Yahoo News The Blacklist season 7 finale will mix live-action and animation because pandemic stopped filming
Several TV series being filmed around the world have had their productions interrupted by the coronavirus pandemic. Some have pushed back premiere dates, while others have been forced to postpone individual episodes until later in the year.
The Blacklist, however, has found a unique way for its season 7 finale to go ahead.
The NBC show revealed that the instalment will feature of mix of live-action footage that was filmed before quarantining measures were put in place, and animated scenes that have been completed by the cast and crew remotely.
It also teased a couple of images that see Megan Boone's Elizabeth Keen and James Spader's Raymond 'Red' Reddington in all their graphic novel glory.
"I hadn't yet played [him] with my son tiptoeing into the kitchen to get snacks," Spader laughed during an interview with The AP. "But you do what you do.
"You turn the heat off so it wouldn't cycle, you try to remember not to run the dishwasher."
Related: Former Blacklist star Ryan Eggold reveals why playing Tom Keen was a "really rare experience"
The long-running crime thriller was halfway through shooting episode 19 when filming in New York City was forced to stop.
While deciding what to do going forward, series creator Joe Bokencamp recalled how he joked to executive producer John Eisendrath that it'd be fun to transform what they already had into "an old-school radio broadcast where we put the image of a crackling fire or a radio up on TV and the actors could voice it".
Instead, they took inspiration from The Blacklist's existing comics and created what they needed digitally.
However, he noted: "It's possible that if we knew how much work it took to do an animated half of this episode, we might well have not come up with the idea."
The Blacklist season 7 finale will air on NBC on Friday, May 15. In the UK, the show airs on Sky One on Thursdays at 9pm.
The information in this story is accurate as of the publication date. While we are attempting to keep our content as up-to-date as possible, the situation surrounding the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic continues to develop rapidly, so it's possible that some information and recommendations may have changed since publishing.
For any concerns and latest advice, visit the World Health Organisation. If you're in the UK, the National Health Service can also provide useful information and support, while US users can contact the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
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