"Issues" w/ Linda Emond

This week we have Sam's Mom! Tune in as Actor Linda Emond joins the show.
From Straw Hut Media

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Straut Media. Hi, and welcometo Psychoanalyzing the Patient podcast. Join me
Stacy Nye and me Lindsay Jones aswe try to uncover each character's dynamics by
talking to experts in the field ofpsychology as well as members of the cast
and crew. So don't be late. Our session begins now. Okay,

(00:37):
here we are. We're back forepisode three of The Patient. And as
always, if somehow you are listeningto this podcast and you have not yet
watched episode three of The Patient,I always have to ask you, what
are you doing? Stop listening tothis right now and go watch the show
on Hulu. Then come back hitplay on this and we can pick up

(00:59):
from where he left off. Butfor those who have lots of the episode
episode three of The Patient, ifyou remember, at the end of episode
two, we saw a figure slowlydescending the stairs with a cane that was
going to confront Alan, and asepisode three begins, we realize that this

(01:19):
person is Candice, who is Sam'smother, and we understand that we are
in Candice's home. Sam has movedin here after he and his wife split
up. Although Alan is really tryingto not reveal any of the things that
go on in the therapy session.What the therapy session that he has been

(01:42):
kidnapped and forced to perform, butstill he's not revealing anything from this session
because he is a professional therapist.Candice actually reveals that she's a huge fan
of Alan's books and suggested that perhapsSam should seek him out for therapy,
But when Alan asks her to callthe police, she is very clear that

(02:05):
she cannot and will not turn inSam. She doesn't support him in terms
of what he has been doing,but she believes that he is trying to
stop and that if he receives thecorrect therapy from Alan, everything might turn
out okay. Sam laturns later withfood, and Alan admits that he did

(02:29):
in fact meet Sam's mother, andso you can tell already that this is
unsettling, and Alan sort of says, hey, what if we were to
have you and your mother in thetherapy session together? So that happens.

(02:53):
During the episode where Sam and Candiceare in the therapy together, it appears
that they don't make a whole lotof progress, and that Sam is really
not open to any interpretation other thanhis own in terms of how things went
in their lives. At another pointin the episode, we see Alan meditating

(03:15):
and thinking back on his life,thinking back specifically to the wedding of his
son, which was clearly an OrthodoxJewish wedding his wife. Alan's wife wants
to sing a song in celebration ofthe couple, but of course, in

(03:37):
Orthodox Judaism, women performing music isagainst the rules, and so while the
mother makes a really wonderful attempt tosing a song for the couple, a
number of men in the audience getup and leave the room as they are
offended by a woman performing music,and you can see that Ezra, their

(03:58):
son, looks deeply uncomfortable. Inthe middle of the therapy session, Alan
sort of challenges Sam to try tothink of his mother when he is having
these dark impulses to want to killpeople, and asks him to think of

(04:24):
his mother as a way of preventinghim from acting on his impulses to go
out and kill They ask if hewill be willing to do that, and
Sam doesn't respond. Finally, welearned towards the end of the episode that
Sam has been visiting the Greek restaurantwith the potential victim that he had discussed

(04:48):
previously with Alan on the episode thathe went back to that and just waited
outside the restaurant, did not confrontthe man, but clearly was thinking about
it, even though he did notact upon it as it yet. As
the episode ends, we are inbed with Alan and suddenly he is awakened

(05:13):
by the truck arriving. That isSam's truck, and we are horrified to
see that Sam is dragging a bodyup to the house. For a moment,
we're unclear whether that person is aliveor not, and then it's very
clear that that person is alive.Their eyes have been tape shut and they
have and then Sam brings that body, drags it into another room in the

(05:36):
basement, and slams the door,and that's the end of the episode.
Super creepy, So creepy. Samwas so menacing. He was so menacing
looking in that moment. Yeah,very menacing. Yeah, Like and you're

