Kate O'Flynn Waited to Shoot Her Shot — And It Brought Her to Widow's Bay

0:04Everyone is talking about Widow's Bay on Apple TV. It was just nominated for a slew of Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Comedy Series and Lead Actor for the Always Fantastic Matthew Rhys. Matthew plays the mayor of a cursed, seafaring New England town with more than its fair share of demons. Widow's Bay also stars so many other legendary actors like Stephen Root, Kate O 'Flynn, Jeff Hiller, Betty Gilpin, and Hamish Linklater. The series was created by Katie Dippold from Parks and Rec. People are calling this horror comedy one of the best and most original shows of the year. It's the perfect mix of creepy mystery and dark humor, and it's so incredibly addictive.

0:50To watch episodes of Widow's Bay, go to fyc.appletv.com.

1:01Anyway, the first day I started work, he said, how are you feeling? I said, Mike, I'm nervous. And he just looked at me with a twinkle in his eye. I said, well, you know what you've got to do? Get over it. I was right. You've got to get over it. Hi, everyone. I'm Katie Rich. Welcome to this special Saturday edition of the Prestige Junkie podcast. Today, I am so excited to be sharing my conversation with the breakout star of the breakout TV show of the year, Widow's Bay. Yes, I'm talking to Patricia herself, Kate Oakland, about how she fit into the really weird and wonderful world of this show and how she built Patricia into being one of the most interesting characters I've seen on TV possibly ever.

1:44We also talked about her career leading up to this point. She's been working in British theater and television for quite a while. She had her big breakthrough film role with Mike Lee, none other than Mike Lee back in the late 2000s. But it really took her this long until Widow's Bay to come and work in America. And she talked about why it took that long, why she feels like such a discovery for American audiences at this point, but also why all those years of training in theater and television got her to the point where she could fit right into Widow's Bay. I really loved talking to her. We also got a little bit of a tease of her upcoming movie she has with Mike Lee, Tender Loving Care, coming out this fall.

2:22Very excited about that one as well. Hear all of that and more in my conversation with the Emmy-nominated star of Widow's Bay, Kate O 'Flynn.

2:33So looking back on your stories about the Widow's Bay audition process and going into this, and I think you'd said you hadn't been in the U.S. since you were like 14 before coming on the set of this show. Was that right? Yeah, I think the last time was, well, I'd been three times, but two of them don't count because it's Disneyland. So I feel like that's not, I'm not really seeing. But my town did do an exchange with a town called Wood. My town was Bury and we did an exchange with Woodbury and I stayed with a member of the choir, school choir there. So I had a little, but apart from that, no. Is that Woodbury, what, Connecticut, Massachusetts?

3:06Woodbury, Philadelphia, near Philadelphia. Oh, okay. Okay. Oh yeah. So that, that counts for something. Kind of, not really. That you've, so often we get, you know, actors from the UK will, you know, work in TV in the UK and then come over here. And I was just curious if you just had been busy enough in the UK, wanted to stay home, hadn't really been trying to do it. Like, why was this the point where you said, OK, I'm going to go out for a show that's in the U.S. and make the sleep? Well, firstly, I think there's so many amazing series and films that get made in America and it's just a much bigger industry.

3:39But like I didn't want to shoot my shot when I didn't have any. I was a theater actress. You know, I've done that for about 20 years. So actually having something that represented me, the sort of stuff I can do on screen took me a while to get together. And so it was then it was more recently that I thought, OK, I've got stuff together. I've got a great manager. And then, yeah, he sent the first thing he sent through was Widow's Bay. So it was always kind of a dream. But, you know, I just I don't have the personality where you can kind of some people can go out there on nothing. And I felt like I needed something in my back pocket to show a manager.

4:18So it took me that long. Yeah. Well, I know that happy go lucky was really one of your first screen roles you had, period. And I wonder if that if that was a breakthrough moment for you then or if you were kind of so new that you didn't even occur to you to, you know, to take the sleep that you're doing now. I was so new. you know that was basically my first job out of drama school and I was pretty naive and I was kind of sort of naively confident thinking well I know everyone says it's difficult but um maybe I'm just going to work with auteurs so that was my that was and that wasn't the case you know I did a lot of damping like but um you know as a 21 year old I was like yeah you know I'm working Mike Lee and yeah, let's see what else, you know?

