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Sometimes the best stories about the experience of making a television show have enormous scope.
1.Meet Kirsten
1.
We were deciding about whether to change Kirsten out of her stage costume.
We liked the practicality of it.
If Kirsten is upper middle class, we wanted to show it right away.
Shes in practical but designer kidswear and Uggs.
Helen Huang, costume designer
2.On the Wheel
2.
TheTraveling Symphonywas one of the hardest things to design.
We wanted believability, and we wanted them to be smart.
One was a former UPS truck I wanted to leave the UPS on, but we couldnt.
Its the opposite of ArthursKing Lear, with a huge stage and huge pretense.
Ruth Ammon, production designer
3.Hamlets Coat of Arms
3.
It was about how to make Hamlet feel regal without just giving him a cape.
A cape is so traditional in Shakespeare, so we didnt want to do that.
It was a coat of arms actually arms, from puffer jackets, sewn on to create volume.
When she plays him, he feels like royalty.
Helen Huang, costume designer
4.She Needed to Feel Like the Core
4.
Finding Miranda felt like a near-impossible task.
We had worked with Danielle Deadwyler onAtlantain season two, and we had her come in and read.
Wed seen hundreds of people at that point.
She just brought her own idiosyncratic energy.
That conference-room scene inepisode three, it was one of the first things we shot from that episode.
Then everything bubbles to the surface and spills over for the first time ever.
Its simultaneously cathartic and strange and kind of funny and heartbreaking.
We were talking about it conceptually like that, and somehow she synthesized it all into one big monologue.
We shot that, and there were still a lot of things in flux about that episode.
They were thinking about getting a hand double, and I said no.
I know how to clap on the two and four.
I was like, I can do this!
I was in that hotel room in Toronto for over 140 days.
I had nothing to do.
I had a beautiful electronic keyboard.
Its not a grand piano, but its very nice.
Hes just the greatest guy, but its like learning basketball on Zoom.
I didnt touch a real piano until two days before I shot that scene.
Theres a big difference between a keyboard and a grand piano thats 100 years old!
The reaction with your fingers is different, and you have to push harder.
It was night it was the last scene of the day.
And it was pouring rain.
It was a storm!
Production hasnt seen me play.
They dont know whats going to happen.
Im like, Shoot it!
I dont care if theres hail!
You think Im afraid of this rain?!
The keys were coming off in my hand, thats how wet it was.
I pulled one of the keys off and waved it at the camera, and theyre going, Lori!
It was likeA League of Their Own, playing with a broken ankle.
I dont care, were gonna get this.
Theydidnt have to cut aroundnothin.
Lori Petty, Sarah
6.News Reports From the End of the World
6.
The news stuff I did one day in a studio in London, shooting with BBC broadcaster Tina Daheley.
It was something I felt really strongly about, that it should be a real reporter.
There was a lot of playing with that stuff to modulate it in just the right way.
That was a direct lift from the book.
Imagine being at home and watching a news reporter walk off the screen.
Thats when you would know shit had hit the fan.
Tina was really great.
I dont think shed ever acted before, and it took some goes, but she was so wonderful.
She even used her real husbands name, to really get into it.
Lucy Tcherniak, director of episodes five and seven
7.The Severn City Airport
7.
There were horrible supply-chain issues, like everyone is experiencing now.
I was always trying to verify we pushed the angles that got the flight gates.
Ruth Ammon, production designer
8.The Snowplow Guy
8.
We were there for a week, and it just magically snowed this massive amount while we were there.
Those trees were so heavy with snow.
But you couldnt necessarily go through the same place twice, because then the snow had been altered.
And there were times where it was like … yeah, thats actually impossible.
The big thing was there was a road.
In the story, its post-pandemic.
There are no cars!
He was like, Why not!
There could be a guy with a snowplow, and hes clearing the road.
Jeremy Podeswa, director of episodes three, nine, and ten
9.Im Dying.
And My Filling Just Fell Out.
He said, What?
And he said, Okay, Ill get in touch with production.
But save the filling and bring it to set.
I said, Absolutely.
Thats where that line comes from.
I laughed for five minutes.
Work with people who tell you to bring your tooth to set.
Its a beautiful thing about this show.
That line about his filling weve all done these things.
Jim Phelps is going to die, but there are these little things were still concerned with.
Timothy Simons, Jim
