Lior Raz & Kaelen Ohm Interview: Netflix's Hit & Run

Hit & Run, the newest international thriller from Netflix, will split time between Tel Aviv and New York City when it premieres on August 6. The action-fueled mystery centers on Segev Azulai (co-creator and star Lior Raz), whose life is turned upside down when his American wife Danielle (Kaelen Ohm) is killed in a suspicious traffic accident. After her killers flee to New York, Segev hunts them down in a cross-country chase that unlocks many doors to the past. While his family is left to sift through the mess left behind in Israel, he and his friends make surprising discoveries in the United States. Between his own dark history and his wife's secrets, Segev finds himself surrounded on all sides by questions that demand answers.

Related: Sanaa Lathan Interview: Netflix's Hit & Run

Raz and Ohm spoke to Screen Rant about the cultural divide explored in Hit & Run and how they connected to their characters.

Screen Rant: Lior, what was the inspiration behind Hit & Run, and how do you collaborate as a writer?

Lior Raz: Avi Issacharoff, my partner, and me, have a curse. IIt's so many ideas.

One day, we were sitting together, and we talked about loss and about what it is to be a man that loses his wife. Since then, we started to develop it and to talk about it. And we have our own experience, of course, in these situations - and that's how we brought this story.

Then we went to Netflix, and we collaborated with Dawn [Prestwich] and Nicole [Yorkin], the American writers. It was quite a crazy combination of rude Israelis and very polite Americans. So, it was a great experience, because we learned a lot from them. And I hope they learned a lot from us. Because this is what this TV show is about: cultural differences and trust and love between friends and countries.

You play a couple from opposite sides of the world, and we get to see both of their worlds. Kaelen, what was it like for you to piece Danielle together as a character posthumously?

Kaelen Ohm: It was really in in the writing. It was so compelling to see all of these layers of her and her story leading up to her life in Israel, where she is an American but moves there and marries in Israeli and is part of an Israeli dance company. She really starts to, you know, build her life around the culture there as well.

I think, as a character, she's a very open-hearted person who really falls deeply for the people that she cares about. Again, it was all in the script. But being in Israel as a Canadian - which is still North America, it's similar - parts of myself came out as well in that experience.

I really love what you said about the cultural clash. I don't have experience with Israel, but it was also a side of New York that I have not experienced. What was it like to bring these two sides together and show different aspects of the world?

Lior Raz: First of all, this is why we chose New York. Because in my experience in life, when I was 22, I came to New York for the first time in my life and felt so small and so abandoned, and like a fish out of water. I didn't understand. There are so many people, and everything was closing on me.

When you come from Israel, as you saw in the in the show, it's all open and bright. It's like California, in a way. The differences are so hard, and we wanted to show that. Not just the cultural differences, but also the space and the locations and where you are. And the lighting even is different from Israel to New York; it's much more cold in New York than in Israel.

And it's good for the story, because our guy Segev is coming from his country as a tour guide to be in fighter mode in New York. So, we tried to differentiate the places.

Kaelen, Danielle's background as a dancer is really interesting to me. What is your own background or interest in dancing?

Kaelen Ohm: I grew up dancing. I started at 10 years old, dancing in my local small town studio and was competitive through my high school years. I have sort of brushed the periphery of the professional dance world a little bit, with a jazz company in Calgary, Alberta. I was in their pre-professional program for a little bit.

But, as you know, being a professional dancer really takes your whole life - and my path in film took me there. To be able to bring my my dance background to this show was was really amazing. It was a dream come true.

Next: Top 10 Foreign Series On Netflix (According To IMDb)

All 9 episodes of Hit & Run premiere on August 6 on Netflix.

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