Willa Paskin: I'm going to start this interview in perhaps a tawdrier way than I should, by talking about sex. Because I think you guys have done some stuff this season--you've done some stuff with the show that is extremely, I mean, without being particularly salacious, you've done some stuff that's extremely interesting, nuanced, and sort of titillating but not just titillating, in ways that other shows don't.
Joel Fields: I think there were a couple of guiding principles for us for this season--we did want to explore sexuality in their relationship. As we were exploring their marriage, we wanted to dig into what that part of their relationship would be. And we wanted to make sure that the sexuality, whenever it was portrayed, was always in a way that explored character and revealed character. So that's what we were after.
Joel Fields: In fact, I'd add one other thing to it, which was part of that 69 scene that was very important to us was the little moment that preceded it in the car. It was a silent scene, driving in a car at night, the hardest sort of scene to shoot, the first scene that you would cut for production because you've got to create the camera mounts and you've got to go out at night and it's not easy, but it was so important to see that moment of them driving, of her intuiting that something had gone wrong for him, him admitting that something had gone bad with that operation with the Afghans but not wanting to trouble her with it, and then that long silent moment where they just held hands after going through the operation they'd just gone through that led into the 69, that showed that they were trying to connect.
Willa Paskin: There was also something a little funny about it, with Paige's--you know, this Freudian moment, where you come upon your parents and sort of in keeping with this family, it's just the extremest version of the thing you could see. And it's also interesting for how that influences Paige, when she's talking about her family episodes later, where she says "maybe they're all cheating on each other." You almost think that that would be not her takeaway from having seen her parents--that part seems under control.
Joel Fields: And what's Paige's response to seeing that extreme thing? Yell at her brother.
Joe Weisberg: Well, right, and then the next morning at breakfast, Elizabeth is eating the bacon, so we're not afraid to get the humour out of it--we want to get the humour out of it. But there was a lot going on in that scene, and in that sense...we have something called a tone meeting where we talk to the director about what the tone of it is, and it seemed to us that if that wasn't handled perfectly in tone, the right amount of humour, the right amount of shock from Paige, the right response from the parents, then the whole thing would be bizarre. Almost sick, almost awful. And yet Tommy Schlamme, one of the greatest directors in television history, who was directing that episode, and what he did was really so masterful and so perfect, and the whole thing was great. With all these elements in it, we got so wrapped up in all these things we're now discussing with you, that when some of the reaction from people was all: "oh my god, they did a 69 on television!", we were surprised by that reaction because we had forgotten that that would be a natural reaction to it. We were thinking of all these ideas.
Willa Paskin: So the other episode I thought that was really sort of remarkable about this is the episode basically where Elizabeth has had this conversation with Martha about what an animal in the sack Philip is, and it gives her sort of these ideas, and a story progresses that is this extremely sexy story for a while. Elizabeth flirting with Philip, she wants him to have sex with her like he does with Martha, and then they actually do have sex and it turns so quickly and it felt to me like, if you think about other shows? You lead up to the titillation, like you're going to deliver it to us, and then you sort of just pulled the rug out from under us and we're like "no, this is a totally different and so much more messed up dynamic than you could even imagine--this is not going to be like a really hot sex scene, this is going to be basically a rape trauma, all these things are going to come up."
Joe Weisberg: Yeah, that's like our show. *laughs*
Joel Fields: We don't need to think about other shows. We can be completely messed up and traumatic all on our own. *laughs*
Joe Weisberg: Because of these characters and where they're coming from, I mean, that makes me think also of the religion story with Paige this season, that she's going to church, and we don't-- We did a little bit think of other shows that have done a story about a kid getting religious, but because of where our characters are coming from--they're communists and they hate religion--that story will be so different in our show without our even having to do anything, that we don't have to worry about the other shows. And this is really the same thing. There are plenty of other shows where somebody dresses up or plays a character--like, oh my god, what they did on Girls with that this season, that was fantastic.
Joel Fields: That was so good.
Willa Paskin: That was so good.
Joe Weisberg: But where our characters are coming from, that they're spies, and they've got these crazy costumes and characters, there's just no concern that it could even relate to any other show. They're going to go to their crazy dark places if you set that up. And not only that, we're going to set it up in the script and have these ideas and our stories for it, but the actors are going to take it to places that we can't even imagine in a scene like that.
Willa Paskin: I also felt like the ripple effect of that incident--though they didn't discuss it ever--was like episodes long. It felt--I mean, that was intentional. It felt like they were--
Joe Weisberg: And it's going to keep going.
