Late Night With Deborah Vance: How ‘Hacks’ Crafted Its Flashy Take on a Hollywood Staple

Spoilers ahead for “Hacks” Season 4, Episode 4

The fourth episode of “Hacks” Season 4 was always intended to be a love letter to Los Angeles. But after the January wildfires that killed 30 people and destroyed over 16,000 structures, Thursday’s “I Love LA” now feels like more than just another impressive feat from a show that is always attempting to one-up itself. 

“It carries a lot more weight to it,” production designer Rob Tokarz told TheWrap. One of the many, many homes lost to the natural disaster was the house the crew used for Deborah Vance’s (Jean Smart) Los Angeles mansion. “Those things are gone. Those are places (where) we can no longer be.”

“Hacks” was one of several productions that was shut down earlier this year due to the devastation. “We were thinking about [dedicating an episode] ever since the fires happened,” series co-creator, showrunner and executive producer Jen Statsky told TheWrap. “It felt like the right moment to make that episode the one we dedicate.”

It’s a fitting tribute. After nearly a season and a half spent chronicling Deborah’s dream to one day host a late night show, “I Love LA” transforms that dream into a reality. Many other shows would gussy up an unused soundstage and call it a day, but “Hacks” — much like Deborah herself — has always been a little extra. Months of planning and building, days of shooting and several trips into television’s past went into constructing a late night set that felt authentic to this fictional comedian. And “Hacks” shows all of it.

“It’s the first episode where the show gets off the ground, and it’s an homage to our L.A. crew, who have done such amazing work for us,” Statsky said. 

Capturing unseen TV magic

When Statsky thinks back on her time working on “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon,” the words “intense pressure” come to mind. “Every day, you tape a show at 5:30, and you have to have the show ready for that,” Statsky said. 

That’s the sort of pressure cooker the trio tried to capture in Season 4. That stress is most clearly felt in “I Love LA,” an episode that opens with a montage of behind-the-scenes crew members cutting metal and testing monitors as Deborah religiously weighs herself and Ava (Hannah Einbinder) breaks a stress ball. “Hacks” had to portray just how much time, energy and money went into creating “Late Night with Deborah Vance” to fully portray the stress Deborah and Ava are under. To capture that tone, Aniello, Downs and Statsky drew on the experience of creating “Hacks” itself. 

“It’s very exposing. You feel naked in a way which can be exhilarating and terrifying,” Downs told TheWrap. 

That opening montage is exposing on a literal level as many of the craftspeople who appear on camera work on “Hacks.” Before anything was shot, Tokarz sat down with Aniello, Downs and Statsky to figure out “what would be the most cinematic.” Once they came up with their list, which included an appearance from the Max show’s wig maker, the second unit director of photography Charlie Panian was brought on board. Panian previously worked on “Chef’s Table” and brought that expertise to this montage. As he and a small crew traveled around the Universal and CBS lots, Panian treated each segment he filmed much like the Netflix documentary, often asking crewmembers to break down what they’re doing step by step. 

“In some instances, they had to slow people down a little bit because they’re such experts,” Tokarz said. The result is a whiplash montage that feels as though it’s building to something much bigger. 

Creating a set fitting of Deborah Vance

Back in Season 3, when the idea of Deborah hosting late night was little more than a pitch, Tokarz knew he had to get the comedian’s show set right. Consciously or not, late night shows are defined by their sets. What would “The Tonight Show” be without that rich blue curtain that introduces Jimmy Fallon every night? What was David Letterman without his cutout of the New York skyline?

“[Aniello, Downs and Statsky] described only one thing on the entire set in the script, and that was a pink star. That was her monologue spot,” Tokarz said. “Everything else came from the conversations we had.” 

Tokarz wanted Deborah Vance’s set to feel “uniquely her” while also communicating that Deborah was taking over a production that had been constantly on the air for 40 or 50 years. During the hiatus time between Seasons 3 and 4, Tokarz started drawing up plans for the set, which he decided would be “a monument to Los Angeles.” Prep work started in the middle of July 2024 with filming taking place in October, giving Tokarz  and his team a little less than four months.

Deborah’s set is actually Stage 1 at Universal, better known as the stage where “The Kelly Clarkson Show” started. “Hacks” used the bones of that show to make its iteration feel more authentic. To channel Los Angeles, Tokarz drew upon the art deco details that are part of Griffith Observatory and added deco arches to the top part of the set — a nod to how Johnny Carson’s set changed when he moved from New York to Burbank in 1972.

