Wednesday Season 2 Post-Mortem: In Conversation with Director Angela Robinson
The filmmaker talks directing disembodied limbs, “Wenclair” fandom, and helping Jenna Ortega and Emma Myers swap bodies
by Lana Thorn 26 November 2025
Courtesy of Netflix
For a show that expertly balances horrific and comedic elements, Wednesday Season 2, Part 2 delivers both the darkest and funniest episodes yet. In “Hyde and Woe Seek” and “Woe Thyself”, there’s the Galpins’ twisted family drama, a zombie eating the brains of a disembodied head, and an internet-breaking scene that sees a typically stone-faced Jenna Ortega dancing joyously to Blackpink.
To bring that wonderfully woeful tonal mix to life, characteristic of executive producer and director Tim Burton, showrunners Alfred Gough and Miles Millar enlisted Angela Robinson. The 54-year- old filmmaker, who’s well-versed in genre television (True Blood), was a natural fit for the series’ mix of visual flair, absurd stakes, and character moments. Robinson’s eclectic resume includes everything from a Disney blockbuster (Herbie: Fully Loaded) to a groundbreaking queer TV drama (The L Word) and a historical romance (Professor Marston and the Wonder Women). But perhaps the project that chimes the most with her episodes on Wednesday is the queer camp classic, D.E.B.S., a spy parody that equally values laugh-out-loud, high-concept comedy and heartfelt relationship dynamics. Anchored by a tender queer romance, D.E.B.S. has grown a devoted cult following and remains a touchstone of lesbian cinema.
With Wednesday Season 2 now a fresh cadaver, Robinson calls me from her home in California to discuss the riotous body-swap episode, bringing back Gwendoline Christie as a spiteful ghost, and the state of queer cinema today.
Courtesy of Netflix
Phantasmag: Can you talk to me about your early career as a creative, from studying theatre to your superbly titled short film Chickula: Teenage Vampire? And where can we watch that, by the way?
Angela Robinson: That is a good question. I’m going to put that on my to-do list. I actually just digitised a bunch of my old films. I think I may have shot Chickula it on Super 8.
I wanted to be a filmmaker since I was 12. I remember taking a film class in middle school, and I was the only girl. I was obsessed with Raiders of the Lost Ark, Clash of the Titans, and playing D&D. I wanted to make movies, but it was really hard to get your hands on a camera, so I started doing theatre. I went to Brown University, and you weren’t allowed to check out a camera until you were a junior, so I got super involved in the theatre department. I directed like 12 plays.
I came out in college, and I started making queer plays. Then I moved to New York and founded a queer theatre company called Three Dollar Bill. We did plays downtown and it was really fun, but one night, as I was freezing cold and painting this black box theatre at three in the morning, I realised that I was never gonna make any money [laughs]. So I went to film school to pursue my original dream of being a filmmaker. You had to make a short for the application, so I made Chickula: Teenage Vampire with a lot of friends that I knew from college. What’s fun is that John Hamburg—a filmmaker who’s a friend of mine, he wrote Meet the Fockers and a bunch of movies —was the cinematographer on Chickula, and then Michael Showalter was in it. So it’s funny, when you see Chickula: Teenage Vampire, there’s a lot of fun talent.
P: That’s why you need to digitise it!
AR: I should put it out on something! So I went to NYU, and I made a bunch of shorts. One was called The Kinsey 3, about a trio of bisexual art thieves—I was making really silly things. Then I moved out to LA, and I hadn’t written anything because in theatre, playwriting and directing are very separate disciplines. So I had a total misconception about how Hollywood worked. In theatre, you could just go and license a play at Samuel French and do your own production of Long Day’s Journey or whatever, and I thought that was how movies worked. That I could do my own version of The Godfather or something, but I had a rude awakening.
