Oh Baby (Episode 4 Discussion)

"I'm always good, always good."

"I'm always very happy." "I'm always happy." "I'm always happy." "Everybody, welcome back to the official Paradise podcast. I am your host, Ryan Michelle Bethay."

And after that emotional episode, make sure you're all caught up by streaming seasons one-in-two of Paradise on Hulu and Hulu and Disney+. But I might need someone else to host today,

“because I honestly, I have had several heart attacks, watching...”

Oh, that episode. Oh, my shade shade. It's an intense one. It's so intense. I don't even know where to start.

I'm deering up because... I deer up and I did. I can't have that.

The script is so reading the script.

I was like, "How are we gonna fill my snow?" It's so sad. But Annie, we just, we fall in love and, you know, resting for us to, to our Annie and you're here in the studio. Chalene would leave welcome back to the podcast.

Thank you. Thank you for being here. I'm really appreciate it. And we're gonna appreciate this group therapy, 'cause I think we all need it, right?

I need it for sure, so I thank you. You know, as actors, I don't know about you, but there's some characters that I get very, very, very attached to. Do you miss Annie? Did you?

Well, I'm a very emotional person, so I'm talking about death any time. That makes me cry.

“But, you know, I think of it so jarring about it”

is that it's over before we even had time to process that it began. Yes! It's so quick. And, I think that when someone does go that quickly, it leaves everyone else in a complete tailspin.

There's no preparation, there's no time to rationalize or being your cognitive brain about what is going to happen. It just happens. And I think that that is what we all probably feel after watching this episode. Yeah.

Is like, how is that real? That can't be real. That doesn't actually happen. Did it actually happen? No, it didn't actually happen.

Right, no, and you keep waiting for the days, Macana, yeah, to just come and save her some kind of way.

And Sterling is there, you know, who's like the guy who usually always has the answers.

And he always knows how to provide and protect.

“And I think one of the things that gets me the most”

and he's so brilliant in that scene is, obviously, and he's having her thing, but if you watch his face and his posture, what he does is so so genius, you watch him know and recognize how helpless he is. And then the guilt of being helpless in a situation that actually needs to help the most.

Yes, yes. I know and there's literally nothing he can do apart from hold and be held. And her father, he was leading a group to the bunker to start the world. You will not let her be afraid of people.

Promise me that you're (laughs) This is your holy charge. And guide in these few seconds of transition, watching that be processed behind such a strong man and a facade

of keeping it together, stay strong for everyone else. He's remarkable in it. It's one thing to watch, someone pass away, it's another thing to watch, someone else watching and holding someone as they go through that experience. Yeah.

Let's go back to the beginning of 204 because she's so happy. Yes, she's so happy. Let's just take it. This is just a roll of act because so much happened. Like so much love and life and ups and downs happen in this episode.

And I would imagine if it's the end of the world and the stakes are so high, just like in a person's life. It's like when everybody starts college together and by the end of the week, everybody's best friends and it's like we literally just met but it feels like we've known each other for entire lives kind of a situation.

And there you are on your court. I mean, my God, I know, all right. How good is the horse? That's all the way. What if I find it the best actor?

No, look at that. This was the Sawyer Mr. Ed, like what a horse, what a horse, right? And you're on the horse and you see this guy. What makes you say, when you come back to grace? Yes, I think that's nothing to do with him.

She's not interested in helping him. I think she's interested in how he's going to help her. And I think she goes, all right. So clearly this man knows how to fly a plane,

And I remember Link told me that this bunker in Colorado has planes.

It has access to materials and resources. Mm-hmm. I know other part of the world has.

“And so I think she clocks all of that together and”

someone assumes maybe he came from Colorado and if he didn't come from Colorado, he has information that she doesn't have. So he's a very important resource for her to lean on. And do you think the fact that he's so incapacitated makes it easier for her and so much?

Yeah, despite her being so pregnant. Right. No, I thought about that. I was like, if he were in any state to do her harm, yes, I think it would have been handled very differently.

