For Elisabeth Moss, every acting role is a chance “to show yourself what you can do.”
Since breaking out on the small screen playing the president’s daughter on “The West Wing,” Moss has become one of television’s greatest chameleons. She played Peggy Olson, the wallflower secretary–turned–quippy copywriter on “Mad Men” (for which she scored six Emmy nominations), then took a sharp left turn into the gruesome dystopia of “The Handmaid’s Tale” with masterful finesse.
The timely Hulu drama based on Margaret Atwood’s novel earned Moss her first Emmy win for the show’s leading role of Offred (aka June). In the series, which takes place in a future totalitarian state where fertile women are forced into pregnancy, Moss is regularly tasked with portraying extreme states of trauma, fear, and rage. In a recent conversation with the New Yorker, Moss revealed that, for her, music is an essential part of getting into June’s head and accessing such demanding emotions. In fact, for every role she plays (including her most recent work on Apple TV+’s “Shining Girls”), she creates a thorough playlist “to get in the mood.”
“AirPods were a massive addition to my career,” Moss said. “I don’t get all wrapped up in wires now.”
Her playlist for “The Handmaid’s Tale” includes Hans Zimmer’s score for “Interstellar,” songs by composer Max Richter—and, for times when she needs to feel particularly “badass,” Beyoncé’s “Formation.”
Elisabeth Moss on the Best Audition Advice She’s Ever ReceivedMoss said she intentionally looks for roles that will require such meticulous emotional preparation. For her, the time she spends getting to know characters that are “very different” from herself is part of what makes acting fulfilling.
“The fun part is that, in life, you’re not supposed to go and scream in people’s faces like that,” she said of shooting a recent “Handmaid’s Tale” scene in which June is so furious that she literally foams at the mouth. “I like playing roles that are very conflicted or have some major trauma. I’m fascinated by the need to climb that mountain.”
And she hasn’t stopped climbing. Over the course of the five seasons of “The Handmaid’s Tale,” Moss has capitalized on her affinity for darker roles by playing a self-destructive punk rocker in “Her Smell,” a passive-aggressive mother in “Us,” and a woman terrorized by her unseen ex-boyfriend in “The Invisible Man.”
“I can’t tell you how many children I’ve lost in roles. They’re either being taken away or stolen. It’s, like, Jesus Christ,” she said.