PopHorror Let's Get Scared
Peacock’s new show, Teacup, is pretty damn good. Created by Ian McCulloch (Yellowstone), executive produced by E.L. Katz (Azrael – read our interview with him HERE) and James Wan (too many to name), and starring Scott Speedman (The Strangers), Yvonna Strahovski (Chuck), and Kathy Baker (Edward Scissorhands), Teacup is balls-to-the-wall crazy and will leave you with the thought of – in a good way – what the fuck?
Trapped on a farm in rural Georgia, a group of neighbors must put aside their differences and unite in the face of a mysterious and deadly threat.
To celebrate the release of the show, I chatted with Scott and Yvonne about what intrigued them about the series, what they wanted to bring to the show, horror movies, and more!
PopHorror: I really enjoyed Teacup so I’m excited to talk with you about it today. All of my questions are for both of you. What intrigued you about the script and made you want to be a part of the project?
Scott Speedman: For me, I knew Ian personally and professionally from other things. We’d been knowing each other and working together for a little while and I loved him so much. He’d never told me about it, but I’d heard he was doing something in the horror space and I just needed to see what that was because that sounded not like him, to be honest. My knowings of him was just about other things and I thought it was really interesting that he was writing something in the genre space. When I got the scripts, I was blown away with the world he created with this family on a farm. I thought this was just so cool and real. Outside of all the genre stuff, I thought these scenes with Yvonne’s character and myself were going to be so fun to do, and if we can half of what’s on the page on the screen, we were going to be in good shape before all the other genre elements started. So on that level, that dynamic, I was all in.
PopHorror: I love it when someone that you wouldn’t expect to make horror, goes and makes horror.
Scott Speedman: Exactly!
PopHorror: That’s the best.
Scott Speedman: Yeah, that’s cool.
Yvonne Strahovski: Yeah, I think that’s what definitely was the draw card for me too, was his vision was… Like he didn’t treat it as a horror, it was more like an elevated drama piece really, and then it so happens to have all this horror element to it. I think that was probably the approach for most of us in creating it, the scenes, and how thoughtful we were about piecing all these relationships together on camera. I think you have to, you have to be really thoughtful about it and have a thoughtful leader on something like this because of how cuckoo crazy it goes at the end. We need the audience there with us for all the crazy stuff that happens towards the end.
PopHorror: I like that you brought up the end because I can’t wait to see more. You hooked me in and you had me through the whole thing, and then at the end, you got me, Yvonne, with your last… I’m not going to give anything away but that got me.
Yvonne Strahovski: Aww!
PopHorror: Was there anything that you were adamant about bringing to your character?
Yvonne Strahovski: I think for me, it kind of goes off of this end conversation. It was demanding, let’s just say that much. It’s a demanding ending. For the character, it’s unthinkable and unimaginable. It’s my job to make that as believable as humanly possible even though we’re in this genre piece. I really want the audience to be with me and with all of us in the relationships that we existed in in front of the camera. It was really, really important that the steppingstones that fall into place prior to us getting to the ending, that all of those make sense emotionally for myself but also in turn, for the audience going along for the ride with me and with everybody else. That was probably the most important thing in building Maggie, the character.
Scott Speedman: For me, in terms of anything I was adamant about, honestly not really. I was very confident with the scripts I was reading. Reading the first three episodes as those episodes rolled in, to be totally honest with you, it doesn’t always happen where you’re not questioning things so much and are just able to go on the ride with the showrunner, Ian, and really liking where he’s taking the show unexpectedly. So for me, it was less about a character thing. I’m more interested in at this point in my career, where the show is going and if they are taking advantage of everything they set up in the first three episodes. Are they taking it in an adventurous, artistic, exciting way? On this, I was yeah, I was blown away by how brave I thought they were being with where they were taking the story and it wasn’t boring at all. It was the opposite. It was crazy and great and wild and challenging and all those things. I was very happy as the show went on.
PopHorror: I love both of those answers. Just one last question for you both. What is your favorite scary movie?
Scott Speedman: Look, it’s pretty easy with The Shining. I love that one. I can watch that one and get really fundamentally terrified. But I also really like going back, and this is probably when I watched Friday the 13th by myself when I was a youngster, and it affected me in a terrible way. Definitely scarred me. The end of the movie scarred me for a good couple of years. The Exorcist too. All of those things.
Yvonne Strahovski: You’re very classic. You go with the classics.
Scott Speedman: Yeah, classics.
Yvonne Strahovski: I used to watch every horror that came out. The one that made me quit watching horror altogether was the first Paranormal Activity that came out. I was petrified that something would come to me in the middle of the night and slowly take the sheet off my bed as I was trying to sleep. That really made an impact. I remember when The Blair Witch Project came out. That also made a huge impact. It changed the scope of horror films and television. And then I really remember watching The Exorcism of Emily Rose a lot. I was a big fan of that one, and of course, The Ring. I love The Ring. I guess I have a few.
Thank you so much to Scott and Yvonne for taking the time to speak with us. The first two episodes of Teacup premiere Thursday, October 10, 2024, with two episodes premiering every Thursday through October 31, 2024, only on Peacock!
