A role to relish
Ashley Judd talks to Julie Eley about rape threats, standing up for what you believe in and why TV needs strong female roles.
Ashley Judd on television and the need for strong female characters
"I am in a constant state of being retaliated against for being a woman who uses her voice.'' Ashley Judd
Ashley Judd has been an outspoken political activist throughout her entire career so it’s hardly surprising she has plenty to say about her role in the SoHo spy thriller Berlin Station.
The Kentucky native joins season two as new CIA station chief BB Yates – a maverick charged with breathing new life into the troubled CIA base after the fallout from whistleblowing scandal.
It’s the type of driven female role fans have come to expect from the star of Kissing the Girls and The Missing and Judd says, ‘‘I really feel my character is the type of woman the world needs now. (It’s) giving us, through entertainment, a real look at what the world should actually be like in the 21st century.’’
The 49-year-old actor, who had a brief flirtation with a run for the US Senate in 2013, was approached about the role after programme makers saw her TED Talk that touched on online sexual harassment.
She been standing up for her beliefs since she was a student at Kentucky University.
‘‘There are plenty of people who like to squelch the general badassery of strong women everywhere.
‘‘It’s a mantle I assumed as a college student. A member of the board of trustees said something undeniably racist at a meeting. I felt that his ongoing presence on the board of trustees was inappropriate. I was great friends with his daughter and still am.
‘‘That was a great lesson for me. I learned to put principles above personalities. And the principle was that he needed to go. So I helped organise a campus-wide walkout of classes protesting his presence on the board of trustees.’’
It’s the kind of behaviour that has won Judd both friends and enemies.
‘‘I am in a constant state of being retaliated against for being a woman who uses her voice,’’ she says during a chat with Stuff in Los Angeles.
‘‘I’ll have rape and deaths treats today on social media. I will be diminished in ways large and small, subtle and covert, just for existing and I am aware of that and it takes radical self care and mentors and really strong female-to-female alliances, encouragement, that this is the right thing to do.’’
However, doing the right thing is more of a blurred area for BB Yates in Berlin Station. She walks a fine line between serving those above her and empowering those below.
Season two is something of a tonal shift for the show which moves from whistleblowing to this year’s General Election in Germany and the rise of the Far Right.
It’s a storyline, says show runner and executive producer Bradford Winters, that references last year’s terrorist attack on the Berlin Christmas market which left 12 people dead and also deals with the fallout from America’s own Presidential election.
‘‘The writer’s room started the week of the election and we know how that went,’’ says Winters.
‘‘Given that outcome, suddenly there was a question of, ‘OK, how directly do we take on this issue, this real sea change of Donald Trump and all that would bring with it in terms of this new administration’.
‘‘I think given some of the things that started happening after the election in terms of the relations between Trump and the administration and the CIA, the onus suddenly felt heavier and heavier to deal with it and to acknowledge it with no agenda.
‘‘The show this season does not have a political or partisan agenda, we just try to deal with the issues at hand, but had the election gone the other way I think it certainly would have made for some differences.’’
One of the differences Winters was keen to make this year though was to bring in more female characters to ‘‘balance out the cast and mix things up’’.
Judd, the daughter of country music singer Naomi Judd and the sister of Wynonna Judd, seemed the perfect fit for the role of BB Yates with Scream Queens star Keke Palmer as April Lewis, a young case officer on her first field assignment.
Programme makers had been eager to sign the black American actress and Judd says, ‘‘At the very highest level of Paramount and Epix (which airs the show in the US) there is a commitment to being inclusive and diverse.
‘They said, ‘We need a person of colour in the cast. That’s what the world looks like’.’’
But that said, has Hollywood become any better at being inclusive as a whole.
‘‘The data shows no, but there is a conversation about it and all change must begin with the conversation,’’ says Judd. ‘‘Naming the problem is the obvious, essential first step. And so hopefully things will continue to get better.’’
The role of BB Yates is a change of pace for Judd, who is used to action women roles but this time around is using her brain as her gun.
‘‘I love action and I love fighting, which I got to do a lot on The Missing, but I’m really busy running the station and running my operatives and outthinking and outwitting a lot of people so as of right now I haven’t been able to rumble,’’ she says, before adding, ‘‘I’m intellectually rumbling a lot.’’
A bit like Judd herself really.
❚ Season two of Berlin Station starts November 3 on SoHo. Season one is still screening.