The Severance Podcast with Ben Stiller & Adam Scott - S2E10: Cold Harbor (with Ólafur Darri Ólafsson, Britt Lower, and Zach Cherry)

Episode Date: March 21, 2025

It is a momentous day — the season finale podcast is here! To break down Season 2 Episode 10, Ben and Adam are joined by Icelandic superstar Darri Olafsson, who plays Lumon’s very-own Mr. Drummond. He reveals how he balances playing a bureaucrat who is also an enforcer and how common it is to hang out with Björk in Iceland. Then, Britt Lower and Zach Cherry are back on the podcast to talk about Helly and Dylan’s monumental decisions in the finale, Ben’s love of animatronics and drumlines, and the importance of dental hygiene. Plus, they soft-launch their new podcast that’s going to give Ben and Adam a run for their money. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, Adam. Yeah? Is your experience at work a bit dysfunctional lately? I don't know. I think it's... it's... Okay, I'll take that as a yes. Your team could undergo a highly controversial surgical procedure that would mercifully sever any and all memories of that work experience from your home lives.

Or you could try Confluence by Atlassian. Oh my god. Well, if it's the choice between those two things, I think I would 100% choose Confluence by Atlassian. Oh my god, well if it's the choice between those two things, I think I would 100% choose Confluence by Atlassian. Confluence is the connected workspace where teams can collaborate and create like never before. Where teams have easy access to the relevant pages and resources their projects call for while discovering important contexts they didn't even know they needed. A space where AI streamlines the things that normally eat up their time, letting teams generate, organize, and deliver work faster. In fact, with Confluence, teams can see a 5.2% average boost

in productivity in one year. So that would equal out, like if we're playing with, like, let's just say 100%, 5.2 of those percentage points. Yeah. That's the improvement. I mean, I'm not great at math, but that sounds very close. Well, I'm doing the math in my head right now as we speak, and I think that's great.

So why not keep your team unsevered? In Confluence, the connected workspace where teams can do it all. Set knowledge free with Confluence. Learn more at Atlassian.com slash Confluence. That's A-T-L-A-S-S-I-A-N dot com slash C-O-N-f-l-u-e-n-c-e. How's it going, Ben? It's going good, Adam.

We have a voicemail call that we want to play for everybody. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's get to that. Hi, this is Kelly, and I am really needing to know by the finale if there's going to be a season three. And if there isn't a season three, I will find a doctor to perform the severance process on myself, so please do whatever it takes. To quote Dylan, I don't give three dry fucks how long it takes to make the still happen,

but please make it happen for season three. We need it. Thank you. Okay, well, first of all, I don't want anyone calling a doctor for brain surgery on our behalf. Yeah, or self-severing, which is just not a good idea. Not a good idea.

Now, the reason we're kind of sounding a little rougher here is this is a last minute call we're making to each other. Right, Ben? Yeah, it's very exciting. The news just came through, Adam. Just now? Yeah, through the coconut telegraph that is Apple. Yeah, we each got what's called a coconut telegram, which is like new technology. Yeah, it's the latest Apple product. But here's the deal. Nobody has to give any dry fucks because

we are officially renewed for season three and picked up. That's right. Yeah. We just wanted to put that at the top of the podcast now and then go to our regularly scheduled programming. But this is, we felt important enough to start out the episode with and get the news out there.

And I couldn't be more excited. Yeah, me neither. And I think everyone can just rest easy that we'll have a new season to you at some point before 2037. Yeah, 2039. Something like that. Okay, I don't want to make any promises. 2042. Okay. Guaranteed before 2042. How about that? Good. Okay, back to the show. Hey, I'm Ben Stiller. I'm Adam Scott.

And this is the Severance podcast with Ben and Adam, where we break down every episode of Severance. That's right. And today is a momentous day. It's the season finale. I can't believe it's here. I know. Not the penultimate episode, but the ultimate episode.

That's right, which is like penultimate. It's just you get rid of the penultimate episode, but the ultimate episode. That's right, which is like penultimate. It's just you get rid of the penna. So today we're gonna talk about the season two finale, Cold Harbor. It was written by Dan Erickson and directed by Ben Stiller. Yes, we've got a jam packed episode for you. First we're gonna be joined by my friend, the incredible Dari Olson, who plays Mr. Drummond.

Now, should we break down the term jam-packed, or should we just keep going? All right. What's your issue with jam-packed? Then we're going to unpack everything from the finale with our friends Britt Lauer, who plays Helly, and Zach Cherry, who plays Dylan. Yeah, and then after that, of course,

we're going to hear Zach Cherry's predictions about what's going to happen next season of the Severance. So this is going to be a bigger swing that he's going to take, but we're going to be live with him this time. So that's a whole other spin on it. Yeah, we can call him on his bullshit is what we can do. You know, he gets away with that sort of charming, fuzzy, lovable, warm guy you want to hug. But that's right. He just kind of goes off on these crazy tangents that you know

I feel like he's playing a little bit of a game Yeah, where he's like playing the kind of like silly kind of like I don't know I've got silly give it it's a little bit like a ploy they would do on the traders, right? Yes It is it's exactly like he's like carol Tom. Oh, I was gonna say Carolyn. Okay. He's okay. Sure He's like Carolyn on the traders. Oh Tom though Tom interesting. Yeah, I was going to say Carolyn. OK, he's OK. Sure. He's like Carolyn on the Traders. Oh, Tom, though. Tom. Interesting. Yeah. Sandoval. Right. Sandoval. He always thought he knew exactly what was going on.

He had the whole thing game. Yeah. Well, Zach, you should go on the next season of Traders US. I would love to see. I want to see Zach and I want to see him at the roundtable there. He would be the ultimate traitor. He really would. I feel like he would last till the end because no one would think he's a traitor. Yeah. Warm and fuzzy likable guy, but he's really he's murdering people. Speaking of murdering people, this is your big spoiler warning.

We're going to talk about everything from season two, episode 10 on this episode. So please go watch it before you listen to this. We're thrilled now to welcome our first guest today the brilliant Dari Olufsen technically named Olufar Dari Olufsen if you're going for his full name who plays Mr. Drummond Dari welcome welcome to our podcast. Thank you guys thank you. Dari thank you for being here this is a thrill. It is a pleasure. Dari, you and I have been friends for a while. Do you remember the first time we met? I do. I remember it really well. Can you remind me what happened? Because I remember seeing your audition. I saw Dari's audition tape for a role in The Secret Life of Walter

Mitty. We were doing, we were casting out of Iceland and I was really blown away. And then I'm trying to remember the first time that we met in person. I had a call back and what I remember most is that you kept saying to me like, no, just go for it because we had a fight. Like attack me kind of thing? There's stuff that reminds me of that. That also brings back memories from the final episode of our show. Yeah.

We'll talk about that for sure. Yeah, we'll talk about that. But yes, that was the first time. And I, I remember I was just like, okay, so you kept asking me to sort of just do more and that was fun. Uh, it was also terrifying. And you didn't want to break me, right? You didn't want to hurt me. I'm a big guy.

Yeah, but I'm kind of strong for a little guy, right? You are very strong. Don't get me wrong. It was also just, I mean, to be honest, I don't think we've ever discussed this, but I've been such a fan of your work. And it felt kind of unreal. And I just didn't want to be known as the guy who got a call back and then broke Ben Stiller's nose. That would have helped actually. I've been waiting for someone to break my nose, my whole career.

