Retelling The Nativity Story With Adam Anders
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All right, this week on Live in the Bream, first of all, I have some confessions to make. While we're talking, this recording, it's still October, and I've already started my Christmas decorations, and I've watched like four Christmas movies.

I just feel like in the current state of the world, we need some hope and we need some joy. And that gets me to my guest today. He is the director, co-writer, producer. He wrote a lot of the music for this amazing new film, Journey to Bethlehem. And if you need to get in the Christmas spirit and you want to see this story in a new way, you are going to want to check out what Adam Anders has done. Adam, welcome to Live in the Dream. Thank you for having me. It's so good to be here.

Listen, so people know your background is very deep in film, in television. You know, you were the executive music producer of Glee. Also, I mean, a huge hit show that brought music really into people's living rooms as a way to be entertained, not just in concert form, but really this idea of musical TV. This movie has got a beautiful musical score. But first things first, you know, one of the things I texted you about this is

I'm a purist when it comes to the Bible. And you do say this is based on a true story. But so people know it's not going to be the exact Christmas story that they're used to.

No, I think it's a great, great thing to bring up. It's not a documentary, right? I've always been very clear. Look, I know there's some things that didn't happen exactly the way, like the timeline, you know, there's certain things. But I also say, you know, they didn't break into song and dance to pop music either. True. So already from the onset of the idea, we're taking creative license. And, you know, there's things like the nativity scene that we've all become so accustomed to.

Where the wise men are there with the baby, well, that didn't happen. They came years later, probably three years later. But that's a scene that we've kind of, we've accepted, right? We have it in church. I have it in my home growing up. Every great artist in history has painted a nativity scene. And I felt like, well, I can do that too. I can take that same license. Because I wanted the wise men to be there for the whole movie because they're fun. I use them as comic relief kids. So, yeah, I mean, you definitely...

hit the nail on the head it's always scary when you take these you know stories are so important to so many people and me particularly um it was very important for me at the beginning of the movie to put this is inspired by a true story emphasis on true um so i you know i'm a believer i grew up in church my parents were ministers so it's very important to me that i was true to the story yet that i took the freedoms i needed in order to make it um to frame it in this way that's accessible and digestible for everyone

You've been connected to selling more than 100 million records. You've worked with all kinds of artists, the Jonas Brothers, Miley Cyrus, and many others. Like I said, Glee as well. So when people hear that kind of resume, they don't think faith-based project, but you've done many of those too. So how do you work in all those different worlds with all those different kinds of artists and products?

Yeah. I mean, like I said, I made this movie for, for everyone, not just believers. Um, and I think I've always felt called to, to work in Hollywood and kind of be a part of pop culture rather than trying to like being in a counterculture. Um,

So that was kind of just my life. I started my career with Stephen Chris Chapman as his bass player, and I started in Christian music. My wife was the founding member of Avalon, which was a big Christian group. So that's where I started. Those are my roots. But I felt called to go to Hollywood, to work here. And this town, L.A., that I live in, it affects pop culture for the entire world.

You know, so it's kind of an inside out thing. And if you can, you bring some light to some of these things that you work on, I think you've done something. And, um,

That was kind of my mission. And I think I've been in training. I've been out here 20 years and, um, I didn't know how to make this movie when I first had the idea 17 years ago, which is crazy. Um, but I think I needed to go to film school for 17 years, working with the best of the best Hollywood. And, you know, I, you can't help, but learn some things, you know, when you rub shoulders with these greats that I've been able to work with, um,

So it's been pretty awesome seeing how now I'm at the stage in my life where I get to tell my stories. And those doors have opened for me after all these years.

Yeah. And so I know that you prefer to be kind of a behind the scenes kind of guy, but we thank you that you're all talking about this again. The movie is Journey to Bethlehem. It's this musical Christmas adventure. It comes out November 10th and will run through the holidays. So it is something that's very family friendly. You mentioned there's comedic relief in this. There are serious moments, beautiful moments, moments of, you know, danger. And one of the bad

guys in this movie is Antonio Banderas who plays King Herod and he's like sort of deliciously awful. How did you get him to be a part of this project because the way he plays King Herod is like even worse than I imagined him from the Bible. Yeah, he's fantastic. I'd had Antonio like top of my list for three years as I was trying to develop this movie and

um it's kind of a long shot right i was like he's a huge movie star oscar nominee one of my favorites of all time but i knew he could sing i knew he could be sinister i knew he could be charming and also know he can sing i've seen him in the family of the opera and all these amazing musicals he's done over the years

And his song is tough. You heard it. It's a really difficult, rangy song. I couldn't just cast anyone. Well, he was directing and starring in a play. And I was having a hard time getting the script and song to him because he didn't want to be bothered. And I understand you're directing. You don't have time for other things. So his manager was like, I like the script. I like the song, but it's just not going to work out. And I said, well, why? Just let me talk to him. And he said, well, he's directing this play.

