S1E5: The Grim Barbarity Of Optics and Design (with Jen Tullock)

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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. Today, we're recapping Season 1, Episode 5, The Grim Barbarity of Optics and Design, written by Anna Ouyang Munch and directed by Aoife McArdle.

Ben, how have you been?

I've been pretty good.

It's been at least, I don't know, 11 hours since we've seen each other.

In that time, the Knicks lost a game they should have won last night. I'm sorry now what does that mean they lost a game that they should have won it means they lost a game they should have won thank you for clearing that up should have beaten it was utah and they should have beaten utah and uh their better team and it didn't affect my mood or anything though oh Oh, good, good.
I didn't notice. Uh,

no, it, you know what? I've never seen the fate of the Knicks affect you, your mood at all, or maybe I just don't know. Um, did you ever see me watching a Knicks game on set ever? Yes, I did actually.
Right. Okay.
We'll edit that out though. I, I scratch that.
Um, Did I ever tell you that as a 16, 17-year-old, I was really into Spike Lee, and so I grew a goatee and wore a Knicks cap everywhere for a while? No, you did not tell me that. Not having, as a teenager, followed basketball at all, nor did I once I started wearing the cap.
Wait a minute. The goatee was to be like Spike Lee? Yes.
And the cap was to identify with the Knicks? Yeah, I got it. How did that work out? Well, not great.
It was probably, I'm sure it's offensive in one way or the other. But mostly it's, you know, actually there is a photo of me with the cast of Crimes of the Heart, the play that I was directing.
And I was sure to wear the Knicks cap, have the goatee and horn rimmed glasses in the photo. We can cut all this out as well.
The image of Adam Scott trying to be Spike Lee. Trying to be Spike Lee.
Okay. Well, you know, today we are lucky enough to be joined by the great Jen Tulloch, who plays Devin on the show, my character's sister.
So, Jen Tulloch, welcome to the pod. Hey, guys.
I'm sorry I'm late. I was just coming straight from a Utah celebration party.
And let me tell you, the spirits were high. It was just great to be in a room with winners.
You know what I mean? Yeah. Which Utah team was that? The ball team.
Ball sports. Ball sports team.
All right. The Utah ball sports team.
That's a good team. Jen, you're awesome.
It's great to see you. Oh, you're awesome.
It's great to see you guys, too. I've missed you.
What about me? Am I? She said you guys. No, I said yeah.
It was to Ben. Yeah.
Okay, so it was to Ben. Yeah, just in the spirit of transparency.
I don't want to set you up for disappointment here. Great to see you, Jen.
You're terrific. Did you guys know each other at all before we started doing the show? No.
No. That's so crazy.
We met, though, for the first time when we were coming out for the table read in March of 2020. Yeah.
What a wonderful time that was. We met in the very strange sort of holding area that they take you to on a fancy plane, which isn't awkward at all if you've never spoken to someone.

Luckily, Adam is lovely.

And I think there was like politics up on the screen.

And I remember very clearly immediately firing my mouth off because I was nervous and being like, I don't know what this guy thinks.

Halfway through, immediately just telling you all of the ins and outs of my personal political beliefs. Right, right.
As I recall, it was like, just like a week or something before everything got locked down, wasn't it? Like we were all together as if we were going to make the show. And then a few days later, everything was shut down.
That was crazy because we all saw each other and then we didn't see each other for a long, long time. I have such a Pavlovian response now to the sound of the hand pumps of the hand sanitizer at the table read.
Because we didn't know. We were just everyone was doing their best.
And it was sort of like, okay, we'll elbow bump and everyone will sort of manically use this hand sanitizer. And then two days later, it was like, go home.
Yeah. Everything was shut down.
It was wild. I think that shutdown, though, really kind of ended up helping us in the show in terms of having time to figure out stuff that we were still trying to figure out as we were rolling into production.
That's good to hear. It was such a wild time to get to know everybody as well as well i told adam this before but we have a hug in one of our earlier scenes at least one of the earlier scenes that we shot and we shot it and then when we cut i like stepped away because i teared up because i realized i hadn't hugged anyone like it was it was the first physical contact i had had in a very long time and i I was like, oh, great, this girl.
But it was very sweet. No.
Yeah. And I kind of feel like it was our – not knowing each other particularly well, but this kind of Mark and Devin relationship kind of clicked in really, really fast.
It did. Really? Yeah.
You guys were just

on the same wavelength right away. Yeah.
And I think that was really, I remember when you guys read together, there was so much chemistry there. And I didn't really know all about your background, Jen, but you're a writer and director.
And, you know, that's an amazing thing when you hire an actor who also is a creator in that way well thanks I mean I'm it couldn't I couldn't be in a cooler group of people and also I think to Adam's credit that dynamic felt easy to develop quickly because he was so kind and warm and available the first thing I shot and you guys have been working for a couple months I think when I came in was was the first time we see each other in the show which was opening the door Devin's knocking on the door yeah and I remember thinking how emblematic it was because you just between every take I was totally the new kid and you were very warm and asking asking me about my life and um you were also i think had just been very sick and i thought it was especially nice that you were and sort of the throes of a fever and still wanting to chat that's a really challenging thing for for actors to have to do is to create a whole inner life and past history someone who's playing your sibling when you've just met them. Yeah.
And you guys did that very well. And I think it's just because you guys were so attuned and so talented and so understanding of what that is to jump in.
It's almost like as, I think, challenging as a love scene or something like that too because you're creating something that the audience really has to buy and believe. And so much of Devin and Mark's relationship is unspoken and is in the history and the language you have together.
Yeah. Yeah, and I think that a lot of that too – I don't know about you, Jen, but the writing was such that there wasn't that scene where it's like, well, you know, since we're sister and brother and our parents died when we were three, or there weren't those expository scenes that we kind of all roll our eyes at that for an audience, I think is alienating and you don't actually feel like you're watching siblings.
In here, we had the room to develop this relationship and we didn't have the responsibility of hitting all those expository beats so we could fill it with behavior. And I think that was more beneficial to us, but also to the show and also being given that room by our directors.
Absolutely. And I think Dan Erickson mentioned early on that he had, in some ways, based Devin on his own sister and his own relationship with his sister.
So I feel like you can feel that it isn't forced, which is great. Yeah, I have a sister and I realize that that dialogue so much of it is when you're talking to a sibling is just sort of the love and the history and all that is just, you just take that for granted.
So a lot of the back and forth is, you know, just like quibbling about things or joking with each other about things or getting annoyed with each other about things. But there's such a basis of trust and love because you're siblings that that's what you're talking about.
Dan didn't worry about putting all that in the dialogue. It was already there.
And so I felt like it was Dan and you two kind of all came together to really were just in sync metaphysically or something before you met. And you Aoife really helped us uh you gave us the space to find that and it didn't feel rigid in any way like we had mile markers to meet and um I think once we roasted each other once off camera it was like oh yeah we're good we're cruising yeah I also remember thinking when I learned about what you do Jen Jen, just thinking, oh, she's really

