{"id":306327,"date":"2025-11-22T02:52:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-22T02:52:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/306327\/"},"modified":"2025-11-22T02:52:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-22T02:52:14","slug":"duffer-brothers-on-game-of-thrones-stranger-things-cast-aging","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/306327\/","title":{"rendered":"Duffer Brothers on ‘Game of Thrones,’ ‘Stranger Things’ Cast Aging"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tFor Variety\u2019s Oct. 15 cover story<\/a> on the fifth and final season of \u201cStranger Things<\/a>,\u201d the show\u2019s creators, twin brothers Matt and Ross Duffer, sat for nearly four hours of interviews in July and September, both times at their postproduction offices in Hollywood. While they are self-proclaimed introverts, the Duffers were nonetheless remarkably candid and open about themselves and how much they\u2019ve changed \u2014 and haven\u2019t changed \u2014 since their show premiered on Netflix in 2016.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn advance of the Nov. 26 premiere of Season 5\u2019s first four episodes on Netflix, here is an edited excerpt of our conversations with them, in which they also discuss why Finn Wolfhard and his character Mike Wheeler are the most like them, what they learned from \u201cGame of Thrones<\/a>\u201d about negotiating with Netflix, their favorite moments from the show, why they aren\u2019t sweating how much their cast has aged and why they feel their show\u2019s success is based in part on their failure to be as scary as they\u2019d like.<\/p>\n

\t\tShawn Levy, who really championed the show in the beginning through his production company 21 Laps, told us that when you first started working on \u201cStranger Things,\u201d you were comfortable talking only with each other in what he called a \u201cbubble of twinship.\u201d But that now, you are much better at working with your department heads and the studio. Do you agree with that assessment?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Want me to take it?<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Sure.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: I\u2019m sure that is true. We had never run anything of this scale and we\u2019re introverted people. That was one of the biggest lessons, just learning how to lead and how to clearly communicate your vision.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: I would say the core philosophy, though, hasn\u2019t shifted. Generally, we just choose to work with people who we think are really good at what they do, and then for the most part, leave them alone. We still do that. We don\u2019t like to micromanage. Just as an example, Amy Parris, our costume designer, she just knows so much more about costuming. She\u2019s done all the \u201980s costume research. Who am I to tell her?<\/p>\n

\t\tAnd with actors?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: The same for actors. I always say with the kid actors, it wasn\u2019t like we were pulling these performances out of them. We were giving very minimal direction. The most impact you can have is in the casting by far. That\u2019s like 99% of it. If you start having to be super hands-on, then you\u2019ve made a poor hiring decision, is what I\u2019ve usually found.<\/p>\n

\t\tBy the way, Shawn told us that his group text nickname is \u201cWarlock,\u201d and he said to ask you what that meant.\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: I actually don\u2019t remember when we started calling him Warlock. Very early on, I would say. Shawn had worked in the studio system for a really long time. Ross and I had next to no experience. So not only were we very green working on the set, but we were not politically savvy in terms of dealing with and navigating studio politics. Shawn\u2019s a master of it. So when things went wrong, would call in Shawn, who we called \u201cWarlock\u201d at some point, just because he had some form of dark magic that he could wield when necessary. You don\u2019t want to set the Warlock loose too often, but when he needs to come in, he will solve any situation no matter how dire.<\/p>\n

\t\tDo you feel like you were calling upon the powers of the Warlock less frequently as you went through the seasons?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Early on, we were leaning on him more for advice in terms of mentorship, dealing with production of this scale. But season by season it gets more complicated. There are more fires. And so certainly whenever we\u2019ve needed to call up the Warlock, we have. But I think yes, we now know so much more than we did back then.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: We learned a lot from him about how to handle these situations. And I think Shawn would probably agree with this, we\u2019re much better now than we were at handling those types of situations.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tMatt Duffer, Ross Duffer and Shawn Levy<\/a> speak onstage at an event for Netflix\u2019s \u201cStranger Thing\u201d at the Directors Guild on August 17, 2017.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tKevin Winter\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

