Melissa Rauch on making ‘The Bronze’

Melissa Rauch, co-writer and star of

The Bronze, has spent a lot of time talking about the dramedy, which opens Friday. The one thing that interviewers keep bringing up over and over is the “likability” — or lack thereof — of her character, Hope. Is she tired of discussing it? “I could talk about this for hours,” says Rauch, best known for her role as Bernadette on The Big Bang Theory. “So we may run out of time.”

It’s fine with Rauch if people don’t like Hope, an Olympic gymnast whose glory days are well behind her. Hope took the bronze medal at the 2004 games after pulling off a miraculous, Kerri Strug-like performance on the uneven bars.

After further injury ended her attempt at the 2008 Olympics, she has remained in her small town, living on free Sbarro pizza, stealing from her mailman dad (Gary Cole) and showcasing an impressive talent for profanity. It was important to Rauch and her co-writer (and husband), Winston Rauch, that Hope’s sour attitude be a product of her circumstances — not something inherent within her.

“We wanted to make sure it was authentic to the experience she was going through,” says Rauch, who was in D.C. to promote the film. “She was cut off from her dream; she’s stuck and unable to reset or re-engage in this new phase of her life, and it’s made her very bitter.” Rauch emphasizes that The Bronze is not a story that’s all about redemption.

“It was important to us that this character remain as bitter as she would have if those circumstances really did happen, and if that makes her a little unlikeable, then we would rather that be the case than it not be true to the story.”

So go ahead and hate Hope. After all, Hope herself wouldn’t really care.