We had so much fun working together. You played this drunken helicopter pilot and so funny in that movie. We became friends and our families became friends and stayed in touch over the years. And do you want to talk a little bit just about your background as an actor and where you come out of? Yeah. I mean, I was born in the U S I was born in Connecticut, but my parents are Icelandic. And when I was four, I moved back to Iceland. I grew up there, went to drama school there. And honestly, when I graduated,

which is something like 27 years ago, if I would have told anyone that I would at some point work in a Hollywood film, people would have laughed me out of the room because that's just the world was different. There were no self tapes. You kind of had to live in LA or New York for anyone to know you existed. And that was good because as an actor, I really needed, I needed experience before I got any kind of real responsibility. And there are no, there used to be no agents in Iceland. So you also had to kind of had to know who was going to, you know, who got a grant from the film fund to go shoot a film and then you would reach out to

them and say, Hey, I don't mind auditioning or so I feel in many ways, I kind of lucked out. So I had to take care of myself and figure out what was important and what kind of makes you happy. Because certainly it isn't fame. I don't think that's the greatest part of what we do. I think for me, it was always to kind of try and get into a position where I could choose what I wanted to do,

kind of choose the people I wanted to work with and maybe have at least some opinion on what parts I might get. But like when I met you, I'd done one film in the US, a small part in the film called Contraband with Mark Wahlberg, which was a great experience. But honestly, after that, I kind of went home and I was like, okay, that was my one Hollywood experience, but that certainly changed.

Yeah. And then you've gone on to work with so many great directors. I mean, would you say you're the biggest star in Iceland? You know what? It's really funny because there's only like 350,000 of us, but I think I can honestly say that there are about probably around 10 actors that consistently work outside of Iceland. So I'm more than happy to share a top 10 with people.

Yeah. It's crazy to think that there's, you know, 10 actors out of 350,000 people. That's kind of a crazy ratio. There's a very small amount of people in Iceland. There's, there is something in the water in Iceland. I mean, honestly, I think a part of it is that Iceland is, or has been a fairly sort of, there's not a lot of status between people. So people interact with each other very easily. You know, Björk, who was probably the most famous Icelandic person of all time.

No, the correct pronunciation is Björk. Yeah. Sorry. How did you pronounce it? Björk. Okay. I guess. I don't think I could do that if I wanted to. Bjork the singer, she's like world famous, but if you're in Iceland, you're more than likely to meet her at a local store.

Really? Well, yeah. When we shot in Iceland for Secret Life, we had our wrap party in Iceland. She was not part of the movie, but everybody was like, are we ever gonna see Bjork? And she came to the wrap party. No way. Yeah. And then like a whole bunch of people

ended up going to her house afterwards. It was very exciting. Yeah. Wow. It was really cool. I remember being so bummed that I didn't have anything to do in Iceland in that movie. Yeah, yeah. I wanted to go so bad.

We had an adventure there. But Dari, what was your, we know each other, but like, what was your connection with Severance before you came on the show? Had you watched it? Were you aware of it? I had watched it. And you know, I had really crazy last year

where I got to be part of two series that I absolutely loved. One of them is called Somebody Somewhere. Incredible. And it's on the show. Yeah, yeah. And I had watched the two seasons of that and just absolutely, and me and Bridget are good friends and I just loved her series and getting to be a part of that was just amazing.

But then also Severance, which I absolutely loved. It reminded me honestly of Twin Peaks. Do you remember when that came out that everyone's trying to figure out what's going on in the series? And I really loved that series when I watched it back in the day, but it had the same kind of vibe of, you just kind of didn't know what was going on. And I think in many ways, Severance reminds me of that. Yeah, it's interesting to me always, like what people connect with and what questions they're asking.

And I mean, you as a character in the show, it's interesting on my end because we're always looking at ways that security and oversight work at Lumen. And it's always connected somehow with the ideology of the company too. And so we felt in season two, after Reiner was gone, there would be somebody who is in the hierarchy who, you know, kind of oversees things. And how do you see Mr. Drummond? Because he kind of oversees a lot of sort of the bureaucratic stuff that's going on at the company, you know, dealing with Milchik and Helena too as a conduit to Jane. But then he's also kind of, as we see in the last episode, the guy is also kind of an enforcer also.

First, I want to say, like, can I tell you when I first came to set the first time I came to set, I wasn't shooting, but I came to the hallways and it is the funniest. Like I had the biggest fan boy moment standing in a hallway and just going like, Oh my God, I'm in the hallway. Just, it kind of blew my mind. I loved it so much. You have a lot of hallways. Yeah, there's plenty of them.

They're pretty amazing. And Adam has explored them all. We have seen that. I remember meeting Adam when he had been running around. You were quite sort of sweaty. And I think we were probably, you're probably shooting the opening shot of 201. Yeah. Probably one of those days. But yeah, I think Drummond is, we're probably shooting the opening shot of 201. Yeah. Probably one of those days.

But yeah, I think Drummond is, you know, a sell it. He's one of these people that just absolutely does not question the company. And, um, I kind of liked the fact that it's hard to place him. I think we kind of get to see the real him in the final episode when he sort of just takes the mask off and we see sort of the monster that exists behind that mask. The disdain he has for Annie's. Absolutely. And the disdain he has even for Milchik, all the, you know, kind of everyone

around him except for Elena. You know, he, he respects her. He respects her father, of course, but he respects her and kind of looks at her like he wants to take care of her. He respects her father, of course, but he respects her and kind of looks at her. Like he wants to take care of her and he feels sorry for her. Yeah. It's interesting because Drummond is in a foreboding, intimidating person. First of all, it's interesting because you're such a gentle, kind person, just it's such a polar opposite of Drummond, but he's scary. It's such a polar opposite of Drummond, but he's scary. And part of that is your voice and kind of this booming, deep voice. And when you talk as Drummond, everybody listens, like it kind of, you know,

takes over whatever room you're in. How did you develop what Drummond would sound like? Was that something you guys talked out together? Yeah, we had a conversation about that. I kind of also loved that there's at least two scenes where he hardly says a word, which I think is also amazing. Absolutely loved shooting that scene in the boardroom where he's just kind of in the scene, but not. interesting because of the body language where you're sort of there sitting while the conversation between Helena and Cobell is happening. And it's just so clear that you're like, you have to be there and that you're sort of taking in everything that's going on yet silently. And I feel like that was a great way, I think, to start to introduce this character and not

have to really explain who you were because I think, you know, people kind of figured that out. But you also kind of have these great moments of humor in the show too in the performance review with Milchik. Just you know the question of like do you want to fill out the lunch menu? It's like a very dry sense of humor I think. And then also you with Mauer later in episode seven when you say why are you wearing that stupid sweater? Yeah. And working with Robbie was, that was so lovely.

That was such a nice, such a nice day. Both of you have really distinctive voices and are able to do a lot, I think, with very little too, in terms of your presence and the way you just decide, you know, the choices that you make. But I think, I want to give some credit credit that I remember we were shooting the review, the performance review. And my instinct was that he was harder on him, Milchik, because I remember you,

you came in and we had this conversation of softening up the performance. And I, when I watched it, I was like, okay, it was exactly the right way to take. And I think it makes it much more weirder, like to be told off that you put the paperclip wrong way. It's just so, it's just so insane. Yeah, you're right. I mean, you also have the ability to kind of like very subtly shift your intonation or attitude and it could become very intimidating. There's a lot of stuff in the show where I just felt I needed that shift your intonation or attitude and it can become very intimidating.

There's a lot of stuff in the show where I just felt I needed that guidance. You know, very often you can show up and you can come and do your work. But when you're doing something specific as Severance, I can, honestly, when I watched the episode, I'm so happy to have, of course, what you need, which is your director and showrunners and writers and everyone around you. But it's kind of amazing that because you're just one tiny cog in this ongoing saga, and it's just really important that all the pieces are there together.