(05:57):
really like you really are, Like, oh my god, is this the
moment he snapped or is this isthis just another moment that Alan will have
to live with And the way thatepisode ends. I don't know about you,
Stacey, but I was like,what it's over? You gotta be
kidding me. What happens now.Well, they all seem to end on
a cliffhanger like that. It's verytrue. Yeah, And so it seems

(06:23):
to me like that Sam may nothave listened to Alan's advice about thinking of
his mother before acting out. Yeah. I mean, clearly he's got he's
dragging a body across the room.So yeah, clearly did not really heed
the advice very well, right ofnot doing anything that didn't work? Unclear

(06:48):
what will happen next. So Ithink that's a good lead in right to
our show today. It definitely is. Yeah, I mean, let's talk
about the lynchpin of this episodiode andwho really is the person who said all
of this in motion? Stacy tellus who our guest is today. Actress

(07:09):
Linda Emond is on the show today. She is a three time Tony Award
nominee and is the recipient of theLucille Rtel Award, an Outer Critics Award,
and an Obie. She plays CandiceFortner, Sam's mom on the show,
and we have so many questions forher. Hi, Linda, welcome.

(07:30):
I bet you have questions. Wedo, so many questions we do.
We are so excited to have youwith us today before we get into
The Patient, which is definitely thething we're going to talk about the most.
I just wanted to talk to youjust briefly, just because for my
own curiosity. When we were firstlooking up guests for this show, we

(07:51):
were like, do we have anyconnections to find people? And I work
in theater, It's basically my job, and so I was sort of doing
research stuff, and I have tosay, I was so excited to find
out that you seem to have kindof gotten your start in Chicago theater,
which is where I got my start. And I still actually you still have

(08:11):
a place in Chicago and go backthere and work all the time. But
I sort of feel like once youstart out in Chicago theater, you're sort
of always known as a Chicago theaterperson on some level from that point on,
and I just wanted to ask youa little bit about how you started
in Chicago and how that might haveled you to The Patient. I love
Chicago. I'm really glad that itwas at the beginning of my career and

(08:33):
I ended up there because right atthe time that I was leaving grad school,
Chicago was being pointed at as thehottest theater town in America. I
think both Time and Newsweek. Aroundthat time, Steppenwolf had won the Tony,
the regional Tony, and they werehad been doing such remarkable work for
a long time. And so Iknew that I'd been doing all this training

(08:56):
in theater, and it seemed weirdto me to go to la and because
my master's were he was in theater, and then and New York. I
had a misguided notion that if Iwent to New York, I would probably
just work out of town all thetime. But all these arrows were pointing
to Chicago. So I went toChicago, and it is a great It's
a great city anyway, period.I love it still. I get there

(09:18):
a lot. But it is agreat place to start as an actor because
it has a remarkable theater community.It has a great non at company community
of non equity, which means there'sthis really great underbelly of fantastic work that's
being done all the time, andthat feeds into the equity productions, and

(09:39):
oftentimes I'm sure it is better thanthe equity productions, but you know,
there's this there's a lot of workbeing done. And also Chicago, with
its Industrial Roots is a very feeton the ground kind of city, city
of broad shoulders, as Sandbrick said, and I think there's a a great
work ethic there, and so asan actor to have started out out there,

(10:00):
you do the work, you tella good story, you go home.
There's not a lot of expectation ofwill we go to Broadway or will
this be whatever? Will I becomereally famous. You're really doing the work
to do the work. And that'swhat I started with and loved about it
and still love about it, andI think it's stuck with me all these
years. That's really cool. Ithink one of the things that I have

(10:22):
responded to the most working in Chicagotheater is it's a super supportive community.
It really you know, people arereally there for one another. And the
emphasis, like you said, becausenobody goes to Chicago to work in theater
to get rich, you know whatI mean, or to find stardom.
They're really there to do the workwith one another. That there is an

(10:43):
emphasis on the acting company really asan ensemble. You know that they're really
like a group working together. Andso when you look at a show like
The Patient, that really feels itin one way it feels very theatrical.
It feels kind of like a playto a large set. And it also
feels like I'm watching a company ofactors of sorts, you know what I

