After receiving a Golden Globe nomination for supporting actress in a TV series/limited series/TV movie for playing the fearsome Aunt Lydia in "The Handmaid's Tale," Ann Dowd talked Monday about her morning and the bits of hope coming in Season 2.
Q: Tell me about your morning. How are you feeling?
A: How's this for boring: I feel really happy. I got my son off to school, I was in really good spirits. Then I got this lovely text from my publicist saying you were nominated. Smile.
Here I was, texting with [Elisabeth Moss] and she's working, mind you, shooting a scene. I'm not working this week. She is on set shooting, and she said I'm trying to be a good actress and not care. So we were texting back and forth. I am so happy for her and the show. It's pretty darn thrilling, that's for sure.
Q: You're shooting Season 2 now, correct?
A: Season 2. We're way in. I go back next week. We don't wrap until the end of March, pretty much. We have 13 episodes that we're shooting. So we'll have a good break at Christmas then back until the end of March.
Q: Aunt Lydia's backstory is kind of a mystery. Do you have thoughts about what her life was like before Gilead?
A: I asked Bruce Miller, our wonderful writer, what did he think? He said her being a teacher made complete sense. I thought, oh yes, she either taught at a public school where she was humiliated day after day or taught and appalled at what she was seeing around her, or she was in a Catholic girls school with uniforms and so on.
I think she is a true believer. For whatever reason, there's usually something going on when someone's line of vision is so narrow. What was it? Did she have a baby at 13 and promised God on her hands on knees, help me figure this out and I'll do anything? I don't know what the reason is that she's so devoted, but she is genuinely so.
I think prior to Gilead taking over, when they had the meetings, she was front and center, well prepared to take over the teaching. Lots and lots of experience as a teacher and also fully believes in what should be changed. Really appalled at the rampant sex, the language, the pollution, the birth rate going down. I think the sense of rage was all-present for her.
Q: Were there any real-life women you looked to in creating the character? Fundamentalist leaders or the like?
A: I've said this before and I hesitate just slightly, but I was educated by Catholic nuns and nothing was ever like Gilead or Aunt Lydia in terms of the cruelty, but we did learn a work ethic and what it meant to commit to something, and that when you start something you don't stop until it's completed. You defer to authority, you defer certainly to the church.
I had that sort of background. I had experiences and they were loving by comparison with really strict teachers, who would just say, "Come back here, that's just not done." So I think Lydia has a bit of that in her.
Q: Everyone has remarked on the timeliness of the show and it feels like it's only become more so since it premiered, not only with what's happening politically but also within Hollywood, where we're seeing this big reckoning about the sexual harassment of women. Just on Friday there were a lot of "Handmaid's Tale" jokes about Rep. Trent Franks.
A: The shock value just never ends. The fact that Roy Moore is being supported by the president of the United States. If someone wrote that, you'd say "come on." But in fact it's true. The number of people who have come out, you would never suspect.
I hope to God I'm not naive at this stage of the game, but it's so far-reaching. And what is it about? When you sit there thinking OK, I'm going to force to someone to have sex with me, I'm going to say something sexually inappropriate to someone I respect. I don't understand it. We think of "Handmaid's Tale" as are we ever going to get to that point? No, we're not because women are prepared.
Katie Couric came to our show. I respect her quite a lot. And she interviewed a few of us. I couldn't answer [some questions] at the time, but one of the things she asked was do you see this is a tipping point? And this was just when the Harvey Weinstein stuff came out. And at the time I said no, I don't really think this is the tipping point, because until we get to the bottom of it _ meaning, what is the behavior about?_ it's just going to get quiet and it's going to come back.
However, the number of people who have stepped up, the number of accusers, the number of women who have the confidence and the strength to stand up and say, "Excuse me, this is what happened and this is who did it." I am impressed by that hugely because it takes tremendous courage. And how about the ones who can't?
My point is, I do think something is shifting, because there's less tolerance. Although, again, there's Roy Moore, there's Trump.
Q: Your career has really exploded in the past few years. Do you think something has changed in the industry to afford you those great opportunities?
A: In retrospect, as you go along in a career, you just keep going. I never went down the avenue of "Well, what if it doesn't work out?" I never dreamt of it. The fact that it actually did work out is, oh my God, talk about my good fortune. I look at all these wonderful actors who are out of work and I don't know what accounts for my good fortune, but I'm grateful for it.
Q: I'm a little scared about Season 2.
A: Be a little scared. But there's big doses of hope too. There's stuff that will blow your mind, quite honestly. In the best sense.