All right, now's a good time for us to take a quick break, but when we come back, we'll be talking all about the season finale. Hey, Ben here. I know you love listening to podcasts, so I wanted to introduce you to a brand new show called Campus Files. It's a weekly series that digs into the archives of American colleges and universities to take us behind some of the most outrageous scandals in the history of academia.

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employers prefer the most based on G2. See how much faster and easier hiring can be with ZipRecruiter. Four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. It's better than a waffle party. Just go to ziprecruiter.com slash severance right now to try it for free. That's ziprecruiter.com slash S-E-V try it for free. That's ziprecruiter.com slash S E V E R A N C E. Dari, we should talk about the finale and everything, cause you're really front and center in the finale.

You know, you're kind of there just waiting for Mark to finish Cold Harbor. And, you know, once Cold Harbor is done, you and Lorne meet up and she has little Emil with her. Is that how she pronounced it? Emil? Emil, Emil the goat. Yeah. Beautiful. Should we listen to that scene really quick? Yeah. As it verve. It does.

Wiles. The most of its flock. This beast will be entombed with a cherished woman whose spirit it must guide to Kiel's door. Is it up to the task? So what was it like working with this little baby goat? Wow, those goats were cute. That was one of my first questions to Ben was like, what's up with the baby goats?

But at the same time, don't tell me. Did he give you an answer? Well, the answer is you're gonna try to kill one. It was so cute. And also working with Gwendolyn was so much fun. Yeah, Gwendolyn's the best, right? That scene, you guys did such a great job with, I was gonna say like, wow, that dialogue's really light and naturalistic.

But you really did such a great job with that scene because it was an important thing to pull off that, OK, there's this ritual that happens. And I remember when we shot that scene, I didn't really say anything to you other than we started to block it. And you kind of went into the space with Gwendolyn, and you both sort of just kind of adopted these movements and the way that you stood

behind the altar and the way that you went to the gun and just the ceremonial nature of it and sort of the flourishes you had. I love when you, you know, we came up with this idea that there's like a secret door in the hallway and when you pushed open that door, it was such a great just motion of it with the music, and then the wind that kind of like flew across your face from opening the door. I think I tell you this, it reminded me of those old Maxell commercials.

I think that was like a cassette commercial for Sound where a guy would sit in a chair and the speakers would blast wind at him. So cool. But you guys were so great with that. And then we had really the other big scene, obviously, is this fight between you and Mark that we'd never done a fight on the show.

We wanted to go for that. And just the way you guys figured out how to get into that, because it really had to kind of escalate. And throughout the series, we've never, ever shown any physical kind of intimidation with innies. We've never, right? It's all been sort of mental.

And we felt like at a certain point, if one of the Lumen employees actually was physical with Mark, that would be a huge, even just, you know, how do you begin that? And it started out by you just kind of pushing them up against the wall and then that one punch right in the nose, which you guys sold so well. To me as a viewer, it's shocking to see like, oh wow, he's punching him because we've never seen anything like that. I remember you wanted it to be quick and brutal, but start small and then escalate.

And it was a brutal couple of days. What do you think Dari? They were. I did my last shot, the, you know, falling out of the elevator. Yeah. And that's after that, my back, which is like someone had to help me stand up. Right. But I loved it.

I don't do many fight scenes, but that fight scene is epic. I have to say though, Adam, again, I'm sorry. When I turned around and threw you into the wall. That was my fault. That was 100% my fault because we're talking about when Dari grabs me and slams me up against the wall and we had worked it out over and over again and practiced it over and over again. And part of my responsibility was while he's swinging me for one of my arms to come up and block my body so I

could get slammed into the wall at full speed but it would guard my head and the rest of my body from the wall and my arm just got like caught behind me or something and I didn't get it up in time. So I hit it with my head and I believe that's the shot that's used in the show, right? It definitely is. Yeah, I remember, you know, first of all, everyone was like, oh my God, Adam, you know,

I felt really bad. And then when everyone knew that you were okay, I remember looking at bad, bad, bad, I was like, oh, we got that. Yeah. Really happy. I was happy. I have to say, and I was, I was glad you were okay, but it looked incredible.

Yeah, totally worth being concussed. Also, I just have to credit Dean Neistat, our stunt coordinator. Yeah. And my friend Phil Nielsen came in to help with that fight, who I'd worked with as our stunt coordinator and second unit director on Tropic Thunder, go back that far with him and escape at Dannemora. And he's just so much fun. He's one of my favorite people. And you guys all worked really hard on that scene, rehearsing it and the stunt people who were in there too, and Gwendolyn.

It's really, you know, I really believe when you're choking him out at the end there, Adam, it looks like you're really, uh, like you're, you, you did something to really make it look like you were about to Oh my God, your eyes, you know, that's uncomfortable thing. I just did that the other day again to choke an actor. Yeah. And you know, usually we were always like, yeah, no, just go for it. I thought we had a no choke clause in your contract where you couldn't choke any other actors except on severance.

Well, I'll have them cut it out. It's probably there. What was it? Do you think it was like three days of the fight scene? Because you're right. It is epic because there's our fight and then Gwendolyn comes in and it's a whole nother little mini fight scene that Gwendolyn was incredible. She's a whole nother little mini fight scene that starts. Gwendolyn was incredible.

She really sold it. Oh my God. I mean, you guys both sold it and... No, but Gwendolyn knows exactly what she's doing. Exactly. She was, she's such a professional. Totally. Yeah.

And then the two of you had to get in that elevator together and do the bloodiest scene ever in Severance. Yeah. It was a blood bath in there. It was pretty wild. I mean, I feel very honored to, you know, finally, when you see blood, you do see blood. There was a ton of blood. It was a lot.

That was one of the places where I'm like, okay, we're going places. We haven't gone on this show before, but it also felt like, you know what, this is kind of exciting and right for this episode. Episodes have different feelings to them and different themes to them. Going back to season one where we had that one moment of violence with Grainer, it felt like this was sort of building on that. I think it's very unexpected. It feels to me when that gun goes off

and you guys really, again, just did a great job of that. And it was fun to shoot. When we were doing the actual gun going off and the blood coming out, we did it three or four times maybe, but I remember one of the times it was like a hose shooting me directly in the face with blood. It was insane.

And that's obviously not the one in the show. But I would love to, I never looked at the dailies from that. I would love to see that because it was nuts. How much blood was it? It was a little too much pressure. It reminded me of the Dan Akroyd doing Julia Child getting cut on Saturday Night Live back in the day. She's like, oh Lord, I've done it now, now I've done it. Or like a Monty Python, you know, Holy Grail.

I remember Judy Chin, our makeup designer and those guys coming over and just like, what are we gonna do? Yeah, there's nothing we can do. Soaked in blood. And then Adam, you're like blood soaked for the rest of the episode. Yeah, that's right.

Every morning I had to come in and put on these crusty blood clothes. Yeah. But it was fun. Yeah, I also think that it's seeing a level of violence and like you said, the true colors of Drummond there underneath that we really haven't seen ever at Lumen because everything is sort of intimated,

but this raw, ugly violence that is at the heart of it, that is now, you know, now that we have seen and has been exposed. And I think it's sort of like, to me, the end of the episode kind of goes towards that tonally, even in the last image, and you know, we're in a place we haven't been in terms of that. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. I'm really excited to see what happens next season. So are we. Yeah, man. I'm excited too. And I love you, love working with you. I'm so glad you've been a part of the show and thanks for coming on the podcast. Just right back at you.