4:59Um, so no, it was, but also I had that attitude, but I wonder if that's my, you know, like, I think everyone just felt really grateful to get a job in my like year of drama school. So, and I got a great job and I had ambition, but I don't know if I quite voiced that ambition to myself even at that point. Yeah. And knowing that, how, how long did it take you to realize that working with auteurs was not a, uh, not a sustainable, even that you do get to continue to work with Mike Lee, which is we're all very excited about, you know, other jobs too. Um, well, you know, pretty soon that, that sort of pretty soon after that it was like, Oh, okay, no, this is, this is how it is for, you know, jobbing actors.

5:39And I did really stuff. I was really proud of mainly in the theater was where I got my opportunities to kind of, uh, do complex stuff and, you know, learn and expand my range and all of that jazz, you know? Yeah. I was looking back at, you know, you've done so much stuff in theater and I want you to tell me if you agree with this or not, just playing Laura in The Glass Menagerie and thinking about that road toward Patricia. There just seems to be, to me, like they would get along or they would have something in common there. And knowing that in theater, you kind of dig into these characters and you figure them out and Laura being kind of a really famous one in theater.

6:15But is that process, does that take you into auditioning for something like Patricia and figuring out a character is it is it that similar process even when it's someone you're inventing it's you know brand new well I guess I don't know if it was conscious going into Patricia but there was there's something about the tiara and the dress you know and her party that's kind of reminded me of of the Laura in in the production I was in um just the sort of slight fragility in the look of her of that party dress I mean Patricia's more practical and they both have really strong interior lives but Patricia's more out more trying you know she's trying she's outwards she's like always putting her energy out with trying to do something for the community and trying to connect in a way that I feel like Laura kind of has a really strong interior life but sort of exists in another in another realm really but there are yeah You know, there are similarities.

7:13Yeah, I love the talking about the fragility of Patricia because that contrast is exactly what it is. It's like she's in the office, she's in charge of everything. She's kind of bossing Tom around in some ways, but that delicacy is just so right there. Was that so present for you from the start of the audition or kind of seeing this character of seeing both sides of her in that way and bringing that out? Yeah, I think when I read episode four, which was before I met, um, Hero and Katie on Zoom, it, the, I remember my touchstone, my, my thing that came into my head was that film eighth grade, you know, the Bo Burnham film.

7:49And not, not like the performances are amazing. It was the feeling of it, you know, that the feeling it's like there's no skin on, you know, it's like there's a layer removed. And it was that that I thought was right for and sort of wanted to go there with the mean girl, you know, the middle aged mean girls. That just felt like she's stuck in that feeling. She's never been able to escape. So that was like a real core thing that I that that was there from the off for me. And then, you know, mixing that with the with the comedy as well was like an exciting combination, I thought. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and the way Katie has talked about her inspirations from the show, she talks about a haunted house that she went to as a kid.

8:34And I'm guessing that came up with you guys as well. There's like a, there's a childhood feeling to the entire thing of like fear and comedy being part of the same thing. And it's, it's part of these characters as well. I wonder if that, if that felt important to you that it was coming from Katie from kind of a place of being younger. And if that kind of, if that affected the way that she wrote Patricia or the way that you played her, that there's like a, there's a child impulse in all of these guys. Does that make sense? yeah totally and it's funny because it was never taught never talked about but somehow understood and I I think part of it like I I think part of it is because Katie was talked about following a feeling and I think my background in theatre is is uh doing a lot of new plays and where the philosophy is it's for the writer to find their voice and you as an actor are kind of serving that And I wonder if just subconsciously, that's kind of what I was thinking with Katie or just sort of like she was following a feeling.

