S2E4: Woe's Hollow (with Theodore Shapiro)

Speaker 1 Adam.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 3 I want you to close your eyes and imagine you're working in Lumen's HR department.

Speaker 4 Okay, give me a second. It takes me 10 minutes to close my eyes.

Speaker 5 Oh, wait. I did it right away.

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Speaker 4 Let me get into character here.

Speaker 6 I think they'd love it.

Speaker 9 It's efficient. It's targeted.

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Speaker 3 Okay, you can open your eyes now. Oh, thank you.
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Speaker 8 It's way more fun than a finger trap.

Speaker 3 Finger traps are not even fun.

Speaker 16 No, I actually get legitimately claustrophobic when I use a finger trap.

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Speaker 19 This show is brought to you by the farmer's dog. Hey, it's me, Adam, and I'm really excited about this one because we have two dogs.

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Speaker 7 Hey, I'm Ben Stiller.

Speaker 21 I'm Adam Scott.

Speaker 7 And this is the Severance podcast with Ben and Adam, where we break down every episode of Severance.

Speaker 24 And today we're talking about the fourth episode of season two, Woes Hollow, written by Anna O.

Speaker 2 Yong Munch and directed by Ben Stiller.

Speaker 7 Yeah,

Speaker 7 this was a big one for us. And the other exciting thing is that we're going to be joined by Severance's marvelous composer, Theodore Shapiro.
Yes.

Speaker 26 Then Ben and I are going to talk about some scenes from the episode.

Speaker 7 And of course, the prophetic Zach Cherry will be back to tell us what he thinks will happen in the next episode.

Speaker 25 That's right.

Speaker 7 Zach doesn't watch anything. We don't even know if he reads the scripts when he's, you know, except for his lines.

Speaker 26 He just feels what he thinks is going to happen.

Speaker 30 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 31 He's like an octopus.

Speaker 7 Oh, like an octopus.

Speaker 6 In what way?

Speaker 32 Well,

Speaker 23 an octopi tends to intellectualize each one of their arms.

Speaker 26 I have no idea what I'm talking about.

Speaker 7 Does this have to do with like my octopus teacher?

Speaker 33 Yes, which I didn't see.

Speaker 18 Okay.

Speaker 7 And you're saying an octopi, but an octopi, octopi is a

Speaker 34 several. Yeah.

Speaker 7 So oh, you're saying octopi use, they sense things?

Speaker 11 I'm just assuming that that movie is about a psychic octopus, and

Speaker 26 I don't think that's what it's about.

Speaker 7 It is not.

Speaker 16 Be warned, there are spoilers for episode four here, so learn from my recap pod listening mistakes and be sure to watch the episode first and then listen to us.

Speaker 7 Yeah, definitely, because there's definitely a big, big spoiler in this episode. Good lord.

Speaker 6 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 39 So how have you been, Ben?

Speaker 7 I'm great. Yeah.
I am great. I'm still buzzing from the experience of the Grand Central Station severance pop-up that happened when we're recording this yesterday.

Speaker 21 That was just so much fun.

Speaker 7 It was incredible.

Speaker 27 It really felt like we were taking a step back and bringing things down to sort of a basic performance level.

Speaker 36 And it was like a happening.

Speaker 7 It was like a happening. Yeah.
Like a fluxus sort of thing, if you know about that history of experimental performance art.

Speaker 7 The idea was to have a cube in the middle of Grand Central Station that had the cubicle with you guys sitting there

Speaker 7 doing your severance stuff.

Speaker 7 And you guys, originally, it was a great idea that Apple had.

Speaker 7 And originally, it was just going to be actors that they hired to kind of like look like office workers at the cubicle. And then you said, we should do it.
The actors should really do it. Yeah.

Speaker 7 You said, I'll do that.

Speaker 32 Yeah.

Speaker 41 And I just figured the cast would be game. And lo and behold, everybody was super into it.

Speaker 7 It was incredible. It was incredible.
And you guys just went in there for three hours. Yeah.

Speaker 7 And you refined

Speaker 7 and you interacted.

Speaker 40 I vacuumed the floor.

Speaker 7 Well, you did that the little roller thing,

Speaker 7 which you do in episode two, I think.

Speaker 42 Not a real vacuum.

Speaker 40 And I'm not convinced it does anything but just move dust particles around.

Speaker 7 Then Ms. Cobel came in.
Oh, man. And you got in trouble with her at one point.
Many times.

Speaker 26 She got upset.

Speaker 7 She threw a coffee cup. I was talking to my wife and daughter on the outside when the coffee cup got thrown.
And I was like, whoa, what just happened? What just happened?

Speaker 7 It was amazing, though, because nobody could hear you guys on the inside. And people were literally enthralled.
It was mesmerizing.

Speaker 7 When Milchik came in with the red ball, I don't even know what he was doing with the red ball, but he didn't look happy.

Speaker 22 No.

Speaker 7 And at a certain point, Patricia got under the desk.

Speaker 18 Yeah.

Speaker 7 What was going on there?

Speaker 30 A couple of the monitors went out.

Speaker 38 And so Patricia took it upon herself to try and fix them.

Speaker 27 And then once she started fiddling with the plugs, all of the monitors went out.

Speaker 7 That's so Patricia.

Speaker 18 It really is.

Speaker 47 But

Speaker 7 when Trammell walked out because you had to kind of walk through the crowd to get to the cube the whole place got really quiet yeah and then like there were cheers too I think when he came back the second time and when Patricia came in it was so great it was just you know people discovered it nobody announced it and it was just yeah we just we just walked in and there was no announcement or anything and people just sort of started stumbling upon it and being like, wait a second, those are the actors from the show.

Speaker 27 And we just improvised for three hours, but there was a certain freedom to it because no one could hear us.

Speaker 48 Yeah.

Speaker 29 So we could just do whatever we wanted.

Speaker 46 And we kind of decided that it fell somewhere around season one, episode three.

Speaker 48 Just the culture of MDR felt like it fell somewhere in that area.

Speaker 7 Yeah. I could not have been more excited or happy watching it.
And it just was, it was so much fun. It was a blast.
And it was fun to also talk. For me, on the outside, I was like taking pictures.

Speaker 7 I got to talk to fans of the show. It wasn't just people who were, you know, going home from work.
There were people who saw it on Reddit or on social media and came down who were fans of the show.

Speaker 11 They made the trip.

Speaker 7 Yeah, well, they saw it. It came up on their feed and they ran over.
And it was great. I talked to people from Brazil.
I talked to people from Ireland, from England.

Speaker 7 It was just great to talk to fans of the show and see how, you know, excited they were about the second season. And you don't get a chance really to interact.

Speaker 7 I guess when you guys went down to Brazil for the Comic-Con down there, you got a chance to meet people.

Speaker 9 We did.

Speaker 40 And people are so excited for season two, which is really flattering and so much fun.

Speaker 46 But this had its own sort of organic feeling to it because, like you said, there was no announcement. It was just something.

