Jessica Lee Gagné is the Quebec visionary behind the hit series Severance

Britt Lower and Adam Scott in "Severance," now streaming on Apple TV+. (Courtesy: Apple TV+)

When Jessica Lee Gagné moved to Montreal from Quebec City to attend film school at Concordia University, she had no idea she would eventually be the eye behind Apple TV+’s biggest show of the year.

With a minor in photography, she quickly became known in class as someone who made beautiful images. Though her dream was to direct, Gagné threw herself into cinematography, which would bring her to collaborate with Ben Stiller on Severance.

In Severance, Mark Scout (Adam Scott) leads a team at Lumon Industries, whose employees have undergone a procedure that surgically divides their memories between their work and personal lives. Scout soon finds himself at the centre of an unraveling mystery, raising questions about “work-life balance,” the true purpose of Lumon Industries and the human mind itself.

After a successful first season, the Apple TV+ show found an entire new audience for its second season, edging out Ted Lasso as the platform’s most-watched series.

“No one knew what Severance was going to become,” Gagné told CTV News from her Montreal apartment.

“Season one had a very strong fan base, and our fans are amazing. They’re just the best, they really go for it. But this season was kind of where I feel like Severance was introduced to the world on another level. People, because they saw how much the fans loved it and how much it resonated a lot for certain people, it brought in a whole other sphere of people watching it.”

From Concordia to New York

To get from film school to Severance, Gagné jumped on every opportunity presented to her.

After her studies, where she said she was able to find herself and her artistic vision, Gagné teamed up with Quebec City director Chloé Robichaud for Sarah Prefers to Run (in French: Sarah préfère la course).

The movie, which follows track runner Sarah, who lives only for the race, was screened at the Cannes Film Festival. From there, Gagné worked as director of photography with Canadian and French directors – even filming in India.

It was her work on the 2017 American movie Sweet Virginia, shot in Vancouver with Canadian director Jamie Dagg, that led Stiller to Gagné.

“He saw it, and was like, ‘Wow, I feel like this really connects with what I’m seeing for Escape at Dannemora.' And then the next thing you know, I’m in upstate New York with him, prepping for this miniseries for Showtime,” she said.

The two really gelled and Gagné said their natural connection made it clear they would continue working together on Severance.

“Our creative collaboration went so well. I think we both really got to do things how we love in filmmaking, and really brought a lot to each other’s careers,” Gagné said of Stiller.

Gagné’s challenge was then to make a sterile, bland space like an office visually interesting. She rose to the occasion as the show has been critically acclaimed for its beautiful cinematography and unique vision, sometimes veering into the absurd.

“So many times I was saying no to things in my life or turning away from things because I was afraid of them. An office show was something, as a cinematographer, that I wanted to run away from so bad,” Gagné said.

It was working with a dedicated team that invigorated her.

“I pushed my own self, like on another level in the world of cinematography, to find the most beautiful office references and visuals I could,” she said.

Working with Jeremy Hindle, the show’s production designer, got the two excited about “office language,” which was heightened by the props department and costume designers.

“Everyone in this team is a class at what they do, and everyone really brings it – the amount of love and thought that goes into everything is mind blowing,” said Gagné.

Directorial debut

It was on episode seven of the show’s second season that Gagné finally stepped into her potential as a director, a dream she had put on the back burner after film school.

The episode focuses on one character’s experiences at Lumon Industries and what led her to join the company while exploring her subconscious and memories.

“I chose to do episode seven because I really connected with it. There are themes in it that I connect with as a woman, and themes about the subconscious and where we connect in terms of spaces that are not necessarily in the present moment,” said Gagné.

“Being the cinematographer of the show, I knew that I needed to push the boundary and reinvent a new language but that still felt like it was in the show. There was space in this episode to go elsewhere.”

The episode was a hit, with many fans saying it was the best and most beautiful one yet. Visually, the episode stands out from the rest of the series as it’s the only one shot on film rather than digitally.

“It was the most effortless way to make these memories real, because the feeling of film evokes nostalgia for us subconsciously. We just look at film and we think it’s the past, so it was the least forceful way of making these memories feel real within the consciousness of people in general,” Gagné explained.

With the season finale airing on March 20, Gagné is looking ahead to other projects in the works. She told CTV News that she’s working on her first feature film, which still needs financing.

Exporting Quebec talent

Gagné stressed her career wouldn’t have brought her so far if it wasn’t for Quebec’s financing of the arts.

Over the last few months, artists across the province have been rallying to demand more sustainable financing of arts and culture, warning that the industry could collapse.

“Right now, there is a lot of questioning about how we finance our culture; should we finance it as much as we do? And the money pot is getting smaller and smaller,” Gagné said.

“But we do have to look and see how strong we’ve been in terms of exporting the talents from here … There is a reality that our careers are due to the fact that there is public financing.”

• Artists rally in Quebec to demand more sustainable funding

Gagné said she would not have been able to get to Cannes or Berlin and work with directors from elsewhere around the world were it not for those funds. She added that it’s still unclear what the repercussions of cutting funds to the arts would look like in the long term.

Gagné isn’t the only Quebecer making it big on prestige television: Charlotte Le Bon put Quebec on the map with her role on the hit HBO show White Lotus’s third season and Sophie Nélisse’s character is central to Showtime’s Yellowjackets.

Montreal-born production designer Patrice Vermette, also a Concordia alumnus, was nominated for an Oscar for his work on Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two this year.

• Academy Award nominee from Quebec ready for Oscar night

“I feel like that’s why we have such a big outreach, because we’ve built our own work and we’ve supported our culture and our strength to the point that ... we’re able to excel,” she said.

“It is political, but … I think there’s something really beautiful about exporting our culture. As French Canadians, we’ve also always been defending the language and trying to keep our culture present and not get overshadowed. And when you encourage like filmmakers and artists to do their pieces, you’re helping that.”