For Jacob Elordi, the final season of “Euphoria” was a seemingly never-ending death chase. Until, of course, his character Nate finally died — buried alive and then bit by a rattlesnake.
While on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” with guest host (and fellow “Euphoria” star) Colman Domingo, Elordi was asked about filming the gruesome scene. When Domingo brought up his once-loathed character’s death, the studio audience let out a sad “aww.”
“Thanks,” Elordi said to the audience with mock annoyance. “Finally, after eight years of all of you saying, ‘Fuck Nate, kill Nate, Nate’s a piece of shit’ — yeah, I read your tweets — now you’re sad. Hmm.”
In Season 3 of “Euphoria,” Nate — once the antagonistic high school bully — was chased by a sketchy businessman and his henchmen after an investment in Nate’s real-estate venture went awry. Episode after episode, Nate was brutally beaten by goons.
“I think Sam brought me back to torture me,” Elordi said of series creator Sam Levinson. “It was like, six weeks of me just getting beat by a seven-foot guy. I was just running the whole time.”
As for filming his eventual demise, Elordi said, “I got locked in a coffin for two days straight with prosthetics and a fake tongue, and I couldn’t see out of my eyes. And then Sam put snakes into the coffin.”
Elordi was joined in the coffin by a boa constrictor, which, in the show, was turned into a deadly rattlesnake.
“He had a very nice personality,” Elordi said of the reptile. “He was very docile and very sleepy. I don’t think he’d had a lot of sun … So I was kind of nudging him, trying to get him to get active and do the scene, because he was meant to be threatening. But he was like a little dog. He just kept curling up at my feet.”
Talking about the impact of “Euphoria” on his career, Elordi said, “It really changed my whole life. It’s an incredible thing. … I don’t know if I’ll ever fathom the sort of size of that show and what it did for me.” Speaking directly to Domingo, who recently starred in “Disclosure Day,” he added, “I mean, we’re in movies now! Like, you’re leading Spielberg movies and I’m working with Ridley Scott. It’s crazy.”
Elordi’s next film, Scott’s “The Dog Stars,” premieres on Aug. 28.