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itself has occasionally struggled to balance Shakespearean plotlines, high-minded political philosophy, and the indescribable pleasure of watching a shuffling zombie get shot in the face. Through it all, ratings have continued to soar – the series is the most-watched drama in basiccable history, with a record-shattering season three finale, and AMC recently announced a spin-off coming in 2015 that will follow different characters through the same end-of-days hellscape. The Walking Dead has come to resemble the fictional zombie plague it documents: relentless, bloody, and always getting bigger. Kirkman loved existing zombie films, but had one problem with most: their endings. After 90 minutes or so of struggle and bloodshed, a couple of characters survive and walk off into the sunset. To him, that didn’t feel like the end of the story, it felt like the beginning. ‘I started to think, “What if one of those stories continued indefinitely?”’ he says. That question spawned The Walking Dead, the first issue of which appeared in 2003. The comic became an underground hit, and soon Kirkman was meeting with people interested in adapting it for film. None looked promising until Darabont called in 2005. ‘He understood the comics,’ says Kirkman. ‘They weren’t about gore or zombie scares. It was a realistic survival story about human beings.’ Darabont – who declined to be interviewed for this story – wrote a pilot and spent several years trying to drum up interest. NBC signed on for a spell but never put the pilot into production. Other broadcast networks felt it was too violent. Premium cable passed. Darabont had basically given up on the project by the time executive producer Gale Anne Hurd – who’d gotten her start working for B-movie titan Roger Corman and later co-produced The Terminator and Aliens – called about it. Together they brought the show to AMC, which green-lighted it in 2009.
Georgia heat
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‘Action! Andy! Action!’ Lincoln is on all fours now, hands and knees in the dirt, and though he sounds like he’s moaning in pain, he’s actually singing along to his iPod, momentarily oblivious to the TV show waiting to be made all around him. A production assistant jars him from his trance. Lincoln hands over his music and runs through the scene once, then again. It’s a short scene, mostly just Lincoln walking toward the camera and uttering a single line, but the actor isn’t happy with how it’s going. ‘Again. Again. Again,’ he says, shaking his head and staring fixedly at the ground as he paces back toward the spot on the hill where he started. One more time through, but still something is off. Lincoln emits a guttural wail of dissatisfaction. ‘Let’s do it again!’ Now he’s shouting. His ear buds go back in and he’s on all fours again. A final take goes well. Or well enough to move on. ‘There’s something in me that’s definitely masochistic,’ Lincoln tells me later. ‘If I don’t feel it’s true, the crew understands and goes, “Keep rolling.” ’ This masochism sets an indelible tone on The Walking Dead, which shoots largely during the hot Georgia summers, frequently outside. The cast and crew brave the heat, dodge the rain, navigate woods and grasslands teeming with hungry ticks, chiggers, and mosquitoes, and endure the punishing schedule required to make a high-concept, action-packed, effects-heavy 43-minute film in eight days, and do this 16 times between May and November. Lincoln’s role here is beyond lead actor: he’s a de facto producer, drama teacher, big brother, and cheerleader. He frequently watches and comments on scenes he’s not in. Others follow his lead. ‘Andy is what drives the show,’ says Steven Yeun, who plays Glenn, a resourceful ex-pizza-delivery guy. ‘Think about the conditions we’re shooting in: you’re asking people to be there for
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12-hour days for seven months. You’d be like, “I’m not doing that!” But there’s a grace Andy comes in with where it’s like, “I’m number one on the call sheet, but I’m in early, staying late, watching other people’s takes, taking this seriously.” That bleeds into the crew and cast.’ The result is the hottest show on television and probably the industry’s most surprising success story of the past decade.
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Two weeks after our initial meeting, Lincoln invites me to play golf with him one morning. Just before he lines up a putt on the fourth hole, he tells me, ‘The most daunting part of leading this thing is that we lose so many key members that established the culture of the show. It’s terrible when you lose people.’ He’s talking about his co-stars Callies, Bernthal, DeMunn, and others who have fallen victim to The Walking Dead’s apocalyptic universe – but clearly, the thought extends to Darabont and Glen Mazarra, both of whom left. ‘It feels sombre while we’re shooting now,’ he says. ‘Which is right! This is what it’s about. Everybody hunkers together, somebody else joins the family, and we get through it.’ He sinks his putt.
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