Love the Clean Look of 'Severance'? You Have This Grimy Jon Bernthal Thriller To Thank

Even people who don’t watch Severance know that it’s one of the most immaculately crafted shows being released right now. Do any casual scrolling through the cinephile corners of social media, and you’ll come across screenshots from any given episode that flexes its formal precision and delicate chiaroscuro lighting. That’s due in large part to cinematographer Jessica Lee Gagné, who has shot 14 of Severance‘s episodes, including the pilot, making her the primary architect of the show’s visual language. Her involvement in the show was a long time coming, as Severance‘s director/executive producer/biggest Knicks fan Ben Stiller said on the Severance podcast that he first noticed her talents when watching a 2017 film called Sweet Virginia, a crime thriller starring Jon Bernthal and Christopher Abbott.

What Is ‘Sweet Virginia’ About?

Sam (Jon Bernthal) pointing a gun in 'Sweet Virginia' — Image via IFC

In a sleepy little town, Sam (Bernthal) runs the local motel, dealing with regular customer problems while trying to move on from his past. He was a promising rodeo rider until an injury left him with a limp and increasingly bad tremors (the less he thinks about this, the better). The only excitement in his life is the budding relationship he’s been having with Bernadette (Rosemarie DeWitt), who’s been grieving her husband getting shot to death by an unknown assailant. Little does Sam know that the person responsible for her husband’s death is Elwood (Abbott), the off-putting young man who forcibly charmed his way into Sam’s friendship and only came to town to kill the cheating husband of Lila (Imogen Poots) for money. Sweet Virginia is disappointingly thin as a narrative, and takes itself too seriously to have any pulpy fun, but it’s worth seeing for the performances of Bernthal and Abbott, two different forces of gruff masculinity butting heads who are stuck in a dance of death with each other. It’s a pretty good-looking dance when you have Jessica Lee Gagné shooting it, and it isn’t hard to see what Stiller saw in her.

Ben Stiller Used Jessica Lee Gagné for ‘Severance’ and ‘Escape at Dannemora’

Stiller said that he first thought of working with Gagné for Escape at Dannemora, the true crime miniseries about a prison escape that was Stiller’s big return to television directing. Similar to Sweet Virginia, it was a project about small-scale crime in a rustic Pacific Northwestern environment, and Stiller knew immediately that whoever shot that film would be the right person for the job. Needless to say, Sweet Virginia seemingly doesn’t look anything like Severance, given its independent film status and smaller scale, but if you look close enough, you can find similar motifs and techniques she uses to build atmosphere.

She frequently highlights the enormous mountains and permanent grayness of the outside that keep the unnamed town feeling fenced-in and hidden by a gloomy cloud from the rest of the world, visualizing the pressure-cooker entrapment that its characters find themselves in. She shows a strong preference for keeping things in the shadows, emphasizing natural lighting that plays across people’s faces without obscuring them too much, in turn drawing your eyes to their micro-expressions. Even the times when scenes are more brightly lit tend to come from indoor florescent lighting that casts harsh shapes onto actors’ faces, leaving them nowhere to hide. This is combined with her penchant for off-kilter framing where characters tend to feel small in larger spaces, even when it’s the interior of an average diner or motel room. All in all, she becomes the primary engine through which much of the film’s tension derives, rather than the script itself.

Ben Stiller Saw Beyond Gagné’s Previous Aesthetic

Jon Bernthal's Sam sipping coffee in Sweet Virginia — Image via IFC Films

If there’s any larger truth to be gleaned from this, it’s to trust the malleability of artists who have proven skill. On paper, it makes sense for Gagné to go from shooting Sweet Virginia to Escape at Dannemora, but not to go from that to Severance, as they seem to exist in entirely different worlds. Severance is so polished and extravagant in its camera maneuvers and is always looking for Stanley Kubrick-esque compositions that make you stop and go “whoa.”

Steven Spielberg sitting in front of a green exit sign

The Film Steven Spielberg Thought Was So Perfect He Almost Gave Up Directing

The film remains a favorite of the esteemed director.

While Sweet Virginia is exceptionally well-shot, it never tries to flex much outside of an impressive tracking shot here and there, and is more content with being handheld and focusing on the characters’ movement. Too often nowadays, the way both fans and artists tend to “fancast” who should be involved in projects is based entirely on the surface level of what people have already done (I mean, look at how we can only picture Sadie Sink playing a spunky redhead in Spider-Man 4). We should be thankful that after working with her on Escape at Dannemora, Ben Stiller saw something in Jessica Lee Gagné that told him she could pull off something far more ambitious in scale, and Severance wouldn’t be the phenomenon that it is without her.