Warning! This post contains spoilers for Station Eleven.
Station Eleven was hit with delays in production due to the COVID-19 outbreak, but this actually made the show better. The HBO Max series is based on the novel of the same name by Emily St. John Mandel and tells the story of the aftermath of the fictional “Georgia Flu” outbreak. Production on the show began in January of 2020, was delayed shortly thereafter, and then was finished in 2021.
Published in 2014,St. John Mandel’s book provides the foundation for Patrick Somerville’s television show adaptation. While the show does include flashbacks, which portray the chaos of the beginning of the fictional pandemic, it mostly focuses on a select few people and how those people dealt with the aftermath. Though such a story will obviously strike a painful chord given the nature of the content, the show really aims to depict how people move on, help each other, and do the best they can with the cards they are dealt.
Filming a show about a fictional pandemic during a real pandemic may sound like the makings of a Twilight Zone episode, but this was the reality for the cast and crew of Station Eleven. However, this perfect storm was to the benefit of not just the show itself, but to the creators as well. The delay in production that COVID-19 caused helped the creators to further flesh out how they would adapt the book given what people around the world were experiencing and also allowed the creators to heal and have closure in their own right.
After the actors had filmed Station Eleven episodes 1 and 3 in January of 2020, production stopped due to the COVID-19 outbreak. In a recent interview, Mackenzie Davis, the actor who plays the present day Kirsten Raymonde in the show said, “I was speaking to Patrick all the time that summer about our experiences, like collecting data for the show and what we’re going to put into it” (via Vulture). Davis pointed out how seemingly random items in her life would remind her of things she did before the pandemic. This happens a lot in Station Eleven, like in episode 2, when Kirsten is trying to explain to Alexandra (Philippine Velge) how her now-defunct phone used to work, it takes Kirsten back to when she found out via text that both her parents had died from the flu.
Station Eleven’s real meaning is about renewal. Matilda Lawler, the actor who plays a young Kirsten Raymonde in the flashback scenes, has also said that she felt a sense of closure after having filmed the show. In Station Eleven, the pandemic ends, and while the effects of said pandemic turned the world upside down, the members of this society figured out what was most important to them. The metaphor of the Traveling Symphony as a way to help heal and cope can also be seen playing out for the real-life actors in Station Eleven who came back together to make art even during an actual pandemic. Davis noted in that same interview with Vulture that she often found herself crying during filming, saying, “It felt like we were in the pandemic, playacting our pandemic.” For an artist to be able to connect with their art on a real, human level, to allow their lived-experiences to help them give the most realistic performance they can, that is when art has a better chance of connecting to others, while also helping to heal the actor themself.
For many, the idea of watching Station Eleven during a pandemic is akin to falling through the looking glass, but the lessons learned by the characters in the show are true to what a post-pandemic society must grapple with. COVID-19 may have caused a delay in the production of the show, but it was for the best, not only in regards to the safety of all involved but because of the authenticity the creators were able to bring to the table when they reconvened in 2021. It is not just the characters that have healed throughout their fictional pandemic, but just as much the actors that portrayed them living through their own.