Speaker 29 And I'm glad we did it for a few hours because people, like you said, were able to kind of make the trip and we were still there by the time they got there.

Speaker 7 Yeah, we wanted it to go on for long enough that people could discover it and you guys would still be there. And you guys were troopers and amazing and so much fun.
So that was great.

Speaker 49 Well, all right.

Speaker 7 Our guest

Speaker 7 is one of Severance's secret weapons, though he's not really that secret because he won an Emmy for the show.

Speaker 49 Yeah.

Speaker 7 I feel like we're the secret weapons. We're the secret weapons.
He's the guy. That's the Emmy.

Speaker 7 Theodore Shapiro, Teddy Shaps, as his friends call him.

Speaker 7 Teddy, how are you, man?

Speaker 44 I'm good. How are you guys?

Speaker 14 Great. Yeah, we're good.
We're good.

Speaker 6 It's so great having you here.

Speaker 7 And by the way, Adam and I are in person together in New York here right now, which is fun. Yeah.

Speaker 35 We can high-five like multiple times if we needed to.

Speaker 44 Yeah, you've done it already so many times. That's right.

Speaker 7 So, Teddy, you and I go back a while.

Speaker 50 Do you remember?

Speaker 7 Do you remember when we first met?

Speaker 44 We first met. You called me to try to get me, successfully try to get me to work on Dodgeball.

Speaker 7 That's so funny because I was asking you that question like I knew the answer and I don't remember when we first met. So now, I mean, I know Dodgeball was the first thing we worked on.

Speaker 7 And I'm wondering, do you remember what you had done?

Speaker 6 Sure. Yeah.

Speaker 44 So I had just done Along Came Polly

Speaker 44 and Starski and Hutch.

Speaker 1 Oh, okay.

Speaker 44 And I think,

Speaker 25 I think you'd see

Speaker 35 that's where you guys both knew each other.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I wasn't involved with either of those movies in any way other than just showing up on the set. But I did

Speaker 7 yeah, no, I didn't. I mean, you know, Todd Phillips directed Sarskin Hutch and the great John Hamburg, who's a mutual friend of ours, wrote and directed Along Came Polly.

Speaker 7 And yeah, those scores were great. And you came and Rosson Thurber, who was directing Dodgeball, I guess I must have suggested that, you know, let's talk to Teddy.

Speaker 7 You were probably Theodore to us back then before we knew you. Hey, can I ask you something?

Speaker 51 Can I ask you something?

Speaker 6 Yeah, yeah, sure.

Speaker 7 It is Shapiro, right?

Speaker 44 It is Shapiro.

Speaker 7 I've always wondered that, you know, some people pronounce Shapiro, Shapiro. Yeah, what is it?

Speaker 44 I mean, I think that Shapiro is the correct pronunciation. And I think that Shapiro must be just some weird Ellis Island, you know, decision that one of my forefathers made.
Really? Really?

Speaker 44 I mean, I'm not the only Shapiro. There are others out there, but I don't think it's grounded in anything authentic.
I think it must be some Americanization.

Speaker 7 So it's not like an affectation that you put on it when you came to Hollywood.

Speaker 44 I was not like trying to make people.

Speaker 11 Sounds like you may be

Speaker 11 able to do that.

Speaker 7 Well, you know, he's like a fancy composer, and maybe he's like, you know, I don't know.

Speaker 18 It is quite fancy.

Speaker 44 I was not trying to impress anybody with Shapiro.

Speaker 7 I'm impressed with it. And I get to impress people when they say like, oh, I really like Theodore Shapiro's work.
I'm like, it's Shapiro. Excuse me.

Speaker 44 It's Shapira. For those in the know.

Speaker 11 So, Teddy, you and I know each other completely separate from all of this because our sons, Julian and Graham,

Speaker 27 have been in school together since kindergarten.

Speaker 44 Yes.

Speaker 44 And, you know, I was thinking about the fact that the first time I ever heard about this show was at a Halloween party where you and I were accompanying our sons and talking about what's going on.

Speaker 44 And you told me about this show. And I was like, oh, man, that sounds really good.
i hope ben calls me

Speaker 7 also oh that's great you know the first time that i ever met you was at our kids preschool yeah in pasadena so that's right i remember going like oh that's adam scott i remember just being like holy ben stiller's here holy holy

Speaker 53 so teddy and we went on to do a few movies yeah you did tropic thunder together and walter midi so you guys have worked together quite a bit yeah we have is there a particular process you you guys fall into together or is each project sort of a fresh start?

Speaker 7 What do you think, Teddy?

Speaker 44 I mean, I think that each project has actually

Speaker 44 been a little different from the last. We've developed a little bit more of a process over time.

Speaker 44 And in particular, I think what I would say is that with MIDI

Speaker 44 and then with this, the big difference is just me starting to write earlier in the process and sort of having the music exist during during Ben's creative process earlier, which I think helped in both cases, which helped the music sort of evolve as like an integral part of the project.

Speaker 26 Yeah, I remember having some pieces that you had written on set from the very beginning when we started shooting season one.

Speaker 41 You had some kind of sketches of themes for us to play on set.

Speaker 38 And it was

Speaker 34 really important to have that.

Speaker 7 Yeah. Well, we were lucky on Severance because when we had this delay due to COVID, I think that was around the time you were able to write a lot of music.

Speaker 44 Well, yeah, I mean, it's interesting. I think that we found our main theme during the COVID break.

Speaker 44 I actually, like, I have this kind of fond memory during the summer of COVID in 2020, we had like just discovered the main theme. And I was up in Oregon and

Speaker 50 drove to Oregon.

Speaker 7 Can I just interrupt you? When you say we had just discovered the main theme, what that means is Teddy wrote the main theme.

Speaker 7 Actually wrote three different,

Speaker 7 didn't you send me like three different options?

Speaker 44 Wow. Well, I said, so actually I had started writing a bunch of themes and sending them to you, and you were excited about what I was coming up with.

Speaker 44 And then in February of 2020, I flew to New York and we met up at the set

Speaker 44 and you were like listening to the music and there was just like this one little part that you kept coming back to and it was just like it was the B section of something that I'd written.

Speaker 44 It wasn't like the main part of it, but you kept coming back to that thing. And I was like, oh, first of all, always follow Ben's instincts.

Speaker 44 That's like the cardinal rule. And like, there's something that Ben is responding to here.
And in that thing that we were listening to, it was kind of like an electronic piece.

Speaker 44 And then when I got back to LA, like I went home and I sat down at the piano and I played the four chords from that B section at the piano. And it was like, oh,

Speaker 44 what if it was this?

Speaker 47 So wait, when you say it was an electronic piece, do you mean it was, what do you mean?

Speaker 32 Like it was that same melody, but

Speaker 44 it wasn't the melody. It was just like the four chords.

Speaker 44 But all of the sounds were like more overtly electronic. Okay.