Yeah. Thanks, Dari. Thank you. I'll see you soon, guys. It's time for us to break down the finale, but we couldn't do it alone. Britt Lauer, who plays Helly and Zach Cherry, who plays Dylan are on the podcast. Britt, Zach, thank you for being here. And hello.

Hello. Hello. Adam, you don't, you don't seem that happy about breaking down the finale. Hello Adam, you don't you don't seem that happy about breaking down the finale You know, I think I'm just a little wary of having Zack on the show That's fair. Yeah. Yeah, cuz I feel like he's gonna make some of his sort of like innocent funny kind of like hey I'm just a guy with crazy ideas comments I'm just a lovable guy and I'm gonna encourage listeners to reach out to Ben and Adam about dental hygiene.

That's right, listeners, if you haven't had a chance yet, make sure to reach out to Ben and Adam and let them know how your teeth are doing. Thank you, thanks. You know, Zach and I have just been recording our podcast just prior to this all morning. So all of our good bits are gonna be tied up. I got my energy out.

What podcast are you guys recording? What are you talking about? Zach, do you wanna tell them? We had a podcast we were recording throughout the production of season one and two. Yep, it's yet to be titled, but. You haven't titled it? Yeah, and we haven't released an episode.

The working title, it's called Soup and Smoothies. Yeah. Contractually, we have it so that nobody else from Severance can have a podcast. Oh, too bad. Severance, that mentions Severance. You could call it like the podcast, or Soup and Smoothies with Zach and Britt,

and not talk about Severance. You don't talk about Severance, though, right? You just talk about other stuff. We kind of mostly not talk about Severance. You don't talk about Severance though, right? You just talk about other stuff. We kind of, we mostly recap. Say the word Severance. We recap each episode of Severance. Okay. And we play a ton of clips from your show.

It's mostly just your show. And then we kind of talk before and after. You recap our podcast. Primarily we break down the food that is eaten on Severance and the types of food that people who work on Severance like to eat. So it's like soup, yeah, soup and smoothies and eggs and melons and eggs and melons. That's right. So you guys, we're going to go through the finale.

What was it like for you guys watching the finale? Because, Zach, I know that you don't really watch the show until it's out on the air. And Britt, I'm not sure what your interpretation and feeling of watching the last episode. I want to know, Britt, when do you watch the show? How do you watch it? I like to imagine when we're filming it

that that's the show, that the camera that's in my eyeballs is the show. So it's POV. Yeah, it's just purely POV. No, I think I watched them all when we were in Brazil doing Comic-Con. Right. In like one sitting,

at least like the second half of the show. In Portuguese or? No, no, when we were in Brazil, not. Britt only watches the show in Portuguese. Although I am really curious about the voice actors who play Helly and Dylan and Mark in the other countries, I'm so curious as to how they sound. Me too, we need to have a meetup.

Yeah, I haven't heard it dubbed into other languages. Pretty easy, I think you just select whatever language you want and you can watch it in any of those languages and find out how they sound. Really? Oh my gosh, he's so smart. Wow. So what language do you like to watch, Den Adam?

I primarily like watching it in Mandarin. Mandarin? Cool. And do you approve of the actor who does your voice? Well, I do the Mandarin. Oh. Yeah. But I think all the actors,

I've watched the entire season in every single language and they're all great. That's great. So you know all the languages? Yep, well, yeah. I'm fluent in all languages, yeah. Who's the Irish actor who does you? Oh yeah, they do it in all dialects too, which is cool.

So, okay. So Zach, are you being diplomatic? Oh no, I was just letting Britt answer. No, I loved watching it. It was really exciting to see everything. It was really fun seeing how it all kind of came together. I also, the band, I ran into one of the guys from the band at Annette's game and he was like, yo, I can't wait until that comes out. And then he was with a bunch of kids.

He was in charge of a kids band that was performing at halftime. And then as I walked away, he was like, we're gonna fuck Mr. Milchick up. So I was excited to see them again and just like, yeah, it was great. It was awesome. They did an amazing job.

Oh, they're so good. That band we put together. Yeah. That was like the greatest week of our lives. Just being surrounded by a marching band. I can't think of anything better. There's nothing more exciting and innervating than hearing like a drum core in a marching band. I love it so much.

Actually, that's one thing when you go see the Nets where they have that drum core that comes out and that drum line, they're so good. I wish the Knicks had something like that because those guys are amazing. I also, the first time I watched it, it was really fun seeing Tramiel do his thing with the animatronic here. That was like, that I was-

That's so fun. That brought such joy to me. That was so, so bad. All of that, the song, the, we should start just going through the episode. Let's go through the episode. Let's go through the episode. All right, we start at the beginning, we're down in MDR,

we pick up where the last episode left off with Jay Meegan visiting Helly, so let's listen to that. What a funny speech you gave at the party. I'm gonna party. I'll miss cross with you after. Let's throw a tin of candies. God, you're fucking weird. What was it like for you shooting that, Britt? Because I remember that day very well. And you and Michael Sibere, who plays

Jane, just did such a great job with that scene. Because the dialogue, when you listen to it and look at it, it's almost like he's in a Shakespearean play, and you're in a sitcom. You know what I mean? He's saying these things, and you're just throwing back these comebacks at him. But yet, you guys make it work tonally.

Yeah, he's so incredible. He's so chilling. It's like the hair stands up on the back of your neck when he starts speaking. And I remember I said to you, Ben, I was like, Ben, when he walks in, I need a weapon. And it hadn't been written into the scene, but I was like, I just think Helly needs to like,

she just wants to fight him immediately. There's something about him that she's like, she just has a physical response. That became a really important part of the scene. And I think it really helped sort of orient us as like, for me, it's such a big deal that Jane was coming into MDR, you know, anytime a new character comes into a space they haven't been in, it just felt very weird. So like you, it's almost like- Especially him too, coming into MDR. That is a huge deal that he's walking in. Huge deal. Exactly. It kind of reminded me of like when you picked up the stapler when Burt came into MDR in the first season.

Yeah, because we're so used to only having us and Milchik and Ms. Wong down there and seeing him on there as a viewer was very unsettling. Seeing him like in that space. It was like, oh. Yeah, it's just like this dynamic between Heli and Jane that started in the last episode of season one. Then since then, he has seen that you were not Helena when he talked to him in the bathroom

and he seems very interested in you. All these things you do, like when you tell him he's gonna burn in hell, it just makes him love you more, which is just so scary and weird. Yeah, and Helly doesn't have to pretend to be Helena in this scene, so she doesn't have to hold back.

I now, with my daughter, I'll sometimes just text her, I do not love my daughter. Oh no. Text me back, thanks a lot. You know what? I should try that. I mean, it's pretty heavy for him to say that about Helena. Yeah.

And it also, I think it's pretty, it kind of is educational for the audience to understand, right, what you're dealing with there and what we saw in episode nine. Well, I think it's probably, I think it's probably the first time that Heli has any sense of empathy for Helena. You know, I think it's maybe the first insight she has into the fact that Helena's life is pretty isolated and trapped and tortured. I love that line, you sound like a great dad. It's so funny.

But it's so true, like, Jesus, what a number he did on this person. And Helly's really getting a peek into. You also find out that he's sired others in the dark, which is really crazy. He's a pretty scary person. Yeah. I like him. Eleanor might be the child that he treats the best.

