Best of 2015 (Behind the Scenes): Freddie Highmore breaks down Norman becoming Norma on Bates Motel 

 fans had been waiting for since the show premiered.

After numerous hints that Norman was headed toward snapping,

 April 13th episode saw a huge moment for the future serial killer when his brother discovered him wearing his mother’s bathrobe and furthermore, believing he was Norma. 

Norman’s cross-dressing was a huge development for the character, after which EW chatted with actor Freddie Highmore about the much-anticipated reveal. As part of our end-of-year coverage, revisit that conversation below.

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ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Norman finally became Norma! You’ve known this would happen since the show premiered, but how did you feel when you learned it was actually happening here, now, in season three?

FREDDIE HIGHMORE: Excitement! I think that’s what everyone’s feeling was in reading episode six in general. There’s so much brilliant material for everybody — the writing, Kerry [Ehrin] just did such a marvelous job on this. Vera had so many tricky, emotionally challenging scenes, and as you see, she just plays them brilliantly, as did everyone else. I think it wasn’t purely this sense of what a brilliant scene I get to do, but how amazing the episode is in its entirety and how it’s just this string of scene after scene that lands with such a blow and pushes the story forward so much.

What does this mean for Norman moving forward?

I think it’s the beginning of the end. I’ve always seen season 3 as the real turning point where, by the end of it, Norman is much closer to the Norman Bates of 

I think this episode is potentially pivotal in showing us how Norman will start to live much more in fiction as opposed to reality. Whether that’s good or bad… I mean, he’s quite happy to wander around the kitchen and pop blackberries into his mouth. But he’s very much living in his fantasy world, and similarly in the basement where he imagines his taxidermy coming to life. More than anything, it’s the start of that [fantasy] for Norman.

Did something specifically spark this moment for Norman? The inciting incident seems to be Norma storming out, but the seeds were of course planted earlier.

The nice thing is, we always knew it was going to come, so that’s what makes it even harder to watch. Because you’re like, oh, it’s finally happening! Norman has always had these visions of Norma, yes, but at the same time, he has moments where he does feel that he is her. He hasn’t quite gone to the extent of dressing up as her in the past, but think about the second season, when Caleb was in the motel room, and Norman felt Norma’s flashbacks, and scratched this imaginary scar on his leg, and was accusing Caleb of doing things as if he were Norma. So we’ve seen that side of Norman before. I think what makes this scene so interesting and more hard-hitting is the fact that Norman’s just so cheery about the whole thing.

Is that unlike how you envisioned the scene in your head?

That’s what’s brilliant about the writing from Kerry, who wrote this episode. It’s so fantastic because instead of it coming from anger or angst or a big fight in which he slips into this Norma character, the fact that it can be so understated and happy makes it even sort of worse to watch. And even creepier, really, that in this turbulent episode, Norman has actually found his real moment of happiness when he is Norma. And Max [Thieriot]’s expression is of course priceless. You can play the scene so much just off of what he’s looking at and what he’s thinking and how he’s reacting to it. That’s a testament to how great he is as well.

You’ve had input into Norman and Norma developments in the past, like the kiss in the season two finale. Did you have any input into this scene?

To some extent. I think it was always a plan of theirs, as it would have been from anyone who’s seen 

. You know that Norman is going to have this moment at some stage in 

. But there was a day just before we started shooting when I went into the costume fitting with Monique [Prudhomme], the costume designer, and there, alongside all of my clothes of the season, were all of Norma’s dresses and robes. Monique and I were like, oh, let’s just try a few of them on. We ended up taking a few photos of me in a few of Norma’s garments and sending them off to Kerry and Carlton [Cuse] in LA. So we like to think that that further hastened the fact that they could finally see me in those clothes and say, yeah, let’s just go ahead and do it! [laughs]

This was such a monumental moment for fans. Did you treat it as such, or did you try not to make a big deal of it?

I guess there was more preparation that went into it, given the novelty of it, and the fact that something like it had never been done before on 

You want to make it right, and you have to find that new character of Norman completely believing that he is Norma.

It’s very much this mix of how Norman saw his mother almost every single day bustle around the kitchen making breakfast. What would Norman have taken away from that experience every day, throughout his life? It isn’t necessarily a mimicking of Norma, but of Norman’s version of her that he holds in his mind.

I want to say something about blackberries. Norman, as Norma, says he bought fresh blackberries the day before, and Dylan finds the berries in the refrigerator. He holds them — they exist! And so I’m wondering if there’s any chance here of Norman already having gone outside of the house thinking he is Norma, to purchase berries, or if he’s burglarizing Norma’s memories, like when he experienced her flashbacks about Caleb.

I think that you’re right! The question is, how much of what Norman is imagining really takes place? And in the basement, when Norman puts his head down on the table next to the pigeon who is very much dead, and Juno the dog is next to them, and then you cut back to him, and he’s just staring straight into space… you wonder whether all of what we’ve just seen has merely taken place in Norman’s head and if he’s been staring ahead in his basement the whole time. You wonder whether what he has enacted in the kitchen takes place in his head. I think there is that suggestion, as you say, that there’s more to what you actually see taking place. I guess you just have to decide how mad you think he is.

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