Exclusive: Regina King Talks HBO’s The Leftovers, Emmy Nod, and DirectingPosted by Wilson Morales
September 18, 2015
We’ve watched Regina King grow up on TV and film for over 30 years and become this amazing actress. She’s an inspiration to many who wanted to be in the entertainment field, especially women of color, when some doors are harder to get in from an acting and directing perspective. From her years on TV’s “227” to starring in blockbuster and critically acclaimed films such as “Boyz n the Hood,” “Jerry Maguire,” “Enemy of the State,” “Ray,” and “This Christmas;” and then returning to TV in series such as “Southland,” “The Big Bang Theory” and “The Strain,” King has done it all.
In 2015, the Los Angeles native is probably having the best year in her career. Besides starting a new path in directing, having done episodes for ABC’s “Scandal” and BET’s “Being Mary Jane,” her very first directorial project “Let The Church Say Amen” was recently aired on BET and to top that off, she recently received her first Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or a Movie for her role on John Ridley’s drama series “American Crime.”
Coming up next for King is a role on Season 2 of HBO’s critically acclaimed series, “The Leftovers,” which brings back regulars Jutin Theroux, Amy Brenneman, Margaret Qualley, Chris Zylka, Carrie Coon, Liv Tyler and Christopher Eccleston. In addition to King, joining her is Kevin Carroll, Jovan Adepo and Darius McCrary.
Created/executive produced by Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta, The Leftovers, is based on Perrotta’s book about the aftermath of a Rapture-type event that causes the sudden disappearance of 2% of the world’s population. King plays Erika Murphy, a doctor who runs the local urgent care in the town. She is married with two kids, teenage twins.
Blackfilm.com recently spoke with King on her upcoming role in The Leftovers, her Emmy nomination and her other career as a director.
How would you describe Erica?
Regina King: She’s a doctor in a small town and she definitely has that small town feeling. She knows everyone and was born and raised in Jarden, Texas. You get the feeling that she’s staple in that town because her family has a long history. She’s a woman that is very much into her family and they are very important to her but there is something about her that she is keeping to herself.
From the first episode, she’s strongly supportive of her husband and the issues that he’s dealing with. Where is that coming from?
RK: I think in small towns and places like Texas, or anywhere else in the South, keeping that family unit together is really important. With men, in New York or LA if you meet them and they are in their 40s or something like that and they don’t have any kids or have never been married, that’s not really frowned upon. But if you’re in the South and you’re 40 something and you don’t have any kids and never been married, it’s like “What wrong with you?” Family is a huge and important thing to her and once again, we’re talking about the South, and even though you are a successful woman, you support your husband. You support your man. She would probably be more than a small town doctor if she wasn’t that super supportive woman by her man’s side.
Not only is Erica a mother, wife, and a doctor, but she’s also deaf? Can you talk about that part of the character? Is this something you did research on?
RK: A little bit of research but I think the biggest thing or the beauty is the way that Damon and Tom wrote the character. She’s not 100% deaf. Most people that are deaf and wear hearing aids are able to get by. We don’t know it and we don’t pay attention to it. It’s a handicap but it’s not one that, when you are lucky enough to be able to wear a hearing aid, it doesn’t impair your day-to-day life other than having to keep up with batteries and things like that with your hearing aid. The funny thing is there are people that I did not know were wearing hearing aids because I just never could see them that I didn’t discover until I started playing this role. They definitely were on hand to let me know what happens when you don’t have your hearing aids. How you keep up with them. How long you wear them in a day or how often do you have to change the battery. There are little things that come with being deaf that the person that has to wear the hearing aid has to deal with daily. Most of us don’t even pay attention or don’t even know that people are wearing hearing aids because we’re not really even getting close enough to pay attention.
What was the attraction to doing the series?
RK: Well, I mean they’re leftovers. I think the writing is pretty awesome. I did not really follow the show but I did know how people regarded the show. When I read the script, like I said, the writing was awesome. I felt like I did not need to actually see that whole entire first season to get into this. In fact, I had not seen the season and I was just totally drawn in from episode 1 of season 2 without having known anything about season 1 other than the fact that there was this great disappearance that happened and we’re introduced to this town, one town in the world after it happened. That’s all I knew. I thought that that was a very interesting topic and I knew that it was a book. I read the script. Damon is such an amazing writer. I was like “Wow”. It’s really as simple as that, the writing.
How was working with Kevin Carroll and playing a mom to twin children?
RK: I have several friends that are mothers to twin children so that definitely gave me a little bit of real-life information to pull from. I’ve played a mother several times. I’m a mother in real life. I do believe though this is the first time I’ve been a mother to teenagers. I’m trying to think before then. Yeah. I think it’s the first time I’ve been a mother to teenagers. Just having a son that’s 19 and having already experienced those teen-aged angst years, I guess I’m kind of lucky. I have a little cheat sheet.
It’s a good chemistry between you and Kevin. How often did the two of you rehearse before you started shooting the scenes?
RK: We actually literally just were thrown right into the fire. I was working in Atlanta prior to flying here to Austin. They had already started shooting and had been working together before I got there with that first episode. So literally I came on a Sunday and we started working on Monday.
What is it you’ve heard about the Leftovers that HBO green-lighted it for a second season, revamping its camp and in taking a whole different directive in terms of the storytelling as opposed to this one long soap opera?
Regina King: Well, I don’t know that I would look at it as one long soap opera but then again I guess isn’t that how TV is now? I mean you kind of follow it because that’s why people binge watch with the DVRs and everything and that’s the way I think writing has gone that way. I don’t think it’s any more long soap opera than any other show. I just think it’s a different subject matter.
