00:00The whole world exists just for you. It's a fairy tale.
00:06How does it end?
00:07Hello, Brandy Victorian with Essence Magazine. How are you?
00:10Hey, I'm fine. Thank you, Brandy.
00:12Good. So good to see you. I'm excited to chat with you.
00:16The second Embrace episode of Modern Love sent me through a lot of emotions in a very short time.
00:21And I'm curious, yeah, what your response was when you first read the script?
00:25Well, it sent me through a lot of emotions in a very short space of time as well.
00:29I was like, you know, I haven't watched the first series.
00:33And on purpose, I didn't watch it because I didn't kind of I like to just go to filming without really knowing how it's supposed to look and be.
00:40Rather, I'm just inside it. So I wasn't even realizing how short it was.
00:44I was just thinking, that's a lot. That's a lot that happens.
00:48Like, that's intense. And that's very quick turns we've got to make.
00:53And then I think, how am I going to do that?
00:55I think, brilliant. A challenge. I love that challenge.
00:58And I just also I'd never really done that kind of genre.
01:02It's sort of rom-com-esque, I suppose.
01:04And it has that essence of that. And I'd never really done something like that before.
01:09So I was really wanting to try something like that.
01:13And also, I love Tobias's work.
01:15So I got to work with Tobias.
01:16And John Carney, great director.
01:18And I'd love some of his films.
01:20And so it was just a great sort of chance to sort of meet, work with these creatives.
01:25Yeah. And, you know, my instinct was like to go to the next episode when it ended.
01:30And I was like, that is it, you know, right there.
01:33But there was so much to ponder, even in, you know, 35 minutes or so.
01:37What was your biggest takeaway from the episode?
01:40Do you know, I haven't watched it because I don't like to watch myself.
01:43So I can only go by my experience of filming it rather than the story itself.
01:48I just think that it's kind of this funny thing with their relationship is that they were together and then they split up.
01:55And often when you see couples that have split up, like depicted on television, it's like they're at each other's throats.
02:02And it's kind of really, and they're kind of just living their life.
02:05And maybe it's because it's from a true story.
02:06They were kind of split up, but they were managing to share, looking after their children.
02:10And they kind of get on fine.
02:13And then just something happens to her where she just suddenly realizes she's deeply back in love with him again.
02:20Yeah.
02:21And it was just so sort of, it sort of surprises her.
02:24Yeah.
02:24As well as, you know, she didn't see it coming, even though other people perhaps could see it coming, but she didn't see it coming.
02:28And then how he holds himself through her diagnosis and how he is able to be a witness for her.
02:39I think she just finds it so profoundly moving.
02:42And at that point in her life, he's able to do that.
02:44And she's able to let him do that.
02:47And maybe 15 years back, they couldn't have done that for each other.
02:51And someday it was just the right time.
02:53And the stars were aligned at that point for them to be able to be together.
02:57And it feels so kind of like, sometimes love feels like those, it could so easily just pass them by.
03:03You know, you could have easily just not done that thing at that moment, but that to happen, you know.
03:08And it's just kind of magic, isn't it?
03:11Yeah.
03:11Yeah.
03:12You know, and speaking of, you know, a challenge, I feel like anthology series and limited series like this are becoming much more frequent.
03:19You know, I watched Jim and Ratched, Love, like, you know, which is only six episodes a season.
03:23This is one episode.
03:24So, you know, how do you like roles like this versus, you know, films and longer series where you kind of stay with the character and shape and mold them over time?
03:34Do you know what?
03:34I like to just mix it all up.
03:36I think for me to do something, a character that stayed for a very long time, you know, a very long form, it would have to be an amazing character.
03:44So I've never really wanted to do that unless I felt like I could, like I'd want to explore that person for a long time.
03:52You know, like there are some characters, because even the best shows, often by the third, fourth season, you think, oh, okay.
03:58Yeah.
03:58I'm done now, you know, and then occasionally come a light again.
04:03So it would have to be something that I really, really wanted to do to explore that character.
04:09But, you know, I do a lot of theatre and in the theatre I'm doing the same show every night, but I'm exploring often different facets of the character.
04:16So I played Cleopatra just before I did Ratchet, you know, it's Shakespeare.
04:21And with that character, every night you felt like there was another bit of her, I mean, that I could explore.
04:27So playing Cleopatra was actually a really good, like, run up to doing Ratchet and playing all those characters.
04:32Because she's so many different things to different people.
04:35And so that was, you know, and she actually can turn on a pin.
04:38So that actually was a really great kind of preparation.
04:42Yeah.
04:42So, yeah, I think it's just, I think that each thing brings its blessing.
04:47And then we did, like, when we did Modern Love, both me and Tobias had such a great time.
04:51We were like, oh, I wish we were doing the whole series.
04:54I wish there was, like, another five parts, you know.
04:56We just got started.
04:57I'm so blessed because the job I have is I do different things all the time.
05:00And I think that's, I wouldn't probably want to do a show for seven or eight years.
05:04I didn't think that would suit me.
05:06But you never know.
05:07What's the space?
05:08Yes.
05:09Because I'm crossing my fingers, black is that long.
05:12And I'm obsessed.
05:14I love that series.
05:15I'm never doing another one, though.
05:17So tell them we need it.
05:20Yes.
05:21It was interesting, you know, because I was thinking about Caroline, you know, also had this long swing with her ex-husband.
05:27She did?
05:28I forgot about that because I filmed it quite a while ago.
05:31Yeah.
05:31And I was like, you know, curious.
05:33What do you think it is about, you know, people who are in love with each other, but they work better, you know, unmarried.
05:40You know, kind of.
05:41I know.
05:41Than together.
05:43I know.
05:43I do know a couple of people like that.
05:45It's not been my experience, but yeah.
05:47Yeah.
05:47It's like, yeah.
05:49I don't know.
05:49But also, the age I am, I'm playing characters that have had a much more life behind them.
05:54So you get these chances to have second chances and third chances and in and out and weave your life in a kind of more complicated way than perhaps when you play characters in their 20s.
06:04It's different.
06:04Yeah, that's true.
06:07And with Caroline, you know, who do you draw from in shaping, you know, such a dynamic character like her?
06:12Well, it's fairly from the script, really.
06:15I start with the kind of the way the script is and that kind of leads me into it.
06:19And then I start to sort of piece together this person and I imagine the world.
06:23And I talk with Ollie, the writer, a lot.
06:25So some of the things I was talking about came into the second series, you know.
06:28So we had an idea that she was fronting something that always a lot of it was a front for something else that she hid.
06:37And so that that definitely sort of I think that came through in the second series more, you know, because the first series, she was just more kind of outline of her.
06:46You didn't really get to see all the things that she was hiding.
06:49But I had in my mind that she was that she was not quite who she seemed.
06:53And then we got that to come through in the second series.
06:56Absolutely.
06:57Well, thank you so much.
06:58That's my time.
06:59But it's been a pleasure speaking with you.
07:01You too.
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