frelling_tralk | The Good Wife

May 2020

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Ausiello asks the King's about the final scene of Alicia and Kalinda being shot separately with green screen, and why those characters have been deliberately kept apart on-screen. They keep trying to sidestep the question but Ausiello doesn't let up

The Good Wife Creators Break Silence on 'Kalicia'-gate, Insist 'There Was No Attempt to Dupe Viewers'

I thought that Ausiello handled it very well actually because the King's seemed very defensive and were pretty rude at certain points IMO when they were acting like Ausiello was just after sleazy backstage gossip on why Archie and Julianna dislike one another, but in fact he was always putting it in terms of how it affected the show that Alicia and Kalinda's character couldn't be in a scene together, i.e "As showrunners, how much of your energy got devoted to keeping these characters at arms’ length — and were there specific instances where it may have hurt the storytelling, like Will’s death and Cary’s imprisonment?"

The King's were constantly side-stepping the question with comments like, "We’re writers and we love writing these characters, so we were thrilled at any chance to have new dynamics." Then when Ausiello keeps bringing up that the issue was in not having the actors film in the same room for the much hyped-up Alicia and Kalinda scene, their response is "we’re making the show every day using tricks, like if you’re in a car and there’s green screen and it looks like Chicago out the window but that’s not exactly where we are" and "Just so we’re clear, Josh wasn’t really killed. We faked those gunshots. We fake everything in the show" Because necessary special effect shots are the same as having to use green screen to get two actresses in a scene together? And your "trick" obviously didn't work if most of the audience immediately picked up on there being something off with the scene

I'm really starting to lose respect for the show, I can't decide whether to catch up on season 6 or not at this point :( And also it's so inaccurate when everyone keeps protesting that the lack of scenes make sense because of Alicia and Kalina falling out in season 2's finale. That would only track if their lack of scenes happen after season 2, instead season 3 sees them gradually repairing their friendship (Alicia was inviting Kalinda to drink in the bar with her again in the season 3 finale!) They weren't besties again of course, but in season 4 they were back on friendly terms, indeed their phone calls in season 5 were always civil enough, so it makes no storytelling sense how all on-screen interaction completely ceased in seasons 5 and 6

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Sigh. I know. I freaking LOVE this show, and I will keep watching, but this whole debacle is so STUPID. To say "we fake things all the time!" is beyond asinine. Yeah, faking a shooting it totally on par with faking two people sitting at a bar. *nods* I really don't know what could have happened to make Julianna refuse to be in the same room with Archie (since Julianna is the one with the power, I presume it's her choice). Plenty of actors have not liked each other, but have still sucked it up and done their scenes. It's truly bizarre.

But that is what it is, and fine. Don't have scenes with them. My bigger issue is that the Kings so stupidly tried to fake that scene and thought we wouldn't know. WHY? Why have that scene at all? I actually thought it worked perfectly to have Kalinda show up at Alicia's and miss her. Because that's life, right? You don't always get the goodbye you'd want. I think that should have been Kalinda's last ep. It was just dumb to have her come back and fake that scene. The ship had sailed seasons ago on Kalinda/Alicia, so why hang a lantern on it?? I will never understand.

I'm also bummed Matthew Goode isn't coming back. I'm hoping Finn will still return in some fashion after he films Downton, or else that whole storyline went nowhere.

SIGH.

Yeah it's strange to wonder what it could be, I keep seeing spec that it's all because Archie won the Emmy in her first year, but I really think it must be something more personal than that for the actors to not even be able to be in the same room together? Getting professionally competitive is one thing, but this seems to be more than that...

And I totally agree, I don't see the point of going to all the time and expense of filming the scene separately after they had already worked around not giving them scenes together for two years. My guess is that the King's scripted it in the hopes that it might pressure the actresses to relent and agree to work together for one last scene? It seemed in interviews that the Alicia and Kalinda friendship was something that they saw as the heart of the show in the first three seasons, so I can understand them wanting to do something more with them before Kalinda left, it's just too bad that personal issues couldn't have been put aside long enough to get the filming down. (I mean geez it's not like they even had to speak to one another, they could have just done the whole thing in character, then gone their separate ways!) The King's should have never hyped up the scene so much

It makes very little sense for TV Line to publish this interview outside of the bigger piece that they're announcing, since there's nothing new here. The way the whole thing was handled was bad, but the writers don't want to badmouth the actress(es), which makes sense professionally speaking. Let's just hope the new season will be better than Season 6, because that was not the only problem there was.

I would understand them not wanting to directly comment on their reasons for keeping Alicia and Kalinda apart, but it would be better IMO for them to just outright say "no comment" or "you know we can't comment on that", instead of constantly insisting that it's all for storytelling reasons and treating the audience like idiots

Yeah, I agree with you, and most fans would prefer honesty. Unfortunately that's basic PR spin.