smart and talented and I hope she thinks this is good.

For some reason, I had that with you and Zach Cherry too.

Yeah.

Like this sort of insecurity of like, wow, I hope they like the show when they see it.

Well, sir, I was feeling the exact same thing the entire time.

I was like just –

We were both on our best behavior trying to –

Oh, my God. Totally.
Trying to impress the other. Yeah.
That's cool. And another thing with someone like Jen is that you can just completely relax.
Just like all the actors on our show were really lucky, but Jen is there to work. And I just know I can completely relax because I know she is prepared and has thought about the thing from all the different angles.
She just has that mind, and so you can just sort of let go and jump in the scene together and not think about all of the kind of exterior things. We can just kind of connect and go, and it's a really – for another actor, at least, it's really something,

a really relaxing sort of great thing. Likewise, my friend.
Totally. I feel very lucky.

Should we take a quick break here? And then when we come back, we'll jump into episode five. Sounds good.
Yeah, let's do it. At Lumen, things are not always what they seem.
Mark, Dylan, Helly, and Irving in MDR make a great team, but what else lies beyond the four white walls of their department? There seem to be more questions than answers as the secrets of Lumen are slowly revealed. There's definitely a lot more going on than you see.
It's a little bit creepy. I agree.
There are more Q's than A's in this place. Yeah, for sure.
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That's A-T-L-A-S-S-I-A-N dot com slash C-O-N-F-L-U-E-N-C-E. So episode five does not ease us in gently.
It starts right where we left off in episode four. Hely has just attempted to hang herself in the elevator.

Yeah.

Which is really striking and horrifying to see. Yeah.
I actually watched this episode for the first time with Britt Lauer, who plays Helly. I watched it at her house with a couple of friends and was sitting next to her on the couch watching that very intense scene.
So she was quiet. And I was freaking out internally because I can't imagine what it's like to watch yourself do that.
And I think I was just sort of like dunking my sweaty palms into my popcorn bucket. It was hard to watch, but in a beautiful way.
I think it's interesting that we see Mark's out in, for lack of a better term, a depressive episode. I mean, he's having a depressed experience.
So to see this happen as an act of defiance, I felt was an interesting counter to watching someone who is in despair, where we might associate that kind of thing with the latter. And so it was, I don't want to say the act was cool,

but how it was contextualized was really cool.

And it's one of my favorite episodes, the stuff around those heli scenes.

But isn't that interesting as an actor?

Because I'm not great at watching myself.

That's one of the things I really like about Severance is that I'm not in it.

I get to enjoy the process of making it without having to look at myself yeah um but you guys you can appreciate it right you can you can appreciate what you do I don't love watching myself um I think I sort of dissociate when um I am on the screen but luckily there's a lot that I'm not and that I was able to just enjoy as a fan because I didn't know much about the any goings on. So I was legitimately excited to see what happened moment to moment.
And then when I happened to wobble in, I would just sort of look at the floor. Well, this is an episode where I hope you watched every single scene you're in because you're incredible, as always.
So, okay, so Mark's coming out of a wellness session and he discovers Helly and it's horrifying for him, obviously. Grainer shoves him in the elevator and sends him home.
So then we just sort of jump to Mark coming right back to work and is, you wakes up horrified, walks out of the elevator, and there is Cobell and Milchick waiting for him. They tell him how he's recovering in the hospital.
Interestingly, the first thing Mark says to them is, is she alive? They tell him that she is in the hospital and her Audi has no intention of resigning. She'll be back in a few days.

And also I think Michael Comste is really great in that scene where just sort of like this moment of like something's gone horribly wrong.

And he's like, get in the elevator.

Mark, get in the elevator.

It's just sort of like it's so messy and chaotic. And just, you know, he's like in this sort of like, you know, mode of just like, you know, like triage mode of it's like when things get messy in that world, it's not pretty.
Yes. Michael is incredible.
He really is. And yeah, because you get the feeling that he saw it on the video monitor and hopefully he'll get there before any of the innies discover this and then it's clean and they don't have to deal but the moment he sees Mark in there he knows that this is now a mess they'll have to contain yeah and the first thing he has to do is just turn turn your any off so he can deal with the problem I'm always blown away by all of our actors generally but the ones in positions of power within Lumen that have to exact these moments with such precision

and calculated control,

it's such a different experience

than Michael Ternis and I, for example, have,

which we're able to be soulful and warm and in the moment.

And I feel like the skill and intellect required

to pull off these moments blows my mind. I also love that character so much.
You're right. There is a quality of stillness that both Patricia and Tramiel are able to have where they just can do nothing but hold the sort of tension.
And yeah, I agree. It's really wonderful how they do that.
Now, this moment where Cobell and Milchick tell Mark that Helly will be coming back, that her Audi has no intention of resigning, is the beginning of a bit of a turning point for Mark. He's been on board up till now with disciplining Helly and keeping her down there.
But I think there's just something kind of fundamental here that he deep inside does not agree with and is a bit horrified by, even if he's not kind of consciously aware of it. And this is kind of the beginning of a bit of a turn.
Do you think that? Yeah, definitely. And it's coinciding with reading the UUR.
Yes. Because I think that's starting to open up his mind.
Yes. And that sequence of Mark sort of devouring the book and the, you know, you're just starting to see all these ideas that are percolating inside of him.
And, you know, the different quotations and the different thoughts that are, you know, that we see running across the screen, which are both profound and ridiculous. Ridiculous.
I mean, and Chernus reading them is so much fun to listen to.

