\u201cSeries 2 ended quite neatly and the world was starting to reopen,\u201d Simon Evans, who wrote the series alongside Phin Glynn, told RadioTimes.com<\/a>. <\/span>\u201cPhin and I always thought we would leave it alone unless a new idea occurred to us.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThere was a lot of discussion about season 3 \u2013 much more so than there was about season 1 or 2,\u201d says Georgia Tennant, star and producer on Staged. \u201cT<\/span>hroughout the process, there were many times where I think every single one of us went, \u2018Oh, this isn\u2019t gonna happen.\u2019 And we were sort of all fine with that.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe process of figuring out what that story was and how we were going to tell it \u2013 and whether we should<\/em> tell it \u2013 took such a long time \u2013 we did go round the houses trying to come up with ideas and nothing felt like it clicked. We could have given up, but it felt like there was a story and we just needed to find it.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThen there was a moment where the idea came and it suddenly felt like, \u2018Oh, OK, well, now we\u2019ve got the hook, we\u2019ve got the premise.’\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n For those keeping score, the first season of Staged \u2013 devised, filmed and released in June 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic \u2013 saw Michael Sheen and David Tennant play fictionalised versions of themselves, battling their own egos, each other and their bumbling director Simon (played by Evans) as they rehearsed a performance of Luigi Pirandello\u2019s Six Characters in Search of an Author during lockdown via videoconference.<\/p>\n The follow-up \u2013 which premiered on 4th January 2021, coincidentally on the eve of a second lockdown across the UK \u2013 offered a meta twist, following the \u201creal\u201d Michael and David after the success of Staged, while Staged 3 \u2013 which is streaming now on BritBox \u2013 follows yet another version of the characters whose attempts to follow up the first two outings with a third chapter end in chaos.<\/p>\n Much of the new season breaks away from the show\u2019s traditional look and style, instead taking the form of a mockumentary \u2013 the punningly titled BackStaged \u2013 that charts efforts to get season 3 back on track.<\/p>\n \u201cGoing into this, there was a huge, huge worry in me that [changing the style] would break something quite special about it,\u201d admits Evans. \u201cI mean, we\u2019ve got David and Michael, who are just amazing, and if I\u2019m writing that sort of bickering, it\u2019s going to have a flavour of [the previous format].\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Perhaps the biggest challenge for all concerned was keeping track of what was now \u201creal\u201d in the world of Staged, with the show having twice pulled the trick of revealing \u201creality\u201d to have been a scripted fiction.<\/p>\n Evans recalls: \u201cThere were certain moments in rehearsals where David and Michael would go, \u2018I can\u2019t say this, because that disagrees with this.\u2019 And we had to say, \u2018No, that\u2019s fine, because you only said that in that<\/em> reality.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI hope that the show identifies and recognises its own chaos a little bit. The characters aren\u2019t somehow one step ahead of everybody else. If anything, they\u2019re a few steps behind.\u201d<\/span><\/p> The blurring of the line between fiction and reality has had an impact on the Staged team\u2019s real lives, too. Georgia Tennant hadn\u2019t met Michael Sheen prior to working on Staged and had met Anna Lundberg (Sheen\u2019s partner both on- and off-screen) only briefly, but had to play a version of herself who was close friends with both \u2013 now, she really is<\/em> close friends with the couple, having worked together on Staged.<\/p>\n \u201cNow we chat every day \u2013 we\u2019re constantly in contact with each other and our kids are great friends. Sometimes you have to kind of go, \u2018Hold on, what\u2019s real, and what\u2019s not real?\u2019 \u2013 we really feel like that. So it\u2019s been an unusual experience.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Staged 3 culminates with Michael and David back on a video call and attempting to improvise their way out of a live-streamed version of A Christmas Carol. \u201cDavid actually said it very nicely \u2013 when he read the first draft of episode 6, he said, \u2018It\u2019s mad, but it\u2019s the only way we could go out\u2019,\u201d says Evans.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cMake of it what you will, but it might be my favourite, because it\u2019s quintessentially my sense of humour and it\u2019s taken three series for me to have the confidence to write something that chaotic. I wanted, in 20 minutes, to do a \u2018live\u2019 chaotic farce and, at the end, move people a little bit. That was the plan.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The series, and apparently the show as a whole, ends with one last meta twist, with Michael suggesting that it\u2019s time he and David take a break from their double act and work on solo projects. So ends \u201cStaged\u201d and so ends Staged.