100% right? Yeah, yeah. It's really beautiful what Dan created in this because it's what Gale did for Annie in the beginning. You know, Gale, I think, also needed maybe a friend at Grace Land surrounded by

all these dudes and now she's has some, you know, a young girl to come communicate with and have a rapport with at work. And by doing so, she saved Annie and that's kind of what happens with Xavier and Annie is. Annie sees that she could use Xavier and Xavier also needs her help.

And so she saves him and there's, there's some synchronicity there.

Oh, I never thought of it that way, but yeah, they're very much

it is, the roles are just switching. Yeah. Now you have this lifeline because anybody who's been pregnant knows what happens when you take your blood pressure, we all know what's coming that your blood pressure is getting higher and higher.

First, we see you take it. Yeah. And then we see that look on your face. It says here right down. And then you see her writing it down and she's just

carefully charting and carefully charting. And anybody who's been pregnant knows, it's pretty kind of you. What's that light because Annie has all of the information she needs to be terrified? Yeah.

Right. I mean, the fact that she's pregnant in a pocket lifts is terrifying enough and then to have that on top of it. I mean, I think that her knowing and her choosing not to tell Xavier and her choosing to try and survive anyways

has always been what kept her alive.

I think that ability to go, okay, sure there's an apocalypse, but I'm going to pretend like my canned food isn't running out. And okay, I'm now alone because scale passed away. But I'm still going to talk to the walls because I don't want to pretend like I'm in a house completely alone.

And Annie has always used different survival skills of, I don't want to say ignoring the problem, but managing the problem and just not making it the most important thing in the room to focus on.

“And I think that's what she did here as well.”

Which it was, this is a very real, very life-threatening thing that she's experiencing and yet she's not going to give it the power until that power is absolutely taken. I mean, that's the other thing. The reality is you have to stay as calm as you possibly can.

Yeah, because Annie kind of freaking out. And she wants to give this baby a life, you know? I think that in Annie's mind, she's like, all right, even if something awful happens to me, I'm going to do everything I can to protect this child. And that was something that we spoke at length

about 10 the director and Sterling and I and Dan going into episode four was what has shifted in Annie from episode one? What was the shift from her experience with Gayle, her experience with Lincoln, the guys, because she is more trusting once Sterling sent her house. You know, she does handcuff him, but he's also a strong man.

Like if he wanted to get out of it, I'm sure he could have figured it out. And she knew that. And I'm not a mom yet, but you can speak to this. And I asked friends of mine who are mothers, there is a mama bear. I will do anything to protect my cubs energy.

But I think exploded. And Annie, the minute she found out she was pregnant. Mm-hmm. And the fear of leaving the home, the fear of being around people. Everything that has ever stopped her in life, I don't want to say it went away, but it had zero power over anymore.

Because her North Star was protect this child. Make sure that the pregnancy is as healthy and as strong as possible for this baby. Because this baby is going to be born into a world that is really dark and really difficult. And she wanted to give it as much light as humanly possible. So that when this baby was born, there was an opportunity for life.

That maybe did have a little bit of hope in it. Mm-hmm.

“I think that was sort of Annie's way of coping with everything.”

And it gave her these guts. I think we saw glimpse of it in episode one, but absolutely she had nothing to fear anymore. In episode four. I'm wondering, because I was with Annie, when Xavier wanted to go and like go find help. How dare you?

I said, I said, I was sitting there and I was like, "Now, when you get shot by these crazy people, it's going to be who's fault? You're fault." But I was so with your character in the sense that we can't trust anybody.

Like, where are you with Annie? Are you more of a trusting person?

“I'd be a little more torn than Annie, because I think I'm always like,”

all right, if we don't have the medical equipment now, then I need you to get it. But Annie's harboring the secret, right? She kind of knows it doesn't matter whether he gets the equipment or he doesn't get the equipment. Like, the baby's going to be okay because babies have been born all over the world with no tools or no equipment and they're fine.

But she knew that she probably wouldn't be. And so when he leaves, it's more than just him leaving in the middle of the labor. It's him leaving and her thinking. Even if I have this child and I managed to burn this child alone, this baby's not going to have anyone on the other side.

