Carrie Coon acknowledges that her road to acting hasn’t looked quite the same as many others. In fact, the now-44-year-old admits she likely would have ended up in a completely different field if it weren’t for very specific choices made at very specific moments in time. “I didn’t have any experience of [acting] as a career path,” Coon recollects, as we first connect over Zoom for an illuminating, unflinchingly honest conversation that tackles life, acting Hollywood, social media, movie nights, politics, and everything in between.

As a former English major myself, I can’t help but ask if the general assumption was that she, too, would go on to become a teacher — but even with a double major in English and Spanish literature, as well as a psychology minor (“If you’ve read the Jeffrey Eugenides book The Marriage Plot, then you realize just what a cliché I was in college in the Midwest”), Coon still wasn’t sure she wanted to be in school for the rest of her life. It was a fateful conversation with her University of Mount Union theater professor, Doug Kendall, that set her on the path towards acting — but even when she received the offer to attend the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she ultimately earned her MFA, Coon says the thought of acting onscreen hadn’t even crossed her mind, especially since her theater career was only just beginning. “I was an ensemble actor at the American Players Theatre in Spring Green, Wisconsin, and had they invited me to join their company, I would have done it in a heartbeat, and that’s where I would be right now.” On the stage, the parts were certainly plentiful — after her debut in the Madison Repertory Theatre’s 2006 production of Our Town, that aforementioned tenure with the American Players Theatre followed, where she was a part of several productions across four seasons, ranging from William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet to Tennessee Williams’ The Night of the Iguana. Once she joined the Remy Bumppo Theatre Company’s 2008 production of Brontë, Coon was dividing her time between Chicago and Wisconsin, traveling between the two for various theater roles, while also taking the kind of acting gigs that allowed her to become more comfortable with the idea of being on camera. “If you were a Chicago actor trying to get into TV and film, we had a pretty robust commercial scene.” But even then, Coon knew she wasn’t going to book the next leading role on a television series right out of the gate, especially with how competitive the audition field could be. “You were lucky to get these little one-line parts.”
Coon Is the “Ambiguous Ending Lady” — and Maybe That’s the Role of a Lifetime

Photography by Yellowbelly for Collider

Even the most diehard television viewers may not remember The Playboy Club, NBC’s short-lived period crime drama starring the likes of Laura Benanti, Amber Heard, Jenna Dewan, Eddie Cibrian… and Coon, in her small-screen debut. The show was cancelled in October 2011, before its first season had finished airing, due to poor ratings. Despite its unfortunately abbreviated run, Coon’s brief appearance in only one of the series’ three aired episodes proved to be only the beginning of her screen career. When I mention that she is also now, technically, part of the illustrious Law & Order club thanks to her early guest spot on a Season 14 episode of SVU, Coon immediately has to give credit to the casting directors who plucked her out of a sea of audition tapes — “the people who were willing to give me opportunities.” On The Playboy Club, it was director Lesli Linka Glatter; after that, Laray Mayfield watched an audition tape sent from Chicago and gave her her first film role — in David Fincher’s adaptation of Gone Girl. Again, Coon is entirely aware of the fact that her past trajectory doesn’t look like anyone else’s, a journey she summarizes as a “wild, quick education in film acting.” Every new benchmark in Coon’s career, however, has been a learning opportunity, even if one could certainly argue that landing your first film role in a Fincher movie is the equivalent of jumping into the deep end before fully learning how to swim. “I was put through David Fincher’s school on that film,” she admits, “and I learned a lot in that process, which then I was able to take to The Leftovers, which was my first real television show.” Amidst all of this, she had also just earned her first Tony nomination for her performance as Honey in the Broadway revival of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, which she starred in alongside actor and playwright Tracy Letts, whom she married in 2013. One Chicago Tribune headline from around that time reads: “From out of nowhere, Carrie Coon” — which, in retrospect, feels like an apropos means of describing just how much her career was starting to take off, even though she’d already been a staple on the stage for years.

