"These youths will be the death of me," is a real statement this E! News' TV editor uttered while tuning into the Feb. 13 showing of Euphoria.
The latest episode of the HBO teen drama featured Rue (Zendaya) suffering a terrible bout of withdrawal, Cassie (Sydney Sweeney) attempting to slit her wrists with a wine opener and Nate (Jacob Elordi) traumatizing Maddy (Alexa Demie) with a manipulative game of Russian roulette. And, like we said, this all occurred in one episode.
So it's no wonder that now, in several interviews, the cast is opening up about what it took to film this unremitting season of television. For starters, in a cover story for The Cut, Zendaya straight-up called her character reaching rock bottom "f--ing brutal."
We can accept this description as fact, with last week's episode showing Rue busting down a door, running through traffic and repeatedly being stabbed with a morphine needle. "I can mostly shake it off," she said of her challenging part. "But there are days where you're just in it, and even if your brain knows it's not real, your body takes on this anxiousness and anger."
Of course, Zendaya's Rue isn't the only one being pushed to a breaking point this season. For Sydney, whose character has been going through it thanks to her disastrous choice to sleep with her best friend's ex, told The Cut she is "very proud of the meltdown Cassie had this season."
Similarly, Barbie Ferreira assured fans that "the theme is everyone's gone a little crazy."
Even uber-confident Maddy is about ready to lose it when Nate points a gun at her, and then himself. "It was an incredibly difficult scene not only because of the gun to my head," Alexa told Entertainment Weekly, "but because it was choreographed in a really specific way. We had to move with the camera movements and it was really broken up, and so it took us two days to shoot. It was basically all we did all day on those days."
Apparently, Alexa and Jacob had to just jump into the scene, as they "didn't have a lot of time" to prepare. And there was certainly no fun in-between takes, as Alexa added, "I'm definitely not the type of actor that can just break a scene like that and start laughing and joking. I have to kind of stay in my own world and tune everyone else out."
For what's next for the stars of Euphoria, be sure to catch the new episode when it airs Sunday at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.