Annalise Basso
ANNALISE Basso might be young, but she’s already a Hollywood veteran.
The 21-year-old actress currently co-stars opposite Jennifer Connelly and Daveed Diggs in “Snowpiercer” on TNT (Sundays at 9 p.m.), the small-screen adaptation of Oscar-winning director Bong Joon Ho’s 2014 movie of the same name.
Before the apocalyptic drama, her best-known role was in the Oscar-nominated 2016 movie “Captain Fantastic,” in which she played Vespyr Cash, a girl in an unconventional survivalist family helmed by patriarch Ben (Viggo Mortensen). She’s also appeared in episodes of “Desperate Housewives” (2008), “True Blood” (2009) and “New Girl” (2012), plus the movie “Ouija: Origin of Evil” (2016).
Basso spoke to The Post about “Snowpiercer,” why she loved “Captain Fantastic,” her college aspirations and more.
Were you familiar with “Snowpiercer” before landing the role of LJ, a conniving teen girl who is a first-class passenger on the train?
I had seen the movie and I was familiar with the director. Especially this year after he won awards for “Parasite,” I just became so much more excited about how the audience was going to react to the show. [Director Bong] wasn’t really present on set, but I would say his creative energy was. Even though “Snowpiercer” the TV show is different from the movie, it carries that same energy.
LJ — spoiler alert — ends up standing trial for the murders that have happened on the train. How did you prepare for the role?
I was watching a lot of documentaries on Netflix on murders — you know how they have those cold-case files? I watched “Making a Murderer.” LJ and I are really completely different people, luckily! But the one thing we had in common was that we’re struggling to find our place in the world. Her world is a train, but I feel like I’m still very much trying to figure out who I am in this industry, so we have that in common.
You’ve been acting for most of your life. How did that impact your childhood — were you home-schooled?
I went to regular school my entire life except for third and fourth grades — I was home-schooled [for those years]. But [after that] I was in regular school and that was really challenging, because I was trying to balance a full-time academic career with a full-time professional career. It was an exhausting several years, but I’m grateful for it because I learned a lot. I love to learn. I wanted to go to college — I’m hoping to go one day. What would you want to study? I would want to study classics. I’d want to get a major in classics and a minor in some foreign language — maybe Italian or French.
Is there a particular role you look back on the most fondly?
“Captain Fantastic” to this day is my favorite project that I’ve ever worked on. I was 14 when I shot it, and at that time in my life professionally I hadn’t had that many roles that were complex or deep or sincere. Your two choices [at that age] are: “I’m an angry teenager! Mom, get out of my room!’ ” and that’s the foundation of your character. Or you have “Tommy, captain of the football team, I love you so much!” and that’s how complex your character is.
Matt Ross, the director-writer, had all the cast members reading the books that the characters read. It made me realize I love to learn. I was given this opportunity to go be out in the woods with Aragorn — I’m a huge “Lord of the Rings” fan — and being able to act with and learn from [Mortensen] was just personally so satisfying. I got to explore myself as an artist and as a person. Whenever I find myself doubting, “Should I keep doing this?” I always think of that film and how there might be another “Captain Fantastic” out there just waiting for me.