(11:07):
mean That it's not an assembled setof guest stars. It really is a
group of people in a very tightknit sort of group, sort of bringing
this story to life. Do youfeel that theater connection at all when you're
working on the show. Yeah,absolutely, I think for the reasons that
you said. By the way,Chicago also has it has more and more
film television stuff now too, sopeople are doing that there. But I

(11:30):
do I feel like the fact thatalmost everything I did was on one set.
Basically a ton of what Steve didwas on one set. You know,
we were all in that basement fora long time, and again Steve
especially, but it felt like that. And also yes, because it was
such a tight small group that youknow, different shows, you're working with

(11:52):
a different number of people, butit was very tight. I only worked
with Steve and a little with Donaldand Emily who played you know, his
ex wife at one point, butalmost all of it was really with Steve,
and so, yeah, you buildup a rapport and it does feel
very tight knit. The other thingis that the level of the scripts,
because the Jays, as they're known, those scripts are extraordinary and they're extremely

(12:20):
tight and concise, and you don'tscrew around with them. You don't need
to. You say what's there onthe page, and they've done a lot
of the work for you. Andthat level of writing is something that I
have been lucky enough to have inso much of my theater work through the
years. So it was a veryfriendly way to work all around. Excellent.

(12:41):
All right, So the Jays,Just to clarify, the Jays are
Joel Fields and Joe Weisberg, whoare the creators of the show and the
executive preser. Yes, thank you, thanks, Lindsay. I just I
just want to comment on that becausethere's a lot of talk in the community
about how or the episodes are andsome people don't like that, they want

(13:03):
more, they feel cheated. ButI love it. I think just what
you were saying. I mean,I I don't really know anything about how
to write a screenplay. Let mejust say, but I love that the
episodes are. They're sure. Everyword matters, every word, every line,
every nuance is relevant. There's nofluff going on, and so I

(13:26):
think that everything that goes on isreally like, you know, a real
nugget of you know, information.And because I'm the psychologist and I'm psychoanalyzing
every single word that happens on theshow, I think it's really great.
You know, they cut. Theyalso cut a lot that's really common in
film and television. You tend toovershoot a bit. And they also found

(13:52):
so they streamlined it even more.There are a couple there are a couple
of scenes that I did, butI think everyone did. But there are
a couple of scenes I did thataren't there. And within the scenes there
often are little excisions, and sothey really made it even tighter. But
I agree with you, lindsay thatI well, I've heard Stacy like you
that I have friends of mine whosaid they're screaming at the television when it's

(14:13):
over because they say, to cutit out. This is unfair, and
they are upset. But the peoplethat I know are upset in a good
way. And also someone's one ofmy friends said the other day, which
I think is so true, thatthere is I don't like, frankly like
as satisfying as it can be tobinge watch something. I don't really get

(14:35):
that. I given that the natureof this kind of television, there's a
great thing that happens, and hereI am with a lot of theater background,
and that's something you sit down andyou watch it at the end.
But there's a great benefit to theway television is that you have to wait,
and that it allows for your systemto absorb everything. There's usually enough

(14:58):
of a recap in the next step, so too, you know. But
I think, especially in a caselike this, there is all the more
suspense and pain and frustration and tensionthat's built up because you've got to wait
and think about it and wonder aboutit and be in some cases worried about

(15:20):
it. You know what is comingaround the corner next. That I think
benefits to show a lot. AndI love that they experimented with having it
be not an hour long drama buta less than half hour drama. I
think it's a great experiment that's reallypaying off. The show definitely seems so
far every episode ends on like acliffhanger that is always like ah, what

(15:46):
you know, it's you're always wantto know what's happening next, So they
really seem to have have perfected theidea of giving us just enough to get
involved and yet leave us wanting.And you know, they did that even
more that I think it's fair tosay this that the episode that I show

