Beauty and the Beast executive producer Kelly Souders opens up in a round-table discussion about the rest of the first season, the shift away from the procedural element and did they move “The Kiss” up after the internet’s reaction to the Alex subplot?
Q: I was getting a lot of Twitter questions about the Gabe character. When are we going to learn more about him?
KS: You’re gonna learn a lot. It’s going to a start unraveling more and more, but in the last couple episodes of the season in particular. He becomes… you’ll understand a new place that he has in the show.
Q: Are we going to go back and investigate Cat’s mother’s death anymore?
KS: That’s definitely going to come into play and how she learns more about her mother is kind of interesting and more will unravel up until the finale.
Q: Is there a cliffhanger planned?
KS: Of course. There’s a couple cliffhangers. There’s multiple cliffhangers going on in the finale.
Q: It feels like there’s deeper levels of mythology that we haven’t gotten the chance to explore yet. In the second season, is that where we would see more of that?
KS: As you leave this season, it tees you up for some bigger revelations to come down the road in season two, so I don’t think you’ll be disappointed with it.
Q: What was your original goal with this series. Was there a master plan of a certain number of seasons?
KS: As the season goes along, there’s a lot of things that we pull out that fit into upcoming seasons. Like, we’ll have one story arc and we’ll pull it back and go, ‘It fits more in line with what we have planned for season two or season three. There’s a lot of different avenues that we’ve been having fun exploring so a lot of it is going back and picking out which stories can work well with each other. There’s an incredible writing staff.
Q: So there’s no master plan as in, ‘We have to get to this benchmark in the story at a certain point’?
KS: Not specifically as far as timelines, but there’s definitely tentpoles and big moments that all of us have been planning. I can’t go like, “Let’s make this happen in episode 8,” but there are tentpoles that will be coming down the pipeline.
Q: Was it always the plan to have them kiss a third of the way into the first season?
KS: You know what, I will admit, no. We had been thinking the kiss, but we actually ended up pulling it forward a little bit more and I think in a way it allowed us to open up some of the story for the back half so going into it, we work really closely with CBS Studios and CW Netowrk and really there’s a big discussion with them and working with thema s partners and we all kind of agreed together, ‘Let’s just move it a little closer up cuz it’ll allow us to blow out some things in the back.
Q: Was moving it forward a reaction to the internet reaction to Alex?
KS: No. I can’t say that because we end up shooting ahead of when they air. We writer them, then re-write them, then they shoot them then they come back and we go thru post and get in the visual effects, so there’s a lot of things and quite a bit of time passes… although we did read all those comments. (laughs)
Q: What sparked the shift away from the procedural element of the show?
KS: Yea, her being a cop is such a critical part of her character, but it was great to have a few of the episodes up top where you were with her as this mystery was unfolding. I think all of us get footage in and you start looking at scenes and things and you start seeing Cat and Vincent together and you see them on the run from Muirfield or whatever it is, all that stuff is compelling so it was nice to be able to shift a little bit. After people kind of knew the characters, we started weaving into their worlds a little differently.
