Summary

Welcome to a new episode of Collider Ladies Night with The Monkey star Tatiana Maslany.

During her Ladies Night conversation with Collider’s Perri Nemiroff, Maslany looks back on her experience winning acting awards, and discusses how she feels about those types of honors now.

She also goes into detail on her collaboration with Osgood Perkins on The Monkey, and their upcoming film, Keeper.

One of the greatest treats of Collider Ladies Night is getting to welcome a longtime favorite to show. That happened this time around with Tatiana Maslany, who currently has The Monkey playing in theaters nationwide. One of my earliest experiences doing week-to-week series coverage was Orphan Black. Not only did I absolutely adore the show and frequently marvel at Maslany’s work in it, but given my investment, it heavily defined some of the earlier years of my career, paving the way to consistent work, work that I was excited to do and quite proud of. While I have crossed paths with Maslany a number of times since for short-form conversations, I was itching to get the opportunity to sit down for a longer chat, and now, thanks to a downright wild Stephen King adaptation from Osgood Perkins, that time has finally come.
Maslany plays Lois in The Monkey, mother to twins Hal and Bill, both played brilliantly by Christian Convery. Lois’ husband (Adam Scott) thought a drum-playing monkey would be a great gift to bring home to his boys – until he discovers its tendency to kill victims in especially outrageous and horrific ways. He disappears, leaving Lois a single mother. The trio forge forward well enough until Hal and Bill unearth their father’s monkey.
With The Monkey currently in theaters, Maslany joined me for a Ladies Night chat to discuss her experience working with Perkins on not one, but two feature films – The Monkey and also Keeper, which was filmed before The Monkey and is due in theaters via Neon later this year. She also took the time to highlight another exciting upcoming project, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, looked back on her experience joining the MCU via She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, and discussed what it was like winning a breakout performance award for Grown Up Movie Star as well as an Emmy for Orphan Black.
The Reality of Winning Awards as an Actor

“There’s just so much more interesting stuff happening in the collaboration that isn’t about singling out one person.”

Maslany earned a dream accolade for a young actor in the early years of her career in film and television. She won a breakout performance award at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival for her work in Grown Up Movie Star. While it’s wonderful to see an artist recognized for extraordinary work, oftentimes, those awards also come with great pressure to make the most of such recognition. Maslany explained:

“I think that’s the big thing is that there’s a lot of people who are telling you you have to capitalize on it. You have to get with a big agency. What is it? “You’re not on fire, you’ve got heat,” or whatever. [Laughs] It’s this weird, industry-created sort of thing. Momentum. I don’t really buy it because when you’re inside of it, you’re still auditioning, you’re still the same artist that you always were, you’re still just figuring it out. Just because the industry now gives you a different market value doesn’t necessarily equate always with how you feel about your own work.”

On the one hand, Maslany was thrilled to see a performance and film she was proud of recognized, but on the other, the award actually took attention away from the work itself by raising questions about her journey in the business. She continued:

“I think what was so amazing about that was that I really loved that movie. I was so grateful to get to do that movie. I felt like, in the making of it, I was really challenged, and then to have it recognized was so beautiful. But then afterwards, there’s all this noise on top of it that sort of takes away from, I don’t know, it becomes about something different. And then you feel like, ‘Did I capitalize on it? Did I do enough with it? Blah blah, blah.’ And I just remember, there have been a lot of moments where those things have happened and then I haven’t worked for a while, or I’ve lost jobs or jobs have gotten canceled, or whatever. I think a lot of actors look to those things, and they definitely do get you in rooms, but the thing that the strike really drove home for me is we’re all in the same fight. We all struggle with the next level of things or working with the people that we want to work with or doing the kinds of projects we want to [do]. It doesn’t matter what level you are, there is another echelon.”

Image via BBC America

A few years after her Sundance win, Maslany would get a taste of the awards circuit in one of the biggest possible ways. In 2015, Maslany received her first Emmy nomination for her work in Orphan Black, a staggeringly impressive performance playing multiple characters – clones. In fact, her work in the series was so magnificent, she’d go on to be nominated two more times and actually win the award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series one of those years.
I’m a big believer Maslany’s work in Orphan Black is one of the greatest performances of all time. That being said, I was thrilled to see her honored at the 2016 Emmys. However, given it takes a village to make any series or film, it was no surprise that, during our Ladies Night chat, Maslany stressed that that award was for a performance crafted by a team of artists.

