There’s a new series on Paramount+ and if you love Kiefer Sutherland, you are really going to LOVE this one. It’s called Rabbit Hole and Sutherland plays a private espionage operative who is framed for murder by powerful forces with the ability to influence and control populations. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Here’s the tea on Kiefer Sutherland’s New Series Rabbit Hole

At SXSW, we chatted with Sutherland, co-stars Meta Golding and Charles Dance, as well as series writers, directors and creators Glenn Ficarra and John Requa.

We started by asking Ficarra where the idea for the series came from.

Glenn Ficarra: “Whether it’s by algorithm or by design, anything is being geared toward you. You’re giving away pieces of information, pieces of yourself. What happens if that falls into the wrong hands?”

Spill the ATX: What is it that you want people most to walk away with after watching the series?

John Requa: Well, we hope they’re entertained most of all… just to understand that when you log on, you do a DNA analysis, you share your information, you’re sharing yourself. And there are people out there who will use that information against you. It was amazing how much we had to push reality because so much of what is actually real is almost unbelievable.

Before getting into details about the series, we asked Sutherland what he thinks about Austin, knowing he’s visited the city numerous times over the years.

Kiefer Sutherland: The times that I spent here the most were, I came here to play. I played Antone’s and The W Hotel a couple of times. It’s a daunting place to come play because there are so many great musicians here. And so many great musicians that have come through the city and certainly have made their name here in Austin. Actually, just play Texas all year round and make a really good living at it. It’s one of the few states that I know that has a music circuit that is actually sustainable. So I’ve always thought that was really cool. Every time I’ve come through here to play people have been really really kind and generous. And then the food is really mmm good.

Spill the ATX: What drew you to this project?

Sutherland: They (Glenn and John) said they got an idea about a show that was gonna kind of harken back to these great 70s thrillers like Three Days fo the Condor, Marathon Man, The Parallax View, Fugitive, and these were all the movies that I’d grown up loving. The thriller genre is the genre that I have always loved the most. I got really lucky with something like 24 to be able to go do that for a decade. So I was very intrigued about this idea.

Then they started to describing the character. and they started describing him in a really human vulnerable way. And i was moved by it. I’m also such a huge fan. They’re some of my favorite writers and some of my favorite directors! Crazy Stupid Love (is) one of my favorite films. If I need to kind of get myself out of a mood I’ll throw that on any day of the week.

Spill the ATX: Tell me about the difference of how the industry has evolved. You’re not having to do so many episodes as in the past.

Sutherland: It’s hard for me because I really liked doing 24 episodes. I felt like I had a regular job. I got to watch my kids grow up. For an actor, that’s a real rare thing. Having said that, it’s really hard to write 24 episodes. That’s the equivalent to 12 feature films a year.

In all fairness, it’s impossible to make everything as good as you want to when you have that much work to do. But you try and that’s an exciting part of it. For John and Glenn to have the parameters of eight to 10 episodes to kind of really focus in on how to tell the story gives you an opportunity to really craft those episodes in a way that you just would not have had time for before. But I also really like everybody on our show so I would’ve been really happy to spend 10 months of the year hanging out and filming this but I’ll take what I can get.

The cast adoration goes both ways. When we asked Charles Dance about working with Sutherland, here’s what he had to say.

Charles Dance: I told my daughter the I was thinking about doing this show with Kiefer and she said, ” I grew up with the Lost Boys, you have to do this!” And I said yeah right and I’m very glad I did. He’s a sweetheart as well as being really really good at his job.

We also asked Dance and Meta Golding about what drew them to this script. Dance’s answer was simple. “The fact that I wanted to turn the pages,” he said.

But it was Golding’s answer that really hammers in on the reason you should be drawn the series.

Golding: I thought the script was so timely. When I got the script we were in the middle of the pandemic and there was so much about can I trust the news, can I not trust the news? So many conspiracy theories. And then also this thing about our phones and all the data that’s collected. But more than that, I got to play a bad ass.

The entire show is bad ass and we highly recommend giving it a watch.

Here’s a preview of Rabbit Hole to help you get even more excited to watch:

You can watch Kiefer Sutherland and the rest of the amazing cast of Rabbit Hole on Paramount+. The first two episodes are available now and new episodes are released weekly on Sundays until the finale on April 17, 2023.

Featured image: Kiefer Sutherland as John Weir. Marni Grossman/Paramount+ © 2022 Viacom International Inc. All Rights Reserved.