SPOILER ALERT! This post contains details from Season 2 of The Diplomat.
Season 2 of Netflix‘s The Diplomat introduced a new adversary, of sorts, for Keri Russell‘s U.S. Ambassador Kate Wyler: The Vice President of the United States.
Although they’re technically on the same team, Kate struggles to find common ground with VP Grace Penn (played by Allison Janney) when she comes to the UK amid an investigation into an attack on a British naval carrier. Her introduction in Season 2 creates a compelling dynamic between two powerful women who couldn’t be more different.
Grace is everything that Kate is not. She’s polished, eloquent and and very much desires the public-facing, if less exciting, position that Kate is so desperately trying to avoid. And yet, behind-the-scenes, she’s being forced out of the Vice Presidency as Kate is being groomed to take over.
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But, Season 2 turns that succession story on its head by revealing that Grace was the one to order the British carrier attack to put a stop to the Scottish independence movement. When Kate’s husband Hal (Rufus Sewell) takes matters into his own hands, informing the President of the move, the news literally kills him.
And just like that, instead of ousting Grace Penn, they’ve unwittingly made her the new Commander in Chief. The shocking twist sets up for an even more interesting third season, which is already in production.
In the interview below, Janney and Russell spoke with Deadline about developing this relationship between two female power players, uncovering the machinations of the State Department and what’s coming in Season 3.
DEADLINE: Allison, what enticed you about playing the role of Grace Penn?
ALLISON JANNEY: Well, I watched Season 1, and they mentioned her character. I never in a million years thought I would be playing her. Then I got a call from Debora Cahn, who I’ve known since my West Wing days, and she asked if I would want to come on on board for a bit. And I said, ‘Absolutely.’ So I had no idea what’s going to happen with with Grace’s character, because I’m only in the last two episodes of Season 2. But I read that last episode, and I threw the script across the room because you just don’t see that coming at all. A lot of people who watch Season 2 say, ‘I always could tell what’s coming, but I did not see that coming.’ It was really fun to get to know that I was going to have that happen to my character. The fact that I get to be president just gave me chills, and I was very excited.
DEADLINE: So, you had no idea that was going to be the case when you signed on for the role?
JANNEY: Oh, no. Debora, she likes to keep things secret as long as possible, I think. I had no idea where I was going, and now I’m the president.
DEADLINE: Keri, Season 2 really ups the ante even more. What did you enjoy most about returning to this world for another season?
KERI RUSSELL: Well, it was really fun to go to Scotland, because we all went as a group, and it just feels like you’re in school again, like on some fun field trip. That was fun. I have to say this — more than any other job I’ve worked on, I really get excited to read the scripts. The writing is so good and fun. I’ve had the chance to be a part of really good shows that I thought were good, but this show is really good and really fun at the same time, and it’s a total delight to read the scripts. It’s just been just a treat. We all have so much fun. We really do.
JANNEY: Keri makes it so much fun because she’s got such a great sense of humor, and she’s so incredibly great at the language that you have to get your mouth around in this. Keri just throws it at me, and I throw it back at her, like it’s a lot of fun.
DEADLINE: Speaking of that back and forth, Debora recently told me that the scenes with Grace and Kate were some of her favorites to write. How were they for you two to act together?
JANNEY: Well, the dynamic between Kate and Grace was just fascinating. There’s these two women in this traditionally male-dominated arena. I am the old — might not want to say old — but I’m the seasoned politician. She’s this Maverick who’s a rising star and blunt and unpolished. Grace represents, probably a more traditional power structure…she’s threatened by Kate. She’s supposed to replace her, and she hates her, but she also respects her. There’s so much going on that to play the words on the page is one thing, but all that this stuff is going on underneath, and it’s just enormously fun. That scene where I got to dress her down, and I mean, I’m helping her, but also saying you need to shape up if you’re going to be a public facing politician. You need to get your hair done. You need to get a better bra… It was a pleasure to get to do those kinds of scenes with Keri.
RUSSELL: It was such a cool idea to take what Debora had built and celebrated in that this character of Kate is so is rough, tumble and messy and not quite put together, but she’s authentic, and she’s all these things. Then have someone come and just pick exactly those things apart in a really formidable way, not just like. ‘You look like shit’ or ‘You don’t look nice enough,’ but to go, ‘No, it actually does matter, because you’re representing the United States population.’ It was such a great idea to take what she had set up, and then to knock it down…Allison and I are pretty jokey and silly ourselves. But Allison, when she came in, pitched Grace Penn at a very even temperature. I loved that quality of it. Like, yeah, yeah, I know that that’s what you think, but it’s not the way it goes.
JANNEY: I love playing a woman like Grace, who’s one of the smartest — both of us are battling for smartest person in the room award, our characters at least. It’s so much fun to embody someone like Grace and go toe-to-toe with someone like Kate’s character, and be emboldened by Debora Cahn’s words.
