‘It’s still a battle for women to be at the centre of storytelling’
• Stars of the glitzy new Apple TV+ series Palm Royale, including Laura Dern, Leslie Bibb and Allison Janney, reveal what’s in store for viewers
The desire to fit in and be accepted is something everyone can relate to. “I think everywhere, every day, people strive to be accepted, to belong, to want to be validated in some way. I think that’s just the way our society seems to work,” says American actress Allison Janney, 64, best known for The West Wing and films including I, Tonya and The Help.
“Unfortunately, we all want to be a member of a club that doesn’t want us sometimes. And of course, the question is, how much you’re willing to sacrifice of yourself to be included in a place that you want to belong to?”
It’s a question that’s explored in new 10-part Apple TV+ series Palm Royale – and if you’ve been missing White Lotus and longing for another achingly opulent, sun and scandal-drenched series to get into, it might be just what you’ve been waiting for.
Set in 1969 Palm Springs, it’s as enticing stylistically (think Slim Aarons-inspired glamour and the sort of mid-century interiors that make you want to blow your life savings on velvet armchairs and plush carpets) as it is for its stellar cast.
Bridesmaids’ Kristen Wiig and Big Little Lies actor and Oscar-winner Laura
Dern lead the line-up, along with Janney and Leslie Bibb (Iron Man, Miss Nobody) among others. Puerto Rican pop singer Ricky Martin also features, while Hollywood legend (and Laura Dern’s father) Bruce Dern, 87, and comedy icon Carol Burnett, 90, guest star.
Loosely based on the 2018 novel
Mr And Mrs American Pie by Juliet Mcdaniel, it’s written, executive produced and showrun by Abe Sylvia (previous credits include Dead To Me, George And Tammy and Filthy Rich), and follows Maxine Simmons (Wiig) as she sets out to break into Palm Beach’s most elite social circles.
Being accepted into this glitzy, wealthy fold, however, requires a certain amount of fakery and embellishment. But Maxine is determined, and she’s not the only one with an agenda and secrets.
For Dern, 57, who won best supporting actress at the 2020 Oscars for her portrayal of a divorce lawyer in Marriage Story – and was also a producer on Palm Royale, along with Wiig – there’s a lot to unravel with these themes.
“As producers, when we read the book, that is the very theme that so interested us. To create this delicious and impossible world of complicated people, who try to belong to what they think matters most, and it’s the antithesis of what matters.
It speaks to belonging and longing and family, and finding what family is to you
“For me in my own life, it’s trial and error every day,” Dern reflects. “From early childhood, you know, you think you want to belong – hopefully you learn that you’re wanting to belong to the wrong club by age 11, 12, 13 – but often that theme follows us throughout our lives.”
Billed as an “underdog story”, Palm Royale isn’t just about trying to secure your place at the most exclusive club in town. It’s about discovering what really goes on behind the scenes, and what happens when cracks begin to show.
Fellow executive producer Jayme Lemons (Enlightened, The Tale) agrees there’s something universally intriguing about these dynamics.
“I think there are a lot of messages in it,” Lemons says of the key aims of the series. “It speaks to belonging and longing and family, and finding what family is to you. But I think one of the strongest messages, at least for me, is about creating change from within, whatever that change looks like for you. Be it a character like Linda (played by Dern) who’s trying to create really substantive change in the world, or a character like Evelyn (played by Janney) who’s trying to create a change in her own life to provide her own security, or a feeling of power for some of the characters that they just need to hold on to, to give themselves whatever sense of self and place in the world that gives them purpose and meaning.
“So, creating that change – internally or, in Linda’s case, sometimes externally – I think is a through line for the whole series.”
Nodding in agreement, Dern adds: “And however superfluous, this idea of racing to the finish line of something that really doesn’t matter, and missing your life while you’re doing it, I think is something we all continue to need to investigate, you know? I think that’s why it was deeply felt at this time in history in 1969, but it’s as deeply felt now as ever, sadly.”
Bibb, 49, who plays Dinah, also believes the themes the series deals with are still relevant today.
“I hope it’s thought-provoking,” Bibb says. “I have a fantasy of like, the next day, somebody going: Did you see that episode? What would you do? Would you do that? Can you believe what Evelyn did? And then somebody going, ‘Well, of course she would do that, because this has happened…’
“Hopefully they (viewers) start to look at the world and see some similarities, and see that, sometimes, maybe the world isn’t that different than it was then, that maybe we haven’t done enough. We thought we might have been evolving a little faster than we have… Maybe we’re slowing down.”
Palm Royale brings a lot of gloss and entertainment, but “it’s so smart and deep – you’re laughing but then it’s also very provocative”, Bibb adds.
There was a lot going on in the world in 1969, she reflects. “We’re surrounded by this elite circle in this little, tiny place, but outside the world is changing vastly. Martin Luther King (has been) killed, we’re going to the moon, you have the Vietnam War, you have women’s rights, and so it’s all happening around them.
“And you have these women who don’t want it to change, who are like, we know what the world looks like, and then it’s changing, they can’t stop it,” Bibb says. “And I think sometimes now in life, I don’t know… I feel like I’m holding on for dear life sometimes right now.”
The series is also a celebration of female-led storytelling, and as Dern observes of one of the storylines: “What happens when a woman is complicated in a man’s world, in the late 60s, and in these pockets of absurd wealth. It was an incredibly fascinating thing to explore.
“Maxine’s character is interesting because she thinks she’s happy playing that role because that’s what her husband likes, and what she wants more than anything is to get his approval. So that was a really interesting, as female producers, lead protagonist to explore, as opposed to the outlier my character plays or other characters might explore… to have a lead who is missing the feminist window around her.”
Dern continues: “It’s still a battle for women to be at the centre of storytelling – and we know that that’s the case in all industries. But the one area that is shifting so much in storytelling is that now they have algorithms, and they know that women, and women of certain ages, are the ones watching most content. And so as producers, we get to build worlds where people want to see themselves and see characters they relate to, and it creates far more dynamic casts than hopefully ever before.”
Palm Royale premieres on Apple TV+ tomorrow with new episodes aired weekly until May 8