100 Foot Wave — Cultural Digest #9
The 'other' must-see HBO show you need to be watching.
“You have to have that mental attitude to be willing to die, and die again, and again, and again. And that’s wave after wave. Day after day.”
Mike Prickett, Surf Cinematographer
It is 2019. I am sat in my friend Joe’s car in the parking lot of a strip mall in LA - think local high street but a handful of squat little brown-beige buildings with garish signage, clustered around a dodgy patch of tarmac with enough parking spots for a tenth of the vehicles it needs to cater to. To an outsider they look like a broad daylight no-no and a late-night absolutely not but these odd little hubs serving up anything from a laundrette to a meditation centre are an American standard. And once you get familiar with them you may even find nestled amongst them, a gem of an independent restaurant.
I, for example, am currently full to the brim with a top drawer noodle soup from a place that’s a regular haunt of my friend Joe (LA local) but I am starting to feel queasy because same friend Joe is showing me footage of surfer Garrett McNamara taking on a wave the size of a…… I actually don’t even know what its equivalent would be because it is too big to quantify, it is too big to comprehend. Later someone will describe it as an eight-storey building but that’s like trying to visualise how many a billion is. All I know is, the scale is disproportionate to the man. (Scroll back up to the picture at the top — for a gasp and an even better sense of scale, eyes on the people bottom right.)
The film stops playing suddenly — bad signal. As it buffers I catch myself from the outside looking in. My jaw is slack, hands clasped around it as if keeping it from falling off, knees pulled up to my chin serving the same purpose, shoulders up at my ears, eyes popping, I don’t think I’ve breathed in over two minutes. Joe pipes up: “Do you like it?” A lot of my friends ask me to litmus test their work; read a script, watch an edit, listen to a pitch. I think it has something to do with the fact that I will always tell the truth whether I want to or not, my involuntarily expressive face/body does it for me before I even have time to articulate anything verbally, but also because I am wildly, joyfully and authentically, enthusiastic. In the editing room for the second series of Fleabag, Phoebe Waller-Bridge watched me whilst I watched the first episode for the first time because she knew I wouldn’t be able to hide that immediate and visceral response. I found myself in a not dissimilar shape then, to the one I find myself in now in the passenger seat of Joe’s car as he swings the phone in a figure of eight to try to pick up better reception.
Speaking of Fleabag, that’s how I met Joe. He worked at Amazon at the time and was one of our producers from their side. He’s one of the people responsible for establishing Amazon’s streaming platform Prime Video, with shows like Fleabag of course but also Catastrophe and Transparent. You could say he has an extraordinary eye for… content? Yes, but it’s far more soulful and intuitive than that. He understands what great stories are made of.
Now running his own studio Amplify Pictures, this footage he’s showing me will form part of a pitch for their very first project, 100 Foot Wave, a documentary on big wave surfing that will eventually find its home on the venerated HBO and go on to win an Emmy. “Come on, what do you think?” I can barely speak. I will come to be hugely familiar with this footage over the next couple of years but in that moment I did what I always do in a fight or flight situation, I froze.
If you watched Free Solo the documentary following climber Alex Honnold as he prepares to climb the 3,200 ft El Capitan in California without any safety equipment or ropes whatsoever, you will know the empathic terror I was experiencing watching Garrett McNamara taking on the tumultuous, giant waves of Nazare in Portugal — formerly a small, relatively unknown fishing village, now big wave surfing Mecca — although this horror will soon turn to awe and this awe to catnip, as soon as I remember that it is not me on that surfboard. I gasp for air and choke up “I think it’s the best thing I’ve ever seen!” Over the course of the next two years I will regularly hound Joe for updates and more raw footage whilst they shoot and edit six episodes of sublime surf-dom.
Are there natural environments that you’ve always felt drawn to? I’ve never felt a particularly strong affinity to water, nor mountains actually; trees are more my vibe. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy a hike, or feel the benefits of time well-spent amongst fresh sea air but I would choose a forest over both given the option, every time. Is it the grounding energy perhaps? The nostalgia of the lost boys in Hook setting up camp in the trees? I feel at home amongst trees in a way that I don’t on a steep, rocky incline where I am a little unsure on my feet. Or in the water where I myself had a very near-miss aged 11 — I got trapped under a bodyboard and washing machined by the waves — which still prevents me almost thirty years later from risking a plunge. At one point in the documentary, Bill Sharp the World Surfing League’s General Manager talks about every surfer knowing what it’s like to get caught up, pounded and ripped apart by a 3 foot wave, let alone one that’s 60, 70, 80 foot plus. Same, Bill, same. But even then, I think this relationship between different aspects of our nature reflected within nature, runs far deeper than any superficial trepidations, PTSD or not.
Some would argue that it has its origins in nurture and the environment we grew up in. Yes, arguably, most friends of mine who grew up by the sea have often articulated how much they miss it and that they need to return to the waterside often in order to restore a sort of internal balance, but I also have friends who grew up deep in suburbia who feel that same pull towards the ocean. I dated someone who grew up in the countryside surrounded by woodland who was happiest balancing along questionable mountain ledges, as far away as you could get from ground level. I grew up in London so whilst there were parks there certainly weren’t forests but trees are what speak to my soul, they are the environment where I feel that I most comfortably belong.
“I just feel real comfortable in the ocean. Probably more comfortable than I do on the land.”