“It definitely gave me a little bit of confidence, but it also feels discordant because I’m like, ‘Well, there’s so many factors that go into making a performance.’ On Orphan Black, there’s the hair and makeup team, the costumes team where we’re building these characters and we’re differentiating these characters. There’s all of the writers room that is fine tuning the voices of those characters so when I see them on the page, they resonate as that character. There’s my amazing double on Orphan Black, Kathryn Alexandre, who is doing all of the work and never gets seen and never gets any credit, and there’s the editors who cut it together and make it coherent because, my god, we’ve seen movies where it doesn’t work. There’s so many elements that that comes down to.”

Another aspect of the awards race that doesn’t sit quite right with Maslany? The competition of it all.

“What was so beautiful about the strike is that there was so much solidarity and you felt like, ‘Oh, we’re not in competition with each other.’ And I think what things like awards do is they put you in competition with your peers, and they make you all hungry for this thing that you’re elusively trying to get. It’s such bullshit and it has nothing to do with what we do. It’s a whole other realm.”

Maslany added, “There’s just so much more interesting stuff happening in the collaboration that isn’t about singling out one person.”
Tatiana Maslany Adores Making ‘Star Trek,’ and Watching ‘Star Trek’

“It’s the best. It’s the best.”

Speaking of films and series never being about a single person, but rather, the collaboration, Maslany is currently busy working with a number of dreamy filmmaking families, one of which is tied to one of the biggest franchises of all-time, Star Trek.
My Old Ass marked Kerrice Brooks’ first role in a feature film. Soon after seeing the film and meeting Brooks in person, I had maximum confidence she’d go on to soar in film and television. Sure enough, soon after My Old Ass premiered at Sundance 2024, Brooks scored a role in the new Star Trek series, Starfleet Academy, a show she stars in opposite Maslany.

“Oh my god, I love Kerrice! Kerrice is unbelievable. The whole cast, the whole set is people, not like Kerrice — Kerrice is obviously very unique; no one’s like Kerrice — but everyone is such a great character. There’s so much heart in the show. I had such a blast working on it. Holly Hunter is my hero. I couldn’t believe I got to work with her. Broadcast News is, again, one of those performances that is just beyond. Paul Giamatti is a total delight.”

Not only did Starfleet Academy afford Maslany the opportunity to work with a top-tier ensemble, but it also opened her up to Star Trek like never before. Now, in addition to being part of the franchise, Maslany is also a massive fan. She explained:

“It’s opened up the Star Trek Universe to me. I knew The Original Series, I’d seen some of the movies. My husband’s a big Trekkie, and so he and I watched Wrath of Khan and stuff like that during COVID, but now I’m going back and I’m watching Deep Space Nine. My husband refers to it as my stories because I’ll be, like, sitting in the tub with my laptop, just like, ‘Oh! Oh no!’ And laughing. He’s like, it’s like my soaps. I love it so much. And it has something to say! It’s not a 1-to-1 about anything, but it talks about things in a way that you can feel this catharsis of watching shows that have a moral compass while also being like, ‘That guy’s a shapeshifter who literally becomes a liquid form and goes into a bucket every 16 hours, and he’s my dream man, and I love him so much.’ It’s the best. It’s the best.”

Osgood Perkins Sets Are Alive

“The ideas aren’t bad or good. They’re just ideas.”

7:42

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“Making Work with People Who Are Kind and Freaky is Possible”: Tatiana Maslany Is Proud to Be One of Oz Perkins’ “Unique Weirdos”

Collider’s Perri Nemiroff chats with Tatiana Maslany for The Monkey.

In addition to Star Trek, Maslany is now a key member of the Osgood Perkins filmmaking family. It all began with Keeper, the movie they made before filming The Monkey, which is also being distributed by Neon and is set for an October 3 release. While making Keeper, it didn’t take long for Maslany to recognize she was surrounded by artists that she “jammed” with.

