“Severance” will not be left out in the cold (harbor) anytime soon.
Series director/executive producer Ben Stiller said during Jason and Travis Kelce’s “New Heights” podcast in the below video that the inevitable “Severance” Season 3 will not take three years to make. While Season 3 has not yet been announced by Apple TV+, the hit series is expected to return…and Stiller assured that the next installment will not be plagued by the same delays (namely, the SAG and WGA strikes) as Season 2.
“No, the plan is not to [wait three years],” Stiller said ahead of the Season 2 finale. “Hopefully we’ll be announcing what the plan is very soon.”
Stiller continued of the three years between Seasons 1 and 2, “It took us a little bit to regroup, and the show, we shot for 186 days on Season 2. Editing takes a while, but thank goodness the audience was there when we came back. The challenge was to get people who hadn’t seen the show to watch the first season, so Apple did a really good job of getting the word out and we did as much press as we could. Also, three years later, Apple TV+ is actually a different…it’s a different situation there now because they have more viewers. When we started out, we were one of the first shows.”
Stiller also shared how making “Severance” has impacted his view on acting as a whole. Stiller directed 11 out of the 19 completed episodes of the show; he also directs the upcoming Season 2 finale, out March 21.
“It’s made me admire actors so much more as a director,” Stiller said. “When you’re really just directing, you can just focus on what you’re doing and be there for the other actors and be connected to the crew.”
Stiller recently teased the Season 2 finale during a SXSW panel with Apple EVP of Services Eddy Cue, saying, “Things are going to happen. I mean, what can I tell you? The season is going to end soon and hopefully people will be along for the ride.”
He further confirmed during “Jimmy Kimmel Live” that the “Severance” team already knows how the series will end. “We know what the ending is but how we’re getting there is the creative process,” he said.