I said, well, where is he directing the plane? He said, in Madrid, Spain. And I said, I'm in Madrid, Spain. What?

Is it true or were you like, I'll just get myself to Madrid, Spain? Oh, it's crazy because I was in Madrid prepping because we shot this movie in Spain. So I had moved to Spain in October last year to start prepping. And I lived in Madrid for three months to prep. And then we moved to the south coast. So I was there. So I'm like, well, that's not a coincidence. I don't believe in coincidences. So I'm going to start kind of pseudo stalking this guy. So we started buying tickets. In a nice legal way.

The nice legal way, we bought lots of tickets to his show. And I started going. And my producer started going. And we just kept going. And we kept telling the manager, just have him come out and talk to me. You know, give me five minutes. And so then the script did get to him. And the song got to him. And he's like, I love the song. I love the script. But I can't sing it. And I said, yes, he can. Just let me talk to him. And sure enough, long story short.

He comes out one night, it's like two in the morning after a Q&A and it's all in Spanish. I heard one word in seven hours. It was California. It's the only word I understood. Okay. He comes out.

and says hi and I get my five minute elevator pitch with him and we just hit it off. It was like a great match. He loved my pitch on how I kind of my vision for Herod and he's like, wow, I love this. I like you. You know what? Let's do this. I was like, yes. Oh my goodness. Okay, so the lesson

of this is if we need to get something done, we need to call Adam Anders and put him on the semi-stocking, all legal, elevator pitch to... I mean, when I watched this, I feel like this role of Herod felt like it was almost written for him. I mean, it just really... He does nail it. And... How fortuitous. I am with you. I don't think anything is a coincidence. So, how beautiful that this happened with Madrid and everything came together the way it did.

I know it's pretty remarkable. And there's so many stories like that. Even Joel Smallbone, you know, from for King of Country plays Herod's son. Well, it took a while to get Herod because of my stocking issues. But when we finally did, it was really late in the game. And I'm like, well, now I need to find his son. Who's going to play his son?

I had cast Mariah Smallbone as one of Mary's sisters. Joel's wife. Yeah. So somebody mentioned, well, Joel's a good actor. I'm like, what? No, he's an Australian singer. Like, what are you talking about? No, no, no. He can act. I'm like, okay, whatever. I dismissed it at first. And then that weekend, we already started shooting. We're a couple weeks into shooting. And I watched a movie.

a few years ago and he was amazing at it. I'm like, oh my gosh, this guy's great. And the song that I had written for that character literally sounds like a for King country song. It's so good.

So good. And I had no idea that I was writing it for him when we wrote it. So I call, I get permission from her. I can, I talk to your husband. I know where this is going. She's like, yes, you can. He'd be great. I'm like, okay. So I called Joel and he's literally packing to come to Spain to visit his wife for two weeks in Spain. So I just tell him like, dude, you got to bring a bigger suitcase. There might be some costumes involved.

So he came and didn't go home. And he was amazing in the movie as well. He is. He's very tortured in this role of Herodson, which, again, is not somebody we know about in the Bible, but again, creative license. And he's caught between just how wicked and murderous Herod is in his own conscience. And that song that he does is really powerful.

You know, that character, Antipater, it is a historical figure. It's not in the Bible. And like you said, it's one of the creative licenses I took. But I wanted a character that could kind of embody the story of Christmas and change and hope. And maybe there is redemption for everyone. And I said, well, how do I do that? And I was in my research for Herod.

You know, his main son that we know is Antipas, who replaced him as king when Herod died. If he was worse than Herod, he killed John the Baptist. I'm like, well, that guy can't be redeemed, so forget that. That's not the redemption arc we're looking for. That's not what I'm looking for. And by the way, a little bit of spoiler alert here. I'm like, we all know Mary, you know, Jesus, everybody's fine. So it all works out in the end. Happy ending, no worries. But so I find in my research, Herod's first born son was Antipater. He was raised in Rome.