Speaker 44 But when I played it at the piano, suddenly like the tone of it changed completely, and it became more of this mystery.

Speaker 44 And I was like, oh, wait, maybe this is the, like, maybe this is the whole thing.

Speaker 6 Yeah.

Speaker 44 Because we had been talking about, like, what if there's one sound for the innies and one sound for the Audis, and, like, the innie world is electronic, and the Audi world is organic.

Speaker 44 And, you know, but when I played that thing, I was like, oh, wait a minute. What if the whole show is just like a puzzle? Like this would be the music if the whole show was just one kind of puzzle.

Speaker 56 Yeah.

Speaker 44 So I sent that off to Ben and I was pretty excited about it and did not hear back from Ben for like three weeks. And

Speaker 44 so I was like, oh man, that's a bummer. He didn't like it.
And

Speaker 44 I sort of thought that I was onto something. And then like one day, like the phone rang and he was like, oh, I love this thing.

Speaker 55 Like, this is great.

Speaker 44 I'm really into this.

Speaker 18 You're like, where the hell have you been for three weeks?

Speaker 29 Was it just sitting in your inbox for three weeks?

Speaker 7 No, I had listened to it immediately and I just didn't want Teddy to feel too, you know, good about like that he was

Speaker 42 not smart.

Speaker 7 No, I don't know. I think I must have gotten preoccupied or something or I was doing other stuff.

Speaker 11 And there's also something else unique about this particular theme in that it's not just providing kind of this emotional through line for the series and sort of tying things together.

Speaker 41 It's also really catchy in its own right, which instrumental themes often are not.

Speaker 46 Often they're there as sort of background.

Speaker 34 But this is a really kind of earwormy, really beautiful song.

Speaker 11 And to think that you were kind of sectioning it off as sort of a minor part of another theme is really interesting.

Speaker 29 And Ben, it kind of obviously stood out to Ben, but you were, was it like a bridge to something else?

Speaker 44 It wasn't a bridge to something else, but it was just sort of the middle set. You know, it was like, here's my main idea.

Speaker 44 Okay, I'm going to do something here and then I'm going to come back to my main idea. And, you know, what's interesting about that is that sometimes when you're not being precious about something,

Speaker 44 you'll just do something that is simple and memorable,

Speaker 44 thinking that you're just kind of tossing it off. Yeah, yeah.
And

Speaker 11 the more complicated thing is going to be the main.

Speaker 44 Exactly. And

Speaker 44 yeah, I mean, it was just, it was funny because I had these four chords and the fourth chord kind of demanded that I write this like sort of a weird melodic idea.

Speaker 44 And that's where, you know, did it did.

Speaker 18 Yeah.

Speaker 44 You know, it was the thing that fit with the weird fourth chord. And

Speaker 7 the fourth chord often does that, doesn't it? That's the thing.

Speaker 7 No, I have no idea what I'm talking about.

Speaker 51 I was just going to say, what are you talking about? What's amazing to me, Teddy, is like...

Speaker 7 You can't emphasize enough how important Teddy's music is for the show. I think, you know, just I am such a fan of yours and I really don't understand how you do what you do, you know, in terms of.

Speaker 7 the creative process because you have so many constrictions in terms of what you're having to create, you know, to have something like to score a scene and to time that it can take and how much, you know, and the notes that you get, the feedback of, you know, if it, if it's right for the scene or not, and also just like where it comes from and the instrumentation and all these things.

Speaker 7 I'm just amazed at your process because you also are incredibly fast in terms of how you do the work and it kind of spoils you for any other process because Teddy will turn things around so quickly.

Speaker 7 But it's really, for me,

Speaker 7 any movie we've worked on together, it makes me want to be in this world, to live in this world that the music creates that, you know, inspires me visually

Speaker 7 and just, you know, in terms of the tone of the piece.

Speaker 7 And so we were really lucky that you were willing to write this music ahead of time when we started shooting season one so that when we were shooting and on set, we could actually play it during some scenes.

Speaker 7 And when we were trying to find the tone of the show. And

Speaker 7 so we play it, you know, in MDR or something. And it would just sort of change.

Speaker 23 Walking down the hallways and stuff.

Speaker 9 You would play it. And it did really help.

Speaker 7 Yeah. You know, there's so much music in the show.
There's so much music in the show. Yeah.

Speaker 2 And I agree.

Speaker 35 It's so integral to the show and the feeling in the show.

Speaker 21 And I actually feel like your music has saved me on a number of occasions in scenes.

Speaker 7 Teddy, you're a filmmaker. And what I mean by that is like, you just, you know movies so well and you've worked on a lot of movies.

Speaker 7 And I feel like that's another part of our relationship and our collaboration for me is, you know, the way that you work with Jeff, our editor, you guys have developed an amazing relationship.

Speaker 7 But, you know, when an episode comes in, you know, you get the rough cut of the episode. I, there's always like a little something inside me until like I hear from Teddy, like, did you like it?

Speaker 7 Did you not? You know, and it's not because, and it's not because I just want you to like it. It's because I really value your opinion as a filmmaker.
And I feel like that's a big part of what you do.

Speaker 44 You know, the way that we work on this show, where I feel like I'm talking, you know, Jeff and I do, we have this very close relationship. And I feel like I'm in constant conversation with Jeff.

Speaker 44 And then it's always understood that you are in conversation with Jeff. And so I feel like the three of us are just sort of.
making the show in post together in a really interactive and creative way.

Speaker 44 And, you know, it's not always like that with every project.

Speaker 44 Like sometimes you're brought in at the end and, you know, the film's already edited and, you know, they just sort of want you to put your music on top of it.

Speaker 44 And you just, and sometimes that's just the way their process worked. But it's just such a joy to do it this way and to sort of have the music live in the show from the beginning like this.

Speaker 7 And you've written so much music for the show and you wrote so much music ahead of time.

Speaker 7 But then when we get to the editorial process with a specific episode, you know, we'll lay in music that you've written ahead of time, but then there'll always, you know, be that sort of crafting of like, oh, no, this actually needs a new cue or this needs a new idea here.

Speaker 7 And that's a big part. And that, you know, goes to episode four, you know, episode 204,

Speaker 7 where obviously this, the story is in a whole new environment. And that required you to come up with a new theme, just a completely new theme.

Speaker 7 And I think you did that ahead of time too, the same way you did it for season one, but for this specific episode, right?

Speaker 44 Well, I mean, that was one of the first things that you ever told me about season two was about this episode. And so I feel like from the time that I started writing themes for season two,

Speaker 44 I was really focused. on this episode in particular and finding sounds.

Speaker 44 But truthfully, like, Ben, I should say that the thing with 204 was that this was the episode where I feel like we worked the hardest to find the tone of anything in both seasons.

Speaker 44 And a lot of those things that I did in advance ended up being part of the episode. But there was, you know, we were working at it for a while.

Speaker 29 And what was it about this episode that was a bit tricky for you guys to zero in on that particular tone?