And I think that is all going through her head, the panic of that. Right. Right. Right. And it's probably very close. There feels like there's a moment when Annie and Dave here become for even the briefest of time of really good team. Yeah. So much so it feels like Annie has as much peace as she's going to get

giving her baby to save your friends. I hate no, but Windows, I mean, I know it has to happen for Annie. She has to make that choice, but you actually don't have to make the choice. I mean, there are other people there. You could have been like, okay, this lady right here, you take my, you know,

when does that happen for Annie?

“I think that Annie, I mean, is it great?”

I think that Annie sees an equal in Xavier and it's the first time in her life.

She's ever felt she's had an equal. I think that she sees him as someone who's fully capable on his own, who does not need her. He needs nothing from her. Even Link who she's in love with needed something from her. He needed her. Gale needed her. Her mother needed her.

Gracelyn needed her, but Xavier does not, and yet he still chooses her. And I think that there's a piece of that for Annie that is a melting and a relief that she's like, I have this oak tree beside me. That's fully rooted and available and offering me a piece and a safety and security, but it's not transactional. Even though it is on paper, you know, they're going to go to Atlanta.

Then they're going to call it Colorado. They have this whole kind of transactional plan.

“What develops from there is, I think, two people and I think Xavier feels the same thing from her.”

Like, down this pregnant lady doesn't need anything from me. She's stitching me up. She's the one telling me what we're going to do. And I think that there's a silent respect that these two people have in a world surrounded by a lot of people that maybe they haven't necessarily deeply respected before. They might have loved enjoyed the company of felt inspired by or educated by people in their surrounding, but to have deep respect for someone I think really brings in

inner peace. Would you trust darling with a baby in the apocalypse? Of course, I would. You know, my favorite thing actually about working with starving sounds like what's it going to

be like? He's so in Xavier so intense. What is this? Yes. Yes. And the first day on set,

I just hear this music. And I hear someone like jamming to music on the sound stage, getting this touch of dancing. And I see his shadow through this tent, the touch up tent. I was like, oh, I like this guy. All right. So yes, I would trust that guy with my baby because I feel like that kid would be protected. It'd be seen. And there'd be a lot of play. Thank you for being on the pod today. And thank you for being to great lead in. I don't think my husband's ever had anything like that.

Um, because we get to talk to Sterling and James Mars. The next. All right. Yeah. Shaley, my Shayshay. Your Shayshay. Oh, my love. That you blanked at it. It's yours. They offer it to you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. All right. Let's prep a war, too. What's going on? Baby's already dropped. There's been a prolonged diesel. I'm about to miss a browner for the

real war. I need to do no emergency. She's such an excuse us. What can we buy? I'll go have a coming through. Say with me. Right here. Where's the father? He was a staff on the plane carrying a Congress. He's just got you. I'm going to go in there with her. Doctors have got this. What can do their jobs? So I came to allow you to go in there on the scorted. Okay, within scrub the fuck up, David. Okay, welcome back. When I'm welcome back,

everyone's the podcast. James Marston, Sterling Kelbee Brown. You guys are back. You guys have a

baby together in this episode, right? Yes. First of all, one in the bunker. Happy to watch.

Yes. So my first real question is it true that they have found babies living for three days in earthquake rubble. Yes. It is true. Yes. We're going to go with that. It is true. It is true. All right. Now things are incredibly resilient. Yes, human being. That was an actual line. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. You're in the operating room. Yeah. In the operating room,

lovely the way in which they used your character. Because you know, we're aching for you to come back.

We really are. Because you know, we've missed you. We know with that you die. We don't want you to die. I don't want you to go. We're like, come back. I'm back. And you come back. It's a breath of fresh air. Every time you step on something. It's very much so. For sure. Hey, woman of the hour. And where you doctor? Mr. President. Oh, cow, please. How are we feeling? Feeling good? Excited? And he and he nerves and he regrets about the cost of college education in

in 1943. There's a levity that he brings to serious situations. And there's a balance to both

“of them that you have. Like something very serious. A baby is being born. Life is transpiring in our”

new world. So you want to comfort this woman. Let it out. It's historic. And that I'm here for you. That's, and it's he want to unify everybody in this new community as well. It's sort of barges into Snatches office. We got the call. That's happening. Louis, Marino.