Willa Paskin: I did also wonder--this may expose me in an unbecoming manner, but I was curious: is that how Martha and Philip have sex? Or is he just frustrated with Elizabeth in that moment of him being aware of all of the horrible ramifications of what she was asking in a way that she wasn't aware, and he got frustrated with her?
Joe Weisberg: This is one of the ones where I'm interested to see if we have the same answer.
Joel Fields: Yeah, me too, go ahead.
Joe Weisberg: I think that is how him and Martha have sex, but without him being upset.
Joel Fields: Yeah, I think that's right. When I think about the scenes where we've shown Clark and Martha having sex, that seems to be the position, and it seems to be pretty animalistic. So that's right. The difference is for Philip as Clark, he's playing a character there, in a comfortable performance. And it's not a place he wanted to go to with Elizabeth. It's not a part of him he wanted to connect with her. And that's scary.
Willa Paskin: Did you, writing that scene between Martha and Elizabeth, that was a really fun scene to watch. Was it fun to have them do and to write? It was almost a case where the complications become almost farce as opposed to being so heavy, that you can kind of let loose.
Joel Fields: It's really the best. I'd say that scene was fun to conceive of--the minute we realized we were going to do that scene, it was fun from then until now. It keeps being fun.
*everybody laughs*
Joel Fields: But I'll just say about that, part of the great things about this season has been discovering for these incredibly out-of-touch, emotionally inarticulate characters, a way for them to start to connect to parts of their souls in disguise. To other people, to strangers. So the idea that Elizabeth, dressed up as Jennifer, pretending to be Clark's sister, speaking to Martha, her real-fake husband's real-fake wife, who has no idea--that suddenly she's able to gain insight into this man she's been with for fifteen years and she's able to react to that and think about that. That she's able to share with Brad pieces of her rape trauma from way back in Russia--all of that has been really rich territory for us to explore.
Transcript of the BTRD-related (and tangentially related) bits of the Slate/Willa Paskin interview
Joel Fields: I think there were a couple of guiding principles for us for this season--we did want to explore sexuality in their relationship. As we were exploring their marriage, we wanted to dig into what that part of their relationship would be. And we wanted to make sure that the sexuality, whenever it was portrayed, was always in a way that explored character and revealed character. So that's what we were after.
Joe Weisberg: We thought about that a little bit in terms of had we always succeeded in the first season? Or had we occasionally fallen a little bit into being gratuitous the first season, and how could we avoid that?Like, our guiding principle is what Joel just said: that if we were always revealing character, then it would not be gratuitous. So a good example is that 69 from the season opener, that there were a lot of things going on there. Elizabeth had just been shot, she had just come back from that and she was coming back home and she had just had to perform a honeytrap, and now the couple--the married couple was reunited and wanting to connect and be intimate in this situation that is essentially unimaginable to almost any of us. I mean, if you look at those circumstances, how would the two of them sexually connect in that circumstance in a way that we could show visually? And in a sense we essentially ran through all of the sexual positions, what are all the possibilities, and anything sort of regular that you're sort of used to, it seemed wouldn't really do the trick. And then we came up with that idea for the 69, and it was so different, and not cliché, and it had a little element of humour to it, and even seemed a little bit bizarre, there seemed also to be something incredibly intimate about it. Maybe because you don't see it very much.
Joel Fields: In fact, I'd add one other thing to it, which was part of that 69 scene that was very important to us was the little moment that preceded it in the car. It was a silent scene, driving in a car at night, the hardest sort of scene to shoot, the first scene that you would cut for production because you've got to create the camera mounts and you've got to go out at night and it's not easy, but it was so important to see that moment of them driving, of her intuiting that something had gone wrong for him, him admitting that something had gone bad with that operation with the Afghans but not wanting to trouble her with it, and then that long silent moment where they just held hands after going through the operation they'd just gone through that led into the 69, that showed that they were trying to connect.
Willa Paskin: There was also something a little funny about it, with Paige's--you know, this Freudian moment, where you come upon your parents and sort of in keeping with this family, it's just the extremest version of the thing you could see. And it's also interesting for how that influences Paige, when she's talking about her family episodes later, where she says "maybe they're all cheating on each other." You almost think that that would be not her takeaway from having seen her parents--that part seems under control.
Joel Fields: And what's Paige's response to seeing that extreme thing? Yell at her brother.
