Filmmakers take all kinds of inspiration, even more one of the biggest modern musicians. True Detective: Night Country showrunner Issa López thought of Billie Eilish more than having her 2019 song, Bury a Friend, for the opening credit sequence. While the song was used specifically, the artist’s influences began during the writing process for the HBO series.
The new season of the HBO anthology series follows two detectives, played by Jodie Foster and Kali Reis, as they investigate dead scientists. What goes from there is something haunting in this Alaskan community.
How Billie Eilish Influenced True Detective: Night Country Beyond the Opening Song
In an interview with IndieWire, the showrunner talked about how she listened to the musician throughout the writing process. The beginning of COVID had everyone locked in, which was ample time to write a project for screenwriters. Through her days and nights, she started to be inspired by the music due to the artist’s “irony and melancholy and poetry.” Those qualities “informed a lot of what was happening in the series.”
Billie’s irony and melancholy and poetry informed a lot of what was happening in the series. And then that particular song, it was so weird because I thought of the tongue and burying a friend and stepping on glass — all of the things that are in the show. Then as I was writing, I started to pay attention to the lyrics, and I was like, ‘That’s insane. That’s insane that one by one, all the elements of the series are in the song.’
Issa López on using Billie Eilish in True Detective
Making the title sequence was one of the most important aspects for the showrunner. Early on, she knew her season of True Detective would open with Billie Eilish. She thought that Bury a Friend was “a dark, moody, fun, sinister little song.” For her, she loved that “it’s so unexpected.” The goal was to make something “as memorable” as prior seasons while being “its own thing.”
The images accompanying the song were the next step when developing the opening for the HBO series. Working with Peter Anderson Studios, the final result was a mix of haunting imagery that ties to the story with the soundscape of the singer’s voice.
Fans of Billie Eilish may catch some of her lyrics coming up throughout this season of True Detective. For the showrunner, she won’t “confirm or deny” that it was purposefully done or an accident. She then joked that she hopes “she [Eilish] doesn’t call me wanting some writing credit.”
