Was this really a comedy, especially in this final season?
It was definitely a comedy when we started. The tone got really expansive. This season, especially in the second half, we changed genre almost every episode: thriller, horror, drama. I was surprised the show was able to hold onto that. I laugh out loud, still, watching the show, but “comedy” doesn’t sum it up.
How much input did you have in shaping Sally?
I had a lot to say, which I never took for granted, because it’s rare. I’ve always said that with Sally you don’t have to love her. You just have to know her. sympathetic? Unpleasant? That’s a barometer that we actually only use for women. I wanted her to be as morally bankrupt as the men on the show. I wanted her to stay complex. I asked that from season 1. I find it interesting to play characters who make bad decisions. I’m not interested in playing nice people.
Sally attracted a lot of hate online, which reminded me of the reactions to female characters in other series. Why do people hate these women so much?
I wish I had an answer that made logical sense. I feel like there’s just an undercurrent of cultural misogyny – the sexism involved in how we look at those characters is wild to me. “Barry” was no exception. I was curious how that would go. My premonition was right that we were facing the same kind of misogyny, but that just made me want to double down and go harder.
Did something feel bad?
Only in the way that as a woman you can feel bad every day. Growing up, I was taught that we lived in an equal world, and I believed it. When I went to theater school, in my year, there were 20 boys to 8 women. We were told, “Well, this is a model of the industry. It is representative of what kind of roles are available to you.” And we all just nodded along like, “Oh, that makes sense.” I have a lot of latent anger around those things. Some of it I was able to channel through Sally’s outbursts, but I felt so frustrated as an actress when I started with what was available. I would have this litmus test of something like, Does she just ask questions? Does she say, “I’m so worried about you, honey”? Does she have an opinion? Does she have a job?