And he tried to overthrow his father because he thought he was unfit to rule. And Herod killed him the same year Jesus was born. And I go, OK, well, this is cool. Like, what if what if one of the people that visited Mary and Jesus was this guy? What if he, you know, didn't want to do the massacred? And so what if, you know, it started just creating this whole thing.

you know, what if scenario. And, you know, the reality is we have Matthew one and two and we have Luke one and two to go on. And it's not that much detail. Right. So where I like to live is in the in-betweens as I call it. And that's where I would just put myself in the shoes of these characters and just think, what if, you know, and, and it really is, is you, you know, it makes it relatable for us. What if we were Mary? What if we were Joseph? What if we were the son of this crazy King, you know, who's,

you know wants to kill everybody you know so right uh it's really made for a really powerful character and i think joel playing that character as a as a believer made it even more powerful um so it was very cool that was it we'll have more live in the bream in a moment

Pull up a chair and join me, Rachel Campos Duffy. And me, former US Congressman Sean Duffy, as we share our perspective on the discussions happening at kitchen tables across America. Download from the kitchen table, the Duffys, at foxnewspodcasts.com or wherever you download podcasts. You also have Lecrae in a way that we have not seen him before. It was fun to have him in that role as well. Yeah, Lecrae is amazing. I was looking for, he plays Gabriel, the angel Gabriel.

And, you know, I was like, who can I find who's powerful, who has a massive presence, but has a kindness and a softness to him at the same time? And if anybody, anybody knows, Lecrae knows what a kind, gentle man this is, but also what a force he is. So he was the perfect fit and he'd never acted before. So really, so this is the first time he's doing that. This is his first time. So, and he's, he's amazing in the movie. He steals the show. He's a movie star.

So that was super cool. And then we have Milo Manheim as Joseph, who's from all the zombies movies, huge Disney star. I didn't even know who he was when he auditioned. I was like, I don't know. I don't know the zombie stuff. So you're Mr. Los Angeles and you've done all this stuff and you don't know. I feel so good that I didn't know exactly who he was, but the leads are both so good. They're so good. Yeah. And you know what's so cool is I cast him on Merit, right? He was just amazing. And he

loved the movie and I didn't and then I found out he was a big deal so I'm like okay well that's a bonus but Fiona Palomo as Mary I can't say enough about her that was the hardest thing I spent months hundreds of auditions I had to find the right Mary if I got that wrong the whole movie's done you know it's just not going to work and

It was like three in the morning in Madrid, a couple weeks from us starting again, you know, panic, can't sleep. And I get an email from casting in L.A. with a bunch more auditions and I'm going to no, no, no. And then I come across Fiona and I sat up and I just watched it over and over again. And I was like, this is it. This is who I've been looking for. So I emailed Sony and I said, I found Mary and they let me cast her without a callback. Wow. Incredible.

on a feature film lead role and she's everything i'd hoped um you know the strength because i i if i imagine who god would have chosen to to do this task um it would have been someone strong it would have been someone who stood out she wasn't like every girl you know he chose her for a reason she was more more blessed than any other woman what does that mean she you know she uh was a special special person and um

I think Mary or Fiona just embodied that she's humble, she's kind, but very strong. And you see such expressiveness from the two of them.

And it gives you a better, you know, those of us who grew up with a Christmas story and you mentioned Matthew and Luke, you get a sense, a little bit, of what they went through and what they were thrown into. But to see this portrayed by a couple people who, they were human beings. I mean, they very much had their own tentative fears about what they were being thrown into and how well did they even know each other when this whole thing happened. They were betrothed, but...

You know, they both had to take enormous leaps of faith and believe what Gabriel was telling them about moving forward and trusting each other in the midst of something really shocking and probably overwhelming. But they have such a beautiful relationship. These two actors do such a good job of breathing real life into that story.

100%. And, you know, this is also, you know, where creative license comes in to some degree, because it's a very modern take on the relationship, very relatable for people today, I think. But, you know, I say I didn't need to make the story relevant. Everything about it is more relevant than ever. But, you know, I wanted to frame it in a way that we could see ourselves in these characters. And, you know, I felt like from the beginning, I had my Romeo and Juliet in Mary and Joseph. It's a love that should have happened earlier.

And one of the great questions I had when I sat down to write this is, did they marry for duty or for love? We know they ended up together.

but how and why? And Ron Howard once said, you know, how do you do a movie about something where you know how it ends? Well, he says, you don't know how they got to the end. You know, in Apollo 13, we knew they came home, but you don't know how. And I think that's what's fun about this movie and keeps you interested is we don't know how, you know, we know so little. So just putting ourselves in the shoes of Joseph, you know, his wife-to-be now says she's pregnant. Well, what? You know, she should have been stoned for that.

Right. He should definitely not have married her, but he married her. He stayed with her. He took the sin upon him or the stain, the perceived stain of the time of her being pregnant and not married. He took that upon himself. He took the child as his own. That's an incredible thing to do. And for Mary to take that, you know, upon her to be pregnant out of wedlock at that time, I mean, nobody would have believed her.

