If you thought the sweeping romances, smoldering glances, and heavy wool kilts of the Outlander universe translated to a luxurious, high-fashion experience on set, prepare to have your illusions hilariously shattered. As the hit prequel series Outlander: Blood of My Blood gears up for its explosive second season premiere on Stan this September 17, the show’s leading stars are pulling back the curtain to reveal the wildly unglamorous—and downright absurd—reality of bringing 18th-century Scottish history and time-traveling drama to life.
Sitting down for an exclusive Australian press tour, the core quartet driving the epic saga—Jamie Roy, Harriet Slater, Jeremy Irvine, and Hermione Corfield—spilled all the juicy behind-the-scenes secrets. From being rolled up on the floor like burritos into heavy woolen kilts to blasting comedic club bangers during intimate romance scenes, the actors proved that making television magic is an absolute endurance test wrapped in a heavy layer of comedy.
The Kilt Struggle: Why the Boys Have It Hardest
While viewers see smoldering Highlanders effortlessly conquering the Scottish terrain, the actors paint a vastly different picture of what it takes to get dressed in the morning. When asked which part of their elaborate period costumes looks breathtaking on screen but feels entirely ridiculous in real life, Jeremy Irvine—who plays time-traveling British soldier Henry Beauchamp—didn’t hesitate for a second.
“F….ing all of it,” Irvine laughed bluntly.
Hermione Corfield, who portrays Julia Moriston, quickly pointed out that the male cast members drew the absolute shortest straw when it came to wardrobe prep. “I feel like the boys almost have it harder than us sometimes,” Corfield explained. “We’ve got the corset life, but the corsets hold you up and they make you sit up straighter. So I quite like it because it helps you get into character. You immediately feel in the time. We don’t have such ridiculous things as the boys do. They have to get wrapped in their kilts like a burrito every morning.”
For Irvine, the morning routine is as far from dignified as humanly possible. “Every morning, in nothing but your underwear, being rolled up like a baby having a diaper put on him is truly, truly emasculating,” he joked. “Someone has to see me lying on the floor in my pants getting rolled up… it’s pathetic.”
Jamie Roy, who steps into the iconic role of Brian Fraser (future father of Jamie Fraser), knows the humbling ritual all too well. His transformation into an 18th-century Highlander also begins flat on his back on a dressing room floor, requiring up to three crew members to complete the process. “They have the kilt laid out on the floor, and then I lie there and they kind of wrap me up like a little sausage roll,” Roy shared. “It’s quite humbling when you’re first there in your underwear.”
Heavy Wool, Mud, and Extreme Weather Workouts
Once the historical layers are finally secured, the physical torment is far from over. Harriet Slater, who plays the fierce Ellen MacKenzie, emphasized that the polished, pristine romance captured on camera hides the grueling reality of battling Scotland’s notoriously extreme weather on location.
“It’s so nice to get to do these press tours and dress up and be clean and dry because half the time we’re filming on location, and the weather is extreme,” Slater noted. “You’re wearing four layers of wool a lot of the time, it’s already heavy, but as soon as it gets wet, it weighs like double. We spend so much time traipsing across fields, you know, to get to the loo, and there’s mud up to your knee.”
Roy added that the sheer weight of the period costumes turns every filming day into an intense physical workout. He recalled the back-breaking demands of shooting the season one finale, where his character Brian arrives at Leoch to save Ellen while wearing his standard costume layered beneath an additional Grant outfit, complete with a heavy sash and clanking sword.
“That thing weighs so much; it’s crazy,” Roy said. “When you add on to that a sword and everything, the whole thing, at the end of the day you take that off and you’re like, ‘Oh, my back!’ It really does weigh a lot, and it’s a workout holding that thing. But then you see it on screen and you’re like, ‘That’s pretty cool’.”
Behind the Steam: Stripper Beats and Naked Leather Boots During Intimate Scenes
The Outlander franchise has built a legendary global reputation for its steamy, highly charged intimate scenes. However, the stars of Blood of My Blood revealed that maintaining a straight face while simulating intense romance requires a healthy sense of humor and some very unconventional musical choices.
To cut through the natural awkwardness of filming heavy romantic moments, Roy and Slater experimented with playing background music on set. Their initial soundtrack choice? Shaggy’s classic party anthem, It Wasn’t Me. Though they ultimately pivoted to softer melodies for the final takes, Slater admitted the pair “giggled quite a lot” through various season two sequences.
Corfield and Irvine took a similarly hilarious approach, attempting to curate a playlist featuring “the most outrageous song” they could possibly inflict upon the film crew. They seriously considered blasting Ginuwine’s infamous track Pony right in the middle of a deeply emotional sequence. “Deep, moving sex scene, and we’re listening to stripper music,” Irvine chuckled.
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Beyond the musical hijinks, filming these scenes comes with its own set of logistically absurd hurdles. Corfield pointed out a hilarious detail television audiences never get to see: footwear. “You’ll never see people taking shoes off before a sex scene because that’s just ridiculous,” she said.
That realization hit home during one particular sequence where Irvine’s kilt had to dramatically drop to the floor. While the camera angles kept everything PG, the reality beneath the lens was far funnier. “I have to let the kilt drop, but then what I’ve got on are knee-high leather boots,” Irvine explained. “So then I’m just naked, just wearing knee-high leather boots, which luckily you can’t see in the shot. That was ridiculous.” Furthermore, Corfield noted that untangling all those heavy historical layers in real life takes a solid 20 minutes, requiring plenty of creative movie magic editing to make it look effortless on screen.
What to Expect in Season 2: War, Time Travel, and Heartbreak
When the cameras roll and the wet wool, muddy bathroom treks, and quirky hip-hop soundtracks fade away, what remains is the spellbinding romance that fans adore. Season two of Outlander: Blood of My Blood picks up right where those dramatic cliffhangers left off, diving headfirst into high-stakes peril across timelines.
For Brian and Ellen, their hard-won choice to flee together and defy their families’ clan loyalties will face its ultimate test against the surging political unrest of the 1915 Jacobite Rising. Meanwhile, Henry and Julia’s story left fans reeling after a jaw-dropping season one finale. Following their desperate attempt to cross through the mystical standing stones at Craigh na Dun alongside their newborn son William, season two reveals that Henry has been tragically separated from his family across time.
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If enduring a brutal temporal displacement wasn’t enough punishment, Henry’s harrowing journey as a World War I veteran ultimately lands him inside a grim psychiatric hospital facing electric shock therapy, all while he desperately fights to find his way back across the centuries to the woman he loves. With original book author Diana Gabaldon remaining closely involved as a consulting producer, the upcoming ten-episode season promises an emotional rollercoaster.
Mark your calendars: Outlander: Blood of My Blood season two premieres in Australia on Stan on September 17, with fresh episodes dropping weekly. Get ready for more kilts, corsets, and chaos!
Source: Compiled from various sources
