Derek Kolstad Talks “Normal”: The ‘Nobody’ & ‘John Wick ‘Writer on Creating Bob Odenkirk’s Reluctant Small Town Sheriff

You might know Bob Odenkirk as Saul Goodman or Hutch Mansell. Now he returns to our screens as an unassuming substitute sheriff (just like a substitue teacher) in a small, snowy town in Minnesota called Normal. The film was written by Derek Kolstad, who co-incidentally wrote Nobody. Odenkirk’s character as Sheriff Ulysses couldn’t be more different than his previous roles. “Bob’s Hutch character from Nobody sees a building on fire and run inside. He doesn’t care what’s in there because he’s an active junkie,” Kolstad says.

“But in Normal, you have a guy that sees a burning building and just sighs, And then, in the last second he hears a meow or a bark or a scream and enters,” Derek adds. The anti-action hero, Sheriff Ulysses, sets off the Rube Goldberg machine kills which has a different type of humor and appeal than Nobody as the chain reaction of violent action scenes escalates.

Kolstad also notes that Sheriff Ulysses’ character most closely align with his own personality. Bob Odenkirk wanted his character to have that name because in the military, Ulysses is a nickname for someone that is useless.

Normal traverses a range of genres with action at the helm. Kolstad considers Normal to be primarily a thriller with elements of action, comedy, mystery, and horror. The screenwriter attributes his hybrid taste to the action movies he watched during the 70s and 80s that always had a horror kill such as being sucked into a jet engine or cut in half by a car.

In Normal, Kolstad focuses the horror kills to the snowstorm – to illustrate the battle of man vs God – the chaos of nature. “And then that bullet you think that’s going to hit the guy, actually hits that other thing that kills the guy,” Derek elabotates on his approach to writing chain reaction action. “I think there was a there was a humor to that in such a way that we kept the humanity intact,” the writer continues..

[More: Derek Kolstad Talks ‘Nobody’]

Who is Sheriff Ulysses?

“I grew up in Madison, Wisconsin. After high school, after college, you marry that girl, you have those kids, you have that life. And that’s all he ever wanted. And then something happened,” Kolstad teases.

The predictable life that Ulysses built is now spiralling out of control and he’s unsure how to manage it. But he’s not helpless. He’s unthethered and questioning who he is and his place in the world. Derek Kolstad likens Sheriff Ulysses to many cowboys in Western films who are lost in circumstances.

Derek Kolstad

Ulysses choices aren’t random or impulsive not matter how much danger he and the town are in. “Something happened, a choice was made, an allusion to the audience as to what said choice made is revealed at a certain point, and you begin to realize when you watch the movie again, why Ulysses did a certain something,” Kolstad elaborates.

Despite the chaos that Ulysses seemingly attracts, he still has a solid moral compass and believes good will prevail. Things will work out for the best. “He’s been been battering about in the wind, doing nothing in the hopes that everything he lost would somehow come back, until he realizes now there’s a bigger world out there for him.” The chaos is merely a test for his destiny.

Sheriff Ulysses empathizes with the people of Normal, but he constantly reminds them that his role is temporary and avoids becoming too enmeshed in the community. He is only their temporary savior.

“The less close you are to someone, the less chance of you getting hurt. He doesn’t want to make any connections because he’s still looking at his wounds. But the reality is, he’s still who he was before things changed. There is still a calmness to him. There’s still a quiet goodness to him. And yet at the same time, he’s convincing himself that no tribe will ever have him. He will never have a family again. There’s a part of him that convinces himself that he’ll always be alone. And so, he just propagates that. He’s a drifter,” Kolstad summarizes.

This is how Sheriff Ulysses is similar to a cowboy – a gunslinger who rides into town and then leaves all alone and rides to the next town.

On Plot and Action Sequences

This was the last aspect of writing the screenplay according to Derek. The screenwriter spent most of his time fleshing out the charaters and action sequences. He knew what the plot was, but he kept it in the background. “It’s more texture than anything else. And as it evolves, it evolves with the characters as well.”

Derek begins writing his story with a skeleton plot. “Then, all the meat, muscle, sinew, and everything else is the characters, the action, the world build, and just making sure that the plot makes sense. And yet at the same time, the plot is satisfying without being at the forefront.”

On Theme

Normal is a small town struggling to survive economically amid rapid changes. Every character is trying survive and doing the best they can. Their morality is malleable. They yearn for times long gone which can never return.

Derek Kolstad writes great jokes and he shares them around town. This process requires dozens of drafts. Then there are notes from Bob Odenkirk, notes from his manager Josh Adler, and notes from Ben Wheatley, the director to polish the script.

Then, there are changes made on set. “It has to be a living document. And with the cast, I want them to say it their way. The movie is found in editing. It’s a magical space that I still don’t quite understand,” he confesses. The movie isn’t finished until it’s released on our screens.

Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures

On the Yakuza 

“It’s the classic Raiders of the Lost Ark story. If Indy didn’t show up, all of that stuff would happen anyway,” Kolstad shares. The storyline is consequential rather than essential to Sheriff Ulysses’ journey.

In the original draft of Normal, the Yakuza was the Sicarios and then the cartel coming from Chicago. Bob and Derek settled on the Yakuza because it was more surreal. It was like a game of whack-a-mole trying to knock them out. It wasn’t until Derek was near finishing the shooting draft that he added the establishing Yakuza scene at the start of the film to outline their motives.

This appeals to Derek because it contains drama, thriller, comedy, and horror. “It gives you a sense of, ‘We can all have fun here, but also, where the hell are you going with this movie?’ It was asking the audience to strap in and enjoy the ride.”

by Staff Writer

From our in-house editorial team.