LEVERAGE #504 "The French Connection Job" Post-Game

Lovely little episode, ain't it?  After #509 "The Frame-Up Job" (which you haven't seen yet) it's probably one of my favorites for the year.  A good Leverage episode has a solid emotional runner that involves more than one character, an interesting but not too exotic locale, serves a tiny chunk of backstory and runs you out a real-time Act Five.  Much like "The Boiler Room Job" last year, Paul Guyot tags all the bases.

The episode had many fathers.  First, we had the location based off our annual trip to Portland.  A fully decked out culinary school, and a character who cooked.  Those just don't fall out of the sky.  

The sub-plot about Parker reaching for a "thing" came form a discarded sublot in #411 "The Experimental Job".  Originally Parker in that episode was going to have a parallel experience to Hardison at the university.  Then, as noted, we realized Parker didn't really need or want the validation in that context.  So we threw it up on the board for later.  It never really went away -- the idea that Parker was somehow blind to the aesthetic value of the objects she routinely heisted was too intriguing to fall off the big board of index cards.  When doing an episode about Eliot's "art", it made sense to address that in this show.

We originally had a straight-on subplot about drug-smuggling, but nobody was happy with that.  The French farce ending was established early in story breaking -- another sequence from an earlier episode's wish list -- but the way into the plot seemed pretty right down the middle.  

This was when Paul Guyot's wife said "Hey, you should watch this 60 Minutes piece on truffle smuggling."  Paul brought that idea into the room, and we jumped on it.  

It also gave us our title.  "How are we changing it from drugs to truffles?" Paul asked.  

"The trick is we're not," I choked around some Bushmills.  "Do ALL the tropes of the drug episodes, just with truffles.  We're doing The French Connection with truffles." And there you go.

We then got a double helping of luck on the casting.  For the villain, the amazing Steve Valentine.  One of the nice things about fifth season is that (possibly unearned) air of legitimacy.  Cary Elwes, Treat Williams, Steve Valentine, Gregg Henry later in the year ... we had some very fine villains this season.

And, of course, Marshall Fucking Teague.  He and Kane are old friends.  As soon as the script dropped with a knife fight, Kane called us and basically told us Teague on a flight, and to not bother casting.  Hey, who are we to argue?

To answer approximately 60% of the questions up front -- yes, that was Kane doing his own chopping.

Other than that, the shoot went smooth as silk, with some great directing by Tawnia McKiernan.

Right, so let's see what your fevered brains have cooked up.  Oh, and a reminder we anwer some of these questions and a few more on the Leverage10 podcast. ...

@Kevin W: Ok, the henchman's name was clearly Rampone but I could have sworn Sophie's alias was Wambach. Is there a USWNT fan writing for you guys?

That would be Paul Guyot.  He and Joe Hortua are giant soccer fans, who have recently attempted to win me over to the sport. Go Everton!!

@Pixie: 1.) Maybe I missed something, but where did the team get enough truffles for the first 'shipment' Nate sold?I knew it was going to end up being truffles the moment the deal took place in a cooking school. 2.) did some of this come up through research on The Last Dam Job?  Because it strikes me that quahog or truffle, it's importing a potentially invasive species without permit. Which the penalties are woefully inadequate for, when you consider the potential for damage.

1.) They came from a friend of the victim.  May have gone by too fast in the edit, apologies. 2.) Nope, the origin was mentioned above.  it was fun coming up with the dead serious Fisheries and Wildlife Agents.  We may have broken out an entirely new spin-off for them at one point.

@Calla: So, is part of the theme of this season about the team rediscovering things about themselves? Hardison - what has he forgotten that he used to enjoy?

That's not quite right.  This was much more about Eliot broadening out Parker's world-view -- and even more importantly, Parker being emotionally evolved enough to feel like she's missing something.  The "art is communication" runner is one of my personal hobbyhorses.

@Eleanor Rigby: 1.) Annoying science question: what on earth did Hardison inject into his super cool liquid nitrogen safe popper? Because, s'far as I know, liquid nitrogen looks like boiling water and not iridescent blue liquid (also, if it's cold enough to pop a safe, it's cold enough to shatter a plastic syringe.) 2.) Is the Foodie Queen a real (fictional) person? Did Parker just borrow her identity for a night?