I’m interested in art that’s ambiguous. I don’t like it all laid out for me.

Besides, what is there to say about The Leftovers that hasn’t already been written in terms of its widespread acclaim and lasting cultural impact? While the supernatural drama from co-creators Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta ultimately wrapped up after three seasons, it garnered increasingly higher ratings from reviewers with each subsequent installment, with Coon’s performance earning significant praise and several critical awards alongside co-stars Justin Theroux and Christopher Eccleston. In revisiting her career, it’s only expected that we’ll circle around to the role of Nora Durst, but before we can even talk too much about The Leftovers, I have a confession to make to the actress. In preparing for our conversation, I’ve been encouraged by co-workers to ask her about the HBO series’ ambiguous ending and her interpretation of it. But in the same breath, I tell her that’s not the question I’ll be asking. Instead, I want to get her thoughts on what it means that we’re still debating the ending of shows like this one, or The Sopranos, or Lost (the finale of which drew many comparisons to The Leftovers, which is hardly surprising, given Lindelof’s involvement on both). Coon’s response is as direct and honest as any other she offers over the duration of our time together. “There probably are some very clear binaries that get exposed in things like Lost or The Leftovers, but maybe that’s just because I’m cynical. But I think that’s more interesting. I’m interested in art that’s ambiguous. I don’t like it all laid out for me. I think that’s kind of dull. It may be satisfying, and calming, and there’s a place for an unambiguous ending, certainly, but that’s not the kind of art I’m most interested in. It’s not the kind of art you continue to think about.” Just like The Leftovers, Coon reminds me, not every question was answered in the third season of Noah Hawley’s FX anthology series Fargo, where she played police chief Gloria Burgle, and perhaps that indicates a wider trend within her filmography — “maybe I’m Ambiguous Ending Lady.” But the philosophy she holds is that the viewer’s response to a particular piece of art likely reveals as much about them as it does the art itself. It’s why she says she’ll never go on the record with her own definitive answer about the ending of The Leftovers; in a suggestion that seems to stem from Coon’s theater background, and her love of being one part of a bigger ensemble, she’d much rather propose a dialogue between different, conflicting perspectives and see what results. “It’s fun to say, ‘Who believes this, and who believes this?’ in a room full of people, and then have the debate.”
The Unshakable Code Behind Some of Coon’s Best Roles

Photography by Yellowbelly for Collider

Alongside more prestigious TV dramas, movie roles were still coming in — mostly supporting parts, in films like The Post and Widows, not to mention her brief time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as the villain Proxima Midnight in 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War. I feel compelled to mention, at one point in our talk, that there was once a time in Hollywood where a “TV versus film” mentality existed, and actors who wanted to pursue one line of acting rarely had the chance to break over into the other. As someone who seems to have a foot planted firmly in both camps, I’m curious about when Coon herself noticed the distinct shift in the industry that has since led to film actors, including the likes of Harrison Ford, Gary Oldman, and Uma Thurman, taking more small-screen parts. “I feel fortunate to have come up at a time where those lines got blurry, because it was so clear that ‘TV actors could not do film.’ They just weren’t considered worthy of film on some level,” Coon says, emphasizing the mindset that seems to become more and more archaic with every passing year. There’s also no ignoring the fact that, when it comes to the silver screen, the path to A-list stardom has changed there, too. “We also had a very strong movie star culture, but it’s actually much harder to mint a movie star now. It doesn’t really work the same way. Our celebrity movie stars are getting old. We have young people coming up, but those young people have careers that are much more fluid.” She cites specific examples, running off a list of names that includes Timothée Chalamet, Florence Pugh, and Saoirse Ronan. “We do have a class of movie stars, but they’re also doing much more interesting and eclectic things. It’s not as traditional a breakdown.”