Do you know some? Well, there's bullies are nothing but bull and lies. That's right.
But for Mark, for this innie, these are profound and just mind-blowing. Yeah.
And it was interesting when we were putting that episode together in editing was that sequence, it was both that the sequence

of the

of the

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of the

of the

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of the

of the

of the

of the

of the

of the

of the

of the

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of the

of the

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of the

of the absurdity of his philosophy. But there's also a grain of truth in it that you have to buy.
And so, you know, again, in the bubble of making the show, when nobody had seen the show or knew what the show was, that was one of the things at night sometimes I would think about. It's like, oh, will the audience buy this as real or will it seem, you know, too silly? I feel like that needle was threaded so gracefully because for one thing, I think the assumption generally would be that Mark Zenni and Audi are the same person with different memories.
But what Adam does so beautifully and was in the writing and certainly in the direction is that you watch the childlike quality of Mark Zenni and his ability to experience wonder and his ability to experience like fandom. I think outie Mark is maybe a little too bitter and downtrodden, but watching any Mark feel inspired by Rickon's words, well, I find it very cute if you want to know the truth.
Yeah, he's beginning to have this sort of, this idolatrous, is that the right word?

Relationship with Rickon and his Audi just thinks he's a fool, obviously. It just completely dismisses him.
Yeah, which is one of the simple core ideas of the season. Just that juxtaposition of any Mark's relationship with Rickon and Audi.
And that to me was always that simplicity of what Dan came up with was what I really felt was just such a, um, smart thing. Um, because it's just a natural sort of, okay, you know, these two, at some point any Mark at Rick and an Audi Mark and Rick and are going to, you know, at some point this relationship is going to, you know, build to something where, you know, to something where it's fun to think about that.
And yeah, I agree, Adam. Your perception of these things and any mark, you're playing it so earnestly and real.
That, to me, is what makes it work. And that's also, I think, the weirdness of the tone of the show is that you can start the show with this, you know, very graphic suicide attempt and then, you know, like halfway into the show we're, you know, doing that.
Yeah. Innie and Audi Marks seem to kind of their interests are on a bit of a collision course here it seems.
Okay. So now it's time to go out to the birthing retreat and it's baby time.

It's baby o'clock.

For Jen and Michael, Mark gets a bunch of panicked voicemails from Rick and when he gets off work, Devin is in labor out at the birthing retreat.

Yeah.

Birthing cabins.

Birthing cabins.

Not a concept that I really was familiar with before Dan wrote it up. Me neither.
And it's kind of briefly mentioned in the previous episode. Yeah.
It's not a – then when you look it up, you go, oh, people for natural childbirth. I feel like every white girl yoga teacher in L.A.
watched that episode and was like taking notes. They were like is a good idea I could make a mean book yeah um and uh yeah I like that little moment where like you're kind of looking on on the internet at the cabins and with you and Devin and you're kind of like pretty snarky about it yeah it seems like Devin feels like it's a little silly too maybe this is more of a Rickon thing that right they're going to the birthing retreat that's by the way something i just wanted to mention from episode four that i didn't get to is when you're uh talking to devin on the phone and you're finished with a phone call and you go okay it's one of my favorite line readings i do not it's literally it, bye.
But it's like, you know, your relationship, like you're talking to your sister or whatever with your funny voice. It's one of my favorites.
That's funny. So Mark goes up to Devin and Rickon's birthing cabin, runs into Alexa, who he had a disastrous date with, who is Devin and Rickon's doula.
And they have an awkward interaction. Nikki James, who is just incredible.
She's so good. We should also note that that's Nora Dale doing an excellent job as Gabby.
I love the tension there between the two of you. And maybe in another kind of show, it would be like, oh, you're going to rekindle your romance in that scene.
But it's kind of just Mark is kind of just still unable to really give anything, even though he's trying to apologize. But it's kind of half-hearted.
And it just felt like a very real moment. Yeah, not particularly good at, you know, sewing up moments.
Yeah. Yeah, and that's also, you know, for the audience being on Audi Mark side again, I feel like you really made sure not to ever try to get the audience to like Audi Mark.
Right. Um, which I think ends up making it feel more real.
Totally. And I think that's why we do like Audi Mark Mark, because it's just so honest.
Yeah, because you know what's inside of you. Yeah.
But in reality, you know, Mark can't really put himself out like that at this point. He's not there yet.
No, no. Which Devin clearly doesn't pick up on because through contractions is still trying to play Yenta.
She's like still trying to land the plane for him. That's that's right like she'll still she would totally go out with you again yeah you should do it you should try which after that last date i can't imagine why she would so then mark goes into the birthing cabin where rickin is sobbing over devon's belly he's pleading that he doesn't want to be like his father please don't let me be my father into her belly and she's sort of comforting him tolerating him i mean good lord the amount of uh improvised things that flew out of turnus's mouth while we were shooting that one little section was it was a gift um he's so great yeah it was, I think, yeah, I think Devin's sick of him, but I think she loves him so much in an almost fraternal way that she forgives all of his frivolities because she also believes him.
I think she's chosen to believe him. And that's a choice that she made many years ago for her own comfort and stability.
And she's like, yep, this is my person. I'm going to say yes.
And do you feel like with this relationship with Devin and Rick, he's always been this version of himself and the relationship has been this version of the relationship? Or are we catching at a particular moment i think we're catching them in a particular moment we all talked a lot about what the friendship looked like you know between uh mark and rick and devin and gemma and how different a dynamic that might have been before everything went wrong and i I think before that, Rickon was probably less rigid. I think he was less interested in people's opinion of him.
I think he was always interested in people's opinion of him. But I think it was a warmer dynamic that had greater ease between the four of us.
And I feel like any friend group, or in this case, family and friend group, when a member steps away, or dies, it affects the entire thing, you know, it's a Tetris game. And so I think Gemma's absence has affected the meat really differently.
And in Rickon's case, he has grown more and more insecure. He's, you know, he's had to confront the instability and the fact that the people around him, there's no guarantee they will always be there.
And so I think Mark and Devin have had their own approaches. Mark's is a very tangible one.
He's been severed. And I think Devin's just trying to hold both of them together.
Yeah, it seems like the vacuum left by Gemma's absence and now Mark's sort of half absence by giving up half of his life to this place has been filled. You know, Rickon and Mark, theoretically, were pretty close at one point and were, you know, kind of understood each other on a few levels.
And now it seems that, you know, Rickon's kind of bought into his own, this like persona thing. And it's just all sort of askew when we find them.
I think when their siblings are really close, when their partners enter the picture, there is a much kinder initiation process because there typically is a moment where the one, the sibling who's not with the new partner says, you know what? My, my brother says, yes, my sister says, yes. So good for me.
I'm going to be friends with this person. And I think there was probably an element of that too.
Yeah. I think that's really interesting that it's a complicated dynamic, what you're just talking about.