1.) That's not a plastic syringe, it just looks plastic. 2.) She is base don a real food critic, and more generally on the research we did about the great lengths food critics will go in New York to stay anonymous, and how the restaurants deal with that.  Big City restaurants really do have mug shot/sketches of food critics up by the reception desk.  Funky, eh?

@oppyu: 1.) What were you doing with Hardison this episode? Elliot was shedding light onto his mysterious backstory, Parker was learning to grow as a person outside of stealing stuff, Sophie was learning to grow as a person outside of crime and acting (for herself) in general, Nate was in the background doing his usual mastermind thing, but Hardison seemed to be front-and-centre doing... nothing. Geeking out over the laser was very in-character and funny, but edible paper and being a douche about tipping seemed a little... I dunno, redundant? The others got character development with their funny, while Hardison just got funny. Which is fair enough, but it just stands out a bit when he's front-and-centre even though he's kind of irrelevant to the grift (I mean, the grift we see. We all remember how quickly the team falls apart without Hardison in 'The Gold Job'; he's definitely not irrelevant.)
2.) Just how good is Elliot at cooking? Talented amateur, someone who could make a decent living as a professional, someone who could make a fantastic living as a professional, or heads-and-shoulders above every other cook in the world? Turning a bunch of uninterested, untalented rich people into professional chefs in the time it takes to set up a con must have taken some talent.
3.) Was that Kane doing the knife stuff during Elliot's fast vegetable chopping into to his students? That seems like it could be very dangerous for someone who wasn't a talented cook.
4.) where the hell does Elliot find the time to be the world's baddest bad-ass, top-notch chef, quality singer and flirty Casanova all at once? It's ridiculous how talented that man is...

1.) I think we just wanted to use Hardison to show off the cool high-tech culinary stuff we found in the research.  It's a goddam five hander, people.  Not everybody's on point.

2.) Eliot could make a very good living at cooking.  He's not one to do anything half-way well.

3.) Kane and knife.  Correct.  He really can cook, you know, we're not making this up.

4.) It's an accretion of experience.  And considering Kane does his own stunts, cooks, sings and is, well, him, we're not exactly writing an impossible dude here.

@Sarah W: I wouldn't have expected him to undertip, either, considering how free he usually is with his money---and how paid for the potential damages to the bar when Sterling walked in way back in The Zanzibar Marketplace. i'm waiting for that to mean something, too---should I?  I feel like a conspiracy theorist, but you've trained me to assume everything is relevant to either the episode or the seasonal arc. Maybe y'all are just a little too good at your jobs (that sounds oddly familiar . . . ).

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.  I think the tipping bit came out of a discussion we had in the room, where we actually had this argument.  I always thought you should tip UP FRONT, to guarantee good service for the meal to follow. But that's just me.

@Allyone: The only thing that fell flat for me is the idea the Parker lost touch with her own passion. This is the girl who's probably the most consistently passionate (next to maybe Hardison) about what she does. I thought the idea that she didn't get someone else's passion could have been explored on it's own without it coming from a place of her not feeling it herself. 

No, that wasn't the intent -- and the theme probably wasn't helped by the Sophie coaching beat, which none of us thought of as on the same theme until YOU people saw it that way.  A constant reminder that you guys are not necessarily seeing the same show we think we're making.  Parker knows she loves stealing.  But the others interests are non-thiefy.  Parker was realizing she has no emotional connection to anything outside work.

@Unknown: Why was the airport capture by Fish and Wildlife instead of the Department of Agriculture?

Because, oddly, that's who it would be.  We've seen some arguments otherwise, but frankly it's just a funnier Department name.

@Lori: 1.) Was the window to the outdoors in the pub there in the last 3 eps? 2.) Did some of the students' names get changed from script to filming (uh..Whitney?).

1.) Yep.  2) We varied the number of students in the drafts, and changed sexes.  Not uncommon.

@SaffieDarling: 1.) I actually have a question that dates back to the (Very) Big Bird Job: do you feel that by creating an episode that features the Spruce Goose, but not a single cast member in aviator goggles, you've broken your contract with the audience?  2.) How is the brewpub menu going? 

1.) Aviator goggles are more Sopwith Camel than Spruce Goose. 2.) It's a work in progress. Currently half Eliot and half Hardison.  Guess which half is more popular ...

@ChelseaNH: Just a note of concern, though: I have been noticing some learning lately, and I'm starting to fear that there might be hugging soon.

There will be some bro-hugging.