The pregnant lady. She's going to be the first woman to get birth down here. I know what she is.

I'm wondering why you think it's a reason to burst into my office. I don't want to really burst more of an ambal. But look, this is a big moment. We've been down here for five months. This is my first chance to give people a reason to smile. A chance for everybody to see that we have a future here. This is hope. He leaves that conversation. She just wasn't really interested in having the conversation. I said, let's give everybody something to be positive about.

And so that's behind the whole thing. And this is a woman who lost her husband and one of the planes that went down. And so he wants to be that figure for this woman. And also kind of unite everybody and lift everyone's spirits. It's a great first baby being born in the book. It's huge. It's gigantic. So yeah. We talk about the balance of the humor, but the reality of the situation, which is this is, once again, very real free. This is what you're good at.

You know, which is James? Well, we talk about James and Cal. I'll say you know, like you guys are good at bringing the hope. You guys are good at bringing the like, no, no, no, no, no. We are human beings.

“And that's what I think I love so much about not just this episode, but the overarching theme of”

season two, which is, we have to hold on to the things that keep us human. And it's just a, you know, it's sprinkled in there. And I think it starts here, you know, with you, which when you're like, no, no, no, people celebrate babies. Right. Yeah. And we're going to celebrate this baby, hope, you know, which she doesn't even know. Well, that's the levity there, right? Yes. But you do get out. Oh, I get a little bit just trying to get as a gender going there on the side of

a little bit. Yeah. I had actually forgotten that you don't like him at this point, which this is speaks to you being such a good actor. Because I was like, why is he being so me? Oh,

he don't like him. Yeah. He's always it like for you guys getting to play again and play that

dynamic that we miss. I mean, we don't say a whole bunch to each other. But it's always fun to be in the space, because I always feel like straight man to his life. He's saying, he's just like the crack

“that nut. You know. But I also just sort of loved listening. I think one of my favorite”

things is a baby is that he does do a lot of listening. And what I take from the scene in the bunker to outside is like, oh, this man is really comforting this woman through this situation. Like, there's a lot of things that could easily stress her out. The doctors running around and you have a way of reframing it and contextualizing it for her in a way that like, like, these are people who know what they're doing. And all these people they hear for you.

And then when it's done, you see them leading. That means there's nothing else to be done. Nothing to worry about. Everything is fine. Hey, you see this? They're leading because there's nothing else to do in here. There he's okay. There he's okay. So like that idea of being able to comfort, I think for Xavier, when he's out by himself trying to figure it out, it's like, all right, how do I comfort this this woman? How do I try to create for her what I saw the present and

create for the woman in the bunker with all the other cool to mom? And we don't have any of that, but like still taking the kernel of that and trying to apply it to that real-life situation. Well, Sterling, you do have real-life experience with babies. I didn't know if you were going to let you want to talk about that. Well, no, because now I realize I was like, you were so gentle and loving with Annie. And at no point did you tell her she wasn't crowning at no point

did you tell her to go back to bed? No, no point did you disappear and go take a shower? I did not work. I just wondering, go take a shower. Well, okay, I was talking about you went into the shower. Do you know the story? I don't know how many of them make this as quick as possible. It's great. I feel like I'm in your living room. We have two children. Yes. Both of them were born in our bedroom. Oh, we, yes, I did know this. We do know that what she's referring to is that

three hours and 23 minutes later. It's late at night. We're trying to go to bed. Your mom had just left for most watching a rewatch of the BET over. Yes. It was as soon as she walked out the door,

“my wife goes, ooh, contraction. I think I just felt something. And I was like, I was looking”

at the clock like, oh, snap. Then like 15 minutes later, she's like, ooh, I think I felt something I'm not like, oh, shit. It's so about to go. No, but you want to sleep. So wait, wait, wait, wait.

