EPISODE 114: THE SEARCH
WRITER: MATTHEW B. ROBERTS 
DIRECTOR: METIN HÜSEYIN
When Ian returns to Lallybroch without Jamie, Claire and Jenny saddle up their horses to go on the road to find out what’s become of him after the Redcoat ambush. “The Search” turns into an epic journey for Claire as she pursues her husband across the Highlands.
For writer Matthew B. Roberts, the episode became his most difficult script to break, because the search in the book is essentially treated as a passing aside. “It’s maybe five paragraphs,” Roberts explains. “It mentions that Claire sings, or Murtagh sings and dances, and then the gypsies relay the message. Boom! That’s it,” he laughs.
With a relatively blank canvas to explore how Claire tracks down Jamie, and plenty of character moments to explore along the way, Roberts broke down the script into three parts. “I did two buddy pictures and then a stage play. It had Jenny and Claire, Claire and Murtagh, and then Dougal and Claire at the end.”
Roberts also wanted to give the entire endeavor a slight twist. “In the definition of ‘search,’ you go and look for something,” he explains. “What I liked about this, and what I really wanted to hit on here, was you did the exact opposite. Murtagh even says, ‘We’re not going to find him; he’s going to find us.’ ”
Director Metin Hüseyin knew he had to create a very cinematic setting so the sense of miles traveled and time passed would read for the audience. Having Claire and Murtagh become an act in a traveling show helped the director hit his goals. “We knew we had to show the repetition of it all, and we knew we had to make it feel like they were crossing Scotland. Although we as a production couldn’t cross Scotland and show all the different places that they may have been to,” he says with a knowing laugh.
The opening block with Claire and Jenny, Hüseyin says, was defined by a sense of impulse. “Claire has an idea,” he says. “ ‘I’m going to go and find Jamie wherever he is,’ but she really doesn’t have a clue. Jenny just leads the way until it reaches a point where they hijack the English soldier, and Claire finds out a big part of herself there, that she would have killed that guy if she’d had to.”
Jenny then hands off Claire to her next guide, Murtagh. “When he arrives, they have to just get on with it,” Hüseyin continues. “They seem to be unhappy with each other, but we find out that they’re both blaming themselves and both feel like they failed [Jamie]. Then we go on this trip with them.”
“The difference of having spent a couple of [weeks] in the sets of Lallybroch and then to suddenly be out in an absolutely different world on the back of a horse was wonderful. And when [Jenny and Claire] ambush the [soldier] and they both have the guns pointed, it was a real badass shot at that. I also like the scene where Claire’s gathering wood and Jenny just reminds her that you’ll do whatever it takes to protect somebody that you love. It’s a moment where they find a mutual respect.”
Hüseyin adds, “I have to say that Duncan, who plays Murtagh, did a lot of training to dance badly. I think to dance badly you have to be able to dance well so that you know what you’re doing. I thought he was fantastic in those scenes with his grumpy little face when people told him he was crap. It was very sweet.”
With the journey leading to Jamie’s whereabouts with Black Jack Randall in Wentworth Prison, Roberts says he appreciated that “The Search” allowed him to explore key characters before the explosive finale. “It was one of my most satisfying writing experiences, because I thought I was very true to the book,” he muses. “And I thought that I was true to the characters. It worked out nicely in the end.”
“The [prosthetic lactating breasts] did take some getting used to. We had a little rehearsal before and a camera test of the contraption to get a bit used to it. Overall, it was a bit of patting your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time. The idea was being as organic as possible in that moment. This is supposed to be something that Jenny is so comfortable with. If there is the slightest hint in my face, or my voice, that this wasn’t something that was second nature, then it destroys the entire point of the scene. Claire is the one that’s supposed to find it fascinating, or in any way surprising. I was so impressed with how it looked when I saw it on the screen. And it was a scene I was actually really proud to be part of, because I think that the whole principle was to show the reality of breasts, and breast-feeding, and the reality for mothers today. I think that it was a great thing to put on TV, and to show people that that’s just reality.”
“Caitriona would sing on set in between takes, so I told her, ‘One day I’m going to have you sing in an episode.’ She just laughed.”