When Jesus met Pope Leo XIV, he made sure to bring gifts.

So recalled Jonathan Roumie, who plays the New Testament carpenter in “The Chosen,” in a video interview Monday with The Salt Lake Tribune.

“[Leo’s] like, ‘I have to tell you. I haven’t seen it,’” Roumie said, referring to the global smash hit. To which the actor told him, “That’s OK. I brought you DVDs.”

Roumie, a devout Catholic, also met with Leo’s predecessor, Pope Francis, who died in April 2025.

“Pope Francis gave me a little prayer when I told him I was playing Jesus,” Roumie explained. “He said, ‘May you seek him, may you find him, may he make you happy.’”

The sixth season of “The Chosen” is, by contrast, decidedly unhappy.

Set to premiere Nov. 15 on Prime Video, the six-episode installment is devoted to Jesus’ final day — his followers grappling with his arrest, Pontius Pilate’s wrestle over his fate and his scourging. Not included in the weekly episode release is the Crucifixion itself, to be told in a two-hour film set for a pre-Easter March 12 release.

True, the Crucifixion has been depicted in film a number of times. But not, Roumie argued, quite like this.

“The intimacy of the event,” he said in a news release, “is covered from a myriad of perspectives that nobody’s ever explored before, and done so with an emotional depth that nobody’s ever attempted.”

Allowing for that depth, Roumie continued, is “5½ seasons of character-building backstory for all of the characters involved — not just the ones who are at the Crucifixion, but the ones who aren’t at the foot of the cross.”

Playing the villain — lip balm and calf stretches

That includes Judas Iscariot, played by the bubbly Luke Dimyan.

Dimyan became especially animated when describing how he prepared for the infamous kiss of betrayal.

“[I used] a lot of lip balm,” he told The Tribune. “I think I went through two cases. And I had to do some calf stretches because I don’t know if you noticed — Jonathan Roumie’s tall.”

Raised Coptic Orthodox, Dimyan said he came to the role with a mountain of “pre-knowledge” about his character.

“I don’t know if it helped or hurt,” he said. Regardless, he said that he has always felt “protective” about one of the world’s most notorious backstabbers.

“I couldn’t help but see so much of myself in him,” explained Dimyan, who said he was especially hard on himself growing up. “Where people see a betrayer and a traitor, I see someone filled with remorse and disdain for themselves.”

The actor tasked with portraying Pontius Pilate likewise argued in defense of his character, responsible for issuing Jesus’ death sentence.

“Whenever you’re playing a villain, you can’t think of them as [one] because they don’t think of themselves as a villain,” Andrew James Allen said. “I just have a lot of empathy for him.”

The way Allen, who — unlike Roumie and Dimyan — knew little about his character before being cast in the role, sees it, Pilate was left to his own devices to dismantle a bomb without so much as a screwdriver and a manual.

“I know that he was ruthless and brash and made bad decisions,” the actor said. “But he [didn’t have] anyone who could guide him.”

Behind the scenes

Filmed in Texas, Italy and Utah, the upcoming season was by far the most logistically challenging, said director Dallas Jenkins.

Sets had to be dismantled and re-created, makeup and hair carefully recrafted day after day — all of it in such a way to give the impression of seamless continuity.

“Season 6 was logistically the hardest thing I’ve ever worked on in my life,” Jenkins said in a news release, adding that the result is a one-of-a-kind examination of one of history’s most-told stories.

“We take more time with the Crucifixion and the events surrounding it than any project has ever taken,” Jenkins said, “allowing the audience to have a deeply visceral physical, emotional and spiritual experience.”

All of this is central to the show’s ultimate purpose, he said, which is to “give you not only the what of the execution but the historical why of humanity’s need for redemption.”

A message to Latter-day Saint fans

Counted among the series’ legion of fans are many Latter-day Saints.

To them, Roumie expressed his thanks for being part of the nearly decadelong journey.

“We’re just so grateful for the Latter-day Saints’ support,” he said, stressing the decision by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to provide its own Jerusalem set in Utah County to the project. “That was a game changer and such an honor.”

He added: “We can all celebrate Jesus and love Jesus, and I think [that’s] huge.”

And has Jesus made him happy the way Francis hoped for him?

“I’m always seeking him,” he said thoughtfully. “... And in the seeking of him, you are made happy because he’s with you.”