Vince Gilligan and Rhea Seehorn, the creator and star of Apple TV drama series Pluribus, have the kind of easy camaraderie that comes from logging over a decade of prestige television together. Their rapport first sparked back in 2015, with the follow-up to Gilligan’s Breaking Bad —  the crime series Better Call Saul, which he co-created with Peter Gould. Seehorn’s indelible portrayal of the cunning Kim Wexler transformed the character from one-off love interest to irreplaceable mainstay, and thus, a partnership was born. In fact, Gilligan very deliberately changed course on the long-gestating sci-fi project that would eventually become Pluribus, pivoting from a male lead to instead shaping the role especially for Seehorn.

Here, the duo talks about their deep love for the Pluribus crew, a Season 2 update, how they relate on a personal level to Seehorn’s character — Carol Sturka, the irascible author who finds herself excluded from the show’s “happiness apocalypse” — and what it means to “take a scene till it breaks.”

DEADLINE: Could you talk about your first meeting? I’m assuming it was during the Better Call Saul audition process.

RHEA SEEHORN: Right here in this building [the Sony Pictures Studios offices].

VINCE GILLIGAN: We had seen [her tape]. You feel like you’ve met someone… [Pauses.] Actors are always at a disadvantage, a little bit, in the sense that we’re now in an age of doing the first audition on videotape or on phones, so we felt like we had met Rhea. She hadn’t met anyone, didn’t even know what we looked like.

SEEHORN: The screen-testing room here is at the end of the commissary hall. But the waiting area before you go in is incredibly close to where people weigh their food and complain about, like, how much strawberries weigh, and stuff in their salad, because they don’t want to pay for it and they get mad.

Vince came in with Peter Gould, Melissa Bernstein, Tom Schnauz, Sharon [Bialy] and Sherry [Thomas] and Russell [Scott] from Bialy/Thomas casting, and Bob Odenkirk. Vince and Peter introduced themselves to me, sitting in the hallway, and I just remember Vince saying, “Thank you so much for coming,” and I was like, “Of course.” [Laughs.]

GILLIGAN: That’s what you say.

SEEHORN: No, actually, I will never forget it. It eased me because it sounded totally sincere. It did not sound like jibber-jabber. 

GILLIGAN: Well, we’re both from Virginia.

SEEHORN: So, that’s where we met, and he was so kind. Vince and Peter Gould said, “We’re going to work on it, we’re going to work on it together, you’re going to have some time to get to know Bob Odenkirk” — whom I was also nervous to meet — ”and then we’re going to videotape it, and we’re going to wait till we have the best take.” Am I getting that wrong? 

GILLIGAN: Boy, this is why I’m bad at these interviews, I get so many details wrong now. 

SEEHORN: I could be wrong! Memory’s not fact. 

GILLIGAN: You can trust her. I’m thinking of the real old days where you had to do it in person for all the executives. 

SEEHORN: I believe you said it was also unique to you guys asking, “Can we please make it more comfortable for the actors?”

GILLIGAN: You’re right. I only slow these things down. [Seehorn laughs.] Crazy old man who can’t remember. Is it still World War II?

DEADLINE: Vince, you had thought about Pluribus and worked on it for 10 years. What was it about Rhea’s portrayal of Kim Wexler that made you want to tailor it for her? I know Peter has also said it wasn’t realized initially how important Kim would be to the story.

GILLIGAN: It wasn’t. We thought, “Let’s let him have a girlfriend.” There’s a young woman who’s read for us. “Yeah, she’s cool. We like her, she seems likable.” And then we met her, we liked her even more. We didn’t know it was that important a character.

We’re about a little past the halfway point. My writers and I have figured out the episodes, and it always — every season on every show — starts out hard. And then you just stay with it long enough. I’m starting to get to the point where I’m thinking, I’m looking forward to shooting this, and people seeing it, because I’m kind of digging it.

Vince Gilligan on Pluribus Season 2

It’s funny how things change. Aaron Paul in Breaking Bad was originally going to be, like, “Yeah, we kill him off by the end of Season 1, because we wouldn’t need him anymore.” No, he’s fantastic, and he made himself indispensable. Same thing happened with Rhea.

But it’s all because Rhea was so fantastic in the role, but on top of that, Rhea was just lovely to root for. She’s lovable, and the whole crew loves her, every crew loves her.

SEEHORN: Thanks. I love them.

GILLIGAN: And then that’s part of the reason they love you, and she respects what everybody does, and takes her job very seriously. And what’s not to love about that? Working with someone who makes it clear by their actions more than their words. Someone like that, when you meet them, you’re like, “I want to work with them again.” And that’s what led to Pluribus.