Related

“Only Somebody Who Worked on the Show Knows What ‘Survivor: Thailand’ Was Really Like”: Carrie Coon Reflects on ‘The White Lotus’ Season 3 and Whether She’d Return for More

Coon also talks about what it was like to start shooting Season 3 of ‘The Gilded Age’ two days after wrapping ‘The White Lotus.’

From Coon’s perspective, some of the industry’s biggest shifts since she began her acting career have impacted the types of roles she’s being offered — and while the big screen was increasingly “dominated by franchises and IP,” leaving little room for mid-level movies to be made, TV became the natural resting place for more interesting projects, hailing from more diverse voices. That’s not to say she hasn’t maintained a foothold in film, as projects like Jason Reitman’s contemporary Ghostbusters sequels or the intimate ensemble drama His Three Daughters can attest, but the small screen still strongly appeals to Coon for a very specific reason. “TV was really pushing storytelling, and especially for women,” she emphasizes. “In what world would you have a film like The White Lotus? We have three women” — in reference to herself and Season 3 co-stars Michelle Monaghan and Leslie Bibb — “in their 40s and 50s playing with each other. I would never work with them at my own age if it was before this time. So, I just feel lucky that the parts on TV are so compelling that film actors want to be on TV.” Every actor has their own criteria for what leads them to a project, so that answer begs my next question: at this stage in her career, what does Coon look for, specifically, when she’s considering a potential role? There’s no real pause at all before she gives me her conditions. “I would say it goes in this order: Good writing, number one, because if it’s not there, there’s nothing you can do that will fix it. Also, it’s just not as much fun to do, and it’s not as easy to memorize. Number two: character. Am I being asked to do something I haven’t been asked to do before? Is there a specific challenge inherent in this that is either stimulating or will make me better, or will it ask something of me that hasn’t been asked before? And then finally, who’s involved? Is it a Mike White, somebody I wanted to work with for a long time? Does it somehow move the needle in terms of adding to the longevity of one’s career? Or is it a project that’s attracted the level of people that it’s going to pay well? But writing is always first.”
For Coon, Period Dramas Like ‘The Gilded Age’ Are a Canvas for Reinvention

Photography by Yellowbelly for Collider

Some followers of Coon’s work may have been surprised by the announcement that she would be joining the cast of Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes’ newest television series The Gilded Age, but considering the pedigree behind the show, as well as her personal requirements for any role, maybe they shouldn’t have been. There’s also Coon’s admission that she’s inhabited all types of period roles since her theater beginnings. “It’s often the case that we get ‘pigeonholed’ in Hollywood — I put that in quotes because I hate that nomenclature for the business,” she says, while using her fingers to make the gesture, “but in the theater, I’ve played working-class characters, I’ve played in period. I’ve done all that stuff.” Alongside the desire not to be slotted into any one type of persona was the irresistible opportunity to be surrounded by her kind of people: fellow stage actors. Multiple times throughout our conversation, Coon speaks effusively about The Gilded Age’s impressive, ever-growing ensemble, many of whom are made up of Broadway’s biggest names, from Audra McDonald to Kelli O’Hara, and likens the experience of filming the series to “theater nerd camp.” At the time that Coon’s casting was first announced, others like Christine Baranski and Cynthia Nixon were already attached to the HBO drama — as was Morgan Spector, whom Coon had first worked with back in 2017 on the horror short Great Choice, a spoof of a ‘90s Red Lobster ad that later resurfaced on the internet after The Gilded Age’s first season premiered in 2022. “We’re good friends, and our partners have worked together. We’re in similar places in our lives,” Coon says, when discussing the actor who plays her onscreen husband. “So, the appeal was also just the people and the kind of people it was going to attract. It was going to be theater people. Why not?” The possibility of career security, as well, was also a draw, especially when taking into account the longevity of Fellowes’ previous period drama. “We didn’t know how long the show would go,” Coon admits. “It was one of those shows where it could have been one year, or it could have been 10. There was just no way to know. But knowing Downton Abbey, the predecessor, was the expectation, it could be work that would give for a long time.” With the series now preparing to air its third season, it’s safe to say that the work is continuing to give — but an inarguable part of The Gilded Age’s enduring appeal, both among critics and audiences, is Coon’s captivating performance. As Bertha Russell, the matriarch of a new-money family attempting to make a name for herself in 1880s New York City, she commands every room she enters, cutting a definitive figure in striking gowns that prove both a showcase of her immense wealth and the type of reputation she wants to cultivate among the oldest members of elite society. As Coon tells it, joining The Gilded Age was an opportunity to take one of her favorite aspects of theater, which she calls “a thoroughly and wildly collaborative medium,” and apply it to the behind-the-scenes process of making a TV show. “When I was going in for a costume fitting, or we were seeing what the sets were going to look like, I always learned something about the play or about the character, because these are craftspeople. They’re artists, too, and they have something to contribute to that conversation. I find that if I were to cut myself off from that input, I would be losing a wealth of information.”

