“The Old Man” will be back soon with a new season. The FX drama will kick off Season 2 with a two-episode premiere on Thursday, Sept. 12 at 10/9c, the network announced Wednesday at the Television Critics Association summer press tour.
Season 2 consists of eight episodes, one more than Season 1. The remaining six episodes will air weekly. All episodes will stream the next day on Hulu.
FX also dropped a teaser for Season 2 — set to Soundgarden‘s “Black Hole Sun” with lots of helicopters and bullet holes — which will pick up after last season’s bombshell. The first season ended with the reveal that Angela Adams/Emily Chase (Alia Shawkat) is also Hamzad’s (Navid Negahban) daughter, Parwana. Season 2 finds Dan Chase (Jeff Bridges) and Harold Harper (John Lithgow) teaming up to rescue the woman they all claim as their daughter from Hamzad.
SEE Jeff Bridges on the ‘magic trick’ of ‘The Old Man’
“It seems to me that that’s part of what’s so interesting about putting us together: Harold and Chase are very different characters. They operate in extremely different ways and are constantly in conflict with each other, and so it’s very exciting when they collaborate and cooperate with each other,” Lithgow said during the show’s panel. “In a way, just the fact that I’m much more a theater actor who’s had to tone down to work in front of the camera and Jeff’s had a long, long — he’s absolutely our greatest actor of his generation acting in front of a camera. I think it’s a very interesting combination.”
Meanwhile, Zoe (Amy Brenneman) makes some surprising moves after being drawn into Chase’s world, while Julian (Gbenga Akinnagbe) finds himself at a crossroads with an unforeseen new path. “It was important to Amy and to all of us at the beginning that that character never felt reduced to sidekick or someone who had just swept into the story and they were there to support,” co-creator and executive producer Jonathan E. Steinberg teased of Zoe’s Season 2 arc. “[We wanted] her story was as meaningful a transformation and as meaningful a process of exploration of any of the characters.”
“The Old Man” was renewed for a second season shortly following its premiere in June 2022, which was two years after production initially began. Season 1 paused production twice due to the pandemic and Bridges’ lymphoma diagnosis. His cancer has been in remission since September 2021. Bridges and Lithgow netted Golden Globe and Critics Choice Award nominations for their work in Season 1. The former was also nominated at the Screen Actors Guild Awards and Emmy Awards. Season 2 was then delayed due to the writers’ strike. “In those four years, we’ve only managed to do 15 episodes,” Lithgow quipped. Bridges is “feeling great now” and never backed down from performing the fight scenes in which he’s getting beaten up more often than not.
“I’m coming back for more punishment. What is so bizarre, to me anyway, the first season, I was doing these fight scenes, I had a 9-inch by 12-inch tumor in my body, in my stomach that didn’t hurt at all. So that’s surprising to me,” he said. “But I’m feeling great now. Fortunately, we have some wonderful stunt coordinators.”
“Some of the greatest scenes in The Old Man are Jeff’s fight scenes — an old man having to summon up the strength and skill he had from 50 years ago,” Lithgow added. “I urge you all, if you haven’t already done so, find ‘Bad Company,’ a movie from the ’70s with Jeff Bridges. … Jeff’s fight scenes in that film, you gotta see that in order to deeply appreciate what he’s doing now.”
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