The second season of Little Marvin's horror anthology series THEM, which is officially titled THEM: The Scare, is now streaming on Prime Video, and ahead of the premiere, we sat down with the show's leading lady Deborah Ayorinde, who is the only returning cast member from season one, this time playing Detective Dawn Reeve.
In our conversation, she tells me more about her new character and her process behind getting into the right headspace for some of the show's most gruesome crime scenes. Plus, she tells me about reuniting with Little Marvin and what to expect from this latest season.
As per Prime Video, "The new story centers on LAPD Homicide Detective Dawn Reeve who is assigned to a new case: the gruesome murder of a foster home mother that has left even the most hardened detectives shaken. Navigating a tumultuous time in Los Angeles, with a city on the razor’s edge of chaos, Dawn is determined to stop the killer. But as she draws closer to the truth, something ominous and malevolent grips her and her family…"'
The cast features Deborah Ayorinde, Pam Grier, Luke James, Joshua J. Williams, Jeremy Bobb, Wayne Knight, Carlito Olivero, Charles Brice, and Iman Shumpert.
Watch our full interview with Deborah Ayorinde below and/or keep scrolling to read the full transcript! Plus, please remember to subscribe to our YouTube channel for more exclusive content!
ROHAN: How would you say your new character Det. Dawn Reeve is similar to and/or differs from your season one character Lucky?
DEBORAH: I think Dawn and Lucky are very, very strong. They're very - what I found about them is they wear many different hats, which I thought was really cool and allowed me to play these characters that are not just one thing, because, I know, even in real life, I'm not just one thing. What I love about both of them is that they're both strong and feminine, you know, one doesn't have to compromise the other, and I love that. I feel very seen by that. I can relate to that, and so, yeah, that really excited me.
ROHAN: Little Marvin has said that you were his muse while he was writing this new season. What does that mean to you and what is it like working with him again?
DEBORAH: Gosh, well, whenever I hear that he's called me his muse, my heart, just yeah, that means a lot. I trust him. I trust him with my art, and that's not something that I can say about a lot of people, because I think it's very challenging to be an actor and do your best, and kind of leave it in the hands of everyone else. It goes through many different processes that you're not a part of, and you just kind of have to hope for the best, but I think the unique thing about when I work with LM, I feel like I can just leave it to him and just do my best, and I trust that it's going to come out great. He's a genius, so I'm literally just trying to keep up with his geniusness, you know, so I will work with him a million times over if he will have me, honestly.
ROHAN: Since you're playing a detective this season, you get to be present at a lot of crime scenes. Was that something you were comfortable with going in or did you have to prep yourself mentally before every scene?
DEBORAH: Being in this Them universe, I've learned to get comfortable being uncomfortable. I didn't go into this expecting to be comfortable at all, so, short answer is no, I wasn't really like, Yay, crime scene today, but I feel like that is kind of my character's experience is that yes, she's trying to show up. Like, this is just another day at work, while also she's a human being at the end of the day, and she's affected by the things that she's seeing and taking in, and so, yeah, I really wanted to portray that. But, I feel like being stretched and being uncomfortable in that way, kind of, you know, it just feels, in a weird way, exciting. I don't know if that’s a bit odd or I need to seek therapy. *laughs*
ROHAN: Horror is a genre that requires you to be very vulnerable as a performer, which I'm assuming is a unique kind of challenge. What is your process of getting to those places mentally?
DEBORAH: It depends on the scene, to be honest with you. Music is always a part of my process, like really just trying to immerse myself into something that would really evoke the emotions because I feel like it's just such a beautiful access point, to access the emotions that I need. But, I spend time before these emotional scenes really connecting with my characters as I would another human being, and just kind of understanding how they feel, and I feel like when I'm able to understand truly how my character feels in any given moment, it becomes not hard to access their emotions, you know, to have empathy and compassion for them, and that's what kind of shows up on screen.
THEM will once again be set in Los Angeles County (the first installment, subtitled Covenant, took place in Compton circa 1952 but will move the time frame forward to 1991). The new story centers on LAPD Homicide Detective DAWN REEVE who is assigned to a new case: the gruesome murder of a foster home mother that has left even the most hardened detectives shaken. Navigating a tumultuous time in Los Angeles, with a city on the razor’s edge of chaos, Dawn is determined to stop the killer. But as she draws closer to the truth, something ominous and malevolent grips her and her family…
Them: The Scare is now streaming on Prime Video!