“Logo text [This story contains spoilers from episode four of Tell Me Lies season two, “Just Stable Children.”] Sonia Mena and Alicia Crowder’s Tell Me Lies characters, Pippa and Diana, have already brought one of the biggest shockers of the season. And it’s only four episodes in. After viewers saw the flash-forward at the end of the”, — write: www.hollywoodreporter.com
[This story contains spoilers from episode four of Tell Me Lies season two, “Just Stable Children.”]
Sonia Mena and Alicia Crowder’s Tell Me Lies characters, Pippa and Diana, have already brought one of the biggest shockers of the season. And it’s only four episodes in.
After viewers saw the flash-forward at the end of the season two premiere of the Meaghan Oppenheimer-created Hulu series — which teased a romantic relationship between the pair in the 2015 timeline — many have likely been wondering how the two former classmates got there. Especially since they’re not that close in college, and Diana is still very wrapped up with Stephen (Jackson White) and his drama with Lucy (Grace Van Patten) in 2008.
But now, after the fourth episode, viewers might start to see a shift in the dynamic after Diana finds the photos of Macy on Stephen’s computer, which only confirms what Lucy told her regarding his involvement in Macy’s deadly crash in season one. And though Diana deleted them, Crowder believes “she’s genuinely scared, she’s scared of him.”
There’s also an unspoken connection already between Pippa and Diana in the earlier timeline, as the latter “stumbled upon this horrible situation” Pippa was in after being sexually assaulted by Chris [Jacob Rodriguez] earlier in the season and helping her. “I think there is also this very deep instinct where she really cares about this girl, and she doesn’t quite understand why or how that came about,” Crowder says.
Below, Mena and Crowder chat with The Hollywood Reporter about navigating the heavy subject of sexual assault, why Diana continues to defend Stephen, and the Diana and Pippa teased 2015 romance. And, most tellingly, they tell viewers you “shouldn’t believe everything that people say” in the second half of the season.
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How does it feel knowing the long-awaited second season is finally here?
SONIA MENA It’s super exciting! I’m excited to share what we made. I’m so thrilled to hear that people are excited to watch it. And like you said, it was a long wait between seasons one and two, so it also feels good to be like, “All right, here you go!”
ALICIA CROWDER I feel so much anticipation just to see people’s reactions to the big reveals, and twists and surprises. That’s the most exciting to me, reading comments and seeing how people react, what it makes them feel, how it makes them think. Like, can they relate to this?
Grace Van Patten and Alicia Crowder in Tell Me Lies season two. Disney/Josh Stringer
As this show just radiates toxicity, how do you get in that mindset to play characters who are wrapped up in that environment?
CROWDER Just looking at the circumstances, taking from what’s on the page. There’s not a lot of mental gymnastics you have to do to imagine your boyfriend where you just want him back and, what does that mean for you? Or that you’ve found out he’s done something terrible and, how do you react? The writing is so good that it really helps us along, and it creates a beautiful framework for these characters who are just constantly grappling with the events taking place in their lives.
Sonia, how did you personally navigate Pippa’s sexual assault this season, with it being such a heavy subject and something so many women unfortunately have experienced?
MENA It’s definitely pretty scary, because you want to make sure you’re doing a good job and taking care of this story, and it’s definitely quite heavy. I felt a lot of responsibility to take care of her. Just trying to find ways to show it, because [her situation is] not front and center, right? And because there’s an element of it that’s oddly subtle. So working with hair and makeup and costumes and being like, what are ways that people deal with this and how does she change? Does she hide and cover up or not? And maybe she stops trying so hard with so much makeup, and her room gets messier and all these things that sort of show that someone’s falling apart when they’re still front and center being like, “Hey, best friends, let’s party!”
Sonia Mena’s Pippa in season two. Disney/Josh Stringer
After Diana found Pippa in that vulnerable moment, why do you think she kept checking up on her in the days that followed, even though they weren’t close friends?
CROWDER I think because Diana isn’t sure if Pippa’s aware of how bad the situation is, because we find her and she’s totally out of it. And so for Diana, she stumbled upon this horrible situation and she’s like, does she know what happened? And I think maybe Diana leans into that too much, and I think it’s also selfishly that she was very scared by the situation and is trying to deal with that by taking care of Pippa, because she doesn’t know how to process it herself. There also is this very deep instinct where she really cares about this girl, and she doesn’t quite understand why or how that came about. And I don’t think that she’s had this kind of friendship before, but it’s this very deep need to care for her. And I think that she’s trying to figure out like, where is that coming from?