Speaker 7 Well, this is, you know, the episode where they go, it's like the Lumens version of a corporate retreat, but it's in a freezing wasteland where, you know, it's called an Ortbo,

Speaker 7 where Milchik is putting them out in the elements.

Speaker 7 And I always wanted the episode to be very visual and to be not a lot of dialogue, at least the way it ended up in the first part of the episode has very little dialogue and to be stark and

Speaker 6 kind of otherworldly.

Speaker 7 So, yeah, that was the idea behind it.

Speaker 7 And, you know, just from the very beginning of the episode where we find Irving on the lake and then he, you know, hears Mark's voice and follows his voice, and he meets Heli on the way up, and they end up on top of this cliff overlooking this big lake.

Speaker 7 And there's this monitor there with a message from Milchik. You know, it just was surreal.
We wanted it to be surreal and eerie and weird. Actually, you know what?

Speaker 7 Why don't we take a listen to the Milchik video music that you wrote?

Speaker 6 Yeah, like the retro music.

Speaker 7 That is the actually the theme that you wrote.

Speaker 42 Yeah, Patricia sings in season one.

Speaker 39 That's right.

Speaker 44 Exactly. The cure him.
The cure him from season one.

Speaker 50 But the music version. Yeah.

Speaker 44 And I remember, Ben, you just kept saying, like, can you make it shittier?

Speaker 7 That's exactly right. You kept on coming to it.
I was like, this has to sound more like really bad music.

Speaker 6 Yeah.

Speaker 11 Yeah, it sounds like almost like a grade below music.

Speaker 25 You would actually

Speaker 6 know what that's right. Yeah.

Speaker 18 Yes.

Speaker 37 It's some guy quickly doing something for this video.

Speaker 55 Exactly.

Speaker 24 All right. It's time for us to take a quick break.

Speaker 6 We'll be right back.

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Speaker 1 Adam.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 3 I want you to close your eyes and imagine you're working in Lumen's HR department.

Speaker 4 Okay, give me a second. It takes me 10 minutes to close my eyes.

Speaker 5 Oh, wait, I did it right away.

Speaker 3 Okay, keep them close. If our partner, ZipRecruiter, was helping Lumen hire for various roles, how do you think HR would feel about ZipRecruiter's ability to search resumes quickly via keywords?

Speaker 4 Let me get into character here.

Speaker 6 I think they'd love it.

Speaker 9 It's efficient.

Speaker 14 It's targeted.

Speaker 10 We can search words like cure lover and affinity for long hallways.

Speaker 3 Okay, you can open your eyes now. Oh, thank you.
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Speaker 7 So, Teddy, the theme that you ended up with for the episode was also sort of mirrored in the theremin tune, right?

Speaker 44 Yes, well, that was a real breakthrough.

Speaker 44 I mean, you know, it's interesting because, like, I remember I sent you two versions of Miss Wong's Theremin music, and one was just kind of like spooky theremin sounds, like, not real, you know, not really a tune.

Speaker 44 And then the other one was this tune that was, it was sort of like a cousin to the Kir hymns. You were like, that's what we want to move towards.
Like, you've, you had your finger on it.

Speaker 7 And that's our, that's our collaboration. Teddy writes something brilliant.
And I go, that's great.

Speaker 1 So, wait a second, wait a second.

Speaker 27 So, the theremin music that Sarah Bach is playing, that Ms.

Speaker 47 Wong is playing, is that same cure hymn?

Speaker 33 Because I didn't even recognize it as.

Speaker 44 No, no, no, it's not. But what it unlocked for me was, oh, yeah, there's this whole body of Keir music.
It's like cure folk tunes.

Speaker 55 Right.

Speaker 44 And when I wrote that and Ben responded to it, I was like, oh, right. There's like, there's a world of

Speaker 44 cure folk music. Like it's

Speaker 27 next to the cure hymn.

Speaker 6 Exactly. Yeah, yeah.
Exactly.

Speaker 32 Now, had you played a theremin before?

Speaker 27 Have you had a lot of experience with one?

Speaker 44 So I'm going going to admit that, no, I don't play a theremin, but I have this instrument called an And Martineau that's like an early electronic instrument that sounds like a theremin.

Speaker 44 And

Speaker 44 I'm not very good at playing it. It's a little harder than it looks

Speaker 28 to do it well.

Speaker 7 Is it a keyboard instrument?

Speaker 44 So it's a keyboard instrument, but it has this wire that you kind of slide from right to left along the keyboard. And so like if you slide it up to a C, then it'll play a C.

Speaker 44 With your left hand, you press one button that says how loud or soft it is. And then with your right hand, you do the pitch with this,

Speaker 44 your fingers in a little, is a little ring, and you move it up and down, and that determines the pitch.

Speaker 58 Sounds super easy. Super easy.

Speaker 7 Sounds like you're making it up as you go along, actually.

Speaker 28 I don't believe you.

Speaker 28 Yeah.

Speaker 1 And it sounds like a theremin, essentially.

Speaker 44 It sounds like a theremin. So, and and because I'm not that good at it,

Speaker 44 it seemed like it would work for Miss Swang on the theremin.

Speaker 44 So, yeah, so that's that's how.

Speaker 7 I mean, the theremin is a fascinating instrument. Yeah.
And, you know, we could talk for hours about what a theremin is.

Speaker 27 She's basically using the force to make music.

Speaker 7 I don't even understand how it works.

Speaker 7 When you watch Ms. Swong play it in the episode, she's doing it, right? What is she doing?

Speaker 44 So a theremin is like the only instrument where you don't physically touch anything.

Speaker 44 You're using your hand to block, I think, a wave, and that is creating the sound.

Speaker 7 Incredible.

Speaker 44 Incredible. I know.
It's totally crazy.

Speaker 7 And you know what else is amazing is that Sarah Bach learned how to play the theremin for the episode.

Speaker 9 Yeah, you can tell she knows what she's doing.

Speaker 35 It looks perfect.

Speaker 7 Incredible.

Speaker 55 I mean,

Speaker 44 I was convinced.

Speaker 7 Yeah, this young woman is just, she's such a good actress and so smart and so committed. And she went and learned how to play it.
That's one of,

Speaker 7 I think, the more interesting scenes in the episode.

Speaker 7 And you then, I remember, scored as Milchik's tail gets darker and weirder, you went on to score it with the theremin to get even weirder and stranger as it gets, you know, exactly.

Speaker 7 Yeah, um, let's take a listen to that scene.

Speaker 64 And he reached up to grasp at his hair, which was suddenly moss that tore easily from his bleeding scalp.

Speaker 20 Good heavens. And as the pus from his eye thickened into sap, I turned from my gargling brother and walked to the pool of the hollow, where I knew the waterfall would drown out my brother's cries.

Speaker 65 That's actually really smart.

Speaker 65 And it was here that I first encountered the Temper Wolf.

Speaker 20 A gaunt bride, half the height of a natural woman.