Right. Somebody walked up to you and said, I'm very nice. It's a fantastical story. Yeah, it really is. You know, I'm pregnant, but I don't have a husband and I'm a virgin. And it's the son of God, by the way. Right. So we all kind of imagine how those conversations went down. But in the movie, again, with your creative license, we see how their different families reacted and the pressures on both of them that most certainly people would have thought they were liars or they were crazy. I mean, yeah.

You know, you just get a better sense of all of those dynamics and how they may have played out for these two in that situation.

So again, I want to tell people, the movie is Journey to Bethlehem. It is this beautiful, entertaining, at times funny, frightening, but encouraging and hopeful Christmas musical story starting in theaters November 10th. We are talking to Adam Anders, who's one of the co-writers, director, the music producer. I got to ask you, and please, whatever thought that you were going to jump in there, please finish that. But I got to ask you of this music, what

What are some of your favorites? Because I definitely had favorites in this. Man, it's hard. So much passion and hard work and love has gone into these songs. It really was a labor of love, this whole movie. Like I said, it's an idea I had 17 years ago. I haven't been able to let go of this idea. We all as creative people get ideas and, oh, well, that didn't work out, so it must have been a bad idea.

And then others come to fruition and this is just one that literally got tattooed on my heart 17 years ago and I haven't been able to let it go. And so every song that came out, it's come from such a pure place and just a place of loving this story. It's the meaning of the story and wanting to bring it to the world. And it's hard to pick a song that embodies that, but probably Mother to a Savior, Mary's theme song is

I think for my wife and I especially, it's probably our favorite song we've ever written in our careers. And we've written a lot of songs. I think it so beautifully sums up what she's going through and the challenge that's in front of her and how her faith sustained her through that and gave her the strength to do it. And I'm very proud of that song. It's beautiful. All right. Where can people find more about the movie, how they can see it for themselves?

Well, you can go to journeytobethlehemmovie.com. You can actually buy advance tickets, group tickets, whatever. But a cool thing we're doing with Fandango is you can actually donate tickets to other people who maybe can't afford to go or don't have the means. Or you just want to give them as a gift to someone you think would want to see this movie. But, you know, the cool thing about the film, and I said I made it for everyone, I really believe that. And this is the movie you can bring your neighbors, your friends, and everybody to this holiday season. It's not, you know, it's hard to...

Some of us want to bring our friends to church, whatever, because they need it or whatever. And this is so much easier. Just go to the movies. It's just a really great, fun thing to do with your family and your friends. And I hope people will do that. So journeytobethlehemovie.com, November 10th, theatrical. The soundtrack comes out on the 3rd, next Friday, which is exciting. I was going to ask you about that because...

I grew up to me, you know, I grew up as a kid. 80s movies were my thing and I thought the soundtracks were so, so good.

And I'm an amateur, unlike you. And so I feel like soundtracks have been lacking really in the last couple of decades. There are a few good ones here and there. But gosh, this movie, there's every single song is different and inspiring and hopeful and will get you into the holiday mood. And so I'm so excited that it is releasing as its own soundtrack. Yeah. And today we dropped our first official single, which is Brand New Life, which is the end credits song. And Stephen Chris Chapman and We The Kingdom are performing.

perform it in the movie and in the end credits it's it's awesome uh i directed the music video for it which was fun um and i started my career with steven as his bass player when i was 18 so what a cool full circle moment for me absolutely to work with him again um so there's a lot of special things around this movie and um yeah i hope everybody will love it as much as we did you know making it and being a part of it um

But yeah, I'm glad you like the music. It's important that the music's good in a musical. And I will say, you know, I'm not a traditional musical guy. I'm not a musical theater type guy. I'm Swedish, so I approach everything from a very pop perspective. So I think even if you don't love musicals, I think you'll like this movie.

Yeah, I think you will, too. Journey to Bethlehem. It's out November 10th. A beautiful musical retelling based on the Christmas story. A great way to bring along family and friends. Something you can make maybe even holiday tradition. It took 17 years for Adam Anders to get it from his dreams onto the screen. But there it is. And I hope that you will join it. Adam.

Thank you so much for joining us on Live in the Bream. It's great to have you. Thank you for having me. Listen ad-free with the Fox News Podcast plus subscription on Apple Podcasts. And Amazon Prime members can listen to this show ad-free on the Amazon Music app. I'm Guy Benson. Join me weekdays at 3 p.m. Eastern as we break down the biggest stories of the day with some of the biggest newsmakers and guests. Listen live on the Fox News app or get the free podcast at GuyBensonShow.com.