Jennifer Morrison is known by fans for a lot of different roles. The multihyphenate star made a name for herself on shows like Once Upon a Time and House M.D.; she briefly starred in the J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie reboot;now she’s an accomplished director working on even more of your favorite TV shows. Her work behind the camera includes helming one of the earliest episodes of Sam Levinson‘s hit HBO series Euphoria. Joining the series in Season 1, Morrison directed Episode 5 titled “’03 Bonnie and Clyde,” a reference to a Jay-Z and Beyoncé song released in 2002. During a conversation with Collider’s Perri Nemiroff, Morrison spoke about working with Levinson and bringing Euphoria to life.
Season 1 of Euphoria set a very specific tone for the series as a whole. It helped to establish the aesthetic fans know and love and brought characters like Zendaya‘s Rue to life. In “’03 Bonnie and Clyde,” the episode heavily featured Maddy Perez (Alexa Demie) and Nate Jacobs (Jacob Elordi) while also following Jules (Hunter Schafer) helping Rue with her sobriety. With relatively little directing experience under her belt at the time, Morrison spoke with Nemiroff about how knowing Levinson through his wife and her best friend, producer Ashley Levinson, helped her understand his creative process.
“I think they were very similar. I think the vision and the experience was very similar. The reason I was lucky enough to be in a position to be up for that job is because I knew Sam Levinson so well, and Ashley Levinson so well,” Morrison said. “Ashley is my best friend and lived with me for a while, and when she lived with me, she was just starting to date Sam, so Sam was there with us a lot. And so I was very aware of his creative process, and I was very aware of just how wildly visionary he was and how incredibly, uniquely talented he was.” Morrison went on to say:
“I can’t say that I understand how anyone’s brain works, but I feel like I had a better sense of it because I had such proximity and time spent. So, I had been hearing about and feeling elements of Euphoria way before Euphoria was being made because I was around for him making his feature before that, and I was around watching some of the things that started to really come into focus for him — that feature’s sort of impact, the way he was thinking about Euphoria, and seeing him connect with Marcell Rév, who was the cinematographer that he kind of found that visual together with, and hearing those conversations.”
Collider Exclusive · Sci-Fi Survival Quiz Which Sci-Fi World Would You Survive? The Matrix · Mad Max · Blade Runner · Dune · Star Wars
Five universes. Five completely different ways the future went wrong — or sideways, or up in flames. Only one of them is the world your instincts were built for. Eight questions will figure out which dystopia, galaxy, or desert wasteland you’d actually make it out of alive.
💊The Matrix
🔥Mad Max
🌧️Blade Runner
🏜️Dune
🚀Star Wars
01
You sense something is deeply wrong with the world around you. What do you do? The first instinct is often the truest one.
02
In a world of scarcity, what resource do you guard most fiercely? What we protect reveals what we believe survival actually requires.
03
What kind of threat keeps you up at night? Fear is useful data — if you’re honest about what you’re actually afraid of.
04
How do you deal with authority you don’t trust? Every dystopia has a power structure. Your approach to it determines everything.
05
Which environment could you actually endure long-term? Survival isn’t just tactical — it’s physical, psychological, and very much about where you are.
06
Who do you want in your corner when things fall apart? The company you keep is the clearest signal of who you actually are.
07
Where do you draw the line — if you draw one at all? Every survivor eventually faces a moment that tests what they’re actually made of.
08
What would actually make survival worth it? Staying alive is one thing. Having a reason to is another.
Your Fate Has Been Calculated You’d Survive In…
Your answers point to the world your instincts were built for. This is the universe your temperament, your survival instincts, and your particular brand of stubbornness were made for.
The Resistance, Zion
The Matrix
You took the red pill a long time ago — probably before anyone offered it to you. You’re a systems thinker who can’t help but notice the seams in things.
You’re drawn to understanding how the system works before figuring out how to break it.
You’d find the Resistance, or it would find you — your instinct for spotting constructed realities is the machines’ worst nightmare.
You function best when you have access to information and the freedom to act on it.
The Matrix built an airtight prison. You’d be the one probing the walls for the door.
The Wasteland
Mad Max
The wasteland doesn’t reward the clever or the well-connected — it rewards those who are hard to kill and harder to break. That’s you.