Speaker 7 I just have to say, the theme that you did come up with, that theme, which she's playing on the theremin, to me, that spooky, weird, kind of evocative melody is, it's so,

Speaker 7 it makes this episode in my mind, you know, because it puts you in this world, which,

Speaker 7 again,

Speaker 7 I just can't say enough how much the music is important in our show. You know, it's part of the world of the show.

Speaker 29 So we're so lucky to have Teddy.

Speaker 7 Yeah, man.

Speaker 6 Well, yeah.

Speaker 44 Thank you. I mean, I have to say that there was a particular moment in the show where I thought to myself,

Speaker 44 this might be the single best piece of footage that I've ever gotten to work on,

Speaker 44 which is during the sex scene between Mark and Helly. that shot with the red glow the wide shot

Speaker 44 of of the red glow of the two of them where you just kind of see almost their weird animal silhouette yeah the wide shot just sort of like at the end of it right yes yes exactly and the cue that you did there is what it's so funny because we've never talked about this that it's like one of my favorite did i tell you this that moment no i think jeff told me that you said that you that you were like because i wrote a chord at the end of that that i really was happy about.

Speaker 44 And the director doesn't always love the thing that you write that you're really excited about.

Speaker 44 But in this case, I've heard via Jeff that Ben's like, that chord is my favorite moment of the sequel of the whole show.

Speaker 7 And then what you're doing too, Adam, is good.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, it's fine.

Speaker 6 Whatever.

Speaker 6 All right.

Speaker 50 Well,

Speaker 7 we've been asking fans to call in with questions. We have this hotline set up.
So

Speaker 7 we got one about the music that we want you to help us to answer.

Speaker 42 Okay. Okay.
Let's listen.

Speaker 67 Hey guys, this is Don Collin from New York. I'm a big fan of your work.

Speaker 67 My question was, what was the influence behind the praise cure

Speaker 67 anthem that was sang to the crew at the end of season one? I was just wondering what went behind that whole composition and

Speaker 67 what the backstory was with that. Thank you so much.

Speaker 22 Thank you, Don.

Speaker 44 So he's asking about the cure him. Yeah.

Speaker 44 What I remember was at a certain point, I think that Aoifa

Speaker 7 McCartle, who directed the episode.

Speaker 28 Aoifa McCartle, yes.

Speaker 44 You know, she had identified,

Speaker 44 well, the Cure Hymn was written into the script, the lyrics.

Speaker 44 And I think that Aoifa gave me a reference of something that she felt would be an interesting reference. And it was this lullaby

Speaker 44 that was in the movie Night of the Hunter.

Speaker 44 And so I listened to that and I sat down at the piano and played and sang the Kira hymn sort of as a lullaby. And then, you know, and then Patricia performed it

Speaker 44 as a punishment.

Speaker 33 Yeah.

Speaker 24 It's so interesting because Patricia, the way Patricia interprets it is ominous.

Speaker 26 And like you said, it's a punishment, but the melody and hearing it now in this episode episode and hearing it kind of travel in different versions, it is sort of lulling.

Speaker 22 And you can see it as being kind of like this soothing song that's kind of gone through the ages.

Speaker 7 Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 44 And you actually hear that theme in the scene where Cobel is in front of her shrine to Kir in, is it 105 or 106? 106.

Speaker 7 And that's the score.

Speaker 44 So it has this sort of devotional quality there.

Speaker 34 And then devotional, yes, that's the word yeah anyway I'm just so happy that we got to work together yeah

Speaker 44 I know it's great and Adam you're so great on this show and I'm thanks man so so amazed by everything that you're doing thanks Teddy well thanks man thanks for joining us yeah thanks Teddy all right yeah thanks guys

Speaker 9 Okay, I'm so excited to dive into this episode with you because we shot it now a couple of years ago.

Speaker 7 Isn't that crazy?

Speaker 51 It really has been a couple of years.

Speaker 7 It was March of 203.

Speaker 49 Yeah. Yep.

Speaker 9 Now, the entire episode is with Innies, but it's out fucking side, which is my favorite line.

Speaker 41 I think from the season is Dylan's first line when he emerges.

Speaker 7 He knew there was no ceiling, but this is.

Speaker 39 Yeah, but this is

Speaker 43 insane.

Speaker 7 I don't know whatever.

Speaker 34 So we're all outside because it's part of a Lumen reform called the Oortbo, which stands for Outdoor Retreat and Team Building Occurrence.

Speaker 30 Let's listen to Milchik telling the innies about it on a DVD.

Speaker 65 Good morning, refiners.

Speaker 68 This is Mr. Milchuk from work, and I'm thrilled to welcome you to your first ever

Speaker 68 outdoor retreat and team-building occurrence.

Speaker 49 He is this Ortbo

Speaker 68 is in response to your desire to see the outside world.

Speaker 51 Mr.

Speaker 68 With your Audi's blessings, you will spend the next two calendar days walking the meadows, thickets, brambles, and brooks that make up the Dieter Egan National Forest.

Speaker 68 Who the fuck is Dieter Egan?

Speaker 68 Dieter Egan?

Speaker 65 Some of you may be quietly yearning to learn more.

Speaker 65 The truth you seek lies within the fourth appendix.

Speaker 34 Wow.

Speaker 58 So, okay, this episode is a complete departure from the Innies world, but also the world of the series entirely.

Speaker 57 Do you want to just talk about where it came from and why you wanted to do this?

Speaker 7 Yeah, I think it was one of the original ideas for season two was we knew we wanted to do a corporate retreat of some type.

Speaker 7 And what would that be? So it was really, you know, trying to figure out what the reason would be for that, which felt like it really made sense in terms of Milchik trying to maybe do something.

Speaker 7 I think it's probably a good question that I don't know if there is one answer for it or not in terms of what his motivation is for it. I think, on the one hand,

Speaker 7 you see that there's some element of compassion that he has for the Innies, but this retreat is not really a fun experience for them.

Speaker 7 It's meant to, I think, on another level, like kind of basically say, okay, you guys wanted to go see the outside world. Yeah.

Speaker 18 Well, here you go. Yeah.

Speaker 12 Yeah. And it's not so easy and it's not so nice.

Speaker 58 Yeah.

Speaker 18 Yeah.

Speaker 7 And, you know, how it's organized, what he's doing, the okay's that he has from his superiors and all that, we don't really know about. Yeah.

Speaker 7 But it was an opportunity just to, you know, really dig into the weird mind games that Lumen plays with the Innies and, you know, what could, you know, we talk about sometimes like, you know, the choices that you guys have to make in terms of like, what's the first thing I'm experiencing?

Speaker 7 Like, oh, I'm buttoning my shirt for the first time. Yeah.
You know, I've never done that before.

Speaker 7 And it's not always appropriate to do that in an episode, but this was an opportunity for you guys to really take in the outside world in a way you'd never done before.

Speaker 7 And just as a production, you know, to go off and make this episode was, it was like we were making a little movie.