9:33And then I was kind of following that feeling without talking about it. And that is you do have to get in touch with a kind of to be able to do anything creative. You do kind of have to feel like you're in a playground, to be honest, as an actor. You have to feel like you're a child to get the to get to not be self-conscious. mm-hmm well I've heard you talk about kind of the you know Katie and Jeff Hiller and various other people who come from this improv background and I think you talked about it in a similar way that um Hiro Moriah did when I talked to him a little while ago of like that is not my world they are doing things that I cannot keep up with like I have to figure out how to like stand back while they come up with all these jokes like how do you figure that out because it is people with that talent kind of blow blow your mind it blew it blew my head off it was like um I remember first stepping on set and just what really struck me was the quickness of everyone's thoughts it was just like you know and it was trying to keep up with that like trying to be able to take the notes and also take you know be able to act with these like titans um with the accent and and trying to to to keep up you know jeff hillary is like a killer improv he can just he just is amazing at the end of scenes he would come up with something that was just so perfect and um it was the main the main um challenge was not to break you know not not to laugh which I failed most of the time with him but because he's so good but um yeah it was I found it very energizing I really like being in the company of these improvers writers I just I'm sort of in awe and I like just sort of being in the room and kind of like you know keep keeping keeping up in a way when you're able to do improv yourself I think I can't remember what it is you said like things that you improvise are kind of brought in that change from that so like did you you catch up after a while and you figure out how to to play your part in that well I don't know if it's like I'm not coming up with funny one-liners it's more like the dance moves of you know like improvising behavior of Patricia or like characterful things where I'm not feeling like I'm coming up with a it's like you've you've got to find me in my natural habitat or whatever it's like I I've sort of like don't know I'm doing it when I'm doing it can't make sense well you've talked about the the physical parts of it like the dance moves are part of it the um you know the running away but I was also thinking about like one of the funniest parts of the show is that when he's meeting with the um the ghost and Patricia comes back and get her back and gets her handbag because I and it's like scary and funny at the same time and there's a physicality to that too do you remember how you like how you figured out the physicality of that scene?

12:07I think it was led by Hamish because that was the first scene we did with Hamish and he came in as a 200 year old zombie like he didn't speak and he was very much in so we we sort of weren't acting we were like we had that feeling just like oh god how do we navigate this and then throughout the day you know as he like did this finish the scene you know he sort of opened up and we got and he's like hilarious and it was like a really boss move of an actor to just come in and be like I've got to commit to this 200 year old guy that's been in the coffin and I'm just gonna do it and then it really helped our acting yeah so I think Hamish sort of set the tone with that one he kind of like scared you on a deep level that that comes out with things like that yeah I was I was just intrigued and you know sort of excited it's always exciting when you see how someone approaches like a role like that you go wow that's a really that's a confident actor who absolutely delivers and you know as kind of doing it with a twinkle in their eye you discover after i guess you never got to see the sea hag i'm thinking of the other big creatures on the show and the sea hag being another big one but i don't think patricia ever meets the sea hag do you patricia doesn't meet the sea hag but i definitely went past um the sea hacks, like the stunt double.

13:26There were like two sea hacks in the makeup just to admire the like the manicure just to get some, I don't know, some recommendations for a manicure race.

13:46Everyone is talking about Widow's Bay on Apple TV. It was just nominated for a slew of Emmy awards, including outstanding comedy series and lead actor for the always fantastic Matthew Reese. Matthew plays the mayor of a cursed seafaring New England town with more than its fair share of demons. Widows Bay also stars so many other legendary actors like Stephen Root, Kate O 'Flynn, Jeff Hiller, Betty Gilpin, and Hamish Linklater. The series was created by and Katie Dippold from Parks and Rec. People are calling this horror comedy one of the best and most original shows of the year. It's the perfect mix of creepy mystery and dark humor, and it's so incredibly addictive.

14:32To watch episodes of Widow's Bay, go to fyc.appletv.com.

14:49Well, I feel like seeing the sea hag or seeing a Hamish in that costume is maybe a moment where you get on the set and you say, oh, we're really going for this. And the tone of Widow's Bay, this is what everyone talks about. And I have interviewed Katie and Hero both and kind of tried to ask them how they pulled it off. And it's such a hard thing to define. But I wonder if there was a moment for you where you said like, oh, this thing that I thought we were making, it's actually working here. Here is the world that this is. If it all clicked into place at a certain point. You know, honestly, I was excited from the read through.

15:17I was excited from the script to me that script made sense I never sort of questioned the tone so much and then at the read-through it was it was Dale and Stephen and Kevin myself Matthew and Kingston and Tim I think was zooming you know who plays the killer clown and it just had a kind of alchemy and I thought oh okay I was excited because everyone was just we just I think because it felt very ensemble and like shared that we were discovering it together and just thought it was going to work. But, you know, maybe that's beginner's confidence. Is that just a power of a good script that everyone can kind of show up knowing what they're making that Katie wrote it in a way that you all understood it without really having to see it play out?