They very intentionally do prepare [Bertha] for battle like she’s a general.

To step into the shoes of Bertha Russell, the costumes Coon dons for each new episode are intricate, luxurious, and certainly not for the faint of heart. Unsurprisingly, her wardrobe in the series is essential to helping her find the truth of her character. “I found that in Fargo, for example, or in The Gilded Age, once you put that stuff on, you’re 75% of the way there,” she tells me. “You understand the space you have to fill; the costumes are part of filling that space. And just standing up straight. Those are the practical considerations of the way I don’t move through the world in my regular life.” It’s a process even more impressive with the knowledge that she was pregnant with her second child while filming the first season, with the show’s costume designers pulling out “all the tricks,” as Coon describes it, in order to disguise her growing bump. “In some ways, it was hard to be pregnant only because I lost some of that structure. I couldn’t wear the corset for the whole pregnancy, and so suddenly I was kind of faking the body in a way, which was its own challenge. Then, wearing heels for 16 hours when you’re pregnant, that’s just a terrible idea,” she chuckles. “I was really in tennis shoes there at the end.” I remark on the fact that Bertha’s dresses tend to always feel like a form of armor, or the character’s protection against the outside world, and Coon acknowledges that that same language was often “thrown around in fittings” with the series’ costume designer. “In Season 2, Kasia [Walicka Maimone] was using a lot of buildings, a lot of steel, a lot of metal, and she would call them things like, ‘This is the Chrysler Building dress.’ They very intentionally do prepare [Bertha] for battle like she’s a general.” This season, the inspiration for her character’s wardrobe fell more within the realm of sea creatures, but there are also moments when Bertha is more stripped down, less confined — and in those moments, the truth of who she is underneath begins to emerge, but all of it begins in the design process, long before there’s even ever a fitting. “It’s a glorious process to behold,” Coon adds. “If it’s a scene where you might want a little bit more exposure because it’s vulnerable, or where she’s feeling attacked, or where she needs to be protected, those conversations are absolutely happening in the room when we’re designing.” Alongside Coon’s performance, another major aspect of The Gilded Age that has had viewers clamoring for more week after week is the power-couple dynamic between Bertha and her husband George Russell, played by Spector. It’s not difficult to understand why; the two have terrific chemistry rooted in the foundation of their real-life friendship, and their characters are each powerful individuals who have to do battle in their own respective arenas. George, an American businessman who has made his fortune in various investments, is constantly thinking about how best to grow the family’s wealth, while Bertha does her dealings in ballrooms and opera boxes and keenly understands how societal perception can be its own form of leverage. The husband-and-wife duo have certainly weathered their ups and downs — including drama the likes of which include Bertha’s own maid attempting and failing to seduce George in Season 1, or George subtly funneling money to support Bertha’s championing of the Met in Season 2 — but one moment that endeared fans to their relationship doubled as both a reminder of the Russells’ fortune and their deep-rooted commitment to each other. When I reference the scene where George buys up everything at Bertha’s charity bazaar as a response to a society snub, shutting down the event in the process, Coon laughs. “That’s our foreplay.” She even stands up so that I can get a better look at the shirt she just so happens to be wearing — the same “Railroad Daddy” tee that she once wore to a virtual panel discussion for the series. (And yes, before you even have to ask, Spector does have his own Bertha version.) Season 3, however, marks a significant turn for the Russells’ marriage, in which the two are arguably at greater odds than they ever have been before. When Bertha effectively promises their daughter Gladys’ (Taissa Farmiga) hand in marriage to the Duke of Buckingham (Ben Lamb), it’s a move the likes of which George, as someone who only has their daughter’s true happiness in mind, can’t fully support, especially since Gladys is also entertaining the affections of the much less successful Billy Carlton (Matt Walker). As the story progresses, it’s clear that this isn’t the type of argument that can be smoothed over by the end of an episode, and while it might be tough for viewers to see a fan-favorite couple experiencing so much strife, Coon admits it was just as hard for the actors to go there after two seasons of Bertha and George largely supporting each other through any bumps in the road. “We really struggled a little bit with that. Morgan and I so appreciated the marriage that George and Bertha have, so to have that marriage be on the rocks the whole season was challenging for us — because we so love the scenes where we get to connect,” Coon tells me. “So much of what we’re doing is ambitious and cutthroat, and those were the moments where we got to be humans. So, to take that away, it was hard for us; we missed it terribly.” Yet, as the person who has been inhabiting Bertha from the beginning, she’s also uniquely positioned to understand the character’s motivations and perspective — a testament to that psychology minor paying off in an unexpected way. “The female purview was very limited,” Coon says, when elaborating further on why Bertha is so single-mindedly driven to make a match between Gladys and the Duke this season. “Bertha knows the frustration of living your life and not being able to have any influence or impact, and it’s important to her. As the world changes, she wants her daughter to be able to be a leader. I find it incredibly loving and generous. It’s just that she doesn’t see the daughter that she has. She sees the projection of the daughter she wants. She sees the projection of herself and what she would have wanted for herself. She speaks often about what she was not afforded and what she deserves. Bertha has the smarts and the energy and the ambition to do all these things in the boardroom, and she’s not allowed in there. She really wants her daughter to live a meaningful life, ultimately.”
Coon Explains Why We’re Still Rooting for the Rich — Even When We Shouldn’t Be

