It took five episodes, but “Agatha All Along” finally confirmed that Teen is Billy Maximoff (formerly William Kaplan), and that he’s on the witches’ road in the hope of finding his brother. But just how far is he willing to go?
That’s the question that Agatha (Kathryn Hahn) prods him with at the end of episode 5, now streaming on Disney+. And in the final moments of episode 6, we learn that there definitely might be some darkness in Billy, as he ominously utters “I’m not that nice” before following Agatha down the road.
So, in the hopes of getting some answers, we went straight to the man himself: Joe Locke.
Joe, you can say things now! Well, you can say some things.
I know! I know, it’s very nice to say things.
My question is, how many secrets are you still keeping? Because I have to imagine there’s still some surprises in the tank, there’s still some things you got to keep locked away.
Well, we have three episodes left, so definitely some things still left.
But at least you can finally say “Yes, I’m Billy. I got the crown, it’s me.”
It’s nice also because, like, everyone knew. So having to bat all the questions of it, actually, it makes it harder when it’s like a bad, badly kept secret, because I can’t say anything. We both know, me and the interviewer, we both know, but I can’t. So now it’s like (exhales) “Don’t have to play that game anymore.”
Obviously, you’ve known from the jump. I’m curious, what order did you guys shoot this in? Did you shoot your scenes as William, and then as Billy? Did you have to go back and forth?
It was really on whatever set we had, but we were definitely back and forth. But we shot pretty much episodically, almost, because of the different blocks of directors. Which is nice, because even if we were going back and forth, it was only within, like, those specific episodes.
But yeah, there was a lot of like, “So at this point, does everyone know that he’s lying? Or what are the intentions at this point?” It was very much like, “Does he know this? Or does this person?” And that, that was the hard bits of all of it.
I imagine there are a lot of conversations with your directors about how to modulate your performance, because when you’re playing him, you have to know where he’s at, and you have to get into a bunch of different mindsets. What kind of challenge was that for you?
I always describe myself as a big nerd, and so like, the logic puzzle of figuring all of that stuff out is what I find really interesting, and the fun thing of filming, the puzzle of it at all.
Did you play them as two separate people? Because obviously we know now that William Kaplan is different than Billy Maximoff, but we also know that he had a love of magic, and little connections like that. So when you’re approaching it, are you taking this on as two different characters?
I did. I mean, you don’t really get to see much of William Kaplan before he unfortunately passes away, so you don’t really get to see much of the difference. But I did try and play it as just two completely different people. Obviously, there’s similarities and there’s overlap in their personalities, but yeah, two different people.
I think one of the big things of our show is that covens and witches are all fated in some way, and so I think there’s an element of that in there, which was fun to play with. I didn’t really get much time to delve deep into the differences of William and Billy.
I think I more focused on the loss of William as the person, and how that affects the family. And I think that scene when they come home from hospital for the first time is actually really quite a harrowing scene, because you’re noticing that these parents have basically lost, like, their child is dead. But he’s still there, but he’s not, and it’s so complicated and really sad.
It was devastating to watch. I also want to talk about Billy’s room, because it changes from when he’s William Kaplan, to when Billy takes over. But specifically I want to talk about the posters. I know everything is by design in this show. Did you get to have, as Joe, any kind of say in the posters that went up?
There were a few film posters up there that I didn’t necessarily think that he would have watched. I’m not going to name the films of those film. Like, very good representation for that time, but we’ve moved on from that sort of thing.
And so we replaced one of them with the “Trans Lives Matter” flag. There was one — I mean all respect, our set dressers and prop department were so amazing, and there was so much incredible stuff there. But there was one sticker in Billy’s room, and it was like, the moon phases in a rainbow, and it said, “Not a phase” underneath it. And I was like, “This is great, but it has to go. I’m really sorry, but this has to go.”
But you know, that set was probably one of my favorite set of all of them, because it’s so witchy, and there’s many candles, and you know, all of the posters.
In this episode, we get to see the interrogation of Billy from Billy’s perspective, which is very clearly different. It was so funny. It looked like, especially when Kathryn Hahn is getting in your face, it looked like you were kind of fighting for your life to not break there.
