KILLING EVE at TCA: Live-Blog

The cast and creative team behind the breakout BBC America drama KILLING EVE. Follow along for live updates from stars Sandra Oh, Jodie Comer, Fiona Shaw, and executive producers Emerald Fennell and Sally Woodward Gentle…

4:12 PM: We’re starting off with a sizzle reel teasing the second season.

4:15 PM: “It’s terrifying, but amazing,” Fennell says. She didn’t work on the first season, but started working on season 2 before the first year exploded the way it did. Fennell has been friends with KILLING EVE creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge for a while, so it felt like a smooth transition.

4:18 PM: “I’m not a member of MI-5,” Shaw jokes, despite having multiple roles recently in that field.

4:19 PM: What is the state of Villanelle and Eve’s dynamic in season 2? “I think what is most interesting about Eve stabbing Villanelle is Villanelle’s reaction to that,” Comer says. “How emotionally she perceives that. It emotionally effects them and changes [things] in a way we don’t expect.”

“I think you see them vulnerable in different ways,” Oh adds. “We have a lot of energy in the beginning of the season, and it pushes them to a new place of vulnerability.”

4:21 PM: “It’s so much fun to play; it’s a real gift,” Comer says of the job.

4:22 PM: Oh says she’s curious why critics think KILLING EVE took off. “I have a theory,” Shaw adds. “I think it was genius to put Phoebe and those books together…but secondly, there’s something about Phoebe’s humor and Emerald’s humor.”

4:24 PM: “The darker the humor gets, the more people get it,” Fennell says. She says it’s important to know where the line is with humor. “The macabre, the strange things that happen, happen to be funny.”

“The humor is the open door,” Oh says. “I think it’s also the placement of the humor in the show,”  Comer adds.

4:27 PM: “I like that we have people who want to be a part of the show to be killed,” Comer says with a laugh. The men on the show would flip through scripts to see

4:28 PM: “I suddenly realized how homicidal my friends were, because I would get texts in the middle of the night of how to kill people,” Fennell says.

4:29 PM: “I think that’s such a personal experience,” Comer says of what she pulls from when Eve and Villanelle are toe-to-toe. She notes there’s a lot of logistics, but they have to also “find so much in the moment.” Oh agrees it’s both personal and difficult to answer.

4:30 PM: “I’ve been an actress for 30 years and I hope I’m in the middle of it,” Shaw says of her career.

4:31 PM: “I just love it so much,” Comer says of playing a character who often has to act around people. “She enjoys it so much. I view her as an actress sometimes, because she puts in her work and learns her lines….I can relate to her in that sense.”

4:32 PM: How connected are Villanelle and Eve, a reporter asks, citing a HARRY POTTER link as being a potential parallel. “I kind of like the HARRY POTTER theory,” Comer jokes “I feel like it’s something we don’t have the answer to. I think it’s something we’re figuring out and finding the pieces to on set.”

“How can you come to terms with a relationship that seems to be impossible,” Oh adds. “That’s what we seem to be figuring out daily.”

4:33 PM: “Villanelle fetishizes clothes,” Fennell says. “We have an amazing team of people who come together and bring amazing stuff to us. We have to be pretty specific…it’s part of the thing that everyone does, and Phoebe established, as people are attentive to detail.”

4:35 PM: Shaw jokes Donald Trump was a fan of the show and the panelists were temporarily very confused—until she clarified she was joking.

4:37 PM: “It was amazing to be making a show and doing exactly what Time’s Up is trying to do,” Oh says of the timing of the series. It allowed a deep dive into women and their psyches.

4:39 PM: The show takes the characters to Rome and Brussels in season 2. “the one part of the show we all delight in…is that our show has an international feel and flavor to it,” Oh says. “It gives a flavor and a depth and a originality to the show…it gives us a depth we don’t have to act [when we film on location].”

4:42 PM: “There’s still work to be done in front and behind the camera,” Oh says of the importance of female-led programs and the difference when shows are run primarily by men. “It’s about setting the tone and having the chance to set the tone…being able to be one of the people to set the tone means a lot to me.”

Fennell says with so many women, “it makes working on a show about women, you meet much less resistance.”

4:46 PM: “With everything with this show, it always comes down to a fundamental …gravitational pull Eve and Villanelle feel toward each other,” Fennell says. But what happens when another assassin comes along? It brings up the question of whether Eve is a Villanelle expert or an assassin expert?

4:49 PM: “It was fun to figure out who they would be,” Fennell says of adding people to the cast.

“It was fun because each actor brings something different to the set,” Comer says.

4:50 PM: “I definitely feel that,” Oh says of the importance of breaking barriers with KILLING EVE awards wins. “It’s not on the forefront of my mind, but I feel like if you’re different in any kind of way, you always know that. The significance of those wins is not lost on me at all. I didn’t want to waste a moment in not being completely there.”

“All I wanted to was hit it out of the f—ing park,” Oh says of being able to address the historic nature of her hosting during her Globes monologue. “I just tried my best to show up as fully as I could in each of those opportunities.”

4:53 PM: “Petrifying. Fear. Relief.” Oh says of co-hosting. “I was pet. ri. fied. And then I was relieved. And then I was ecstatic.” She says she was high from the experience of the Globes. But she says she wouldn’t do it again.

4:55 PM: Is Villanelle a psychopath? “It was something we didn’t want to be stuck to,” Comer says. “I think she has a lot of traits.” Oh adds it’s not a documentary, and they want to be as flexible as possible so the character isn’t limited.

“The biggest thing she wants is connection,” Comer says of Villanelle. “She thinks she knows what love is and feelings are.”

Follow @GiveMeMyRemote and @marisaroffman on Twitter for the latest TV news. Connect with other TV fans on GIVE ME MY REMOTE’s official Facebook page.

And be the first to see our exclusive videos by subscribing to our YouTube channel at youtube.com/givememyremotetv