Do you sleep on any of this? They always tell you. Ladies, please, if you have babies,

what I always tell you? Oh, you're in for a big day. It could be anywhere from 24 hours to what have you just because you have that first one doesn't mean it's going to happen in the immediate future. So the duly was even like, we text that her just like, look, make sure she gets lots of rest. Mommy's in for a big day tomorrow, I was like, right, let's try to go to bed. And then you have like your hip no therapy tapes because you're a crunchy granola black woman. So I was like, listen to

your hip no therapy tapes and do your thing. But what would happen is she keep popping about a bed. Oh, I got to go to bathroom. I was like, oh, I go to bathroom. And then I try to get it back to coming to the bed, try to get it to relax or whatnot. Then one time, you came crawling out of the bathroom.

“And I tried to do this thing where I hold her hips up and together, because that's what's”

the relief pressure of your lower back. No, so you're right, you're right. Thank you.

I was rubbing your back. I was rubbing your right. You're right. I was asleep. Where are you rubbing my back? I was in the bed. At a certain point, you go, I need you to get out of the bed and come rub my back. Then I knew, oh, this is my point is, is that an even bringing that up is now that you've seen Xavier. Yeah, acts very differently with a sense of urgency and purpose during a labor. Would you have, would you have, would you have? I'll fire you right now. I have the power.

You got to go. Would you have done anything differently with your wife? Can I say, was I, was I calm? You were sleepily calm, yes. It's okay, baby, get back again. You got a laugh. She throws it. Yeah, long, nice, a little sweet. I delivered this child like that we got the midwife on the

“phone or whatnot. She said, I think I'm in labor or something like that. No, I said, I think I'm”

crowned. I said, I think I'm crowned and I said, I'll sweetheart, you can't be crowning. It's too soon.

So we finally, like, she had because he's crowned. How many times have you crowned? Well, I had the

equipment. I could at least envision what it had. He had the paramedics on one line and I had the midwife on the other line, right? And so I looked down and between her legs and the baby's head is all the way out. Oh, she's the blonde crowning and a midwife was like, oh, good. She said, wait for mommy to push again and catch the baby because we didn't know if it was a boy or girl. And then put him on mommy's lap so they can start bonding. Sure enough, the bird pushed again. His little body just came out.

He cried this little bit. At the past him, in between her legs, I didn't drop him. Start out the coach, hope man, high school football coach. I didn't drop the ball at the time. They dropped the ball. That shit was firm. That his coach came in the middle of this. You handed the baby down. But put him on your tummy and rise sort of like shaking and then she goes to hold the baby or whatnot. And then he starts, you know, looking to feed. And then the paramedics

come like two minutes later. Right? And I was like, oh, I thought this is all good. We got a boy and anything. You did. He opened the door. Who's like, hey, how are you? Oh, well, she's just right here in the back. Why don't you just come up? Well, I was like, how are you? This is this is my point to you and then how plays into the story. I knew we were in a high pressure situation. I knew that if I freaked out, no good comes from us. You're not going to give me any credit for it. And that's

okay. Because I'm going to give myself credit for it. Okay. Well, there was aspects of the situation that were very scary. But I chose to believe because of the midwives, honestly, that your body knew what to do. And I was like, I'm going to trust and believe in this situation that Rhyme knows her body knows what to do and not add to anything to cause agitation, right? And I think in this situation, Xavier kind of had, he's like, I don't know anything. I said, doc, what do we need in this

place? She said, all right, we need clean towels. I was like, this shit is dirty, right? I need some insurance to do this. I was like, all this shit is dirty. I was like, girl, I got to go get some help. And she's like, don't trust people. And I was like, none of us is, it's okay to believe in goodness. I got to go get help. If not help, then at least a few supplies will help you deliver. No. You're not going to have this baby any time soon, right? Your contractions are still very far apart.

They only come rocket and out in the movie. I can't. I can't. Look at me. I will not allow you to have

hill. They'll have what we need for them to know where to get it. No, we do not know those people.

