Miguel Rivas may be the last person any of the Pearson goes to when making decisions. But on Tuesday These are U.S, his portrait artist gave all the cards.
Regular series character Jon Huertas directed “The Ride,” an hour that followed when Kevin / Madison, Kate / Toby / Ellie, Rebecca / Jack and Randall / Beth have brought babies from the hospital home over the years. And at the end of the episode, a new installment of the Rebecca-centered flash forward showed Annie and Deja – who was pregnant – arriving at Kevin’s house. (Read a full recap, then dive deep into flash-forward with our detailed guide.)
TVLine called Huertas on Tuesday to discuss his directorial debut in episodes, which included filming scenes with his much pregnant co-star, Mandy Moore. (“She was right there. She could really have broken her purse on one of my shooting days!”)
TVLINE | How did you drive this?
I was assigned to direct the show, practically since the first season. We have a show that is very desirable to direct because of our cast. Many television and film directors would like to sit in that director’s chair. Being an episode director for the first time, I had to wait for my turn, wait for my hour. One of the things I wanted to be sure of – we had this conversation, me and [series creator] Dan Fogelman – I didn’t want to be in the first episode I directed. I wanted to be able to focus on driving, because eventually that is where I wanted to be professionally full time. Being an actor in this would also have been much more difficult. We found a hole where I wouldn’t be in the episode I shot, and it wasn’t so much in the previous episode. They managed to stack all my work so that I could be there for the entire preparation period, because that is the most important part of the direction is the preparation.
I think Dan also felt that this episode fits for me, from the conversations we had in the past, what Kevin’s character is to me, he’s the character I connect with the most, personally. His desire to be accepted by his family. This is the moment when Kevin realizes that I must dedicate my time and myself to this new family, and that is a decision that I had to make at some point. Where I couldn’t think about what was missing in my life, with regard to the family. And it had to be about me and my family, and more about my future than my past. This is something that I thought was really good in this episode, what they did for Justin [Hartley]the character of, making him make the decision to finally make a real proposal and really commit to this family he created with Madison.
TVLINE | These flash-forwards are heavily examined by fans – and writers like me. With that in mind, was directing these scenes different from how you approached the rest of the episode?
Yes and no. What is no different is that all of our episodes are a minor piece of a larger story. And so, the way this flash-forward relates to the comprehensive story of the entire series, for me I see it as one of the Legos in this thing that I’m building. But the part we need to focus on is what they are saying, what they are doing and how can we be sure that they are not revealing anything? And how are we going to shoot to make sure of that? And so the challenges were just trying to find actresses who embody who our younger versions of Annie, Tess and Deja are. That was the most challenging element and I think we were very successful in that. There’s a cut scene from the episode that shows adult Annie who’s just remarkable how much she looks like our Annie. So like Faithe [Herman]. But for a while, we had to cut back on part of the episode. When I see those three girls next to each other, from Randall’s point of view, I am amazed at how much they look like them, how much they sound like them, how much they embody them.
… When Randall had that conversation with Beth about wanting to have a big family and a big family tree, that was another way of showing that he fulfilled his dream, his wish, with these three beautiful girls. And one of them, Deja, we revealed in the car that she is expecting a baby. This is speaking directly to where he says, “You are going to give me grandchildren.” For me, that was the most important part of that scene, not so much what is going on in the future with the family and Rebecca.
TVLINE | Rebecca as a new mother dealing with everything that happened to her is not a Rebecca that we saw a lot on this show. This episode deals directly with the character’s pain and shock. What did you and Mandy Moore talk about when you talked about these scenes?
The last time we saw Rebecca in that place with emotion was in Episode 1 × 03, from the first season. And then I watched that episode and said, “I want to do this right. I want it to look like a piece of that episode. ”But at the same time, we are at a different time – the car ride home … the whole episode is about everyone coming home with new babies – so how’s that play? Because the reality is that you have to be a mother now … We had to show the moment when she decides: “I have to be a mother”. … That was important for us: making Mandy play with the sadness of losing a child, but also playing with the need to be a mother, which is almost instinctive. So, we talked a lot about it and I think it worked very well. Mandy did an incredible job of really walking the fine line to maintain some of that sadness, but also to find that instinct.
And what was great was that Mandy herself was about to become a mother while we were filming. She was 37 weeks pregnant. She was right there. She could really have broken her purse on one of my shooting days. And I’m so happy that she didn’t. [Laughs] [Editor’s note: On Tuesday, Moore and husband Taylor Goldsmith announced the birth of their son, Gus.]