I didn’t have the money to pay somebody to write me a screenplay, so I was like, ‘Ok, I’m gonna teach myself how to write.’ And I was friends with Jamie Babbit, who directed But I’m a Cheerleader, and Andrea Sperling, who produced that film and many more. I made these silly little D.E.B.S. comics that I xeroxed and gave to my friends, and they encouraged me to adapt them into a short film. It was one of the first things I ever wrote on my own, and I got a grant to make it. It screened at this gala, and it was an auspicious night because Ilene Chaiken and the cast of The L Word Season 1 were there. And Larry Kennar, who was an EP on The L Word, came up to me and said he wanted to represent me. He was like, ‘What do you want to do?’, and I said that I wanted to be the female Sam Raimi. I said, ‘Okay, I’ll sign with you if you get me a job within the week.’ I was really ballsy. And he did it. He introduced me to Ilene, and I got a job as a staff writer. The L Word was my first Hollywood-type job, and then we took the D.E.B.S. short to Sundance.
© Samuel Goldwyn Films
P: I just rewatched D.E.B.S. last night, and it’s such a comfort film for me. It continues to be just as meaningful for multiple generations of queer viewers and has only grown more popular. What does that legacy mean to you?
AR: It is so gratifying. Because I was totally clueless about the renewed interest in D.E.B.S. I shot it in 2003, and I call it a pre-Hollywood movie because it was the first thing I’d written all the way through as a feature. It was totally me. I just wrote what I thought was funny, and it was my happy movie. The reason I wanted to be a filmmaker was basically that I would always rewrite my favourite shows in my head to make them queer. So Charlie’s Angels or Buffy or The X-Files. And I wrote it thinking that nobody would ever watch it.
Then Clint Culpepper loved the short and gave me some money to go make the feature. It was super fun, but we showed back up at the studio with this film—and I don’t know the ins and outs—but the studio was like, ‘What is this? Who let them go and make a lesbian spy comedy?’ I think the studio didn’t know what to do with it. We took the feature to Sundance, and it killed, but then it got shelved and was finally released a year later. It had a lousy release, and nobody went to see it. I was kind of depressed, but then I went on my way and directed Herbie: Fully Loaded. So D.E.B.S. was my first love. It was so close to my heart, but I kind of just forgot about it. Cut to 20 years later, and I got a call that D.E.B.S. was gonna screen for Cinespia at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery—they do these screenings of cult films. I was psyched that they were showing it for Pride for its 20th anniversary.
I showed up to watch the movie, and there were all these young people. It was packed. It was thousands and thousands of kids, when I expected it to be old gays or something. From ages 17 to 30, people were dressed up like D.E.B.S. I asked, ‘How do you even know about this movie?’, and they’re like, ‘TikTok!’ So I went on TikTok—and I had never been on TikTok in my life—and there were all these videos. What was really fun was that today’s audience really got the film much more than when it was originally released. I mean, over the years, people have come to me and said, ‘Thank you for making D.E.B.S., or D.E.B.S. saved my life.’
P: Before Wednesday, you worked with Alfred Gough and Miles Millar on Herbie: Fully Loaded. How did they approach you about working on Wednesday, and what was your collaboration like?
AR: It’s funny, so Herbie was my second feature. Suddenly, I was helming this Disney summer tentpole, which was wild as a biracial lesbian in 2005 [laughs]. Al and Miles were the screenwriters—they’ve always had this way of bringing these big worlds to life and combining emotional stories with action and adventure. We kind of went through the crucible together on that movie, and we just kept in touch. Al and I both lived in the same neighbourhood in LA, and we would both go and work at the same cafe. Any time they had a new show, they would call me to see if I would come and direct on it.