You know, siblings, grown siblings with partners, how the partners get along with each other, all of that. And relationships change over the years.

And dynamics change.

Yeah.

So Rickon has these birthing practices that he's getting everyone to participate in, one of which is he asks Mark to share a secret which will create a soul void to speed up labor. No one seems to know exactly what that means.
I know what that means. Well, of course you know what it means.
Just because I have two children. You created a soul void? On the on the second one oh but what is interesting when you think about that is in the writing uh if you had sort of been told this is how we're going to set up the idea of mark telling devon the secret about what he's thinking about it's going on at lumen that pey told him.
We're going to set it up by Rick and saying someone should tell a secret so that they can create a soul void and release themselves of that guilt or whatever it is. So that later Mark can be asked by Devin to tell a secret.
Totally. It's a great, it's a great way to kind of sneak it in there and also for us to get the information that that rickin is aware uh that the book has not been commented upon by audi mark and that audi mark isn't even aware that there was a book so yeah it's probably he might have even made it up just so that he could say that to mark to find out why he hasn't gotten the book.
Yeah, he's clearly fishing for a compliment or an acknowledgement. Like he created the soul void thing just to try.
That's so interesting. Yeah, that's great.
And it's interesting because there's this moment where Mark and Rickon are hanging kelp in the birthing room and Mark's asking him, why are we doing this? And Rickon's just kind of like,, do you really want me to explain it? Like you think everything I say is bullshitting. They have this honest moment and Mark just kind of leaves.
I really would like him to explain it though. It leaves you wanting more.
So Devin goes on a bit of a walk here looking for a cup of coffee and kind of discovers this big cabin, this kind of larger cabin.

Do we want to listen to the clip of her interaction with a woman she finds in there?

Yes, she really wants coffee.

Yeah.

Hi.

I'm so sorry.

I'm another pregnant lady.

I'm from over there.

I just came out on a coffee run, and I got distracted by your beautiful coffee,

and I was wondering if there's any chance you could hook me up.

Uh, okay.

Yeah.

Yes, thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, thank you so much.

Squeeze right past you.

Oh! Hi, thank you so much. Squeeze right past you.
Oh, I'm Devin. Gabby.
Thank you for narcotics. My husband is driving me fucking crazy.
My brother is depressing me. Is it your first?

Yeah. Yours?

My third.

I'm naming him William.

Three kiddos. I'm so fucking scared of ruining one child.

How do you handle it?

A lot of help, I guess.

Yeah. Holy shit, by the way.

About this cabin. So nice.
Hey, Rich. I love the way you play this, Jen.
So good. That dialogue on the page, when you see that dialogue on the page, Jen, and you're going to work, you're like, okay, I have to get coffee, and I was distracted by your beautiful coffee.
Was that dialogue on the page? Beautiful coffee? Or did you say that? Did you make that up? I don't remember. It seems – I think I might have added beautiful.
Okay. But that on the page to me, if you saw that on the page and Dan's, you know, creates these situations, it's not like a typical situation.
No. I'm not saying it's like the most like you're playing a scene where like you know some awful thing has happened you have to but like to make something like that work or to make that real that's not not the easiest thing to do you know it's a simple thing but and i do find for you as an actress and this is a compliment but i've i find like it's almost impossible for you to say something that doesn't feel real when it comes out of your mouth.
Well, thanks. Okay.
Yes. Thank you.
No, no, but I'm curious in your process, like how you process the words and is there something, how do you do it?

I don't know that I do process the words.

I think it's for Devin anyway.

She's so, she wears it so obviously on her sleeve.

It is almost childlike in that way.

Like clearly she's intelligent, but she is a bit bombastic and bro-y.

And that, once I decided that that was the lane, that made it easy because the writing is so good anyway that I think she means everything she says even when she's being sarcastic with Mark it's done from such a sweet place that I do remember shooting these birthing cabin scenes and thinking you know when people are in physical in physical pain, they become more childlike. And what does it look like? I think we have so many misconceptions about labor.
I myself have never experienced it, but many people I'm close to have. And I actually asked a bunch of my friends before we started shooting that had given birth.
I was like, you're not really making that sound, are you? Like, what are you?

Are you being funny?

Are you? And they had all given me interesting backstory. So I do think that Devin kind of defaulting to this goofiness a little bit is also a coping mechanism because she's in pain.
She wants the coffee because she's in physical discomfort. And I think that she also knows that she can connect with people from a place of vulnerability.
Maybe that's come into clearer focus and contrast to her husband, because for Rickon, that is nearly impossible. And that's probably why they work so well.
But I think it was just, you know, there's a need. She needs the coffee.
That's the bottom line. And even though, you know, like you said, the container is so dramatic and the context is so dramatic.
And I knew there was going to be this gorgeous score underneath. It's like, well, she still just wants her coffee.
So, yeah. I just, there's so much important information in this scene.
And it's killing like six birds with one stone because you're playing it so well. And we're learning so much about Devin here, how she behaves in a situation like this, how she sort of thinks about money and class class it's also pushing class into the show a bit which is super interesting but it's all within this it's only care it's only being pushed by character here but there's all this interesting information it's just there's a heavy load on you as an actor and you're just getting it all out there in such a fascinating way that you don't even notice all the other stuff that's kind of being loaded into the show right here.
It's just like the way you ask her if she's rich. You just learn so much about Devin in that moment.
Yes. There was – there is a toddler in my life, and I had been one of my best friends.