Since our conversation has turned to ambition and aspirations, it seems like the perfect time to bring up the curious conundrum that Coon’s character poses for viewers. While The Gilded Age introduces the Russells as a new-money family initially on the outside looking in, there’s also a sense that we’re meant to cheer them on, these movers and shakers who should be able to upend the archaic systems of New York high society and introduce bold new reforms. But there’s also the undeniable truth of the show’s preoccupation with an incredibly wealthy group of individuals, where money and status are considered the ultimate goal. Coon is all too aware of the uncomfortable parallels that exist between our current real-world circumstances and Fellowes’ latest period drama. “We have incredible economic stratification, and in the midst of that, you have people rooting for Elon Musk,” she points out. “You have people championing these billionaires, hoping that these changes that are going to happen are going to benefit them, but they’re not. There are people who will be stepped on in service of rich people getting richer, and yet, people are voting to put these people in charge of their future. We’ve been doing it forever. We’ve been rooting for Bertha and George forever, and we haven’t learned our lessons yet.” Indeed, some historians and economists have alluded to the fact that we may very well be living in a Second Gilded Age; Coon even asserts that the foundation for contemporary society was laid during the time in which her show is set, but simultaneously acknowledges that, from a purely creative angle, the Russells are positioned as the characters who drive the story forward, making it compelling but also creating a complicated dilemma for the viewer. “The parallels between then and now are terrifying, and yet we still covet the things that the billionaires have. On some level, even though everything in reality contradicts the possibility that the American Dream is alive and well, we still believe in it. There is still an undercurrent of idealism that lets us believe we could be George and Bertha, and that is just foundational to the American character. I think that’s part of why people are fascinated to watch the show, and why we root for them.”

