Main cast: Ali Ahn, Ato Essandoh, David Gyasi, Allison Janney, Rory Kinnear, Keri Russell, and Rufus Sewell
Casting by: Julie Schubert, Lucinda Syson, and Natasha Vincent
Created by: Debora Cahn
Distributed by: Netflix
As we prepare for the 32nd Actor Awards presented by SAG-AFTRA, Backstage is breaking down this year’s film and television ensemble nominees for your consideration.
On Debora Cahn’s “The Diplomat,” two characters sharing a scene rarely say exactly what’s on their minds. This makes for a political pressure cooker that feels extra volatile on the show’s explosive third season.
Ruthlessly pragmatic vice president Grace Penn (Allison Janney) abruptly ascends to the presidency after her predecessor’s death, bringing a radioactive secret into the Oval Office: culpability in a deadly terrorist attack. Kate Wyler (Keri Russell), the messy but effective ambassador to the U.K., is one of the few who know. Like a geopolitical Thelma and Louise, Russell and Janney put the pedal to the metal with their characters’ volatile relationship. The actors even make a quiet changing-room moment feel high-stakes, while exposing the reluctant but undeniable camaraderie between two capable, ambitious women navigating a world stage that never lets them forget their gender.
Among the season’s other complex pairings are Kate and her husband Hal (Rufus Sewell). The most frustrating couple on TV manage to make marital rot look hot. As their characters confide and flirt, betray and separate, Russell and Sewell’s repartee clearly says: Oh, this is what gets these people off.
There’s also plenty of sexy subterfuge to go around. As U.K. foreign secretary Austin Dennison, David Gyasi depicts a torturous tension between romance with Kate and duty to country; and Ato Essandoh’s diplomatic deputy Stuart Hayford tenderly breaks the shell of Ali Ahn’s depressed (but still sarcastic) CIA station chief Eidra Park.
If good acting is about finding something truthful, consider this cast’s tightrope feat: They craft honest portrayals of very deceitful people.