Olive Kitteridge, Mare of Easttown and… Penny Wilding? In ‘After the Party,’ Series Mania Winner Robyn Malcolm Joins the Ranks of TV’s Most Beloved Anti-Heroines
25.03.2024 - 19:25
/ variety.com
Marta Balaga “After the Party” came from anger, says co-creator Dianne Taylor. “It came from a lot of anger.” “Robyn delivered an amazing audition for something I wrote, and the director said ‘no.’ He said she was ‘too mature’ for the role, even though it was written for someone her age. We decided to make something together, where a 50-year-old isn’t played by a 30-year-old.” “For the longest time, we didn’t have a character and we didn’t have a story.
All we had was this rage. Then we decided to use our own lives and own experiences, and in the meantime, this anger just went away,” Malcolm says at Series Mania. Penny, played by Robyn Malcolm – who also co-created the miniseries – is a high-school teacher.
Years ago, during a party, she accused her own husband of sexually exploiting her daughter’s drunk teenage friend. Now, he is back, and many people – including Penny’s own daughter – just want her to move on. “The thing with Penny is that she’s always on the edge – she just can’t let go – of anything.
Even though it would have made her life so much easier. She is unable to do it, even during what we called ‘porngate,’ when she’s discussing porn she found on her student’s phone. The only time you see her sitting still is when she is posing and even then, she can’t fully relax,” observes Malcolm, awarded for her turn at Series Mania as best actress in the festival’s International Panorama section.
In between fighting her many, many battles, Penny poses nude for a drawing class. “We show a middle-aged woman and we show her middle-aged body. It’s there, front and center.