Fresh off being behind the camera as second unit director for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, director Victoria Mahoney returned to the world of television for HBO’s new series Lovecraft Country. Mahoney directed the fourth episode of the series (which aired over the weekend on the premium cable network) and brought a flair to it that was clearly inspired by some of the previous films down by none other than Lucasfilm. In a new interview, Mahoney opened up about these inspirations and how a specific note from showrunner Misha Green got her excited about working on the show and influenced her episode.
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“What’s exciting about the overall approach I think that Misha Green had was she wanted them to live on their own, and then the audience will see this really, truly does veer off to uncharted territory for them, and it is a standalone,” Mahoney told Deadline. “There was an operative sentence that came to me at the beginning, and it had to do with Jurnee Smollett calling me on a Saturday early early early in the morning. She said a sentence to me, and that was the sentence that got me on the plane, essentially, and it was, she said ‘This is Indiana Jones and The Goonies for black folks.’ I thought, ‘Oh my goodness, I’ve waited my life for that.’ So, it means a great, great deal to me as an individual, as a storyteller, and as an audience member.”
Though she’s not set to return for the rest of this season on Lovecraft Country, Mahoney already has her next project lined up and will direct an adaptation of the Kyle Starks graphic novel Kill Them All for Paramount Pictures. Screenwriter James Coyne has been tapped to pen the adaptation with Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol‘s Josh Appelbaum and Andre Nemec set to produce. Timing on when the film will go in front of cameras naturally remains a question mark as productions are mostly still on pause due to the coronavirus.
Last week, HBO announced Lovecraft Country: Sanctum, a new series of virtual reality events aimed at transporting guests into a world inspired by the show. In a first-of-its-kind social VR event series, 100 influential voices will experience three events consisting of immersive theater, escape rooms, art installations, puzzles and a live concert, via the Oculus Quest headset, all inspired by Lovecraft Country. The events will be simultaneously run on the social VR platform VRChat, which allows guests to talk and interact with each other in real-time within the environment, and streamed to the world via YouTube Live and interacting in real-time.
Lovecraft Country airs Sundays at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on HBO and is available to stream on HBO Max.
