SPOILER ALERT:This interview contains spoilers for Season 4, Episode 5 of Barry, now streaming on HBO Max.
Last weeks episode of Barry ended on one of the shows most bizarre cliffhangers: Barry (Bill Hader) and Sally (Sarah Goldberg) appeared to be several years older and living in a house in the desert with a young son. The HBO show has toyed with flashbacks and dream-like sequences before, and Sundays newest episode didnt reveal what was going on until the final minutes
and its a time jump into the future!
The end of last weeks episode actually moved ahead eight years, during which Barry and Sally have evaded public recognition after he escaped prison. Theyre living under brand-new identities, Clark and Emily, and raising their son, John. Barry, newly religious and peaceful, homeschools John but is too afraid to teach him how to play baseball because of the sports violence. Sally wears a brunette wig, dons a Southern accent and works at a rinky-dink diner, where she gets sexually harassed by a biker.
In the episodes most harrowing moment, Sally seduces the biker, brings him into the bathroom to make out and then nearly strangles him to death. He promises not to tell anyone, but the next night, Barry and Sally get a mysterious knock at their door. Nobody is there, but its enough for Barry to dig out a gun and keep watch until the morning while Sally and John hide in the bathtub.
The time jump is then revealed when the show cuts back over to Los Angeles, where a bearded Gene (Henry Winkler) has re-emerged after going off the grid hiding from Barry. The actor has been presumed dead for the last eight years. He arrives at a Warner Bros. studio, where he takes a job as a consultant for a movie about his and Barrys lives. Back in the desert, Barry sees an article announcing the biopic, and he decides he needs finally to kill Gene.
With Variety, Goldberg explains that bonkers time jump, why Sally, now an alcoholic, is at her darkest depths and how theres no chance any of the Barry characters will get a happily ever after.
What was your first reaction to reading the time jump in the script?
Bill had told me were going to do an eight-year flash-forward before Id read the whole season. I was really excited, because from the beginning of the series, I just wanted to push Sally into the darkest depths that we could. I was curious to see her as a full-blown alcoholic; that was my hope. Bill promised me wed go all the way there by the end of the series, and he held true to his promise. Its a full departure from anywhere weve been in the show.
I could already imagine cinematically it was going to be really elegantly shot, which it was, and there were Paris, Texas references and inspiration from Bill. I was thrilled and very shocked. The moment that dropped in my stomach the most was the bathroom scene. That was something they hadnt talked to me about before reading, and I just had no idea where that was gonna go. Is she going to sleep with him? Is she going to kill him? That was exciting not to know, even as Sally, where were going.
What are Sallys darkest depths?
I think its the darkest place weve seen her in the whole series. Thats not to say she wont go darker in the next episode! Theres a combination happening of all the trauma weve seen Sally through, and the things we know about her family and her marriage. Now shes trapped, quite literally, in another abusive relationship of a different kind, living a lie with a child that she seemingly had no interest in having, with a major drinking problem and pretending to be religious.
I mean, do you want me to go on? The list is long! Shes in this false sense of security. Shes hitched her wagon to Barry thinking that this is the place of safety, being with this person is where shes most secure. But actually, shes in the belly of the whale. Shes not in a safe place at all.
I didnt see the twist coming until the end of the episode. Then I was trying to do the math, like Does this kid look eight years old?
I cant imagine what Sallys labor was like. That would have been a curious episode. I cant imagine that went very well or they were in an actual hospital.
Did you and Bill talk about what else might have happened in those eight years before Barry and Sally were living in the desert?
The idea is that theyve been on the run, so theyve been in various locations under various identities, and this is where theyve landed and have been for a while. The end of Episode 4 was actually the very first thing that I shot for Season 4. It was the Lets go scene, so it was a hard place to start. We thought with Episodes 1-4, how are we going to get Sally to a place where this tracks, and shes wanting to go with Barry?
Thats why theres the moment in Episode 2 when Sally says, I feel safe with you. The idea is that shes been through so much in her life and shes been through abusive relationships. Barry was the one person who witnessed her crime and her most animal self in this terrible thing that she did, and he chooses to love her anyway. Sallys the only character in the show who murders someone when murder isnt a part of her regular life and isnt her career. Shes in his terrible trauma state from whats happened, and Barry, for some reason, is the only person that makes her feel safe because he was there. Its like him being around her annuls the experience. It makes it all quiet. Its tragic, really.
Did Sally have any other personas before Emily?
