In season three of Shrinking, Gaby (Jessica Williams) gets a new patient in Maya (Sherry Cola), who is initially quite resistant to therapy. The two soon see their relationship evolving into a friendship, though Maya is still struggling to find her footing and get back to a good place.
Awards Buzz spoke with Cola about the very welcome opportunity to find and inhabit this role:
“What a wonderful gift this character Maya was because I don’t see characters like this on TV very often. As someone who’s been in therapy myself for almost five years, I feel like society has always wanted Asian women to bottle their emotions and just not rock the boat, etc. I still have to have conversations with my mom about those things. It’s generational. It’s cultural. To see this character, to see me and Jessica Williams have these conversations on TV, I’m recognizing that that doesn’t happen often, so I very much feel just grateful and honored and thrilled to be a part of this series that has already touched so many people. It is about navigating grief and just finding joy in between and doing your best and learning that your best is enough. Even with Maya and her arc, as you see, Jessica trying to open her up and Maya has these moments of hope, and she has these moments of being self-deprecating. She has these moments of putting herself out there and being vulnerable. It’s like two steps forward and three steps back and that’s so human. That’s real life. Sometimes we don’t get a happy ending and we’re just left there to figure it out, what went wrong and what I could have done differently.”
“This storyline was so tender and, once again, human. I just feel so lucky that I got to bring Maya to season three. When this audition came in, I already felt that it was important and had potential of being impactful, and that just means the world to me already, the fact that this character will exist because it was written as an Asian woman. Like I said, I don’t see these characters. I don’t see Asian women in therapy on TV period! Come on! Mental health just entered the group chat in our community, so we have to show it so that people realize they can use the tools and the language. I think, with Maya, a big reminder for the audience is that you are not alone and you don’t have to be alone. I’ve been blown away by the response. People have felt so seen and heard through this character because everyone has been at some point in their lives. It’s impossible to make friends in your thirties. It just really means the world that I got to portray Maya.”
Watch the video above to hear about working with this cast and getting to be part of other great projects like Shortcomings, Joy Ride, and, of course, being the unsung glue that brought everything together on Nobody Wants This.
The first three seasons of Shrinking are streaming on Apple TV.
