In season two of Paradise, Annie (Shailene Woodley) drops out of medical school and works as a tour guide at Graceland, which soon becomes her permanent residence when the world changes for good. Her relationship with Link (Thomas Doherty) leads to her thinking of starting a family, and her meeting Xavier (Sterling K. Brown) offers the promise of a place where they might actually be able to start over.
Awards Buzz spoke with Woodley about how it feels to be back in a dystopian world given that she’s been here – in a way – before:
“The dystopian world of Divergent was a very long time ago now so I haven’t really been in that mindset for over a decade. Paradise felt different because we were filming in Los Angeles, which is such a gift today, because there aren’t a lot of jobs in Hollywood itself at the moment. I’m from Los Angeles and I grew up acting here, so to film on the Paramount lot in and of itself felt like some kind of miracle and magic. The dystopian nature of the Paradise world didn’t really hit me with Annie until episode four when Xavier and Annie leave Graceland. But those first few weeks were really this gorgeously contained set of Annie and Elvis and at Graceland. What she did with her time and how she managed to stay sane despite being locked in this home for so long, the textural experience of acting off of inanimate objects and existing in this solo space before Link arrives, the character played by Thomas Doherty, was really very special and very unique.”
She expressed how she might fare in a similar situation to the one her character has to endure:
“I’d like to think that I would be as strong and willful and patient as Annie. I think that hardest thing for me would be the patience and the hope that one day the sun will rise again and the curtains will come down and I’ll be able to open the front door. The uncertainty and the unknowing, the ability to get over the fear of that, I think, is a true test of human character and it’s something that Annie did so well.”
Watch the video above to hear what unanswered questions she still has for Annie and reflections on past roles in The Spectacular Now, Big Little Lies, Three Women, and other projects.
Paradise is streaming on Hulu.
