Jeff Bridges on the surviving virus

SPOILER ALERT: The following interview contains spoilers from “XV,” the season 2 finale of “The Old Man,” now streaming on Hulu.

There was no neat bow during Thursday’s finale of FX’s “The Old Man,” which ended the drama’s thrilling second season with a cliffhanger that hinted at things to come.

That doesn’t mean there wasn’t resolution in ‘XV,’ like former CIA agent Dan Chase (Jeff Bridges) escaping death after girlfriend Zoe (Amy Brenneman) reached him in time to administer an antidote needed was to stop a deadly virus. to which he had previously been exposed. Once in a safe house to recover with Zoe watching over him, Chase was also reunited with his presumed-deceased daughter Emily (Alia Shawkat), opening the story for the show’s third season. (As of this writing, the Emmy-nominated series has yet to be officially renewed.)

As viewers wait for renewal news, Bridges spoke Variety about Chase’s complicated relationships with the surprising women in his life, how the Academy Award-winning actor played the intense role while dealing with his own personal battle with stomach cancer and where he places ‘The Old Man’ in his well-versed acting career .

The whole season was such a nail-biter. Do you feel any of that when you’re filming, since the stakes are always so high in every scene?

Oh yes, absolutely. It’s fun because unlike movies that have a beginning, middle and end with a show like this, I don’t know where it’s going. It’s a lot like life, and luckily we have a great guy at the helm in Jon Steinberg. But I have the same feeling when I first read the script that you have. I say, “What? I need to read that again! Oh my God!”

In The scene in the penultimate episode has you trapped as this airborne virus slowly takes over your body. How could you convey so much while at the same time remaining very quiet?

It was quite a challenge to figure out what the effect of that drug would be. I’ve looked into it a little bit, and you take certain poetic licenses when you have long speeches, but you’re like, “How long ago did that guy inhale that stuff?” So we went back and forth trying to dial that in.

We saw Zoe make a big step in the finale by wielding a gun quite well and saving Dan’s life. How does Dan feel about her at this point at the end of season 2? He must have questions for her.

She has some explaining to do with everything she’s done. You can imagine living a secret life for so long and then letting someone in just to know – I was going to say “to know who you are,” but I don’t even think Dan really knows who he is. But I think circumstances led him to fall in love. This idea of ​​not being authentic, he’s very good at that. He makes his life by not being authentic. He longs for someone to really see and understand him, and that’s why he fell in love with her. Those are my thoughts. I think Dan is surprised by some of the things she does.

The scene in the finale where Dan sees his daughter Emily (aka Parwana) for the first time since he last saw her in Afghanistan is really emotionally packed. DDoes Dan have any idea what she went through during her time in Afghanistan?

I don’t think so. He can only imagine it – but no, he has no real idea what happened.

Is it because of his love for Emily that he is going to do as she asks to help rescue Harold Harper (John Lithgow), who is being held captive by his ex-wife Marion (Janet McTeer)? He initially doesn’t seem happy with her question.

I think so. I don’t think he wants to go. He tries to convince her otherwise until the end, but leaves the next step open to Dan. You see those cars and the boys immediately go and take him away. It’s not like he’s going with her because he loves her at that moment. He’s quite surprised. And he’s angry! I mean, I have three daughters; I know a little about that. I may be angry, but I still love them.

Emily even holds herself differently in that scene, as she has a level of power and responsibility that she didn’t have before, as she now controls the valuable Meshbahar deposit. How does Dan see her right now?

I think some thoughts might be, “Well, I taught her well. Now I am facing an opponent who knows all my ins and outs.” And Emily is so mad at me. She holds a lot of resentment because I keep all that truth from her.

How many takes did you get for that whole final scene with you, Amy and Alia?

There were one lot number of shots of that scene. We approached it a lot of different ways, but there were a lot of takes.

We hear Emily say that Dan needs Lou Barlow, and we realize that it’s not a former alias of Dan’s that he likes to live under. Is it safe to say that’s true?

Certainly. I have questions and I spoke to Jon Steinberg. I still don’t know the definitive answer to who that guy is and what he’s done, but I do have some guesses and some tips and it’s pretty fascinating. The plot really thickens.

Considering the final scene of the third season where Dan agrees to help rescue Harold, the third season renewal has to happen, right?

Well, we don’t know. We’ll see in a few days, I guess. Maybe they’re waiting for that last show to give us the floor. Don’t know.

This season you’ve been through a lot on the show, whether it’s riding horses or taking out physically bad Russians. It’s a very physical show for you. How have you been coping with it all, with your health problems?

Well, those health issues happened in the middle of the whole thing. When I watch those fight scenes from the first few episodes, I shudder because I didn’t know I had a nine-by-twelve-inch tumor in my stomach while I was taking a punch. I was hit in the stomach, and it didn’t hurt. But we have Tim Connolly as the stunt coordinator, and he’s great to work with. I enjoyed doing the fight scenes.

My only request for season 3 is that we need more dogs, as they weren’t present enough in season 2.

I’ll report that to Jon Steinberg and see if we can help you that way. But they are great to work with. There are all six of them, and my favorite is Freya. Very sweet. But for each task they switch them up and make them up to look like cool dogs.

Looking at your career, where does “The Old Man” fall in terms of being challenged and something you are proud of?

Oh man, that’s a tough question. I know that corny thing actors say about each of their projects is just like their kids. They love everyone, so you get so involved and it becomes so intense. Being an old man myself, my memory is fading a bit, so I’m most interested in the one I’m working on at the moment, which is ‘The Old Man’. It’s up there with all my stuff. That’s my current love.

This interview has been edited and condensed.