\t\tYour lives went, apologies, upside down overnight when the show premiered in 2016. Was there anyone who had a similar career trajectory and you thought, \u201cthey did things that I want to emulate\u201d or \u201cthey did things I want to avoid\u201d?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: M. Night Shyamalan was a big influence. Like us, he had a movie that was a total dud, and then he did \u201cThe Sixth Sense,\u201d which became this massive phenomenon. Yes, he continued to do some version of the twist thing, but I thought he took a lot of pretty exciting risks. He kept making original films. I don\u2019t know if I was consciously thinking about it after \u201cStranger Things,\u201d but he\u2019s been such a big part of our life that I\u2019m sure it was in there. [To Ross] Can you think of anybody else?<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Well, what\u2019s strange about our trajectory is we\u2019ve been on this show for 10 years, so it\u2019s a very specific situation that we\u2019re in. It\u2019s hard to find a one-to-one.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: In terms of television, we always looked to \u201cGame of Thrones\u201d and what [showrunners] Dan [Weiss] and David [Benioff] did. They used the success to scale the show up and evolve it, and it snowballed. We would always take that example to Netflix for reasons why we should scale up the show: It\u2019ll scale up the audience. At least, that was what we told them.<\/p>\n

\t\tThere are the obvious ways your lives have changed, but what do you think fundamentally is the most different about your lives now versus 2015 when you were first starting to do this?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Matt having a family has sort of changed the dynamic in the biggest ways. For most of our early career, we were living in the same apartment together. Even though we do still work together, there\u2019s more distance there on the personal side. It used to be just all-consuming.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut every time we\u2019re starting a new season, we\u2019re trying to get back to when we were brainstorming Season 1. You\u2019re always chasing that high that we felt, and the excitement when we first came up with that idea.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: It\u2019s weird. It\u2019s both easier and harder. You have more influence, it\u2019s easier in some ways to make things happen, but there\u2019s so much more noise and pressure. It is a little bit harder to tune that out \u2014 and that\u2019s the most important thing. The best way Ross and I have of doing that, and this has always been true of us, is we don\u2019t actually talk to that many people. It is a pretty small group of people that we hang out with. So that\u2019s worked in our favor.<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019m not online at all. Ross has Instagram, and even that I find annoying, but you\u2019re kind of in this little bubble. That\u2019s the best way to just get back to where we were 10 years ago, where you\u2019re just going, \u201cOK, this is just exciting to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\tIs there anything with the story that you would do differently if you could do it all over again?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: There\u2019s not a single season where I\u2019m like, \u201cBam! Perfection. Where\u2019s our 100% Rotten Tomatoes score?\u201d After Season 1, I just remember feeling overwhelmed and somewhat numb to everything. I don\u2019t remember feeling the excitement that I should have felt. It was almost too much to absorb because it was so different than anything else we had experienced, which was mostly failure. Shawn did call us, I remember, and said, \u201cThis is unusual. You need to soak this up.\u201d We were told to do it, but it was hard to do. So, if I went back, I would probably tell myself that.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Enjoy the ride.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Enjoy the ride, and don\u2019t stress so much. That is what we\u2019re trying to do a little bit more now. The fact that I do have a family now, I\u2019m going, \u201cI cannot be working on the weekends,\u201d just making a little bit of space for yourself.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tIn 2016, the Duffers with Millie Bobby Brown, Gaten Matarazzo, Finn Wolfhard and Caleb McLaughlin<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCurtis Baker\/Netflix<\/p>\n

\t\tWhat have been the most autobiographical parts of the show for you \u2014\u00a0and which characters do you relate to the most?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: The friendship of all the young characters to us is the most autobiographical. We had a small group of really close friends. We were playing Magic: The Gathering and video games and making movies and having adventures in the woods. So a lot of especially the early years was us attempting to remember what that felt like and tapping into that feeling again.<\/p>\n

\t\tDo you have some of your old childhood friends being like, \u201cAm I Dustin? Am I Will?\u201d\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Not exactly, because there\u2019s not a one-to-one. It\u2019s more trying to capture the spirit of what it felt like to hang out with those people. I mean, Mike is the closest to our doppelganger. Finn in real life is the most similar to who we are, which is probably why we cast him. Season 4 was the most autobiographical in terms of how difficult high school specifically was for us. There wasn\u2019t any one character who, again, was a one-to-one, but Max\u2019s storyline was a way of us communicating what a lot of high school felt like to us, and same with what the boys were going through.<\/p>\n