As for the flourishes that were distinctly Deborah, Tokarz incorporated silhouettes of several buildings, an idea that was a nod to the 1929 Oscar winner “Broadway Melody.” From right to left, the silhouettes detail Deborah’s journey from being the queen of Las Vegas to her triumphant return to Los Angeles, the city that once rejected her. Even the floor was influenced by this character as it mimics the floors of Deborah’s Las Vegas mansion as well as her tour bus, which appeared repeatedly in Season 2. Marquee bulbs inspired by Fremont Street were also added, another nod to Debroah’s Las Vegas roots.

Speaking of lighting, that also posed a major challenge for the team. Late night often lives in the wide shot, which requires a huge collection of lights so the audience can see the entire stage. That’s exactly the opposite of how a single camera comedy like “Hacks” operates. In Season 3, Deborah guests hosts an episode of “Late Night,” an episode that served as a dry run of sorts for production. For that episode, the show filmed at CBS Television City on a stage they shared with “ Real Time with Bill Maher” and “The Price Is Right.”

“I remember walking onto that stage when they had their set up, looking up at the lighting grid and being completely overwhelmed,” director of photography Adam Bricker told TheWrap. “There was immediately a lot to learn.”

To create the right effect, “Hacks” built its own lighting grid, which included “a ton” of Tungsten lights. Though the Max comedy doesn’t typically use those particular lights, they’re a standard feature of late night, often identifiable by the five black flaps that surround the light. Gaffer Daniel McNutt then hid the lighting equipment and tools the show typically uses among the newly built lighting grid to ensure the episode would still have “that signature cinematic ’Hacks’ look,” Bricker said.

“It was really important to me that it didn’t feel like Deborah Vance was just coming onto a brand new stage. It really needed to feel like she was inheriting something that had a history, and she was following in the footsteps of the men that came before her,” Bricker said.

Bricker wanted to pull in one more detail from Deborah’s past as a beloved Vegas comedian: a spotlight. “A spotlight is great because there’s a duality to it. It can both be very isolating … but then it can also be heroic,” Bricker said, nodding to the central obstacle of the episode where Debroah experiences stage fright for the first time in her career during a dress rehearsal. 

Clothing this glamorous star

Deborah’s outfit proved to be another obstacle. Costume designer Kathleen Felix-Hager wanted the late night look to channel Deborah’s sparkly and sequined aesthetic while also being “a little streamlined.” 

“Even though she’s the host of a late night show, it was more about letting the environment and guests take center stage,” Felix-Hager told TheWrap. “We always like to make Deborah the shiniest person in the room. But in this case, we tried to balance it with the set design.”

There were also practical concerns to consider. Since “I Love LA” ends with Deborah falling in a go-go cage at a gay club after being force fed poppers, Felix-Hager decided to put Smart in a pantsuit so that she could do everything she wanted to do in the episode without thinking about what she’s wearing. Felix-Hager eventually fitted Smart in a bronzy Bagley Mishka suit with a custom-made sequined jacket. Three sets of that costume were made to ensure Smart didn’t have to worry about messing up anything during her club scenes. 

But the real magic of this suit comes from its coloring, which was specifically chosen to compliment the rosy pink curtain for “Late Night with Deborah Vance.” Felix-Hager worked closely with Tokarz throughout the season to ensure that Deborah’s late night looks always complimented her set. 

“I loved how [the suit] played against the curtain behind her,” Felix-Hager said. “It just mimicked it in a beautiful way.”

The fabric for the curtain was found by set decorator Jennifer Lukehart. That curtain became the centerpiece for color language of the entire set as pinks were incorporated into the offices of “Late Night.” The tapestry department even allowed “Hacks” to film them sewing the curtain together, a moment that became part of the opening montage.

“We wanted to feel like when that curtain opened, you were inside of her world with the sequins and the softness of the fabric and walking down the shiny floor,” Tokarz explained. 

By showing all of this passion and work, the central stress of the episode is compounded. When the spotlight first hits Deborah, you as the viewer feel the full weight of this endeavor and the dozens of people whose livelihoods depend on her and Ava making this show work.

“The show is about the writing, so you see a lot of that. But you also see the huge amount of artists and crafts people that make the show happen. It is mind blowing that it’s a community piece of art,” Downs said. “Most people have been there since day one in our crew. They’re all not only so talented but care so deeply about it and are so proud of their work. It was nice to peek behind the curtain.”

“Especially for an episode that was very much about Los Angeles,” Aniello added. “We’re so lucky to have been able to make this show for four seasons here in LA with an amazing crew.”

“Hacks” releases new episodes Thursdays on Max.

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