00:00There is a case, and there is a culprit, and there is detectives figuring out a puzzle,
00:06but that's not what we remember.
00:09What we remember is the feeling of it, and the eerie feeling, the sinister feeling of
00:16it, number one.
00:16Number two, we remember those two characters, beautifully and perfectly portrayed by those
00:22two actors, and we miss it.
00:25So, there is a case here, and it comes together, and I was very careful in constructing the
00:33mystery, but I think that what will stay with you is the feeling of the series and the emotional
00:39journey that these women go through, because in order to figure out the outer mystery, they
00:46have to figure out the inner mystery they carry, and that's journey.
00:53What I can bring that is new is to talk about female insecurities and fears and the generational
01:02pain we carry, and how we face our sexuality, and how we understand justice, and how we understand
01:13loss and loneliness, and the existence of God, and, you know, faith, is there faith or not
01:20as women.
01:22So, that's what I did.
01:27We were in the middle of the pandemic when I was writing the first episodes, and I couldn't
01:32go to Alaska.
01:33I was desperate to just move there and write it there.
01:35What I did was I submerged myself in endless hours of social media.
01:41People in these towns in Alaska get super bored, especially in winter, and they just go around
01:47recording themselves, making breakfast, going to the supermarket, going to do laundry, you know,
01:53going to school, and in all these towns in northwestern Alaska.
01:58So, I could absolutely immerse myself in daily life, and how the streets worked, and it was amazing
02:06to have that tool.
02:07And number two, I wrote the scripts listening to, I studied those of the radio stations of
02:16these towns, and Billie Eilish on the other side, because that's what I was listening to
02:20during the lockdown, and that's what created the atmosphere of the show.
02:25Eventually, the lockdown allowed for me to jump on a plane and go to Alaska, and visit these
02:30towns that I had become obsessed with, and see the people, and eat the food, and
02:38go with them on snowmobiles on the frozen ocean, and visit the graveyards, and go to church
02:45with them, and have long conversations to understand truly so many other things that I couldn't
02:51find online, that you don't learn in a library, and that you don't learn even with social media.
02:57So, it was a long process.
02:59Very importantly, I brought, at the moment that I had a first pass of the scripts, we brought
03:04on board Inuit, Inupiaq producers, that are storytellers themselves, to go over every page
03:15of the scripts and get us right, to truly represent the sensibility, the sense of humor, the way
03:22they cook, to get it right, you know?
03:28I wanted Jodie Foster to play that part.
03:31You know, I've always been a fan.
03:33I feel deeply that we don't see enough of her, and I was really craving getting the opportunity
03:39of seeing more of her, and she's never done TV.
03:42And what Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson brought to that first season of a movie star
03:48that suddenly is making TV, you know, so many incredible actors that come from cinema are
03:56making TV now, which is suddenly more prestigious and has better stories than cinema.
04:02But not Jodie.
04:03It felt like it would make people stop and watch, and I think I'm seeing the effects of
04:08that.
04:08But on top of that, I just wanted to work with her.
04:11I mean, she's absolutely one of my heroes.
04:13And I know the piece of an actor she is.
04:17Well, I thought I knew.
04:18And then I worked with her in the series, and she blew my mind with the places she could
04:23go and what she could do with the characters I wrote.
04:26So it was a no-brainer.
04:28And then you have Kayleigh Rice.
04:30I needed, you know, a warrior, an Amazon with a soul, with a heart that truly was there
04:38for her people and that felt deeply and that could get emotional and at the same time
04:43be dangerous.
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