The Big Picture

• The third season of The Righteous Gemstones sees Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin taking over the family televangelist empire and facing challenges to protect their business.
• The characters Judy and BJ have trendy and flashy wardrobes, and their fashion choices reflect their newfound success and confidence.
• Judy's cheating in Season 3 surprises her, leading to self-reflection and a deeper understanding of her feelings for BJ, while BJ learns to stand up for himself in his marriage.

[Editor's note: The following contains spoilers for Season 3 of The Righteous Gemstones.]From creator Danny McBride, the third season of the HBO series The Righteous Gemstones sees Jesse (McBride), Judy (Edi Patterson) and Kelvin (Adam Devine) taking the reins of the Gemstone family televangelist empire and further solidifying their legacy, now that their father Eli (John Goodman) is easing into retirement. Now that they’re in charge, they’re going to have to overcome their differences and their own greed, in order to keep everyone else, including some long-lost cousins with questionable motives, out of their business.

During this interview with Collider, co-stars Patterson and Tim Baltz (who plays BJ, Judy’s husband and the only man in her life that really cares about what’s best for her) talked about their characters’ flashy wardrobes and the need to sometimes lean into metallics, the damage done by Judy’s affair, BJ’s emotional roller coaster, the challenges of shooting a naked fight scene, and spending time together in a bathtub.

This interview was conducted prior to the start of the SAG-AFTRA strike.

Collider: Edi, Judy’s clothing choices are always absolutely on point. What does her wardrobe say about her? Do you feel like it expresses her in ways that she can’t express herself?

EDI PATTERSON: Yeah. In Season 2, her wardrobe and BJ’s wardrobe went off, in a good way. I think they show that she’s feeling like she’s a boss now. She buys things that show she has money and success.

Tim, BJ really matches her in the wardrobe department. Have you learned anything from him about fashion and style? Is it just part of being a Gemstone, or do you think he genuinely appreciates the wardrobe?

TIM BALTZ: I think he genuinely appreciates it. He probably went through a phase of discomfort with Judy picking some of his outfits out, early on. But by this point, he’s completely leaned into it. Personally, what I’ve learned is that I can pull some of these crazy outfits off. I need a stylist picking these things for me because I never would have taken swings like this. Sometimes I’ll get dressed and step out of the trailer, and I feel like all eyes are on me and everyone’s like, “Yeah! Look at that!” It’s given me confidence in my personal life, I’m not ashamed to admit.

I think the wardrobe of this show has taught me that we do not appreciate metallics nearly as much as we should.

BALTZ: Amen! I never thought I could look good in metallic of any color, let alone a pink that’s very close to my own skin tone.

PATTERSON: Hey, man, if you feel good, show it with metallics.

Edi, a big part of Judy’s story this season is her cheating. Do you think she’s surprised by how much that decision ends up affecting her? It seems to teach her how much deeper she really feels about BJ. Do you think that took her by surprise?

PATTERSON: I think part of the reason it’s a no sex affair is because she knew that it wasn’t right for her to do this to BJ. I don’t think she ever loved him less. It was a mix of things. She felt a little bit neglected because she couldn’t always get him on the phone when she wanted, or he wasn’t on the road giving her all the attention that she requires. She also thinks that there are certain things you’re supposed to do when you’re a rock star, and stepping out is one of them. If somebody is in love with you and they wanna worship you and fall in love with you, you’re supposed to let them, if you’re a rock star. She was just very misguided and probably realized, very early on, how badly she was screwing up.

Tim, I root for BJ. It’s so hard to watch him not find his voice in his marriage, so I was glad to see him evolve a bit. Have you also been rooting for him to find his voice and to learn to stand up for himself a bit? How did you feel about his growth this season?