Pluribus was something I was kind of working on anyway, but it was a male protagonist, because that’s just my default, because I’m a dude. And then I thought, why does it have to be a guy? And I’m so glad I made that call, and I made it because I love Rhea so much, but it also works better for the show. It actually works better as a female protagonist.

DEADLINE: After working with each other for so many years, have you developed a shorthand, and if so, what does that look like? Do you intuit each other’s moves?

SEEHORN: I didn’t realize to what degree until… [Pauses.] Definitely the people that we had not been around as much were like, “You realize you guys are not actually finishing your sentences.” Like, “Could you just…?” “We’re gonna…” And I’m like, “Yeah, I know, because it’s…” Which is fun.

GILLIGAN: It’s like the thing at the end of that episode: “Oh, yeah, the thing with the thing with the other show.”

DEADLINE: I hate to put you on the spot but do you have a favorite memory from filming Pluribus Season 1?

SEEHORN: It’s so hard to say. I had so many late nights laughing my head off between really serious takes of things with my crew, with my cast; Karolina [Wydra] and I having to learn how to play Spit — never heard of that card game — and having a crew of people having to reset the cards underneath, so that they always come up on the same one.

DEADLINE: he told me about the donut-eating ritual you have.

SEEHORN: I do eat half a donut every day, and I do force someone else to eat the other half, so I don’t feel bad about it. It’s usually Phil Palmer, our sound mixer, but occasionally when he’s like, “I can’t today,” and I finish yelling at him, Karolina would pick up the slack, so I appreciate it.

DEADLINE: And I agree with you; I don’t like a filled donut.

SEEHORN: No filled! [To Gilligan:] Are you aware that because you and Karolina keep saying in these interviews — “Oh, Rhea hates a lot of stuff” — that there is now an edited reel out there where I just bitch about stuff? It looks like I hate everything.

I have seen this.

SEEHORN: No food should be filled with other foods.

GILLIGAN: That’s not true at all. What about turducken [a deboned chicken stuffed into a deboned duck stuffed into a deboned turkey]?

SEEHORN: A great case in point.

DEADLINE: Anything you can share about the next season?

GILLIGAN: Well, we’re about a little past the halfway point. My writers and I have figured out the episodes, and it always — every season on every show — starts out hard. And then you just stay with it long enough. I’m starting to get to the point where I’m thinking, I’m looking forward to shooting this, and people seeing it, because I’m kind of digging it. [To Seehorn:] You’re in it.

SEEHORN: Thank you.

GILLIGAN We kind of debated for the first month. 

SEEHORN: Sure.

GILLIGAN: Just leave the people wanting more, make people wait till about Episode 7 or 8, but we said no. We’re thinking we’ll learn more about the atom bomb instead of just dropping it completely as a plot point.

DEADLINE: How does working with the same Better Call Saul crew help foster that familiarity that’s a prerequisite for a creative and collaborative environment?

GILLIGAN: Rhea and I have that shorthand she was describing, and I get to have that with our sound mixer, Phil; I get to have it with Mark Hansen, our prop master; I get to have it with Jennifer Bryan, our costume designer; with Denise Pizzini, our production designer.

SEEHORN: Diane Mercer, who you’ve been working with forever.

GILLIGAN: She’s our head of post-production. It saves a lot of time. That’s not what it’s all about, but that is a great boon — to not have to start from zero with every conversation. To say: “It’s like that thing we did. What was that episode we did?” “Better Call Saul?” “No, no, Breaking Bad.” It’s so efficient. But also, you’ve been in the trenches with all these people for years, and there’s a shared respect, there’s a shared knowledge of what everybody does best. With these folks, they’ve got a very deep bench of very profound talent, and knowing people have your back and you have theirs It’s very important.

SEEHORN: I know that we [as actors] are not always rewarded for taking a risk on a set, because if it doesn’t work, you feel like you got egg on your face, and maybe everybody’s wondering, Oh, did we make a mistake? I told our cast that this crew — and these directors, and these writers — they’ve got your back; you can try things. Those scenes and the episodes where I’m by myself, and people ask me how hard that is — I’m never alone, I’m doing this whole dance with all these artisans. 