“I remember in the costume fitting working with Mica Kayde, who is a genius. She and I were finding the character, and that felt really like, ‘Oh yeah, this is so fruitful and so energizing.’ But then, also, on set, I remember there was one scene that we were about to shoot and we were blocking it, and I sat in the corner kind of like this. The scene, by all accounts, should have been us walking around, but Oz was like, ‘Great. Stay right there.’ And then we tried the scene from this bizarre blocking that wasn’t what was written, and that’s what it ended up being, and I was like, ‘He’s so here. We’re so here in this. This is the moment. We’re making the movie right now. We didn’t make the movie two months ago in our brains. It’s alive right here.’ And it meant that there was no pushing. My body wanted to do this thing, and he was like, ‘That’s exactly right.’ You know what I mean? I don’t know why that is revelatory, but it really is when the present moment is the thing that we’re capturing.”

Having that experience of discovering on-the-spot and feeling encouraged to explore extended to the set of The Monkey. Maslany continued:

“[Oz] always urged me forward to keep exploring that way. It’s hard to pin down what it is when you’re working with somebody who you jam with, but I think it’s just that the ideas aren’t bad or good. They’re just ideas, so there’s no, ‘Oh, I got it wrong,’ or, ‘Oh, I got it right.’ It’s just like, ‘We found something together.’”

Image via Neon

One particular thing that helped Maslany find Lois in The Monkey? Recognizing that we’re seeing her not only through Hal and Bill’s eyes, but also through Perkins’ eyes, given the character of Lois is quite personal to him. In fact, of Maslany, Perkins said, “To have someone who is playing my mom — or at least what I feel about my mom — it seemed like getting truly one of the best actors I’ve ever beheld.” After mentioning that quote to Maslany, she said:

“I was scared of that weight, but also he’s written her so clearly on the page, and doing any research of my own, just in terms of collecting little ideas, there was never, ‘Get it right and do it like this because she’s written so specifically.’ I don’t really know what to say about that, except that it’s an honor to get to play that part, and also, the honor wasn’t the thing. She’s so funny and she’s so odd and off and also direct with her kids. There’s so many other things to play. But the idea of her being a mother that we’re looking at through the kids’ eyes was a helpful in. So whether it’s looking at her through Oz’s eyes, but also looking at her through Hal and Bill’s eyes, who was she to them? What did she mean to them? Why is her loss so devastating? What lessons has she given them?”

Tatiana Maslany Explains What It Took to Pull Off THAT Crushing Scene in ‘The Monkey’

“There’s no un-amped death in this movie.”

Image via Neon

[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers for The Monkey.]I love horror movies, and I love horror movie magic, but an epic display of genre death, destruction and mayhem can only mean so much without a powerful and thoughtful performance behind it. Maslany brings that to Lois’ death scene in The Monkey in spades. Lois’ sudden aneurysm is a rock solid big screen scare, but it’s also an especially shattering scene of the film because of the depth of Maslany’s work.

“I feel like it’s a moment of deep vulnerability for her. She’s pretty matter of fact and pretty in control of her other thoughts, feelings, etc. Annoyed by dates, you know what I mean? She’s just sort of above it, and that’s where she’s leveled completely. There’s another moment that’s maybe a flashback, maybe more just what Bill is imagining where she actually says goodbye, and that moment, I think, Oz was also like, ‘She knows she’s never gonna see him grow up.’ So it’s, again, giving me a little gift of imbuing it with something else.”

Maslany also took a moment to walk me through the practical effects required to pull off such a scene:

“The death scene was very exciting. We had multiple costume changes just in case we needed to do it again, because I did get absolutely soaked, but it was practical. There was a tube up my back, tubes coming out here in my sweet little hairdo. The timing of shooting that off with the pop of the piping. But the timing of that kind of stuff, it’s like when you’re working with any kind of effect or stunt, the feeling I get is, ‘Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!’ It’s very exciting. It’s very nerve-wracking. You want to get it right. You want it to all go off correctly but also want to look surprised by it, so everyone gets hyper present. And the effects scene was so great. And then I think there was some digital effects that came in after to amp it up because there’s no un-amped death in this movie.”

Looking for even more from Maslany on the making of The Monkey, Keeper, Orphan Black, and so much more? Be sure to check out our full conversation in the video at the top of this article, or you can listen to the interview in podcast form below:

The Monkey

Release Date

February 19, 2025

Runtime

98 Minutes

Writers

Osgood Perkins

Producers

John Rickard, Natalia Safran, Ali Jazayeri, Chris Ferguson, Fred Berger, Giuliana Bertuzzi, James Wan, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, John Friedberg, Jason Cloth, David Gendron, Michael Clear, Jesse Savath, Peter Luo, Dave Caplan

The Monkey is in theaters now.
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