(16:07):
up in really is obviously I'm atthe very end of two, but you
don't know it's me episode one,the second episode, but I show up
really in the third episode. However, as written, that scene that's at
the top of the third episode wasactually at the end of the second episode
originally, And so the cliffhanger wasthat you were left with saying, like,
what the what she's his mother andshe's living upstairs, And instead they

(16:32):
create even more tension by you onlyseeing someone coming down the stairs and the
poker. And I thought it wasa brilliant choice because once again you're creating
even more tension by saying first what, who what, and then you get
the while up of finding out thatit's his mom. So that's my first
question is why do you have thispoker, Like, are you like maybe

(16:56):
afraid of who's down there, likethat you have to protect yourself from whoever
might be down there. No,she knows who's down there. She absolutely
knows that it's for sure. Okay, So yeah, that's what I thought
too, is when you come downthe stairs and you see a man chained
up in your basement. What Ifound almost right away, what I was

(17:18):
struck by, is how totally unphasedyou are by that picture. That you're
just like, I'm surprised. Youseem completely like you. I don't want
to say you feel okay about it, but you seem like you have.
You are not panicked, You're notlike, oh my god, let me
help you get you free. Thereare none of the typical reactions to seeing
a person chained in a basement,would normally be no. But she doesn't

(17:41):
know he's there. I think that'sactually clear in the writing of it,
but that she talks about how sherecommended she knows who he is. She
in fact, he's written one ofher favorite books. Clearly she's the one
who recommended him and also recommended therapyperiod, and so she knows he's done

(18:03):
this. And so the poker toanswer your question, Stacy, is I
think there's still a fear of couldhe get She hasn't seen the setup,
so she doesn't really know. Sheknows he's chained I'm sure she knows he's
locked down there, but is hecapable of has he broken the chain?
Has is he capable of something orwhatever? And I think it's a sign

(18:26):
also that she knows how awful thisis, that it is awful. So
I like the fact that the pokerin her hand is in some ways conflicted
to her her. You know,we loved the idea, and I love
the idea and really work to havethe idea of that. One of the
oddest things is that she is normalquote unquote. She's not, of course,

(18:49):
she's totally out of her mind,but you can imagine her, you
can imagine her outside in the worldwith a regular job, because she has
one, and you know, wecame up with one and know like what
she did and everything else. Thenall of that, you know it is
true. But yes, I thinkshe knows when she absolutely not. I
think she knew knew when she camedown the stairs that she was there.

(19:11):
She knew he was there the wholetime. All right, So now we're
going to move into the part ofthis podcast where we're going to attempt to
ask you questions about your character andabout the show. But we definitely do
not want to accidentally get you toreveal any spoilers of anything that we don't
necessarily know as of episode three ofThe Patient. So I've come up with

(19:32):
a plan of how to do this, which is that every week on the
podcast, we're going to take whateverthe food is that was served in that
week's episode, and that will bethe safe word. So if we ask
you a question and you're like,you feel uncomfortable answering that question, this
week's safe word is pastizio. Thatthis week's pastizio, which is a Greek

(19:52):
pasta, served to Steve Carell's characterafter Sam goes back to the restaurant to
check on his potential victim. Iwould like to interject and say that one
of my favorite little things that wasmissing from the show was taken out was
a small scene that I had withSteve in this episode. Maybe it might
have been in the next episode,doesn't matter because it's not there, okay,

(20:14):
in which I won't even tell youthe little interaction we had, but
it was another in a line ofodd interactions. And as I'm leaving to
go up the stairs, he asksme, do you have any more of
the pastizio? And I say no, I ate it. I'm sorry,
I ate it. I'm sorry,I ate it. No, and that

(20:34):
was one of my favorite things.I was really sad to have a missing
But okay, so carry on.Pastizio is the safe word. I've got
it. Thank you. I justwant to say that anecdote has literally made
this entire podcast. Thank you.That is awesome. Um, okay,
so like this, this is mybig question for you with this character,

(20:56):
which is you play the other ofa serial killer, and you seem on
some level aware of what he iscapable of, even if it's unclear how
much you know as to what hehas done, and that you see that
he is seeking help and you arerecommending help for him. And we also