We got a little lazy as actors; we didnt write our journals of the last eight years, but we did talk about being on the run. For Sally, its the last little drop in the jug of who she used to be, and at least she still gets to act. In this life that theyve got on the run, shes gonna give Emily her full Meryl Streep. Its the one piece of her old self that she still holds onto; she goes to work every day and gives this performance. At this point, theyve been on the run so long and theyre truly in the middle of nowhere, theres no real reason for her to be doing the accent and wearing the wig. Theres some element of her old self still kicking and screaming, wanting to give a performance.
We met Sallys parents in the season premiere, and they didnt have the healthiest relationship. How did Sallys upbringing influence her dysfunctional parental style?
Its something that we definitely thought a lot about. Some of the choices that we ended up making in Episode 1, particularly performance-wise, were decisions we made after reading Episode 5 and knowing where we were heading. Initially, Sallys mother was written a lot more bubbly and Midwestern and then theres a flip-side to her. Ultimately, they decided on this really cold, detached parent who doesnt listen and isnt taking Sally in. It felt like that would help us understand Sallys behavior in Episode 5. She hasnt had any examples in her life to draw from, in terms of a parent or maternal figure. Shes also been duped into this faux family, and Barrys in this delusional state. In his mind, they have this perfect, nuclear, Christian family. And Sally knows the whole thing is kind of a lie.
So I think that shes struggling to accept her reality, because it doesnt feel like a reality, hence the drinking and the persona. Her own upbringing definitely has colored her ability to not just be compassionate to her own child, but in life Sally struggles to connect with other people. Weve seen that over all the seasons in her myopia of her career obsession, and when she wants something so badly she just cant see past it. I think that comes from an upbringing where nobody was ever listening to her. Shes literally screaming to be heard and having a panic attack, and nobodys there. It explains a lot about Sally, and her more belligerent side and inability to fully take in other people.
Was there ever a discussion of Sally going full Barry and killing the guy in the diner bathroom?
Shes gonna go right to the edge. She doesnt know where that moment is going to end when she starts it. I think she has a lot of pent-up rage toward men, with good reason. Shes so trapped in this dynamic with Barry, and his delusion is so stifling. You cant reason with somebody whos not seeing reality. With all of this built-up rage toward Sam, toward the man who attacked her, toward Barry, its all coming out. There is a moment where shes on this precipice of a moral tightrope and she could kill him.
Ultimately, shes not that person. Shes not Barry, or a bad person at her core. She makes very bad decisions and has done some bad things, but her impulses dont come from that place. She wants to scare him because the way hes behaving at work is predatory, and shes had enough of that in her life. She wants to have the power, and instead of being afraid of his predatory nature, she wants to attack him. But I dont think she would have ever killed him.
Being with Barry must have rubbed off on her. Are there other aspects of Barry that have seeped into Sallys personality?
Without him, that type of violence wouldnt have been in her life. Thats the effect of dating a serial killer. They used to be this sort of perfect, disastrous match in the way that they saw each other. It was a relationship based on projections. Barry was obsessed with Sally, and thats all Sally needed to hear, that she was going to be a star. But he never saw her. Even in the fantasies that Barry had in Season 1, we always had Sally in these pink costumes, but Sally never wore pink in life. It was supposed to be this subtle nod to the fact that he doesnt see her for who she is at all. He sees this idea of a woman and had this projected version of her.
And then for her, it was the idea of being worshipped by someone who thought she was going to be a star. They were two people who never really listened to each other, or took each other in. By the end of Season 3 when their pact is made in blood, and theyre now complicit in a crime, thats really where Sally becomes wed to Barry and its too bad. Theres a knowing quality to Sally we can see in Episode 5, shes not being fooled by him in every way or buying into the religious charade hes posing. Shes not going to play happy family; having this child was very much Barrys idea, and an agenda he pushed.
I dont think Sally ever wanted to be a mother she wanted to be an actress. Theres a self-preservation in there somewhere, a bit of resilience. Even the drinking is a form of rebellion.
The episode jumped ahead eight years. So where do you think Sally is in the next eight years?
Well, I dont think I can answer that. What I can say is Id hope for Sally to find some peace, and find a way to make just one selfless choice.
Hopefully she and Barry end up being happy parents.
I dont think theres a happily ever after for these two. I dont think its ever been a love story between Barry and Sally. At worst, Id say its been convenience, and at best its been survival but never a love story. Theres not really any character that has a happily ever after. All the characters are so morally bankrupt, and we all walk this line the whole time, its challenging for anyone to be in any kind of meaningful, loving relationship when theyre constantly making the selfish choice.
This interview has been edited and condensed.