We don't know what they're capable of. They're just people. Any. And we're not going to be scared of them, right? So you just keep walking, keep breathing through your contractions. I'll be back in 15 minutes. Take care. Take this. No. Please, take care. Please, don't. Stay here. I'll be right back. Stay here. Stay here. Stay here. Stay here. Stay here. Stay here. Stay there. Stay there. Right? It's like, I know we don't know everything that's out here in the world. I've

already gone through some crap. But I'm going to choose to believe that something is going to be here for us rather than against us. And it wound up working out in that way. She needed something very different than you did in that situation, right? So stop hating on me. Stop hating on me. Did you answer your question? What do you do in eating different? What I do anything

“different from what no. In that situation, I could imagine that if I believe that everything's”

going to be fine, your body, your energy. What you're doing is contagious. Both of you brought the right energy in both of those scenes. You brought the trust energy. She had to trust these people to herself, trust that the world is not a scary place. At the end of her life, she gets her life lessen. But you also had that moment of like dialing into what this woman in this very dire could be, dire situation. And she's surrounded by everything, right? But there's still that

panic. One has nothing, one has everything, but the feeling of fear is the same. You know what I mean? Yeah, absolutely. And it's a sterile environment, and it can be sterile in tone. So, right? Like there's not these doctors sometimes are so clinical. You bring, like, she still can feel very alone in that situation. And I think just imagine what a strong supportive presence would look like or how, you know, I would want to be spoken to if I was going through something.

“So in emergency c-section, like it didn't go according to plan. And either of their situations”

it didn't go wrong. Right, absolutely. Why don't we say thank you to both of you, James and Sterling being a part of this, ah, what an episode. You know, and it's special for you guys to be here. I'm appreciative. My pleasure. Thank you for saying all the nice things you said. And if you're interested, you're a master, I'm really sorry. I'm sorry. You can say that you're a jerk.

You're a jerk, right? But you don't understand. Egal, it's a loss for a job. Make you really like this story. And if you then work, you'll be able to do it. That's right. Save. Like this story. Hold your money. Now, you're going to try to find out there. Some dignity. Some grace.

We've got writer, producers, John, Hoburg, and Stephen Markley, who also wrote and conceived

this incredible episode. So first of all, thank you for your time and coming here because I'm

sure you guys were doing something that like really, really brilliant and smart people do. And then you wanted to come and talk to us, which is like, really cool. So yay, thank you. Yeah, well, I want to clarify also, Markley wrote this. So if you're going to hate anybody, you're right. I'm one of the writer forducers, but also this has Markley's name. So he is to blame here. And you throw people under the bus. I do. Yeah, I got it.

I got it. So now I know now I'm situated. It's what smart people do. Yeah, exactly. We were talking a little bit before we got started because you were saying that it's almost like you had six weeks to film a movie with one of the biggest movie stars on the planet.

“So what was that like knowing that you have to be responsible for the whole season?”

Right. How did you both manage? Did you just hold on to each other for dear life? It's interesting because we shot in Graceland with Chalene and none of our other regulars. And so we were shooting and a set that wasn't part of our show with an actor who was brand new. So it was almost like we were filming this movie that had nothing to do with paradise, which was so odd to do. But also just kind of knowing what was on the way on the horizon and knowing

what's coming. But you're kind of keeping track of everything because it's like, "Oh, that might be a nugget that we want to remember and really call out when we get later down the line of the season." So that's one of the things we're keeping an eye on. And to some degree, it's like we're restarting the show. Like we're doing an entirely different show

the second season, right? Like Xavier's out in the world. And suddenly the audience is

let into like what's going on out there. And so we needed sort of a conduit, a way of seeing what it happened in the world at large. And that's how this character of Annie came to fruition.

like? But from this very, very specific point of view? Well, so basically at the end of the season,

we knew Xavier had this incredibly strong goal. He had to find his wife. And we knew we were going out into this world. And we wanted to really put him through it because it's like he had been and it's hard to call like the bunker a safe place after everything that happened. But he's out in that world. And we want him to experience what that world was like. And we want the audience to experience what that world was like. And so it's funny, at some point during season one,

I feel like all the writers got this idea like, "Wait a minute, in some ways, this is a Western." Like Xavier is almost like, if you think of those classic Westerns, he is this hero who has a coat of honor and a coat of ethics and he lives by that. And he doesn't care if it's the president who's breaking it or somebody else. He'll do what he thinks is the right thing. And so we wanted to put him out into this world almost like a Western hero and it's like he's going to have to

“go through these or deals. And it's also very important that if he's going to go through this and”

he's going to have to suffer to try to get to his wife, we need to have both him and the audience deeply invest on an emotional level. And one of the ways you do that is fall in love with someone and then have them take in a way. So it was a pretty early thought that this is going to be an important part of the season. You wrote Annie and Xavier as two halves of a whole. Yeah. Was that intentional or did I just-- Yeah, no. I mean, that's-- I love the way you phrase that.

