Behind-the-scenes of 'The Ex Wife' season 2 in Cyprus
Filming the second series of thriller The Ex-Wife in a sun-baked Cyprus was a challenge for cast and crew, but there were plenty of compensations…
Robin Parker - 1 April 2025
In July, even the sea won’t cool you down in Larnaca. Temperatures cling doggedly to the mid-40s in Cyprus’s south-coast port city, where tourists flock to a palm-tree-lined strip dotted with terraced bars and restaurants, their swimsuits already dried by the walk from shore to seat. Local businesses vie with the likes of Pizza Hut and McDonald’s for their trade. Summer highlights on the Finikoudes promenade include Kataklysmos (the Festival of the Flood): three weeks of dancing, funfairs and pop-ups selling things like lokma balls, a local speciality made of deep-fried dough soaked in syrup or honey.
After a nearly five-hour flight from Luton to Larnaca International Airport, a dip in the outside pool at the Sveltos Hotel, a 20-minute drive north of the main promenade, similarly confounds expectations by being effectively a warm bath.
Spare a thought, then, for the cast of Paramount+ thriller The Ex-Wife, for whom Cyprus not only acts as a key location for its second series but also doubles for London, with heavy drapes, diffused lights and dark walls employed to keep up the illusion by reducing the light. And with temperatures still hovering around 39°C after the sun goes down, night shoots get sweaty.
Budapest stood in for the capital in series one, but three years on in Part 2, the action shifts to Cyprus, where Tasha (Céline Buckens) and her daughter Emily are living under false identities. Back in the UK, her manipulative husband Jack (Tom Mison) is out of prison and claiming to be a changed man, before trying to charm his way back into their lives. “It helps to make Jack feel slightly off-kilter – and for me, there’s no acting required when I’m this uncomfortable,” laughs Mison. “When it gets to 40°, it’s an experiment in how long lines stay in my head.” Katie McGrath, who takes over from Janet Montgomery as Jen, the ex-wife of the title, says Cyprus has given series two its own identity and allowed her to slip more comfortably into a cast who were all out of their comfort zones.
It’s new territory, too, for the local film crew, who haven’t shot shows on this scale before, but work with pristine efficiency to keep hours short. A small film studio houses locations such as a police station, while a short drive down the road there’s a large open-plan villa, bathed in natural light and a garden of banana trees, that wouldn’t look out of place in Miami; this is where Jack will tempt Tasha with riches.
“I love how fast we’re moving here – it’s intense,” says McGrath. “There’s no breathing time. You sit down for maybe three minutes between set-ups, so you have to be on your game all day.”
She’s been struck by the “mix of wanderlust and the oppressiveness of the heat”, which lend authenticity to some of Tasha’s lapses of judgement as the drama unfolds.
Thankfully, the cast could unwind at the city’s plethora of restaurants on its cobbled backstreets, where waiters pile generous portions of souvlaki, stews and sausages, with endless refills of bread and chips.
“A Cypriot friend told me I’d have the best time and come back twice the size, and it’s completely true!” says Mison. “If I went to a restaurant and left some food on my plate because I was saving myself for the next course, waitresses would pour it back on the plate! I think they wanted to fatten us up.”
Local restaurant institution Stou Roushia became a cast favourite. “I’ve only ever had grilled halloumi before, but here they fry it with oil and green citrus dressing and it’s mind-blowing,” says Buckens.
A 90-minute drive away lie the beaches of Limassol, while the island’s capital Nicosia offers both a lively nightlife – the cast sing the praises of a cocktail bar called Granazi – and a fascinating history as Europe’s last divided city, with a UN buffer zone separating the Turkish and Greek sections. Jordan Stephens, who plays Tasha’s friend Ben, fell in love with the city’s “dusty mystique”, while McGrath lingered in its “nooks and crannies”.
East of Nicosia is Famagusta, where ancient remains remind you that this was once the richest part of Cyprus, but the Turkish invasion of 1974 left a sea of derelict buildings, some of them so bombed-out and bullet-ridden that they’re deemed too dangerous to enter. One crew member likens it to “a huge apocalyptic film set”. Yet a short walk away lie the stunning blues and turquoises of the Mediterranean.
