“In the room” writer Vera Herbert and director Ken Olin offer insights into Delivery Day.
(Thank you, Nasir Ahmed, and your geek squad!)
It just felt like, “Oh, this is the story of the moment right now.
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This is what everyone is going through.”
We didn’t anticipate that it would be so many months before we were out of the pandemic.
What were the biggest challenges in making this pandemic-hindered episode during the pandemic?
We’re [delving into] a really emotional episode about connection, like you said.
And that’s challenging you’re dealing with babies and how we can keep them safe.
There’s a rigmarole involved.
So that’s a challenge.
It’s a very close-knit group of people that have enormous affection for each other.
Yet we have to be very restrictive in terms of the way that people can express their feelings.
That’s tricky… We didn’t want to change the emotional trajectory of the season.
So we’ve had to figure out ways to overcome it without losing the emotional intensity of it.
This is the happiest, all’s-well-that-ends-well episode ofThis Is Usin a while.
Even the guy in the parking lot received incredible news about his wife.
Was this intended as a bit of a reward for viewersandthese characters, who could use a breather?
HERBERT:Yeah, it was for us.
It’s just a lot of waiting and separation.
And that just feels, again, what we’re all feeling in our own lives right now.
It’s nice to put some love back in the world a little bit.
And not in any ambivalent way.
Just embrace that for a moment.
So it seemed like a good time to do that.
And on my finest day, I’m simply doing a poor man’s imitation of you."
Randall responds, “We both said things; tensions were high.”
First of all, is it a little awkward that Randall didn’t say anything so complimentary back?
It’s like “Um, hey!
I just said something really nice about you.
Actions speak louder than words.
But, as he explains, now is not the time, when Kevin has new babies.
The inclusion ofreallyis interesting.
Will we get to see that conversation later this season?
And is Kevinreallyready to have that conversation?
So they’re going to have to go through another level of communication to get there with each other.
This is all I’ll ever need.”
Is this going to be theirs?
How realistic is that he’ll be fulfilled by taking only in-town jobs?
So it is going to be for him a balancing act of putting his money where his mouth is.
Let’s talk about Ellie.This episode plays a bit with that tension of her handing over the baby.
Was there ever any talk of in the writers' room of having Ellie change her mind?
HERBERT:You know, there really wasn’t.
In a lot of cases, the birth mother doesn’t necessarily change her mind at the last second.
Not to say that itdoesn’thappen, but it doesn’t certainly happen with every single adoption case.
How much, if at all, will she be in Kate and Toby’s life?
How did you stumble across Nasir Ahmed’s story?
And then we just did some internet research and came across Nasir and his story.
Did you end up using more from his conversation than you planned to?
The original video chat was just with him.
It was me Dan, Jess Rosenthal, our executive producer, and Nasir.
And then his wife kept weighing in from off screen.
So that really shaped making it a loving family story.
I know that there are plans to tell that story, but how close are we to seeing it?
Or is that looking more like next season?
But it’s definitely coming and it’s a thing we talk about a lot.
The babies are coming home.
What’s in store for the Pearsons in the coming weeks?
We had Kate and her story with Marc [Austin Abrams].
What is your one-sentence tease for next week’s episode?
HERBERT:It has a lot to do with cars.
[Laughs]
OLIN:It has cars and babies.
That’s where we live now for two episodes and then we’ll get out of the cars.
