[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 Episode 4, “He Goeth Before You Into Galilee.”]
The Righteous Gemstones‘ latest installment uncovered a new facet of the televangelist family’s lore with a trip to their never-before-seen lake house, aptly named Galilee Gulch.
The retreat was initially devised by the Gemstone siblings Jesse (Danny McBride), Judy (Edi Patterson), and Kelvin (Adam DeVine) as a way to break up their dad Eli (John Goodman) and his new girlfriend Lori (Megan Mullally). Tagging along for the adventure are their respective spouses and children, as well as Uncle Baby Billy (Walton Goggins) and Lori’s son Corey (Seann William Scott).
What ensues are various shenanigans as the Gemstone siblings try to remind their dad Eli about the good times he had with his late wife Aimee-Leigh (Jennifer Nettles) with a variety of executions, including awkward musical performances, and mentions of Lori’s recent romantic entanglements.
HBO
Ultimately, the siblings’ efforts don’t yield the results they hope for, but for star and series creator McBride, he couldn’t be more thrilled about the family’s outing to Galilee Gulch. “It was pretty amazing,” McBride marvels, noting, “That lake house was written into the show this year and for whatever reason, it turned out to be the hardest location to find.”
“There weren’t a lot of lakes around Charleston where we could shoot that are that big, and also had a house that felt like it was a place that the Gemstones would go to on vacation,” McBride continues. To make up for the extended search, the lake scenes this season were “pushed to the end of the schedule because we didn’t have it yet,” McBride explains.
“We got to the point where it was about two weeks away from us having to film all that stuff, and we still didn’t have the location, and I was about to like press pause in the production,” McBride reveals. Ultimately, it was the show’s location manager, Kale Murphy, who found the home that would be Galilee Gulch. “He found a house, knocked on the door, and the two gentlemen who lived there were kind enough to say, ‘Yes, come into our house with your massive crew, and take it over for the next three weeks.’”
The result, McBride says, “was magic,” adding, “It was so much fun to all be there together at the lake and shoot all that stuff.”
While the lake retreat may not have had the results Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin wanted, it adds a new layer to the Gemstone family’s onscreen history. Whether viewers will visit this location again, they’ll have to tune in to find out, so stay tuned and let us know what you thought of the family’s Galilee Gulch getaway in the comments section below.
The Righteous Gemstones, Season 4, Sundays, 10/9c, HBO and Max