Not very good spin though if "Just so we’re clear, Josh wasn’t really killed. We faked those gunshots" is their response to a perfectly reasonable question on the reasons for green-screening two actors into a scene together :P

Some people take the audience for idiots to the point that they probably don't realise how ridiculous it sounds. XD

My first thought when I saw that was that they must be trying to make Margulies look bad because you'd think they'd be adept at dealing with the press after all this time.

That's an interesting idea. XD

I wouldn't be surprised if the King's are getting a little bit frustrated and passive-aggressive, Juliana seems to have WAY more power than is usual for when a star becomes executive producer? With her requests for less court time (in a lawyer show no less) being granted, with the King's taking care to point out that Julianna is happy with the casting of JDM, or that Julianna knows the character of Alicia better than anyone and we won't get into a public argument with her on Alica/Kalinda, or that Julianna didn't want a romance with Finn and Alicia, it seems like Julianna has more sway than the King's themselves do in some ways?

With her requests for less court time (in a lawyer show no less) being granted

Wow, that one is especially weird. And the resulting Season 6 was bad. I guess the Kings weren't that inspired by the request.

I can't remember where I saw Julianna talk about it now (I *think* it may have been at Paleyfest or something like that?), but she explained that she has a problem with the courtroom scenes because it tooks so long to film and get all the shots that they need, she wanted more time at home with her son. That's certainly understandable, especially as she's having to film 22 episodes a year (well 24 in seasons 1 and 2), but it still seems like the show going above and beyond to accommodate her when I wouldn't have thought that's something that would usually happen? Alicia is a lawyer after all, courtroom scenes have always have a necessity for that reason...

I think that's the reason that The Good Wife is filmed in New York as well actually and not Chicago, even though it's a lot more expensive to film in NY, but it made the commute easier for Julianna as she already lived there? In that case it worked out better for the show though IMO, as they get access to a lot of great guest stars by filming in New York

That's weird, because it feels like Season 6 was really more focused on her and less focused on others than before. That kind of sounds counter-productive, even if they needed fewer shots for other scenes.

I guess that the issue with courtroom scenes are that they generally have a lot of characters and shots to accommodate, and all of the actors in the scene would still need to be in the background for all of those shots for continuity, whereas it's probably much quicker and more rewarding to shoot the more personal one on one scenes?

Edited Date: 2015-08-20 06:33 pm (UTC)

Maybe, they just seem really defensive on how it's a close-knit set and it's nobody else's business, but they must have known that they'd be asked about it after all the attention it got at the time??? They seem to want to point the finger and act like Ausiello is just interested in salacious gossip to ask about it, but I mean it's a legit question when you hype a farewell scene between two characters who haven't appeared together in over two years, and then film the whole thing with split screen tricks. You'd think they would have had time to come up with a decent response as to why it had to be filmed that way, instead of just constantly steering the question to Will's exit, and acting insulted that the question was even coming up.

I plan to watch the show at some point, but even I have heard about this issue. I agree that it's a major issue affecting longform storytelling (not just on this show but any show), how much the availability or cooperation of different contributors to the show end up affecting what gets told.

No one balks at show runners complaining about network interference or acknowledging that a recurring actor whose career has taken off somewhere else has changed what they can do. It's undoubtedly awkward to address but many an actor has ruined their shows for reasons of ego, going through the motions, or conflicts with others.

Oh I do hope that you catch up with it at some point, I really loved seasons 1, 2, 3, and 5 (4 is a little shakier in the first half, but by no means bad), so I would definitely highly recommend it. Seasons 2 and 5 especially are near-perfect seasons of television IMHO. And in spite of what now seems to be coming out about the difficulties behind the scenes, I do find Julianna to be really wonderful in the part of Alicia

And yes, undoubtedly there's an issue of tact in what you're going to say about your starring players, but you can't act so defensive and shocked at it coming up when you have two members of your (smallish) cast very pointedly only sharing scenes over the phone for two years, and then the characters final send-off being with the magic of green screen. It does make the set look ridiculously unprofessional to accommodate the actors like that, and snapping that it's all television magic and we don't kill actors for real either when a character gets shot isn't exactly called-for when Ausiello was addressing real issues with the storytelling

Edited Date: 2015-08-20 06:42 pm (UTC)

As if this whole situation wasn't ridic enough,this interview takes it to a new level. All their answers (or well,non-answers) are total BS and really condescending and insulting the intelligenc of the viewer's. Like,yes I get it,they can't really reveal anything openly and that's fine but this interview did even more damage than just a 'no comment' would have done and I honestly lost almost the little respect I still had completely. I will still tune in for season 7 but it needs to improve FAST then! Unfortunately I fear that sidelining Diane and Cary in 6B was only the first sign and it will be even better next season :/

Yep, I feel like they're trying way too hard to justify themselves, instead of just being as honest as they can be when questioned about it. Surely they can at least admit that it's not ideal and that it's a situation that they've had to work around, but they would hope that it didn't affect the show too badly etc. Instead they seemed embarrassingly desperate to keep answering questions by throwing in that they misled the audience with Josh's departure too, or that they fake Chicago all of the time without issue and nobody cares about that

They seemed to be getting pretty pissed off by the end lol, I love how Ausiello would not let up at their attempts to dodge the question <3

Edited Date: 2015-08-20 09:46 pm (UTC)

"Just so we’re clear, Josh wasn’t really killed. We faked those gunshots. We fake everything in the show"

LMAO OMG

Nice try with the false equivalence, LOL. Oh dear.