Joe Weisberg: Well, right, and then the next morning at breakfast, Elizabeth is eating the bacon, so we're not afraid to get the humour out of it--we want to get the humour out of it. But there was a lot going on in that scene, and in that sense...we have something called a tone meeting where we talk to the director about what the tone of it is, and it seemed to us that if that wasn't handled perfectly in tone, the right amount of humour, the right amount of shock from Paige, the right response from the parents, then the whole thing would be bizarre. Almost sick, almost awful. And yet Tommy Schlamme, one of the greatest directors in television history, who was directing that episode, and what he did was really so masterful and so perfect, and the whole thing was great. With all these elements in it, we got so wrapped up in all these things we're now discussing with you, that when some of the reaction from people was all: "oh my god, they did a 69 on television!", we were surprised by that reaction because we had forgotten that that would be a natural reaction to it. We were thinking of all these ideas.
Willa Paskin: So the other episode I thought that was really sort of remarkable about this is the episode basically where Elizabeth has had this conversation with Martha about what an animal in the sack Philip is, and it gives her sort of these ideas, and a story progresses that is this extremely sexy story for a while. Elizabeth flirting with Philip, she wants him to have sex with her like he does with Martha, and then they actually do have sex and it turns so quickly and it felt to me like, if you think about other shows? You lead up to the titillation, like you're going to deliver it to us, and then you sort of just pulled the rug out from under us and we're like "no, this is a totally different and so much more messed up dynamic than you could even imagine--this is not going to be like a really hot sex scene, this is going to be basically a rape trauma, all these things are going to come up."
Joe Weisberg: Yeah, that's like our show. *laughs*
Joel Fields: We don't need to think about other shows. We can be completely messed up and traumatic all on our own. *laughs*
Joe Weisberg: Because of these characters and where they're coming from, I mean, that makes me think also of the religion story with Paige this season, that she's going to church, and we don't-- We did a little bit think of other shows that have done a story about a kid getting religious, but because of where our characters are coming from--they're communists and they hate religion--that story will be so different in our show without our even having to do anything, that we don't have to worry about the other shows. And this is really the same thing. There are plenty of other shows where somebody dresses up or plays a character--like, oh my god, what they did on Girls with that this season, that was fantastic.
Joel Fields: That was so good.
Willa Paskin: That was so good.
Joe Weisberg: But where our characters are coming from, that they're spies, and they've got these crazy costumes and characters, there's just no concern that it could even relate to any other show. They're going to go to their crazy dark places if you set that up. And not only that, we're going to set it up in the script and have these ideas and our stories for it, but the actors are going to take it to places that we can't even imagine in a scene like that.
Willa Paskin: I also felt like the ripple effect of that incident--though they didn't discuss it ever--was like episodes long. It felt--I mean, that was intentional. It felt like they were--
Joe Weisberg: And it's going to keep going.
Willa Paskin: I did also wonder--this may expose me in an unbecoming manner, but I was curious: is that how Martha and Philip have sex? Or is he just frustrated with Elizabeth in that moment of him being aware of all of the horrible ramifications of what she was asking in a way that she wasn't aware, and he got frustrated with her?
Joe Weisberg: This is one of the ones where I'm interested to see if we have the same answer.
Joel Fields: Yeah, me too, go ahead.
Joe Weisberg: I think that is how him and Martha have sex, but without him being upset.
Joel Fields: Yeah, I think that's right. When I think about the scenes where we've shown Clark and Martha having sex, that seems to be the position, and it seems to be pretty animalistic. So that's right. The difference is for Philip as Clark, he's playing a character there, in a comfortable performance. And it's not a place he wanted to go to with Elizabeth. It's not a part of him he wanted to connect with her. And that's scary.
Willa Paskin: Did you, writing that scene between Martha and Elizabeth, that was a really fun scene to watch. Was it fun to have them do and to write? It was almost a case where the complications become almost farce as opposed to being so heavy, that you can kind of let loose.
Joel Fields: It's really the best. I'd say that scene was fun to conceive of--the minute we realized we were going to do that scene, it was fun from then until now. It keeps being fun.
*everybody laughs*
Joel Fields: But I'll just say about that, part of the great things about this season has been discovering for these incredibly out-of-touch, emotionally inarticulate characters, a way for them to start to connect to parts of their souls in disguise. To other people, to strangers. So the idea that Elizabeth, dressed up as Jennifer, pretending to be Clark's sister, speaking to Martha, her real-fake husband's real-fake wife, who has no idea--that suddenly she's able to gain insight into this man she's been with for fifteen years and she's able to react to that and think about that. That she's able to share with Brad pieces of her rape trauma from way back in Russia--all of that has been really rich territory for us to explore.