Blessed be the fight until the very end. The Handmaid’s Tale, a dystopian drama adapted from Margaret Atwood’s 1985 novel of the same name, centers on Elisabeth Moss’ June, a woman living in a dark age who sees her family and former life stripped away. She strikes back and becomes a fierce leader of a rebellion, but her quest for justice endangers herself and those around her. One of the aforementioned leaders is Naomi Putnam (Ever Carradine), married to Commander Joseph Lawrence, who is ready to defend the controversial values of Gilead at the cost of personal relationships.
Here, Carradine speaks to Deadline about her views on Naomi and her experience on the show.
DEADLINE: What do you remember about those initial descriptions of Naomi in the beginning? And what do you think about her trajectory to now?
EVER CARRADINE: Naomi has had quite a journey over these six seasons, from where she started to where she landed. Initially, I had done the pilot. I had never read a better pilot script, probably ever. I told my agent and manager that I would do anything to be a part of the show. I didn’t get the role I auditioned for, but Naomi shows up in Episode 2. So then, I was approached again. You have to remember back then, all we had was the pilot and Margaret Atwood’s novel. We didn’t really know what this world looked like. We didn’t know who these people were. My first day on set was the episode where Janine gives birth to Angela, and Naomi is giving fake birth behind her on this insane birthing chair. And I just remember showing up on set at the Putnam residence; we shot in this really big, gorgeous house in this posh neighborhood in Toronto. And I walked in, it’s my first day on set, and I look around and there’s Handmaids everywhere and there’s these beautiful cloaks.
It was such an immersive experience, and I had never met Madeline Brewer before. And in comes Maddie, who is giving fake birth. And I was like, what is happening? This is the most incredible experience of my life. And when I look back over the course of the show coming to an end, a lot of us have looked back at photos or memories. When I look back at photos from my first episode, I’d like you to know that during my off time, I was streaming the presidential debates of Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump.
DEADLINE: What a time.
CARRADINE: Mhm. But when I look back at those pictures, I just took pictures of piles of cloaks and the handmaids walking in a line. It was a world I never would have imagined. But then, when I got there, I was completely invested. From what I remember, Naomi was described in this audition scene for me, where she’s bitching about her handmaid Janine biting her hand. And I think that says all you need to know about Naomi. She has a disconnect. And she treats people, like Janine, as her pet and property.
DEADLINE: Was there any pressure when you found out that you were a regular for the finale season?
CARRADINE: No. That took the pressure off. When I began the show, I was a series regular on Marvel’s Runaways, which was also Hulu. Everyone got along, and since we shot on opposite schedules, I was able to do both shows. And then, as the show progressed, they found, I thought that when Stephen Kunken, the late great Warren Putnam, was shot in the head that that was maybe the last we had seen of Naomi. I learned that Naomi married [Joseph] Lawrence in a script. That’s the bonus of being a regular on the show; you do get your scripts a little bit early.
As an actor, this is such a job of limited security. So, more than anything, to be a regular, it just meant that I knew my comings and goings. I knew how many episodes that I was in. And since I have been with the show since Season 2, it really meant a lot to me to finish this show with the cast as a regular at all sorts of fun finale events.
Ever Carradine and Bradley Whitford in The Handmaid’s Tale
Hulu
DEADLINE: Speaking of Commander Joseph, you and Bradley Whitford play off each other very well. Can you elaborate a bit more on how you complement each other? Do you rehearse this constantly beforehand?
CARRADINE: We don’t sit and rehearse and rehearse. Bradley is so lovely and smart, and I think he will tell you, and a lot of people on this show will tell you, that we take the work seriously, but not ourselves. You’ll do more honest work if your ego is removed from it. When playing off him, Bradley is always making me laugh. He finds humor in everything. And a lot of filming Season 6 overlapped with the presidential election pre and post. So, there were some extraordinarily stressful days. It also coincided with the Palisades fries, which we were all on set for, and many people were being evacuated, and homes were burning down; it was extremely stressful. So, Bradley’s humor was welcome. I always say that to play Naomi, who is so rigid, tight, and stressed, Bradley keeps me loose. So, that is a gift to me. He’s smart, funny, generous, and has great stories, making him a great scene partner. I can’t say enough good things about working with Bradley. And I think it was so brilliant of the writers to stick Naomi and Lawrence together just because they’re so different.
There’s a lot of humor to be found on screen between the two of them. And I think that for this show, we do need it. For a second, I was worried that I was in a different show because I was doing all these funny little moments while dark stuff was happening across Gilead. But I’m a big fan of the show, and when I watch it, those are the moments that I need them to breathe. Bradley provides a lot of that off-camera, and together, we provide it on-camera.
DEADLINE: I feel in Season 6, there’s a little bit of a compare-and-contrast situation between Serena and Naomi. Both are willing to be mouthpieces and like the status of that more than anything else. Are they similar to you?