I was thinking a lot about this book called "A Paradise Built-in Hell" by this author, Rebekah Solnit. Mm-hmm. And the basic like premise of this book is that when disaster strikes, when there's catastrophe, our imagination says everybody eats each other. Everybody acts terribly and like overturns cars and loot stores. But the premise of our book is that that's not the case, what you find in disasters that people act with enormous solidarity and enormous compassion.

And so I just kept thinking about that as Xavier's response to coming upon this young woman is that

“he's on a mission to find his wife, but that compassion in him is activated. And I think that's sort of”

one of the themes of our show. Compassion has an incredible tool in the fight for survival.

Annie comes to such a profound humanity at the end. Granted a lot is happening, you know. It would be blood loss, but she comes to this really deep understanding of herself and what she wants for this child. And I just thought that that was really really amazing now that I know that that's where you guys are in your mind. You were thinking, there might be a better way. There might be a way out of this. And Annie is our window into that

way out. That was probably her worst fear as strangers coming in. Even in your script form, it was a gorgeous moment. It starts with her fear of people to begin with and then it ends with this moment of trust at the end. And it's not just that she has to trust a stranger with her life. It's that as she's dying, she has to trust a stranger with her child, which I think is like, it's so much a part of not to give anything away, but Xavier's journey going forward that this is

his charge. This is like what he has to do is, you know, not just get to his wife now, but he has to bear the responsibility. Yeah. I'm glad you said that because I've been using that phrase in my life and in this podcast the whole time, the Holy Charge. It's the idea of, again, that compassion and that community with other people being one's Holy Charge. And I think when they have that conversation

about that phrase, Xavier sort of says it incidentally to her. And it's the first time they really

connect. It's the first time she has a moment with him that like, this guy is like something special, like he is somebody I can trust. We're all capable of great change, great love, of great promise. That's a holy charge. Holy charge. When you realize that you had to kill Annie, how hard was that for you? Did you cry while you were writing? I weep when I put out a whole

“time. Thank you. And that's what we all want to know. Weep when I sit down. I weep when I get out of this.”

So you're sterling. Yeah. Yeah. No, we knew she was going to die before we really knew what the character was like, because we sort of had that idea in our heads. And then like when I was getting towards the end of writing it and sort of like understanding like the gravity it would hold in the series. I was like, Oh, thank God I got this episode because it was a enormous challenge. But also like, I don't know this is the wrong word, but it was fun to go tackle that. You know,

it was fun to like go after that challenge and to try to find that moment of grace between these two people in this awful moment. I wish you hadn't killed one of my favorite scenes in the second season is when Xavier's talking to, I forget the character's name after Annie dies. It's a monologue, they're markedly wrote that is just beautiful, just to kind of about time and passage of time and death. And it's just so novelistic, not surprisingly, but it's one of my favorite

parts of the whole season. Yeah. I had that look at Tony sometimes and I think I cannot God damn

of the football games trying to get laid with my first boyfriend. Now here I am an old woman

“looking after a snoddy little boy with my same eyes. I wonder what he'll have to live through.”

And it all happened just like, we all forget how close we are in time, how quickly our scenes

become our children's burdens. Everything starts with the script with the words and thank you so

“much for all of that and for being brilliant. We appreciate you. Go continue to be brilliant.”

All right, let's go right. Thank you. Paradise, the official podcast, is now streaming

and stream the new season of Paradise on February 23rd on Hulu and Hulu On Disney Plus for Bundle subscribers. Terms apply.