It's her son. And I had been spending a lot of time with him leading up to shooting, and that was him.
Because I was thinking about how adults, however intelligent, can resort to childlike behavior when vulnerable. and I was like I don't I think Devin's too tired to try

to frame that as as like a diplomatic question she's just like i got a question and and that's what kids are and i love i i think about kids so often with any character that's at all vulnerable or messy or not intentionally put together it's like that's what it is. It's just a little kid inside of us that's wanting to get information.
And I do think Devin, though deeply smart, is kind of kid-like in that way. That's so interesting.
Yeah. It's great.
Yeah. It's a great moment.
I love it. Thanks.
So Devin eventually heads back to the cabin, Rick is asleep. So Mark and Devin have this moment where they're just chit-chatting.
She's telling him that Alexa might give him another shot. And then Devin starts getting another contraction, and they, you know, face each other and kind of make a joke about Rickon's earlier theory that we need to tell secrets when the baby's born or whatever.
And so ends up with Mark almost telling Devin about Petey. Yeah.
Gets real close. Then the contraction hits.
Then a contraction hits, saved by the bell. Adam actually was very helpful because I was asking you about your wife Naomi's experience with labor and you were very kind telling me that I wasn't insane making those weird noises.

Yeah.

After we'd cut, I was like, is that, is it weird?

Am I making weird noises?

Is it too cartoony?

And you were very helpful.

No, it feels so real.

It's really.

Yeah.

I mean, it's intense from every birth that I've been around. It's pretty intense.
Every birth that I've been around. The two of my children.
Yes. But yes, the almost getting the information I also think is so important, both because it's telling of their relationship and also because it was fun to feel that type of suspense with Deon because until that point we're sort of only existing outside of the danger of lumen and uh we're really only in sort of familial environments even if you are in pain and so it was it was fun to get to to dip my toe in that for a second yeah and it shows that mark Mark, doesn't have anyone else, and he wants to talk about this with someone because there are concerns.
This whole thing happened with Petey. He watched someone drop dead in front of him and was keeping him in his, like, he hasn't told anyone about this.
So he's, you know, this is his person to talk to about this this is episode five and mark is starting you know starting to believe that that what pd was talking about is real yeah um and you know it's it's taken a little while but we see that settling in and the reality of you know of the fact that there's something going on that he is feeling this need to have to figure out and i remember really loving that about the show and the pace of the show because when some stuff like this is happening you know on you could see that in a different situation on a different show you know episode one he believes pd immediately and goes on this quest to fight for justice. You know, it takes like he doesn't it seems crazy.
So it's going to take a while to really form it and believe it. You need to gather evidence and really internalize it.
And I feel like the scene after this where Devin is giving birth off camera and you're sitting on the dock is sort of – it sort of reinforces that. Yeah.
Because the whole scene, we're just hearing the childbirth. And I'm curious how that was for you because you had to go to an ADR stage.
Oh, right. And do the sounds.
Well, it was great because it was the first time I'd seen what you shot of Adam when he's on the, is he on a pier?

He's sitting on this little dock.

Like a dock, yeah.

And I remember I got distracted because it was such a beautiful moment and I feel like it was such a bittersweet tableau of Audimars' loneliness. Like this major life event that represents rebirth and new life is happening behind him and yet yet he's here in this moment of solitude that is very clearly pained.
And I remember thinking how poetic and beautiful that was, that you've got this huge life event happening for Devin, but Mark is so mired in all of the bullshit of Lumen that we just sort of see him stuck there.

But yes, doing the pregnancy sounds, the labor sounds rather, in the ADR studio was a fun one.

Was Michael Chernis with you?

No, I think we did it separately, which was tough because I don't like really to do anything

without Michael Chernis.

Taxes, exercise classes, I need him there. So it was tough.
That's how we all feel. Right? All right, let's take a quick break.
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All right, so we're back in MDR, and Helly's returned, and Miss Casey is there sort of observing her and offering hugs upon request. It's so weird.
She haunts me in my dreams, Miss Casey. Yeah, Dejan Lockman, the best.
Everything about her. She's so good.
Yeah, and she's kind of like, you feel like she's sort of like, she knows she has to be there, but inside you feel something's going on with her. She's not maybe quite sure why she's there, but she's doing her job.
And Irving is getting sleepy again. Yeah.
And he has another dream. I love how Aoife McArdle did this.
This black goo is coming through the light panels in the ceiling and starts to drip out. And I know she was very adamant about making sure we had real goo.
So there's like this weird black, goopy, oily goo. I don't even know what it was.
But the way she integrated that with the visual effects, it's pretty weird and kind of beautiful too. It's really cool.
And I remember I had to, for me leaning back into his dream, I had to put in this black contact lens. Yeah.
And then they dribbled goo coming out of my eye as well. Yes.
Yeah. How did that feel? It was super comfy.
I loved it. How did they trigger that? Like how did – from whence was the goo coming? We injected the goo into my tear ducts and then I was able to – I don remember i don't remember how we did that um i think it was there was like a black um contact lens of some time yes it was and then we just dripped some some some of the black goo and it might have been enhanced a little bit with the computer yeah and then irving goes to make a photocopy of the map to O&D.
And out of the copier come the scary painting. Yes.
This sort of like melee, this coup happening. And it's between O&D and MDR.
Yeah. And we know it's O&D and MDR because of the color of their tag thing? Yeah.
O&D has the green tags and MDR has the blue tags. And it's a great little weird kind of mural-like painting of this office battle happening with people's throats getting slit.
Yeah, it's carnage. And John Turturro's reaction is so amazing.
Yeah.

