Kevin Cordasco truly understood Walter White. So much so that the 16-year-old teenager inspired a crucial plot point that changed Sunday’s Breaking Bad finale.
At some level, the Calabasas, California teenager understood what Walter was going through. Cardasco suffered from neuroblastoma, a rare form of brain cancer, for seven years. But his insight had little to do with Walt’s illness, and instead hinged on his recognition of another older, deeper hurt that motivated the chem teacher turned meth kingpin, and resurfaced at the end of Episode 515. (Spoiler alert for Breaking Bad up to episode 515)
The story began in when a friend of Cardasco’s mother contacted star Bryan Cranston, who plays Walter White, telling him about the ailing teen.
“My wife and I went to see him in his hospital,” Cranston said, recalling the September visit. “We were dreading going. But Kevin brought us up. Bright, personable, and knowledgeable, he wasn’t just a fan, he was into the structure of the story, the complexity.”
Cranston arranged for other cast members, including Bob Odenikirk and Anna Gunn, to visit Cordasco at home.
But this became more than a bittersweet Make a Wish story when showrunner Vince Gilligan visited Cordasco at home later in the fall, bringing along one of the coolest Breaking Bad props, Danny Trejo’s severed head. Like Cranston, Gilligan had been dreading the visit at some level, but came away dazzled by Cordasco’s spirit and intelligence.
“I think he was our number one fan ever for Breaking Bad,” Gilligan said. “He was so smart and astute about the show.”
Gilligan arranged for Cordasco to visit the writer’s room in Los Angeles, and plans were in place to fly him to Albuquerque to film a cameo that never happened because of Cordasco’s declining health.
“I was so happy to meet him,” said writer-producer Tom Schnauz. “He was such a smart, kid so full of life. We got to hang out in the writer’s room and joke and have a good time. Vince spent a lot more time with him than we did.”
But Cordasco’s legacy moment came in that first meeting with Gilligan in October.
“At that point he was at home and I was dreading going over there,” Gilligan recalled on the show’s Insider Podcast. “But he was such a wonderful young guy. I learned about my own show from him.
“At one point I said, “What would you like to see on the show?”
“I came back and reported [what he said] to the writer’s room, and it colored our perception of the show. We added something to these final eight episodes that we wouldn’t have otherwise if Kevin hadn’t mentioned that.”
What did Kevin Cordasco tell Vince Gilligan? “I want to know more about Gretchen and Elliott.”
Gretchen and Elliott Schwartz were mentioned prominently in season one of Breaking Bad in an episode entitled “Gray Matter.” We learn that the three of them founded a company called Gray Matter when they were in graduate school. We also learn, through a flashback, that Gretchen was Walt’s girlfriend, and we’re left to assume she left him for his best friend. When that happened, Walt left the company, selling his share for $5,000.
Fast forward 25 years, and Grey Matter is now a $2 billion dollar tech company. Gretchen and Elliott are rich beyond imagining. And Walt is a cancer-stricken $43,000 a year school teacher who checks the total valuation of the company he founded on a weekly basis. Gretchen and Elliott offer to pay for Walt’s cancer treatments. Walt tells Skyler they’re paying, but instead refuses their offer.
This was a pivotal moment in the plot. Walter White was now cooking meth not because he needed to, but because he wanted to.
When Gretchen finds out about the lie, she and Walt meet and he ends their meeting with a rare, and well-earned F-bomb: “F^% you.” (Clip NSFW for unbleeped profanity.)
Walt then tells Skyler that Grey Matter is on the verge of financial collapse and Gretchen and Elliott can’t pay his medical bills.
Cordasco recognized Walt’s frustration, jealousy and envy, and even though he was only 16, understood the power of a wound this deep and how it can affect a man throughout his lifetime.
He told Gilligan, who took that idea back to the writer’s room. “We took that and ran with it.”
(Photo: Ursula Coyote/AP)
During that first meeting, Gilligan also offered C0rdasco the ultimate prize: the ending. He would be the first person outside the Breaking Bad writer’s room to know how the story ends.
“I said to him that first meeting. Do you want to know how it ends if you promise not to tell anybody? Without hesitation he said ‘No, I’m going to watch it.”
That wasn’t to be. Kevin Cordasco died on March 11.
Breaking Bad dedicated the first episode of the final eight to “Our Friend Kevin Cordasco.”
A more profound tribute came at the end of Episode 515. Having already called the DEA to turn himself in, Walt was sitting in that New Hampshire bar, sipping his last drink before the police would arrive. The bartender is flipping channels and Walt catches Gretchen and Elliott doing an interview on Charlie Rose, talking about him.
That interview set Walter White into motion. (And Andrew Ross Sorkin to his keyboard to write the faux New York Times story referred to in the script.)
Will Walt encounter Gretchen and Elliott in Episode 516? We’ll see on Sunday.
But however the Breaking Bad finale plays out, the catalyst for Walter White’s last stand will be a 16-year-old boy’s deep understanding of how a man old enough to be his father can be driven by a quarter-century-long grudge.
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