First things first, if you’re curious whether Rian Johnson is back at work on that new “Star Wars” trilogy announced eight years ago, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. That’s not his focus at the moment. Despite the Lucasfilm franchise finally finding its way back to theaters with new movies in the works, Johnson has other priorities on his plate. He’s hard at work finishing his third “Kives Out” movie, “Wake Up Dead Man,” and getting the second season of Peacock’s breakout hit “Poker Face” out the door. A difficult task, as both projects were in production at the exact same time last year.
READ MORE: “Poker Face” Season 2 Review: Natasha Lyonne’s detective series takes big swings with absurdist mysteries
That conflict is one reason why Johnson was only able to direct one episode of “Poker Face” this time around, the season premiere, “The Game is A Foot.” This particular murder mystery is a special one, though, as it finds Cynthia Erivo playing six identical sisters, all with very distinct personalities. Getting the “Wicked” star to jump on board was a godsend. Especially as it turns out, many of the show’s high-profile season two guest stars, including John Mulaney, Kumail Nanjiani, Katie Holmes, Giancarlo Esposito, Gaby Hoffmann, Melanie Lynskey, and John Cho, were cast, yes, last minute.
“The casting on this show is a weird combination of the traditional casting process with Mary Verniu and Bret Howe, our casting directors, but also texting friends,” Johnson admits. “And the answer is, there are a lot of people you run into who are like, ‘Hey, I want to be on a ‘Poker Face’ episode.’ It’s always harder to actually make the reality of it happen. So, that’s the challenge. And also, we don’t cast the whole thing at the beginning and have it all up on the board. We’re casting week to week. That creates a real degree of chaos to the process that is both terrifying and really, really fun. So, I’ll literally have Natasha [Lyonne] coming in and just like, ‘Ah, I ran into so-and-so at The Bowery the other day. They said they want to be in it.’ ‘Can you text them now and see if they can show up Tuesday?’ So, it’s thrilling and fun and also terrifying, but it’s amazing to get to the end of that chaotic process and look back over the list of people we got for the season, and pretty, I still can’t believe we got all those folks.”
Throughout our conversation last week, Johnson discussed the very quick turnaround he had from finishing filming “Wake Up Dead Man” to his “Poker Face” episode, why a major plotline from season one gets wrapped up faster than you might think, and much more.
Please note: There are minor spoilers about “Poker Face” season two in the context of this interview. This interview has also been edited for length and clarity.
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The Playlist: How did you pull off co-producing this show while also shooting a movie across the Atlantic at the same time?
Rian Johnson: It was a lot. [Laughs.] Yeah. I mean, it’s funny because in the first season that kind of overlapped with “Glass Onion,” but this one it was different because the production periods actually overlapped, which is the reason that I was only able to be there and direct one episode this season. But I was just as involved this season in terms of the writing, the editing, and kind of during production. So yeah, it was a beast and I was shooting the movie in London, so there was the time change to deal with, but also, I mean, really the answer is though we just had a tremendous amount of talent working on the show from our writers to the guest directors that we had and Natasha holding it all together. Our show runner, Tony Toast. We kind of just had a team here on the grolly executing it all. So, that’s the real answer.
Well, I haven’t had a chance to talk to Tony yet, but when the writer’s room started for the second season, were there any specific goals you guys had after the first go round?
Well, I’ll steal something I heard Tony say, actually, which is a good way of putting it. We didn’t want to kind of reinvent the wheel just because the type of show it is and what it was created to be is obviously kind of like a throwback to “The Rockford Files” and “Colombo” and “Quantum Leap” and those type of shows where you create an engine and then it’s about seeing what the engine can do. We didn’t want to reinvent the engine, and that’s kind of how we approach season two. It was just, “O.K., this form and this format works, how far can we push it in these different directions? What can we use it to do that we haven’t thought of yet?” And so yeah, less than reinventing it, it was more just “How can we now use this thing that we’ve created and have fun with it?”
I believe it’s the third episode where you end the narrative from the first season of her being chased by the mobsters. Where did the decision come to make that choice? I thought it was somewhat inspired to end that so quickly.
Thanks, man. Yeah, it came really naturally just in the course of the room, and I think I kind of felt my shoulders sagging a little when I thought about just repeating the arc of the first season, of just a whole thing of being chased. And then the finale is dealing with the Mob boss, but one of the things that we learned quickly drives each episode, because Charlie is not a cop, it’s not her job to solve these crimes. You have to find an emotional relation based way into why she’s invested in the killer or the kill. And so it’s all about the relationships, and because of that, taking away the outside threat and having it be put back on her in terms of, “O.K., you don’t have an external pressure, where do you want to be? Who are you? Why can’t she, as a character, stay settled anywhere? Why does she keep moving and investigating every world that she comes into?” Also, in terms of finding her place in the world in a bigger sense, that gives you more fuel for the fire in terms of the relationships she forms, which is what the mysteries feed off of. So more than just kind of a sprinkling of what her character’s up to all season, it felt like it genuinely served what makes the show tick.
