Shane never survived past the sixth issue in The Walking Dead comic book series, but after 18 episodes, the character finally met his maker at the hands of Rick Grimes last night. Moments later, he came back as a "walker" and was finished off with a bullet in the head from Carl. Talking to Entertainment Weekly, actor Jon Berthnal has revealed plenty of new details about the circumstances surrounding his departure from the AMC series as well as what it was like to film those scenes. Be sure to click on the link below to read even more.
On Playing A Zombie In The Last Few Moments Of His Time On The Walking Dead: You know, man, it was crazy. I didn’t even realize that I was playing a zombie until I was playing it. There was a lot of discussion going back and forth, a lot of arguing going back and forth on what that last scene actually should be — between myself and Andy and the writers. And everybody kind of got their own little say in what that last scene actually was. But then at the very end I realized, now you gotta go play a zombie! I never even thought about that. Then all of a sudden I’ve got these contacts on, I can’t see anything, and I’m a zombie. And I’m like, "I don’t know how to do this! What do you do?" I tried to convince Greg Nicotero to let me be the only zombie with a speaking line, like, "Riiiiiick." But he didn’t go for it.
On Shooting His Emotional Exit: We shot that scene all night long. And the entire cast came out and spent the entire night out on that field to be there for the last scene, and Jeff DeMunn [who played the recently deceased Dale] actually had been gone. He lives on a farm in upstate New York, and he had flown down and surprised me to be there for my last scene, which just touched me. And like I said, there was a lot of feeling about the last scene. The writers wanted it to be one way, the actors wanted it one way, the producers wanted it to be another way, I think everybody just sort of had their idea of what that scene should be, and it was just Andy and I in the woods walking out together, and Andy and I turned to each other and said, “You know what, man, this is you and me. Let’s do this for you and me.” I can’t imagine a better actor, a better partner, to do this with, and it’s been the honor of my acting career to act alongside Andrew Lincoln. He’s my brother, he’s my best friend that I’ve made in the acting world, and to go out the way I did and go out with who I did — it was, and still is, very emotional.
On Whether He Think Shane Got What He Deserved: I think so. And I think that no matter what, somebody was going to die that night. And Shane really did set out that night to kill Rick, and through the conversation, by the end of the scene, he just knew one of them needed to die. I do think he did the right thing.
On Whether He Asked To Be Written Out After The Firing Of Frank Darabont: You know, no. I did not. This was always the plan. This was always the plan that this was going to do down this way. [However] when Frank left, there were some discussions that it was going to go a different way. One of the things I was really, really looking forward to is Frank always said he was going to write and direct our last scene — the last scene Andy and I would play together. And I’ll be honest: It brought all those feelings back up, because at the end of the day, this thing started with Andy, Frank, and I. Frank continues, I know, to live in Andy’s heart, as he does in mine, and I think that he was sort of there in that last scene. The fact that now I get to go work with him again [on TNT’s upcoming L.A. Noir] is something I’m just tremendously excited about.
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