[Editor’s note: This interview contains spoilers from Poker Face’s season-two finale.]
Patti Harrison isn’t afraid to dial up the humor (as you will find out towards the end of this interview). If her performance in various I Think You Should Leave sketches is any indication, she thrives on playing ludicrous, over-the-top people (seen also in Hulu’s Shrill). Now, as she did in 2021’s Together, Together, Harrison takes an interesting swerve on Poker Face with her performance as an unassuming woman. Harrison makes her season two debut in “A New Lease On Death” as Alex, who quickly befriends bullshit detector Charlie Cale (Natasha Lyonne). It makes sense because Alex hates dishonesty. “If you ask me a question and I lie, who are you having a conversation with? Nobody,” she smoothly tells her new pal at one point.
The actor’s convincingly bashful performance comes to a halt in the finale. Halfway through “The End Of The Road,” Alex reveals herself as a ruthless assassin who tricked Charlie into taking her to a target in Indiana. Not only that, she also tries to drive them both off a cliff to an early grave. This is devastating for Charlie, who’s left friendless once more. Instead, she gains a sociopathic nemesis who is well and truly obsessed with her, Moriarty-style. (Alex went as far as controlling her breathing technique so she wouldn’t be caught in a lie, now that’s commitment.)
The A.V. Club spoke to Harrison about what made this role particularly challenging, her tricks for playing a nefarious villain, and, as the conversation winds down, she displays those aforementioned comical skills in her answers.
The A.V. Club: How did you feel about taking Alex from an amusing sidekick to this evil big bad? What did you want to achieve with this switch as an actor primarily known for comedy?
Patti Harrison: I talked to the team about how to differentiate between the two a lot. I knew the twist beforehand, but I love to imagine what the experience would’ve been like on day 11 of playing this character if they said to me that she goes from telling Charlie “Oh, here’s a coffee” to “Sit in the chair, bitch” and “I’m going to drive you off a cliff.” Hopefully, watching [the reveal] is like a surprise party, and you feel the same chemical reaction happening in your brain. When they filled me in on the details, it truly was the most excited I’ve ever been for a role because I’ve always wanted to do an action movie, stunts, combat stuff, and use weapons. I’ve never really gotten that opportunity because I’m a comedian, and that makes complete sense. Coming into it with this story, we had a lot of meetings. [Season two showrunner] Tony Tost, who is an angel, really helped to guide me tonally.
I love Poker Face‘s comedy, but I didn’t want to dishonor the stakes that were being built by this moment when the turn happens. I wanted it to feel evil in the sense that, when all is said and done, Charlie is a deeply wounded and traumatized person with no sense of security in her life. The show is about resilience and resourcefulness in the face of her loneliness, considering she’s subjected to people who are trying to kill her. I wanted this moment to feel like a death knell of “Oh my gosh, I can’t trust anybody.” Imagine what would happen to her brain after that. I didn’t want it to feel silly, yet all of us were determined to keep Alex as an interesting, fun character. Tony, Natasha, and everyone were constantly checking in with me to see how I was doing. We were also having in-depth conversations about what my voice would be like in the finale and how it would juxtapose against how Alex talked.
AVC: What were those conversations like about modifying your voice? Was it daunting as a performer to navigate these specific qualities of the character?
PH: Well, as you can hear from my actual speaking voice, it’s pretty low, kind of chainsaw, cigar smoker-esque, and it’s not that I smoke. I have asthma. I think my voice is just scratchy because in my teens and my early twenties, I wanted to be in a metal band. I would make scream songs on GarageBand, and it shredded my vocal cords, and no one ever heard them. But it gives me this “sexy woman in her 90s” voice, which is different than Alex’s voice, as you can also hear. She’s sincere. When I thought of what would be impactful for Charlie, Alex felt like a super earnest character. She has an almost infantilized level of sweetness. So I based part of that on one of my college friends whom I met during improv. Her name is Emily, and to this day, she is the most earnest person I’ve met in my life.
I come from a pretty sarcastic family that uses dark humor to cope with stuff. I guess I can’t speak for all of us, but for me, my humor when I entered college became irony-poisoned, and Emily was so open about what she was feeling. She was always going like, “Awww,” and you could hear it in her voice when she was happy. Being around her helped me become more gentle. So I thought, for me, it would be the most painful to find out that she was the person using me. I was also trying to strain my neck so the voice is dance-y and to get a ribbon-like intonation. My acting coach throughout the process, Michael Warner, was constantly there to help and make it feel fun and real for the story. God bless that man. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson needs to get that stripped from him, and it needs to go to Michael “The Rock” Warner for all the help he gave me to figure out the two different voices.
