DTF St. Louis mines the poignant, awkward reality of new adult relationships in all their complexity, exploring the tragic fallout of the budding friendship between suburban dads Clark (Jason Bateman) and Floyd (David Harbour) as the former begins an affair with the latter’s wife, Carol (Linda Cardellini). But for a moment midway through the limited series, creator Steven Conrad — Emmy-nominated for writing, directing and executive producing all seven episodes — brings viewers into the realm of euphoric fantasy. At the high point of Clark and Floyd’s bromance — which is to say, before the fall — the men break into a perfectly, cringily endearing rehearsed rap. “We had to feel the clearest height of what having a new friend can feel like for somebody,” Conrad says. “I wanted a big feeling of what this has come to mean for the two of them.”
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While the rap sequence crystallizes the friendship between Clark and Floyd, it also sneakily works as a kind of time jump: “How do you show that time has passed in a way the audience will feel like it’s not routine?” Conrad says. “Then it dawned on me: What if they had this established rap song that obviously they had been working on for a while? They’re not just making this up in the moment. It indicates that they’re way into it, that they’re kind of lost in their own little world. It conveys the idea that they’re spending a lot of time together, apart from the rest of the world.”