Garrett McNamara, Big Wave Surfer
I understand the compulsion to be in the environment you feel the strongest affinity to. I’m desperate to organise a trip to the actual 100 Acre Wood in Sussex, and visit the sequoia redwood forests in California but being in those environments is not inherently dangerous in the way that big wave surfing or free solo climbing is. And it is this that compels me to watch the narrative unfolding for the people that are in pursuit of these endeavours, knowing the risk that it poses. This is the part that I in no way resonate with which is what compels me to watch it even more. Their compulsion is as unstoppable as the full force of the phenomenon they seek to be in commune with. It is a supremely unique labour of love but also risk. As human observation goes, I find this endlessly fascinating. Even after a horrific injury and months of rehab, where they have narrowly escaped the jaws of death, though they may be questioning everything and they are nearly always captured on film asking “Why am I doing this?” you will find them doing it again at the earliest opportunity. They are doing it, it seems, because they have to. They can’t not. They are compelled.
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The first season charts the discovery and establishing of Nazare as a big wave surf destination alongside Garrett McNamara’s journey into, out of and then back into with fervour, professional surfing. They also debate the purity of the sport versus traditional paddle surfing - big wave surfing requires the surfer to be towed into the wave on a jet-ski which doubles as a collection vehicle once they’ve come off the wave if they’ve come off safely, or a rescue one if they haven’t.
Though Garrett is the protagonist the show is flooded with other character’s too, from surfing veteran Laird Hamilton (who invented tow surfing with Buzzy Kerbox and Darrick Doerner) to the fresh face of Justine Dupont. There are the Nazare locals, Dino, Lino and even the former Mayor, Jorge Barroso, all supporting Garrett in his quest to prove that Nazare is indeed a bonafide surf spot to the wider surfing community, and also to the understandably sceptical townspeople many of whom lost family members to the same waters, fishermen just trying to do their job.
Garrett’s brother in law CJ Macias, features too, a professional volleyball player, roped in by Garrett literally and figuratively to change career-course and pursue this sport instead. There’s also Devon’s Andrew Cotton and Al Mennie from Northern Ireland. My standout though is easily Nicole McNamara, Garrett’s wife and manager who also acts as the ‘safety spotter’ for their team — she stands atop the cliff at Nazare like an actual goddess, directing the team via walkie-talkies towards the biggest waves and managing the rescues when things go wrong. She serves as a beacon of grounded truth amongst the chaos and unpredictability of the waves.
I have a saying, you know, ride to ride another day. And I think Garrett’s saying is, you know, ride to ride today and maybe not tomorrow.
Laird Hamilton
I had the privilege of meeting Nicole last year and can vouch for her having the most extraordinary presence both on screen and off. She has borne witness, as do we the viewer, to both her husband and her brother, the aforementioned CJ, riding some of the biggest waves in recorded history, as well as experiencing the worst wipeouts imaginable and subsequent injuries, usually after her delivered foreboding was ignored. We go on their healing journeys with them too, which in and of itself makes for an incredible observation of humans in the face of adversity. Their restoration will be as spiritual as it is physical which seems to be integral in some way to surfing. The way that surfers articulate their relationship to the water, to the waves, to Mother Nature is deeply esoteric. And how could it not be? If you spend that much time in congress with nature isn’t it just inevitable that you cultivate a deep respect for its majesty and power but also a relationship akin to divine exchange? (See also, My Octopus Teacher.)
This show wasn’t widely advertised, if at all, over here in the UK for some reason, which is why I wanted to shout about it — and also because I’ve just seen a sneak peak of Season 2 and it’s phenomenal, it’s profound, it’s as transcendent as those willing to explore their relationship to a power greater than themselves.
The gift of a second season is that everyone comes back knowing what they didn’t know before. The camera work in particular is absolutely breath-taking. I wept, I gasped, I cheered, I got full shivers, I even hid behind my hands at one point. A ton of new surfers and their tow partners are introduced — who are now recognised and awarded as a pair rather than as individuals — and we go deeper with some familiar faces who only popped up momentarily in the first season. There are competitions. There are actual fights. There is the birth of a baby, that almost never was. This new season is currently airing in the States and will be arriving on UK shores soon - I will update this post as soon as a date is formally announced but in the meantime, the first season can (and must!) be gobbled up in a one and done, lather, rinse, repeat as necessary on NOW TV. I cannot recommend it highly enough. **Update: both series are now available to watch on SKY or NOW TV in the UK, so have at it!**
I think 100 Foot Wave has something for everyone and speaks to a deeply human part of ourselves. If you love nature, this show contains the best footage of the ocean you will ever see. If you love sport, these surfers are some of the greatest athletes in the world, stretching the limits of human possibility. If you love drama, this show is real time dancing on the edge of life and death. If you love people watching, big wave surfing is extreme and the people compelled to be involved with it even more so. If you’re into the esoteric, surfers are incredibly cognisant of their spirituality and joyfully not embarrassed to talk about being at one with the ocean. If science is more your thing, just you wait until they get into the infographics of how you measure a wave and why a three mile deep underwater canyon (three times the depth of the Grand Canyon people!) creates the biggest waves in the world. If you want something meditative, the waves will lull you into effortless submission. If you’re a thrill seeker, your adrenaline-junkie heart will be fulfilled. If, like me, you don’t ever see yourself partaking in extreme sports, no-way-not-on-your-nelly, live vicariously and watch other people defy death for you. Oh, and if you needed any more convincing, it’s scored by PHILIP GLASS.
I have been invited to go to Nazare during its October — March surf season, as a friend and an observer but I think what I love the most about this show is the fact that I am just a person that gets to watch not even from the clifftop, but from the comfort of my sofa. Consider me a tree person, who from an overly safe distance, could happily watch 100 Foot Waves all day.
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