The people that I talk to that watch The Leftovers, they were just intrigued because of the subject matter because the idea of not talking about but creating a debate about religion and doing it because religion has always been a subject that’s taboo to touch even in conversations and you don’t really see any challenge of religion that often on TV. I really don’t remember it. You see it in a movie sometimes but you don’t see it so often on TV. I think that’s one of the things that was intriguing for a lot of people that I would talk to, just trying to get down to the bottom of what happened. I think they stayed in because they wanted to know.
Congratulations on your Emmy nomination for “American Crime.” How excited were you when you got that call?
RK: Oh, thank you. I was very excited. At first I was a little bummed because I didn’t hear anything about the show. I really wasn’t bummed about myself not being nominated. I was bummed because I really felt like that moment in time it was a singular experience and it was so much amazing work put into by a huge group of men and women, as every project is a huge group of men and women. I just would have loved for it to have been the show be nominated or John (Ridley) be recognized.
I hadn’t heard anything so I just kind of, whatever, it is what it is; it’s not the first time. So I was on my way to the set on The Leftovers and it was like 10 or 11 o’clock and that’s when my phone just started buzzing, buzzing, buzzing. I was picking up my phone a little concerned, like why is it buzzing like this? I was in the middle of a conversation with my son so I was not picking it up but I figured I’d better since it keeps ringing and vibrating. That’s when I saw that I had gotten the nomination and then I called Michael McDonald. He was the first call that I made, the executive producer.
I was like “Wow” and he was like “Oh! You’re chosen”. I was like “Tell me are there any other nominations? Just tell me there are more nominations?” He was like, “Regina we got 10 nominations” and I just started screaming and the tears just started dropping because it was like a validation of all the work that everyone put into it. We were nominated for sound, the show, writing, best actress, actor. That’s impressive and it’s a confirmation. It’s really a great feeling to be nominated, don’t get me wrong, but it is an even greater feeling to be nominated on a show that everyone else feels is an awesome show like you did when you read that first script.
A lot of your friends got nominated as well and it was a record year for African-Americans to get this much recognition than in years previous.
RK: Absolutely. That’s another reason that makes it special because history was made this year when it comes to people of color being nominated for Emmys. I hope that it continues. I hope that we are able to continue telling stories or, I guess not continue, but tell more stories that include people of color in the story because although there was a record amount of nominations, I still think that we’ve got a long ways to go as far as what we’re seeing on TV.
Besides the nomination, BET recently aired “Let the Church Say Amen” in which you directed. Although you’ve been directing episodes of other series, how great was that feeling to just get that first film off the ground?
RK: Let the Church Say Amen was the first thing I’ve ever directed. Well, as far as outside of a video or a short. I directed Let the Church Say Amen before I did Southland, before I directed Scandal, before I directed Being Mary Jane. It just took three years to actually air. I can’t answer that question as to why. That would be a question you’d have to ask BET. How did it feel to do my first project? It was huge. It is hard to actually put that into words. Here you are having had something that was precious to you for a long time. It was three years that we were developing it and trying to get the financing for it before we even shot it. It’s an amazing feeling to have people support it and I had an amazing group of actors. Our production designer from Southland actually came in and did the production design for me. It’s hard to put into words how honored you feel to have people believe in you for your first time at something because in a lot of ways they’re putting their life in your hands and that they believed that I could do it and that they trusted that I could do it, so the responsibility was huge.
It was a lot of pressure because there were a lot of people believing in me. Even though you believe in yourself you don’t want to let anybody down. It was a lot of pressure. My dear friend Tim Story, and we’ve been friends for over 30 years, told me that either you’re going to love directing after this or hate it. He actually surprised me on set while we were shooting Let the Church Say Amen. It was maybe about two weeks into me shooting, and he’s like, “So? What do you think? Do you love it or hate it?” I was like, “Oh, my God! I love it. I’m not getting any sleep but I love it so much.” It was one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve ever had.
Now that you’ve done it, and you’re in a position who can get behind the scenes, did you ask yourself, why aren’t there more women doing this or is it that the public isn’t aware of their work?
RK: Oh, I’ve always known that there were more of us. There’s a lot of women directors out there. A lot of women directors that I have worked with years ago that made me even consider that “Oh wow. Women direct?” I didn’t even realize it probably until I was in my teens because I’d never worked with, I don’t think we had a female director on 227 until maybe season two or three. That was my first time ever seeing that a woman did direct. You believe things are the way they are because that’s what you see. I’d never even considered that a woman could direct until I saw Ellen Chaset Falcon and worked with her. It was like “Oh my gosh.” Then just talking to her and meeting Neema Barnette and talking to her realizing that there are directors out there that we just don’t get to work with them often.
What’s next for you? When are we going to see you next on the big screen?
RK: I don’t know. Every time I’ve tried like there was a movie that I was going to do and then it conflicted with this schedule. There was just no way for me to do it. I was doing American Crime last year and from there I was going right to direct Scandal. The movie conflicted with those and I couldn’t do it. It’s not that I don’t want to do film. It’s just that when the film that I like has come up it’s conflicted with directing and acting. As I am establishing myself as a director, I can’t get an assignment as a director and then pull out because the acting has come up. I don’t want to. Then I’ll get the name as a director that “Oh, you can hire her, but if a project that she likes better comes up she’s going to pull out.” That’s not how you want to go and do this.
It’s good that you’re directing. The doors have already been opened but I think your name can open up the doors for a lot more people if they know it.
RK: Well you know, hopefully. That’s not necessarily why you go into something but if that’s something that comes out of it, that makes it even better.
Season 2 of The Leftovers debuts on HBO on October 4th at 9 p.m. EST.
Full Trailer
Trailer 2
