From foul-mouthed nuns to parasitic demon
Parks and Recreation regular branches out in Legion, Season 2
It’s pointless to ask Aubrey Plaza about what we can expect from Season 2 of Legion.
It’s not only that she is bound by the cone-of-silence rule that governs this golden age of premium cable television. It’s that she honestly doesn’t seem to know what is in store for viewers in FX’s mind-bending superhero show.
“I wish I knew, I have no idea,” Plaza says, in an interview with Postmedia. “I don’t even know what happened in Season 1.”
It’s true, Noah Hawley’s cheerfully demented X-Men offshoot defies easy characterization and a quick synopsis. But now that a season has passed, we can at least safely reveal that Plaza’s character, who goes by the name Lenny Busker among others, is one form of a shape-shifting parasitic demon/mutant. She gives a wonderfully unhinged performance that is funny, sexy and terrifying, and bringing the actress some of the best reviews of her career.
“I think it’s funny when people say, ‘ Well, that’s a predictable role for you to play,’ ” says Plaza with a laugh. “Oh, OK, the most evil mutant in the universe?”
She says it’s a little premature to say what long-term impact it will have. But it reflects an overall career goal to play a variety of characters and never repeat herself.
Her role of Fernanda in Jeff Baena’s comedy The Little Hours seems to fit nicely into that plan. Without giving away the story, we can say she is a horny, foulmouthed 14th-century Italian nun who has some peculiar side interests and is prone to fits of rage. Plaza, who before now was probably best known as the acerbic and occasionally creepy April Ludgate on the sitcom Parks and Recreation, joins an all-star comedic cast that includes Alison Brie, Dave Franco, Kate Micucci, John C. Reilly, Fred Armisen, Molly Shannon, Nick Offerman and Paul Reiser. It’s her third film with Baena, who is also her boyfriend. Both will appear at the screening of Little Hours at the Globe Cinema on Monday for the sold-out opener of the Calgary Underground Film Festival.
Plaza said she was drawn to the film by the 14th-Century setting and darkly comic tone and the rarity of these two elements coming together in one film. Plus, she likes nuns.
“I went to an all-girls private Catholic school for almost 12 years,” she says. “In fact, my first job ever was in a convent. I was a receptionist for a convent that was attached to our school. So I have a fondness for nuns and just the history of Catholicism, I guess.”
Baena loosely based the script on The Decameron, Giovanni Boccaccio’s 14th-Century set of novellas about young women and men who find shelter from the Black Death in a secluded villa. The Little Hours tells the story of a sexy young servant (Franco) who flees from his cuckolded master (Offerman) and finds refuge in a convent, where he pretends to be a deaf-mute as three nuns (Plaza, Micucci and Brie) attempt seduce him.
The dialogue was largely improvised and delivered with a casual, modern sensibility that includes plenty of cursing by our frustrated sisters.
“The screenplay was not a traditional screenplay but it was a really detailed story,” Plaza says. “So we just did whatever Jeff wanted us to do. He had all the scenes written and worked out in his mind. It was improvised to keep it spontaneous and casual, but what we were saying was planned out. It wasn’t a typical improv comedy.”
Plaza first worked with Baena in his debut, playing the title role in 2014’s zombie comedy Life After Beth. She also had a role in his followup, the melancholy comedy Joshy.
“He knows movies really, really well and has impeccable taste,” Plaza says of Baena. “I think he is a real visionary. He really has a plan and an opinion. Some directors don’t, they just figure it out as they go along. He really attacks movies in a very specific way. I think you can tell when you watch them. You just can’t believe that he has all of that in his brain.”