Here is a NEW Interview with Richard Rankin from Vulture
From Vulture:
When a scene is scored with Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings,” you know it’s going to be a moving moment. In this week’s episode of Outlander, “Providence,” Roger (Richard Rankin) had the chance to escape the Mohawk village where he’s being held captive, but he opted to turn around. He’d befriended a Frenchman — the fellow fool for love, Father Alexandre Ferigault (Yan Tual) — who, despite Roger’s counsel in their shared “idiot hut,” chose a slow, painful death on a simmering pyre rather than baptize the baby he’d fathered with the tribe’s healer, Johiehon (Sera-Lys McArthur). The Mohawk supported the couple’s union, but Ferigault believed that, as a fallen priest, his blessing would damn his daughter, so he refused to give it.
More after the jump!
Roger, unable to escape Father Ferigault’s screams as he fled through the woods, ultimately ran back and put him out of his misery. Roger knew he could be recaptured, but he didn’t anticipate what else happened as the flames raged: With her face still wet with tears, Johiehon calmly kissed her daughter’s forehead, layed the child down, and walked to the pyre to die embracing Father Ferigault’s burning body. As Kaheroton (Braeden Clarke), the Mohawk man who clearly had feelings for Johiehon, collapsed to the ground cradling the orphaned baby, Roger was escorted off. “That’s it, lads, take me back to the idiot hut,” he said dazed.
Vulture spoke with Rankin about shooting the heartbreaking sequence, the importance of his character’s conversations with Father Ferigault, and why, in the end, Roger MacKenzie will never change.
I imagine every actor wants at least one scene in their career that’s worthy of “Adagio for Strings.” When did you find out that song was being was used, and what was your reaction?
I was told by Mairzee [Almas, the episode’s director] as we were shooting it, if I remember correctly. Of course, you’re gonna be super excited, super grateful to have the honor of an epic episode finale. Very happy about that.
What do you think Roger decided to turn back? He has a lengthy debate with himself before he says, “Ah, fuckin’ hell.”
[Laughs.] I love Roger so much. I love the fact that he even has this debate with himself. Because you know he’s gonna. He’s a man of such compassion. Hearing someone in such pain and anguish, he has step in and do something. He just thinks, I’m gonna try to help him, somehow. More than likely it’s gonna lead to my own demise in some respect, but I can’t not. It’s almost like he’s pulled from the soul towards that, to try and help the man. This is just how he is.
This was such a tragic episode – that poor Priest. I have read the book “Drums of Autumn” a number of times – and the Priest truly believed that he had chosen the only path open for him and to save his little baby daughter. It was all so heartbreaking.