Allison Tolman‘s playing another badass female cop, this time on the debut season of ABC’s Emergence. Naturally, this new character evokes shades of Tolman’s breakout performance on FX’s Fargo series, but the two TV shows and Tolman’s characters differ quite a bit from each other. In Emergence‘s case, we’re talking about a sci-fi drama thriller with a conspiratorial vibe that won’t stop unfolding with each episode. Tolman plays Jo Evans, a divorced police chief who meets a mysterious child near a plane crash site and takes her into the family home. Soon enough, the child’s identity becomes the launching point for the series’ central mystery.
Tolman was gracious enough to sit down with us to discuss her new leading role, which is one of her many empathetic characters, as opposed to the villain that she recently enjoyed portraying. Oh, and we also chatted about action scenes and pushed off-topic into her true-crime viewing conundrum.
You did a really wonderful questionnaire for us a few years ago, and I don’t want to ruin that vibe with some inferior questions!
Well, I’m a nightmare now, so we’ll see how things have changed.
In that piece, you told us about the nicest thing that anyone had ever done for you, which was when Shawn Doyle ran lines with you on Fargo. Have you found a way to pay that forward?
Oh gosh. I try, all the time, on this show and to foster an environment where people feel like it’s okay to … fail? [Laughs] You know, it’s really hard being a day player, coming in as an extra for just one day on the show when a series is already in motion, and it’s like a well-oiled machine, and everyone knows what they’re doing. It’s difficult, so I try on Emergence, in the spirit of Shawn, try to make a set where people feel welcome, and it takes the edge off that sort-off “new kid in school” feeling, which is what I was feeling when I started Fargo. I was a nervous wreck, so I think that every person who we probably had on our set had more experience than I did on Fargo, but it doesn’t matter. When you’re new, in a new environment, it’s really scary, so I do try to put people at ease if I can, even just to go into the makeup trailer to shake hands and make jokes and sit with them lunch and whatever I can do.
You get a lot of comparisons and contrasts between your characters on Fargo and Emergence. Does it get to be too much at times?
It doesn’t bother me, I think they’re like bookends. The parallels are obvious because they’re both policewomen and badasses and good at what they do. I do think they’re also incredibly different. I’ve never been pushed into territory where I’m like, “You’re insane, you don’t know what you’re talking about!” The fact that they’re policewomen with strong father figures is where the similarities end. Molly’s story was so much about fighting against these odds, trying to get some recognition and find her place in the force that she was on and get credit for what she was capable of. Jo’s already fought those fights and is already on the other side of it. She’s the boss, and everybody knows it, and she handles herself like a boss. Jo’s like a later iteration of Molly.
She also has a much better wardrobe, I have to say, even though her name isn’t as cool. I mean, “Molly Solverson,” come on. The Fargo names are righteous, but you don’t have to wear brown every day now.
Yes, that’s definitely an improvement!
So when I started watching Emergence, I thought about all the horror movies with unsettling children and why you should never adopt them. Was that in your head?
Yeah, absolutely. This is a genre that I love as well, so I was aware of the long history of creepy kids and how effective it is to have a creepy kid in a story like this. But Michelle [Fazekas] and Tara [Butters], our showrunners and head writers, have done a good job of setting her apart pretty quickly, and we narrowed down the possibilities of what she was and what she was capable of, so we didn’t fear her too much for too long. Because I think that would have been a hard place to live for too many episodes.
Why do you think Jo struggled so much with accepting that Piper, you know, might not be human?
I think because everything that she’s experienced with Piper suggests something different. Not just the outward appearances and what a good replica she is, but she seems like a sweet kid. She’s funny and trips and forgets to tie her shoes, and she likes Rice Krispies treats, and Jo has this affection for her. That’s one of the strengths and one of the things that is interesting about our show, especially its place in our world today. It brings forth questions: “What is consciousness?”; “What does ‘real’ mean?”; and “What makes something a being an entity and something that’s worth your time and worth trusting and giving your heart to?” That’s something that everybody can relate to.
Yes, how can anything that loves Rice Krispies treats not be worth it?
I absolutely know what you mean.
This series involves a conspiracy, but it’s also about family, and a character suggests that Jo might be trying to fix herself through Piper. How valid is that?
