(lively music)

- Well, Dallas Jenkins.

Thank you so much for doing this.

Look, I know that you are a busy man.

Thank you so much for being here.

- No, I'm thrilled.Thank you for having me.

- What led to The Chosen?

Because I've actually heardthat there was a pretty big,

for lack of a betterword, failure in your life

that God used to bring you to The Chosen.

So tell us about that.

- I had the opportunity to make a film

with big-time Hollywood producers.

And they financed it,

they co-produced it with me.

It's a faith-based film.

It's called Theresurrection of Gavin Stone.

And I'm still very proud of the film.

And it added a strong faith message.

When it came out intheaters, it totally bombed.

And all the companies that were involved

who had previously wanted tomake future movies with me,

and that was the plan for thenext 10 years of my career,

we were gonna be doing, like,a movie every two years.

And they all pulled out ofthat once that happened,

once the movie failed.

And I remember just with mywife home alone on that day,

when the numbers came in andit was clearly a failure,

well, God just, like, a bolt of lightning.

It wasn't a verbal, it wasn't a voice,

but it was on my wife's heart,

like impressed, written on her heart,

the feeding of the 5,000.

And the phrase I do impossible math.

So we thought, okay,

well that's encouraging.

Just because there's a hunger right now,

just because there's adesperation right now

and a failure, in that case,it was the lack of food,

in our case, it wasthe lack of everything.

But just because of thatdoesn't mean God's not involved.

And so what is he setting up here?

Ooh, I do impossible math.

You know, if God isreally saying that to us,

that probably means thatthe box office numbers

are gonna magicallyturn around this weekend

and he's gonna do thismiracle with the numbers.

And that's impossible math, you know,

and that didn't happen.

That night the numbers didn't improve.

And so we were still encouraged,

but still thought,

what are we hearing from God right now?

What does God have in our future?

So I was writing at fouro'clock in the morning,

a 15-page memo, analyzingeverything that I had done wrong.

And out of the blue,

Facebook message popsup on my computer screen

from someone I've never actually met.

Still haven't met to this day.

We were just Facebook friends,talk once a year maybe.

Didn't say hi, didn't say hello.

Didn't say heard about your movie.

Even though we had.

All it said was, "Remember,

your job is not to feed the 5,000,

your job is only to providethe loaves and fish."

And I said, "Before I respond,

can I just ask you why you told me that?"

And he said, "Oh, that wasn't me.

God wanted me to share that with you."

- Wow.

- And, I told this story so many times,

but I still get emotional becauseit's the moment where God,

like, I just, I feel like I metGod again for the, you know,

like, I've been a believer my whole life,

but I felt like thatwas when I really became

a different person than who I was before.

Because I knew right then andthere, my priorities changed.

My perspective changed.My desires changed.

All I wanted from thatpoint on was to provide

the best loaves and fish that I could,

however small they were.

And then once God deemedthem worthy of acceptance,

and the transaction was over,

everything else was up to him.

So I was genuinely okay

if I never made another film,

I just wanted to do whateverGod wanted me to do,

which is how I was open-minded

to doing, it's what made meokay with doing a short film

for my church's Christmas Eve service

about the birth of Christ

from the perspective of theshepherds a few months later.

One of my friend's farm here in Illinois,

20 minutes from my house,

and that's all it was intendedto be was for my church.

Video went viral.

I had the idea for amulti-season show about Christ.

Didn't think it would ever happen

'cause I knew it wouldrequire millions of dollars.

But someone else had the idea,"Why don't you crowdfund it?"

And I'm like, "Yeah, right.

That's ridiculous."

But loaves and fishes, loaves and fishes,

it's not my job to worry about that.

- That's true.

- So I put my loaves and fishesand they were really small

'cause it's just this little short film,

put them out on social media,

told people about my ideaand $10 million later

from 19,000 people shattering

the all-time crowdfunding record,

my wife turned to me whenwe looked at that number

with tears streaming downher face and she went,

"I do impossible math."

That's what, like, God waslaying it on her again.

Like, that's what Imeant when I said that.

- Let's talk about Matthew.

He, you have said that youdecided it was a choice

that you guys made

to make him on the autism spectrum,

which I think is amazing.

Talk about that.

And what led you to make that decision?

- Yeah, so when you decide,

one of my co-writers andI got together and decided

who the main charactersof the show were gonna be.

Once you then make thatdecision, which we did, you know,

Jesus, Matthew, Simon, Andrew,Mary Magdalene, Nicodemus

in season one, you then putthem up on a whiteboard.

And you're like, "Allright, character profile,

who are these guys?

Who is this woman?"

Like, as we write them,

we need to know theirpersonalities, their backstories,

all that stuff.

So we start writing things out,

everything we can think of.

So we start with scripture, of course.

So you go,

"What do we know ofMatthew from scripture?"

Tax collector,

so that means he's a numbers guy.

He's very efficient.

You know, tax collectorswere buck down to the penny.

You know, he's a facts guy.

The first chapter ofhis book is a genealogy

split into three sectionsof 14 names apiece.

All right. So he's a facts guy.

- Okay, yeah.

- So I thought this guy like, A,

this guy has Asperger's traits, B,

wouldn't it be really interestingto put him on the spectrum

that's never been donebefore in a bible project?

I think it would be areally humanizing way

to connect with this character.

So we just thought this couldreally make people realize

this is a show.

And this is an attempt to tryto really get you connected

with these people asopposed to a documentary

or a typical Jesus project,

where we're just goingfrom verse to verse,

miracle to miracle.

And you never get to reallyknow any of the people involved.

There's actually a videoon our YouTube page

and Facebook page,

that's an example ofsomeone who she's a teenager

who always felt a littlebit on the outside

'cause she's on the spectrum.

Always felt a littledisconnected from people.

And when she saw theshow, it just went, whoa,

Jesus called him, he's calling me.

And she happened to be a musician.

And she just wrote this heartfelthandwritten letter to me.

And I thought,

wouldn't it be cool if wecould like get some, you know,

get her in the music of the show?

So we flew her out to Nashvilleand she played the cello

at a key moment in actuallythe scene of Nicodemus

and Jesus.

(cello music)

- Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

(man weeping)

- Obviously a lot of people would consider

The Chosen to be successful.

And I'm sure you wouldconsider it to be successful.

Like, what, how do you define success?

Like, what is successto you, Dallas Jenkins?

- I mean this genuinely,

it's not a cop out answer.

Because the same things that I told you

when I was telling my storyof the feeding of the 5,000

and my failure and all that.

And the joy and the peacethat I found in that moment,

I was preaching that backthen, before the show existed,

I made the decision then,and I've practiced it.

And I've sought this outto not have specific goals,

to not think about whatsuccess looks like.

So success to me right now is that so far,

I believe that the showthat I've made pleases God.

I believe that it representsmy best five loaves

and two fish.

I don't have regrets aboutthe first two seasons

of this show that I have made.

- Dallas, seriously, thank you so much.

From the bottom of my heart,

thank you so much forchatting with me today.

I just say thank you for your integrity

and your honesty and your transparency.

It really does come through,

even what you're creating with The Chosen.

So thank you.

- Well, thank you so much.

It was an honor.

Glad to do it.

- Thanks Dallas.

(lively music)