We’re most likely going to be hearing a lot from Frank Darabont and his “Walking Dead” cast and crew in the coming months, so hopefully you’re prepared. The executive producer and head honcho of the hit AMC series sat down for an interview with Deadline.com and discussed the surprising acclaim the show has received thus far, the controversy surrounding his supposed decision to replace the entire writing staff, and what we can expect story-wise from the second season.
Regarding the rumor that he canned the writing staff in favor of freelancers: “Let me just begin by stating the obvious: that it was all pretty overblown. It left the impression that I walked in one day and murdered 12 people. Would you like to know how many writers we were talking about? Two. My thought had been that they’d under-delivered, and a change was necessary. I had to do too much of it by myself last year, and that was only six episodes. This season, it’s 13 and we’ve hired a fantastic writing staff. We hired Glen Mazzara as our Number Two in the room. We consider him our head writer and he’s just a fantastic asset. We’ve also got three other staff writers in Scott Gimple, Evan Reilly from Rescue Me, and Angela Kang. Plus Executive Producer Robert Kirkman, who wrote the original comic book, is also writing for us.”
On what’s on tap for the upcoming season: “It’s fair to say that the fi rst six episodes were teeing up a lot of conflicts that will be more fully explored in our second season. We find a growing conflict with our two main guys, Rick [Andrew Lincoln] and Shane [Jon Bernthal]. We’re really excited about putting all of the characters on a chessboard and seeing how wonderfully and effectively we can toss conflict into the game.”
On whether or not he’s got the Emmys on his mind: “You know, a little bit. And it’s awesome to be a part of that chatter. We were just blown away to get nominated for a Golden Globe, a DGA award, and a WGA award in our first year. But that stuff is out of our control.”
To read the entire interview, head on over to Deadline.com.
From season 1, Emma Bell
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