Your episode is the first episode of the season. I’m assuming it was not the first episode shot, because in theory, production started when you were on “Wake Up Dead Man.”
It was not. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was a ways in, because I had to wrap “Wake Up Dead Man, “which we were shooting in London and get back here, and I basically flew straight back and started production on that episode, which was no break.
No break for you.
I think maybe I had half a week off or something. But yeah, it was a very quick turnaround. Yeah.
So what made you want to do this particular episode? What about this one’s appeal to you?
I mean, logistics honestly ended up determining it, but I was also really thrilled to be able to do this one for a few reasons. First, I mean, the script that Laura Deeley wrote, I thought was terrific. And the big, big, big thing was just when I knew Cynthia was available to actually do it, and her playing Sextuplets and getting to do this kind of acrobatic magic trick of playing multiple characters. The fact that she was excited about that when I talked to her, and was really ready to show up and play. That was just like, “Oh my God, this is going to be heaven.” And it was insanity and it was wonderful, and there’s no way we could have pulled it off if we didn’t have somebody as good as Cynthina in that part.
Did you have more time to shoot because you were there? There are so many scenes where she’s playing multiple characters and you have to do multiple setups. You had to have more time, right?
I’m so happy you asked me this. I can say, no, we did not. [Laughs.] We had 10 days to shoot it, and it was a very complicated episode. I mean, that’s about par for the course in terms of television shoots, but it was a very complicated episode, and I give so much credit to Cynthia because it’s not like we had crazy motion control cameras. We were literally just putting the camera on a tripod with a lot of sandbags on it so it wouldn’t move, shooting one half of the conversation, she would do a 45-minute change, come back and shoot the other half of it. It was the way that she held it all in her head and created these characters and was able, on the run, to keep them all straight, and also be such a fun collaborator at the same time. I really…I dunno, it was inspiring for me to see.
Was there one character that she created of the sisters that maybe entertained you more than the others?
One of the sisters is kind of a flippant DJ character named Bebe, and she had us in stitches, but also every single one of them. I may get them mixed up now, although we named them be Amber, Bebe, Cece, and Dede, so we could [refer to them as] A, B, C, D, to keep them straight. But Dede, the one who Natasha really bonds with, is not a huge caricature of a character, but she might be my favorite just because it was really, really fun seeing the two of them and their scenes where they genuinely bond, and seeing these two amazing actors play off each other.
It’s such a fun episode. How much was it on the page, and how much of it was some of Cynthia’s inspiration for some of these characters?
It’s all on the page. I mean, when you’re moving that fast and there were certain…in prep, there are certain things Cynthia would call me and just ask, “Oh, could we tweak this line? Could tweak that line?” But when you get there and you have something that’s that intricate and that complicated to shoot and you have 10 days to shoot it, there’s no room for improv. You’ve got to show up knowing your lines, and you’ve got to shoot what’s on the page. And there are always little discoveries when you’re doing the scenes. But no, all credit to Laura. It’s her script that’s up there on the screen.
I don’t know how involved you can be with everything you’re working on day-to-day, but how often do you have people you run into other actors being like, “Hey, if you need me, I’ll do an episode?” Is there anybody in this season who was a fan of the first season and wanted to take part?
Most of them, yeah. The casting on this show is a weird combination of the traditional casting process with Mary Verniu and Bret Howe, our casting directors, but also texting friends. And the answer is, there are a lot of people you run into who are like, “Hey, I want to be on a ‘Poker Face’ episode.” It’s always harder to actually make the reality of it happen. So, that’s the challenge. And also, we don’t cast the whole thing at the beginning and have it all up on the board. We’re casting week to week. That creates a real degree of chaos to the process that is both terrifying and really, really fun. So, it’ll literally have Natasha coming in and just like, “Ah, I ran into so-and-so at the Bowery the other day. They said they want to be in it.” “Can you text them now and see if they can show up Tuesday?” So is thrilling and fun and also terrifying, but it’s amazing to get to the end of that chaotic process and look back over the list of people we got for the season, and pretty, I still can’t believe we got all those folks.
Was there any performance, any guest star that sort of surprised you by what they brought to the show?
Kumail Nanjiani in episode four plays a Florida panhandle cop named Gator Joe, and he went full on. He took a big, big swing with the role. It didn’t surprise me in terms of, I know Kumali is a great actor and he can do anything, but I think what he actually reached for and pulled off in that was really, really cool. Also, Method Man, who’s in an episode that Clea DuVall directed that’s set in a gym, I think, really just all of us were just like, “Oh my God, he’s great.” And he holds a whole episode and plays a great character in it. But in all these episodes, it’s fun because in a way it’s low stakes because it’s just a two-week shoot and it’s just one single standalone episode. I think actors feel a little bit more freedom to play with a role that they might not usually get cast in.
Do you guys want to do a third season? Do you guys want to keep making the show?
We’ll see, I mean, yeah, yeah. But it also, right now, I feel like the conversations have been started about it, it’s really just, let’s put this one out. Let’s see how everyone’s feeling. Let’s get a vibe for it, and we’ll see what happens.
“Poker Face” season 2 is now available on Peacock
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