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The Daily Star, Oneonta, N.Y., Friday, May 15, 2020 4 By Rachel Jones TV Media T hey're playing a danger- ous game, and it's hard to tell who is hunting whom — a new episode of "Killing Eve" airs Sunday, May 17, on AMC. This wildly popular crime drama is pushing its way to the top of everyone's watchlist, and after the shocking and devastating loss of a character earlier in the season, fans are champing at the bit to find out what happens next. When we first meet Eve Po- lastri (Sandra Oh, "Grey's Anatomy") in Season 1, she is a CIA agent stuck behind a desk. Her life is lacking the thrill and excitement she dreamed of when she joined the agency. To make up for the void she's feeling, Eve takes a special interest in female serial killers, becoming particularly preoccupied with whom she believes to be a killer as yet un- known to the CIA, one who has been operating under the ra- dar. After some exciting twists, Eve becomes responsible for hunting down the notorious Villanelle, played by Jodie Comer ("The White Princess"). Villanelle is a high-class as- sassin who relishes the luxu- ries that her violent work af- fords her. As Eve becomes ob- sessed with catching her, Vil- lanelle becomes equally ob- sessed with Eve. Connected by a mutual passion for the twist- ed, they enter into a confusing relationship characterized by mutual respect, wacky obses- sion and mistrust. The show also stars Fiona Shaw ("Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," 2001) as Carolyn Mar- tens, who leads the Russian di- vision of MI6, and Danish actor and director Kim Bodnia ("Ne- farious," 2020), who plays Vil- lanelle's handler, Konstantin Vasiliev. So far, "Killing Eve" has also showcased a few interesting guest stars. We have seen tal- ented actors and actresses, in- cluding Susan Lynch ("Mon- roe"), Julian Barratt ("The Mighty Boosh"), Emma Pier- son ("Absolutely Anything," 2015) and Shannon Tarbet ("Beast," 2017). The show has also included David Haig ("Downton Abbey," 2019), who has had a long and suc- cessful career both on stage and on screen. All of these ap- pearances have added to the story's strong and compelling characterization. Like other top-tier shows air- ing right now, "Killing Eve" was derived from a popular novel, the 1998 thriller "Code- name Villanelle." Written by Luke Jennings, a British jour- nalist and author, the book is actually a collection of four no- vellas that were originally re- leased as ebooks between Feb- ruary 2014 and June 2016. His writing has been lauded and his style has been compared to that of Ian Flemming, the famed author of the James Bond novels. In fact, the assas- sin Villanelle has been com- pared to Bond, thanks mostly to her tongue-and-cheek atti- tude and love for the lavish. Producers of the show knew whom they wanted to play Eve right from the start, and their casting of Oh was the perfect choice. Her down-to-earth per- formance allows us all to relate to her search for meaning in her life. It's true that the concept of a female killer has been done be- fore, most recently with Alice Morgan (Ruth Wilson, "His Dark Materials") in BBC's "Lu- ther." But "Killing Eve" brings some compelling and previ- ously untapped angles to the role of the assassin Villanelle. The show itself is uniquely femme powered, managing to keep palpable tension while having both leading roles be women. Beyond just Oh and Comer's performances, the show gets much of that power from its female writers. Phoebe Waller-Bridge — the creator and star of "Fleabag," and arguably one of the best screenwriters of our time — was the first to put her spin on Jennings' novel as head writer for the first season of "Killing Eve." There has been a new head writer for each season, which goes a long way to keeping the story feeling fresh and new. It's no surprise that "Killing Eve" has received critical ac- claim, especially with how popular it has become with viewers. The popularity of the show was driven in large part by word of mouth, with each fan gushing about the series to their friends to create a snowball effect. Not long af- ter the show's release, it was named the Best Show of 2018 by Time magazine. In 2019, Comer was named Best Lead- ing Actress by the British Academy Television Awards. The show also received the Peabody Award in 2019, and Sandra Oh won a Screen Ac- tors Guild Award for Out- standing Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Se- ries. coverstory Sandra Oh in "Killing Eve" It's a thin line: The love and hate of 'Killing Eve' returns on AMC By Adam Thomlison TV Media Q: My kids enjoyed "Goosebumps" with Jack Black. At the end of that movie, [spoilers redacted]. The implica- tion, we thought, was that this would be the starting point for a sequel. Is one in the works? A: Actually, a sequel came and went without you knowing, and that may be because it didn't use the first movie as a start- ing point at all. "Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween" was released in 2018, three years after the first "Goosebumps" movie. Jack Black returns in a cameo, again playing author R.L. Stine, but other than that, the sequel basically has no connection to the first film, and that may be why you don't know about it (let alone why there hasn't been a third). The film made its money back, but it didn't have anything close to the success of the original. "Resetting the location and characters is a baffling idea that never pays off," Hollywood Reporter reviewer Josh Spiegel said. Without giving away the exact details of how the original ended (in case anyone is just now finding out about it and doesn't want the plot spoiled), it did end in a way that left it open for a sequel. But the sequel didn't take that opening. In- stead, we got a whole new group of kids and a whole new plot. The only commonality is the tolerably scary hijinks and the meta take on the source material — both films feature Stine, author of the original Goosebumps books, as a character (although again, he only appears briefly in the sequel). Q: Alex Trebek speaks so clearly when reading the "Jeopardy" clues. How many languages does he speak? A: It actually depends who you ask, or maybe when. He told Parade magazine he speaks five, including English. "I can get by in Spanish, Italian, Russian and Swahili. But don't expect much in Hawaiian and Welsh." But other sources say he speaks as many as 17, but only English and French fluently. The truth might be somewhere in between, especially since he didn't mention French among the five he listed to Parade magazine. He said in another interview with Ask Men magazine that his famous care for enunciation and pronunciation, which you point out in your question, comes from being raised in a bilin- gual English-French household. But just because he doesn't flub a non-English word in a clue doesn't mean he speaks the language. He admitted in the Ask Men interview that he spends up to an hour and a half be- fore each show just rehearsing the answers and questions. Have a question? Email us at questions@tvtabloid.com. Please include your name and town. Personal replies will not be provided. hollywoodQ&A Towne Floring 3 x 2

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