DEADLINE: Did either of you look to any real-life female politicians to inspire you?
RUSSELL: Kate, I feel like is an amalgamation between many, many people. That’s what Debora and I have always spoken about. I mean, someone we talk about a lot is Samantha Power [Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development], who is a pretty good example. But, also, a lot of these stories that are even in the show are [inspired] from Susan Rice, out of a story that happened to her. Obviously there’s Hillary Clinton aspects about the relationship. I would say those are the three that I really think of.
JANNEY: Yeah, I started looking at someone like Hillary Clinton, because I imagine that Grace, too, started very early in public service, and looking at Hillary’s trajectory made sense to me for Grace.
DEADLINE: I very much appreciate that, although your characters have very different outlooks on how to achieve a specific goal, they are both powerful women who are often messy. They make mistakes. They’re not universally liked or even trying to be. How do you reflect on that aspect of playing these high-powered women and depicting them in a truthful, raw way?
RUSSELL: There was a time in, especially American TV, 15 to 20 years ago or something, when…every script I read after Felicity was like, ‘She is a surgeon, and she is the best surgeon out there, and she’s smart and she’s beautiful.’ And you’re like, ‘Who cares?’ Those people are so boring. The people that are fun to hear about are the people who are really, really smart, but then really messing up in their personal life and are making big mistakes. Those are the interesting people, or they’re certainly the interesting people to play. You always want to be losing a little in acting, as a character, because it’s just so much more fun to play.
JANNEY: I think that playing someone who’s imperfect is part of what makes them compelling, and their messiness reflects reality. And in real life, people are more complicated than just being all great. They’re all many different things. I think navigating the gray areas, it just makes it more interesting…showing someone like Grace being imperfect sort of acknowledges that leaders don’t have to fit into rigid molds to succeed. They don’t have to. They could be many things and messy is more fun, absolutely.
DEADLINE: On that note, what did you make of Grace’s decision regarding the British carrier?
JANNEY: I think sometimes you can have a moral code or something that you live by. But sometimes, when you have to make decisions on the ground, when something is happening, you have to make hard decisions. That was a decision that came across her plate, and she thought, ‘I got to look at the greater good. This is the decision I’m going to make, and I can live with it,’ but never foreseeing that what would happen would be so terrible. But what she says to Kate at the end, it’s like, ‘I know the names of every of the 41 souls lost.’ She’d rather have that on her shoulders, than thousands of people dying from a nuclear explosion. I feel like those are kinds of decisions that people in her position need to make, and they need to be prepared to make them. I stood by her decision. I think she did the right thing in the moment. Those kinds of decisions are unbelievably hard to make. I can’t even imagine being in her position, but she did it, and it was a great scene to get to play with Keri. It took me a long time to memorize. It was fascinating learning it. I was like, ‘God, it makes sense to me.’
DEADLINE: This show is so specific in its portrayal of the State Department, and it does get really in the weeds about these international relationships. What’s been most compelling to you about exploring that?
RUSSELL: I mean, first of all, Debora has said it before, and we really mean it. This is our love letter to the State Department and to the people who work in the Foreign Service. I mean, what they do is SO behind the scenes, and they are uncelebrated for the most part. So they do such important work for our country and for our world, and we are fans of what they do, and we only want to celebrate them and show them respect. I got the chance to hang out a lot with the American Ambassador to the Court of St James, Ambassador Jane Hartley. They do important work, and they’re incredible, incredible people who are so interesting, and they’re just the top of their game. Just getting the opportunity to be in the circles with those people, being at those dinners with Jane and Christiane Amanpour and Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, you see why they are where they are. They are so smart, they are so curious. They’re so easy with people. We’re in a weird time, but I only want to celebrate them.
DEADLINE: Allison, now that Grace is president, does this mean we will see more of you in Season 3 than we did in Season 2?
JANNEY: Definitely. We’re shooting Season 3 right now, and I don’t know how many episodes I’m in, because we’re doing that thing where you block shoot. We’re shooting different episodes at the same time. I’m not sure how many episodes we’re gonna end up being in, but I’m definitely in more than I was in Season 2. There’s just more of that wonderful way Debora combines these characters’ personal lives with their professional lives. That messiness is also great fun, because as the audience, you look and you see what’s going on between Hal and Kate in their personal lives, and then you see them have to operate in their professional lives. It’s just so great. I think we’re going to see more of that, and possibly that kind of stuff for Grace as well.
DEADLINE: Keri, what is exciting you most about Season 3? What should we expect?
RUSSELL: It just gets better and better. Honestly, it really does. Just when you think it’s taking one turn… and truly, it’s so fun. The main people are all there, but just taking crazy turns and [exploring] what it does to a relationship. We’re getting to see more of what’s going on in Grace Penn’s personal life and and her flaws, that becomes more prominent, which is great. The one episode we have not read yet is Episode 8, and I can’t wait to read it.