\t\tYou don\u2019t shy away from the darkness of adolescence, especially with Max\u2019s storyline in Season 4. Did things get that dark for you when you were that age? Were you looking at this show as a way of exorcising it?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Yeah, high school was really, really challenging, but at the time, there wasn\u2019t a lot of mental health awareness. It wasn\u2019t something that anybody was talking about. Looking back on it now, do I understand what I was going through. But it\u2019s scarier when you don\u2019t understand what it is that\u2019s going on with you. You just feel like there\u2019s something wrong. The best thing that ever happens to me with this show is when young kids or teenagers come up to me, some of them are older now, and they say the show helped them through these periods.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo yeah, we\u2019re trying to channel a lot of what we went through. A lot of the writers we work with, they\u2019re all weirdos, so they all had challenging childhoods in different ways. That\u2019s probably why we created this fantasy of Eddie<\/a>, because you don\u2019t want the show to become too depressing.<\/p>\n

\t\tBut then you killed Eddie off.\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Yeah, that\u2019s true. But I\u2019ve always looked up to a show like \u201cMy So-Called Life.\u201d That was probably the first show I saw that tackled this stuff head on, and that was realistic and honest about what high school was like or what it was like to be young. It\u2019s important to put stuff out like that out because there wasn\u2019t a lot of that when we were growing up, and [that absence] just can make you feel more isolated. It\u2019s also something that people don\u2019t do with younger protagonists. That\u2019s why we had them cursing in the first scene, just to immediately indicate that this is not a kid show, even though it\u2019s stars kids.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tMatarazzo and Joseph Quinn in Season 4 of \u201cStranger Things\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of Netflix<\/p>\n

\t\tYou\u2019ve mentioned Mike and Max. Do you each have characters who you love writing for and characters who are more challenging to write for?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: We love writing all the characters. Given that, the kids are easier for us than the adults, especially the government, military characters\u00a0\u2014 the scientists and so on. It becomes easier once we cast someone. Season 1, we really did not understand Dr. Brenner: Matthew Modine really helped us lock in on who he was. This year, once we cast Linda Hamilton, it became a lot easier once we started to see what she was able to do. Whereas, Dustin, I can write in my sleep.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Also, whenever there\u2019s some sort of exposition, you\u2019ve got your checklist of characters you want, because we just know it\u2019ll be fun. So it\u2019s like Robin, Dustin, Steve.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Steve\u2019s always like, \u201cWhaaaat? I don\u2019t understand. What are you talking about?\u201d And then someone who talks very quickly, which is usually Dustin, can explain to him.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: It\u2019s a very, very helpful dynamic duo to have with Steve-Dustin. We can get across any amount of exposition in.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: I will say though, this year, more than any other year, if a scene was too easy to write, it probably means we\u2019ve written a version of it too many times, and we need to come up with a more interesting way to do it. Same with filming it. There\u2019s only four or five scenes in the show where I felt like we\u2019ve really done this before. As much as possible, you\u2019re trying to avoid doing that, because then you\u2019re repeating yourself. It\u2019s boring for you and it\u2019s boring for the actors.<\/p>\n

\t\tWhat have your biggest fights with Netflix been about? Matt, your eyes just really bugged out!\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Oh, no, no, no! [Pause. Clears throat.] Listen, it is crazy the creative leash that we have at Netflix. We\u2019ve had a really great experience. There haven\u2019t been too many insane fights. If there are disagreements, it\u2019s usually budget-related. There\u2019s certain concepts that we have to fight for as essential to the narrative. There\u2019s usually compromises to be had.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Season 4,\u00a0we had toyed around with stuff in the mind before with Eleven, but suddenly we\u2019re making a pretty big U-turn from our gooey monsters to going, \u201c[Vecna] is someone that\u2019s going to invade your mind. He\u2019s going to speak.\u201d Now it seems obvious, but at the time, it took a lot of explaining. At that point, luckily, we were far enough along that ultimately there\u2019s trust in us in the process, even if it took a second for everyone to fully understand the direction we were taking.<\/p>\n

