Death Becomes Her.
SYFY’s brand-new series Revival recently made its explosive debut, and fans already can’t get enough of the comic book adaptation for the small screen. In the closing moments of the premiere of the suspenseful series, it is revealed that Martha “Em” Cypress had been harboring a “deadly” secret: she’s a Reviver.
In the upcoming episode, “Keeping Up Appearances,” viewers will learn a little bit about how that came to be in the Em-centric installment.
PopWire recently connected with Co-Creator/Co-Showrunner Luke Boyce, who divulged details on the casting process for Em, why actress Romy Weltman was perfect for the role, introduced character Rhodey Rasch, and explained why viewers will not want to miss the episode.
Though Melanie Scrofano was Boyce’s and Co-Showrunner Aaron Koontz’s first choice for the role of single mother Dana Cypress, for the character’s sister, the creators cast a wide net when it came to filling the role of complex character Em.
“We saw hundreds and hundreds of auditions [for Em],” Boyce tells PopWire, “and there were some amazing people in there. But when me and Aaron got to Romy, I remember we were sitting in the same room and I started crying. I saw the audition and I stopped it and I said, ‘Aaron, I’m choking up. This is amazing.'”
Canadian actress Romy Weltman tells PopWire that one of her audition scenes was the one in the car opposite on-screen sister Melanie Scrofano in the series premiere. The scene was not only a favorite of ours but also one of Boyce’s.
“Em is so interesting because she has to exhibit this fragility. You want to protect her, but at the same time she also has to project this incredible strength. Like she has to play both really well. And we saw that [with Romy]. We saw this vulnerability there, but she went from like vulnerability to super funny in like a moment. Because the other thing is like Dana’s really funny.
“Dana uses humor and sarcasm as this defense mechanism, and so we felt Em to a degree would do that as well,” Boyce continues. “[Romy] ticked all the boxes, and more that we didn’t even realize, so much of her, it’s just her ability, just like Melanie, to go from something such high drama into just being funny and everything like that so quickly and so effortlessly.”
Naomi Peters/Lavivier Productions/SYFY
In the opening moments of the upcoming episode “Keeping Up Appearances,” viewers will be taken back to the moment where Em Cypress unexplicably “wakes up.” We later see the aftermath of the revelation that the younger Cypress daughter is a Reviver when she heals after rudely being impaled to ‘death’ by an aggressive Reviver. Not only will Em’s story surprise those watching, but who she is surprises even Dana.
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“It’s one of the reasons I really enjoy [Episodes 2 & 3] because they’re about uncovering this person that Dana thought she knew and realizing maybe she didn’t know her as well. With Em, especially where we’ve really kind of moved away from the comic with her, is we’ve kind of given her secrets. It’s fun to do that because on the surface, she is sort of that kind of emo, introspective, overprotected person that she is in the comic. But [in our series] we’ve gone further with it.
“I think people will be surprised a bit about what [Em] is capable of. And it’s just her strength. I’m just so excited for people to go on this Em journey. Dana is our anchor in this story and I love Dana so much and Dana’s story is incredible, but Em is right there and I think the Em story throughout this whole season is ultimately what people will really gravitate towards.”
Along Em’s journey in Episode 2, the character meets Rhodey Rasch (Kaleb Horn) after a bloody bar brawl at Nella’s. Fans of the comic are familiar with this character, but for the SYFY series, creators Koontz and Boyce went through an interesting process to adapt the character for the screen and opted to go in a slightly different direction.
Naomi Peters/Lavivier Productions/SYFY
“As we know in the comics, [Rhodey’s] a YouTuber. His November Dismember is his YouTube page. In our version, November Dismember is his band name. I don’t want to spoil too much with Rhodey, but that character is certainly a little different, but we really loved what we could do with him.
“The whole reason for moving away from YouTube is we placed the time period a little earlier, even earlier than when the comic takes place, because we wanted to insulate our town. And so just the idea of social media, it just creates a scenario if you had [an event like this shared online, it would’ve gone viral.] So we wanted to make sure that we sort of still had a world where that wouldn’t.
“It’s still a global event in our story,” Boyce adds, “but social media is not so prevalent that it’s just like a wildfire. It keeps our story a little bit more focused and centered on the town and on our characters. So moving Rhodey away from that a little bit was one of the decisions we made.”
For the season’s second installment, Boyce reveals that the show dives much deeper into character lore and the history of its cast. It’s one of his favorites, as viewers will finally get a closer look at Em.
“With the pilot, structurally we had to keep Em tampered a little bit because you don’t want to give away that ending. We have Em at arm’s length for most of episode one. Episode 2 is our chance to really get to know Em. And I think that people will be surprised.
“If you already kind of love Em from Episode 1, you’re really going to love Em in Episode 2,” Luke Boyce exclaims. “It just really opens that door. And of course more Dana and Em dynamic, which I think is fantastic through the whole series, just moments together are just wonderful.”
Revival “Keeping Up Appearances” was written by Aaron B. Koontz & Luke Boyce and directed by Amanda Row. The episode airs Thursday, June 19 at 10/9c on SYFY.
