There’s nothing more stressful than starting a new school, even if you’re Wednesday Addams.
In Wednesday, the titular Addams Family scion, portrayed by Jenna Ortega, heads off to Nevermore Academy, the eerie institute that serves as a home for society’s outsiders and is where her parents matriculated. There, she finds more than she might have wanted: monstrous classmates, mysterious teachers and a string of murders that force the introverted Wednesday to become an investigator.
“Wednesday, to me, is the classic outsider,” executive producer and director Tim Burton says in the behind-the-scenes video above. “And part of the fun of the show was to create a school for outsiders at Nevermore.”
“Nevermore was established for people with special abilities,” Ortega adds. “But the main cliques are vampires, werewolves...” You know, the usual.
The school’s production design reflects its unique student population. “In the courtyard, all the gargoyles are designed to represent the different groups within the schools,” production designer Mark Scruton tells Tudum. “So there’s vampires and gorgons and sirens. And other clues are built into that as well.”
Alongside those hints, there are quite a few other Easter eggs hidden in the walls and halls of Nevermore Academy. “We’ve sort of approached it from three points of view,” Scruton says. “There’s Tim Burton Easter eggs, there’s Addams Family Easter eggs and there’s clues to the mystery of the show.”
There’s also something a bit less subtle: Wednesday’s room, which she shares with her sunnier roommate, Enid (Emma Myers). True to form, the ultra-goth Wednesday doesn’t quite connect with Enid’s colorful decoration of their dorm room, and the large spider-webbed window at the room’s center quickly becomes a sharp divide between the unlikely duo. “The window became the central icon for the whole room,” Scruton adds. “I literally took the concept and drew it down the middle and just desaturated one whole side, window and everything.” Now that’s a room fit for an Addams.
You can keep an eye out for more of Nevermore Academy’s hidden details when all eight episodes of Wednesday hit Netflix on Nov. 23. Yes, that’s a Wednesday.