That was my favourite response, isn't it just dripping with condescension for the fans for daring to question how they run their show XD

I mean, if nobody had noticed there was something off about the scene and it had only leaked through, like, super-observant fans like the ones who go through DVDs and spot continuity errors, etc. then it wouldn't even be an issue IMO, but it seems like tons of people did notice while the scene was airing? I read that article from Ausiello right after the ep and his abrupt transition from :DDD to DDD': as people clued him in via his Twitter feed made me LOL, heh.

To be fair I think that a lot of people were already wondering if Julianna and Archie would actually both appear in the scene together, so the scene did come in for a lot of extra scrutiny, maybe it wouldn't have been picked up on otherwise? People mostly commented on how it was a dead giveaway that neither Alicia or Kalinda's hands crossed the middle of the screen when they both appear in the shot together, and also the way that the camera didn't show both women in the frame when one of them was speaking to the other was pretty different from how bar scenes with them had been shot in the past, it seemed like an obvious stand-in with a wig for those shots

This is the scene if you're curious, I don't think it's badly done as such, but it didn't do a good enough job of faking it when most of the audience were already curious about how the filming of it was going to go

Thanks for linking the clip! Obvs I can't know what my reaction would've been if I'd watched it without knowing the truth beforehand, but I think it started out OK but then got awwwkward halfway through, right around the 1:29 mark, LOL.

To be fair I think that a lot of people were already wondering if Julianna and Archie would actually both appear in the scene together, so the scene did come in for a lot of extra scrutiny, maybe it wouldn't have been picked up on otherwise?

Hmm yeah, probably. The thing is, the heightened scrutiny was also the result of how the behind-the-scenes feuding affected the long-term story enough to make most of the audience notice, which is part of the whole problem, IMO. Like, we know everything on TV is faked, but the whole point is we're not supposed to be thinking about that while we're watching, LMAO.

I did notice that Kalinda's eyes didn't quite line up at that point in the clip with her supposedly looking at Alicia, and you'd think that would have been the easiest part to get right if they had a stand-in in the exact same positions as the actresses would have been? Idk lol

But yeah, people were definitely already riled-up over the way that the Alicia/Kalinda friendship had been cut short, Ausiello was really trying to get across to the King's that as a fan it did affect the storyline to keep Alicia and Kalinda separate for every single story for over two years, while their only response to that seemed to be "But new and different dynamics!"

Oh all the things I would have to say about this, if I hadn't already exhausted my capacity to care by the bullshit surrounding it.

Urgh yeah, I couldn't believe the way they were responding, as if it was so rude and unreasonable to question why two members of your cast apparently can't work together. That's not Ausiello poking around for backstage gossip, that's an issue that's really affecting your show!

And it has been, and they just get worse and worse about responding to questions about it. It is so sad what happened to the show really. It is by no means bad now, but it was great, and now it's okay.

"Just so we’re clear, Josh wasn’t really killed. We faked those gunshots. We fake everything in the show"

Amazing.

(I'll still watch next season tho, lol.)

No doubt I will still be watching as well *g*

I've largely abandoned the show (haven't watched since the mid-season break) due to increasing issues with the Kings, and this really just takes the cake, doesn't it?! Like, nope. Nope, nope, nope.

It is hard to respect a show when the showrunners treat their audience like idiots :( I understand them needing to protect Julianna's privacy, but there was no call for some of those cracks about how we fake everything on the show, didn't you realise that by now

awww this is so sad. I'm only season 5 in my marathon and there are signs that they're mending fences as characters so these lame excuses suck. wow these showruners are pretty crummy.

Yeah it was so fake how the narrative in interviews suddenly become that well Alicia and Kalinda never moved past Kalinda's past with Peter, so keeping them apart was obviously all story-driven, even though seasons 3 and 4 were definitely building up to them becoming closer again and starting to work things out. Then suddenly two years of not speaking at all for no real reason, even though their last on-screen conversation in the hotel room had been pleasant enough.

They never got their friendship back to how it had been certainly, but there wasn't nearly as much tension between Alicia and Kalinda as interviews seem to imply as to why they ceased giving them scenes together. Maybe post season 2 I could see that, but not after season 4 (which was when the scenes between them ended)

Edited Date: 2015-08-29 01:01 pm (UTC)

I'm in it for Cary and Diane but it's so sad when this happens

It's frustrating that Julianna couldn't have kept things professional on a work-level, even if she did have legit reasons to have personal animosity with Archie, but oh well. At least the show won't have to keep writing around it in season 7 anyway

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