We’ve been rooting for Bertha and George forever, and we haven’t learned our lessons yet.

Given their respective active online presences, both Coon and Spector are clued into the fact that fans are celebrating the Russells, both individually and as a united pair — when I spoke with Spector during Season 2, he admitted that he and Coon were “​the kind of sick freaks that like to read the comments,” and have a general awareness of the types of articles that are being written about their onscreen partnership. They’re also both regular contributors on social media; in addition to her Instagram, Coon maintains an account on X, which she steadily posts to and occasionally even interacts with other users — some of whom are more combative with her than others. But she also reminisces with me about the old days, when the site formerly known as Twitter was rooted in being able to have valuable conversations about what was happening not just across the country, but around the world. Now, Coon says, posting through it is not an adequate substitute for creating real, lasting change. “What we are starting to understand is just how spending our time on social media, political or otherwise, gives us the illusion of having some impact in the world that we do not have. The direct result is that these actual movements that are these social movements, or their abolition movements, anti-genocide, whatever it is that we’re trafficking in right now, they don’t have any boots on the ground because everybody feels that they have this megaphone, that they’ve done their work for the day, and now they can eat chips in bed, and no one’s actually showing up to do the really hard work,” Coon asserts. “That’s been true for a decade. That’s not new. There’s less and less involvement on the ground. I’m aware of my own complicity in a system whereby you think you have some influence, when in fact it’s not really meaningful.” It’s emphasized with a degree of forthrightness that you wouldn’t necessarily anticipate from any actor these days — several weeks after our sitdown, The View’s Joy Behar expresses surprise at Coon’s readiness to voice her own political hot takes in our current cultural climate. Her response is perfectly succinct, and even more expected once you’ve had any opportunity to speak to her at length: “Well, I’m a mom first.” Now, Coon tells me, she doesn’t use X nearly as much as she once did, especially since the Musk-owned social media site’s algorithm has become, as she puts it, “a morass,” but she still sees the value in amplifying the causes she’s most passionate about, like climate change, to her nearly-90 thousand followers. She doesn’t spend a lot of time on Instagram, apart from “mom stuff” or looking up exercise routines, “when I need a quick and dirty hotel workout.” Having two kids under the age of 10, she adds, serves as even more of a reminder to put her phone down and engage with the world around her, rather than losing hours through doomscrolling. “I don’t think it’s meaningful or helpful, and I think it’s the reason why the world is literally on fire.”
The Reluctant Queen of HBO Would Like a Word — and a #MovieNight Recommendation