His innie seeing this, he's just so – this, you know, in terms of like sensory, the effect of seeing something like this for him who has seen very little in his life, that violent – you know, for a desensitized culture that we're in where we see so much every moment on our phones and screens for

Irving seeing this painting, he's never seen any of that.

Yeah.

And John just fills it with so much dread and fear.

It makes it so important.

Totally.

And for Irv, his whole world, like how he kind of – his like window into the world is completely through art and paintings.

And so this is horrifying.

His sensitivity to these images.

And then all of a sudden Milchick is there.

And let's play that little moment where Milchick finds him looking at the painting. I'm sorry, Irving.
We must have sent this print job here by mistake. You weren't supposed to see this.
What are these? Nothing. A joke from Miss Cobell.
It's the O&D coup, isn't it? The one that Dylan talks about. Did that actually happen, Mr.
Milchick? Of course not. Nothing like that could happen here.
Wow. Oh, God.
Just awful. The mind control going on, the levels with Milchik fake lying.
And yeah, throughout the episode, Milchik and Cobell are sort of going rogue and, you know, influencing all the employees sort of like, you know, like they're kind of pawns in their chess game. And we really get to see how that manipulation happens.

And Milchik goes back and sees Cobel.

And, you know, it turns out it was an unauthorized 266.

Oh, I hate those.

That's a maneuver.

I try and pull 266s on Jen all the time. And I've got the scars to prove it, okay? And you also get the sense that, you know, Cobell trusts Milchick with her secrets of what she's up to.
You get the feeling that what she's doing with Mark and sending him to Miss Casey, we don't quite understand, but she's doing something that's unauthorized. Right.
Yeah. They're kind of, you get the sense that they're going rogue down there.
Yeah. Yeah.
The relationship between Milchick and Cobell is one of my favorite relationships on the show. Watching that power dynamic and how it shifts and evolves is pretty fascinating.
And man oh man Tramiel every time he opens his mouth in that character I get a

little scared It shifts and evolves is pretty fascinating. And man, oh, man, Tramiel.

Every time he opens his mouth in that character, I get a little scared.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, I think one of the interesting things in the show is that you don't quite know where people are coming from in management.

You don't know if Milchick is up to something really bad.

I mean it seems like he's up to something bad, but then there are moments where he's kind of empathetic. And with Cobell, I mean she's just such a cipher and what Patricia is able to mask going on.
It's fascinating to watch her, but you're always wondering what is she up to? And Ben, would you say that the idea of alienating MDR from optics and design through the art or trying to get them to believe this fable about this big coup that occurred, is it the ultimate sort of idea behind it, the ultimate reason? Is it to prevent like a form of unionizing or them getting too chummy? Yeah, that's what it seems at this point is that there's an interest in keeping them separate. And it's dividing, dividing and conquering.
Yeah, getting people divided on things that don't actually have anything to do with their lives is the surest way to be able to control them, right? Isn't that sort of – Yeah. Well, and also in that there's a scene later where Cobell says to tame a prisoner.
The surest way to tame a prisoner is to let him believe he's free. Right.
So they're putting these ideas in their heads and letting the ideas fester and grow. So at the same time in the office, Helly's really not loving having Miss Casey observe her.
And Mark sort of sees that and accidentally spills coffee to get Miss Casey out of the way. And you and Helly take a little walk into the hallways.
Yeah. It seems part of this sort of shift that's happened for Mark since the suicide attempt is that he's started feeling badly and is worried about Heli.
Yeah. Yeah.
I think he's worried about Heli and he's also, I think trying, I think he's kind of – in my perception, he's sort of wanting to connect with her.

Yes.

Maybe having some sort of feelings of – I don't know if they're romantic feelings but they're – he just wants to reach out to her. Yes.
And Mark and Heli walk through the hallways and find this sort of abandoned office bay where the desks are wrapped up in plastic. And Mark tells her that he's been recreating the map that he shredded.
Which is a huge step for Mark to be creating this piece of contraband like this. Yeah.
For the sake of connecting with – like I feel like he and Hellie, Bert and Irving, this episode, all these relationships are starting to sort of dislodge and take on a life of their own a little bit. Yeah.
And I think also the parallel of Indy Mark starting to question what's going on a little bit too, that making the map and Audi Mark starting to quite you know there's parallel tracks happening

for indian audi mark at the same time yeah yeah totally and you know you give heli the map and and and you know you say this is the map that you know pd was drawing i'm recreating and she says i'm not your new pd right right um not going to be that easy with her and you start going into the far recesses of the sort of the outer hallways, which are dark and kind of – Yeah, so the lighting – it seems like the lights are kind of going on as they travel through the hallways to save power, I would assume. Is that what that's about? Yeah, yeah.
It's sort of like the areas that are not used as much to save energy and money.

They keep the lights off and they're triggered by motion sensors. I actually saw that in this great Ruben Oslin movie, The Square.
Oh, my favorite movie. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So great. So great.
It's really good. And that was – I saw it in that.
I was like, oh, that's really cool and creepy. He's a great filmmaker.
He's incredible. And so I think that's where that idea came from.
And it sort of just creates more mystery and, you know, the feeling of this, you know, the maze of these hallways and the images it allows for in the frame are really fun because, you know, these perspectives and these kind of, you know, rectangles and, you know, different shapes that you can create with the lighting. It makes it even more disorienting and confusing too.
Yeah. You really don't know where the hell you are.
Yeah. And shooting it was really strange because those lights weren't motion sensor lights.
obviously. There were technicians, our incredible lighting crew, controlling those lights as we walked.
Yeah, exactly. So our gaffer, Kurt Lenning, would be literally triggering each light as you walk down the hallway.
So we'd have to get that timing right on each take. Wow.
And then you, Mark and Helly, hear a little baby goat bleat. That's right.
Is that a goat bleat? I think goats bleat. And it's very jarring.
And here we are with one of the, would you say the hallmark elements of severance is the baby goats? People have really, really gotten into the goats. They really do.
It's pretty funny because, I mean, yeah, the goats, you know, again, Dan Erickson coming up with the idea of goats in office hallways. What are the goats about? Because you guys find this room and there's a gentleman with a sort of a leather apron and a bunch of baby goats he's nursing.

