“I think [that journey] is kind of beautiful,” Amell says. “Greg is just such a genius. Sometimes he hides the comedy. Sometimes he hides the misery or the drama, like the satire. He just walks this tightrope of genres and tones, and he grounds them in these characters and their relationships. And you get lost in these people.
“You know, the division of wealth, the themes that are present in the show are dark, but it is a light show,” Amell says. “You can watch it and not think about any of those things if you don’t want to. But the second you start to, it becomes very real. Don’t Look Up would be another exploration of the same thing.”
When the series began, it was more or less a grim parable about commercialised healthcare. But there are a raft of other themes tucked in there along with it, notably the way in which commercialised religion in the US sells the “afterlife” like a gift-with-purchase, and the extent to which big tech controls our everyday lives.
“You have to have a little bit of a memory like a goldfish [as an actor] because sometimes you can’t bring that stuff into a scene,” Amell says. One scene in the latter part of the first season with actor Kevin Bigley, who plays Lakeview resident Luke, “was a totally comedic scene, but I am saying goodbye to him. I know the stakes are high for me, but it can’t be about that.”
The show explores “the good and the bad of things,” Amell says. “In real life, I know people that hate social media, I know people that love social media and I know people that use social media as their business. So it’s one of those things where I think Greg does a good job of not taking sides, [saying] these are the parallels to the world that we live in, and you decide. It gives the audience credit and lets them make their own decision.”
A comedy with byte for the post-COVID era
Source: Philippines Alive