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a bittersweet sign-off, ending on a long, lingering shot of a melancholy Michael and David, though Evans thinks there\u2019s also something \u201coptimistic\u201d about the final scene. \u201cThey\u2019re not saying they don\u2019t like each other, they\u2019re not saying they have fallen out or they\u2019re hurting, they\u2019re just saying that a page needs to be turned here.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cObviously there\u2019s a sadness to that, but I think it\u2019s a sort of healthy ending to something. It\u2019s always sad to say goodbye to something.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Georgia Tennant echoes those sentiments. \u201cIt ends with a sense that it has meant so much to us and it has given us so much and has sort of helped us keep our sanity in a time that has been scary and boring and frustrating and anxiety-filled. So it\u2019s more a sort of nod and a thank you to everything it\u2019s meant, rather than a sort of sadness, I hope.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI know people have [felt sad] because they\u2019ve messaged me, but I hope the sadness is representative of how much love people have felt, and that we have felt, so the sadness isn\u2019t bleak, but more celebratory.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Of course, Staged 2 could have been \u2013 and very nearly was \u2013 the end. So can the team say with confidence that we won\u2019t see any more Staged? \u201cAs confidently as I have ever said it before,\u201d quips Georgia. \u201cEach time has felt like the end \u2013 much like the pandemic. And then in exactly the same way stuff can happen and it can change.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve very much written a break-up here between two people,\u201d says Evans. \u201cI\u2019m sure another idea will occur to me and Phin, and it\u2019d be lovely. David and Michael have always been brilliant when either of us text them or email them and say, \u2018Is this a thing?\u2019 so never say never. But I\u2019m really proud of that final episode and I get worried about diminishing returns\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSo at the moment, having just finished it. I\u2019m very pleased with that as a sort of full stop. But who knows what the versions of us in two years will want to cook up?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Staged season 3 is available to watch on BritBox<\/a> now <\/b>\u2013 you can sign up for a 7-day free trial here<\/a>.\u00a0<\/strong>Check out more of our\u00a0Comedy<\/a>\u00a0coverage or visit our\u00a0TV Guide<\/a> and Streaming Guide<\/a> to see what\u2019s on tonight.<\/strong><\/p>\n The latest issue of Radio Times magazine is on sale now \u2013\u00a0<\/strong>subscribe now<\/a>. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to the\u00a0Radio Times View From My Sofa podcast<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n By Morgan Jeffery Published: Wednesday, 30 November 2022 at 12:00 am Staged has taken its final bow, wrapping up after three seasons with its most meta outing yet \u2013 the trilogy capper has been warmly received by fans and critics, but Staged 3 almost didn\u2019t happen. \u201cSeries 2 ended quite neatly and the world was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":26337,"template":"","categories":[1,5],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/11\/georgia-tennant-simon-evans-on-staged-3s-ending-and-possible-future.jpg",620,413,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/11\/georgia-tennant-simon-evans-on-staged-3s-ending-and-possible-future-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/11\/georgia-tennant-simon-evans-on-staged-3s-ending-and-possible-future-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/11\/georgia-tennant-simon-evans-on-staged-3s-ending-and-possible-future.jpg",620,413,false],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/11\/georgia-tennant-simon-evans-on-staged-3s-ending-and-possible-future.jpg",620,413,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/11\/georgia-tennant-simon-evans-on-staged-3s-ending-and-possible-future.jpg",620,413,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/11\/georgia-tennant-simon-evans-on-staged-3s-ending-and-possible-future.jpg",620,413,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Morgan Jeffery Published: Wednesday, 30 November 2022 at 12:00 am Staged has taken its final bow, wrapping up after three seasons with its most meta outing yet \u2013 the trilogy capper has been warmly received by fans and critics, but Staged 3 almost didn\u2019t happen. \u201cSeries 2 ended quite neatly and the world was…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/26336"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"""\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/3\/2022\/11\/britboxstagedsr302-4f9fb62.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C413"\" "\\"\"\"\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>![\"""\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/3\/2022\/11\/staged-a00b235.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C413"\" "\\"\"\"\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"