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Bitten Q&A: Season 2, Episode 1
Each week different cast and crew members will answer questions about the latest episode, providing an exclusive behind-the-scenes look into the world of Bitten.
We have a lot to discuss and ponder after every episode of Bitten ... and so do the people who make the show! Each week different cast and crew members will answer questions about the latest episode, providing an exclusive behind-the-scenes look into the world of Bitten.
Season Two kicks off with Laura Vandervoort (Elena Michaels), Greyston Holt (Clay Danvers) and Executive Producer J.B. Sugar. See what all the howling's about below!
You guys had a big Season Two launch party. What was that like?
LAURA VANDERVOORT: It was great! We had cast and crew; we watched the first two episodes on a nice big screen in the basement of a hotel, which was great. Yeah, it was awesome!
GREYSTON HOLT: That sounds bad, but it was actually good!
LAURA: Haha, yeah, it was a really nice hotel. And I think we were just really pleased with everything that we saw. It looks epic, it looks cinematic this year. With the witches and everything it just has a different quality to it.
What was it like seeing that finished episode up there? What were your reactions to it as a viewer seeing it for the first time?
GREYSTON: Amazing. Naturally you just forget storylines; you're given ten episodes of information, so it was nice to get refreshed on the episodes and to see it. I was kind of shocked by some twists and turns to, "Oh yeah! THAT happens! Right!" There's so much packed into this season.
LAURA: We shot them out of order as well. We shot Episodes Two, Three and then One, so I think we forgot how the opening sequence went and what happens in it, so it was like watching it as a viewer and not being a part of the show, because we were all surprised.
GREYSTON: I got lost in the show. I was trying to watch it objectively, but I'd just get lost in it. It was great.
GREYSTON: Yeah, it's like "We got this." We were so fortunate to get a second season, and going into a second season we know our characters so well, we know the crew very well, so it's just nice to be back with the family.
LAURA: We were all just excited to hang out again.
Did the fan reaction to Season One surprise you? Obviously you're confident, you know the scripts are good, you know your directors and your fellow actors are good, but at the same time when you put that out there in the world and it does as well as it did ... what did that feel like, knowing that it became the hit that it did?
GREYSTON: It felt great. You never know until the viewers see it, but we know that we did the best work we could possible do. It's tough adapting from books; you have to please those fans, too.
LAURA: But they seemed very happy, especially on social media.
GREYSTON: I think initially there was some backlash; there always is. Reading a book is so subjective; you have an idea of the characters in your own head, but I think the haters grew to love us and the lovers just grew to love us more.
LAURA: And this season is going to be incredible, they're going to love the show even more than they did in the first season.
There was so much in this premiere; there were a lot of great moments. Do you guys have a favorite moment?
GREYSTON: What happened? I like how it opens when [Elena] just kicks open the door.
LAURA: It's exactly the pace Elena is on this season. It's symbolic of where she is; she's just taking down doors, pulling people off stalls, seeking revenge.
What has been the most fun part of making Bitten?
GREYSTON: Meeting Laura Vandervoort.
LAURA: Meeting Greyston Holt.
GREYSTON: I think the most fun as just been building this family. From the first day of filming Season One we just became friends instantly.
LAURA: It's developing the relationships. Especially with Greg [Byrk], who plays Jeremy. He really is our Pack Alpha.
GREYSTON: He's our foundation.
LAURA: Yeah, he's the go-to for advice off-camera. He's very poetic and openhearted.
What’s your favorite part about Elena, Laura?
LAURA: I would have to say her strength; but her inner strength, not her exterior. She has been through so much in her life. She's strong and she's able to overcome a lot of things. She has skeletons in the closet that we saw in the first season, as a child who was molested. That was an intense episode. The fact that she's able to overcome the bite and come out this season on the strong end and empowered; I love that about her.
Greyston, what do you like about Clay?
GREYSTON: One of my favorite things about playing Clay is that it's fun to play a character that has so much angst and anger and violence boiling under the surface. It's fun to keep a cap on that and then also lash out and be impulsive at times. So that's just an interesting thing to be conscious of when I'm in that character.
