Three years after the Season 1 finale of Carnival Row, the steampunk fantasy is finally coming to a close with Season 2. Based on Travis Beacham’s 2005 Blacklist screenplay A Killing on Carnival Row, the series is set within a Victorian-like fantasy world filled with fantastical creatures filled with prejudice, murder, and betrayal. The story mostly focuses on the faerie Vignette Stonemoss (Cara Delevingne) and Rycroft Philostrate (Orlando Bloom) who are caught up in the political intrigue in the Row, but it also features a harrowing look into the star-crossed romance between Imogen Spurnrose (Tamzin Merchant) and Agreus (David Gyasi), who are on the run from her cruel and controlling brother Ezra Spurnrose (Andrew Gower) in Season 2.
COLLIDER VIDEO OF THE DAY

During the 1-on-1 interview with Andrew Gower, he spoke about Ezra’s evolution between Season 1 and Season 2 of Carnival Row, when he reached the point of no return, and what the most difficult scenes were to film in his final season. He also spoke about his first major role in Frankenstein’s Wedding… Live in Leeds, his upcoming role in the adaptation of The Winter King, and what it was like getting to finally play a modern role in You Season 4. You can read the full interview below and watch it in the player above.

COLLIDER: So this is going to be an insanely deep dive into your filmography for my first question. It is a role I think of often and a show that I recommend to people all the time. But what was it like filming Frankenstein’s Wedding… Live in Leeds?

ANDREW GOWER: Wow! Maggie, you’ve gone deep. That was incredible. Yeah. I was a year out of drama school. It was live. We’d rehearsed once with the band. I had to sing live; I had to dance live; I had to get married live. It was in Leeds. We had a live audience of 12,000 people. So as a baptism of fire for somebody who just left drama school, it’s the thing that I constantly remind myself, saying, “If I can do that, I can do anything.” Yeah.

Well, you really did well. I watched it when it first aired all those years ago, and it was such a fantastic performance. More shows should perform in crumbling abbeys.

GOWER: Do you know what? I couldn’t agree more. I think the BBC, it was so brave doing that project. And it was a unique project, definitely.

Image via Prime Video

Definitely, definitely. Jumping into Carnival Row, I’m so sad that it’s ending, but glad that things got to wrap up. Did your approach to Ezra change at all between the seasons?

GOWER: Definitely. Yeah, definitely did. Season 1 for me was almost—I had this Victorian etiquette book from the 1800s, which was an original book written by a Victorian gentleman of how to live in society. That was my bible for the whole of the season. That was it. That bible, in Season 2, went completely out of the window having read the scripts because basically, you think how your character’s going to be tested, and then Erik Oleson tested my character in ways that [were] unexpected.

For the audience, it would be so unexpected. And for me, as the first time I read it, it was so unexpected. So I think yeah, Season 2, the challenge was dealing with, even though Ezra is an anti-hero, dealing with him as the hero of his own peace and why he needs his sister so much back in his life, how he’s going to do it, and I guess when he’s put in these scenarios, what parts of Ezra he uses. Not to spoil anything, but definitely, the animalistic side of Ezra as a human definitely comes out in Season 2.

Definitely. I know I was rooting for him to maybe have a turn. I was hoping. But where do you think he reached that point of there was no return for him, he was determined that he was going to get his sister back into his life?

GOWER: So there’s definitely a point in Season 2 where there’s a point of no return. It is so interesting because the Burgue society is, as you see, a lot of it is based on the Victorian society. It’s all about reputation. And [there are] two big points at the beginning of Season 2 where things, pardon the pun, but stab him in the back and make him feel like his name is disgraced and there’s no way back for them. But there’s definitely a point, I think it’s Episode 3 for Ezra, where I think that’s where he reaches a point of himself that I don’t think he ever thought was capable of. But then, it’s interesting to then see how he deals with that going forward because I think he covers it again quite well or tries to in his own way.

Image via Prime Video

What was the most difficult scene to film for the season?

GOWER: The most difficult scene to film? I think night shoots are always interesting to shoot because you’re dealing with a different spider-sense. Big emotional scenes to shoot at nighttime are always quite difficult. Especially when it’s winter in Prague, it gets very cold. So a couple of those scenes out on the back lot were quite challenging in the nighttime. But again, because we’re surrounded by such geniuses on set, such artistic geniuses from makeup, the actors that I got to work with, it was all joyous. But those were the ones that stick out just for the temperature.

I did want to ask about another project that you’re working on. I think you just wrapped on The Winter King, which is based on such a phenomenal book series. But how would you compare your role in that to some of your previous roles?

GOWER: Oh, The Winter King. Again, just totally different, totally different context. It’s medieval. It’s a retelling of the legend of Arthur, and again, I just get the joy. When I’m offered things, or when scripts come into my inbox, I’m always looking for something I haven’t played because I don’t want to play the same thing. I don’t want to play the same time period. I’m just lucky that those franchise of books, they’ve offered me a character, Sansum, who I play, that goes on a mad journey in his own way, but in a totally different way. So it’s lucky to land another character that I can hopefully bring life to on the screen.

It was fun. I just interviewed Ed Speleers yesterday for You, and I watched the screeners of You, and I saw you pop up in that, and I was like, “Oh, I have to ask.” What was it like getting to join that franchise for a little bit?

GOWER: Do you know what? It’s the first modern job I’ve done for a long time with my own hair and my own beard, and I got to wear modern clothing. But great, incredible to work with the cast there and shoot in London, which I know is a big thing for You, filming in London, because that’s a first. So it was nice to meet the cast in such a popular show. And can’t wait to see it myself because I haven’t seen any of it. So it’ll be fantastic to see.

Carnival Row’s second and final season premieres on Prime Video on February 17.