‘The Good Place’: William Jackson Harper Reveals Most Challenging Scene To Film

“The Good Place” star William Jackson Harper revealed that the needle gag in last week’s Season 2, episode 7 is the most challenging scene he has filmed for the NBC series so far.

In a recent interview with Vulture, Harper shared that the makeup crew had to put real needles in his face for that scene. “I had to go to acupuncture and they put 50 real needles in my face, just to see if it would work, if I could still move and talk,” shared Harper, who plays Chidi on the show. “And the thing is, they had to put them in really far, just to see if they would stay in case I did have to act with them.”

But after all that, Harper said that 50 needles still just didn’t look enough like torture. “So they used a prosthetic that they put on my forehead and my chin and all that stuff, and that took several hours to apply,” the 37-year-old actor said. “And then the needles went in my hands and my feet. It took several hours to get that all in.”

While putting all the needles was a laborious task, Harper said that they have a “real crackerjack” makeup crew. “They were very, very, very efficient and diligent,” the 37-year-old actor said. “To concentrate for that long, putting all these needles in some guy’s face, and not mess up, is pretty impressive.”

Meanwhile, in the same interview, Harper shared why he thinks a lot of people relate to Chidi. “Most people I know in my life have a hard time making decisions or dread it, especially as we get older,” Harper said. “I think that’s pretty relatable — it’s certainly the thing that I relate most to in that character.”

On the Michael Schur-created series, indecisiveness ultimately cost Chidi everything, including his life, and that actually pushed Harper to try to be more decisive at all times. “Working on this character has actually made me a bit more decisive,” Harper told Entertainment Weekly last July. “Having conversation after conversation, it’s awful to subject people to that. So now I’m trying to go to the other extreme of ‘I don’t care, just do this, it’s fine.’ Make quick decisions so I’m distancing myself from that old habit as far as I can.”

“The Good Place” Season 2, episode 8, titled “Derek,” airs tonight at 8:30 p.m. EDT on NBC.