“As an actor, loyalty to your character and her
story is of paramount importance. I will never stand in judgment of any
character I play. You can’t abandon them, no matter what they do, think or
feel. It serves me not one bit, and it doesn’t serve the story. Mistress Epps
[from 12 Years a Slave] was a
diabolical character—her behavior was reprehensible. But I remember [director]
Steve McQueen telling me, ‘You must not judge her.’ So I didn’t look for ways
to excuse her behavior. Instead, I tried to understand her actions within the
context of her time. She wasn’t smart enough to question what she’d been told;
she wasn’t an independent person of mind or heart. But the story wouldn’t be
told in the same way if I’d tried to make her more palatable. My job is to serve
the story, and if you have no loyalty to your character, you might as well not
bother.” —Actress Sarah Paulson (American
Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson), quoted in “Soapbox: The Columnists—WSJ Asks Six Luminaries to Weigh in on a Single Topic; This Month: Loyalty,” wsj.com, March 2016
(The image accompanying this post shows Sarah
Paulson in character as Marcia Clark in American
Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson.)
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