Viewers now know something sparks romantically later on between Diana and Pippa after seeing the flash-forward in episode one. How was it working together on a closer basis this season?
MENA It was super fun. I mean, Alicia is an amazing actor, so it was fun to do these scenes and try to put in as much detail as we could. We really see just the tiniest bits of them. So, how can we make it the most full and surprising?
CROWDER That reveal at the end of episode one was one of the first things we shot for the season, and we kind of both just showed up and we were like, “Ok, we’re doing this!” But I felt immediately so comfortable and really at ease. I think that’s also where these women are in their relationship. There’s no sense of having to put on any airs; if you’re having a bad day, you’re having a bad day. They can meet each other where they’re at, and that’s such a beautiful and unique thing in this show.
Alicia Crowder and Sonia Mena in season two. Disney/Josh Stringer
This season, Diana is still extremely wrapped up with Stephen [White] and his drama. Why do you think she continues to make excuses for him?
CROWDER I think that she truly deeply loves him. Like, he is the one. They also have all this history. They’ve been dating for years at this point, and I think she truly sees and believes in his potential. He’s incredibly smart. I think she’s not aware of how he uses that in nefarious ways, obviously, that reveals itself sooner rather than later. He’s a real fixer upper. She thinks, “I can change him, I can fix him,” it’s one of those things. He comes from a very different world than her, and I think that Diana is really intrigued and interested in that. I don’t think growing up that she knew anyone like Stephen, and I think that’s really interesting to her as well.
However, in episode four, I feel like Diana is starting to believe what Lucy told her regarding Stephen’s involvement in Macy’s deadly car crash in season one, especially after she found the photos on his computer. What do you think was going through her head and why did she end up deleting them?
CROWDER I think that if Diana had never found those pictures, she would have stuck with him until the end. I think it had to be a huge, undeniable fact that made her break it off. And I think that’s really relatable. A lot of times, people don’t leave toxic relationships until the worst possible thing happens. And deleting the pictures, I think that she’s genuinely scared; she’s scared of him. She’s very selfishly afraid of how this situation could affect her, that she panics, honestly, in a deeply selfish way.
Crowder and Jackson White in season two. Disney/Josh Stringer
Pippa has seen a lot of character growth from season one to two. Sonia, what was it like navigating those changes?
MENA The way she sort of finds herself through the season is maybe less of a choice of like, “I’m not going to try to be somebody else because I don’t believe in it anymore,” and more out of pure exhaustion from everything that she’s going through. She just doesn’t have the bandwidth. And when you go through something really big, small things start to feel so trivial and I think she’s looking at things with new eyes and being like, “Oh my God, what the hell. What is wrong with everybody?” And for me, coming back to the second season, it’s so lucky and exciting. There’s a comfortability and a certain confidence that I felt that I didn’t necessarily have for the first season. So it was a nice mirror for me to feel that way about my ability as an actor, and then have someone who’s more in themselves also. That was lucky, I guess.
On the other hand, I feel like Diana is slowly cracking this season compared to how put together she was in the first season. Alicia, did you have to prepare differently at all?
CROWDER The preparation is really just understanding the circumstances, where she’s coming from and her motivation for why she’s making the decisions that she’s making. And I think that she’s put into a corner a lot this season and having to make snap decisions, like deleting those pictures. But I think it shows a much more human side of Diana. She can seem like this glamorous robot sometimes, but she has faults and worries and insecurities and doesn’t always make the right decision. The biggest example of that: she made a terrible decision attaching herself to this man who’s turned out to have done horrible things.
Can you both tease what you’re most excited for viewers to see in the second half of the season?
MENA The intensity ramps up and up. And some of the choices made by some of the characters really come out of left field. It was really fun to figure out the positive decision-making behind that when you can look at it and be like, “what a psycho.” But when you’re that person or that person is your character’s friend, you’re like, “I can understand how you got there and I can see that it’s fucked up, but it’s with love.” So I think it’ll be fun to take people on that journey with us.
CROWDER I would say even at the halfway mark, don’t believe everything that people say. People are still in the throes of an elaborate ruse and lies. So it keeps you on your toes. Always be looking closely at what’s going on, and what people are saying and how they’re saying it.
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The first four episodes of Tell Me Lies season two are currently streaming on Hulu, with new episodes dropping every Wednesday. Read THR‘s interviews with Grace Van Patten and showrunner Meaghan Oppenheimer, who teases a major season two moment, here.