Then, finally, our schedules synced up, and they said we’d love you to direct on Wednesday. I think they also—I mean, this was a big secret at the time—specifically thought of me for the body-swap episode. They thought my specific style and vision as a filmmaker would lend itself well to that episode. But also, we just wanted to work together. So I went to Ireland, where they shoot Wednesday, and it was a great collaboration. Because they really know what they want, and that’s the best thing for television directing. On features, you’re with a project from the start, but with TV, it’s like Double Dutch. They already have the rope going, and you have to jump in and not mess up the rhythm. I almost think of it as being a delightful dinner party guest. They’ve cooked the meal, but you have to come and do your part. But it was really fun to join the show. We had a good shorthand because we’ve known each other for such a long time, and they respected what I brought to it. They really let me do my thing.
Courtesy of Netflix
P: Speaking of the body-swap episode, it’s such a delight to see Jenna Ortega and Emma Myers play each other’s characters. How did you work with them to develop those complex performances?
AR: It was really fun. I can’t say enough incredible things about Jenna and Emma because they are lovely people and also incredible actors. I mean, it was a tall order. They’re also very good friends, and they really wanted to get it right because they respected what the other does with their character so much. And it’s a very challenging production schedule—on top of everything you’re already doing, you get this body-swap episode. So I came in, I met with Jenna, and we talked about just how fun the episode would be. What was exciting was that it was different from all the other episodes. It was bracketed as a different type of Wednesday episode. We talked about ways to make it special. Jenna’s so smart about her character, and about the whole voice and vision of the show.
I asked them if it would be helpful to rehearse together. So we put them in a room, and they each talked about how they developed the character. It was really fun to have them both articulate their process in developing Wednesday and Enid. Then we filmed them each doing the scenes separately, so that they could study the videos. Jenna would act out the Wednesday scenes and send the videos to Emma, and vice versa. They’d send videos to each other and then to me. And we rehearsed in depth the scenes where they’re both together, like when they first wake up and see each other.
A big part of my process was to study their characters: their intonation, their physicality… And it was a process to find the right acting level where the body-swap would read, but it wasn’t over the top. They’re both consummate actors, so I’d work with Emma on getting Wednesday’s walk right, for example, and not blinking, which is a whole thing. Now, I’m an expert because I’ve studied every movement the actors have made through seasons 1 and 2. My job was to say, ‘I think that movement was a little off, or you need less bounce in your walk.’ It was very technical and specific. So we played around, and then they just locked in. They were brilliant. Even the crew—if they weren’t looking and only heard them speaking, they weren’t sure who was on set. And I’m so happy that the episode has been received so strongly.
Courtesy of Netflix
P: The voices were so good.
AR: Yeah, and they also were carrying the emotion of the characters. The acting was incredible. It was a difficult job because you had to do the physicality and then also play the emotions of the scenes. And they go on quite a journey in each other’s skin, literally.
P: You oversaw another exciting dynamic, because Episode 5 saw the return of Gwendoline Christie as Principal Weems, albeit as a ghost that only Wednesday can see. What was it like directing that relationship?
AR: Gwendoline is a-mazing. She’s a brilliant, wonderful person. It was so exciting to have her back—and I was so thrilled she was reintroduced in my episode, because I was so bummed out when she died in Season 1. We talked a lot about how Weems would be as a ghost. What would be her perspective? How would she materialise? We talked about The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, because she had done a lot of research for Weems, drawing from…I wanna say, Kim Novak, and all these fabulous actresses from the 1950s. We talked about her relationship with Wednesday and Morticia, and how that would change now that she’s a ghost.
We decided on a shooting style where the camera would find her, so she wouldn’t blink in and out. So she was corporeal and not hazy. The fun part was that she could affect the world—she’s able to zap the book so that it moved at Morticia’s house. It was a really fun dynamic between her and Wednesday. She’s looking for ways to affect her life, but she can only guide her.
P: Also, a lot of the so-called “Wenclair” shippers went wild when they knew you were directing the episodes. I saw an edit on TikTok mixing scenes of Wednesday and Enid with Lucy and Amy from D.E.B.S.
AR: Really? Oh, my God, you have to send me some links.
Wednesday Season 2 is available on Netflix