Lena Headey is frustrated about the current political situation. “We just need to move on,” she told POPSUGAR. “We need to see meaning, not money. I don’t know if that will ever change.”
Frustration with political forces in general is certainly something that her “White House Plumber” Dorothy Hunt character can relate to — albeit for different reasons. The real-life Dorothy is a former CIA agent married to E. Howard Hunt, one of the main causes of the Watergate scandal. However, Dorothy never fully witnessed the consequences of her husband’s crimes when she died in a 1972 plane crash while leaving Washington DC. Since her death, rumors about the extent of her involvement in efforts to steal classified information from the Democratic Party have tarnished Dorothy’s legacy. According to The Washington Post, she was identified as a “hostess” who bribed the defendants to silence them about the scandal – and that was just the tip of the iceberg. Despite that, it’s clear that Dorothy is definitely not completely out of the loop.
Headey’s Dorothy is a shrewd housewife tasked with raising children alone, while her husband bravely undertakes tasks that often end in disaster. At the beginning of the show, she is a muted presence. However, at the end of the season, Dorothy was freed.
She said that portraying Dorothy allowed Headey to experience “the joy of playing someone…who was completely underrated”. “She’s more calculating and she plays a better game than anyone appreciates her, because she’s a woman and she’s in the back. Howard always shows his ego, very outstanding. sharp, as he would say.”
Howard, played by Woody Harrelson, is actually portrayed as a clumsy agent, overconfident and with too much power. As a CIA agent like his wife, Howard’s ego soars when he is tasked with becoming “the white house plumber,” or the party responsible for identifying information leaks. government news. In the end, his dedication to his work is a bit out of hand. Along with G. Gordon Liddy (played by Justin Theroux in this series), he became one of the parties responsible for the Watergate heist that ultimately brought down his beloved Nixon.
As Harrelson’s Howard navigates one silly task after another, Dorothy is always in the background, handling their daughter’s ongoing mental health crises and smiling during meals. painful evening with Liddy and his wife (who tended to listen to Adolf Hitler’s speech on their tape recorders).
Dorothy’s arc was a slow burn, and of course Howard never noticed his wife’s long-smoldering rage until she stepped out the door. “She was constrained by the era she lived in, and the expectations of a married woman and a mother. But Dorothy knew – she always knew – she was smart,” says Headey. best in the room”. “I speak for a lot of women [when I say] Women tend to take their time as they move forward, while men reach certain realizations. Mostly, when women say, ‘I’m done,’ [men] go, ‘What?’ That’s what happens in Howard and Dorothy’s marriage. She was like, ‘I’m done. I worked hard. You didn’t see it. I organized this together.’ And Howard was reeling from that revelation, but we hope to have seen Dorothy’s evolution to realize her truth.”
Seeing the completed film for the first time made her realize the stark contrast between her character and the film’s mostly male cast. While she plays Dorothy with a certain degree of dramatic seriousness, most of the time the men are in comedic mode and the effect is amazing. “It’s really just a frenzied bunch of goofy men, with a kind of sparkling smart woman in the middle who barely sees but watches it all,” Headey said with a laugh.
Headey played an underrated woman lurking behind the scenes of previous political conspiracies. As the cruel, ruthless Circei in “Game of Thrones”, she embodies someone who is willing to sacrifice anything to gain power.
Headey herself is also a mother interested in politics – although unlike Circei, who only wants to gain power, or Dorothy, who operates firmly from within political systems, instead, Headey actually seems to spend most of his time fighting the forces that are. She is a staunch refugee advocate, working with the International Rescue Committee to bring attention to the global refugee crisis. The British actor has also taken a political stance on her social media platforms, and after being shamed by mockers for posting a video of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in 2019, she He had a clear message. “I care about the climate, I care about my children and their future, I care about my friends and their children and their future, I care about the ongoing crisis. worldwide, humanitarian crisis,” she said in a video. at that time. “If that offends you, or you think actors have no place in this world to give their opinion – get lost. Unfollow me and I won’t cry.”
Like Dorothy and Circei, Headey loves her children — but while the descendants of her fictional characters often find themselves a little too close to explosive consequences, the real-life actress is more concerned with ensuring Telling her children, 13-year-old Wylie and 7, Teddy-year-olds not to overextend the toxic wasteland is political. “I see it as a crazy circus. It’s a dark street,” she said. “I’m into certain issues and topics, but it’s not a general political house. I talk to my kids about everything, because the world is crazy.”
She makes it clear that it is difficult for anyone of any age to live in a world where political motives are often rooted in greed. “It hurts, doesn’t it? Pain in the chest,” she said. “It’s a headache when you wake up and you’re like – it’s another day of dealing with greed and stupidity, and we have to line up and stay right.”
However, despite her doubts and fears, she will not stop fighting for a better world for the time being. “You have to be supportive. You have to speak up,” she said. “I think that’s probably what I teach my kids, hopefully more than anything. You have to be on the good side.”
“White House Plumbers” is currently streaming on HBO Max.