\t\tWhat have been some of your favorite moments from the show when you look back on it?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Oh geez.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: The moment I went, \u201cI think this show could work,\u201d was seeing the editor\u2019s cut of when Eleven<\/a> vanquishes the Demogorgon and disappears in the classroom [in Season 1]. I just remember seeing it and how incredible Millie [Bobby Brown] was and the emotion of Finn and with the synth music and going, \u201cHey, this might actually work.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: The first scene we shot, which was the scene with the kids playing Dungeons and Dragons in the basement \u2014 that\u2019s the first time we had them in a room, in a set performing a scene from the show with cameras running. Just watching that come together was a massive, massive relief. Even though it was 10 years ago, I\u2019ll never forget that moment.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Season 1 was a lot of big swings, just a mishmash of ideas that don\u2019t really make sense together, and is it just going to look silly? But even as we became more confident in moving forward, we still have those fears. We didn\u2019t know if Vecna was going to work until Jamie [Campbell Bower] spoke for the first time, and we saw Barry Gower\u2019s makeup on him in the lighting and suddenly went, \u201cOK, this is going to work.\u201d When you\u2019re taking a big swing like that, those are the moments I remember the most, because you\u2019re like, \u201cWhat a huge relief that is.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: It\u2019s really hard for us to re-watch the show because you just start nitpicking stuff, but there\u2019s certain episodes that I\u2019m really proud of. \u201cThe Battle of Starcourt.\u201d \u201cThe Massacre at Hawkins Lab.\u201d \u201cDear Billy.\u201d And this year there are a couple episodes that I think really came together. You don\u2019t always nail it, but sometimes you\u2019re like, \u201cThat\u2019s pretty close to what I wanted it to be, and that script flowed the way we wanted it to flow.\u201d Because you\u2019re moving so quickly, sometimes you just make mistakes or you just can\u2019t completely figure something out.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tMatt Duffer and Ross Duffer with Jamie Campbell Bower on the set of Season 4 of \u201cStranger Things\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSteve Dietl\/Netflix<\/p>\n

\t\tWhen did you know that it was going to be five seasons?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: At the end of Season 2, we were feeling pretty burned out. I remember I told some journalists that I was like \u201cfour [seasons] and done.\u201d I think it was probably midway through working on Season 3, we realized we just aren\u2019t going to be able to properly wrap this up with four seasons, and we needed five. So it was probably a little after Season 2 and part way through Season 3.<\/p>\n

\t\tDid you have in your heads events that had to happen in order to reach the end? Could you do the mental math of, \u201cI can fit this much into a season, but not the rest\u201d?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Yes, it was as we were working on 3. And then obviously once we got into 4, you\u2019re fully building out the end game of it.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: Three is an unusual season in that it probably advances the overall story the least. We had built the sandbox, and it was the one where we just played the most with our toys. That\u2019s why it\u2019s such a fun season, but in a way, an outlier. Season 4, we had to get a little bit more serious about laying the groundwork for the end game. So especially the time we were working on 4, we knew roughly where we were going with it.<\/p>\n

\t\tWhen did you start sharing your plans for Season 5 with other people?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: We don\u2019t like sharing anything until we\u2019re happy with it. Scripts and edits aren\u2019t turned over until we think they\u2019re ready. We\u2019re not averse to notes, but I want to get to a point where I\u2019m going to be annoyed by any note, because I feel like I\u2019ve gotten it where we\u2019re happy with it. So we don\u2019t share until we\u2019re absolutely forced to share, basically.<\/p>\n

\n\tI don\u2019t like people looking at unfinished work. We make sure the sound is polished. We make sure the color looks as good as possible. We make sure the music is good as it can be. I don\u2019t like when people give me vomit drafts of a script. How am I supposed to know if this works? They\u2019re like, \u201cI know it doesn\u2019t work.\u201d \u201cWhy are you showing it to me?\u201d That\u2019s how my brain works.<\/p>\n