@petticoat: 1.) What was Sophie's tree-hugger accent? It sounded like it was in and out of British with some Ashley Judd thrown in? Perhaps some UK country-esque regional accent?  2.) Did Nate fill up those last 4-ish pounds of truffles with something else? 3.) It seems like the villains this season are more personable. And hilarious. ('Napoleon's dead.' 'Thank you, Rampone.') Is this a conscious trend or just something happening on its own?

1.) as commenter Suzanne M points out: "Sophie's accent was a pretty spot on West Country (South West England) accent. It's stereotypically spoken by Cornwall/Devon farmers but I'm from Bristol in the South West and know a fair few people who talk exactly like that and have that kind of twang myself to be honest!  You don't hear that accent on American tv very often! It was pretty great."

2.) No, he got them from Toby.

3.) I think it's a mix of the types of cons and casting.  The casting's been super-strong this year.

@PurpleOps:

1. Wasn't Hardison's insult of the delivery man by not wanting to tip him somewhat out of character? And was Hardison really receiving D&D material? (If so, gotta be Rogers' hardcovers!)
2. Did Eliot do all his own cutting? Particularly good rhythm on his initial cutting sequence. How much wound up on the, erm, cutting room floor?
3. Did Eliot actually say "And I smelt it" at one point, rather than "smelled"?
4. About midway through the episode, there was this cityscape shot, and a very loud "wipe" sound effect. We've heard such wipe sounds before, but never that loud. What might have happened?
5. What accent was Gina doing as the "hippie"? It seemed to swing wildly between something UK and American - very odd.

1.) See above for the tipping thing.  Honestly, it struck us as a quirk.  And yes, they were the D&D hardcovers.

2) Him.

3.) Maybe.  I;d have to go back and check.

4.) Sometimes the mix gets distorted in the compression between the distribution copy and however your cable/satellite provider encodes the signal to get it to your box. We see and hear weird artifacting all the time when we watch on TV.  Makes us wince, but there;s nothing you can do.

5.) Noted above.

@Cheese: I loved this episode as I usually do with Leverage but I was just wondering: are we ever going to see deeper into Hardison's backstory? His may be the least dramatic out of the team, but I think we've seen the least of hardisons background story outside of his hacking escapades as a teenager in little glimpses. It would be fun to learn more about his experience in foster care with Nana maybe.

You kids love your Hardison backstory.  Not this year.  As we've discussed in the podcast, we always felt you joined Hardison early enough in his arc, you were kind of getting his "backstory" from episode #101.

@Suzanne M: My question: I loved the Parker & Eliot stuff. I'm really liking the way Eliot's letting his guard down even more this season - explaining his love of food, asking Nate for help and last week almost telling Nate & Sophie about his helicopter missions before catching himself and covering with the hilarious fishing line (amazing line read there btw). Is this deliberate or am I reading too much into things?

Eliot's definitely more comfortable with the team this year.  The tone of the season is indeed to show that they are in a new equilibrium.

@Video Beagle: Ok, I'm missing something...how is having the truffles illegal, if restaurants are advertising that they have them?

Not having truffles -- importing truffles, and doing it from a black market to boot.

@Izzie: What book is Parker reading when Hardison's package arrives?

The stoic writings of Marcus Aurelius, as recommended by Nate.

@Bill Crouch: How long does the cast have the script before filming?

The script drops during prep. So in theory they have about three to five days, but note that they are filming when that script arrives.  For big ones with great demands on the actors (big emotional scenes, high page count for one character) we try to get it out early.  To tell the truth we usually have the script done a good two weeks before prep at least, but I don't like loose scripts floating around in the production cycle.  Distracting.

@David Hunt: So how much of that scene of Eliot holding the knife on the Busey was Eliot actually considering killing the guy and how much was Eliot punishing him by making himthink Eliot was about to kill him? I lean more toward the former, but his conversation with Nate makes me wonder.

I'd say that's a Kane acting choice there more than a writing choice.  However, I think I can point to an actual decision moment in the performance.  YMMV.

@Laney: I was watching season 4 of Leverage on dvd and realized something when watching it. In episode 10 (The Queen's Gambit Job), when Sterling and Eliot are in the car, Sterling says to Eliot "You're father says that you crawled 3 miles through a sewer to kill the head of Al Qaeda in Yemin, but the coffee is a problem". So, Sterling mentions that he has talked to Eliot's father; so does that mean that Sterling knows his father? If so, that should definitely be in an episode! Please respond, because I'm interested to hear what you think!

