Dichen Lachman, Jessica Lee won on the set of the “Semets de Feu” and by giving life to Gemma

“Seeding” captures the dark and sterile atmosphere of office life because it follows Mark (Adam Scott), who works for the lumon disaster. But an episode of the recent season diverges both visually and narrative of this aesthetic. Season 2, episode 7 (“Chikhai Bardo”) focuses on Gemma (Dichen Lachman) and finally reveals part of his background.

Lachman is the star of the episode, who presents Gemma since the start of his relationship with Mark to his confinement in Lumon as various innovatives. To shape Gemma’s journey, Lachman worked closely with Jessica Lee Gagné, the director of photography of the show, who made his director’s debut with this episode.

For both, this episode lent itself to a different filming experience from that of the rest of the series. The flashback scenes were filmed on a film in a house where won lived during production. There was a rehearsal weekend in particular in this house which allowed the team to determine and change organically choices. At one point, before the production obtained approval to use the film, Gagné even borrowed a Bolex from a gaffrus and itself bought a film in order to shoot a period of nature around the house.

Below, Lachman and Gagné describe their collaboration, running on the film and building each innie character.

How did you address the training of a director-actor partnership for this episode?

Won: I have always stayed away from the actors, and I do not know Dichen, if you feel that of me, but I have always been like: “I will give the director and the actors their space, as if I will never intervene or never intervene.” It was like a form of protection, in a way of not wanting to go. But then season 2, I really had to get my feet wet. Because he was a character who needed all this end, and we had to build his world, like, who is it? And you, Dichen, were so open to exploration, that for me, it was a safe landing.

Lachman: I was incredibly excited. Obviously, in season 1, Jessica was very concentrated on the appearance of the show, in terms of shots and lighting and everything, and it is zones; It’s really remarkable. I felt that there was a director in you, even if you did not involve it. I just felt it. So when I heard you realize 7, I was just above the moon. I had so much faith that you would just do an incredible job.

Won: I could not have done so if it was not in the environment of the “starting semets”, where I had at least one link with the cast and the whole team around us who, for me, there was this knowledge of “Oh, there will never be the opportunity to do it in a safer space.”

When I read the synopsis, it was very clear for me that I wanted a woman to direct him, and there were so female themes within her. I have the impression that Dichen and I were able to infuse so many very female details in the character. It is a man who writes it. It is a mainly written show. But I connected to this way. I really wanted him to have this authentic female voice.

Lachman: It was incredible that we had so much time to sit with him because you had always wanted to shoot him at the end of the season for light and flowers and everything. So, even without the strike, on which we did not have control, we had a lot of time to discuss, and I loved the way Jessica stretched out and I wanted to have a lot of dialogue on the character and on really specific moments. It is not always like that when you work on television because of the speed at which you have to work, that someone will take so long and is very deeply invested to honor what this episode meant for the whole series. Mark is in this situation because of the sorrow from which he suffered, and this episode was so important for the public to feel really invested.

Because this is the first time that viewers have learned to know Gemma, how did you work together to calibrate what was his presence on the screen going to be?

Lachman: We were on the same wavelength with its warmth and relationship with Mark. You had to have a lot of nuances to feel anchored. Obviously, when we went home, everything’s workflow has changed because we turned on a film, and we are in this very warm and textured environment. I think his voice is different from Ms. Casey, but they are not completely different people, so he still had to be in the same world. You just had to be a little more relaxed.

I am so grateful that we have had this weekend, that you almost never get on television, to really sit with the spirits and simply work on the texture of the scenes, and some of them have changed. Jessica, I do not know if you remember that of the bathroom with the needle which was initially a little heavier, then it found itself during this rehearsal process, being a lighter scene where you saw the lightness of the characters and they obviously go through a difficult period, but they find a moment of lightness.

Won: What I tried to do was just understand where each scene was in each calendar. I shared a timeline document with you and Adam so that you can locate it. So there was all this background work that has already been done.