\t\tRoss, are you better at that? Does your brain work differently?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: No, we\u2019re the same in regards to that. It goes back to when we were little kids, though. We always just kept things very close to the vest.<\/p>\n

\t\tDo you rewatch the show or does it just live within you?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: I haven\u2019t, like, sat down and watched, like, a full season since the season\u2019s been completed. We\u2019re constantly going back, whether when we\u2019re writing it or when we\u2019re directing scenes, and re-watching moments that we need to. And sometimes I\u2019m surprised when we go back, because you get some distance from it. But I have yet to go back and just sit down and, like, watch Season 1 again. It\u2019s been nine years or something since I\u2019ve done that.<\/p>\n

\t\tHow are you keeping track of all of the show\u2019s mythology, like a show bible or notecards?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer:\u00a0Yeah, we probably should have something more organized, like you\u2019re suggesting. So many of the writers, the vast majority of them, have been on since at least Season 2 \u2014 one of our writers, Paul has been since Season 1. So I feel like collectively, we have a pretty good sense, and then if we forget something or are unsure, we just double check it, or we have an assistant check it.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer:\u00a0It does mostly live in our heads. Netflix wasn\u2019t certain how everything worked and connected, and what was Upside Down, and what are Eleven\u2019s powers? So they made us write a mythology document out on Season 1, that we did look back on when we went to this season. But it\u2019s not like a Bible that we\u2019re constantly referring to. That\u2019s the closest that we have.<\/p>\n

\t\tWas Vecna part of that document?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: We did obviously figure everything out about the Upside Down because it was so prevalent, but we honestly didn\u2019t think this was going to go on for more seasons. So most of the build out of the mythology started on Season 2. It\u2019s why Season 2 was such a challenge for us, because we are on a pretty tight timeline and we were trying to build out a mythology that could sustain multiple seasons.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: But I do think there\u2019s too much emphasis now on mapping out a massive mythology, rather than just focusing on making one great season. I don\u2019t know how much of it\u2019s coming from pressure from the writers themselves, or the studios. As much as possible, we just try to focus on one season at a time. I think it works best for us.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tT.R. Knight, Louis McCartney and Rosie Benton in \u201cStranger Things: The First Shadow\u201d on Broadway<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMatthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman\/Netflix<\/p>\n

\t\tHow much is the play \u201cThe First Shadow,\u201d which is set in 1959 and introduces the backstory for Henry Creel, going to factor into Season 5?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer:\u00a0There is stuff in Season 5 where it\u2019s calling directly to the play. And even to the play that Joyce put on in the play \u2014 we do a little callback to that. And you see a little glimpse of it. There is direct connective tissue.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer:\u00a0But everything you need to know and understand is in the show. I think the play itself would sort of flesh some of it out for you.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: And it\u2019s fun, I think, if you\u2019ve seen both. It should work either way.<\/p>\n

\t\tYou\u2019ve said that you wanted the show to grow up with your audience. Where does Season 5 fall into that arc?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: I think 4 is as violent and dark as the show gets. We were gross in 3 at times, but a fun kind of gross. With 4, we really wanted to push the horror. Season 5, there was less conversation about that. But we certainly didn\u2019t want to backtrack, I\u2019ll say that.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: I feel like a key to the success of the show is that Ross and I are always striving to make things as scary as possible. But we can only get so scary, for whatever reason. Some of the success results in our failure to be as scary as we want to be. I really believe that.<\/p>\n

\t\tYou want it to be scary, but\u2026\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: We\u2019re not James Wan. We just can\u2019t. Season 1 in particular, I wanted it to be scarier than I think ultimately it was. It\u2019s more accessible than we actually intended it to be. Which helped the show!<\/p>\n

\t\tWas that something you discovered about your own sensibilities, that you were more accessible than you\u2019d though you were?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: I think so. Some of that is just the show became what the show became, just over the course of making it. But I think that\u2019s correct that our sensibilities only go so far in terms of darkness and horror.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: We\u2019ve always had somewhat mainstream taste. That\u2019s probably helped us out. We have a pretty healthy diet in terms of consuming all sorts of different types of movies. Especially when we were growing up, we gravitated towards somewhat mainstream films. In film school, we didn\u2019t have the hippest taste, you know what I mean? Everyone else was making these sorts of deep movies, dramatic films. Our senior thesis was about a cannibal. That\u2019s just where our taste gravitated to. It\u2019s very helpful because then we\u2019re just writing what we love, rather than trying to write what we think people like or what will reach a broad, wide audience.<\/p>\n

