The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon made a somewhat surprising decision to take a beloved character and send him overseas, and the gamble has paid off. The show is set in France, and what’s more, actually feels like it; French is spoken often and only occasionally subtitled, further cementing Norman Reedus’ titular hero as a fish out of water. As strong as other The Walking Dead spinoffs have been, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon has come the closest to capturing the feeling audiences had when the mainline season first premiered in 2010: that of an unknown world, full of possibility.
Visiting post-apocalyptic France for the first time also means meeting hordes of new characters. Two of those are a tough and focused fighter called Codron, played by Romain Levi, and Anna Valery, brought to life by Russian actor Lukerya Ilyashenko. Romain Levi spoke with Screen Rant before The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon premiered but returned to shed more light on his character and experience, and Lukerya Ilyashenko joined to discuss her character’s debut in episode 3.
Lukerya Ilyashenko and Romain Levi spoke with Screen Rant about their favorite sets, their characters, and singing in an unfamiliar language. Note: This interview was conducted during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, and while these actors are not SAG-AFTRA members, the show covered here would not exist without the labor of the writers and actors in both unions. This interview has also been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Lukerya Ilyashenko & Romain Levi On The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon
Screen Rant: Romain, when we spoke last, it was before anything had come out. Now that the first couple of episodes are out, have you talked to friends or seen reviews? How are you feeling?
Romain Levi: We are very, very happy. The first reviews were great, and I have a feeling that people are happy about it. They really enjoyed the show, the first episodes, and we are very proud.
Lukerya Ilyashenko: I watched the first episode, and then when the second episode was released, I thought to myself, “Oh, it’s coming closer to the third episode,” in which I am involved, and I got scared. I thought to myself, “Okay, Lukerya, hold your breath, wait until the whole season comes out, then just see what happens.” But I was reading comments on Instagram and on YouTube, and it looks like everybody’s happy, and we did a great job.
And Lukerya, can you tell us about your character?
Lukerya Ilyashenko: This is my first interview in English, ever, so I’m a little bit nervous. She’s a fighter. She’s a singer who has used her looks, her charm, and her selfishness to survive over 12 years after the appearance of walkers in Paris. For most of this apocalypse, Anna has lived with Quinn, an equally selfish and shallow man. Not because he loves her more than his long-lost love, Isabelle, but because she knows that he is the best chance of survival.
But when Isabelle returns, the truth that Anna ignored for years is finally realized. I think that Anna really loves Quinn. It’s not only about being on the safe side while she is in a relationship with Quinn, but they’re life partners and business partners, and she really loves him. That’s what I think. That’s why she’s being patient with him; that is why she doesn’t really get offended when he’s being openly rude with her or when he basically humiliates her in a way.
Romain, last time, you talked about your character feeling like he was at war. Do you feel there’s anything he wouldn’t do to track Daryl down? Have you found the limits of his personality in that way?
Romain Levi: There are things he won’t do. For Codron, I know he’s the bad guy, but I don’t see him like that. This guy wants to take revenge for his brother’s death. He really loved his brother, and he will never be the same after that, so he needs to find a way to get justice. That’s all. But he will not do everything to get what he wants. In his way, he is aware of what’s good and what’s not good.
Lukerya, I loved hearing you sing in the episode. I don’t remember hearing a lot of musical numbers in The Walking Dead. How was it to perform on the show?
Lukerya Ilyashenko: Oh God. Okay. First of all, I do not speak French. I’m sorry, Romain.
Romain Levi: Two words!
Lukerya Ilyashenko: I can say bonjour, bonsoir, très bien, ça va, ça va bien… when AMC sent me the lyrics for the songs, I didn’t know that in the show there would be three songs. I thought it was only one by Françoise Hardy: “Le Temps De L’amour”.
In block one, when the season started, production sent me these three songs in French, and the director and the whole creative team wanted me to sing all of those three songs. I was like, “What?” I didn’t understand the words. What I did is, I found those three songs on YouTube, and I lowered the speed three times; that’s how I learned them. I was so stressed because of those songs that when I arrived in Paris—I think it was the fourth of January this year, and my first shooting day was, like, the 16th—I wouldn’t go and walk around, see Montmarte or the famous cemetary Père Lachaise; I just stayed in my hotel room for 12 hours a day and tried to memorize those lyrics. Another technique I was using to memorize a word and understand what I was singing is, I would put certain gestures on the words.
Romain, what is it like to work with the walkers? Is it cool to see them in person, or harder to kind of imagine what’s happening?
Romain Levi: No, it was amazing. The makeup department is amazing. It’s an amazing job; the skin, the eyes, and the actors behind those masks. I loved it. I was really hypnotized by them. I could look at them for hours. It’s amazing work.
Lukerya, I spoke to your production designer who said his favorite set was the Demimonde. How was it to spend so much time working there?
Lukerya Ilyashenko: Well, it’s a dream job. I’ve been a fan of The Walking Dead since episode one, so everything that happens on set is just one huge miracle for me. In Demimonde, the decorations were amazing and beautiful. It was quite cold in there because I had that open dress, but that doesn’t matter at all, because that feeling when you understand that you are becoming part of something as big as The Walking Dead universe inspires you so much that you literally can jump over your own head. Learning those songs, spending many hours in very high heels–that’s fine, and I’m ready to do anything.
Romain, your character follows Daryl throughout the season, so you get to go to the same places he does. Did you have a favorite place to shoot?
Romain Levi: I really loved the Demimonde. I was shocked by the beauty of the set. I don’t know if you can see it properly, but there are two floors. It’s an incredible work. You can feel a kind of energy with characters like Lukerya and all these people in this world. I loved the set. I really liked the roof camp too. We shot there a couple of times. But I think that my favorite location for now is the Demimonde. I really loved it.
Lukerya Ilyashenko: Coco, in real life (Hugo Bardin), and those artists and performers are amazing. And the piano player; I started following him on Instagram after the show. He’s a great composer. Check him out. (Note: his name is Charly Voodoo)
About The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon
In The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Daryl washes ashore in France and struggles to piece together how he got there and why. The series tracks his journey across a broken but resilient France as he hopes to find a way back home. As he makes the journey, though, the connections he forms along the way complicate his ultimate plan.
Check back for our other The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon interviews:
- Louis Puech Scigliuzzi, Romain Levi, Eriq Ebouaney & Anne Charrier
- Director Daniel Percival & Director of Photography Tomasso Fiorilli
- Production Designer Clovis Weil
- Hugo Bardin
New episodes of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon release Sundays on AMC.
