The Late Show with Stephen Colbert – “The Queen’s Gambit, But About A Rubik’s Cube”

After the runaway success of The Queen’s Gambit on Netflix, studios have started clamoring to develop media from other successful “games”, and have now greenlit a Rubik’s Cube movie (this is completely true) and a Rubik’s Cube game show (again, ACTUALLY TRUE, I promise you). But who’s gonna make a 14-part limited series for streaming? Luckily, Stephen Colbert already got started on a new prestige drama that mixes elements of The Queen’s Gambit with a strong desire to make a lot of money off the popularity of The Queen’s Gambit.

Directed by Ballard C. Boyd
Written by Gabe Gronli
Produced by Emily Potthast
Starring Holly Hinchliffe & Brian Stack
Photographed & Edited by Ballard C. Boyd

Major thanks to everyone at The Late Show that helped pull this off. Not only in the realm of great period production value from our hair, makeup, and wardrobe teams; but in the fact that this entire sketch was shot on greenscreen in New York, in four hours, while I remote directed & DP’d it over Zoom from Tennessee. Then the footage was overnighted to me and I cut it on a laptop in two days. Wild. Still amazed we pulled that off!

The A.V. Club – “Stephen Colbert Has The Next The Queen’s Gambit All Squared Away”
Scriptnotes Podcast – featured in the “Unions and Guilds” episode