16:02Well, I can only speak for myself because I don't know if anyone else saw it like that. I think it's a good script and it's also having great creatives around the script and like great collaborators like Hero like you know they have he has a taste a certain taste like you you can kind of you understand from his previous work and um so there is a kind of understanding of of a world there already but um yeah I think it's it you know you can have a great script and it all go wrong it's the truth so I think it was the combination everybody yeah yeah yeah well I mean in theater you you get to do so many different things you can try a bunch of different things but comedy I mean improv comedy is one thing but what was your comedy background or your interest in comedy and how did you kind of grow into it and you know did you kind of have to grow to the point where jumping into widow's bay was something possible for you how did how does comedy fit into your, your background?

17:04Uh, honestly, sort of accidentally, it wasn't like I thought I'm going to go down the comedy route, but, um, I guess I, I'm used to playing a kind of the dark and the lights, like a lot on stage and, but comedy really opened the comedy doors kind of opened for me I did a limited series called landscapers um a few years ago and that seemed to bring in comedy and then I did a show called everyone else burns which was a straight comedy and yeah that's it's not it's not been a conscious thing it's sort of been a natural kind of evolution I guess and then when it came to widow's bay because it's character driven I understand that it's like you're going I understood the character so you can kind of hide behind that rather than if it was hard comedy, it would maybe be more intimidating.

18:02No, yeah, that's true. No, that's something that I think all of you guys have said is that you just take it as seriously as possible. And as an actor, maybe that's like the most natural way to approach it, but I don't know if that's challenging when you've got a killer clown and a boogeyman or if that's just what you do, because that's the job. Well, I've said about that, it's like this is sort of how I experience life in a way. Like I feel the big feelings, you know, being scared and like the comedy like in life okay it might not be a killer clown it might just be something much more banal but um the feelings of it make sense to me um so yeah just not not not playing the comedy but I don't know if that's completely true all the way because there were so many amazing jokes and different types of jokes you know you had you did have the like really big I don't know set pieces the right words but like obvious jokes and then layer of like jokes you might miss or pick up on the second watch.

18:54And there are all these different levels of it. And so sometimes it did feel like I'd compare it to golf where it's like you've got one, you know, you had like one hit of a golf ball. You have one, you've got to stick the landing of a line to just get that joke right. So there was a bit of that as well. It wasn't just playing the truth, I guess. I think part of the comedy, Patricia, too, comes out that there's this exasperation and all the awful stuff that's happening, like with the boogeyman, especially it's like fear, but just, I can't believe I have to put up with this again. And I don't know if that was a note you were deliberately playing, but like, as a, you get as a woman who's just trying to live in the world, exasperation is just what comes up all the time.

19:32And it feels very present for Patricia. Yeah. Well, to me, it was logical. It's like, you've been on this Island. You can't get off. You know, it's in your blood. Your ancestors have gone through this shit. You're going through it. It's just like, for God's like, I'm not going to get away from this boogeyman. I can't just keep running. It is, you know, it is so frustrating and exasperating and anger inducing and terrifying and all of that at the same time to me was just like a natural, a natural reaction. Well, it's also not that different from how she responds to like, you know, Tom pointing out that she's in her forties and wouldn't be chasing anymore.

20:07It's just like, come on, man. Like, it's kind of the same thing totally totally and i think she feels them kind of in a similar to like a similar strength i mean i think i think that is a huge part of the like the patricia fandom that has grown up around it and i think you weren't at comic-con that just happened last week which is just wild but i yeah but i assume you've gotten to witness the the you know the Widows Bay and Patricia explosion that has happened over the last few months. Yeah. It's been crazy. I, it's been crazy, like amazing. Um, and, and couldn't, couldn't predict it really. Um, but then I guess it's, it's quite, I feel it's quite heartwarming that so many people feel like Patricia, you know, actually these inner Patricias that we all have that we're sort of embarrassed by those, you know, like keep, Keep that side of yourself hidden because it's like too much that everyone's got behind this character.

21:10It's like quite, it is a lovely thing, I think. Yeah. Unsurprising. It surprised me. Well, that's such a big thing of theater is that you get that instant audience reaction that you see people in the crowd, you see people at the stage door, you understand how it's hitting with something. And how have you gotten that from your film and TV work? do you try to seek out how people are reacting to it or does it, does it just feel different that you don't get that immediate feedback from, from film things that are filmed? You mean when you're doing it, when you're. Yeah. Like, you know, you know, if the audience was into your show, into your play, but you, you don't really ever know about a show, TV show unless you go seek it out.

