As the wild card player in a series known for its twists, turns, and fake-outs, "Mr. Robot" star Portia Doubleday's been enjoying an actor's holiday in her role as Elliot Alderson's childhood friend, Angela Moss, who may or may not be assimilating into E Corp, the malicious corporate entity he opposes.And while things are routinely tense, dour, and unpredictable in Angela's often bleak world, the actress does what she can to keep things light when the cameras stop rolling, as she revealed to reporters during a press at the Television Critics Association press tour -- except for that time she and her grandmother got embroiled in a nasty real-life hacking scheme.
You've said that Angela never smiles. How difficult is that for you?
Portia Doubleday: It's hard -- I break all the time. As soon as the camera is off I have to get that energy out. I have to kind of cheer myself up a little bit. I actually do a lot of work to get there in terms of my relaxation and my posture and stresses in my face. I have to focus to maintain that energy.
She has an internal game going on. It's very unpredictable, especially this season. You don't know what she's going to do yet. The ending is unimaginable for Angela. Sam wouldn't tell me for awhile and I begged him! It is insane.
I think the reason why she's like that is because of these positive affirmations, which are so insane. Wanting to change the way you think and control yourself in that way. What are you hiding? What are you repressing to change yourself to be acceptable? What she's repressing, you eventually see how she starts to deteriorate throughout the season.
Is there any part of your character that you sometimes take home?
Yeah I do. There's something very heartbreaking about her and playing this character that is so internally tortured. I find that there's a lot of similarities with people that have talked to me about what it's like to be a corporate woman my age trying to garner some sort of power and respect and validation and what that looks like.
I would say the one thing that I take home, hopefully, is to be courageous and strong and committed and driven. I love that about her and I love that there's no guy that's she's pining for. From the first episode she said, "Don't take care of me. I'm not a damsel. I want my own journey."
I hate that the idea of a woman being independent is, like, a novelty. No, we're all equal, and I'm just a woman in the corporate setting. Those inequalities still do exist, and I love that my character is able to navigate that environment and show those things.
Tell us about the rapport among the cast.
I've never been a part of a cast like this where we take care of each other. There's such an insane camaraderie between all of us. Rami [Malek] are Christian [Slater] are dreams to work with. I think the most important trait an actor can have is not to be talented -- all those things are really great -- but to be a giving actor. It makes my job so much easier when all they do in my scenes is take care of me and constantly ask what I need for the scenes to be better because we want it to be great.
But, of course I tease them. I tease Rami all the time. I prank him. I put whip cream all over his trailer, inside. It was all over a jacket I asked if I could put whip cream on. I was hoping he'd walk in and be like, "She pushed the boundary and put it on this coat, and they're going to be so upset about it."
What was his reaction?
It wasn't that great. He was just like [shrugs shoulders]. He was just like "Why would you do that?" And I was like, "Great, there's whip cream everywhere and I have to clean it up."
Did he retaliate?
I think he did something to my phone once and it didn't work. He put glue on my office phone last season so I couldn't pick it up -- something trivial. He needs to do better than that!
So this is the best prank that Carly [Chaikin] and I want to do: What we want to do is we want to take the sides that we get every morning, have the office print different sides [dialogue pages] for him and have all these monologues in them and be like, "Oh my God, you have such a crazy day! Did you look at your sides?" We would never do that to Christian. He's on our side if we were going to do something like that.
Have you ever been hacked?
Oh my God, majorly! The day the show was picked up I was hacked. They called my grandma's phone and they knew where I was. I was supposed to be on a flight, so they thought I wasn't going to be reachable. My poor little grandma was running around trying to get money from banks and I happened to literally drive past her at this intersection. She was like, "You're alive! You're not kidnapped?!"
They called your grandma and they told her they kidnapped you and she had to pay to get you back?
Whatever was in her bank account. They told her what banks to go to. They knew where she was. They knew my information and where I lived ... I reported it and I haven't heard anything. It was crazy.
New episodes of "Mr. Robot" air Wednesdays on USA.
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