\t\tFrom the series premiere in Season 1 to the Season 5 premiere, how much time has passed?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: Honestly, I\u2019d have to look it up. I can\u2019t remember when that first season \u2014 was it \u201983? Five years, maybe?<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: So it\u2019s been maybe four fewer years than reality or something?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\tThe energy of the Upside Down just accelerated everybody\u2019s aging.\u00a0\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer:\u00a0It\u2019s not as dramatic as people think. There was a scene in Season 4 in Episode 4, the \u201cDear Billy\u201d\u00a0episode. Sadie [Sink] is in the basement, writing her letters, and then she walks out of the basement outside, and a year has passed for her, because we shot the two scenes at the beginning and the end of production. And you can\u2019t tell. No one\u2019s ever, ever noticed that. That\u2019s a full year.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tMcLaughlin, Matarazzo, Wolfhard and Noah Schnapp in the series premiere of \u201cStranger Things,\u201d filmed in 2015; below: McLaughlin, Schnapp, Matarazzo and Wolfhard on the set of Season 5, photographed in 2024<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tNetflix\/Courtesy Everett Collection; Atsushi Nishijima\/Netflix<\/p>\n

\t\tBecause of the COVID shutdown.\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: If you\u2019re paying attention, you can notice it.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: But my point is, nobody\u2019s ever noticed it.\u00a0As they get older, it\u2019s less of a dramatic jump. Coming to shoot Season 3 was shocking to me and Ross. And we had to quickly adjust the writing, because we had been writing them too young.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\tTheir voices changed.\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: We\u2019re still dealing with that. We were recording with actor Jake [Connelly], who plays a new character this year, and his voice has already dropped quite a bit since we shot him. Luckily, there\u2019s EQ technology. We actually were just listening today. It\u2019s fine. We got worried for a second, but it\u2019s OK.<\/p>\n

\t\tSo how often are you two apart?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: When it comes to work, we\u2019re never apart, except when we\u2019re this far apart working on our individual computers. So what is that, five feet? There have been a couple instances when there\u2019s been a family or a medical emergency where Ross is not there. It does cause quite a bit of panic for me.<\/p>\n

\t\tWhat\u2019s the longest that you\u2019ve been apart, just in life?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: It may be when we took a break after Season 4. We didn\u2019t see each other for three weeks.<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: We probably will have the longest break we\u2019ve ever had after we finish Season 5. It\u2019ll probably just be about three and a half weeks, because I\u2019m going to be with my kids. That\u2019s not much of a vacation, anyway.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: We love working, and since we only work together, I start to go a little crazy if I\u2019m not doing something creative. I can\u2019t imagine going much longer than that in the near future.<\/p>\n

\t\tSo what are you thinking your life is going to look like on January 1, 2026? What do you think you\u2019ll be doing?\t<\/p>\n

\n\tMatt Duffer: I think it\u2019s going to be two weeks of recovery. I\u2019ve realized, do not go on vacation right after the show releases, because there\u2019s just so much noise and online stuff, you can\u2019t enjoy yourself. So I was like, two weeks, let it set in. Especially this being the last season. So just deal with the reactions. We\u2019ve probably had less than three months\u2019 [vacation] in 10 years.<\/p>\n

\n\tRoss Duffer: But we\u2019re excited. We haven\u2019t really worked on something brand new for almost 10 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This Q&A has been edited and condensed from two interviews.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For Variety\u2019s Oct. 15 cover story on the fifth and final season of \u201cStranger Things,\u201d the show\u2019s creators,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":306328,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[64321,88,52585,45712,13671],"class_list":{"0":"post-306327","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-duffer-brothers","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-game-of-thrones","11":"tag-shawn-levy","12":"tag-stranger-things"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306327\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/306328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}