Karyn Kusama, Emmy-nominated for her directing work on ‘Yellowjackets,’ found herself drawn to the darkness of the story: “I often romanticize this idea that we just are left to fend for ourselves as women”
You also were involved with casting. Who was the hardest to nail down the right actor for?
The first scene in the pilot — of this young woman running in the snow in fear and then meeting her death in this trap —is so striking and ends up being a big mystery for the rest of the season. What went into shooting that? I think there were a couple challenges: We knew as we were shooting that scene that we hadn't completely answered the question of who that girl was, so we knew we couldn't really see much of her. But there was a lot of story to tell, which is that she, at the very least, is feeling hunted or is running from something, and at the very least is trapped and killed by what are clearly man-made efforts. It was sort of trickier than one might assume when you can't see the girl's face.