Speaker 51 It really was.

Speaker 26 And, you know, watching the episode again last night, I was like realizing just how expansive it is. And we were out there.

Speaker 11 We were out there in the elements for what, five weeks?

Speaker 34 Yeah.

Speaker 7 I mean, we talked about how we were going to make this episode.

Speaker 7 We, you know, we're not the kind of show that does that kind of visual effects stuff where we do something, you know, with green screen or something like that.

Speaker 7 So we knew we wanted to go to a real location. At first, we started thinking about, you know, we knew snow was really important.

Speaker 7 And of course, like in our world with climate change and, you know, finding snow is a really hard thing to do, even in the winter.

Speaker 53 You can't depend on any location at any particular point in the year.

Speaker 7 Right. And we're based in New York with the production, and it's hard to go very far away.
We talked at one point about going, maybe going to Colorado or going to Canada.

Speaker 7 Canada, and we realized that wasn't really feasible for us. But the Catskills were, you know, close by.
We shoot a lot of our exteriors in upstate New York in a town called Kingston.

Speaker 7 And this was a little bit further west and out there more. But we have a great location manager named Ryan Smith.

Speaker 7 And Ryan went out and started searching around, and we found this.

Speaker 7 The biggest centerpiece for the episode is the waterfall.

Speaker 48 Yes.

Speaker 63 Keir's twin was always with him.

Speaker 63 That's why we provided the very same for each of you.

Speaker 19 Fuck you all. I was right.

Speaker 64 Mr. Miltek,

Speaker 20 this is the tallest waterfall on the planet.

Speaker 63 You have followed the path of Keir and Dieter and reached Woes Hollow.

Speaker 63 You stand upon sacred earth.

Speaker 64 We're starving, Mr. Milchuk.

Speaker 20 Are you?

Speaker 63 I thought the waterfall's grandeur would satiate you.

Speaker 63 I'm teasing, of course.

Speaker 7 So finding this waterfall was sort of the key, and Ryan found Awasting Falls, which is near Lake Minnewaska. And Lake Minnawaska was where that lake is.

Speaker 46 But that was the other part of it, too, is the frozen lake, the cliff above it.

Speaker 7 I mean, yeah. Well, this was also like it was written originally that you guys were in a clearing.
That's right.

Speaker 7 And then all of a sudden they hear you and they're like you kind of come out of the woods or something. Right.
And, you know, we thought.

Speaker 7 This is something we could really find, something that's a little bit more dramatic.

Speaker 7 And we found this lake that has this cliff over it and we thought well wouldn't it be cool if Mark is standing up on top of the cliff and Irving is in the middle of the lake yeah which we really I was really up on that cliff he was out in the middle of the frozen lake and we were actually screaming to each other yeah yeah that was fun to do look the whole episode was so dependent on weather too we got so lucky I remember it was touch and go for a while and then right before our shooting dates right before moving up there there was a big storm am i right yes there was a storm that like for the four weeks that we were shooting basically we needed snow and a storm happened and it only happened like at the altitude the snow was at the altitude that we were shooting at wow but everybody kind of moved up to the catskills for a while and we're staying in hotels around there we were based in a cord we had a really fun uh roller skating rap party that was really fun at a place called skate time in a cord new york you know bjorn corn the popcorn?

Speaker 29 That's where I discovered it, and I eat it to this day.

Speaker 7 Yeah, so that skate rink is owned by Bjorn of Bjorn Corn and Stephanie.

Speaker 8 I love Bjorn Corn.

Speaker 7 Yeah, and they hosted us. And we had, I mean, we had a really good time.

Speaker 7 I mean, it was a huge production in terms of like, you know, having to get up to where the campsite was.

Speaker 7 Was, you know, you had to take these like snow cats or, you know, other like kind of vehicles to get up there, especially when the weather hit.

Speaker 2 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 41 I mean, just for the actors to get to and this means that everything else was 18 times more difficult.

Speaker 26 Just for the actors, we would drive from where we were staying for a while and then arrive at the base of the mountain, get out of the car and get onto a snow cat because there were no actual roads going up to where we were shooting, ride in the snowcat up to the top of the mountain where we had our base camp, which is just a series of tents with heaters in them.

Speaker 27 And that is where we were all day.

Speaker 41 And we would go venture off and shoot from there, sometimes needing to hike for 45 minutes or something to get to where we were shooting.

Speaker 7 The cave, the cave,

Speaker 7 Scissor Cave was a real hike. There was no way to reach that little cave except to hike at least, yeah, it was like about 30 minutes.

Speaker 7 But our camera crew had to literally carry those heavy cameras and camera cases. It was an ordeal.
It was an ordeal.

Speaker 7 And the weather was constantly changing when we were filming the episode too. And the other other big centerpiece of the episode is Irving's Dream.
Yeah.

Speaker 7 The cliff where we find you in the beginning and where you have the scene with Miltchick and then you see the shadow off on the cliff, you know, the sort of faceless version of you.

Speaker 7 That was at a place called Sam's Point and in this Peterskill area, which was a little bit away from Lake Minawaska. This is the Shawungunk Mountains.
Beautiful, beautiful views.

Speaker 70 Really, really gorgeous.

Speaker 7 And we had to shoot that dream dream sequence. Basically, we had to switch our schedule around because one morning we came into work and it was really foggy and snow had fallen.

Speaker 7 And it was so foggy that if we had shot that scene of you guys on the cliff with the TV, you wouldn't have seen any of that vista. Right.

Speaker 7 So, Jessica, our cinematographer, made the call to say, Let's go shoot the dream.

Speaker 7 And so, we went over to this sort of burned-out forest area that was at altitude that was near that cliff and it was foggy and eerie yeah and what you see when when irving walks to the you know the cubicle in the middle we we brought the cubicle out to the middle of this charred out forest yeah

Speaker 7 and that's not a set that's not um visual effects that's all real real fog that was extraordinary because I wasn't there, but you told me about it when you guys got back and looking at the dailies, it looks like it was designed and it looks like special effect.

Speaker 34 Like you never could have asked for better fog placement, for better colors.

Speaker 26 I mean, it is beautiful and it was all naturally occurring.

Speaker 7 Yeah, we were so lucky. We were just so lucky with the elements and the ability that we had as a crew to like kind of like change our plan and just go do that made all the difference.

Speaker 7 And then we shot in this sort of this blueberry field where you guys were walking through where Irving's reading from the Keir book,

Speaker 7 the fourth appendix.

Speaker 45 And it was difficult to walk because we had these boots.

Speaker 59 We need to talk about the wardrobe, but we had these boots that also had cramp-ons attached to them that were made for walking on slippery ice.

Speaker 26 They're basically like almost like straight claws that lift you an extra like five inches off the ground.

Speaker 9 But walking through deep snow and or blueberry bushes made lifting our feet up and down exhausting.

Speaker 29 And we were all drenched in sweat by the time we made it across those fields.

