HBO’s ‘Big Little Lies’ Kicks Off Production On Season 3, Sort Of

HBO has been feverishly working to align the schedules of the main stars of Big Little Lies to start full production on season three of the thriller series.

But before that, the show shot one day of production, featuring Merrin Dungey, in order to keep its California tax credit.

Deadline has confirmed that Dungey, who plays Detective Adrienne Quinlan, shot scenes at Warner Bros. Studios Burbank’s The Ranch Lot this week. Variety broke the news. HBO declined to comment.

However, the main stars of the show including Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon, Laura Dern, Zoe Kravitz and Shailene Woodley were not involved.

Deadline understands that the show is closing in on aligning the schedules ahead of a full production kick off next year.

In September, HBO chief Casey Bloys told Deadline, “There are a lot of schedules to line up there, so I think they’re all doing their best. The good news is we’ve got a lot of very popular movie stars. The bad news is they’ve got very busy schedules, so we’re doing our best to line them up.”

The move was done after Big Little Lies had already received approval for the California tax credit, although it’s not clear when this became officially. The rules suggest that principal photography must start within 180 of receiving approval, or 240 days for projects with qualified expenditure over $100M.

Big Little Lies was created by David E. Kelley and based on Liane Moriarty’s novel. It also stars Alexanders Skarsgard, Adam Scott and Meryl Streep. Season one premiered in 2017 and season two premiered in 2019. Season three was confirmed last year.

Francesca Sloane has boarded the show as a writer and exec producer alongside Kelley, Witherspoon and Kidman.

Earlier this year, Moriarty published Big Little Truths, which is thought to be the basis for season three. The book is set ten years after the events of the first two seasons. The protagonists’ children are now in high school, dealing with teenagers and drugs, sex and alcohol, while also managing new periods in their lives.

Woodley told Deadline earlier this year that it was a “blast” to play Jane Chapman. “I’m really excited about the third season, and for the opportunity that might exist in exploring who these ladies are 10 years later. We’re all 10 years older. The children are all 10 years older. They’re not really children anymore and most of them are adults now. So the prospect of that is very cool.”