(21:22):
know from Sam's backstory that he blamesthis on his father, which is technically
would have been your husband, yourcharacter's husband. So I guess my biggest
question is how responsible do you thinkthe mother feels for this situation? I

(21:45):
mean, I feel like when wesee like mass killers, for example,
people who do horrible things, oneof the questions that always gets thrown out
right away is what was the parentinglight? How are they brought up?
Who could be or where were theyyeah or where were they? Yeah,
it's true, and so I guessin terms of playing your character, how

(22:11):
much of that do you factor intowhat you're doing fundamentally? Lindsay and Stacy,
I am not going to answer thisquestion. But the reason the reason
I'm not going to, I mean, I will in a sense, but
I won't in a sense, andthat's because I think that ache for you
to understand it is inherent to thedrama of the story, and that there

(22:33):
are things that will be made clearer. But I think that there I can
tell you, and I think youwon't be surprised by this. There is
not going to be some it's wrappedup in a nutshell, you know kind
of thing. And that's partly becauseof the nature of the human mind,
the nature of human emotions, thenature of lives lived that are wounded and

(22:56):
or damaged, and how the psycheresolves that in order to carry on.
What does happen in a child ina house in which there was an extremely
violent man and who was violent toboth of them, but who was extremely
violent and how did you cope?And yes, there is fault all around

(23:23):
in a variety of places, butthere is no particular finger that can be
pointed specifically, you know, it'sfar more of a mess than that.
Life is far messier than that,and so I was really interested with the
Jays the writers in having it beI mean, you know, one of

(23:45):
the one of the strange things aboutsam and also as we know of some
people who commit horrible crimes, istheir ability to seem quite normal in the
rest of their life and yet theyare harboring a terrible, terrible secrets.
I think it's what makes this storyall the more terrifying as you watch it.

(24:08):
But it's true and we know itout there that it exists, that
there are people who just flip andyou there are some stories that you hear
people will go, oh, well, I knew it was going to happen,
or he was always weird or whatever, and that is the case.
I think with Samsum there's some ofthat that shows up. But I think
also that part of the scariness ofthis are the ways in which we all

(24:32):
find a way through ignore deny,and the Jays are taking that to an
enormous extreme by having in something toodoes these things that are on a horrific
level. But I think as itgoes through and you learn more about all
of the characters. I think someof those things will will become clear.
But as I said, the reasonI don't want to go into exactly my

(24:56):
particular reasons or the history that Ibuilt is because I think absolutely part of
the story is in your journey asa viewer with that sense of madness and
that you can't quite get your headaround me the Candice, I should say,
as a character, and that's partof the tension of the story,

(25:17):
you know. And I want tosay, like, I really am so
glad that you're here, because again, as as a therapist, I really
wanted to talk to the mom,but also as a mother. So I'm
I'm watching this show and I'm relatingto Candice as a mother, and I'm
also thinking about her as as asI'm a therapist, and I've done plenty

(25:41):
of family sessions. Let me justsay so, And mothers, traditionally in
therapy have gotten a very bad rap, right, Mothers have been blamed for
years and years and years, andwe don't you know, moms, I
think ninety nine point nine percent ofthe time are just doing the best they
can. And so I'm watching yourportrayal and I want to say, I

(26:03):
think that you do a really greatjob of both being a little creepy.
But I sympathize with her because asa mother, I think about, well,
what would I do. I wouldlike to think of my child did
this, I would turn him in. But I can see that she wants
to protect him and she thinks thatshe's doing the right thing. Candice thinks

(26:26):
that she's doing the right thing here, you know, to help him get
better. And you know, wemoms sometimes think we're doing the right thing,
and maybe we're doing the completely wrongthing. And as a therapist,
I appreciate how you know also thatyou must have been, you know,
traumatized in this relationship and you're you'redoing the best you can. Um.

