Melissa Benoist wants a drink. It’s November 8, 2016. She’s filming Tremendous Lady in Vancouver and information simply broke that Hillary Clinton misplaced the presidential election. “We had been on a bar set and I actually wished a drink,” she tells StyleCaster, “however I couldn’t as a result of it was a pretend set.” She laughs about it now, however on the time, the temper was extremely somber. “I cried,” she recollects, explaining that she’s been a registered Democrat since she was sufficiently old to vote.
It’s a second in time Benoist needed to revisit for The Women on The Bus, a fictionalized MAX comedy-drama collection impressed by reporter Amy Chozick’s memoir Chasing Hillary, which paperwork her time on the candidate’s marketing campaign path. Benoist, who can also be a producer on the present, performs Sadie McCarthy. She’s an optimist, a “lovable mess,” and a “journalist with a capital J” who uproots her life to cowl the race to the Whitehouse.
However the present isn’t about politics, not likely. It’s about life on the marketing campaign path and the unlikely bond between 4 girls rivals: the veteran “gotcha” reporter Grace (Carla Gugino); the conservative cable information anchor Kimberlyn (Christina Elmore); the “new media” TikTok influencer Lola (Natasha Behnam); and Sadie, who’s determined to show she will nonetheless be goal.
Actors and journalists have extra in widespread than you may suppose. Journalists establish a lot with their career that even after they depart the sector (of their very own volition or not) they nonetheless establish as journalists. Conversely, what number of instances have you ever heard an actor say their work is a calling?
“I believe lots of people possibly romanticize performing in that they see the glitz and the glamour; individuals may romanticize journalism in the identical method in the best way,” observes Benoist. “However I for certain didn’t find out about how mundane marketing campaign reporting is typically… DC and Hollywood, they’re each like a one-industry city and everyone seems to be on this bubble collectively. We’re all consuming the identical crappy breakfast. You already know what I imply?” StyleCaster chatted to the actor about The Women on the Bus and the way she put herself in Sadie McCarthy’s sneakers.
How do you relate to Sadie and in what methods are you completely different?
I establish along with her optimism. Generally I may be cynical—I believe it’s onerous to not succumb to cynicism, particularly these days—however I believe I comply with her hope. I’m very captivated with what I do and I take it very severely after I discover one thing that I actually care about or a narrative that I actually wish to inform.
Within the ways in which we’re completely different, I’m not as a lot of a compartmentalizer. All through the present, there’s lots of development for her. However I’m somebody who actually likes to really feel my emotions, lets them out, and actually needs to cope with them to develop. Sadie type of squashes all of it down.
What kind of preparation or analysis did you do for the function?
I learn something and every thing that I may get my palms on, particularly the books that Amy Chozick advised me to learn. Her e-book was undeniably useful, after all. However this e-book known as What It Takes by Richard Ben Kramer was actually useful, and likewise simply fascinating.
I learn The Boys on The Bus by Timothy Kraus, and Concern And Loathing On The Marketing campaign Path ‘72, which was wonderful. Hunter S. Thompson’s prose is exclusive however fairly dated. However my favourite factor that I learn was an essay known as Up Simba! by David Foster Wallace. I used to be already a fan of his and it’s concerning the 2000 election. A lot of documentaries, too. I like to consider myself as an knowledgeable particular person in the best way I digest my information, however I noticed that I might love studying about journalism and what it means to be a journalist.
I like how Hunter S. Thompson is Sadie’s… would we are saying conscience? What had been these scenes wish to movie?
These scenes had been essentially the most enjoyable as a result of PJ [Sosko] who performs Hunter S Thompson was simply down and sport and had inhabited the pores and skin of Hunter S. Thompson. Nobody’s performed that function since Johnny Depp and for PJ, there have been no guidelines as a result of he’s a figment of her creativeness. Ought to we be involved about her? Perhaps [laughs]. It was at all times like, so what can we do that time? What’s one thing humorous that he may do? After which he has moments of sheer poignancy which might be so laden with that means for Sadie.
The phrase objectivity comes up rather a lot on this present. Do you suppose people are able to being goal?
That’s a very good query. I do know that I’m not. I might not be capable to do this. If I’m trustworthy, I believe I’d transfer in direction of a subjective or a extra Gonzo-style method as a result of there may be a lot in our faces that we have now to have an opinion on… I do know that I wouldn’t, is my reply.
I discovered this quote from Thompson about reporting on Richard Nixon. “You needed to get the subjective to see Nixon clearly. And the shock of recognition was typically painful.”
I do know precisely the quote as a result of I’ve it written down in my Sadie McCarthy pocket book. [holds up notebook].
What else have you ever received in there?
A lot of Hunter S. Thompson stuff. Notes from every thing that I learn, actually, after which ideas that I had. He has an entire passage about cynicism, I believe, relating to Nixon.
I wish to end with some questions on your different work. Has there been any speak of a Supergirl reunion?
I believe it’s so recent [the finale aired in 2021] that it’s not something I’d be against. All of these persons are my household. We have now a shared bond, however I haven’t heard something a couple of reunion.
There have been two musical episodes within the Arrow universe. One in The Flash and the opposite in Supergirl. Your self, Grant Gustin [The Flash] and Darren Criss [Music Meister] from these exhibits had been additionally in Glee. Do you guys communicate?
That’s one other shared expertise that I believe all of us are going to hold perpetually as a result of we had been so younger. It’s humorous as a result of Glee and Supergirl had been each very difficult jobs. So, I believe that bonded us. I talked to Grant Gustin on a regular basis. Really, he and my husband went to school collectively, so he was already a pal. I see him and speak to him on a regular basis.
In the event you had been on Glee in the present day, what track would you wish to sing?
There was truly a track that I believe I used to be alleged to sing whereas I used to be on the present however due to copyright, they couldn’t get it. It was “Superwoman” by Alicia Keys. I at all times wished to sing that.
This interview has been edited and condensed for readability.
The Women on the Bus debuts with two episodes on MAX on March 14, 2024, adopted by one new episode weekly by Could 9.
