‘Yellowjackets’ star Warren Kole breaks down Season 3 Episode 4: Bad karma, Ben’s trial, and fear that Jeff ‘is ripe’ for death
The following interview contains spoilers from the fourth episode of Yellowjackets Season 3, titled "12 Angry Girls and 1 Drunk Travis."
The fourth episode of Yellowjackets Season 3 debuted on Paramount+ with Showtime on Friday. In "12 Angry Girls and 1 Drunk Travis," the team holds a trial for Coach Ben (Steven Krueger), who is charged with attempted murder for lighting their cabin on fire. Natalie (Sophie Thatcher) is the judge, Taissa (Jasmin Savoy Brown) is the prosecutor, and Misty (Samantha Hanratty) is the defense. In the present day, Jeff (Warren Kole) thinks that he and Shauna (Melanie Lynskey) are haunted by bad karma, and signs them up for volunteer work at the residential home where Misty (Christina Ricci) works. The episode ends on a major cliffhanger when Lottie (Simone Kessell) is found dead.
Kole spoke to Gold Derby to break down the relationship between Jeff and Shauna in this episode, as well as provide his own insights on Season 3 of Yellowjackets.
Jeff thinks that he and Shauna have bad karma and encourages her to do charity work. Can you give us some insight on Jeff's state of mind and the guilt he's feeling?
In this episode, we start to get into Jeff having a growth mindset as opposed to this fixed mindset that everything is happening from outside forces. He wants to fix things — and he's getting more and more desperate. He's venturing into metaphysical realms of karma and karmic debt, and he just wants to get back to some familiar streets in his life. He's willing to try anything. So maybe we can just start doing good things and good things will happen as opposed to repeatedly walking into danger every corner that we turn here.
Jeff convinces Shauna to volunteer at Misty's place of work, which sets up a confrontation between the two of them. Talk about shooting that scene and watching Christina Ricci and Melanie Lynskey go after each other.
It's kind of like when you're on the team and you're wearing the pinstripes, but you finally get to go on the field. I've been lucky to be with Melanie so much of this show, but to get on the field with superstars and share some space with them and watch them do their thing, it's a treat.
Photo credit: Colin Bentley/Paramount+ with SHOWTIME
Jeff's kind of a proxy audience at times, which makes it really easy to sit back and just take it all in. Christina is a very prepared actor, and you sense that right away. She comes in very professional, not that Melanie isn't that way as well, but Melanie is reactive. Watching those styles and those characters bounce off one another makes my job really, really easy.
It's such a dark series, but also so funny. What do you think about the writing of these episodes and what is it like to have that opportunity to bring humor into Yellowjackets?
It's been a treat for me. I came into Yellowjackets in a wheelhouse of very intense, very brooding characters, heavy drama, often venturing into psychosis, which is great. But sometimes it's like, "Well, I can have fun out here. I am funny!"
I think the creators and actors were in such a groove going into Season 3. We understand what we're capable of, and I think I earned enough trust from the writers and the creators to have them venture into levity with Jeff. He doesn't try to be funny, and when he does, it's ridiculous. He just is funny, and that's a great groove to get into. It's a real rare place for an actor to feel that kind of trust coming back at you saying, "You know what? We know you're going to find the levity here. We don't need to push it. We don't need to force it. Do your thing. Be Jeff, and we'll just give you these scenarios to work through."
What is the current dynamic of that relationship between Jeff and Shauna? How much do you think Jeff truly understands her?
It's a pretty good question. I think he's understanding her more and more, but he's needed this experience and he's needed to break out of his own adolescence and his own insulated place and grow up a little bit. There is some stuff coming up where Jeff starts to talk about how much more he understands what her language is and where she's coming from.
Everything's driven by a loyalty and a love for her, and breaking away from the mythology of who he wants her to be and who he thinks she is — accepting who she actually is, is a big part of what makes that tension and that relationship so good.
Shauna gets locked in a freezer and has visions of Jackie (Ella Purnell). What were your thoughts on that whole situation?
Ella's fantastic. It's so great that she's coming back and making these appearances on the show. She's a big part of the chemistry on the show, and it's nice to have that back. That's Yellowjackets at its best, where it's just cool and free to go wherever it wants to go and play with the audience that way. I love it. I just sit back and enjoy it. Everybody's able to lend their own brand of "cool" to this thing, and it shows in moments like that.
Photo credit: Kailey Schwerman/Paramount+ with SHOWTIME
Shauna escapes the freezer and then ditches Jeff at this facility where he's calling a Bingo game. She goes and adopts a cat that she's going to use for her own "good karma" — returning this false look-a-like to a family mourning their missing pet. Jeff seems unfazed that she just took the car and left him. Has he just learned to not rock the boat with her? And what's going to happen with the cat?
That's me making a choice. I think coming into that scene — Jeff had a good day. Jeff thinks he's making reparations with their karmic debt and Bingo went really well. He's just going to ride that. That's a little bit of denial, whatever, but it just feels good to feel normal and good that day. That's a great place to start when the chaos is waiting for you on the other side of the door. So that's all that was. Whether this cat survives deeper into this season or not, we'll see.
Photo credit: Colin Bentley/Paramount+ with SHOWTIME
In the teen storyline, there's this dramatic trial going on with Coach Ben accused of attempted murder for lighting the cabin on fire. What is it like for you to watch that timeline that you're not directly involved in?
I think this is where Yellowjackets kind of stands out as a singular show — not that they're the first to do the time jumps — they just do them really well. When you're this invested in the characters, you get to have this multi-dimensional access to each one of them that deepens with each progression of the timeline.
The past informs the actions that the characters are doing in the present, and in a strange way, what we're watching in the present can inform what we see in the past. We know where these girls are going to go or where these characters are going to end up. It's this great access to it all. Watching something like the court case, which is just a really well-written sequence, is a lot of fun for me to watch.
I'm kind of a tourist on a lot of this show. My story is just a little piece of it. So to watch how hard this young cast is working — they are busting their butts down there on those sets and on locations doing this thing. They're showing a lot of grit and they're crushing it.
After the trial, Shauna convinces everyone to turn on Ben and convict him even though there's so much evidence that he was innocent. What does that say to you about Shauna and her personality? And her rise to power within the group?
It's like she's getting the Walter White treatment. She is being allowed to 'break bad' here because maybe she's just in so much pain and she's lost so much, and this is how she's going to handle that and assert some control and some power. Sophie [Nélisse] and Melanie are so good and doing such bad things, so it gets harder and harder to like them. That's a testament to the quality of the acting and the quality of how well they've built these characters because, 'We're going to go bad. We're going to go antihero here.' But you're still going to be rooting for them.
Photo credit: Kailey Schwerman/Paramount+ with SHOWTIME
What is your favorite part about working with Melanie?
I've had some great scene partners. Melanie might be my favorite scene partner. She's so sneaky good, and so present. I think my favorite part of working with her is trying to surprise her. And I'm not saying that I'm making a game out of it and disrespecting what we're doing on set, but she's so good. When she's surprised, this natural taste comes out of her. It seems to elevate the scenes, and it might be my favorite part of working with her.
This episode ends on a cliffhanger. Lottie's body is found, so it's not looking good for her. Are you fully prepared to die every time you read a new script?
Yes. No hesitation on that answer. Maybe I'm just the insecure actor, or maybe my intuition is dead-on. I've analyzed a lot of scripts in my day, but Jeff is ripe. Sure I've got that fear, but that's the show I'm on. This thing is going to turn into wildfire. It's really strong through the back nine episodes of this season.
Photo credit: Colin Bentley/Paramount+ with SHOWTIME
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