(26:49):
One thing I want to say isthat the you know, there's there's references
in that first scene to the factthat she she you know, you can
infer that she sought help, becausein her own way, she never says
something about specifically therapy, but althoughI do think she probably did, But

(27:10):
she talks about her books and thatshe read all these books, and in
our discussions in history, she reada lot of them. And it just
so happens that doctor Strauss is oneof her absolute favorites. You know,
absolutely, she was greatly helped byit, she felt like, and so
there was a desire on her partobviously to figure out some of what's going

(27:34):
on and what was going on andwhat was going on with herself. And
so she recognizes and admittedly does inthat first by those references, I think
to the fact that she well andshe clearly believes in therapy for sure.
Yeah, I mean that seems clearthat by the way that she seems so

(27:56):
present in the therapy scene in whichshe's asked to attend, although it does
seem like Sam is quite resistant tothis idea, and then once she begins
sort of offering her ideas that Samseems to kind of shut them down fairly
quickly. Yeah, I think sheloves that therapy session. Can I just

(28:19):
say, I mean, I thinkthe fact that she's in a therapy session
with doctor Strauss, doctor Alan Strauss, who wrote like her favorite or one
of her favorite therapeutic books with herson, you know, I think this
is sort of her dream in away, and of course the we all

(28:41):
know it's utterly bizarre because she's sittingthere in the therapist is chained up to
the floor and it's all insane.But if you if you try to remove
that, which of course is whatshe obviously does an enormous amount in her
life, is an attempt to compartmentalize. And we all do this, and

(29:03):
I think that as maybe one getsmore and more unhealthy, you compartmentalize more
and more and more. And ofcourse you're doing that to protect yourself sometimes
either from your inability to face thingsyourself and or your fears, your trauma,
your you know, whatever it is. But she obviously does an awful

(29:26):
lot of that. Yeah, andI mean it makes me wonder. I
mean, I will tell you,Linda. An episode one of our podcasts,
we interviewed a psychologist who is veryclear with us that as far as
he knew, that he had neverheard of anyone who had who had been
a serial killer who could be curedthrough therapy. And then in episode two

(29:49):
of our podcast, we had anotherpsychologist who was an expert in malevolent creativity,
and we asked him could a personbe converted from when who was interested
in malevolent creativity and move over tobenevolent creativity? And he seemed equally convinced
that that was probably not possible,which then brings me to the question,

(30:11):
which is, what do we thinkCandice's endgame goal is? Is it too
hopefully have her son cured and oneday walk amongst men without any difficulty.
Is it to have him ultimately commithimself to care? What do we think

(30:33):
what are her goals for her son? Do we think for him to be
cured? Absolutely, for him tolive a normal life. I mean,
I think that's just a completely understandable, primal maternal you know, desire,
Yeah, for her son to havehis best life. But I also think

(30:56):
that, you know, is shecompletely convinced of that on other levels and
deeper levels, I don't know,or maybe we'll find out, maybe we
won't, But but the fact is, and also, you know, does
doctor Strauss think so? You know, I think we have to remember also,
yes, the circumstances that everyone's in, So the actions that he is
taking, for example, you know, nothing should be taken completely at face

(31:21):
value because for him especially, thestakes are so high, and he's obviously
trying to save his life. SoI was always fascinated in working with Steve
on at and or in watching thework, and certainly in watching the final
product was all of those amazing,because I think Steve is just dropped a

(31:44):
brilliant in it, and the choicesthat he makes constantly leaving us guessing,
wondering, aching at what is truethat he's saying, what's not? You
know, what is he having tosay? There's so much that he had
to submerge, you know, inhis self. Steve talked about he's just

(32:07):
one of the nicest people on theplanet too, by the way, but
he talked about how exhausted he wasfrom doing it, and part of it
was that, you know, hemay seem in some of those seem some
of the scenes anyway, like there'sa relative calm in a sense, or
that he sort of has it togetherand is working through as a therapist.

