“She needs to know where everyone is at all times, physically when they’re not there, when we shoot what we call ‘ghostless passes.’ I’ll shoot with you, you’re a ghost, you leave, I shoot with you again to an empty chair. And I do that all day long. That’s what she has to do, because she can see the ghosts. So she is constantly aware of where we are in the script. And that is a lot of work mentally.“
Because Jay can’t see the ghosts, instead of being hyper-aware of where everyone is in a scene, Ambudkar has to be hyper-aware of his own movements and his physicality through each scene. Despite doing very different work in their scenes together, Ambudkar explained that he and McIver have found their groove now, revealing she’ll even attempt to get him to break during his coverage of a scene. He told Nemiroff:
“My work is very time-consuming as well, and can be quite tedious, which is, while all that is happening, while she’s talking to you, I’m over here filling up time with busyness, because I can’t talk to any of the ghosts. So I’ll be like, ‘On this line,’ cause I have to do continuity, ‘I’ll unscrew this, do that, then I’ll reach for my phone.’ So everything is hyper-technical physically for me. Which, you know, is the hardest part. And so if I’m cooking, right, and somebody misses a line, and we have to reset, that means I have to reset eight things before I can start again. Which I can imagine could be very tedious, if you’re like, ‘I just want to do my line before I forget it.’ I’m like, ‘I know dude, but I’m making pasta. I don’t know what to tell you.’
We are managing a lot of different things together, so finding the common ground took a little while. Also, I love to improvise. And Rose is very script-driven. So we found ways now — that’s not true anymore though — she has a lot of fun. She’s a very, I think, natural improviser. She’s really funny, especially in Season 4. She’s the cast member who made me laugh the most. I break the most with Rose.”
Ambudkar Will Plan Surprises for the Bit While Filming ‘Ghosts’ With McIver
“We’re like on my coverage, she’s not even on camera, snd she’s trying to break me. And for me, I’m like, ‘That’s awesome. You feel happy enough and joyful enough in your expression that you’re trying to mess me up lovingly.’ I love those kind of games. And now I know too, when I’m planning something that is gonna go off, I won’t tell anyone else. But I’ll always tell Rose. I’ll go, ‘I’m gonna do this when I do that. Okay?’ She’ll be like, ‘don’t tell anyone.’ And she’ll go, ‘Okay, mate, okay.’ I’ll be like, ‘Right after this, I’m gonna do that. So just give me some space, this is what I’m gonna do.'”
Ambudkar and McIver will have their work cut out for them when Ghosts returns for Season 5 as they attempt to get Jay out of his hell-bound contract with Elias (Matt Walsh). In the meantime, you can watch Ambudkar’s full episode of Collider Forces below and stream Season 1-4 of Ghosts on Paramount+.
