After four months of filming and a few weeks left before its second season wraps, just three days remain before the season premiere of “Under the Dome” airs on CBS.
Anticipation is high for the return of the locally filmed series, which proved a summer hit for the network last year. Cast and crew members promise an action-packed season, starting off with the premiere episode penned by Stephen King, whose novel the show is based on and who serves as an executive producer.
“No one is safe,” King has said of the show’s characters, two of which are said to not survive the first episode—a tone that was set with the season one pilot, which saw the beloved sheriff of Chester’s Mill among the dome’s first victims (the first a poor cow in the wrong place at the wrong time).
“It’s constant high energy, high intensity,” said actress Mackenzie Lintz, who plays Norrie on “Under the Dome.” “Things are starting to get dangerous, and you really can’t ever stop. You have to keep going and you have to keep getting answers, or else everyone’s going to crumble. So it’s very much just like a last resort.”
Lintz was among several cast members and crew who took part in a media day at EUE/Screen Gems Studios, where “Under the Dome” has sets in two of the studios’ stages. Within a set of a hallway in Chester’s Mill High School, actors took turns talking to multiple media outlets, answering questions about the season and how they’ve enjoyed their time in Wilmington.
Dean Norris, who plays power-hungry town councilman “Big Jim” Rennie, said he and his family were excited when they learned the show had been renewed and they’d be returning to Wilmington.
“I love it out here. I love the South; I love the southern hospitality,” he said. “We’ve met some great people. My family’s out here now, and they really love it.”
Norris said he stayed downtown from March to May and has been in Wrightsville Beach since Memorial Day. Often seen out and about at downtown spots like Slainte last season, Norris said other commitments have taken him out of town this year but he’s been able to enjoy several restaurants and the local sights.
“I love to take a walk when I’m downtown,” he said. “My favorite thing to do at the end of the day is just grab a cigar and take a walk down that river walk there. It’s awesome: just sit there and watch the sun go down.
“It’s just so beautiful and just so pleasant, and the people we’ve met too are just awesome, so we’re having a really nice summer here.”
Norris also complimented the local crew base and facilities here, describing them as “some of the best that I’ve ever worked with.”
“The crews are awesome,” he said. “Really good people and really good professionals, and you can tell they’ve been around a while and they know what they’re doing.”
Colin Ford, who plays nice-guy high-schooler Joe on the show, also noted the local crew as a reason he was glad to return to Wilmington.
“If we didn’t shoot season two here, we’d kind of have had to start all over again,” he said. “I’ve made a couple friends down here, and we’ve had a great relationship with our crew that we worked with last season. So to have to start all that over again would be really annoying or just kind of difficult.
“So I definitely enjoyed that aspect of that, but I also enjoy Wilmington as a city itself,” he said. “I like going to the beach, the entertainment and stuff that’s here. Mayfaire is cool. I love the food, and the southern hospitality is nice. People are really nice down here.”
Ford had previously filmed in Wilmington before “Under the Dome,” having appeared in an episode of the NBC show “Revolution.” Based in Los Angeles, Ford said the Port City has become a home away from home, especially with his upgrade from an apartment to a house this year.
Beyond Mayfaire Town Center, Ford said he enjoys Tower 7 and Wrightsville Beach overall, and he said he’s enjoyed seeing movies here and exploring the city.
Asked what locals could expect to see and recognize in the show’s second season, Ford said Wilmington would certainly be recognizable—just in a different way.
“I think the viewers will be able to see some of their favorite spots in Wilmington, but they’ll be able to see them how they’ve never seen them before,” he said, noting visual effects and other filmmaking magic.
Brooke Barnhill, the show’s locations manager, noted this season shows more of Wilmington specifically, where last season established Chester’s Mill with locations in Burgaw and Southport.
“We were able to bring a bit more filming to Wilmington this year. We did do quite a bit with some of the houses that we had here in town, but we were able to open up some other avenues of the show that we didn’t explore last year.”
Locations added this year include New Hanover High School, which was the scene of a frosted-over exterior for a shoot last week. Other locations have been added as well, though Barnhill noted Chester’s Mill is still well represented by Burgaw and Southport, which were featured prominently last year.
“We have some houses off of Chestnut Street that we film in, and this year we filmed the high school as a new location,” she said. “Other than that, with it being Chester’s Mill, you’ll still see bits and pieces of Southport that we shot last year that we go back to; Burgaw is still our center of town and everything. So you’re going to see a lot of callbacks to tie you back into season one.”
For Lintz, who has been staying in Wrightsville Beach and got to spend several weeks hanging out with her friend Ben Winchell—the star of “Max Steel,” a feature movie that filmed here this spring—the second season of “Under the Dome” will continue a wild ride that she said all involved have enjoyed since day one.
“It’s been such an extraordinary experience to have it be such a hit,” she said. “I think we’re all just very thankful and excited about it and definitely excited about season two.”
Related stories:
- Season two trailer for ‘Under the Dome’ released
- Wilmington goes back ‘Under the Dome’ as season two production starts
- Stephen King on set as cameras start rolling for ‘Under the Dome’
Jonathan Spiers is a reporter for Port City Daily. He can be reached at (910) 772-6313 or [email protected]. On Twitter: @jrspiers
