Posted in: Interview, Movies, Paramount Pictures | Tagged: edward burns, Gretchen Mol, Millers in Marriage

Millers in Marriage: Gretchen Mol on Burns, Bratt, Contemporary Roles

Gretchen Mol (Boardwalk Empire) spoke to Bleeding Cool about her latest drama Republic/Paramount Pictures' Millers in Marriage, Burns & more.

Gretchen Mol has been active for the better part of three decades since her debut in the 1996 film Girl 6. She emerged as a star across film and TV with early memorable work like ABC's Spin City, Sony's Donnie Brasco (1997), The Thirteenth Floor (1999), and Fox's Girls Club. Whether it's leading role or part of an ensemble, Mol has continued to thrive with 2007's Lionsgate remake 3:10 to Yuma, ABC's Life on Mars, HBO's Boardwalk Empire and Perry Mason, and Paramount's Yellowstone. Her latest is the Republic Pictures/Paramount ensemble drama Millers in Marriage, which follows three middle-aged married couples coming to grips with universal questions about marriage fidelity, professional success, and failure, and the challenge of finding a second act. Mol spoke to Bleeding Cool about how fate meant for her to cross with writer, director, and actor Edward Burns as a contemporary, challenging herself in a contemporary role and working with co-stars Patrick Adams, Julianna Margulies, and Benjamin Bratt.

Millers in Marriage Star Gretchen Mol on Edward Burns' Open Creative Process

Bleeding Cool: What intrigued you about 'Millers in Marriage?'

The script intrigued me, and I also Ed Burn's work. He's been a peer in a way. I remember in the 90s when Sundance and those independent films, which were when we were coming up at the same time, so I was familiar with him. When I knew I was getting an Ed Burns script, I was immediately intrigued, because I knew that it would be a great opportunity for an actor. It turned out all the roles were wonderful.

What does a role like Eve allow you to do that you possibly haven't done before or maybe do enough as an actor?

What I loved about the film was that it was so contemporary and dealt with issues I could recognize clearly. It wasn't like a whole…sometimes when you take a film or a project on, it's a whole other world, or it's a genre that you haven't done, and that can be exciting or, in the case with 'Boardwalk Empire,' it was that period (of the 1920s/30s) in Atlantic City, and so you're learning so much about that. It's funny; in my career, I have not had a lot of opportunities to play a contemporary person whose experiences can mirror mine or at least are recognizable to me. I could say, "That's like a friend of mine who also has children the same age and is going through a divorce," or whatever the different situations that these characters find themselves in. That was fun. When I read it, I thought, "Ooh, if my life were a little bit messier and more difficult, I can really relate to this."

What was it like working with him as a creative, and do you feel that his acting background offers a unique advantage or perspective when directing as opposed to a more traditional director?

I feel Ed loves actors and the characters he writes, so we had such a nice time on our first conversation, which was over the phone. He was already listening to me about what my impressions were of him because he's very humble. He writes these characters, and then he's fascinated to hear about them. It's not like he's coming in knowing; he's saying, "What do you think? You're gonna end up knowing this character better than I do."

That's such a gift to an actor because you don't feel like he's precious about these people that he visualized as he was writing on the page. He's not stuck at all. He's looking for it to evolve and get stronger. Sometimes, if you say something in a conversation, it might end up a little like in the dialog that you're about to say or another situation.
When I was working with Benjamin Bratt, we were talking about what that relationship is. Is he this Lothario who's just trying to hook up with Eve, or is he enamored and seeing something deeper there and wanting something deeper? With that approach from Benjamin Bratt, too, we ended up writing that [Ed] ended up coming in after a weekend, and he had written the scene where we speak outside on the lawn outside of his house, and I say, "You really inspired me. I wrote this song. I haven't written any music for so long. I sat down and wrote the first piece of music." That wasn't in the original script, but that spoke to the relationship not being a flimsy fling but in a situation that ended up changing her outlook on her life.

Aside from the script, was there a previous role you've done or maybe an element in your life that provided extra inspiration or perspective for Eve for you that put that button on?

Oh, gosh, so many little things. I have conversations with my best girlfriends about this stage in our lives, where it feels like the kids we were so focused on raising are now teenagers or they're about to face that empty nest time. You have to make sure that your life is full and rich and that you haven't forgotten about all those things you cared about prior to that. You've been planting seeds, your goals and dreams change, and there's room for them still.

All those little elements we talked about on set, and I could relate to those. I started a dress line, and it was like, "I've been thinking about it for probably 10 years, moving out of New York City, and the COVID at the time. A lot of times, being an actor, you have a lot of downtime when you're waiting for another great script to come along. If you're a creative person, a lot of people, that's why they get into writing, or they look direct. I wanted something completely outside of that, and it's been so much fun to go down the journey of developing in a fashion line.

You talked about developing something with Ed on your scenes with Benjamin and fine-tuning. Did you have a similar type of experience when dealing with Patrick and Julianna?

With Patrick, it was a different situation with a lot of it. The delicate balance with that was finding what their relationship was and how abusive it was. With Patrick's character, people can be drunk in various ways, and on the page, [Scott's] mean to her, but it could be with humor, and so Patrick had so many variations. Sometimes, it would almost be [laughs] too funny. He was gifted at finding all those different nuances, too. A lot of it was like playing with the temperature of each scene and how volatile it would feel or not wanting to repeat the same note of their relationship too many times.

I didn't have much screen time with Juliana, but we had such affection for each other. I've known her for years through work in New York, so we were excited to be on and have these scenes together. They all felt natural and much like two people doing it for a long time [laughs], for long enough that we could sit there, be comfortable, and do it. We discussed our sibling relationship in that Julianna's character is the oldest sister, and so, therefore, she's probably a child of alcoholics. She's managed her role in taking care of her siblings, and you can feel that. You can also feel every time Eve calls with, "Do you know where Scott is?!" and it's like, "She's heard this so many times," She has this eye roll and all those little things we would find.

Millers in Marriage, which also stars Morena Baccarin, Minnie Driver, Burns, Campbell Scott, and Brian d'Arcy James, is in theaters and digital.

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