That’s the contradiction of Cyprus in a nutshell: a beautiful island in a constant state of repair. The legacy of Britain’s rule of Cyprus from the late 19th century, meanwhile, lies in its commitment to driving on the left and general comfort with the English language.
So for those who can take the heat, a combination of reliable sunshine, low prices and golden sands makes it hugely appealing – both for tourists and for escapist TV dramas.
After a nearly five-hour flight from Luton to Larnaca International Airport, a dip in the outside pool at the Sveltos Hotel, a 20-minute drive north of the main promenade, similarly confounds expectations by being effectively a warm bath.
Spare a thought, then, for the cast of Paramount+ thriller The Ex-Wife, for whom Cyprus not only acts as a key location for its second series but also doubles for London, with heavy drapes, diffused lights and dark walls employed to keep up the illusion by reducing the light. And with temperatures still hovering around 39°C after the sun goes down, night shoots get sweaty.
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Budapest stood in for the capital in series one, but three years on in Part 2, the action shifts to Cyprus, where Tasha (Céline Buckens) and her daughter Emily are living under false identities. Back in the UK, her manipulative husband Jack (Tom Mison) is out of prison and claiming to be a changed man, before trying to charm his way back into their lives. “It helps to make Jack feel slightly off-kilter – and for me, there’s no acting required when I’m this uncomfortable,” laughs Mison. “When it gets to 40°, it’s an experiment in how long lines stay in my head.” Katie McGrath, who takes over from Janet Montgomery as Jen, the ex-wife of the title, says Cyprus has given series two its own identity and allowed her to slip more comfortably into a cast who were all out of their comfort zones.
It’s new territory, too, for the local film crew, who haven’t shot shows on this scale before, but work with pristine efficiency to keep hours short. A small film studio houses locations such as a police station, while a short drive down the road there’s a large open-plan villa, bathed in natural light and a garden of banana trees, that wouldn’t look out of place in Miami; this is where Jack will tempt Tasha with riches.
“I love how fast we’re moving here – it’s intense,” says McGrath. “There’s no breathing time. You sit down for maybe three minutes between set-ups, so you have to be on your game all day.”
She’s been struck by the “mix of wanderlust and the oppressiveness of the heat”, which lend authenticity to some of Tasha’s lapses of judgement as the drama unfolds.
Thankfully, the cast could unwind at the city’s plethora of restaurants on its cobbled backstreets, where waiters pile generous portions of souvlaki, stews and sausages, with endless refills of bread and chips.
“A Cypriot friend told me I’d have the best time and come back twice the size, and it’s completely true!” says Mison. “If I went to a restaurant and left some food on my plate because I was saving myself for the next course, waitresses would pour it back on the plate! I think they wanted to fatten us up.”
Local restaurant institution Stou Roushia became a cast favourite. “I’ve only ever had grilled halloumi before, but here they fry it with oil and green citrus dressing and it’s mind-blowing,” says Buckens.
A 90-minute drive away lie the beaches of Limassol, while the island’s capital Nicosia offers both a lively nightlife – the cast sing the praises of a cocktail bar called Granazi – and a fascinating history as Europe’s last divided city, with a UN buffer zone separating the Turkish and Greek sections. Jordan Stephens, who plays Tasha’s friend Ben, fell in love with the city’s “dusty mystique”, while McGrath lingered in its “nooks and crannies”.
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East of Nicosia is Famagusta, where ancient remains remind you that this was once the richest part of Cyprus, but the Turkish invasion of 1974 left a sea of derelict buildings, some of them so bombed-out and bullet-ridden that they’re deemed too dangerous to enter. One crew member likens it to “a huge apocalyptic film set”. Yet a short walk away lie the stunning blues and turquoises of the Mediterranean.
That’s the contradiction of Cyprus in a nutshell: a beautiful island in a constant state of repair. The legacy of Britain’s rule of Cyprus from the late 19th century, meanwhile, lies in its commitment to driving on the left and general comfort with the English language.
So for those who can take the heat, a combination of reliable sunshine, low prices and golden sands makes it hugely appealing – both for tourists and for escapist TV dramas.