Sorry, Laney, Sterling said "Your file says you crawled ..."

@Katie and others ... Jesus, last episode Hardison is jury-rigging starscapes to make Parker feel good about not being able to follow through on the date she was planning, and now he's a putz?  Let the guy have an off week.

Oona: 1.) When Nate and Eliot are talking at the beginning about Eliot's past, Nate says basically "you did wetwork," and Eliot nods. Google tells me that means assassinations/murders. Correct? 2.) Was Eliot really close to killing Rampone before Nate stepped in? If so, are we to assume that Eliot would only slip that far back if someone was a real threat to someone very important to him? 3.) Also, did I hear right that Eliot referred to having worked as a PMC - Private Military Contractor?

1.)  Oh yeah.  Eliot was a bad man.  2.) Others would answer differently.  I'd say "No, but he was certainly comfortable with the idea." 3.) Yes, before he quit to become a retrieval specialist, he did time with a PMC.

@Jessica Snyder: Did christian really get cut while doing the knife fight with Marshall? Chris's reaction to it looked like he really got cut by the knife

Yep.  Some day if you meet him in person, ask Kane to take you through the tour of his scars.

@Crazy Eddie: Why did Nate shake his head and blow off Parker after one question? How did everyone except Sohpie manage to forget that Parker already had a passion. At the end, was she reembracing her passion, or was she *seeing* the artwork for the first time and that's why she was shown looking around and not touching anything?

1.) Because Nate is often kind of a dick. 2.) It wasn;t about not having a passion, it was about not understanding a passion that wasn't crime-related.  3.) Seeing it for the first time.

@PsychoKitty: 1.) Alright, so the French guy who was dealing the truffles was named Jean-Luc and the guy sitting next to him in the front of the car was called Patrick. Is that subtle reference to Sir Patrick Stewart and Star Trek: TNG? Because it made me very, very happy (especially after the "Willy Riker" thing in the previous episode)! 2.) is there ever going to be another Con-Con? I saw all of the video from the 2010 one but didn't hear about it until afterwards and ever since I've really wanted to go!

1.) You people miss nothing. 2.) We're not planning on it, but the Fan Con seemed pretty fun this year.

@SueN: Most of my questions have been asked above, so I'll throw out that occurred to me this morning, about the teaching chef Sophie cleared out with the cooking strippers reality show. What happened to the poor guy when he got to wherever he was going and discovered there were no strippers? Or, more meta, what happens to anyone the team clears out with a fake story and plane tickets? Do they just enjoy the free vacation, or does the team actually have something waiting for them?

It depends.  Nice people get a free vacation and soft let-down.  In the chef's case, Hardison had actors from an ARG group tell the guy the financing fell through.

@CHelsea: You guys come up with a ton of backstory for the crew that never makes it into the show. What's the best heist or con pulled off by a character or the team that the audience doesn't know about?

You see little bits of it in this week's episode, "The Broken Wing Job".

@Shayna: I don't mean to be crude but... have Hardison and Parker... consummated? The reason I ask is because Parker seemed really unfamiliar with sex in season 3. Notice I didn't say she'd never experienced it before. That I could not tell. But she certainly didn't seem to know it when she heard it. I realize that was for a cartoonish comedic beat but still. In addition, she clearly hasn't gotten close to anyone before Hardison (at least no one that didn't then leave her). I don't know if Leverage is the type of show where you can deal with that kind of thing (physcial intimacy I mean. Maybe that's too "adult") but I just want to know what we're supposed to assume as viewers (and I was kind of looking forward to Sophie giving Parker "he sex talk". Not that we were promised that or anything). It seems like they're sleeping together and she has no issue with it (waking up in the morning with one of Hardison's t-shirts on is a clue). Are we just to assume everything is hunky dory on that front? Did I spell hunky dory right? Is it bad that I'm too lazy to look it up? Does that make me a product of a lazy generation?

You lazy, lazy sex pervert.

No, right, let's see ... I'm going to go with, as usual, "whatever makes you want to watch the show more."  I think to enjoy this year you just have to know they are emotionally intimate and physically comfortable.  Anything more is up to you.

