Jeff Bridges and Alia Shawkat interview

Warning: The following story contains spoilers from “The Old Man” Season 2, Episode 8.

FX’s second season “The Old Man” may have ended with a truly breathtaking change of power, but for series creator and executive producer Jonathan E. Steinberg, it was “a long time.”

Season 2 revolved around rescuing Angela/Emily (Alia Shawkat), a goal that required Chase (Jeff Bridges) to team up with his former partner and rival Harper (John Lithgow) to save the woman they both see as a daughter. That trip forced them to put aside their differences and travel to Afghanistan. But as Angela/Emily spent more time in the country, she discovered that her real father was actually Faraz Hamzad (Navid Negahban). In doing so, she embraced her new identity and discovered her heritage, becoming Parwana Hamzad.

The season ended in a complete upset. To ensure Parwana’s safe return to America, Harper teamed up with his ex-wife, former British agent Marion (Janet McTeer). But gradually he disappeared. In the final moments of “XV,” Parwana tells Chase in no uncertain terms that he will help her do whatever it takes to get Harper back. Just as Season 1 ended with Chase reluctantly teaming up with Harper, Season 2 ends with him and Parwana teaming up.

“From the beginning of the story, a big part of it was about raising an adult child, being the adult child and dealing with aging parents,” Steinberg told TheWrap. The showrunner noted that this dynamic power exchange between Chase and Parwana is akin to “realizing that your child has real authority and agency and is no longer forced to listen to you.”

“This is obviously the most outsized version we can imagine,” he continued. “It felt like an interesting place to tell a story and an interesting place to highlight the relationship between Jeff and Alia’s characters.”

The scene between Bridges, Shawkat and Amy Brenneman as Zoe McDonald was filmed over two days. “It took a long time because they made so many special shots. Even though it seems like such a simple scene, there are a lot of angles that give it this dramatic effect,” Shawkat told TheWrap.

Filming the scene over several days allowed the actors to experiment more with this crucial scene. However, both Bridges and Shawkat emphasized that the emotional weight of the moment was baked into the script itself.

“I am a photographer. When you take a photo, sometimes you have to bracket the exposures,” Bridges explains, referring to the process of taking the same photo multiple times. “I also like to do that with my acting. The actors create their painting, then the editor and director cut out those paintings and make a collage. It is a communal art form here. So I want to give my comrades as much choice as possible about what’s going to work once they start putting it together.

Bridges is a big believer in trying recordings in different ways. “It can give you some good surprises, for yourself and for everyone,” he said.

“It starts with them reuniting in this beautiful scene: they see each other after he thought she was dead. By the end, she really puts him in a position where his hands are tied and he’s getting on the plane no matter what,” Shawkat explained. “It’s a great scene that captures the entire show’s first season. In a sense, you’re saying that what you thought you knew was the truth isn’t, and now you’re going to have to pay for it.

To play out Parwana’s discovery of her own identity, Shawkat leaned on the mood of the series and her own relationship with her racial identity.

“I’m mixed race. Unfortunately, I haven’t been to Baghdad, where my father is from, but every time I’m in an environment with other people from there or other Arabs, it’s this feeling where you think, ‘I’m one of you, but I’ Me neither,” she said, noting that there have been times when she hasn’t felt “ethnic enough” or “white enough.” “I don’t feel like I really fit in.”

“I delved into that in an extreme way. She wants to be part of these people. She knows she’s just like them – they’re the same – but she’s had such a different life, so she doesn’t feel the same,” Shawkat added. “It’s that identity thing where you wonder who she really is and feel a little lost.”

The actor kept in mind the inner turmoil Parwana experienced as she approached this final episode. “She’s falling apart this season, and what’s left after that? I played that as much as I could,” Shawkat said. “By the time you get into the food scene, I wanted it to be like she’s been through so much and has nothing else to hide. She just looks at (Chase) and says, ‘You’re going to get on this plane. There’s nothing else to do.’ She no longer puts on masks at that point.”

As for Chase’s claims that he has seen and done things “uglier than death,” Bridges told TheWrap that he has spoken with Steinberg about what that could mean. “I don’t know where exactly it’s going. But I do have a suspicion,” he said.

Steinberg also noted that the team around “The Old Man” is now building Season 3’s story around “the answer to that.” “It’s not as simple as killing bad guys anymore. It’s much more complicated,” Steinberg teased.

As for the future of FX’s thriller, it remains unclear. However, both Shawkat and Bridges are hopeful that there will be another season. “I’ve signed on for three films, and I love working with the people. I’m curious to see where the story goes, so I’m just playing it by ear. I haven’t thought that far into the future yet,” Bridges revealed.

“As much ground as the story has already covered, in a sense, the relationship between Jeff and Alia’s characters has only just begun. What I would be excited about in season 3 is to see how they have to occupy the same space in the story and interact with each other. They are not allowed to use a telephone as a buffer,” Steinberg said. “We all feel very good about the story we are telling and the team that has been put together.”