LAURA: But Clay is so quiet and gentle-natured, but when you see the way Greyston plays it, it's always very impressive. He plays both levels.
LAURA: We love it.
GREYSTON: Yeah! Laura has a background in karate, but this show is the first time I've done fight choreography, so I've really enjoyed it. Laura's amazing at it.
Laura, do you give Greyston pointers?
LAURA: No, no. We have two different fighting styles. He is very brute force …
GREYSTON: Clay Smash!
LAURA: Yeah, exactly. Elena is more stylized.
GREYSTON: You're quick with your hands; very choppy. I'm more bear-huggy.
Tell is a little about Elena and Clay’s relationship in Season Two. They seem to be doing pretty well, right?
GREYSTON: Yeah, as well as you can be doing in that situation, but we're back together.
LAURA: But it doesn't mean that things won't get in the way of their relationship this season.
As actors, what's it like shooting intimate scenes? We've been told something may have happened with a towel, or lack thereof.
LAURA: Oh yeah. So in the scene [Greyston] has a towel on as he walks in and obviously he's supposed to have just gotten out of the shower. While we were filming his towel dropped … but he was wearing underwear.
GREYSTON: It was a sock.
LAURA: Really? I blocked that one out.
GREYSTON: Yeah, whenever I do my nude scenes I wear a sock. I'd do them completely nude, but it's for the comfort of the crew.
LAURA: The first season they specially made socks for all the boys.
Really?
GREYSTON: Yeah, everything could fit in. This season it's just more of a pouch, so it looks really silly when you're fully nude.
LAURA: I just keep my eyes averted.
J.B., watching the episode, what was your favorite scene?
J.B. SUGAR: It's really hard; it's like trying to choose your favorite child. I really love the opening, bringing back Nate Parker who was a tertiary character in the first season. Then we open the second season with him in this mysterious compound, which is also a good seed for where the storylines are headed this season. That whole sequence has such an edge to it and we get a wolf transformation right off the bat. The visual style of that whole sequence really sets the tone for the second season and I love that scene.
We got to see the witches a little bit in this episode. What can you tell us about the importance they're going to play in Season Two?
J.B.: Yeah, we introduce witches into the pantheon of characters this year and it was a really behemoth task for our writing team with Daegan Fryklind, Will Zmak, Jen Engles, Larry Bambrick and Garfield Miller. We really had infuse this new mythology into the existing mythology and with that comes a whole new set of visual effects and special effects. It really does open up the story in great and interesting ways and also brings some new female energy into the show as well.
LAURA: Finally!
LAURA: First off, both of them were incredible. I think it was James McGowan's [Malcolm] first time doing stunts and he loved it; he was on a high that day, he thought it was great. Our characters couldn't partake in the fight because it's sort of Pack Law that you have to let the Alpha handle it. As much as we wanted to step in, for the audience wondering, we weren't allowed!
How closely will Season Two follow the plot of the book series?
J.B.: We've been really blessed with this crossover, being able to bring in fans of the book series and try to convert them to fans of the TV series as well. The plot for the first season was very heavily grounded in Bitten, the first book in the Otherworld series. The second season is a little more off-book. There are some notions and big plot devices that are still part of the season, but it's more about the characters. We do get to visit a lot of the backstory that's peppered throughout the entire book series throughout the season, so there will be some great moments to look out for.
So we get some origins stuff?
J.B.: Origins stuff indeed. Paige and Ruth Winterbourne and Savannah Levine, those are all huge fan favorites in the book series and we introduce them as characters, but the plots really do evolve and there's a lot of invention this year. Some things do parallel the books, so it will be interesting to see how fans of the books, and of the TV series, react.
Along with Season Two, a brand new digital companion site to Bitten was launched. It’s called The Undoing and it takes the viewers deeper inside the storylines. How exciting is it to have this website all about Bitten?
GREYSTON: it’s great. It’s just another way for fans to get involved with show. It’s interactive, it gets into the mythology and back story, and it’s a beautifully done website. It’s amazing.
J.B.: We're extremely proud of it and it's a great extension of the show and a way to give fans a deeper experience and look into the mythology and some mysteries that are seeded to pay off later in the season. So there are some real Easter eggs in there.