And there was one night, while shooting the pilot, and the sequence is getting my wife’s body out of the truck and dragging it up, and when you come back to that each night, you need to start at the same anxiety level that you wrapped the night before, and so we were doing it, and we needed to alter some things, and now we’re hurrying because the sun’s coming up over that court when you look out. I’m standing right outside of that door, and I know we’re wasting time, and I’m having the best time of my life, but physically my body was a little, like, “Whew, we gotta dig deep right now,” and I remember just putting my hands on my knees. Jules, our camera assist, was moving my mark a little bit, and he just tapped my ankle, and he said, “You know, we all got you, right?” I looked up, and I could see this beautiful, Kara Walker-esque silhouette — 200 people working with the sun coming out behind them, all doing this just to tell this story, and all doing it together, and I got so teary. It was a very beautiful moment, one that I will never forget, because the scene started, and, in that moment, Carol has lost everything that means everything to her — and I also knew in that moment how lucky I am to have this whole second family that is the whole life that I want to have, and the career that I have.

DEADLINE: That’s so beautiful, thank you for sharing that. Vince, when I had talked to you before, you indicated you could relate to the curmudgeonly aspects of Carol; I can understand that as well.

SEEHORN: Oh, good! Occasionally, people ask me why I’m not perkier, and I’m like, What if your wife was killed?!

DEADLINE: I’m with you.

SEEHORN: Thank you!

“You’ve been in the trenches with all these people for years, and there’s a shared respect, there’s a shared knowledge of what everybody does best.”

Vince Gilligan

DEADLINE: A big and broad question, but, for both of you, what does she mean to you, and has she taught you anything?

SEEHORN: [Laughs.] That’s kind of a lot.

GILLIGAN: The character or the actress?

DEADLINE: However you want to take it.

SEEHORN: Or, how did he explore his curmudgeon side?

GILLIGAN: I do that every day, with every breath I take. Living my best curmudgeon life. That’s a great question, and I don’t feel like I have a good answer for you. I learned so much from Rhea. She’s so positive; some of the most positive people I know, you got to work at it, which makes me respect it even more. Especially when you’re No. 1 on the call sheet, and I’m the boss and you realize you have responsibilities. When you’re not feeling that great, but being around someone who is so wonderfully positive and cheerful and happy — and we’re all human, sometimes you’ve got to kind of fake it till you make it — I think that helps. If I happen to know Rhea may be really tired or exhausted, but just still being so sweet and wonderful to the crew, I learned a lot from that.

SEEHORN: Oh, that’s kind of you.

GILLIGAN: There is a lot of me, probably, in the character of Carol Sturka because it’s the conundrum of, at the beginning of the first episode, she’s surrounded by love, before the world changes; she’s surrounded by fans of her books, and she goes the extra mile to sign books, pose for photos, and she says, “I’m enjoying the heck out of this,” and then she gets in the car afterward, it’s like, shwoop, ugh, and then she goes and has a drink at the bar, and she’s like [makes complaining noises]. Like, what is it? Do you enjoy this or do you not? And it’s a weird thing; you do, and you don’t. How do you feel anything but deep and abiding gratitude for people you don’t even know loving your work, but then sometimes you’re like, “I feel like I’m being tickled to death.” Being tickled should be enjoyable, but it’s almost like torture. I don’t know how much I learned from the character of Carol, because if I could learn more about myself, I’d probably be a healthier human being, and maybe I wouldn’t need to write characters like Carol.

SEEHORN: It was telling when you were explaining to me that Carol doesn’t actually have disdain for her fans, and she’s not mocking her work; she’s very proud of her work. We have great conversations with Denise Pizzini, but also set decorator Ashley [Michelle Marsh], about this: You can’t hate your work if you have giant posters of all the covers all over your office and copies everywhere… It’s about beating somebody to the punch: Carol’s afraid to drink the Kool-Aid. We’ve all been there. You, as a journalist, where you think, Yeah, but a real journalist would write this kind of piece, or a real actor would have been blah blah blah…

GILLIGAN: A real TV showrunner would do this instead of that… Sometimes we crap on our own work.

SEEHORN: Yeah, you didn’t write War and Peace, you’re just writing TV. Calm down.

GILLIGAN: I’ve had that my whole career: “Well, you’re not doing movies.” Because there’s a whole vibe… luckily, it’s gone away.

I am trying to learn from Carol that sometimes speaking your mind about a boundary can still be a kind thing. I’m definitely a people-pleaser, and then I’ll just go home and be upset or break out in eczema rather than voice it.

Rhea Seehorn

DEADLINE: I hate that, by the way.

SEEHORN: It’s gone away, but yeah, I used to get it too: “Have you done anything I would have seen?” I’m like, “Well, uh…” I’d start to name something, and then I’d get: “I meant film.”

GILLIGAN: “I don’t own a television.”

SEEHORN: Exactly, and they’re all lying through their teeth.

GILLIGAN: It still exists; it’s just gone underground a bit: “The best TV show ever made doesn’t hold a candle to the worst movie ever made.”

