Being busy suits Katy O’Brian. In fact, the few hours of downtime she’s enjoying between filming scenes for her just-announced zombie comedy (helmed by George A. Romero’s daughter) are enough to leave her “bored out of her mind.”
That’s partly why she’s stayed booked these past few years, skipping from Star Wars series to Marvel sequels, bodybuilding romance thrillers and disaster blockbusters. But forward momentum is only half the story. O’Brian’s unlikely rise to go-to action hire has also come thanks to her persistence, her willingness to confront the challenge of preconceived notions on which characters she can convincingly play, and the ease with which she smashes them (sometimes, literally). She did that in Rose Glass’ Love Lies Bleeding earlier this year, playing a professional bodybuilder caught up in a dangerous love story, and she’s set to do it again — in Tina Romero’s Queer sci-fi comedy about a group of drag queens slaying the undead and in the upcoming Mission Impossible installment.
But right now? Right now, she’s chasing tornadoes in Lee Isaac Chung’s Twisters.
O’Brian had just two hours to speed read Chung’s script before signing on to the role of Dani, a member of Glen Powell’s slightly unhinged Tornado Wranglers crew. Outfitted in a western belt buckle and ten-gallon cowboy hat, O’Brian admits that split decision came with unforeseen consequences – outrunning actual storms while filming in Tornado Alley during tornado season and dining on motel dinners for three months straight – but ultimately, she took the role so that when audiences flocked to theaters, they see her in a different light.
We spoke with O’Brian about the struggle to avoid typecasting, her Midwestern upbringing and its ties to the film, and her rom-com ambitions.
You’ve had a couple of big years. Do you feel the pressure to keep working at a certain pace now?
I really just love working with creative people on creative projects, so I’m hoping that I get to continue to do that. I’m getting to do a fun little project with George Romero’s daughter. I’m filming that right now. Then Mission Impossible comes out next year, and I don’t know what else. Just keep hiring me, please.
Has Tom Cruise been kicking your ass?
[laughs] I really can’t talk about anything Mission Impossible but … no one kicks my ass.
Stunts and fight scenes are one thing, mother nature is another. You’re from the Midwest, was anything about filming Twisters triggering for you?
The weather doesn’t bother me. I didn’t know that I would be there as long as I would. That was something that might’ve made me take pause just because it was a long time away from your family and we were kind of living in motels with just microwaves and mini fridges. I have a bowel disease and that’s very difficult for me. So I think I would’ve taken a little bit more pause and kind of come up with a better plan. But in all honestly, it’s really hard to say no to a project that Isaac is working on.
Would you call yourself an adrenaline junkie?
I would say no, because I tend to just be happy chilling at home, but the second someone’s like, ‘Let’s go do this crazy thing,’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, let’s do that!’ So I guess as long as I’ve got a partner and it feels competently safe, if someone asked me to go skydiving tomorrow, I would be a hundred percent down. I just started rock climbing because I’m afraid of heights. It’s one of those things that, if you fear it, chase it. Right?
Yeah, there’s a fine line between that adrenaline rush and the desire to actually help people that your character in the film has. You worked as a police officer before becoming an actor, so you have to be familiar with that. How much did your background play a role here?
Even in high school I taught disaster preparedness with the Red Cross — I would go around to middle schools and elementary schools and just little events and stuff. It’s kind of always been on my radar of how things affect people. My mom has always been a nonprofit volunteer. So it’s just taking into account that there are these spectacles of nature like a tornado or a hurricane, and they’re beautiful to watch because the world is so powerful and it just kind of humbles you. But if you are chasing it … some people maybe do it for the adrenaline rush, some people do it for research. I was talking to girls who chase and a lot of them are doing it to help guide people to tell them, ‘Hey, the tornado’s going this way.’
It’s to help people and not just to get excited seeing a tornado. So I wanted to bring that into my character as best we could, and I really did love that Tyler’s group does that. They go in and they respect nature, but they also understand the damage that it can do, how severe and serious it is, and they keep a level head in those moments where they know that they have to go in and help people out.
Being able to stay calm in a crisis, assess your emotions in the moment, is that important as an actor as well?
Yeah, you have to because then otherwise you become that person that is unsafe to work with. There was a scene in Love Lies Bleeding, for instance, where originally I was on cocaine and drunk. I was going around throwing things in the house or whatever and at the end of the day, I’m kind of manhandling Kristen a little bit. I’m bigger than her. And it’s one of those things, my heart is racing, I feel a little blurred or whatever, but if you can’t separate yourself from that just a little bit and maintain just a little bit of sanity, you could really hurt somebody and yourself. And that to me is just not worth anything. It’s really important to be aware of where you are in a space. You could turn around and smash your face in the camera. You could punch a wall and break your hand. There’s so many things you can do if you’re not really thinking it through.
After a film like that, do you still feel like you’re fighting against being typecast?
Yeah, unfortunately. That’s one thing that I really did love about Twisters is I just got to be this cowboy hat wearing bit of comic relief. It’s a role that people don’t usually get to see me in. I still get the badass military [offers] and if the script is great, look, I’m here for it. But yeah, I’m trying really to branch out and it’s so hard.
And a lot of it is because people like sci-fi action, they like military. I do enjoy action movies, but I like Jackie Chan Kung fu fun where the fight scenes are kind of the big thing and it’s not about the explosions. I like when the characters are well developed and people have onus of their characters. It’s one thing I love about Twisters, it’s not just your [typical] blockbuster movie. Isaac does a great job of making you actually care about the characters. So I’m trying to branch out and if it’s something that’s interesting and new and unique, then I want to do it. But throw a rom-com at me. I got you.
Your physicality helps you land some roles, then shuts you out of others. Is there a conflict between wanting to stay fit and strong, and knowing that certain parts are going to be harder to get because of it?
Yeah, that’s just not within my control. I’ve seen people get turned down for roles because the husband was younger and they didn’t want the wife to be older than the husband. And it’s just like, ‘What are you talking about?’ It’s such a silly reason to turn somebody down that’s the best actor for the role. So much of that’s outside of my control. It is something that definitely makes you kind of want to start producing your own stuff, writing your own stuff. I’m finding that it is important to do that just because it’s like, ‘Well, if this industry is not going to see me this way, then I have to show or I have to do it myself,’ basically. So I can’t let that bother me. I’m going to continue to do what I want to do for my own health and my own confidence. And if people can’t understand that you can be a strong muscular woman and also a mom. I just have to build my own stuff.
‘Twisters’ is in theaters now.