Yep.

Who gets very, very concerned that you're trying to take the goats away. It's really weird.
And one of the things that we shot and it was really fun and interesting being with baby goats all day. But then when the show comes out a year later and this element of the show sort of explodes, it was not something I anticipated at all.
I don't know about you. No, no.
No, definitely. I didn't think about it either.
And also I think it was also just the mystery of the goats. What are the goats about? Yeah.
And you don't really get a sense of that from this scene at all.

Should we hear a clip of that particular scene?

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

They're not ready.

You can't take them yet.

They're not ready.

It is in time.

Oh. Get the hell out of here.
Go! Those goats had to go to the same ADR studio. Yeah, they were there with you, correct? Yeah, they asked me to double team it.
Was one of them running the ADR session, like with headphones and everything?

Yeah, that was Jane.

She's great.

She's terrific.

She's like a grown-up now.

It's crazy.

Absolutely.

So there's like a really big Severance Reddit site. I think it's called r slash Severance Apple TV Plus.

And there's a lot of theories apparently there about what the goats are about.

But friends did send me links to this Reddit.

And they're really cool and smart.

Like a lot of them are like, oh, that would be an interesting direction.

But they loved the goats.

One of them is, here's a quote, I really think they're testing cloning technologies.

That's interesting because didn't they clone a sheep?

Yeah. Yeah.
In like the 90s. What was her name? Sally? No.
It was... Deborah.
No. Betsy? Betsy? Betsy.
Dolly. Dolly.
Dolly. But whatever happened with that? Because there was a whole thing.
They cloned a sheep, but then at this point, they should be cloning people. They are.
Really? We just don't know about them. Oh, my God.
Yeah. You guys, you should read my subreddit.
Someone should follow up on that cloning thing is all I'm saying. You know? It's been a while.
Yeah. I want to hear some new cloning techniques and stories.
Because that would work out well for all of us. Like you could clone yourself to live through daylight savings time.
What's another theory? The goats have been inserted with the Audis of other severed employees slash people. Their minds are trapped in the goats.
Oh, okay. That's spicy.
Wow. That's cool.
So like the goats have the, yeah, the consciousness of severed people in them. Adam, I'm curious, just actor to actor, what it was like to work with the goats.
I mean, listen, I've worked with a lot of really talented creatures over the years, human and not human. Thank you.
Yeah, I actually took video that day and I kind of pan over to our boom operator, Kira Smith, and then go down and you see that baby goats are eating her shoelaces. Oh, my God.
They will just walk up to you and start eating your pants. And they are so cute and gentle.
Oh. And they're lovely.
Also, I think they were actually, they're not all baby goats. They were pygmy goats.
Yeah, I think you're right. So some of them were baby pygmy goats.
So they never get that big. Would you say that's in the top three questions you get asked is about the goats? Yeah, I get a lot of goat stuff just because of of the show but also generally so while heli and mark are wandering the halls irving and dylan go to find bert yeah dylan is sort of suspicious right and he follows right he follows irving right and i love this scene with the three of them uh with uh, Irv, and Bert and seeing these three incredible actors kind of jump into this.
And Christopher Walken saying that he was practicing a joke. That's why he was there.
and Irving kind of getting stuck on it and saying, if you were coming to see me, why were you in the conference room?

And you just sort of get this, again, another example of this being such a small world for these people. And, you know, these small moves within an office environment take on such meaning.
Yeah. Do you want to hear that scene? Totally.
It's literally silly. Like they say, you all have pouches.
Pouches? Like to carry young? Yes, according to some. You each have a larval offspring that will jump out and attack if we get too close.
That's fucking psycho. I mean, it's a joke, of course, but I don't know.
The sentiment, you know, somehow holds people are weird. Though I'd be remiss not to say that in this theory the larva eventually eats and replaces you oh which irving would solve the mystery of your youthful energy oh my god when they flirt i just i just melt it's the best mean, that dialogue is just so unique.
It's very Dan. Yeah.
You know, the larva eventually eats and replaces you. It's so awesome.
That's his little flirtatious move. That's right.
It would solve the mystery of your youthful energy. But it's also Dan.
Marvel can eat out of its pouch. To be like sort of spinning these fantastical tales, but then you have a character that's so grounded in realism that they're cutting through because Dylan is like, that's fucking psycho.
Totally. It's so great.
And the King of Fucks. Yeah, that's great.
That could be Chris Walken's next film and sequence of King of New York. The king of fucks yeah that's great that would be uh that could be chris walken's next film and sequence of king of new york the king of fucks and it's interesting to get this insight into how lumen like top brass they plant these fantastical myths about you know department versus department we were talking about earlier it's this crazy the things that they're sort of planting in in their minds yeah and it really sets dylan off he because you know and dylan's dialogue too is are you sweet on this guy yeah it's like all of a sudden he's like in a 1940s movie it's great but without the homophobia of a 1940s movie which i think is really special in the world of women, is that Dylan's just annoyed that he has a crush on someone.
Oh, yeah. He has no problem with that.
It's just that he's from O&D. Yeah.
That's right. He does not trust him.
That's right. Yeah.
And so they go off to O&D, right? Yeah. Burt sort of invites them along.
Right. Right tie Bert up right they tie his hand Dylan takes his belt uh which becomes a theme uh in the show somehow and then on their walk over to O and D they continue flirting and seeing Dylan as like the third wheel is so funny well they're flirting while Bert has his hands tied behind his back and Dylan is behind them like a guard.
And then he like unties him and he's like, hey, why don't you come in for a second? Yeah. I'll show you something.
Like Bert just doesn't care, isn't threatened by these guys. In my dream, like alternative reality, alternate reality rather, Burt has a public access talk show and his Audi has a public access talk show because I could just listen to him philosophize about things all day long with like a giant padded microphone.
I'd watch that. Me too.
And then while they're hanging out, Burt and Irving, Dylan sort of kind of starts snooping around in the back of the O&D sort of the storage area. Where, by the way, the production design there was sort of, I think, intentional to make those drawers kind of – it feels kind of like a morgue.
Yeah. And I love that feeling there.