Speaker 7 I mean, Sarah Edwards, our costume designer, just did incredible work.

Speaker 7 That was the other thing. We knew all we were going to have were you guys out there and the snow.
So what are the costumes going to be? What would they put, what would Lumen put you in?

Speaker 7 And I think Dan had this idea that it would be something that would feel like it was from like 100 years ago.

Speaker 7 And she came up with just the most beautiful costumes, these black coats, these black fur hats and everything down to the undergarments were period were from a particular time yeah it felt like revenant yeah era and it was just really you know that choice was really important because we knew we were going to sort of live with that for the whole episode yeah and also the color of the wardrobe that everyone had it's particularly beautiful and particularly stark when up against the snow.

Speaker 25 It's really, really just incredible to look at these four figures moving across the landscape.

Speaker 7 Yeah, and I remember we shot tests of you guys in that, and I remember Milchik's outfit, which is white and kind of

Speaker 12 and Miss Wong as well.

Speaker 7 Yeah, Miss Wong, too. And there's like a Jeremiah Johnson vibe going on there.

Speaker 30 They look like they're in the Empire Strikes Back, and we look like we're in Jeremiah Johnson.

Speaker 49 Right. Yeah.

Speaker 7 All right, let's take a break, and we'll come back and talk a little bit more about some of the plot stuff that's going on in this episode.

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Speaker 7 All right, so a lot of different things going on in this episode.

Speaker 7 The big thing, of course, is that since episode one, Irving has been suspicious that Helly is not telling the truth about what went on with her when she had her Audi activated.

Speaker 53 Yeah, something about it just hasn't sat right with him since that first episode when they all got back.

Speaker 7 So you guys are trudging through the snow and he's suspicious and he's, you know, he's asking about the night gardener comment.

Speaker 35 Yeah, he's sort of starting to pick apart Helly's story a little bit.

Speaker 40 And to Mark, it just kind of is out of the blue and feels ridiculous.

Speaker 56 Like, what are you even talking about?

Speaker 7 Yeah, and I think that's also probably because Mark is so into Helly at this point, too, and not maybe wanting to see that.

Speaker 38 And thinking about Irving and Irving being the one who started to pick up on something strange about Helly, I wonder if, because he's so heartbroken and he's so sort of emotionally wrong, split open, if he's extra sensitive to the vibrations of everyone in the group or something, because he, from the very start, sees something very wrong, but can't quite put his finger on it.

Speaker 7 That's right. And you even see that in episode three a little bit too, when you guys go out to look for the goat people.

Speaker 27 Yeah, she stops and comforts him

Speaker 29 and takes liberties that just feel a little off.

Speaker 18 Yeah.

Speaker 7 And then you're trudging through the snow, you discover the dead seal.

Speaker 7 By the way, a moment in time when real snow came down from the heavens just for like three hours. Well, we shot that scene in three hours, all of that scene, because we knew the snow was going away.

Speaker 69 Just real quick, I remember when we were shooting this with John and I and him asking me about the night gardener, we were walking through a raw space where snow had fallen and no one had walked since the snow fell.

Speaker 40 That's right.

Speaker 46 So you were extra excited because there was fresh snow for us to organically walk.

Speaker 7 You were like on this little peninsula in this little brook.

Speaker 11 Could have fallen into the creek at any moment because who knew?

Speaker 7 It was very delicate shooting that scene, but I remember being so excited that we were getting that snow.

Speaker 7 And then the weird campfire.

Speaker 7 I mean, we could have a whole separate podcast about Milchik's crazy tale of the temper woe that is just one of my favorite

Speaker 7 trammel moments in the series. But then Irving pushes Helie about, you know, what really went on.

Speaker 64 Just tell us about him.

Speaker 20 Who?

Speaker 64 The night gardener.

Speaker 20 Oh, Irv, come on.

Speaker 64 Did he have a flashlight?

Speaker 20 Hmm?

Speaker 64 What was he wearing?

Speaker 61 What is your deal right now, dude?

Speaker 64 What color was his shirt?

Speaker 25 He really kind of makes a spectacle of it, really embarrasses her in front of everyone.

Speaker 58 Yes.

Speaker 7 Yes, he does. And then he goes off into the forest forest and has this weird dream.
At the same time, this huge experience happens in the show, which is that you and Helly sleep together.

Speaker 7 And as that's happening, Irving is having this dream where the temper woe shows up. And maybe for a second, I think you might see an image of...
like just the slightest image of Heli in her face.

Speaker 7 And then he wakes up knowing that he has to confront her and confronts her out by the waterfall.

Speaker 46 So it's almost like there have been some random puzzle pieces scattered in front of Irving now for a few episodes.

Speaker 26 And it's this dream that is abstract, but it's the dream that sort of puts them together.

Speaker 71 And he knows when he wakes up, he knows what's going on.

Speaker 7 Yeah. And I think he's been trusting his instincts more from these dreams that he's been having from season one, too.
But let's take a listen to that scene.

Speaker 75 Mr. Milchak!

Speaker 75 Mr. Milchy!

Speaker 75 Mr. Milchak!

Speaker 75 Mark!

Speaker 75 Hey! Turn on back, Mr. Milchak! What are you doing, man? Turn on back!

Speaker 75 What the fuck?

Speaker 75 She's an outing!

Speaker 75 No! Stop it! Ermic, stop this! She's on fucking mold! What are you doing? I'm gonna kill her, Mr. Milchetta!

Speaker 38 The jig is up at this point, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 7 And this was, I mean, what a, you know, this was the scene that was a bear to shoot. I mean, you're, you know, you guys are up on a cliff.
He had to attempt to drown Britt in this icy, cold water.

Speaker 53 So cold.

Speaker 7 There were so many aspects to shooting this scene, to put it all together. But really,

Speaker 7 it's one of my favorite Irving John Toturo moments in the series.

Speaker 22 It's beautiful.

Speaker 59 And do you want to talk about the close-up of Helly being dunked in the water being shot later at our stages up on a

Speaker 18 platform?

Speaker 7 We had to create a tank, a little mini tank that we could put the camera under and have a camera person, a scuba diving camera person underneath so that...

Speaker 7 they could see the close-up on Britt's face when she transitions and several transitions. But I have to say, John's reading of when he says, she's a fucking mole.
Yeah.

Speaker 7 It's this, you know, aspect of Irving. It's just like this strong,

Speaker 7 dark, incredibly, you know, forceful version of Irving that we've never seen before.

Speaker 7 And that whole scene, as challenging as it was to shoot, just it's the acting, I think, is just so great there where Milchik, you know, banishes him. And I think it's pretty emotional.

Speaker 46 John is world-class, class and you see it here.

Speaker 56 He's a heavyweight.

Speaker 18 Yeah.

Speaker 7 He's one of the greats. And I love when Zach is yelling out, you know, because he's like, you just hear the pain in his voice.

Speaker 22 That was emotional.

Speaker 59 I remember it being emotional on set watching John walk away.