AVC: Since you have only the last 20 minutes or so of the finale to sell the switch, does it help knowing the weird details of your character’s backstory, like how she supposedly wrestled a polar bear and walked 100 miles in the snow?
PH: Totally. It helps me take the performance where I need it to go because the details of her life are so absurd. The things that she’s done, there is a version of it that we could have done, where it’s very silly and caricature-like of a catty assassin. But in learning about how extreme her backstory is, it makes me oddly ground her and add naturalism. I mean, I wouldn’t say that for me it’s a naturalistic performance. I was definitely having fun with the creative liberties I got, but there was a lot of attention towards how to bring these aspects of her to life without tipping over into caricature, and how we honor the betrayal emotionally. Natasha is giving an incredible performance. She has to do so much emotional lifting in those final beats where her character is being traumatized in real time. I didn’t want it to then cut to me, and I’m just like all “Ha ha, I’m goofy and silly and crazy and I might kill you.” So it was cool to find a bridge between the backstory and the presence this character has on camera in this moment.
Eventhe incredible costume department was helpful with that, and the fittings were a lot of fun. I got to try the craziest shit, like all the snow outfits we put on were so fucking cool. That black outfit, in particular, was great. Up until that point, I’d been wearing girl dinner universe clothes, if that makes sense. So to get to wear a knife holster on my arm and feel the weight of that, wear the driving gloves and fucking Louboutin combat boots made me want to do a flip, wrap my legs around someone’s head, and then flip backwards and slam their head on the ground.
AVC: In an alternate universe, would you have liked to continue playing Alex as Charlie’s friend and gotten the chance to develop that character and dynamic?
PH: It would’ve been nice. And it would’ve been nice for Charlie to just have a friend, and I think she’ll have one someday who can give her the comfort and safety that she deserves. I think even if she stayed friends with Alex, who didn’t turn out to be evil, she would have inevitably, kind of accidentally gotten her to sign up for a weird pyramid scheme or something where they would lose all their money. I think she would be in a life of pain in a different way with Alex, and would be annoyed to death.
AVC: Now that you’ve tried your hand at playing a sociopath, do you have definitive tips and tricks for getting it right as a performer?
PH: [Laughs] I would just say to act like who you are on the inside and not who you are when you’re saying hi to your friends, talking on the phone with your family, or talking to your partner. Be the person who, when you’re standing on a platform waiting for the train or in a grocery store, when someone gets in front of you in line, there’s that voice saying “Bury him” or something. Listen to those voices.
AVC: The comparison to Moriarty is inevitable because he was obsessed with Sherlock in a way your character is with Charlie. Was that an inspiration for you, or did you go back to watch any Columbo episodes with memorable villains?
PH: I don’t know what the hell that is. [Laughs]. They told me I was going to be like Moriarty, and I was like, “Who the fuck is that? I don’t give a shit.” They were like, “You don’t know Sherlock Holmes? We are setting you up to go from Watson to Moriarty.” We got in a huge fight about it that day. I remember I had to wear a brace on my wrist because Tony picked me up and threw me through my trailer window, and then I came through the other green room trailer, the makeup trailer, and then just got in a huge fight with everyone there. Yeah, it was a rough day.
AVC: Now that sounds like it would make a good movie.
PH: True, but some things are personal. We live in a society that teaches us to capitalize on every story, and some of these stories are just for us and our friends who experience them, and I think that’s a beautiful thing.
AVC: Have you talked to Rian Johnson about returning for season three as Charlie’s ultimate nemesis since your character survived that car crash?
PH: You know, I can’t say because as I’m talking to you right now, there is a representative from Peacock who has an anti-tank rifle pointed at me and there’s a red dot laser right at my throat, which is such a strange, painful place to do it if you’re going to kill me. But don’t worry, I won’t say anything. All I can say is you’ll have to keep an eye out in the future.
AVC: Well, now you know how Charlie feels.
PH: [Laughs] Exactly, yeah, I’m feeling empathy and I hate it. I’m getting a perspective of how other people feel, which is not making me feel great.
