Interview (Written): Carlton Cuse and Ryan Condal (“Colony”)

A /film interview by Fred Topel with producer Carlton Cuse and showrunner Ryan Condal of the new USA network series “Colony”:

Is there a difference between secrets the characters know and secrets you’re keeping from them?

Cuse: Good question! Yes. There are two types of secrets. There are the secrets that the characters are trying to puzzle out. As a writer you can actually put forth something that the audience knows but the characters don’t and you can kind of play the tension and suspense of that. In Colony, we’re really doing more of the former. We wanted to be really present with the characters, so we tried very hard to make sure that the characters were neither too far in front or too far behind what the audience knows. We tried to dish out the information really just so the audience gets the knowledge just as our characters get the knowledge. The same was actually true, interestingly, with the actors. Josh [Holloway] was very experienced from doing Lost at getting scripts week to week without any sense of what was happening in the future. It was really great on Lost because it made the actors very present. They were just acting that week’s script and in most cases it was because we were still writing the next week’s script. It became something that all the actors on that show embraced. It made them feel very much in the moment of the mystery. So we’re kind of doing the same thing here. The actors are really only reading the scripts just ahead of when they’re shooting them. The difference is that our show is not leading to these mysteries, like who these aliens are, why they’re here, what they’re doing here? That’s not really what Colony is about. Colony is about this family and how are they going to survive this occupation and what is their fate? That’s really what we’re ultimately interested in exploring and that’s where the series is going to stay focused.

Who has more secrets, Will [Josh Holloway] or Katie [Sarah Wayne Callies]?

Condal: I think they both have secrets. I think the big central secret in the show is the fact that Katie’s in the resistance and Will has been co-opted by the occupation and forced to collaborate with them to hunt down the resistance. So the secret that his own wife is in the resistance is the big central drama of the show. Week to week I think the audience is going to be on the edge of their seat wondering what’s going to happen. Is Josh going to find out? When is he going to find out what’s going on with his wife? That’s the central story that the whole show is wrapped around.

“Colony” airs Thursdays at 10/9C.

For the rest of the interview, go here.