What we know for sure about Brendan Hunt’s stoic assistant coach on Ted Lasso is that he’s a loyal friend, a voracious reader, and a masterful chess enthusiast who doesn’t even need a board to play.
The true appeal of Coach Beard is in the negative space he creates: what we don’t know, can’t see, and maybe can’t even imagine about him.
Hunt, who is one of the show’s co-creators, spoke with Vanity Fair to reveal some of his own backstory for the character, including whether “Beard” is truly his name.
We just found out he is sleeping in the office and there’s talk of drama with him and his girlfriend, Jane.
I guess I believe that whatever crazy things you’re getting up to outside of work doesn’t inherently mean that you’re some kind of jerk or anything.
Would you say Coach Beard is a wilder man than his exterior would suggest?My sort of backstory that I have for him is, I don’t think he’s from Kansas, like Ted, but I do think he’s from central Illinois, like Peoria or something.
Until the writers room sets it down on a sheet of paper and then it gets in front of a camera, it’s all vaporware.
And then somewhere along the way he just stopped using phones and email, and no one saw him for a real long time.
Sports was what originally brought them together, and as much as he loves a good Trey Anastasio guitar solo, he likes watching linemen block as well.
I know this is such a silly affectation for me to even be worrying about, but that’s part of why I insisted this year that he has wrap-around sunglasses.
His first material desire would have been that pair of glasses, and now he can afford it! Um, so he’s gonna wear those glasses, even though it might be douchebag nomenclature to some people.
How did you come up with the name Coach Beard? Was it just because he had a beard and you figured people are going to identify him that way anyway? I can’t remember when he got named.
We know where the show is going in so many respects, but Beard is still very much in Choose Your Own Adventure territory.
So me and Jason and Joe Kelly, the other creator of the show, before Bill Lawrence came along, were working with NBC Sports to do this ad campaign.
Joe Kelly’s idea that has born considerable fruit, even now, eight years later, was that Beard needs to speak as little as possible, preferably one word at a time, wherever we can, because that’s going to be a fun contrast to play between Ted’s hayseed verbal diarrhea.
And because me and Jason have a bit of a history, that history is present on camera unavoidably every time we’re together.
There’s something really special about their relationship and their friendship, because so much of Ted Lasso, the show, feels like it’s about masculinity and about a way of being masculine without being, let’s say, an asshole.The show is trying to get at some stuff about masculinity.
Ted showing up in the middle of episode one of this season with fingernail polish on, and Beard having no comment on it whatsoever is because it’s not that big a deal to them.
I like that they’re not intimidated by each other, and not trying to impress or one-up each other, or slyly put the other one down.
Beard has one blow-up with Ted, and is not the way Ted would live, but Ted doesn’t judge it.
Sometimes you know a friend so well, you take for granted, “Oh, they’re just like this, and they’re going to be okay.” Beard misses some stuff that Ted is going through this season.
Is part of the goal to keep Beard an eternal mystery?We might dance a little closer to the borderline on that.
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