There’s some validity to that. I think Jo’s pretty well-adjusted, but she knows where her blind spots are. I don’t know that she’s trying to fix herself, but I do know that there’s a touch of her righting a wrong that was done to her through Piper. Like, “I had this trauma happen to me at a young age, and so, in the cosmic balance and grand scheme of things, I can help another kid, and it will have righted that wrong in that way.” I don’t know that Jo would ever talk about it in that manner and in the same terms that I do. But not only is she a kind person that sees a kid in need but, on some level, she thinks, “This could have been me. And the things that were hard for me, well, I don’t want them to be hard for another person.”
You portray a lot of empathetic characters, but you did get a villain-ish role in Good Girls, so how much did you enjoy that?
I love Jo, and I really love spending my days as Jo, but man, Mary Pat was one of my favorite roles I’ve ever played. I had so much fun playing a villain. There’s really nothing like being able to create a human being out of scratch with the writers that people have such strong feelings about. She was funny and manipulative, and she also had a lot going on. She wasn’t strictly bad or good, and she was a little crazy, which just made playing her a joy because I think her brain works differently than a lot of the other characters that I’ve played. And to play around with that in the moment as an actor was just a blast.
Do you rely a lot on the writing for Jo’s complex personality, or do you get to add aspects? I see a little bit of hard-boiled nature in her.
The scripts come to us super strong, and especially as the season goes on, the writers learn the actors’ voices, more and more, and they start writing toward that. I have a pretty good deadpan, I do that pretty well in my regular life, and I can see them starting to thread that through into Jo’s sense of humor, so the writers start to write more for your own voice. I am really lucky to work on a show where our writers are not married to every single word, so we can loosen things up a bit and add “ums” and “yesses” and “huh” into the middle of my lines, so people really sound like humans. And we do that all the time on our show, we’re constantly finessing things and making sure that we’re making the best show we can with people who really sound and act like them.
You’re doing some action-y scenes, too. How much training did you have to do for that scene where you go into a factory and get attacked by, what was that, a robot-dog?
[Laughs.] I know! We didn’t do a ton of training, some of the one-on-one fights, they’ll have a day devoted to [that], but I have not done any specific rehearsals for that. We have a really, really strong fight-set coordinator, who takes good care of us. I have a great stunt double who is always there anytime I have to do anything physical. She’s there in case I’m not comfortable with a part. They’ll just figure it out and make it work. And we usually do one wide run where cameras are pretty far back with stunt doubles, and then we just shoot it piece-by-piece with us in there, throwing punches and ducking and firing guns. I kind of feel like an action star all of a sudden, which I did not think was in my future, and it’s an absolute blast. It’s been really awesome.
Are you developing cravings for doing action movies now?
I mean, oh gosh, that’s hard because I look at people who do all their own action stuff like Charlize Theron, and I’m like, “Well, I can’t do that, I’m not that athletic.” I can do the little pieces, but I wish that I had the confidence to do all the big pieces like her. She’s just incredible.
Yeah, but you also have to think about how it’s all going to feel, 20 years after doing those big pieces.
That’s true. My bones are tired, and I’ve aged on this shoot because I’m using my body in ways that I’ve never used it before! It’s hard on your body.
Well, you’ve played two pretty strong police officers, but do you ever actually sit down and watch true crime or procedurals?
Well, I watch true crime a lot, and I’m watching Mindhunter right now, so I do watch those. I don’t really do procedurals like CSI or any of those, I think it’s such a big bite, and there’s such history that it’s hard to jump into, but I do love a moody crime drama.
Did you watch Dirty John yet?
I haven’t, no, but only because I wanted to listen to the podcast first, and I did that but then forgot that Dirty John existed until this very moment. So thank you for reminding me.
You’ll enjoy it, I think. And Unbelievable, the Netflix show with two female cops.
With Toni Collete, right? I watched the first episode, but here’s the problem. My apartment in Jersey is on a corner, and it’s super well-lit, and so I can’t really watch TV in here during the day if it’s anything that’s moody or dark because you can’t see anything on the screen, and then when I’m home at night with my boyfriend, he doesn’t watch any of that stuff. He’s been out of town for the past couple of days, so now I’m just devouring Mindhunter, and then I’m gonna watch Unbelievable and get in all of my dark stuff.
Good luck with it all, and with Emergence, which is shaping up nicely as a series.
Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
ABC’s ‘Emergence’ airs on Tuesday nights at 10:00pm EST.
