After an impressively quick turnaround, the successful new series of Apple TV+, Slow horsesbrings fans back to Slough House for Season 2. Based on the author’s best-selling novels Mick Herron, Slow horses the first season introduced us to a team of disaffected M15 operatives, including their disheveled and disillusioned leader Jackson Lamb, played by the Academy Award winner. Gary Oldman. After the explosive finale, Season 2 begins with Lamb’s team bowing to the good of M15 and will see them tackle a new mission on an even bigger scale.
When long-buried Cold War secrets begin to surface and Russian sleeper agents threaten London – and perhaps the world – Lamb and his Slough House team may be the only ones able to stop those in power . Season 2 will see the return Saskia Reeves as Catherine Standish, Jack Lowden as River Cartwright, Kristin Scott Thomas as Deputy Director General of MI5, Diana Taverner and more.
Ahead of Season 2 premiering on Apple TV+ on December 2, Collider’s Steve Weintraub was able to sit down with stars Oldman and Reeves to discuss the perks of filming on location in London, filming in the building that inspired author Herron’s Slough House, and where he’s at with season 3 production. Oldman also shares what it’s like. eat 20 bowls of noodles a day, past projects they are proud of and when Slow horses Season 4 will begin filming. You can watch the interview in the video above or read the full transcript below.
COLLIDER: For both of you, if someone has never seen anything you’ve done before, what’s the first thing you’d want them to watch and why?
GARY OLDMAN: You know, I’m terribly proud of JFK. I have a pivotal but not huge role in the film. But I thought about what Oliver [Stone] what I did with him was really something. And it was, I think, the first movie that I saw… I was invited to a little screening of it, and it was the first movie that I was in that I thought, “I can’t believe I’m in this movie, that I’m involved and that I’m a part of it.” For me, it’s one of the [Oliver Stone’s] masterpieces, in fact.
SASKIA REEVES: I agree.
OLDMAN: So I think that would be a good one for me.
REEVES: Yes. I did, I think it was my third or fourth film, a low-budget independent film that Michael Winterbottom directed called Butterfly kiss, which I enjoyed doing this. And he made some lifelong friends after that movie. But that was really interesting to me and I like the way it developed. Yes. This will be a good place to start.
Gary, I want to ask you an individual question. When you read the scripts for season 2 and saw how much you would eat in each scene, did you say yes or did you say, “Do I need a rewrite?”
OLD MAN: Oh, no, no. There are certain things that come with the job. Certain things that come with Jackson [Lamb]. He smokes. I have these fake herbal cigarettes, but still, he smokes. He drinks. He eats. And this is all part of the character.
I was telling Saskia, I don’t like that thing when actors pretend to eat. When they have a scene with a table and you can see them cutting and then moving their food around the plate. It’s like when people pour tea, and they pour it like that, and you know that’s all they poured… Stuff like that really annoys me. You know what i mean? Pour the tea. Eat the food.
So yes. Jackson Lamb would devour these noodles. The only thing is, of course, you don’t do it once. You do it 20 times. I think I had about 20 bowls of noodles that day.
I have a lot of friends who are actors and they’re like, “Yeah, when you shoot a food scene, that could take hours and you eat and you eat and you eat and you eat.”
OLD MAN: Yes. It wasn’t that bad. But I’ve been in scenes where it’s at the end of a meal and there’s leftovers on the plate and you keep coming back to it. Have you ever had this where it’s really rancid? Where is it under the lights? If you’re looking at a half-eaten lamb chop for three days under the lights, it’s not good.
In Season 2, you can both do things from the office. I love the production design of the sets that were built, but there has to be something great about filming on location in London, it just adds so much to the show.
REEVES: Well, I live in London, so this job is just a gift to me. I went to drama school very close to where we shoot the exterior of Slough House. And it’s such familiar territory. It’s very nice to pretend you’re this female secretary who goes to work at Aldgate near the Barbican. It’s great. And I think they have chosen some wonderful and unusual locations in London. It’s not the clichéd images we see of London. I think it’s great. There are some great choices.
OLDMAN: We shoot where he…
REEVES: Conceived?
OLDMAN: He designed that building that is Slough House, it’s the building that Mick Herron used to walk past, or he used to walk past on the bus, every day to work. So he put it in that building, that location, and that’s where we shoot. And in season 3, where I have a meeting with Ben Chapman in a laundromat and—I don’t think we could get it with the first season, we couldn’t lock down the location—but in the third season, I meet Ben in the laundromat, which is at the laundry that is in the book. So we’re very lucky that… All these different milestones…
REEVES: The Russian house where he goes and plays chess, it was in the most extraordinary location. I didn’t know it existed. It was a house right on the river in the East End of London. And it was like an oasis in this huge housing complex. And it was a very old river lord’s house, and I think it was common for a while. It was an incredible old Georgian building. The set design and art design in this program is exceptional, I think. They really bring out so much detail and don’t hold dust and dirt, and it’s just awesome.
OLD MAN: Yes.
Excuse me for not knowing, but I believe you filmed season 3? Are you filming 3 and 4 right now?
REEVES: We still do at this point.
Three or four?
REEVES: Three.
OLDMAN: I’m done for a bit. They are finishing season 3 as we speak. And then-
REEVES: Actually, I think Jack [Lowden] fly back soon to finish. It has a whole stunt section.
OLD MAN: Yes. Jack flies in, lands at 7:30 in the morning and goes straight to the set. So yeah, I’m still shooting. And then we come back, hopefully, we’re told, sometime in February to start season four.
If I’m not mistaken, did you shoot one and two together, or did you take a break?
OLD MAN: There’s a little break. I shot back to back. Yes?
REEVES: Yes.
OLD MAN: Yes.
I was wondering if you were going to do this for 3 and 4, but apparently not.
REEVES: Well, they need time to prepare. So department heads, everybody, they need time to prepare. I think their timing was kind of messed up because… Yeah. There’s an interesting start to season 3, isn’t it, Gary? But no spoilers.
OLD MAN: No, there is. A very good one. And we’re lucky, too, that we’re one of the few shows, if not the only show, where we have a director for the six episodes. So, in a way, we get a director who, for all intents and purposes, makes a six-hour film, rather than a lot of shows where you have a director who comes in for two and then changes and then shoots. .I like familiarity and…
REEVES: Its continuity.
OLDMAN: – its continuity. Yes.
Slow horses Season 1 is available to stream on Apple TV+, and Season 2 will premiere on December 2.