CARRADINE: What I feel, honestly, as a view, because a lot of what Yvonne [Strahovski] does, she’s not in [a lot of scenes] with Naomi, that Serena is much more of a true believer than Naomi. I really believe that Naomi is just a little status-hungry. She wants to be the belle of the ball. I’ve said this before, and I really believe it; I think one of the best days of Naomi’s life in Gilead is when she went to visit Serena in prison; that was a feather in her cap. “Let me bring you your baby gifts in prison, Serena.” And I think as the show moves on, we are chipping away at who these people really are, not their beliefs, but who they are in their soul. And you see more of that in Serena, for sure. And you really see it in Naomi as well. And there’s a great scene in Episode 9 where you get to see Lawrence and Naomi really connect as parents and as people, and it’s stripped away. They could be just two people in a home in sweatsuits talking about their kid.
It was a really important moment to Bradley and I, and it was beautifully written by Eric Tuchman. What this show does really well is that there’s a lot of big things happening, but these writers really allow these small moments to have some breath, and it shows you who these people are when you slow down and let two characters just be with one another, you can learn so much about them.
The Handmaid’s Tale
Hulu
DEADLINE: What are you pulling inspiration from to create Naomi?
CARRADINE: Half the work is done for me with the hair, wardrobe and shoes. Since Season 2 or 3, I’ve asked for really tall shoes. And the hair buns have gotten bigger and bigger. She’s peacocking. And so that to me, once I’m zipped in, half of the work is done for me. I was a giant Little House on the Prairie fan when I was younger, so Naomi, to me, is little Nellie Oleson. Nellie just wants to be Laura Ingalls. I don’t think we would call Serena Laura Ingalls in this, but there’s just bottomless envy and the pressure to keep up with the Joneses, as well as the emphasis on status, particularly with hair and all of it.
DEADLINE: Elisabeth Moss directed a few episodes. Talk about that experience of having an actor-director at the helm.
CARRADINE: It’s such a treat. Here’s the thing: Lizzie is a generational talent. I don’t know how she does all the things that she does so well. If she was just an actor on the show, if she was just number one on the call sheet and showed up and did her job, I would be gobsmacked in awe. And then she’s a producer, and now she’s a director. She is incredible. But just as far as having an actor direct you, she’s incredible. She’s been there since day one. So, she can answer any question you have about Gilead, your character, what happened off-screen, whatever the context, because sometimes it’s a little confusing regarding the rules of Gilead or what’s transpired. So, she has an answer to all that.
She’s also just loose and easy, knows what she wants, knows what everybody is capable of giving, and believes in everybody. I could talk for an hour about how incredible Elisabeth Moss is.
DEADLINE: What was the most challenging scene for you this season?
CARRADINE: I have two answers. There was one day when we were on set with a lot of work to do, and it was the exact same time that the Palisades Fire started. So, we were all trying to do our jobs and trying to stay up to date for either getting our families evacuated or making sure our friends hadn’t lost their homes. So, navigating those two things at the same time was tough. Now that I’ve seen that episode that I’m referring to, you really can’t tell that we’re all worried that our houses are going to maybe be OK another day. That was more emotionally challenging off-screen. The directors and crews and cast were all so amazing. I’m also including that showing up to work two days after the presidential election was gruesome. It was brutal. It was out of body. It was totally, completely awful. And it was really hard to put these clothes on and step into this world. I actually didn’t work the day after the election, but I have two kids. So, my family is in Los Angeles, and I had an apartment in Toronto [during filming]. I didn’t want to be alone, though, after the election results. So, I called transport on the show, and they brought me to set, and I spent the day hanging out with our writers and director.
Then, as far as tough days, I think everyone will probably tell you the challenges of this show is that it’s freaking cold in Toronto. And a lot of what we shoot is in the middle of the woods at 2:00 a.m. and it’s 10 below zero. It’s just cold. But I have to say that it’s harder on no one more than the crew. Because, as cast, we get to sit in a warming trailer, or we’re drinking chicken soup while the crew works 12 hours in the freezing cold. So, my kudos to them.
DEADLINE: What would you like people to take away from Season 6 as the series ends?
CARRADINE: I want people to remember that June is just a person. She’s not a superhero. I believe that this message of resistance and hope is particularly important, especially in these challenging times. And I hope that’s what people take with them. And when I read the finale, I mean, it was obviously an emotional experience to read the finale and then to see the end of the show. The feeling that I had when I read the finale was maternal. I don’t know how else to explain it, but I read the script, and I really felt like that feeling of a kid being at a playground and maybe falling and scraping their knee and Mom coming over to them and dusting off their knee and saying, “You’re going to be OK. Get back out there.” That’s not what happens in the show, but that was the feeling that I had, and that’s the feeling that I hope that audience members have. “Get yourself up, dust yourself off, and get back out there.”
There is a message of hope and resistance, and it is throughout the season, and it comes in all different shapes and sizes. And whichever kernel resonates with you, take that and run with it because we need it. We’re going to need a lot of Junes; we’re going to need a lot of handmaids. We’re going to need a lot of Aunt Lydia’s post-Episode 7. And we need our friends to be an army. I really think the writers nailed the landing with that message. And I just want to make sure that everybody’s listening and paying attention because it’s extraordinarily important, especially right now, and go rewatch the pilot.
[This interview has been edited for length and clarity.]
