Emily Alyn Lind didn’t really keep that We Were Liars twist in the back of her mind while filming the Prime Video show.
Spoilers for We Were Liars season 1 below.
“The Liars in Summer 17, once they’re ghosts — that feels weird saying that [out] loud,” Lind, 23, told Us Weekly exclusively ahead of the show’s premiere. “Once they’re ghosts, I basically threw that out the window and just acted like I was acting with them.”
All eight episodes of We Were Liars premiered via Prime Video on Wednesday, June 18. And yes, the show’s big reveal stayed true to author E. Lockhart’s novel of the same name. In the end, viewers discover that Lind’s character, Cadence, plus the three other Liars (Joseph Zada as Johnny, Esther McGregor as Mirren and Shubham Maheshwari as Gat) set fire to their grandparents’ house on Beechwood Island. While Cadence came out alive, the other three didn’t.
For Lind, it was “really easy” to act as if The Liars were still alive, because to Cadence, they were.
“Any time that they were being weird, it felt like they were being weird,” she explained. “I just felt like I was being gaslit, and that is the worst feeling in the entire world.”
How ‘We Were Liars’ Season 1 Deviates From Novel: Premiere Recap
The show is told through Cadence’s point of view during Summer 17 (the numbers coincide with the age of The Liars). At this point, she is still interacting with The Liars — unaware that they’re ghosts — and trying to remember the accident she suffered in Summer 16. (Cadence developed amnesia in the aftermath of the fire because of a traumatic brain injury.)
“I just kind of felt like the outsider for the whole Summer 17 bit, and I think it worked. So many times, I just forgot what had happened. That they were supposed to be dead,” Lind continued. “I think that that’s why the twist is so great, not because of me, but just because we [were] still connected. We all decided to go at it the same way, which was we’re not going to — they didn’t act like they were dead.”
The adults in Cadence’s life knew three out of the four Liars were dead but were under strict instruction to refrain from talking about her accident. Caitlin FitzGerald (who plays Cadence’s mom, Penny) explained the twist from her point of view.
How Does Prime Video’s ‘We Were Liars’ Series Compare to E. Lockhart’s Book?
“It was a balance of not tipping our hand, obviously, but also letting the truth of the reality of dead children permeate these scenes,” she told Us. “I hope it adds to the sort of weirdness and mystery of the show, and that we don’t give too much away.”
All episodes of We Were Liars season 1 are streaming now via Prime Video.