Yeah, I was. I was fully breaking, I wasn’t even fighting for my life. I bite my cheeks so much, because she’s such a comedy pro. She gives, like, nothing away. And I was just wetting myself.
I was gonna say, how do you get through that? Like, is she improvising that? Is all of that written?
The “poke the bear” stuff and the pen clicks were improv, but the rest was all incredible, incredible writing.
Well, another scene with Kathryn that got me was when you’re back on the road. She has this moment where she’s like, “It’s good to see you again, Billy.” And that seems sincere to me, there are tears in her eyes. What kind of discussions did you and Kathryn have about crafting this scene? What kind of tone did you want to set with that?
That scene is my favorite scene in the show. It was the scene that me and Kathryn did in our chemistry read, the scene that I think I have the most affinity with, because you see Billy’s dark side, but you also see him care. And you see you see Agatha potentially care as well.
I think it’s the first time you see the real complexness of their relationship and how these two people admire each other, but also hate each other, but also have this weird pull to each other. And we don’t really — it’s like an almost maternal relationship, but then he did just try and kill her. So it’s such a push and pull of these two really damaged, complex people, and also just so much fun to play.
That was the first scene that I filmed that I was like, “This is cool stuff.” And, me and Kathryn were just shouting at each other, and we were so comfortable with each other, working together, that it just gave so much freedom to play.
The bit where she pulls her hair up into like a crispy mustache. In the scene it’s so serious, but it was on her coverage, so you can’t see my face, but I didn’t know she was gonna do it. And just one take she randomly decided to just do this mustache. I just completely broke and started laughing. She was a complete pro, but I was like, tears rolling down my face laughing, because it was so not what I expected her to do, but worked so well for her character.
I don’t know if you’re even going to be able to say, but at that point in the scene when she says, “It’s good to see you again,” does he have any memory of interacting with her before? Where Billy’s memories are there is kind of hard to read.
We talked a lot about this. We always said that he doesn’t have any memory of anything to do with William Kaplan’s life, and it’s more like he has a sense of what happened in “WandaVision” and Billy Maximoff’s life.
And in some way he figures out he is Billy, and figures out that Tommy is missing, and has an affinity for Tommy, and has affinity for all of that. I think he senses that there’s a past with Agatha. But until she like, reminds him and stuff, that’s when he starts to piece things together and remember things.
Got it. You mentioned that there is the darkness in Billy that we see. I assume we’re going to find out more and see where he’s at, because his very last line is “I’m not that nice.” But for you, Joe, when you’re playing it, when you’re building him out, how much darkness is in him, to you?
I think that he is a good person who does bad things, is how I’ve always seen him in my head. But I think that any actor should always root for their own character. Whether that means he is a good person or not is to be seen. But I think that leaves a lot of space for if, you know, there’s ever a larger future to the character of Billy, then he could go in many different ways. But I have always seen him as a good, damaged person who makes mistakes.
There’s certainly some trauma there, there’s some things that have happened in his life. We’ve touched on it a little bit, I want to talk about building that relationship with Kathryn Hahn, as a whole. You couldn’t speak much to it early on, because their relationship is so fluid, and it changes with the events of the show. So when you and Kathryn are behind the scenes, what was the most important touchstone for figuring out who Billy/Teen and Agatha were together?
I think what was so great about filming episodically is that we [were] almost filming quite sequentially. The relationship built with our relationship as people, and their relationship is so complicated.
But one thing that is a line that goes through it is that is they — neither of them would admit it, but there is an affinity or a care. Probably not the right word is not care, but like, in the same way that when Billy goes to drink the wine in episode three, Agatha stops him. But then she goes back into like, “Eh, no, I’m back into my mode.”
I also really love the relationship between Billy and Alice. And now that we know that she was at the crash, when he became Billy. But even from the jump, in Jen’s trial, you guys are so cute together, and then you exchanged the brooms in episode 5, and then it was really even more heartbreaking when she died. So talk to me about crafting that relationship, because it seems like an important one for Billy within the coven, outside of Agatha.
Yeah I mean, Ali [Ahn] is just such a wonderful person. And we all got on so well on set, and we all just like bonded so well that it was just so easy. Everything, all of these relationships were so easy to build, and I feel very lucky to have had that ability to do that, because it was, I think that’s quite rare on a set.
