After a three-year hiatus, Severance is back with season 2. The new season dives headfirst into the intense and suspenseful world of Lumon’s Severed Floor, picking up where the previous season left off. According to Adam Scott, the premiere’s opening scene is particularly thrilling, with Adam revealing that he drew inspiration from Tom Cruise’s iconic action sequences to bring the intense sequence to life. Also read: What to stream: ‘Severance’ returns, a Mac Miller album and Cameron Diaz and Jamie Foxx pair up
Adam Scott gets candid
Adam recently appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert where he previewed the opening shot of Season 2, which features his character running down Lumon’s eerie white hallways. He said he channelled Tom Cruise’s iconic run.
Adam shared, “He’s the best runner in the world. You gotta get the blade hands, you gotta get the knees up, and he’s always running in uncomfortable clothes, so I had a suit and dress shoes and had to run an enormous amount. It took almost five months to shoot that sequence — off and on, for five months. That’s all Ben Stiller and we had our own little wrap party when we finally finished the running sequence”.
In a recent interview with Rotten Tomatoes posted on Threads, Adam shared, “I trained by watching Tom Cruise and what he does. Ben (Stiller) and I talked about Tom Cruise quite a bit when shooting that stuff because he is the very best at running in clothing that should not be run in, and I was in a suit the whole time.”
It was also revealed that Adam had developed a keen sense of observation on set, particularly when it came to anticipating intense scenes. According to Ben, Adam had even picked up on a subtle cue, a “tell” that signaled when he should prepare for more high-energy hallway running sequences.
The opening scene of season 2’s ‘Hello, Ms. Cobel’ alone took four to five months to film, mostly due to headaches with scheduling, Ben explained.
“I think there are about 10 different pieces in it. …Each (piece) had a different need in terms of what had to be done with the set. There was one where we had to do it completely with green screen and have you on a treadmill and have a motion control camera come around in front of you and do all this stuff,” Ben said on the podcast.
About the show
Nearly three years after its cliffhanger season one ending, Severance is back with the second season. It streams on Apple TV+. The dystopian series stars Adam Scott as Mark Scout, a widower who undergoes a procedure to be “severed” that renders him unable to access his memories at work, and vice versa. He works at the mysterious Lumon Industries with Irving (John Turturro), Dylan (Zach Cherry) and Helly (Britt Lower). The second season picks up after the team led what is referred to as the “Microdat Uprising”.
Severance also stars Tramell Tillman, Patricia Arquette, Christopher Walken and Dichen Lachman. The Apple original series was created by Dan Erickson and is produced by Ben Stiller. Spanning 10 episodes, season two of Severance premiered on January 17. Each installment will be released weekly and the finale will release on March 21.