[Warning: General spoilers ahead.]
I think we can all agree that Fatima has been through it this season. The sweetheart of the Fromily is in the home stretch (we hope) of a particularly bleak storyline as the maybe vessel for a maybe baby that first compelled her to eat garbage and then, apparently, murder Tillie in a rage. It’s been a lot. I recently caught up with Pegah Ghafoori for a welfare check-slash-interview to chat about this season.
Going into the season, she had no clue what awaited her when they returned to snowy Halifax, but she was grateful for being able to go home at night to roommate and co-star Hannah Cheramy and her beloved dog, who made the trip for filming. “I didn’t know. I was just praying that I make it through the night and make it through the next episode. Even now I’m like, ‘Did I make it through the episode?’ I could be gone next season. I don’t know,” she recalls.
“It was really, really sweet having Hannah there and my dog, obviously. He just brings me right back down to Earth. Every episode that we get, it’s a new blow or a new headache trying to figure it out. And it’s grown into this huge, beautiful piece of work and being able to be part of it has been very, very, very sweet.”
Ghafoori feels fortunate for the camaraderie she’s found with the extended cast. “We really show up for each other. It’s a really huge blessing having a cast that feels like family and acts like family,” she shares. “While we had Elizabeth Moy here, she would make a soup and bring it for us. Having each other has made all the difference.”
As we’ve discussed with others this season, the winter weather was a factor in filming, but Ghafoori considers herself lucky in that regard. “I was able to wear a jacket this season. The actors who play our monsters, seeing them in the outfits that they have, I’d watch and think, ‘I’m so sorry,'” she says.
“I remember in Season 1, or Season 2, it’s been a long time, when Ellis falls out of the window and I’m in that little blue slip dress, that night was cold [but] it was not December in Nova Scotia. And just seeing some other people that didn’t have coats and scarves and the heating packs stuck to their pockets, I just felt so bad for them. It was really difficult, but I think we did a great job.”
Fatima’s pica and near-vampirism was ickier to watch than it was for Ghafoori to play, but it wasn’t without its challenges, and overall, she’s grateful for the range f material the season provided her. “The rotting food was chocolate cake with black food coloring and molasses, which makes it sound a lot better than it was. The black dye would stay in my hands between each take and was sticky, so then I was eating tissue,” she laughs.
“Originally there were supposed to be maggots on them, too, but we lost that part. I’m glad that it reads as disgusting [on camera] as we wanted it to. [Keeping] that image in my head and trying to eat it and trying to play that balance was difficult. But scene with the blood, I mean it’s movie blood Right, it was edible, but sensory-wise it was a nightmare, it was not great.”
“I was lucky enough I got to do a lot this season. [Some of the scenes] were taxing on my body and there was a lot of screaming. And just being in that mental head space and physically, it just took a lot out of me. But I’m glad that I was able to do it and I’m glad that it’s done.”
This Sunday, in the first part of the Season 3 finale, the town rallies to find Fatima, with a limited set of details on her disappearance. Elgin approaches Ellis without trying to tip his hand. Julie helps her mom follow more clues about her past. And Victor tries to make amends for sending his mom to the bottle tree. The core producing trio handle the finale duties, with Jack Bender directing a script by John Griffin and Jeff Pinkner.
From Season 3 airs Sundays linearly at 9pm/8c on MGM+ in the US and on Paramount+ via Prime Video subscription channels in Canada. It drops on the MGM+ app at 12:01 am ET. All S1 and S2 episodes are available in the US on MGM+ online and via the app and on Prime Video, and on Paramount+ in Canada. ICYMI, all of our previous coverage — almost 40 pieces — is here. Here’s a sneak peek of “Reflections, Part One.” [Again, IMDb has a different title for this, calling it “Revelations: Chapter One,” so YMMV]
Photos courtesy of Chris Reardon/MGM+; videos courtesy of MGM+.
