casting director says<\/a> that they thought of you for Hayley because it goes completely against what audiences have seen you in. Is that a big reason why you wanted to do it?
There was something really thrilling about playing against type. People have known me since I was 6 years old, and I\u2019m aware of the fact that there\u2019s a lot of associations with me in that timeframe. To get to do something that felt very aligned with being in my mid-20s was really exciting.<\/p>\nWhat has the transition from child actor to teen actor to now an adult actor, and not just an adult playing teen roles, been like? I think this show and character is probably the best way to officially declare yourself as an adult actor.
A full indoctrination! I\u2019ve loved my career, and I don\u2019t ever feel like I was in a major rush to get to the next phase. I look back and feel really lucky that I got to play through the different phases of my life. Everything has sort of met me where I\u2019ve been at, and now being 26 and getting to jump in with these guys and do this sort of stuff, the timing has felt right. I\u2019m really glad that my 20s have shook out the way they have, because I think I needed to go out there and live my own life and do a little research for that club scene. [Laughs.] I feel like I can bring my adult self to parts now because I\u2019ve been an adult for an amount of time where it doesn\u2019t feel like I\u2019m stretching. There was a moment in my life where I went, Wait, no, I need to know what it\u2019s like to be an adult so that I can bring it back into my work. And I feel like I\u2019ve gotten a chance to do that, and it was helpful for Hayley.<\/p>\n
Speaking of that season-opening club scene, there\u2019s this incredible vibe between you and Charlie onscreen, but I imagine shooting something like that isn\u2019t as fun as it looks.
We were in an actual club, and friends of the show\u2019s creators, Mickey Down and Konrad Kay, were actually DJing. To play someone who\u2019s intoxicated and loose and free, I felt like all the rules went out the window. We could just try stuff. When it\u2019s a heavy dialogue scene, there\u2019s so many different things that you\u2019re considering and want to convey, but just act drunk and the rest is gonna handle itself. Rehearsal was awkward. The lights are still up, and everyone\u2019s like, \u201cSo you\u2019re gonna just grind on each other here,\u201d and you\u2019re like, Um, let\u2019s get the lights down, get the strobes going, and we\u2019ll do it.<\/p>\n
Hayley and Yasmin\u2019s chemistry is there from the minute they meet in episode two \u2014 was it the same for you and Marisa?
It\u2019s funny, I sat next to her at a dinner a year ago, and I remember her talking about filming the show, and I\u2019m like, \u201cOh, that sounds fun.\u201d You never know where life will take you. She\u2019s such an easy person to get along with. Yasmin and Hayley\u2019s chemistry is one of the most fun parts about the relationship, because there are power plays happening the whole time, and so there\u2019s not a lot of trust in their relationship. But I do think it\u2019s built on chemistry, just this powerful thing they have from the get-go.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s your first thought or question when you learn about the threesome?
My question was, what\u2019s her long game? Like, what does she want, and what is she doing there? Because in most of the scenes she\u2019s in, there\u2019s an ulterior motive that is unclear until later in the season. It was really important for me to know what that motive was, and what she was trying to accomplish in any given scene, because I wanted it all to track. I was reading each script a couple times because there\u2019s so much subtext.<\/p>\n
Were there any nerves going in?
Yeah, I can\u2019t say that I\u2019ve done a three-way in a castle before. [Laughs.] I wasn\u2019t nervous for that part of it at all; I was very concerned with what she was trying to do and how she was going to use that moment later. And every character in that scene is going through it in their own kind of way.<\/p>\n
The power dynamics are constantly shifting throughout that scene. Were you conscious of that while filming it?
We talked about it from a choreographic perspective, like, what would make the most sense when it came to the physical elements of the scene? Everyone was kind of doing their own individual thing at the same time, and it was fun to watch back because there was stuff that I missed on the day. But when I actually watched it, I was able to see Marisa while I\u2019m making out with Henry, and Yasmin\u2019s on a journey. She has this incredible arc throughout the whole scene and kind of gets her power back.<\/p>\n
Henry is the only one who seems to regret what went down, later telling Hayley to skip out on Yasmin\u2019s proposed \u201cnightcap\u201d after they\u2019ve returned to London. Moving forward, how would you say that dynamic is affected?
For Hayley, I think the three-way was a, Let\u2019s see what I can do with this. Like, let\u2019s get some raw materials and see how I can work with them after. I think it does give her a stronger hand, and that\u2019s really what she\u2019s able to use when asserting her own power with Yasmin. The questions raised about that scene and the remnants of that night are very pervasive throughout the season, and one thing that really carried on is that sense of trust, or lack thereof. Yasmin and Hayley have an incredible amount of chemistry, but Hayley is not to be trusted.<\/p>\n
We\u2019ve mostly seen Hayley in a work environment or around her bosses, even if their activities are not very HR-friendly. The only time she\u2019s been shown outside of that is in the opening of the season. I was curious if you thought that the Hayley who goes off on Jim when she learns of his identity and threatens him with a knife and her \u201cbig\u201d and \u201cBlack\u201d boyfriend is the most in line with who she truly is?
I think that was a more raw version of her. In that moment we got to see an animalistic, aggressive, reactive Hayley. Throughout the rest of the season, she\u2019s really calculated and doing everything according to a playbook she\u2019s written for herself. But that was not part of any sort of agenda, and it\u2019s a very impulsive thing she does. To see the way that it throws her, I think that\u2019s closer to the real her. The crazy thing is, even though that is one of the few moments in her arc that catches her off guard, she still figures out how to use it to her advantage. And that\u2019s kind of her ethos, to make anything work for her. She\u2019s making lemonade \u2014 and she is probably spiking it with something.<\/p>\n
\n See All<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cYasmin and Hayley have an incredible amount of chemistry, but Hayley is not to be trusted.\u201d Photo: HBO…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264595,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[22681,93,61,759,1635,60,55797,4313,282],"class_list":{"0":"post-264594","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-chat-room","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-industry","12":"tag-interview","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-kiernan-shipka","15":"tag-qa","16":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264594\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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