21:45No, I think it's like the doing of it. I do think it's a very different process. Like, and, and, uh, I guess what I'm learning with it is you do just have to, who, Who's that director that said he's not looking for perfection, he's looking for spontaneity? And that feels like the territory that is good for, you know, when you're on camera, you've got to find it in the moment. Like you can't, it's got to be discovered and caught. Whereas with theatre, you've kind of got to find it in rehearsal and anchor it down and down and down so you can repeat it every night and then try and make it fresh every night.

22:19But it's just a totally, you're not thinking about the audience, You're just searching for a kind of spontaneity, I guess, that feels truthful to the scene. Well, that feels like so much of how I think of Mike Lee's work and knowing that you've got a film coming up with him that, you know, I don't want to be spoiled. I want to find out about it when I get to see it. But I wonder how that sticks with you. You start your career working with Mike Lee on screen. You get to build things together. Does that stick with you? And can you take those tools with you into working on anything else of that sense of building the character and being spontaneous like that?

22:50I don't have a set process it my process is collaborating with the people in front of me and and every everything requires something different you know it depends on the style and my leads process you can't take that anywhere because it's just so particular you know you're creating you you're not interpreting a script you're creating from scratch I mean it demands a lot you're sort of treated like an artist you know you're like coming up with it from the ground up and you sort of fill a whole backstory like a whole you have a whole life of a made-up character in your head and all these made-up people that they're friends with and it's just completely unique but what I do take from Mike is and what he has retained you know at the age of 83 is a curiosity a curiosity in the world around him a curiosity in people and that and I remember from doing that at 21 to doing that at 40 that is the thing that I keep coming back to is keeping a curiosity about things and not knowing the answer and that's you know I'm not I'm not and seeing someone from lots of different angles you know we are not just one thing and so that's what I take from Mike and it was very special to get to work with him you know 20 years later you know had a life 20 years of life experience 20 years of work experience coming in as a rookie and then being able to meet him as more of a collaborator and less you know sort of like you know able to able to come as an adult really was special to do that oh that's so that's I love moments like that where you get to loop back to something and be like oh we've changed I mean maybe he hasn't changed he's you know been a master for a long time but you know you've changed you get to bring something yeah different it's really exciting you know on the first day because it's an undertaking it's you're jumping off a cliff you don't know whether you're going to be in it whether you know what you're going to do in it and it's I mean even when you start filming you don't know what you've got one scene that you know maybe and you don't know what the rest of the film is anyway the first day I started work he said how are you feeling I said Mike I'm nervous and he and he just looked at me with a twinkle in his eye I said well you know what you got to do get over it.

25:05It was right. You've got to get over it. You've got to get on with it or feel it and do it anyway. And that's really important. It's important to be uncomfortable, you know, to have any chance of growing. Um, yeah, get over it. So, you know, he's great. That's perfect advice. That's the thing about that a lot. Yeah. And, but you, you've gotten, you've gotten to see tender loving care, right? I know the rest of us have a little while. Yes, yeah. Yes, it's coming there. Yeah, it's, yeah. Well, to tie it back to Widow's Bay as we wrap up too, that sense of like curiosity and that there's a whole world around you is such a huge appeal of that show to me.

25:40Like knowing that we're getting a second season, that there's this entire parts of the island we haven't seen and characters we haven't met. And, you know, characters like Dale Dickey's Rosemary, there's so much more to learn about them. And knowing you don't know what's in season two, but I assume that you feel that too, making this show, that it's this vast world that awaits us. Totally. And I have just complete faith and belief in the show and in Katie, like it's going to be what it needs to be. And it is stacked with incredible, you know, you could look anywhere on the island and find an interesting story.

26:11You know, Kevin Carroll as Bashir is perfection to me. Every line reading is so dead, so funny. Yeah, you could just, it'll be, yeah, it's just a great show to work on. I really am so made, it's a dream come true, really, honestly. I mean, I keep saying it, but it is true. When something gets happening, you say it, you know. Exactly. It's okay for trees to come true sometimes. Yes. It's perfect. That does it for today's special bonus episode. We'll be back with our regular show on Tuesday as we continue our fall preview series. In the meantime, this podcast is edited by Brett Fox and produced by Brett Fox and me.

26:52Our theme music is by Dave Gonzalez. Subscribe to the Prestige Junkie newsletter at theankler.com. watch this podcast on YouTube or subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or anywhere else you get your podcasts. We'll see you on Tuesday.