@SureenderDorothy: I know you can't talk about the actor's contracts but, out of curiosity, did Gina ask for time off or something? I'm not saying us Sophie fans are getting shafted or anything. I'm happy with what we're getting. It just seems like something is off with her presence.  Does the network put any pressure on you to focus on characters that they know are really popular? Like Eliot and Parker? I'm just curious. Again, no complaining. Just genuine curiosity.  Sophie's character must be hard because you don't really want to dig too much into her back story (which you know we hate haha) so you have to create conflicts and obstacles for her that are very... present tense. like her theatre. It explores her character in an interesting way without actually revealing anything about her. Is that right? Or am I way off?

The network never tells us to do anything with the characters.  TNT are a remarkably freeing creative partner.  They give us feedback on tone and plot, but don't dictate the fine tuning of the show at all.

I think you can look at it two ways.  Sophie's arc was accelerated when Gina stepped out for her pregnancy in S2, so when she came back the character had settled a lot of stuff in her head.  Instead of looking at her conflicts, look at how often she gives THE emotional or support speech in the episode over the last two seasons, and how often she's in the last keynote scene of the show.

You're also in a bit of a weird place in the season.  The back half is much Sophie-heavier.

@Sabine: Eliot had already developed (or regained) some principles about his job before the Nigerian Job. So when he says that Nate kept him from hitting the bottom, is he referring to something that happened before the team got together or does he mean Nate kept him from backsliding? 

Backsliding, although at that point Eliot was really more in a holding patter, rather than moving forward.

@TJ: 1)It seems like Eliot bring in most of the personal cases – a lot of the times, one particular character will get attached to a case after it comes in, but Eliot so far is the one who has brought in the most aside from maybe Nate himself, most of those cases Nate hears about from other people who bring them to the team for him. Eliot is the one who actually acknowledges the people he knows and says “These are good people and this should be a job.” Any reason for that, character wise? 

2)What was Parker reading? 
3Is Hardison going to regret that whole tip thing later in the season? That seems like it should be a running joke, considering how much stuff he orders. 
4)What happens to the old chef when there is no show and there are no strippers? Does he just try to get his old job back confused or slink away in misery or what? 
5)What made Nate give up on helping Parker? His exasperation seemed kind of quick especially since it was obvious Parker was so…distraught, (for Parker, at least.)
6Was the techno pop theme playing while Hardison and Eliot were arguing their theme song from the car chase? It sounded a bit out of place until I realized it sounded a bit familiar…
7)Poor Chef Eliot just laying on Stonerboy and squeezing the strawberry – hilarious. 
8How did it end up being Eliot and not Sophie that Parker went to with her feelings problem? (Character wise and writing wise…) Normally when she wants to be “normal” or understand people she asks Sophie for advice. Was it the “It makes us, us.” (From Long Way Down) principle in action? 
9)Please tell me where the hell the N was in Nate’s alias? Please. 
10)What part of the U.K. was Rebecca the co-op lady suppose to be from? I recognize the accent, (sort of) but I don’t know the location.
11)How did Lampart not realize how badly he got screwed in Nate’s version of the truffle deal? He was a full four pounds light…
11)I’ve noticed this a bit lately, I think everyone has, but specifically in this episode is Nate pushing Hardison (thief-wise) and Sophie (mastermind-wise) in this episode or did it just happen that way because of the plan? 
12)Please tell me what was in the students’ mind during the French mooks cooking prep/beatdown moments? 
13)What were the black noodles again? I couldn’t hear Eliot’s very complicated explanation of what they really were.
14)How did Rampone (?) not recognize Eliot earlier? I went back and checked, Eliot did attempt to turn away every time they ran into each other, but he looked him dead in the face at least once when Eliot was doing something extremely sketchy in the freezer, and I think a couple of more times. He didn’t seem to have any sense that something was familiar until the knife fight. 
15)Eliot left his meal. Was it because it was a bit blood splattered? 
16)Was Eliot really debating killing Rampone or was it all just show? If it was show, why? If it wasn’t, how close did he come? 
17)Head pat on kid’s head, again very cute and very Eliot. 

Good Lord.

1.) Let's see, the Horse Job, this one, one later this season ... out of 77?  Nah, we'r enot going for a pattern. Just seemed revelatory.

2.) Noted above.  

3.) Nope.  A one-off based on a room bit.

4.) Noted above. Nice vacation, cover story, and there's a lovely severance package waiting for him.

5.) As noted.  Nate's on mission.  Nobody's perfect. Speaking as someone who's been married twenty years, it is very,very easy to miss when a love done is genuinely concerned over something.