BALTZ: Yeah. That’s a great question. When you read something like that, even if the character is lower status, you’re looking for how they feel about themselves because it’s just more interesting to play it complex in a way where they are a person who knows who they are, but they’re in a position where they don’t have status. That’s more complex. That’s more interesting. So, I’ve always been playing it in that way, but this guy is also a fish out of water in a dysfunctional family that has a lot of power and money. I read it and got to a certain point in the scripts where I thought, “Oh, wow, this is very different for him.” This confrontation that he embarks upon is him sticking up for himself, after the imbalance of the relationship got to a point where Judy took some misguided steps. Ultimately, when people take steps like that in real life, it just comes from insecurity. On the other side of it, BJ probably has a level of forgiveness and even piety that rivals anyone on the show. At times, he might live those values or virtues a bit more stridently than other characters because he doesn’t seek power and he’s not striving for that as much as they are. So, it was very refreshing, but also challenging because of the nature of those scenes and that confrontation. That emotional roller coaster is really challenging and really rewarding. When you read it on the page, you’re like, “Oh, my God, it hurts my heart.” But as an actor, you’re like, “Oh, hell yeah, this is gonna be really fun because it’s different and it’s hard.”

And then, you get to the day where you have to do the naked fight scene. What was that like to shoot? How much of that was scripted exactly how we see it, and how much do you have to figure that out, once you put all of that in motion?

BALTZ: The script maybe evolved a little bit. It was the last thing that I filmed, all season. It was the last two days. And everyone’s got a plan, until they get hit in the mouth. I, for sure, really got hit in the mouth. I got hit everywhere that day. It was probably the hardest day of work that I’ve ever had to do. Props to my stunt guy, T. Ryan Mooney, and everyone who coordinated that thing. Jonathan Watson directed that. It was a really rewarding thing. You can understand what it is, but then once you start doing it, it is very different when you’re actually doing it. A full day of getting your ass kicked is hard. I trained for months to get my ass kicked for two days.

By somebody naked, where there are no clothes you can grab onto.

BALTZ: Well, there are one or two things there to grab onto.

It’s a moment that says so much about the whole season.

PATTERSON: Yeah, I agree. It’s totally wild, but every part of it is real and you go, “Oh, yeah, that is what would happen. Oh, God!”

BALTZ: I like how long it stretches out too because you get to see Judy go through all these moments of, “It’s going to be okay. Don’t blow it for me.” And then, “Oh, shit, it’s all falling apart. We have to deal with this now.” I thought that was played out just really well. The pacing of that, from episode to episode, is great.

I also really loved the scene that you guys have at either end of the bathtub. What was it like to shoot that? How long were you in that bathtub?

PATTERSON: You are in and out of water so many times in a day, for so many hours, with something like that. At least with each other and the people who were handling us, like the intimacy coordinator and our on set costumer, you just revert immediately into the old school notion of show folk. And by that, I mean being in a play and you don’t care who’s looking. You’re not trying to impress anybody, you’re just trying to change your clothes. It turns into that thing where you just go, “Yeah, Tim’s seen my entire body, and it is what it is. Let’s just get in and out of this water again. Here we go.”

BALTZ: Yeah, you forget about it pretty quickly. Honestly, your best friend on that day is probably the guy from props who’s making sure the water temperature is good. He’s like, “How are you guys feeling? Are you feeling good?” You’re like, “Thank you. Yes, that’s great.” There was also bubble bath soap in it, so you were sliding down.

PATTERSON: That was the hardest part, to make sure you could stay up enough for the camera. You had to try to brace yourself on either the other person’s hip without putting too much of your skin on their skin, or you’d push against the wall of the other end of the bathtub. You’d be just trying to hold yourself upright because literally what your body wants to do on the slick surface is go, “Goodbye.”

BALTZ: Hip is generous. We had one of those waterproof suction cup pillows, and my foot was jammed in between that and Edi’s ass. I was like, “Is this okay? My foot’s not going in your ass?” And she was like, “No, its’ good. It’s good.”

The Righteous Gemstones is available to stream at Max.