It's kind of like weirdly creepy,

even though it's just art stuff.

Yeah, that's so interesting.

So he finds another version of the painting

that was so upsetting earlier in the episode,

except this time the lanyards are switched

and MDR are now the aggressors

and O and D are the victims.

Yeah, and it are the victims. Yeah.
And it happens just as Irving is starting to kind of make a move on Bert in terms of reaching out to touch his hand after the last time where he had pulled away. Now Irving is starting to feel more confident and wanting to connect with him.
And just at that moment, Dylan comes out with the painting saying, look, look, they're lying. They're lying.
Look at this. But Dylan didn't realize that the tags had been switched.
So Irving and Bert look at the painting and realize that somebody had shown them a version of the painting with the tag switched. That was what the printed one was.
And they start to get the sense that someone's trying to manipulate them. Yeah.
And it's interesting to see sort of the ripple effects of Helly arriving down here are just sort of reaching out. And everyone is sort of shifting their mind a little bit about their circumstances down here.
And Bert takes this opportunity to open the door to that back room that Irving had sort of peeked into last time and introduces them to the O&D team and says, you know, they're friends. Yeah.
Um, and we see Felicia in there too, whom we, uh, we'd met, uh, earlier Claudia Robinson. She's great.
Truly. All right.
So that's episode five, Jen, how are you feeling about season dose or two? I always forget you're bilingual. Um, it's, I feel great.
I'm so excited. I think the fact that both Adam and I have aged so aggressively between seasons really lends a new level of vulnerability to both of the characters.
I hope people recognize you. I hope they do too.
I think and you know what? If they don't, it's okay. I don't need it.
I don't need it. But you didn't get a facelift like I did before we started.
Which is, and you always said, only do it in Spain. And now I understand why.
It's seamless. And way cheaper.
You guys both look marvelous. You look marvelous.
You do too, Ben. You look marvelous.
You all look marvelous. I think season two is marvelous.
And I'm so excited for people to see it. We've got to get Billy Crystal on the podcast.
Definitely. Oh, yeah, on the show.
We should get Conan O'Brien, because I was just doing Conan's podcast the other day, and he's a really big fan of the show. And I think we should someday try to get Al Pacino on the show.
100. Because he is the man.
acting idol he's the world's acting idol i just wanted to say to those listening because he won't say it himself but ben stiller has i'm gonna say an airtight impersonation of pacino that's it's truly yeah it rattles i didn't know about until today it's me doing an impression of bill hater's impression. Well, just as good.
Bill Hader is the... Let's have Bill Hader on the show.
I don't even know. Bill's a friend, but I don't even know.
He's seen the show. I think he likes the show.
He's just so entertaining. He would impersonate every character to a frightening degree.
It would be great. It's crazy how good Bill Hader's impressions are.
And he does like Alan Alda and people that don't usually get impersonated.

And MASH.

It's real specific. He does all the characters of MASH.

Yes.

But, yeah.

But I do have it on inside information from having had an interaction with Mr. Pacino, and I know you did too, that he is a fan of the show, which just really makes me want to now just retire.
It's so cool. That's really cool.
I cried a little bit after I met him, and he told us that. Have you ever talked to him about Al Pacino from Tropic Thunder? From Tropic Thunder, yeah.
I know. It was an interaction at a dinner, and I just try to pretend like it's, hey, it's cool talking to these people.
But these are people that are so – the work is so just the basis for why we do what we do, right? Al Pacino, man. I um people at at such an insane level of success uh such as yourselves are are able to be honest about those moments that feel cool and i think that they're i think that it's we should all maintain that for for all of our lives i think it's very special when you're like oh you've inspired so many people but then when you talk about someone who's inspired you, I think it's cool.
Yeah. It goes back to what you were saying, Jen, about acting.
And when you think about your characters as kids. Yeah.
Like, aren't we like, isn't that what the basis? Like we're all, if you're, we're all kids. Yeah.
We're all fans. Yeah.
And you do need to be in touch with that as an actor, but just as a person like that, that's kind of like the basis of your feelings. And so, yeah.
Kate Blanchett put two fingers on my shoulder simply to steady herself at an event. It had nothing to do with me.
And it was like a hot knife through butter. It changed my molecular structure.
Yeah. Because she trusted you enough to lean on you.
She saw you as a solid person, a balanced, solid person. That's right.
She said, look at those shoulders. I can lean here.
That's right. Yeah.
For me, it's like that is the excitement of doing what we do, like to be able to interact with people who have inspired you so much or who work you still go to. You still watch and still, you know, every day you can go back and look at this stuff and it's what keeps me

wanting to do what we did. I feel that way

about this podcast.

How about that? Thank you, Jim.

How about that, guys? It's a good way to end it. And thank you for

being on the podcast. My pleasure.

It was so good to be with you.

That is it for episode five.

Follow, rate, and review this podcast on

Apple Podcasts, the Odyssey app, or anywhere else you love listening to our gorgeous voices. 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 Malofsky, Jenna Weiss-Berman, and Leah Reese-Dennis.
The show is produced by Zandra Ellen and Naomi Scott. This episode was mixed and mastered by Chris Basil.
We have additional engineering from Javi Krucis and Davey Sumner. Show clips are courtesy of Fifth Season.

Music by Theodore Shapiro.

Special thanks to the team at Odyssey. Maura Curran, Eric Donnelly, Michael LaVey, Melissa Wester, Matt Casey, Kate Rose, Kurt Courtney, and Hilary Shuff.
And the team at Red Hour. John Lesher, Carolina Pesikov, Jean Pablo Antonetti, Martin Valderudin, Ashwin Ramesh, Maria Noto, John Baker, and Oliver Agger.
And at Great Scott, Kevin Cotter, Josh Martin, and Christy Smith at Rise Management. We also had additional production help from Gabrielle Lewis, Ben Goldberg, Stephen Key, Kristen Torres, Emmanuel Hapsis, Marialexa Cavanaugh, and Melissa Slaughter.
I'm Adam Scott. I'm Ben Stiller.
And we will see you next time. 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 a 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, 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.