Haven returns to Syfy with its fifth season in little more than a week. In anticipation of the premiere, Emily Rose (Audrey Parker) and Lucas Bryant (Nathan Wuornos) spent an hour talking to the press, including OHSOGRAY, about their feelings on the new season and where their characters are going. Here is part one of the interview:
Can you discuss the transition of filming this new relationship between Mara and Nathan?
Lucas: First of all, Emily Rose, who is sitting next to me…
Emily: Don’t embarrass me, Lucas!
Lucas: …is incredible this season as always, but exceptionally so in the role of Mara. It’s a total treat to watch her get to play with her. Except for the fact that she kicks my ass all over town. So that’s a new development.
Emily: [Laughs] That’s a new development! I didn’t ever do that as Audrey? I think I did that as Audrey, too.
Lucas: In less physical ways.
Emily: Oh, right…I kicked your butt mentally.
Lucas: That’s right. My mental bottom.
Emily: Right, right, your “mental bottom.”
Lucas: For Nathan, this is a nightmare. I can’t really tell you all the things that Mara is capable of, but she is a force.
Emily: She was a lot of fun to play. Audrey always has been in a very kind of – up ‘til the recent seasons – in this kind of melancholy, dire, life sucks for her state, which it did. All the time. So, to play someone that was and is on top of things so to speak, and has sheer joy and delight in how she relates to everyone around her was a real, real pleasure and really fun. It’s always fun when you take these normal relationships and you mix them up. It creates a really fun environment. It was a blast.
Emily, are you hoping to extend playing Mara as long as possible? Lucas, are you getting tired of being the love sucker?
Lucas: The what? [Laughs]
Emily: [Laughs] The what? What’s the definition of “love sucker”? Is it a noun? What is this?
The way she’s playing Nathan by using his feelings for Audrey against him.
Emily: You going to think on that while I answer my question? Mara is a lot of fun and something I never expected would be the case with Haven. But, it’s definitely turned out to be true – the ability to play so many different characters. Her personality is a blast, even though there are moments in this season where she made me really uncomfortable and I didn’t like playing her at some points. For the most part, I do enjoy being that evil and bad. I don’t know what that says about me. It really was fun. I do hope to get to play her for a long time, and we don’t know if Audrey comes back, do we? We don’t know how and when and if she does come back. We don’t know.
Lucas: No, we don’t. Am I getting sick of being the eloquently-coined “love sucker”? No, I think. I, in fact, love being the “love sucker.”
Emily: [Laughs]
Lucas: I think that anyone, Mara specifically, but anytime that Audrey is used as bait or hope for Nathan, he is a sucker. Sometimes it’s frustrating – his undying, bang-your-head-against-the-wall devotion to her. But, I think that’s also one of his most…
Emily: Noble attributes.
Lucas: …noble traits. Hopefully, we’ll get to see that suckerness pay off with some light at the end of this dark tunnel.
Coming into this season, what were you expecting since last season ended on such a big cliffhanger?
Emily: That’s a big question.
Lucas: I don’t think that I had any idea how this season was going to go.
Emily: I had no hope for this season. I had no clue cause we ended in that cave.
Lucas: Not in a “no hope” sense like it’s hopeless, but just no ideas of where we were going or we were going to do. In some ways, I think it kind of developed as it went, too. There’s a larger idea for this double season that we’re shooting right now, of course. But, I think some specifics were changed along the way because of what was happening in the shooting and what people were reacting to on screen. Personally, I guess what I knew coming into this season was that we’d be shooting double episode blocks. That was exciting in that it promised a sort of … instead of having to deal with the Troubles quickly and succinctly every week, we had more time to explore the effect that those Troubles will have on our characters.
Emily: It’s a 13 and 13 episode arc.
Lucas: That gave us a longer format story telling. That’s been pleasant.
Emily: It was nice to take a breather and not necessarily have everything wrapped up so quickly. It did get very confusing in the preparation of it because you have two episodes in your head that you are currently shooting while you’re prepping for the next two coming up. In that way, while confusing, it was nice because you did know big chunks of the season. At any given point, you knew what was happening for four episodes, so you could make a longer arc, or know more fully where you were and where you were going. We haven’t had that advantage as much in past seasons. In terms of what I was hoping for, I really had no clue. I knew from the last sentence last year they were trying to… They gave me that one last sentence that I said in the cave as Mara last year. I didn’t know that it was going to be a big main character of this year. I’m glad, though, it was. That was a pleasant surprise, really enjoyable, and a cool challenge. It’s interesting to come back every year … some of the people coming back, playing the same people … they know these characters backwards and forwards, up and down. Having to come back and not play Audrey Parker, but play a totally different entity, a different person, a different personality was getting to know someone new all over again and have those early conversations with the showrunners and writers about what we all felt like she would do and act. Giving birth to a new character is always a new adventure. It was a real gift, and I really appreciate them giving her to me in that way.
Haven returns September 11th at 10/9c. Keep checking back with OHSOGRAY for more of the interview with Emily Rose and Lucas Bryant.