EPISODE 104: THE GATHERING
WRITER: MATTHEW B. ROBERTS 
DIRECTOR: BRIAN KELLY
Scottish culture—its hierarchy and its politics—takes center stage in this episode, as the MacKenzie families arrive to show their annual fealty to Colum at Castle Leoch. Written by Matthew B. Roberts, “The Gathering” featured a lot of new faces, dynamics, and cultural proceedings (like boar hunting), all of which Claire has to understand and adapt to quickly.
“Jamie, in a lot of ways, represents Dougal as a young man. He sees himself in Jamie. At the same time, he sees the threat that Jamie embodies. That’s what I always had to try and walk that line between, those two feelings.”
“It was one of those stories that had a lot of work to do,” Roberts says. “There’s certain episodes that can linger and just be more lyrical, so to speak, but ‘The Gathering’ had to be a workhorse. It had to explain a lot of stuff, like the dynamics of the clan system.”
Aiding that visually was director Brian Kelly. “There’s just a lot going on behind the scenes and then a lot of learning who these people are and what they mean to each other,” Kelly says of the challenge of bringing to life the inner workings of Clan MacKenzie. “There’s the Gathering formality and then also the loss of somebody [Geordie] in the day-to-day, which is part of their life. It all helps flesh out how they treat each other and the importance of what their life means.”
“As Jamie swore allegiance, because no matter how much you can cut around the room and have a look at people’s reactions, the story is between these two. They did it very well and without a great deal of dialogue, and that makes a big difference, because you rely on the chops of the acting. It’s not so much if people can remember the lines, and I don’t mean that in a dismissive way, but I think often the best acting is that which is done without speaking.”
To get Claire—and viewers—up to speed without lengthy, tedious explanations, Roberts says, he used a writer’s trick for combining background with action. “During the Gathering speech, where Colum says it all in Gaelic, Murtagh is interpreting and basically outlining what’s going on in regards to how Jamie had to remain in hiding and who he is. I thought it was a clever way of getting out the exposition in a way as something else is going on around it.”
“Ron was going to do a cameo, and so I said to Diana, ‘Would you like to be in it?’ She thought it would be great, and I said, ‘I’d like to give you a line or two; would you be up for it?’ She said, ‘Yeah.’ We called her Iona MacTavish. I gave her the line, and when we filmed it, she was dead-on. She just nailed it both times, and we even added a ‘Shush!’ because she was really feeling it, so we gave her more. Now Diana and I have been talking about Iona’s backstory and how she and Mrs. Fitz hate each other and what could have happened in their history.”
Filming the oath ceremony utilized the massive Great Hall set created by Jon Gary Steele and his team, which was filled to the brim with cast, crew, extras, and special guests. “It was pretty daunting, I have to say,” Kelly remembers. “In terms of physical space, we rehearsed for a couple of days with all the background artists. I think that was the right thing to have done, because we got them to rehearse dances, their reactions to stuff, and how everyone would part when people would walk through. That made a big, big difference. We didn’t really have to think about them, so then I could throw all my resources and energy toward the cast, as we had almost every member of the cast on the set that day. Plus Ron was there and Diana as well—no pressure!”
“Dougal’s got a touch of the peacock about him. I think he’s quite vain. He’s not shy about bringing out a nice little outfit to show off. He was dressing to impress. You know, Terry used to refer to [my costume] as my Darth Vader outfit. I think he’s a little kinder than Lord Vader, but he’s very much making a statement of power with that outfit.”
“For the stickball game, they were real shinty players. They had been standing around all day and looking at these lily-livered TV folk. It got a bit physical but in the best possible sense. In the end, Jamie and Dougal were having a face-off. I took one of the small cameras myself and was shooting it. One of my camera assistants turned to me and she said they were like two stags, and that’s exactly what we wanted.”
“One of my favorite scenes that I have written is the one where Claire puts a sedative in the wine. She and Angus are having a conversation about it, and the way Stephen Walters and Caitriona played it, I couldn’t have been more pleased.”