6) No.

8.) It is indeed a call-back to the bond they share from that Job.  In particular, while Sophie's very good at explaining things, she;s not necessarily good at understanding the problem Parker is grappling with.  Parker sees Eliot as the closest to her in emotional landscape, and went to him for help.

9.) Gnar Slabdash.

11.) Good noticing.

12.) Whatever amuses you most.  Primarily fear at letting down Eliot.

13.) Squid ink noodles, I believe.  You can go back and check on the iTunes version!

14.) That's just editing trapping us.  Seven days of shooting.  Although, as Kane has explained, Eliot didn't have his hair long when he was "working" back in the day. He grew it to throw off people who might be looking for him.

15.) His hunger was for justice, and it was sated.

16.) Noted above.

@Caravelle: - 1.) A few years ago I heard a report (on French radio) about truffles, and about how there was this Chinese species of truffles which is 1) very common, i.e. cheap and 2) terrible-tasting that was flooding the market and replacing the "good" truffles that grow in France and Italy. Once I saw this episode was about truffles I somehow expected this to come up, and in fact if occurs to me such cheap-but-terrible truffles could have helped Nate pad out the 16 pounds to 20... Did this issue come up during your research at all, and did you consider using it if so ? 2.) the other thing that confused me was Parker's story; I mean, as others have said, isn't thieving "her thing" ? Having just watched the Rashomon job and her doing her happy dance when she gets the knife it surely looks like she's feeling something. And in the Studio Job that was an actual tear on her cheek listening to Eliot sing. 3.) Is it the significant thing here that she's actually trying to explore her emotions where she usually ignores, denies, or represses them ? Or does she want a hobby, to branch out from her laser focus on thieving ? 4.) And while I'm remembering S3, I'd forgotten about that flashback to Eliot in Home Ec. Has he always had a passion or inclination for cooking, or was that just a random class he took in high school and his real passion for cooking came in the story he tells in this episode ?

1.) Yes, it did come up, and was one fo the first versions of the cons we were going to use.  There may even be a reference in there kicking around.  In the end it got too damn complicated.

2.) Again, Parker is looking for a "thing" like a hobby, while thieving is her avocation.  Look, I'm giddy when I'm typing, but I also love hiking and game design. You've seen Parker's crash pad.  It's thief-a-riffic and not much else.

3.) Yes exactly. She's leanring how to prcess her emotions, and that means exploring them hin a non-crisis way.

4.) It's where he developed a taste for it.  His time with Toby, seasoned by his years of monomaniacal habitual training, brought him to the next level.

@Chelsea: Given the extent of Christian Kane's fight training through the course of the show, what's his capacity to win a real brawl? Does the choreography make practical application tricky, or is it just a matter of gauging distance between fist and opponent?

Answering that question sis the sort of thing that winds up inspiring people to come up and challenge actors to fights in bars.  That said, I've known Kane a fair bit of time.  He can handle himself.

@Kate: A bit off-episode. I'm set to be the Fixer for a Leverage RPG and wonder if there's a consistent source of ideas for villains you might be able to recommend?

The villain generator in the RPG is pretty great.  If you do a search for "Weird Crime" on the web, or peruse the WIRED magazine back issues, they;ve been focusing on 21st Century crime a lot lately.

@KAtie: So the first thing Parker goes to because she loves it is on of the Shades from the Gates of Hell? I'm sure there's some deep inner meaning there. Is there?

Yes. It cleared legal.

@Andrew Wilson: just wondering if I was the only one who thought Palmer and Sneeds small lady in charge and silent enforcer act was great and wishes they reappear in atleast a cameo.

Good lord, I loved those characters.  We originally had a much larger scene for them that was cut for time.  Just know they are the Riggs and Murtaugh of the Fisheries and Wildlife Agency.

@allyone: did somebody punch Tim Hutton in that last scene or was he allergic to all those truffles he was sniffing? One eye was distractingly red and puffy in that final scene with Rampone and Eliot. Like, injury or medical emergency red and puffy. Which also brings to mind, we know Kane spends his fair share of time getting scuffed up. Have the other actors had any major scrapes?

He did indeed have a weird eye infection flare-up that day.  But on our shooting schedule, we couldn't give him the day off.

I think everyone's managed to get a little dinged over the four years.  At least emotionally.

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Okay, kids, strap in for the next one, in just a few days.  As always, thanks for your time and questions!