70s as roommates, we'd pay to do something like that.

Matt Lauria: Yeah. "It's a play that pays me $300, and there's cockroaches in my cereal, but wait a second. You're telling me I can pay rent and be an actor? Fuck, I'm in." It's that kind of project. I had to say the F word just because it's all over. I'm trying to give you a sense of KINGDOM.

Matt Lauria as Ryan Wheeler.

Source: DIRECTV

Question: Matt, can you contrast the physical demands of FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS and KINGDOM?

Matt Lauria: We had so many exceptional real football players who were our doubles in FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS. It's a liability thing that they couldn't let us get in there and break our necks, you know. So it's a tribute to those guys for making us look amazing.

Jonathan Tucker: And you had helmets. And helmets and pads are very different than your shirt off boxing.

Matt Lauria: Yeah, you've got I've got two bruised ears. I've got a bruise here that the makeup gal this morning nicely covered and one up here and a swollen knuckle. When those things happen, you kind of go, "Now I get why Fight Club was Fight Club." It's like, "Yeah, it feels good." This is harder. It's a big commitment. We'll shoot 12, 14 hours, and then we will go to the gym and then try and keep putting the weight on. And Frank and I shot a scene Thursday night, and the doubles did the wide and ran through the whole thing. And then the rest of the night -- and Frank's a great fighter and very experienced -- we just gutted it out and did the whole thing all night.

Frank Grillo: And he has this big welt because every time I was punching him and he was supposed to go that way, he went that way.

Matt Lauria: There's two sides to that story.

Frank Grillo: But that's it. And nobody stops.

Matt Lauria: It's very demanding.

Frank Grillo: We do have the luxury of having doubles. And he could have easily said, "Get my double in here. I do not want to get punched in the head again." And he's like, "All right. Let's just figure this out. Just please don't punch me in the head again." So it's that kind of commitment. I personally have grabbed his head a couple times and said, "Dude, I've just punched you in the temple." And he's like, "Okay. All right. I got it. I'll go that way, but don't punch me in the face again." For me, I've been involved in fighting for a long time and have a lot of experience. But I still get uncomfortable doing certain things. And these guys are game a hundred percent of the time.

Matt Lauria: We're working our asses off. I mean, it's a constant thing. We're training in Brazilian jiujitsu. We had some muay thai training. I'm really focusing on the wrestling shit. I bought the ear protection so that, hopefully, I can have other roles after this. But I plan on continuing in the off season and, God willing, we get a second season to kick my ass and get in there and keep training. You've got to make it look authentic.

Jonathan Tucker: And Nick's first fight was against Cub Swanson, who just fought in San Antonio and is up for a shot at the title fight for welterweight UFC. This is a legitimate fighter, and you're going to have Nick Jonas going up against him -- and that has to look real. The training that he did and the weight that he put on and the choreography that was set, boy, that fight came out great.

Byron Blasco: This was a big part of the challenge in casting this show, which was finding guys that, number one, were phenomenal actors, but, number two, could carry the physicality of this, because it's not FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS. We don't have pads and helmets. It's very personal. It speaks to the question of why is MMA great to shoot on TV? Because it's very personal. These guys are in shorts and little gloves. So you can't really fake it. So it's incredibly difficult to find actors that carry that physicality. But we are a very heavy emotional drama that these guys have to be able to do. And I hit the lottery in terms of guys that can do all of that stuff. It's just rare. And it scared the living shit out of me going into it. But we found them.

Nick Jonas as Nate Kulina; Frank Grillo as Alvey Kulina. Source: DIRECTV

Question: Chris, how does KINGDOM fit into the big picture for Audience Network? Are you looking to be the go-to place for sports drama? What type of slate are you looking to build?

Chris Long: So our wheelhouse is 35-54 adult male and female, highly educated, and own their own homes. It's basically the DIRECTV audience, right? But I don't think our slate has to fit a certain demo in the sense that it has to be within that 35-54. What we're looking for is television shows that kind of get out of the clutter. ROGUE was our first endeavor in that, and our second season has done that. KINGDOM was not chosen because it is a sports show or has a sports background. It was chosen because we loved the script and we thought we could kind of identify ourselves as a destination for people to come to. 

Chris Long (cont): If you compare KINGDOM and ROGUE and FULL CIRCLE and our new comedy that's coming out, THINGS YOU SHOULDN'T SAY PAST MIDNIGHT, the only thing you can say about all four of those is that they're premium type shows with amazing casts and great writers.  I said this before to someone, and they kind of looked at me. I remember I was watching BEING DAVID GEFFEN, and he was kind of this great collaborator with all this young, amazing talent in the '60s and '70s with Jackson Brown and The Eagles. What we want to be at the Audience Network is we want to be able to cultivate great artists like a Byron Blasco, like a Neil LaBute and be able to give them an outlet where they have the creative freedom to do what they feel is their vision and almost be this tastemaker for the future of great television. I don't think we're going to fit ourselves into any demographic or pigeonhole ourselves into sports or anything else. I just want people to say, "Wow, every time I go on that channel, there's something unbelievably interesting on it." If it's not these shows, it's our documentaries that we're starting in the fall. It's our slate of movies that we're getting from Fox Searchlight or Miramax. I mean, there's a plethora of programming on, which we're extremely proud of. And I think that's what differentiates us from anybody else. And it's new content all the time. It's not the same old thing you're seeing all the time.