We don't know how he treats any other children. Yeah. Yeah, or if he even knows them. So outside of Lumen, what we pick up with at the beginning of the episode is that Mark and Devin and Cobell are at the birthing cabin, right? And they sort of lay out this plan for Mark to go down to the testing floor and to save Gemma. It's a lot that we have to kind of set up there in a quick amount of time. And Adam, you have to then go into

this scene with yourself. Yeah. Hey, I guess you know who I am. I think you've spoken with Devin and Mrs. Silber, Miss Gobell. So you know what it is that we're asking. But the first thing I need to say to you is that I am so sorry. You know, I created you as a prisoner and as an escape. prisoner and is an escape. Lumen told me you'd be happy that innies are content and because I took their word for it you've been living a nightmare for two years." Yeah, I remember this just being

like, okay, how are we gonna do this? And we shot for a few days, but I remember at the beginning when we kind of got on that set, which is beautiful by the way, Jeremy really outdid himself with that cabin set with that fireplace and everything, it's really cool. Once we started kind of going through it and being like, okay, this is the innie, this is the Audi and this is where we'll be mapping out physically where we're going,

the scene itself started shifting a bit. Yeah, we had to rehearse it a lot. It was one of those scenes that we were in the writing, we're looking at, like, what is the core of this scene? And so there was a lot of work on the scene as you would rehearse it with yourself. And it was usually you sit in there and rehearse with another actor.

Adam had to rehearse this thing with himself. And it's a long scene. And then we'd be questioning like, well, you know, what would Audemar say to Iniemark when he says this and what's Audemar's attitude and, you know, all of the progression of this scene. And then we had to sort of figure out what the blocking would be for it.

And then we had to kind of lock it in on Friday because we were gonna start shooting it on Monday. And it was our first shooting that we were doing post the strike, I remember that. So it had been a long time. And you had to commit all this to memory. But also we had to lock it in because once we shot one side of it,

we couldn't start adjusting the dialogue anymore because it was locking in the other side. Right, you couldn't improvise anything because you couldn't respond to it yourself. Then you had to record video messages to yourself on both sides that you could then listen to when you're playing either Audi Mark or Any Mark. And it was, I use the term mind numbing because just for you, it must've been incredibly hard. And for us, just trying to keep track of all the angles and how we were going to put it together. But when Jeff and I put it together in the editing room,

I just remember every time I would watch it, I just would get pulled into the discussion that was going on, which I thought was a good sign, that I was just getting pulled into your dialogue. Right. And also, you and Jess, I remember, it was interesting watching you guys map it out and figure out how to make it. Because, you know, it's one person kind of having this conversation with themself.

It could get boring, but you guys like keeping it visually interesting with all the moves you make and all the stuff with the camera and everything. It's really fun to watch how you guys keep that ball in the air visually. Yeah, I feel like that's one of those scenes where you should sort of like, like you shouldn't be thinking about the camera or like what you're seeing because what you're doing is so interesting and you just wanna kind of keep it very clear

who's talking to who. So we just made like very simple choices, like Innie Mark is gonna be looking from right to left and Audi Mark will be looking from left to right the whole time. Right, and Audi Mark is outside, Inimark is by the fire. Audi Mark's outside, Inimark's inside and then we knew that we'd have the video message itself to sometimes cut to but just keeping it simple like that for

screen direction and then figuring out when you want it to stand up and actually and I always thought it was interesting that your instinct as Mark would be to stand up when you get upset as Audi Mark, but then any Mark gets upset at hearing what Audi Mark says and he stands up. And so you kind of both stand up at the same time and it kind of matches that action. And that was important to figure out, I think, for you, like what felt like what was the right build to get to that end moment the moment when Audi mark sort of gives away how

Desperate he is for any mark to help him and you start to feel that Audi mark in some ways trying to get any mark to Do what he wants no matter what any mark really wants. Oh Hey Miss Google tell me you you like someone down there Miss Covell told me you like someone down there. Helena Egan, right? Any names, Helena? Honestly, I love that experience. So now, you can imagine

like what you and Helena have, but multiply thousands of days of joy and arguments and passion, then you can see why I have to get my wife back. I have to have her back. That moment when you say, hey, I heard you fell in love with, I think her name's Helene, which kind of reminds me, Britt, of that moment in the episode six scene when you're at the Chinese restaurant. Yeah, I was thinking about that same thing when I was rewatching it the other night.

I was like, oh, that's a little echo there. No one can get Mark's wife or girlfriend's name correctly. Like, what is going on? Those scenes were also so fun as a viewer and as someone who wasn't there for those scenes, both the scene in the Chinese restaurant and this one, because it was like the first time these sets of characters got to talk to each other.

So that was so exciting to finally see like your Innie and your Audi communicate somewhat directly. Like there was still the video camera in between, but that was like so satisfying to get to see you have that conversation. And I want to talk a little bit about when Dylan starts to communicate with his Audi too, because that happens later in the episode.

But before we get to that, there's the scene after you finish talking to yourself that then Cobell has to explain to you what's going on. She says the numbers are your wife, and she basically breaks down what's going on. She says the numbers are your wife and she basically breaks down what's going on as much as we've ever known. What do you see every day when you look at them? Why? We feel things.

What do you feel? Different things. Sometimes sadness. Woe. Fragile. Malice. Dread. The flowers dried.

So you're saying the clusters are tempers? A lot of information happening in this birthing cabin. Yeah, and I think Dan and Bo and Mark, they did a really good job of taking all of this really information heavy stuff and kind of embedding it in character and making it important that they say these things to each other. So it just doesn't feel like endless exposition. Yeah. What was it like for you guys? Like, Zach, I'm curious, like someone who famously doesn't like to watch the show until the end or I don't't know if we know if you read the scripts or not. We know we don't know.

I know I read them for him. It reads them to me. OK, do you have the scripts right to you? So for you as a viewer, what are you taking into there? Because we were thinking about how much information is dispersed and what is the sort of the core information? What's the least amount of information? What do we want the audience to kind of like think about?

But then also you don't want to give them too much there too. Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of it is confirmation of stuff that you've sort of been feeling and like getting hints of like getting confirmed by Cobell that, oh, the numbers are your wife. They're related directly to her. I think that's something that this season you kind of have started to feel pretty sure of.

So it was this fun moment of like, yes, okay, that is what's going on. And like, now let's kind of find out what happens now that the characters know that. Right. Yeah, I felt like I was excited to kind of see Innie and Audi Mark's intelligence and how they are just a little bit different.

Like they're both hyper-intelligent, but they think about things slightly differently and you're able to really see those subtle differences when they're like really up against each other. And I thought it was really interesting the way that Audie Mark makes all these assumptions about the Innie that then Innie Mark is able to kind of defend himself and refute. Yeah. I think that what ends up being the straw that breaks camel's back is this

Audi Mark not having the self-awareness to know how condescending he's being towards this person, not realizing that he's pushing it a little too far and treating this person like they're a little kid or less intelligent that they are. I have one question when that happens and he goes into the elevator. At that point for you, Zach and Britt, were you like where are you feeling your allegiances as viewers? Are you rooting for Audi Mark or Any Mark at that point?

Yeah, I mean, I think that scene does a great job of balancing out their separate but parallel. But you're rooting for Any Mark. Does that, what? You're rooting for Any Mark to get to Helly, right? Well, I guess Any Mark's sort of stating the thesis for all of the Innis in this episode, really. He's kind of saying like, why does your need? Like why does it eclipse my need? Yeah, exactly.

Like Dylan is going through the same experience with his Audi. Like why does his Audi have more of a say than he does? Same with, as we'll get to in the sort of end of the episode, like Helly's thesis statement to the band members as well. It kind of like, that's the through line. Yeah. All right, this is a perfect moment to take a quick break.