SEEHORN: That’s what people think — we don’t. But it was another clue to me that sometimes it’s scarier to believe people that are saying you’re great, and in your head, you’re like, “Well, then they must be idiots.” For me, I’m sometimes like, “If you want to believe that, then why don’t you believe the review that said you’re a piece of crap, too?” Normally we memorize those. [Laughs.] Unlike Carol, I’m somebody that does seek joy, and I’m not a faultfinder.

GILLIGAN: That’s where we’re different. [Seehorn laughs.] I’m not even being funny.

SEEHORN: But I have a dark, very introverted, skeptical side of me, which is probably where we do have like-minded conversations, and I am constantly afraid that the other shoe’s going to drop, that if I let myself enjoy this — I’ll be the first person that hopes we can find a good laugh in the room, or helps someone, but the part I don’t do well with is not being afraid that it’s all going to be taken away, that it’s all a joke. “OK, you can have this, but that means this is going to happen.” And it was interesting to look at someone like Carol, who never could enjoy what was being put in front of her. She was just so afraid. I remember thinking, “You don’t want to be that person,” and she’s somewhat subconsciously learning that.

GILLIGAN: You just reminded me: 20 years ago, I was already on The X-Files, but someone asked me for my autograph, and I said, “Sure,” and they said, “I was kidding.” [Laughs.]

SEEHORN: Oh my god.

DEADLINE: What?! That’s insane.

GILLIGAN: That’s the vibe you’re talking about. I was like, I must be a giant asshole. It’s like, No, that person was.

DEADLINE: Wow.

SEEHORN: So, trying to balance those things. I am trying to learn from Carol that sometimes speaking your mind about a boundary can still be a kind thing. I’m definitely a people-pleaser, and then I’ll just go home and be upset or break out in eczema rather than voice it. But then I feel very similar to Vince that I learn a lot from him and the way he’s the boss on the set: Yeah, we have bad days and say something I wish I hadn’t said, or maybe I said it in a tone that I’m not super-proud of — being able to come back the next day and tell somebody, “I’m sorry I was short with you.” Also, being able to say, “I don’t know,” which he does. I’m always very suspicious of people that have the perfect answer for every question.

GILLIGAN: Trying to hide my ignorance would be a fool’s errand.

SEEHORN: [Laughs.]

GILLIGAN: Might as well cop to it.

DEADLINE: In a previous interview, Karolina told me you often take a scene “until it breaks”. What is that process like?

GILLIGAN: I get greedy, seriously, when I’m directing. I try not to hover behind the directors when I’m not directing; it’s like one of the least fun things in the world, being on the set when I’m not directing, because I am cognizant of, I don’t want to annoy the hell out of the directors. But it’s like, “Well, if you try this…”

SEEHORN: [To Gilligan.] But everyone always wants you there.

GILLIGAN: Well, I don’t know that the directors do.

SEEHORN: Well, I didn’t ask them, so…

GILLIGAN: I’m not proud of this, but I’ll see Rhea or Karolina or Samba [Schutte], [Carlos-Manuel] Vesga do it great, and I’ll be so delighted that I saw it great that I’ll say, “I want to see it again.” It’s like, The roller coaster was awesome. The guy who’s putting down the bar, will he just wave me through? Can I stay on the roller coaster? And my producer sometimes will say, “You know we’re running behind here.” It’s like, “Yeah, but that was so good,” And they say, “It was, and it’s been shot, and we have it now.”

If I’ve got two or three takes that I like instead of one, then it’s like, “What if you do it this way instead? What if we change it up?” And so “take it till it breaks” means, “Let’s just see it where you’re even more dry, you’re even more sarcastic, you’re I do eat half a donut every day, and I do force someone else to eat the other half, so I don’t feel bad about it. more flat affect.” Typically, it’s not, “Let’s see one where it’s angrier or bigger.” It’s, “Can you do even less? Let’s try it a little quieter still,” or, “This whole sentence or two — can we cut that out and just do it with a look?”

SEEHORN: And then sometimes also with comedic things, like the scene where I’m walking out of the hospital. I don’t have a car, I will pick the police car in a minute. And it wasn’t in the script, but in this moment where she should only care, basically, about survival, Vince adds this thing. He’s like, “Go over to this car and get in, and then just decide it’s too smelly,” and I was like, “What?” And it’s like this bereft moment, where she’s coming out covered in blood. I love it so much when you try those things. It’s a wonderful thing to trust him that much, and he trusts me. All I need to do is commit 100% and then it’ll work. And if it doesn’t work, we’ll move on.