by Gill Pringle
“You should never trust the husband. That should be the motto,” teases Brit actor Oliver Jackson-Cohen who knows a thing or two about dodgy spouses after terrorising Elisabeth Moss in Leigh Whannell’s clever 2020 reboot of The Invisible Man.
Don’t call him typecast but he’s back in action as another sinister spouse in Apple TV+’s twisty drama, Surface – this time with a new wife played by Gugu Mbatha-Raw.
An original story created by writer/showrunner Veronica West, perhaps this is the very reason she cast Jackson-Cohen in this eight-part mystery thriller, messing with audiences’ pre-conceptions of protagonist versus victim.
A co-production between Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine and Apple TV+, Surface asks: What would you do if you woke up one morning and couldn’t remember your past, who you were married to, who your friends were, or any of your own secrets?
That’s exactly what happens to Sophie (Mbatha-Raw) after being told she has survived a suicide attempt. However, she has no memory of trying to jump off a ferry into the San Francisco Bay, the trauma of which has caused complete memory loss.
“When we first meet Sophie, she’s in quite a vulnerable state,” says Mbatha-Raw. “She’s starting from scratch in terms of understanding who she is and what happened six months earlier.”
Her successful venture capitalist husband James (Jackson-Cohen) clearly loves her and is patiently helping to navigate her recovery. They live in a stunning San Francisco home. She has a caring best friend in Caroline (Ari Graynor) and a closet filled with designer clothes and jewelry. “But something at the core of it, she knows is wrong,” adds West [left] whose credits include High Fidelity, Ugly Betty, Brothers & Sisters and Mercy. “There is a question plaguing her from the beginning of the series: ‘If she had such a wonderful existence, why did she try to end her own life?’”
As Sophie begins to reintegrate with her friends and volunteer work, she encounters Detective Thomas Baden (Stephan James). “Sophie first meets Baden seemingly by chance,” Mbatha-Raw explains. “He is the first person that really brings the question mark to her present reality.”
Baden mysteriously suggests that there was more to what happened to her that day on the ferry and that she shouldn’t trust her husband, sending Sophie spiraling as she struggles to uncover her own memories.
Jackson-Cohen enjoyed the ambiguity of his portrayal of Sophie’s husband, James. “I think Veronica has constructed this incredible arc for the entire story, which is so well weaved together; how she does it with all the characters. You’re constantly reevaluating how you feel about every character in the show.
“And I think James is an interesting one. Without giving away too much, there is a real journey that James goes on where you meet this couple, and he can’t be trusted because he’s holding on to something.
“It’s a testament to Veronica, the way she wrote the show, that when you finally get to a point where you get more answers about his behaviour and what it is that’s going on, it’s tantalising. It’s thrilling to play and, for them in the edit, to play with an audience’s perception of how these characters come across. It’s all about perception – you can put a coat around someone and it looks caring, but it can also look controlling and so there’s all these things that they play with which adds to the mystery of everyone’s intentions,” says The Haunting of Hill House actor.
For Mbatha-Raw, messing with audiences’ instincts was the least of her problems – also having to shoot complex underwater scenes, a ritual which she nicknamed the ‘weekly wet’.
“‘Water is life’ became our motto on this show because, every week, Sophie would get wet in a very dramatic way, either the underwater sequence or a bath scene or a shower scene, or it was raining or we were on a boat…” recalls the actress whose credits include Motherless Brooklyn, Miss Sloane, Belle and Beauty and the Beast.
“Water is thematically the element that runs all the way through the show. I’ve never done any underwater acting before and it is way more challenging than it looks, I think because you’re literally out of your element. All of the usual tools that you use, how you move your face, how you breathe, all the basic things that you hopefully forget about when you’re normally acting, are completely contorted underwater; your eyes are bulging, you’re focused on staying alive, and not inhaling a bunch of water,” says the actress who worked with a free dive expert, coaching her in breath holding techniques.
“It was definitely one of the more challenging stunt sequences I’ve done. I did work with a stunt double, but I did a chunk of it myself which was intense. I’m not gonna lie, it was really grueling. But, for the effect that it has in the show, in terms of really opening us up to Sophie’s subconscious and her dreams or nightmares about that event on the boat, I think it’s very powerful imagery,” she says.
Sophie is not the only character who is trying to uncover a mystery, she is the mystery. “She is both the investigator and the investigation,” says West.
Throughout the season, audiences see Sophie at different stages of her life. “Gugu has the challenge of embodying the same character, but in different times in her life, with different attitudes and with different goals. And Gugu does that spectacularly. It’s so intriguing to see her walk through the world as Sophie from five years ago, then from right before the incident, and we also get the opportunity to see her in flashbacks as well.”
Mbatha-Raw – who played a pivotal role in Apple TV+’s Morning Wars – even goes as far as to describe Surface as “the role of a lifetime”.
“I feel like there’s so much to Sophie, so much meat and texture and so many layers to her that it’s just been so exciting. I love a challenge and it was exhilarating to have this huge character arc but also to be able to be a part of a lot of the choices behind the scenes that shape the feel of the show,” says the actress who also serves as an executive producer.
Filmed in challenging circumstances during the pandemic, she says, “I learned about resilience and endurance and leadership – being the Number One on the call sheet is a fun job. But, it’s a responsibility as well, so I learnt about that. And also, just what a joy it is to work with incredibly gifted actors and be inspired by this incredible cast, including Oliver and Stephan James, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Ari Graynor, Francois Arnaud…
“Coming out of lockdown and coming out of the pandemic, I re-discovered so much joy in being around great creative people.”
If Jackson-Cohen is careful not to give away any plot points, he will say that this new character is unlike The Invisible Man. “James is not an absolute sociopath,” he says playfully.
The first three episodes of Surface premiere on Friday, 29 July, followed by one new episode every Friday on Apple TV+