We'll be back right after this. The MDR team continues to search for answers as they try to piece together memories from the overtime contingency. But luckily, you don't have to take a mind-erasing elevator to work every day. So your workplace productivity can be much simpler with Confluence by Atlassian. Confluence is the connected workspace where teams can collaborate and create like never before. Where teams have easy access to the relevant pages and resources their projects call for,

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And then Milchik shows you this response you got from your Audi. He writes you this note. Dear Innie, I've read your request and organized my response into three points. Point one, fuck you. Gretchen is my wife and my beloved, and your actions with her were deeply fucking indecorous.

Point two, I get it. She's perfect. And given our shared physiology, it tracks that you'd agree. Here's the thing. I've never been an impressive person. So when Gretch told me that you're like this self-assured badass, I don't know. It stung. So I guess point three is, I hope someday she sees in me what she sees in you.

How was that for you, that experience of playing that scene and Dylan sort of Finally connecting at least in some way with his Audi. Yeah, it was interesting and I think Dylan's any and Audi They actually have like kind of a shared set of goals that they figure out as the season goes on which is like being the best version of themselves and they They see things in each other that they kind of want to have, you know, like the any see stuff in the out, he wants in the out, he sees stuff in the any that he wants. And I think for them, luckily, there isn't this their love

triangle is with the same person. So there isn't as much of a kind of like tension of like, who are we going to choose? Because they both love Gretchen. So they're kind of able to reach this understanding of like, hey, you know, I kind of need you down there because I can't really do what you do. And also, you have reminded Gretchen of these things that I used to be. And so maybe I can kind of rediscover that a little bit. And then, you know, the Innie also reaches this conclusion of like there is part of me that is Helping out there and so even if I can't directly be a part of this relationship with Gretchen I can kind of like contribute in the ways that I have been and also I can kind of maybe help this Audi

Get back a little bit of his of his groove I guess and I do think it was interesting also for me over the course of the season They became a little more alike. Like the Innie moved a little towards the Audi and the Audi moved a little towards the Innie. And this is kind of that final moment where they kind of both realized that. I feel like, you know, that coming together

of the Innie and the Audi is something that's very unique to Dylan in this season of the show. And I feel like for me it was really interesting to see explored not having to have this huge delineation between an Indian and an Audi. And obviously the realization for any Dylan that he's not this big famous person on the outside or his life isn't better than his life is on the inside.

And the empathy that he ends up having for his Audi through this shared love of his wife I also love that we have the one moment in the show where Dylan takes off his glasses Yeah, I don't know if you've done that on fallout or not But I'm just wondering is have you taken the glasses off in other shows? Not not a ton honestly Yeah, that might be a first. That might be your first, in terms of actually taking them off.

I've done like one job where I didn't wear them at all. Really? Yeah. You didn't have glasses at all, is that what you're saying? Yeah, I didn't wear glasses at all, but I didn't take them off in a scene. So yeah, you're right.

Well, that was pretty exciting. Zach, I have a question for you. Yeah. Zach, was that your handwriting in the letter? Yeah, that was my handwriting. I think that's one of my favorite parts about it. It just, I can feel like your character in your handwriting. Yeah. Did you do that on purpose? It was sort of just my handwriting. It wasn't a major character choice for the handwriting, but I think the way we shot it, there were sometimes where you're actually seeing me write it.

So they just had me kind of do it over and over. But it was nice to have that there. And now, you know, my sort of elementary school teachers, if they're watching, they can kind of see that I've made no progress. And then I still have the same style that I had when I first learned the craft. I really love that when we're hearing you read the letter,

we're seeing images from your Audi's life too. Yeah. It's like a love letter really. It's like a love letter to yourself. Yeah. It's so beautiful. Yeah, to yourself. So then you guys, Mark and Heli, they get to MDR

and it's all like scary green lighting and the Keurigen statue. And basically you're gonna complete the file and Heli is gonna watch. And you guys, I mean, you have these final scenes together as Mark is headed towards completing the file of not knowing what's gonna happen, except that you know that you have to do something.

But if you get her out, maybe that will take down Lumen, like his sister said. And maybe you could do this combining thing. Well, yeah, but he could be a total liar. What if he's not? At least you'll have a chance at living. Yeah, but I want to live with you. You know, there's so much beneath what's going on between the two of you there, and I think

you guys did a beautiful job with that scene. How was that shooting that for you guys? I remember it being just a really kind of emotional day. Firstly, the lights were low and were very rarely in the dark in MDR. So it already created this mood of, you know, like there was sort of an ending coming. And I think we'd been working on the show

for like four or five years and in this room that we've had so many scenes, so many memories in. I remember at one point, Ben, you came to give me a note. It was like in a very quiet part of the scene and your eyes were welling up and it choked me up to see. I was getting choked up watching what you guys were doing because it was very emotional. Yeah, and then it had this like knock on effect. Like I couldn't, like I couldn't stop crying

and just looking across just that environment and feeling this was essentially like a by scene. It was really emotional. Yeah, really emotional. And you guys, you know, the scene of Zach, of you in the room reading the letter, and then the two of you having this sort of final conversation, it was really... And you guys were just doing such good work.

I mean, like you said, there was a lot of history there already built into it, but that we're finally at this moment of shooting this scene. Yeah. I remember just being... It's so sad that these two have to do this. There's really no other choice. And I remember I'm looking at the computer screen, finally looking over at you, Britt,

and you were just a wreck when I finally looked over at you. And it was so sad. And I felt like we were just really connected. And it was towards the end of shooting. And so we were all just really in it. We were just in the show and it was our whole lives. We were just there all the time, all of us. And so this really meant a lot.

This moment was a, it was a big moment. We have to fucking say goodbye and it was super sad. I think it was like time traveling for me. It was like traveling back in time and forward in time at the same time. Like imagining the first scene we ever shot in MDR and then time traveling and imagining the last scene that we'll ever shoot in MDR whenever that may be. And then, you know, it's like, Oh my gosh, I'm 16 and now I'm my age and now I'm 70. And, you know, just feeling that kind of timelessness that was like baked into the writing. That's actually the timeline I've had working on the show from 16 to 70.

And then basically the lights go down, you finish the file and the smoke comes out of the incident MDR, the serious Alan Parsons project song plays. Revel now in the fruit of your labors, and hail your earthbound steward, your very own floor manager. You're saying. Yeah, just. I also, I did want to say,

when Tramell runs out of the room after leaving the letter with Dylan, that's one of the funniest moments of the show for me. He just sprints out of there. That made me laugh really hard. I think he only did it, I think he only did it one take. It was the first take that we used because the camera doesn't even know

that he's gonna do that. He just runs out. It's so good. It's really funny. Because he's late and he's got a lot to do on this day and he's gotta get ready for the celebration. He has to change and yeah. He's gotta change into his marching band.

And he's excited. He finally got rid of Miss Wong. This place is his and yeah, he's got to change into his band, marching band. And he's excited. He finally got rid of Miss Wong. This place is his and he gets to do the thing. Except he is feeling, I mean, look, it is post the Drummond scene in 209 and he's definitely feeling a lot of conflicting feelings towards the company, I think. And that's why the comedy act with the Cure statue doesn't really go probably as planned. It's an honor to receive your barbs, Mr. Egan. The legacy you've left behind is truly and irrefutably larger than life.

