Rage Rooms and Mason Jars
by Lane Florsheim | Wall Street Journal | May 4, 2020
When stay-at-home orders began, the cast and crew of Billions had finished seven of season 5’s twelve episodes, the first of which aired May 3. On a Zoom call with WSJ., some of the cast and crew’s most vital members were emotional about seeing each other’s faces again. “I’ll just say—looking at all of you right now, I’m very sad that we’re not together doing this,” said showrunner Brian Koppelman. “Whenever we can go back to work, we’ll finish the five remaining episodes, which are pretty much written.”
This season begins a little less harmoniously. Almost everyone is out for blood: Chuck Rhoades (played by Paul Giamatti) is back in the attorney general’s office, hellbent once again on taking down billionaire hedge fund manager Bobby Axelrod (Damian Lewis), all while restarting a teaching career and coping with the dissolution of his marriage to Wendy (Maggie Siff). Taylor Mason (Asia Kate Dillon), who left Axe Capital to start their own shop at the end of season 3, is back at Axe with plans to let Chuck and Axe demolish each other. New guest stars arrive this season: Corey Stoll plays woke billionaire and new Axe foe Mike Prince; Julianna Margulies stars as a sociology professor peer of Chuck’s; and comedian Eva Victor joins as Rian, a brilliant analyst with a unique market view in some of the season’s later episodes.
In a group interview, Giamatti, Dillon, Siff, Stoll, Koppelman and his co-showrunner David Levien discuss the making of season 5, how the cast’s real-life moments become parts of the show’s script and whether the characters on Billions are capable of change.
Continue reading The Billions Cast on What They’ve Learned from Wall Street – May 5, 2020
