‘Industry’ stars Myha’la and Marisa Abela break down the Harper-Yas fight — and its fallout
HBO’s Industry isn’t a show necessarily concerned with the will they/won’t they? of relationships, but rather the are they? — are the characters as close personally as they are professionally, and which aspect of the relationship is more valuable? So it felt almost inevitable that Season 3 would bring to a head the issues impacting the show’s foundational bond: the friendship between Harper Stern (Myha’la) and Yasmin Kara-Hanani (Marisa Abela).
“They have sort of been frenemies for so long, and over the three seasons, it feels very will they, won’t they — they love each other and they’re friends, but there’s still something lost in there,” Myha’la told Gold Derby in an interview last year. “Harper’s got the leg-up on Yasmin on the business side, and Yasmin’s got the leg-up on the interpersonal and social side. They both have things that they envy and resent about each other, which keeps them coming back.”
In the sixth episode of the cult HBO drama’s third season, Harper and Yasmin’s bond experiences soaring heights and crushing lows. As revealed in flashback, Harper is the only person who knows that Yasmin’s father has drowned after an argument with his daughter, and Harper is there for Yas as she navigates those complex feelings. However, in the show’s present day, Harper also used Yas’s naivete in the business world to get an advantage on Pierpoint, Harper’s former company, that she hopes to crush out of revenge. Harper’s choice to use Yas as a pawn ends with the termination of Yas’s job despite Harper’s best efforts to keep her friend from facing the blowback.
“They have what I believe to be the most selfless and pure act of love the show has ever seen, when Harper chooses to protect Yasmin on the boat,” Myha’la said. “That’s the first time Harper’s ever done something where she didn’t have an agenda and did not imagine it would benefit her. Yasmin shared her trauma, and there’s no one else who knows that. So there’s a closeness there that you just cannot create. It’s completely unique. And they’re now bonded forever. So once that happens, Yas losing her job because of something that Harper said or did is like the ultimate betrayal for Yas. But Harper is feeling like, ‘How do you not know that I did my best to protect you? I saved your ass on that boat.’”
Their fraught dynamic culminates with an argument that recalls the famed “Whitecaps” episode of The Sopranos, when Tony and Carmela finally lay into each other after years of resentment.
“It’s an incredibly emotionally charged scene,” Abela told Gold Derby. “Yasmin is incredibly angry when Harper comes in, and Harper is not. And I think that’s an excellent dramatic situation. Yasmin knows she’s about to have an argument with Harper, and Harper doesn’t know. So you’ve got two people in a very different situation walking into the room, and she lays it out for Harper in a very specific way. She doesn’t say, ‘I’m furious at you because of this.’ When she first comes in, she asks, ‘Why did you do that on the boat? Why did I think you loved me?’ Harper has no idea what is coming — there is so much anger. It’s so much hurt for Yasmin and for Harper, too.”
The scene ends with a shift from verbal strife to literal violence as both women slap each other across the face. Yasmin strikes first before Harper responds. According to both actresses, the original script pages for the scene played out differently. As it was written, Yasmin slapped Harper across the face. Harper, in turn, called Yasmin a “whore” and then left. The actresses saw the moment differently. They noted how if one person in the relationship chose violence and the other did not, then it would become a bridge too far.
“But if they both hit each other, if violence is done by both, now again, they’re on an even playing field,” Myha’la said. “You’re both hurt to a place that we can’t describe any other way than to smack each other. So I think because they’ve both done the worst — the best and the worst — to each other, it feels like they’re the same. So we keep coming back to each other, because no one else will ever understand what we’ve been through. It’s a truly unbreakable tether there. It feels familial. It feels like they’re sisters. There is a true, deep, unconditional love there, however bastardized by their environment. But I think now that there’s nothing they can do to each other that's going to keep them from saying, ‘I’ll always support you.’”
Season 3 of Industry ends with Harper and Yas still at odds, but with an unusual glimmer of hope. Yasmin invites Harper to her wedding, and the pair shares a phone call, and they quickly fall back into their rhythm.
“I think that Yasmin is trying to reinvent herself right now completely. She has decided to be a lady of the manor, and that’s it. So anyone from her old life that doesn’t see her that way, she doesn’t want to know,” Abela said. “But now and then, it’s comforting to know that someone knows you — the real you — and Harper is that person for Yasmin. She sees her; she knows who Yasmin is. They’re kind of like sisters in a way. So I think it’s very good that they both slapped each other because it leveled the field. If Yasmin had smacked Harper and then Harper had gotten up and walked away, it would have been a very different phone call. But I think there’s safety and an intense amount of vulnerability in the fact that Harper sees Yasmin.”
Industry Season 4 is now in production. The show’s third season is eligible for Emmys consideration this year.