Filed in The Americans

Latest from TVLine – March 4 2014

Question: I’ll take an Americans scoop, please! —Jordan
Ausiello: Boardwalk Empire‘s Wrenn Schmidt debuts in this season’s fifth episode as Phillip and Elizabeth’s new handler Kate — and Claudia she’s not. “We spent a lot of time talking about who the new handler should be,” shares exec producer Joel Fields. “And we thought, ‘Well, if we’re running the center, and it didn’t work out with Claudia, who would we send? Let’s find Claudia’s polar opposite. Let’s send somebody who is going to keep Phillip and Elizabeth happy and encourage them to do their job well.” Adds fellow EP Joe Weisberg: “There’s no reason a handler has to be dishonest or particularly manipulative. There’s no reason not to try to be fundamentally open.”

Source: http://tvline.com/

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Keri on Jimmy Fallon

Keri will be on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on this friday March 7. Don’t forget to watch it.

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Keri Russell on fame, kids and series TV

Keri Russell still has great hair, but playing the deadly Soviet spy Elizabeth Jennings on “The Americans,” she has come a long way from the shy college coed she played on “Felicity” 15 years ago. But unlike either of the tightly wound characters on “The Americans” (FX), Russell is relaxed and personable.

Still, the actress, 37, does have one thing in common with Elizabeth — being the mother of two kids. Russell’s are 6 and 2 years old; Elizabeth’s are 14-year-old Paige (Holly Taylor) and 11-year-old Henry (Keidrich Sellati).

“What’s fun about the show is that Elizabeth goes on all these spy missions, and then she’s in the car flipping out like a normal mom about something that her 14-year-old girl is doing,” Russell says.

This strange dynamic has made “The Americans” a hit among fans and a critical success. The show has received two Emmy nominations and was named best new program by the Television Critics Association.

When the series launched its second season Feb. 26, the storyline had reached the year 1981, and Elizabeth and her husband, Philip (Matthew Rhys) — KGB sleeper agents for 15 years who pose as travel agents in the Washington, D.C., area — have barely escaped being caught in an FBI trap. Now the couple is once again juggling parental duties with espionage — involving assassinations, sex and disguises. Continue reading Keri Russell on fame, kids and series TV

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The Americans: TV Review

In its second season, “The Americans” proves that it’s safe to trust in the greatness on display last season, as the writers ratchet up the tension and deftly broaden the story.

One of television’s finest dramas, The Americans, returns tonight on FX for its second season and almost immediately answers a nagging question that haunts all ambitious, claustrophobic thrillers: Can this series get even better or will it go off the rails as the story unspools?

Not only does The Americans get better – a nifty trick given how impressive season one was – but it deepens along the way and confidently asserts the narrative abilities of creator, writer and executive producer Joe Weisberg and executive producer and writer Joel Fields. Nothing calms the worries of critics (and fans) like visual evidence of a sure hand (or hands, in this case). Look no further than Homeland for the most recent example of a great series (season one) going completely sideways (season two) and then into a ditch (season three). In a television landscape where there’s an excess of top-tier brilliance, never have the strengths and pitfalls of the medium – that it provides a platform for an ongoing, multi-hour, multi-season story – proven so deadly to maintaining greatness.

It would be so easy to look away, to look elsewhere, if The Americans faltered. That’s the beauty of modern-day television – we are blessed with an abundance of choices, so by God don’t trip up and lose the confidence or interest of your audience, because they’ll turn the channel. Continue reading The Americans: TV Review

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Americans Post Mortem: Keri Russell, Matthew Rhys and EPs Explore the Bloody Season 2 Premiere’s Big Twists, Lingering Questions

Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys and exec producers Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields reflect on the episode’s three biggest twists and lightly tease what’s to come.

ARE WE IN MAYBERRY? | After several months away “visiting her aunt,” a fully recovered Elizabeth returned home with a surprising new accessory: a smile. The entire Jennings clan seemed to be enjoying a rare moment of bliss. “Everything was great,” shares Rhys. “There was a real sense of, ‘Possibly, this could be fine. We can all be happy spies ever after.’” Adds Weisberg: “This is the first time that Phillip and Elizabeth are able to be happy as a couple after that year of struggling with their marriage. It’s their time to be married.”

THE OTHER SHOE | Their temporary respite from doom-and-gloom was shattered in the hour’s final act when Phillip and Elizabeth found the bodies of their spy doppelgangers — Emmett and Leanne Connors — lying in a pool of blood in a hotel room. The Conners’ daughter also was killed; only the son managed to survive. “They lost these people who are really like them,” points out Weisberg. “It sets this undercurrent of, “Are we next?” Before, their primary fear was, “We might be on an operation and get killed or arrested. The kids could be orphaned, or sent to a state orphanage because we’re in prison.” But now that’s different. Now their family could get killed. It’s a whole different thing. It’s an emotional punch that you struggle with.” The bloodbath affects Elizabeth “in a massive way,” previews Russell. “She hasn’t been worried about her children in that physical way, but now the danger is encroaching on her family. This whole season is about protecting her family.”

KITCHEN NIGHTMARES | Phillip is now murdering innocent people — in this case, a busboy who just so happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. “Once his wig comes off and [the busboy] could see him and recognize him in a line-up, he made the snap decision to shoot him,” explains Rhys. “And it starts to weigh heavily on him this season. Not specifically this death, but the consequences of what they do.” Fields admits he wasn’t worried that the brazen incident would make Phillip irredeemable in viewers’ eyes. “We really don’t think that way,” he shares. “We think about being true to where the characters are. What choice did he have once he was in that situation? He had been seen. Was that busboy not going to go to the police and do a composite sketch? Had [Phillip] not ripped off his wig, he probably would’ve walked straight out.”

Source: http://tvline.com

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