Speaker 34 I remember we were off camera just being there for eyeline for John, but we were all weeping.

Speaker 30 watching him turn around and walk away.

Speaker 12 It was really, because also, you know, Irv, from the moment he smashes the egg in the book in season one,

Speaker 71 he has not only defined for himself what right and wrong is, but I think he's been a living definition of right and wrong for the rest of us.

Speaker 4 And him being excommunicated in that moment was heartbreaking.

Speaker 14 Yeah.

Speaker 66 Your workspace will be cleared and any personal items discarded.

Speaker 61 Your file, including any and all professional interactions and personal relations, will be purged and destroyed.

Speaker 63 It will be as if you, Irving B,

Speaker 66 never even existed nor drew a single breath upon this earth.

Speaker 65 May Keir's mercy follow you into the eternal dark.

Speaker 18 Now.

Speaker 7 And I remember thinking about how Milchik could do this because we had discussions about, well, how is he going to, you know, turn him off?

Speaker 7 How is he going to, are there going to be security guards that come and drag him away? You know, what's going to happen?

Speaker 7 And we came to the conclusion that something in Irving is probably accepting this.

Speaker 7 And the strength of the mind control that Milchik has and they have over these innies is so strong. But I think ultimately there's something in Irving

Speaker 7 that

Speaker 7 accepts his fate.

Speaker 7 And maybe

Speaker 7 on some level, you know, the lovesickness for Bert or something in there, he has to somehow. And watching John come to that realization is pretty amazing.

Speaker 71 Yeah, I think the moment he makes the decision to out her as who she is, he knows he's done for and he's doing it for his brethren there,

Speaker 46 his compadres.

Speaker 7 Right. But he does tell Dylan to hang in there.

Speaker 6 Yep.

Speaker 42 All right.

Speaker 7 Before we go, it's time to check in with our telepathic friend, Zach Cherry, to find out what he thinks.

Speaker 35 The octopus of us all.

Speaker 7 The octopus that is Zach Cherry. What he knows deep in his heart will happen in episode five.

Speaker 3 Let's hear.

Speaker 7 Hello again, it's Zach here. You know what time of the episode it is.
This is your favorite part of the episode. The feedback has been coming in and people are saying they skip right to this part.

Speaker 7 Sorry, Ben and Adam, but that's what I've heard. Anyway, you know what's coming.

Speaker 7 Next time on Severance.

Speaker 7 You know, we've seen the Innies have one field trip, and now I think it's time to see them have another. They're going to go to the mall and watch a movie.

Speaker 17 Wow, their first movie.

Speaker 24 That's exciting.

Speaker 7 What was your first movie? Call in and tell Ben and Adam what is the first movie you ever watched.

Speaker 51 For me, it was the movie Meet the Parents starring my friend Ben Stiller.

Speaker 7 I watched that. It was the first movie I ever saw.

Speaker 18 I was 20 years old.

Speaker 6 Okay, all right. Wait a minute.
You know what?

Speaker 17 Wait a minute.

Speaker 29 So much of that just doesn't add up.

Speaker 7 His first movie at 20? Yeah.

Speaker 27 His first movie was at 20.

Speaker 7 He's just trying to get to me. Yeah, he is.

Speaker 49 He's trying to make us feel old.

Speaker 7 It's not going to work, Zach. All right.
I'm sure your first movie was probably like Madagascar or something like that.

Speaker 40 Exactly.

Speaker 14 Something else Ben Stiller created or is a part of.

Speaker 6 Yeah, right.

Speaker 7 It's nice. Isn't it nice to be at that point of your career where people come up and say, I grew up watching it happened to me in front of you.

Speaker 51 I saw you.

Speaker 34 And you were so happy that I experienced that.

Speaker 14 I was like, welcome to my world.

Speaker 12 It was someone that came up and said, I've been watching you since I was a little kid and you mean so much to me, which was lovely and so kind of them to come up and say,

Speaker 9 but

Speaker 32 it strikes a particular chord when someone says, because you know, when you were out acting in front of cameras, you were a grown-up,

Speaker 11 which means you are now an old person.

Speaker 7 It's also the person telling you, when you look at the person, you go, this person's like maybe like almost middle-aged.

Speaker 39 Exactly.

Speaker 14 Yeah.

Speaker 11 That's the infuriating part.

Speaker 7 And you're younger than I am, but I have come, I've been dealing with this for a while now, and I've come around to like appreciating it.

Speaker 7 Like I don't even have any weirdness about it now when people, I really do appreciate it. Yeah.
Like, you know, no joking.

Speaker 7 But it was fun to watch you really experience it for the first time and just like the pale kind of wash of

Speaker 7 that's like, oh my God.

Speaker 11 I didn't even know it was apparent what I was going through, but then I just turned my head and you're like, yeah.

Speaker 18 See?

Speaker 7 Zach Cherry is 48, by the way.

Speaker 39 Yeah, he's older than both of us.

Speaker 49 All right. We did it.

Speaker 51 We did it, man.

Speaker 9 We did.

Speaker 26 We are done, and that is it for this episode.

Speaker 25 The Severance podcast with Ben and Adam will be back next week to talk about season two, episode five.

Speaker 7 And you can stream every episode of Severance on Apple TV Plus with new episodes coming out every Friday.

Speaker 25 And then make sure you're listening to our podcast, which drops right after the episode airs.

Speaker 24 The Severance podcast with Ben Stiller and Adam Scott is a presentation of Odyssey, Pineapple Street Studios, Red Hour Productions, and Great Scott Productions.

Speaker 7 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.

Speaker 7 Our executive producers are Barry Finkel, Henry Malofsky, Gabrielle Lewis, Jenner Weiss-Berman, and Leah Rhys-Dennis. This show is produced by Xandra Ellen, Ben Goldberg, and Naomi Scott.

Speaker 7 This episode was mixed and mastered by Chris Basil. We had additional engineering from Javi Crustis and Davey Sumner.

Speaker 45 Show clips are courtesy of fifth season.

Speaker 36 Music by Theodore Shapiro.

Speaker 24 Special thanks to the team at Odyssey, Maura Curran, Eric Donnelly, Michael LeVay, Melissa Wester, Matt Casey, Kate Rose, Kurt Courtney, and Hilary Schuff.

Speaker 7 And the team at Red Hour, John Lescher, Carolina Pesakov, Gian Pablo Antonetti, Martin Balderutin, Ashwin Ramesh, Maria Noto, John Baker, and Oliver Agar.

Speaker 24 And at Great Scott, Kevin Cotter, Josh Martin, and Christy Smith at Rise Management.

Speaker 7 We had additional production help from Kristen Torres and Melissa Slaughter. I'm Ben Stiller.

Speaker 15 And I'm Adam Scott.

Speaker 7 Thanks for listening.

Speaker 16 And how dare you, Mr.

Speaker 22 Milchik, for throwing out my marshmallows? I am a team player.

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