You mean my company? No. I mean this wax statue that's five inches taller than you actually were. Thank you for that feedback. Seth. Ben, you got to be the animatronic, right? Does everyone know that? Well, I got to, yeah, Doug Coleman, our special effects supervisor, made a remote control for that animatronic, right? Does everyone know that? Well, I got to, yeah, Doug Coleman, our special effects supervisor, made a remote control for that animatron. And I love animatrons. I grew up, I'd be like, I'd go visit Disneyland,

Hall of Presidents. Anything with an animatron makes me happy. And he had the remote control that controlled the arms and the neck, the turns. And so I would do the remote control. But then we had Mark Geller, who is Kier Egan, on set reading with Tramiel. So he was doing the lines so he could get the timing. And Tramiel just played that scene with so, there's just so much going on underneath. Oh, one of my favorite

things to watch, because we watched him do it many, many times, him losing his patience a little bit with the animatronic doll and poking fun at him was not landing particularly well with Milchik. Him trying to cover that up and just continue on, it's so specific and so good. It was also fun shooting your reactions to it. Just watching you guys have to kind of assimilate and kind of take in this weird reality

after that super emotional scene. Which was really hard to act because it was actually super funny and interesting and we had to pretend it was terrifying. How many times have you had to do that reaction in the show of like, what the fuck is going on? Yeah, what the hell? And then, you know, he has to cart off the statue because it's not over because the

final celebration moment is going to be the marching band choreography environment. And this was probably the most daunting idea for us to put 100 marching band people in MDR and just what would that even feel like, what would that reality be? In a way, it's sort of like, in Citizen Kane, there was a whole marching band scene and I've been a huge, I'm a fan of that movie,

Drumline, that Nick Cannon movie. I could watch that all day. I just love it. That was a really exciting idea. And then we put together this marching band. It's so good. But we had to really figure this thing out. I mean, it was crazy shooting it.

And Tramell, once again, Can do anything. Busting out the moves. His moves. And he's such an instinctual actor. It was so interesting for me to watch him work with the choreographer and then for him to like, he just sort of owned these moves. But also him having that baton and him having that to work with was really fun. Yeah.

And then you guys had to sort of be intimidated by this marching band too. But the marching band, was it like five days they were working with us there? They were there a while. They were incredible. Incredible. We had to figure out what the choreography was, of course how to shoot it, like try to figure out how to make it feel claustrophobic and all that. But I do remember we had to basically build an MDR set on another stage that had no ceiling so that we could put the camera

way up high to get the overhead when they put up the cards that say, mark 100% that nobody sees. And then the hallways, those narrow hallways, and you shooting them marching down the hallways. Yeah, that was experimenting, like how many tubas can we fit in the hallway or how many? For me also, like one of my favorite moments, two moments in that scene at the end are you, Britt, when you have to get up on the desk and really basically start to rally the troops

almost literally. Yeah. This desk used to have four seats. Our friend Irving is gone, and they want our whole department gone. If he gets out, we're dead. They're gonna turn us off like fucking machines. You've seen them do it. I know you've lost friends too. And you could be next.

You could be next. They give us half a life and think we won't fight for it. Right, Milchik? Your speech is so good. It's so good. And that moment when the lights go off and the alarm turns on and that moment where, Heli, you know that the plan has gone through and that he's reached her. Right.

I think, you know, the way that speech is written is that she's remembering Irving as she's standing on the desk. She's like, our friend is gone. And you know, in the process of that, I think she kind of discovers this argument, which is like, they're giving us half a life. Why shouldn't we fight for it? Yeah, well, you bring it back to friendship because Irving, you're bringing up Irving and Dylan, after reading that letter is sort of motivated right to

come back and it's like the group kind of comes back together there and you have that heroic moment of pushing the vending machine in front of the door. I loved that when he came in and saved the day. Yeah. Dylan's like Han Solo. Yeah, that's what I've been modeling the character after the entire show is Han Solo.

So it was nice to finally get that moment, but I do think, you know, this season Dylan kind of is isolated and he has neglected his connections with the MDR folks. And then he reads that letter and he kind of decides, well, I'm going to be here. So if I'm going to be here, let me get back to my friends and like be in here with them. Yeah.

Can I ask you guys what you thought this whole revelation of what Cold Harbor is, what they're doing to Jemma down there and that scene where she has to go in and try to disassemble the crib, how did that resonate with you? To me, it felt like they've been testing out this process of severance and then they put this moment in front of her that is tied to like one of the most emotional and like Hard moments of her life And so this is kind of the final test of will even a memory and emotion that strong break through

I'm your husband Okay Your name is Gemma Scout. We've been married for four years. No. We were. We had a life together. Don't speak to that man.

He's here to hurt you. And if you come with me right now, we can get it back. It was just so satisfying to see Gemma escape this hell that she's been in for two years. To see her be on the other side of that door, that was so satisfying. Yeah. And the moment when she, asma first sees Mark as Mark is also incredibly satisfying. So beautiful. Especially after watching Episode 7 and seeing kind of what she had gone

through and that level of isolation, but she still always was thinking of Mark. So that moment where Gemma and Audi Mark got to briefly kind of see each other in that floor was very, very satisfying. And then we get the end where Iniemarque dashes Audemarque's dreams and his plan. And probably a lot of the audience's desire too, I think. How did you guys feel about that? I think seeing the way Dietsch and as Gemma reacted to it was so impactful in terms of like the confusion and the herd and you know, because she's not aware of all this additional context. She's just like, what is happening? Like, why is my-

That's my husband. Yeah, that's my husband. Why is he not coming out here with me? So that really drove it through in a way that I didn't necessarily expect to feel that much about that moment because I knew it was coming, but seeing the way she was reacting really did make that powerful. Yeah, I mean, I think Heli is also, for the first time, experiencing how Gemma feels about Marc. She gets to see that firsthand,

and there's kind of a last moment where she lingers as Marc is pulling her away, and I think it's this moment of understanding and connection with Gemma that I think is really important. Interesting, because I feel like you could interpret that look in different ways too, the last look to Gemma. I mean, it's a complex moment. There's kind of this reckoning with one another,

like a connection across the hallway. Yeah, for sure. And then you guys running down that hallway at the end, we had this one hallway set up where Britt and Adam had to kind of run with the camera running in front of them for this final shot and we were shooting it in super slow motion. So you're running obviously regular speed and you had to kind of go through the, I mean, do you want to talk about like what the range of emotions you went through in that shot? Yeah, you really wanted us to, I remember we did it a few times and you wanted us to cycle through

a bunch of different like feelings as we were running. Well, there's the literal fact that Helly knows which is like maybe we have this whole band on our side. Maybe we have all of these people who can help us. And then again, I think Heli is really carrying the heartbreak that she just saw on Gemma's face. And I'm sure any Mark is too, even though they're kind of like these wild horses running through the hallways, there's still this like,

what we've just done has an effect. Yeah, and then it's just the question of where you're going to her like. Yeah, that's the, I kind of felt like it was just so exciting to be with Heli and to just be running. But then I felt like during the run is where kind of occurs to them or to Mark,

like I'm not sure exactly where to go and what the hell we're gonna do, which is a really fun place to end the season. Ben, how did you come upon that song, the song that you used for the- Yeah, it's Windmills of Your Mind performed by Mel Torme. So good. You know, it was on my episode 210 end song playlist

of just like ideas for songs that we could play. Cause we knew that that was what the image we wanted it to be at the end, from the beginning, was this freeze frame that I had in my head. Like, oh yeah, let's do this freeze frame. It's like weirdly romantic but scary moment. And then we're going to do a 70s freeze frame ending, or even 60s freeze frame.

So many movies used to do that in a really interesting way, where you're just like, wow You're just stuck in this moment and like what's gonna happen Yeah in the scene when I'm like at the door and heli appears and kind of going back and forth That was always the end point for the season right from long ago It was always was always that was always we knew we were headed there But I remember also and this is interesting to think about now, the thought at one point was to end the season before the choices made.

