Editor’s Note: This article contains spoilers for Severance Season 2, Episode 4, “Woe’s Hollow.”
Episode 4 ofSeveranceSeason 2 is now streaming exclusively on Apple TV+, and the show makes the daring choice to venture outside the offices at Lumon for an ORTBO (AKA an “Outdoor Retreat and Team-Building Occurrence”). Episode 4 takes Lumon’s Macrodata Refinement team out into the snowy wilderness, where the group is forced to navigate several challenges — which culminates in Irving (John Turturro) holding Helly (Britt Lower) under the water until she reveals that she’s actually her outie, Helena Eagan, pretending to be an innie.
The entire episode is incredibly effective, largely due to it being the first time we’ve gotten to see the team’s innies outside the office since Season 1. During a recent interview with Collider’sCarly Lane, directorBen Stillerand starAdam Scottdetailed the process of bringing the ORTBO to life, including where it was filmed and how they made it to set:
STILLER: We went to Siberia. [Laughs] No, we shot that in upstate New York, where we shoot a lot of the show, and it was winter. We were fortunate enough to be blessed with a couple of very timely snowfalls that, these days, are few and far between. We were really lucky to have that.It was kind of a bonding experience for everybody. We were up there for about six weeks. You guys were out there for about maybe four weeks.
SCOTT: The actors would get to set, and we would drive all the way up to where cars can no longer go, and then we would get into these snow vehicles — they weren’t snowmobiles, they were snowcats — and thenjust go straight up a mountain for 20 minutes until we got to our base camp at the top of the mountain. That’s where we were for 12 hours a day, shooting every day.It was a true adventure. And yes, it was very cold, but so fun and so crazy. We were doing it just for a month straight up there. It was amazing.
STILLER: The cave where they find the book was like a 15-minute hike because we couldn’t have vehicles go through the woods and stuff. So yeah, it was a fun adventure for everybody.
SCOTT: Every time you started feeling sorry for yourself when you’re hiking to a location, you would look and see our incredible camera crew carrying insanely heavy equipment.
There are some shows and movies that would have instead opted for a less practical approach, crafting a shorter version of a retreat that can be filmed in the Volume or with a green screen, but that would undoubtedly take the audience out of the moment thatSeveranceSeason 2, Episode 4 so intensely entrenches you in. It’s a testament to the creative minds behind the show that everyone was willing to go to such lengths to make the experience more authentic, and the BTS crew carrying all the heavy equipment out in the snow deserves the special praise Scott made sure to give them.SeveranceSeason 2 has already delivered more twists and thrillsthan its predecessor, and the show is further cranking up the heat before it even reaches the halfway point.
Who Stars in ‘Severance’ Season 2?
Adam Scott features in the lead role of Mark Scout inSeveranceSeason 2, withZach Cherry’s Dylan George, Britt Lower’s Helly Riggs, and John Turturro’s Irving Baliff filling out the rest of his Macrodata Refinement team.Tramell Tillmanis also back inSeveranceSeason 2 to reprise his role as Mr. Milchick, who has since been promoted in the wake of Harmony Cobel’s (Patricia Arquette) firing.Christopher Walkenalso features inSeveranceSeason 2 as Burt Goodman, withMichael ChernusandJen Tullockportraying Mark’s family outside the office, as Ricken Hale and Devon Scout-Hale, respectively.
The first four episodes ofSeveranceSeason 2 are now streaming. Stay tuned to Collider for more updates and coverage of the project and watchSeveranceexclusively onApple TV+.
Mark leads a team of office workers whose memories have been surgically divided between their work and personal lives. When a mysterious colleague appears outside of work, it begins a journey to discover the truth about their jobs.
