We're locked in our own inside. I think of Steppenwolf sitting on the steps, the Stranger in Camus, living without purpose and yet living meticulously. I saw the potential for that in the book. There's a pathology that unfolds in the book. That started out as a device.
Screenplays are about exposition, that's the bugaboo.
That began as a device to give exposition, Vann's back story. At first, it was like, how am I going to handle this, the guy's a serial killer. Then I realized, these agents weren't that. I wanted Vann to be in total control of everything, to be very sane, as sane as Huckleberry Finn. That was in the cops, but they're whimsical.