Starring Ryan Reynolds and Kenneth Branagh, the Apple TV movie Mayday, written and directed by John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein, is currently the most popular film on the streaming site. It begins when U.S. Navy fighter pilot Troy Brennan (Reynolds) is on a surveillance mission over Russia when his plane is shot down, waking up after being rescued by Nikolai “Nick” Ustinov (Branagh), a former KGB agent who’s enamoured by American culture, especially the movie Top Gun.
Troy has to get from Nick’s remote cabin to the American Embassy in Moscow. Nick agrees to help in exchange for Troy’s assistance in defecting to the U.S.
‘You have to figure out the rhythm’
The comedy in Mayday is a true driving force in the story, with so many moments that lean into the hilarious dynamic between Troy and Nick. Just one small example example is a comedic beat where Nick is drinking from a tiny glass very slowly, annoying Troy, a gag that comes back near the end of the film as well.
“It was really funny, and the hardest part was figuring out how to edit it because we had so many wonderful takes of him sipping in so many different ways,” Daley told Yahoo Canada. “And those timing-related set pieces are always really tricky because you want it to play long enough that people stop laughing and then start laughing again, and that’s always a delicate balance that you kind of have to refine after you test it for audiences, because it’s really like playing music. You have to figure out the rhythm.”
But that great rhythm found in Mayday is also evident in the film’s action-filled moments. They’re specific, stylish, and each action piece feels particularly energized. Like when Troy and Nick go to the apartment building where Nick’s estranged daughter Anna (Maria Bakalova) lives, with a two-story set being built for that moment.
“The infiltration scene in Anna’s apartment was definitely a very complex series of shots that we really relied on video playback. We were basically editing as we went because there are a lot of transitional shots, and we wanted to sort of be looking inside the mind of Nick,” Daley said. “It’s sort of a Rubik’s cube of, Nick’s kind of figuring out how to get them out of there.”
“He’s incredibly thoughtful and precise in the approach that he has when it comes to evading attackers, and it really does tap into this sort of learned experience that he had as a KGB agent. So it was something that was really gratifying to be able to pull off, but also, very tricky. It was a giant two-story set. We did have real explosives in there. We did cut through the one floor into the lower floor. But when it all came together, we were very pleased.”
“It was the only time that I’ve been on a set where everybody had to get off the stage except us and the stunt guys. That was scary,” Goldstein added.
Kenneth Branagh and Ryan Reynolds behind the scenes with directors, producers and writers John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein on the set of “Mayday,” now streaming on Apple TV
‘The price that you pay by being overly loyal to your country’
There was also a real commitment to authenticity creating Mayday, including in the Cold War-era aircrafts.
“We took some liberties for the sake of the story, but by and large, what you see in terms of the cockpits and the interior of these planes is pretty accurate,” Goldstein said. “We were able to see a couple of SR-71 Blackbirds out in the desert in California, where they’re parked, basically, and we also had two former pilots, now in their 80s, who flew these things and could tell us the specifics of where the controls were, how you would have manipulated it, and so on. So we did spend a lot of time trying to get as close to real as we could.”
But that authenticity also extended to the personal stories of these people. That includes Troy’s relationship with his dad, who made ships for the Navy, which we find out led to health risks, and how, when Nick has a conversation with his daughter at her apartment, we don’t hear what they’re saying to each other.
“There was nothing that we were going to write that was going to be as impactful as simply seeing it play out as a kind of a silent show,” Goldstein said.
Maria Bakalova, Kenneth Branagh and Ryan Reynolds in “Mayday,” now streaming on Apple TV
While Mayday is certainly fun to watch, the connective tissue throughout the film is the theme of “love of country, faith, and patriotism,” but also “the price that you pay by being overly loyal to your country by not asking questions.”
“I think a film like this, it should have something to say. We don’t want it to be preachy. We don’t want it to sort of indoctrinate audiences or tell them how to feel. But instead, present these two disparate characters and show how they had these preconceptions about one another and their countries,” Daley said.
“Just in spending a little bit of time with one another, they start to realize that it almost doesn’t matter where they came from, and their humanity is what transcends any kind of border lines. And that really is the message we were trying to tell, which is, I would imagine, as relevant today as it was then.”