That's yeah, early on, we thought about maybe we'll have you in the middle of the hallway there looking at Gemma, looking at Helly, and that would be the end. But it really felt clear to me and I think to Dan and you was we started to talk about it that we didn't want to end on another cliffhanger like that. It would feel like we're trying to beat the first Yeah, that was the goal of this episode for me was to try to do something totally different than last season's finale Because that was something that people specifically Keyed in on I feel like that episode is so much a result of the writing of the first season and all the threads that are coming together there because it's

a pretty simple episode in terms of what goes on and this one I felt like we wanted to make it more of like its own thing in terms of like what the ride was so that was something we were intentionally trying to do. I mean I really miss making the show. I can't wait till we get to go back to it. Me too. I miss seeing you guys every day and it's so fun making the show. Yeah. Yeah, totally.

Now we're gonna go to the end of the episode event that we've all been talking about, which is Zach Cherry's favorite segment of the episode where he predicts what will happen next on Severance. Zach, you haven't really gotten anything right at all this season, so I'm hoping that you... That's sort of open to interpretation. And now you have to predict what happens next season on Severance. Yeah, we'll probably have to cut it because it's gonna be so spot on.

Let's listen to it. Let's hear what the great Nostradamus, Zastradamus has to say. Hi Adam. Hi Ben. Wow. The season finale. That was another humdinger. Thanks for teaching me that word, Ben.

You know, I just wanted to make sure I check in with you, Ben and Adam. I realize I've been, I've been so caught up in my own thing of predicting what happens next. I haven't been asking you what's happening with you So if you guys want to take a second to just sort of share how you're feeling about anything you want You can go ahead and do that Okay, that's enough. All right. Now, let's talk about next season on Severance next season on Severance

Next season on Severance. So our characters, they've put themselves into another pickle. You know, they're in open rebellion, there's a marching band hanging out with them, any Mark and Heli are running down the halls. Who knows what's going to happen next? Well, obviously, I do. And this time, I mean it. Mark and Heli are running down that hallway and they are never going to stop. They're just going to keep running and running and running and they're going to really

show what humanity is capable of and set new records for the marathon, the mile, and the ultra marathon. And you know, runners are a really dedicated dedicated community they're not going to just let that slide they're going to find out about this and the running community is going to come to the innie's aid and get them out of there so that their champions and their heroes can do what they were meant to do which is run free so that's right next season on severance we're going to mostly be focused on the ultra marathon and marathon running community And I know that sounds strange, but when you see it, it's gonna make total sense Adam I just wanted to say a few weeks ago. I said that the first movie I ever saw was

Meet the parents starring Ben Stiller and that's not the first movie I ever saw was Torque starring Adam Scott and I saw it when I was 19 years old All right. Sorry everyone and talk to you next season. Oh, wow. You didn't see a movie till you were 19 Yeah, but that was the first one I saw and it made me love movies. Cinema. Wait, Torque, is that like an action movie or something? It's a motorcycle movie with me and Ice Cube and many others. You're IMDB list, it just keeps giving and giving. It's like, it's crazy how many things you've been in.

Star Trek, V. And Torque is another stop on the road, my friend. Are you a motorcycle racer? No, I'm the FBI agent McPherson. McPherson. Yeah, McPherson. I complain about the coffee and stuff. So basically, season three is Severance running free.

That's the subtitle. Just us running the entire season is what you're saying. I imagine so. Sounds terrible. When we pick up season three, you have a long beard and mustache and a baseball cap and you're just running. And so does Helly. Yeah, I want a beard, too, please.

Well, you'll get a beard. OK. Do you have any predictions for season three? Everyone gets haircuts. Oh, yeah, that's a good idea. Wait, you know what I really want to see? Actually, this is true. Well, I do want to see? Actually, this is true. Well, I do want to see the heart cuts, that is true, but I also want to see all of us play instruments.

I want to see Ben play the drums. I'm going to bring my trumpet because I used to march in the marching band. Tramell plays like something. He plays like the saxophone or something. Yeah. All right. Zach, what do you play? Recorder. I play the recorder.

No, you don't. I did. Adam plays the flute. Adam, you play the flute? I? I play the recorder. No, you don't I did Adam plays the flute Let me play the flute wish I played them gone. It is weird. We don't have like a jam man type of thing Yeah, you assume it's weird that we don't have a band Doesn't that always happen on TV series Hey, we have we have one hotline call. call we wanna play before we let you guys go. That's pretty interesting.

So let's play it. Hey, this is Alan. I was told to call this number, talk about dental hygiene. And I mean, look, obviously we all know dental hygiene is like super crazy important, but like what I don't understand is why is it that there's nothing I can do to remove plaque from my teeth?

I mean, look, I do all the stuff, right? I do all the stuff I'm supposed to do. I brush my teeth, I floss, I do all that jazz, and then every time I go to the dentist, there's just more plaque on my teeth. And it's like, look, I don't expect to sit here at home and like chisel away at it, but I mean, there's got to be something I can do, a pill or like some gum. I don't know. I mean look. All right. That's all thanks to you, Zach. Thank you, Alan. That was awesome. Wow. First of all, I'd say dental hygiene is connected

to mental hygiene. So start there. Wow. Right? That's so important. You have to have the right outlook first. What's your attitude towards plaque and your relationship with your own plaque? And what is it that's binding you to your own plaque that you can't let it go? I think he said at one point plaque and all that jazz. Which I appreciate. He must have had the wrong number of this guy.

We should put Zach's phone number at the end of this podcast. We should put Zach's phone number at dental offices of this podcast. We should put Zach's phone number at dental offices. Totally. Yeah, everyone, the listening community, if you are at your dentist's office, please write down my phone number and just put it in the waiting room, and I'd love to hear from anyone. Anyone.

All right. That is it for this episode. The season may be over, but The Severance Podcast with Ben and Adam will be back next week for a bonus episode. That's right. To unpack all of season two with some very special guests. Very exciting. You guys are special guests. That's right. Thanks for having us. You guys are awesome. Well, listen in on soup and smoothies next time. Soup and smoothies. And Zach, maybe next season, read the scripts or not? We can talk about that. Okay, cool. next season read the scripts or not? We can talk about that. Okay cool. The Severance podcast with Ben Stiller and Adam Scott is a presentation of Odyssey, Pineapple Street Studios, Red Hour Productions, and Great Scott Productions. If you like the

show be sure to rate and review this podcast on Apple Podcasts, the Odyssey app, or your other podcast platform of choice. Our executive producers are Barry Finkel, Henry Miloski, Gabrielle Lewis, Jenner Weiss Berman, and Leah Reese Dennis. This show is produced by Zandra Ellen, Ben Goldberg, and Naomi Scott. This episode was mixed and mastered by Chris Basil. We had additional engineering from Javi Krustas and Davy Sumner. Show clips are courtesy of Fifth Season. Music by Theodore Shapiro. Special thanks to the team at Odyssey, Maura Curran, Eric Donnelly, Michael Lave,

Melissa Wester, Matt Casey, Kate Rose, Kurt Courtney, and Hillary Shuff. And the team at Red Hour, John Lesher, Carolina Pesakov, John Pablo Antonetti, Martin Baldoruten, Ashwin Ramesh, Maria Noto, John Baker, and Oliver Acker. And at Great Scott, Kevin Cotter, Josh Martin, and Christie Smith at Rise Management. We had additional production help from Kristen Torres and Melissa Slaughter. I'm Ben Stiller. And I'm Adam Scott.

Thanks, everybody. Thanks, you guys. Bye.