Interview: ‘Shōgun’ Director Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour Jr. Discusses “The Abyss of Life”

During an interview with Awards Radar on Zoom, director Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour Jr. explained how he got involved with helming the eighth episode of Shōgun titled “The Abyss of Life.” While working on Netflix’s The Midnight Club, his assistant director Dan Miller told him he had joined FX’s Shōgun and asked if he would be interested, knowing his love of Japanese cinema and culture, having lived in the country for many years:

“He told me a bit about it and their goals of trying to create an authentic Japanese samurai period piece, and my ears perked up. He had learned about my time in Japan and that I speak Japanese, and he wanted me to meet Rachel and Justin. He gave me their email addresses, but I didn’t want to pursue it aggressively. My manager encouraged me because Dan offered to connect us and take them up. My manager emailed Justin Marks and Ed McDowell and pitched the heck out of me. I ended up going to the interview for the show, and it was probably the most enjoyable interview I’ve ever had for television up until now because they were both Japanese cinema aficionados. I’ve lived in Japan and am a huge fan of Japanese films. They were trying to explore in the show the same themes that I’m drawn to when I watch contemporary Japanese films: identity and belonging.”

The filmmaker had extensive discussions with showrunners Justin Marks and Rachel Kondo on what the episode would mean for the grander arc of the show, but he was allowed to bring his own spin to it, referencing both Hirokazu Kore-eda‘s Maborosi and Masaki Kobayashi‘s Harakiri to give it its unique visual style:

“When you’re a television director, ultimately, your job is to serve the show, but also the vision of the showrunner. Every episode has its own goals. I believe that my episode was very unique. It was great because it came right after Toranaga’s [Hiroyuki Sanada] son, Nagakado [Yuki Kura], died. The entire clan is in an emotional state; they haven’t really been in the whole series. Because of that, Justin really wanted something specific for this episode. He wanted this collective sense of grief and mystery because Toranaga is acting differently than he normally does. He looks like a man that’s on the verge of giving up. He’s sick and has no interest in pursuing any conflict with Osaka, which is completely uncharacteristic of him. Justin always wanted the audience to ask themselves if this is a ruse or if he is truly affected by the death of his son, therefore giving up.

He also allowed me to put my own stamp on it. My cinematographer, Marc Laliberté, and I gravitated towards Hirokazu Kore-eada’s Maborosi, his very first film. He’s one of the contemporary Japanese film greats, and that film is specifically about grief, with a very unique visual style. It uses darkness and composition to capture the isolation and despair you feel during grief. I felt it would work well in scenes in Edo, and it’s what we used. I pitched it to Justin, and he was totally on board with it, which is why the scenes in Edo feel so dark and ominous. That was very intentional. Regarding the overall mystery intention that I spoke about, we leaned towards Masaki Kobayashi’s Harakiri because, in that movie, Harakiri means seppuku in Japanese. But the reference was mostly about the quiet tension. I wanted every angle, every change in shot size to be heavy and weighted so that when the camera did move, it meant something, which creates this quiet tension to the whole episode and accentuates this house of cards because the whole episode is about Toranaga trying to manipulate every single character through this performance of grief. Those quiet choices created an atmosphere that felt a little different, but at the end of the day, the showrunner had fairly clear goals for the episode, and I did my best to support them.”

Osei-Kuffour also expanded upon his collaboration with cinematographer Marc Laliberté, stating that they would “talk through everything. We went to the sets and all the locations and walked through most of the shots. When you have real actors there and are ready to shoot, you want to be open enough to allow their performance to dictate where the camera is. I like to be very prepared, and you don’t have much time when you get on set on any show. Especially on this show, you want a strategy and a plan. The whole goal of prep for me was to focus on the subtext of every single scene and understand whose point of view we were seeing. What happens under the words being said out loud, and how does that all add up to the climax? The planning is all about getting the pieces together and making creative choices that elevate the emotion and the intention we need for this episode to hit you.”

During our full audio interview, seen below, we also talked about working with Anna Sawai to explore Mariko’s introspection during the Tea Ceremony sequence while also discussing the process of showcasing Blackthorne’s (Cosmo Jarvis) reunion with one of Erasmus‘ shipmates after spending so much time in Japan, the clearest shift in his arc before he reveals his true intentions to Toranaga in the finale. We also discussed the extensive planning of the episode’s seppuku scene, emphasizing building tension and wanting everything to feel as practical as possible.

You can listen to my full conversation with Emmanuel below and see all episodes of Shōgun on Hulu and Disney+.

[Some of the quotes in this article have been edited for length and clarity]