You don’t need comfort, community, or a cause larger than the next horizon.
You need a vehicle, a clear threat, and enough fuel to outrun it — and you’re good at all three.
You are unsentimental enough to survive that world, and decent enough — just barely — to be something more than another raider.
In the wasteland, that distinction is everything.
Los Angeles, 2049
Blade Runner
You’d survive here because you know how to exist in moral grey areas without losing yourself completely.
You read people accurately, keep your circle small, and ask the questions others prefer not to answer.
In a city where humanity is a legal designation rather than a feeling, you hold onto something that keeps you functional.
You’re not a hero. But you’re not lost, either.
In Blade Runner’s world, that distinction is everything.
Arrakis
Dune
Arrakis is the most hostile environment in the known universe — and you are precisely the kind of person it rewards.
Patience, discipline, and political awareness are your core strengths — and on Arrakis, they’re survival tools.
You understand that the long game matters more than any single victory.
Others come to Dune and are consumed by it. You’d learn its logic and earn its respect.
In time, you wouldn’t just survive Arrakis — you’d begin to reshape it.
A Galaxy Far, Far Away
Star Wars
The galaxy far, far away is vast, loud, and in a constant state of violent political upheaval — and you wouldn’t have it any other way.
You find meaning in being part of something larger than yourself — a cause, a crew, a rebellion.
You’d gravitate toward the Rebellion, or the fringes, or whatever pocket of the galaxy still believes the Empire’s grip can be broken.
You fight — not because you have to, but because standing aside isn’t something you’re capable of.
In Star Wars, that willingness is what makes all the difference.
Jennifer Morrison Shares How Her Inside Knowledge Helped Her Direct ‘Euphoria’
Zendaya in the Euphoria Season 3 finaleImage via HBO
Outside of her impressive body of work as an actress, Morrison has become a prolific television director. With shows like Dr. Death, Yellowjackets, Tracker, and the new series Five Star Weekend on her resume, a lot of her work is beloved by television fans. Part of what makes her episodes stand out is Morrison’s understanding of each show’s vision, much like how her work with Euphoria was rooted in knowing how Levinson worked creatively and what she needed to do to make his vision come to life. Morrison shared how Levinson had to trust filmmakers to come into his show to create the vision he had for the hit series.
“So, I was like a fly on the wall for a lot of conversations that led up to what was the pilot and what was the beginning and the genesis of that first season, so I had insider energy for that. It was funny, I felt like I already knew it was a huge hit, and I remember being surprised when I was talking to maybe my lawyer or someone, and they were like, ‘What is this Euphoria?’ I was like, ‘What do you mean what is it?’ In my mind, it was already this massive show. Like, I somehow felt its future in some way. I felt it. But I think some of that is just because I was living inside the energy of that creative hunger and voracity that Sam has. So, I knew how important it was to him to protect the visual concept of that because he wanted to give the audience in that first season a visual experience of what the drugs would do to someone.”
Morrison went on to talk about how Levinson’s own struggles with addiction gave him a unique perspective while creating his show and telling Rue’s story. “He’s a recovered addict, and he spent a lot of his life working through all of the different things that Rue works through, through the three seasons of the show, and so he is intimately aware of what he’s offering people,” she said. “And it felt important to him that the visuals give people the highs and lows of what an addict is experiencing at that point in their journey of addiction. I was very excited to be trusted with that, and it wasn’t something that anyone had done before. I mean, now people rip off the show all the time, and I rip off the show all the time. I steal from my own stuff from Euphoria all the time. But before there was Euphoria, there wasn’t Euphoria, right? He was establishing something that required him to trust his filmmakers to not come in and try to mess with that vision or try to undermine it in some way.”
As much as Euphoria has permeated the television landscape, Morrison doesn’t take her time on Euphoria for granted. “So the fact that he trusted me, and he knew enough of my work, and we had enough of a creative shorthand with each other that he would fight for me. I had never directed television before,” Morrison told Nemiroff. “HBO had no business hiring me for that job, and the reason I got hired is because Ashley and Sam, and at the time, Kevin Turen, really went to bat for me and said that I was going to deliver.”
You can see Morrison’s work on Euphoria on HBO Max and watch her full episode of Collider Ladies Night below.