But then in this house, this weekend, there was just the moment, okay, before, we will discuss what is happening in the scene, but when we try to do the scene, that was what feels good. And what happened there was this reality and this lightness which also served the flashbacks so good because there are a lot of really heavy themes, but we then need these moments of rebound between clear and dark. And you and Adam both have strong intuitions and feelings. Whenever something felt a little outside, we could simply go to micro-chainger or modify it. Even in the kitchen scene, it’s a super simple detail, but when it makes the sandwich and you play with the cards, I wanted you to be shot in different parts of the room, but Adam was like, “but I have the impression that I cannot”, as if it did not work with what was in the scene, as it had to be next to it at the beginning.

For Dichen, passing from normal “Severance” sets to filming in a more intimate setting, did this have a different experience as an actor in this program?

Lachman: Regarding the internal process, not so much, but maybe the pressure was a bit, because you know that you are going to miss the coil-do you call that, Jess?

Won: Did you think about that? The fact that we are going to miss film?

Lachman: Yes, because digital is infinite, when there is something so precious in the film. I have the impression with digital, you can make a mistake and take it back, and you can come back and continue. You can take another grip on a film role, but if this light changes very slightly, it makes this impression in a completely different way.

So I just wanted to make sure that I was really on the point all the time and ready to move because we were advancing very quickly these days, even if we had to capture all these moments, it was a really crowded schedule. And Jessica had been there with the bolex striking small extracts over 16 millimeters to also put in flashbacks. So, it was as if everything moved very quickly, which is not as if it was in the studio, where things sometimes, because it is so precise with symmetry and everything can sometimes be a little slower.

Won: It was probably the most pages that we had drawn in a week, or at least in one of these really heavy weeks, more on top, adding film and adding a unique camera approach, which was different. In the studio, we will sometimes make two or three cameras all the time, and we pass through a lot of crew.

To carry out this week of filming, the amount of appearance, scenes and things that we tackle was very intimidating. Even the announcement that worked on this episode was like: “Oh, it will be really very tight, as really hard.” And I say to myself, “I know we can do it.”

How did you both work with other departments such as the design of production and costume design to create the Innurs of Gemma and its rooms in Lumon?

Won: You are like a child in a candy shop when you work with the production design team on “Severance”. It was a very long collaboration to get there, because the construction of all this soil was – it is a whole new set and you need it to be in the aesthetics of Lumon, but it also needs to feel like its own space.

And then by choosing these three rooms, it would define your experience, Dichen and Gemma’s experience in these places. We just tried to find a version of ironic beauty, where beauty and pain meet. And each piece was inspired by a different photograph and another photographer. The dentist’s room was inspired by Lynne Cohen. It was a photo of Eggleston that inspired the plane and a photo of Diane Arbus for the Christmas room. I don’t know if I told you, Dichen or not.

Lachman: No, I didn’t know that, it’s fascinating.

Won: The funny thing I found about to develop looks and everything that is to make it so real and so bad, like aesthetics, like the work that comes into you. But even more than that, by developing the story behind each piece … It was the thing we were able to collaborate on it: “Okay, in the dentist’s room, you are perhaps six times, so you are always somehow to assess this experience. And in the Christmas room, your other feeling of angry teenager was like, you have been 100 times here, and you’ve finished it, so that’s why you are more rebellious. “

Lachman: Yeah, the costumes too. Sarah [Edwards] I went to great efforts and the wigs with Jon [Carter] and Judy [Chin] With makeup, everyone has contributed so much to these innie rooms, which, obviously, helped me to inform me, but I am curious, Jess, how many conversations have contributed to some costumes and hair? I remember that “working girl” was a benchmark for the plane scene, and I know that I went to many different fittings for the dentist’s scene. And also, we tested the different fabrics or paintings in this room.

Won: We are the test kings on the “dryer”. With each look, there was also an era on each set. There was more than one thing from the 50s, 60s for the Christmas room. The plane was the 80s thing in the early 90s, “working girl”. The dentist’s room, we leaned a little; We haven’t really struck an era as much on that one. Your look was supposed to have a little feeling of the 70s. But I have the impression that we did our own thing. It was intuitive. He was trying to find this beauty and this coldness, this kind of balance.

This interview was published and condensed.