Cold War Confidential

As the fifth season of The Americans gets under way, EW pulls back the (iron) curtain on the FX series' writers' room.

- Shirley Li

You started breaking this season’s story in April of last year. As you’re well aware, spring 2016 was a very different time in American politics. Different president, different headlines, different understanding of Russia’s influence on the election...

JOEL FIELDS For me, I separate that out. The political, real-world component has been discussed a lot around the lunch table, but that really has nothing to do with the show. We write the show in a bubble of the early ’80s. Now the show has a lot of, we hope, allegorical value in terms of what’s happening today, a lot to say about the nature of what it is to have an enemy, what is it to be an enemy, but it also has a lot to say about trust and family and marriage, and those truths will extend until we find ways to not be tribal and territorial.

JOE WEISBERG I think what happens in the world has a dual function. We’re the beneficiaries of it in that it creates a lot more attention for us, but what is actually happening is it’s fighting against the thematic intentions of the show, which were to say, “Hey, look, these people who were our enemies are not our enemies anymore.” That may be completely out of our control, but it’s an unwelcome surprise.

JOSHUA BRAND It may be unwelcome for Joe and Joel but not necessarily for viewers, ’cause what it does is it takes a show that’s a period piece and it makes it feel very present. Now you don’t feel like you’re looking back, you’re looking into a mirror.