But everything was easy! Not everything was easy (laughs). The relationships were easy. The job was not easy.
You mean it’s not easy flying around on a broom and being in a bog full time?
(Laughs). Yeah. I always felt bad for Kathryn when we were filming any post-episode 5 scenes, and she’d have to spend the extra hour in makeup getting mudded up. And I’m like, “Yeah, sorry about that! That was my fault, sorry!”
Let’s get into the sigil, because we now know that Lilia cast the sigil. I’m really interested in the decision of him destroying it now. Did he not know that he could destroy it before? Is it because he realized that Agatha has always known who he is?
We find out that he hasn’t always known he’s had the sigil on him, and this sigil is a very complicated and fluid thing that changed. The rules of it changed a lot whilst we were filming to get them right, because there was a lot of different, like, making sure that it was fit with Marvel lore and all of that fun stuff.
But I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know how to get it off. He also isn’t completely sure that he is Billy. He thinks he is, and he’s got a pretty good [idea], but I think he sees Agatha as a way of figuring that out completely, and so therefore … the sigil can’t be destroyed, because it’s still needed. And also, I think he only realizes that he’s in control of it when he realizes the full extent of his power, and therefore it’s not needed anymore. We’ll see next week!
Let’s talk about that power, though, because obviously, like Agatha said, it is Big Magick. He has a big hitter for a mom, and so he’s got a lot of power, but then it fizzles out, and it seems to only work when he has these big emotions. How did you guys figure out the rules of his magic? Like, does it always need to be big emotions?
I think the end of episode 5 is the first time he has used his magic in that way. I think he’s always known that he’s had power, in the same way he can read people’s minds. He can’t really control that either at the top of episode 6, when he explains to Eddie in the car. But I think it’s like a learning thing. He’s still a very young witch. I was gonna say a line, but I don’t know if it’s been said yet, so I’m gonna wait.
I just want you to be able to do the big things, and do the wiggly woos. And speaking of wiggly woos — I wasn’t planning to segue this way — but we got to talk about the return of Ralph Bohner. You get to work with Evan Peters. Tell me everything about this scene, how much of it was improvised, how much of it was written? How exciting was it for you to work with the Ralph Bohner?
That was such a fun scene to film, and such a fun day. It was so great having him on set, he’s such an incredible actor. That scene was always funny as a read. But then when you, watch him do it, it’s like “How!” He came in for one day, and like, was the best part of the episode.
Like, “Great, come in for one day. And you take everyone, take all the credit!” Which he probably deserved. He was so good in that scene. And I’m pretty sure he added the shaking of the thing and the like, the premise of the old jingle he does. Every take would be a different addition that he added. And it was very funny.
I got to point out, one person you haven’t gotten to spend much time with yet is Aubrey Plaza. Even in scenes that you have together, Billy and Rio don’t interact very much.
I mean, because those scenes were so ensemble, I still got to spend a lot of incredible time with Aubrey and I feel like I still had the experience, because she’s now one of my close friends. So I feel like I still got the Aubrey Plaza experience.
Good. But should we be reading into that lack of direct interaction?
I don’t know how to answer that! Because if I say “Read into it,” then people will think, if I say don’t, then people will like “Mmm?”
There are some really good theories, and there are some less good theories. Not less good. Less correct. They’re all very good. I will say, most theories are really like, “Oh, that’s so cool that you think that that means that and that, and I see how you think that, because I would think that too if I’d read this. But you’re wrong.”
I think what Jac and her team are so good at is adding so many little sprinkles and hints for things, that you don’t know which ones are the red herrings and the real things. And it adds to, like, a great twist, because you might be half expecting it, but then there’s something else that counteracts, so that can’t be true. But you already thought about it, so when it happens, you’re like, “Oh, damn!” I don’t know, I think that’s what makes a good twist.
Note: this interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
“Agatha All Along” is now streaming on Disney+, with new episodes dropping on Wednesdays at 6 p.m. PT.
TheWrap will also have a new deep dive with showrunner Jac Schaeffer for each episode on Fridays. You can check out our breakdown of the first five episodes here.