Image via HBO

Among Coon’s semi-consistent posts on X and Bluesky are the ones that include the hashtag #MovieNight, which act as a shorthand diary to document the films she and her husband digest together. Thinking of my own firsthand experience with the ongoing debate about which spouse gets to pick the movie that both parties watch, I have to ask whether she and Letts have established a system for their #MovieNight viewings. “The system is this,” Coon prefaces, and I’m hanging on every word, making my own mental notes for future reference. “After the children go to bed, and we finish cleaning the kitchen, we go down in the basement, and Tracy puts on a movie. I have no idea what it’s going to be, and I don’t ask. I don’t question it. I just watch it. And it is glorious, because it’s one decision in the day that I don’t have to make.” While some might notice that their movie nights have dropped off recently, there’s a good reason for that — now that the season of Emmys voting is upon us, the couple has devoted their screen time to catching up on eligible TV shows. “Usually we’re watching Severance, The Pitt… We’re watching all the things right now, and he’s totally responsible for how we’re going to get through all these shows in time for our voting.” Letts, himself a devoted collector of over 10,000 Blu-rays, is someone Coon has repeatedly dubbed the “King of Hard Media,” as well as an attentive, considerate curator of their running watchlist, which has recently included the likes of Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi’s 2014 vampire mockumentary What We Do in the Shadows as well as Andrzej Munk’s 1963 Polish war drama Passenger. The latter is explained through the context that Coon is currently preparing for her next role in Guy Nattiv’s new thriller Harmonia by listening to interviews with Holocaust survivors — she also tends to watch older films, at Letts’ personal recommendation, when a new project comes along. “He’s very intentional about the curation of the list. ‘We haven’t seen a lot of international films lately, we need some female filmmakers, we need to find a great part that’s going to inspire you for what’s coming.’ He’s very thoughtful, to the point of almost paralysis. It’s very endearing.” Much like her and Letts’ intentional consumption of both film and television, it seems as though Coon doesn’t plan on ever firmly planting her flag in one medium over the other. Yet when the trailer for The Gilded Age Season 3 came out, at least one headline proclaimed that the “queen of HBO” was back. Funnily enough, it was a moniker that positioned her alongside the likes of her White Lotus co-star Walton Goggins, who became a trending presence last month thanks to Season 3 airing back-to-back on Sunday nights alongside the final installment of Danny McBride’s irreverent religious comedy The Righteous Gemstones. For Coon, the notion that she’s come to be regarded along similar lines, with a definitive link to just one platform, is met with a mixed reaction, but it all goes back to the undercurrent of work that will continue to give, as she so astutely put it. “As an actor, the fear is: would anyone else hire me? If HBO stops hiring me, would that be the end of my career? I don’t know! You don’t want to find out. Really, it’s just about who’s going to give you a job. I’m very grateful.” As she puts it, HBO has earned its reputation through developing quality premium television — it helps, of course, that she played a role in shaping said reputation through her breakout screen performance, but she also namedrops The White Lotus’ predecessor as another piece of the foundation. “Enlightened? I don’t know who else would have made that show.” That doesn’t mean that Coon’s not willing to expand her horizons to other streamers and networks, if the right part comes her way: “I’ll certainly entertain all offers, though.” I realize, by this point, that I’ve kept her talking for much longer than I planned to, but when I mention it, Coon waves me off with a reassuring expression, promising me that the only thing on her immediate agenda is to make dinner for her kids. We spend a little more time discussing more spoiler-filled moments from The Gilded Age Season 3 that have to be held back from print — including one particularly emotional Russell family scene, from the finale, that even she hasn’t had the opportunity to watch yet but only has very faint memories of, since episodes are rarely shot in sequential order. The constant refrain that carries through our lingering discussion about the show is what a refuge it’s proven to be for viewers, especially as the real world only becomes more and more charged. Coon admires that Fellowes, as a writer, isn’t afraid to wrap storylines up more neatly than reality would indicate. “I think it’s great. A problem gets created, and 15 minutes later, it gets solved. How satisfying in a world where that’s just not true. It’s really nice to have your art deliver that kind of problem-solving. I’m happy to be part of that in the world right now.” It’d be a mistake, however, to assume that Coon is simply going to coast on The Gilded Age’s reputation as a lavish escape in place of actually doing that boots-on-the-ground work she mentioned. Less than a month after our conversation, amid doing press for Season 3, she joined the #NoKingsDay rallies that were organized across the country in protest of President Trump’s taxpayer-funded military parade. Thinking back on the sign-off she’d ultimately left me with, it now comes as no surprise whatsoever that Coon will always make good on using her voice to keep speaking out about the issues that really matter. “See you on X,” she’d said, before quickly amending to: “See you at a community meeting where we can actually do something.” The Gilded Age Season 3 premieres June 22 on HBO and HBO Max. Photography: Yellowbelly | Hair: Peter Butler | Makeup: Rebecca Restrepo | Styling: Alicia Lombardini | Location: New York