(32:29):
But I am rather certain that that'snot what he was feeling inside. You
know, he's locked up and thinkingthat he might be be dead in any
second. And as you say,I wonder too, did does he recognize
that this is not solvable? Really, you can't solve this, you know,
these people are too far gone.And so that's his version of that,

(32:52):
And yes, what is Candice's versionof that? You know? But
um, but I do think clearlythat for me, it was there was
ever a question of I think onsome great level of you know, big
sky dreams. She absolutely wishes andhopes that her husband could have a I
mean her husband. Oh that wasweird, YadA, get into it,

(33:15):
Stacy. Um, but you knowthat that her son could could have could
somehow be cured. Of course,that's what she wants. So I think
you just raised a really interesting point, Linda that because the solute one of
the solutions that he offers is well, maybe you won't act out in this

(33:37):
way for your mom. And I'msure that Candace loved that idea, you
know. Um, And yet I'mI don't think people can do that.
I mean, I've treated clients forthirty years, and no one can get
better for their mom. But givenwhat you just said, it makes me
wonder because he really needs to continueto you know, like maybe maybe Candice

(34:05):
is his freedom, is his ticketto freedom, and um, if he
can you know, try to helpSam but also kind of befriend Candice in
some way, maybe this will help. And there's a moment, so so
there's that, but there's this momentwhen he asks her for the key,

(34:28):
and um, she says, Idon't have the key, and I don't
believe her. She's a little dismissiveat that moment um. It seems like
she's a little defensive. I thinkshe knows where the key is. You
don't have to tell me, butI think I think Candice knows where the
key is. I think that's agreat moment of encapsulating a little bit anyway,

(34:52):
that you were picking up on somethingwith me, and that no matter
what, it's a bit of anexcuse, you know what I mean,
because to just use that and go, well, I don't have the key
is I mean, she even knowsthat she's saying that that that's not really
answering the question he's getting at.You know, they're frankly obviously a lot
of things she could do to changethe situation, and I think she knows

(35:15):
that in the in the moment,but that's the one that she says to
basically as an excuse to kind ofjust get out of that moment anyway,
you know, and don't have thekey, so I can't I can't unlock
you. And so to me,it even makes sense that she maybe doesn't
have the key. I'll leave thatagain up to the audience to guess what
they think or not. But thatBut the thing is is that in my

(35:37):
response to it, I think Iwas trying to lean toward the idea that
she recognizes though, that he's he'sasking a bigger question, which is for
her help. And you know,she's at this moment anyway not going to
give it for the sake of herson, and the key itself is just
one thing. But you know,so maybe she actually doesn't have the key,

(35:57):
as my point, but that isshe recognizes that that isn't she wouldn't
get the key anyway, you knowwhat I mean, right right, She
wouldn't do it anywhere. Her responseis a little defensive though or something,
and so, um, yeah,maybe I had an interesting time. I
had an interesting time because you knowwhen I when I, um, I

(36:17):
did read for this part. Youknow, I did audition for this part,
and it was really of the restof the story. They talked me
through some of it, but theydidn't even have all the scripts written yet,
you know, so some some ofit was that and some of it
was saved, and I I didn'tyet understand completely what her purpose was going

(36:37):
to be in the whole of thestory and also, yes, it was
very tricky to me to find theline of I knew that they had written
some humor in it, and Ialso knew there was this normalcy they were
going for. And I remember whenI read with them and then with Steve
we had it was all zoom,of course, but we did what's called

(36:59):
sort of a chemistry read, whichis kind of funny to do a chemistry
read over zoom, but we did, and we did the scenes and we
sort of worked on the scenes fora bit. It was very tricky,
and we tried them in. Iwas given direction in every different direction,
and some of that was because Ithink we all knew it was tricky to
find what that balance was. Andat the end of meeting them, I

(37:21):
even said to them quite candidly,which could have cost me the job.
It didn't, but I said,quite candidly, I want to tell you
I don't yet get it completely.I don't yet know how to do this.
I think I can and I canfigure it out, but I don't
completely know what you've written is somethingreally tricky and complicated And it wasn't.
And they gave me the job,which was great, but it wasn't really

(37:42):
until between those meetings and and doingthis, getting showing up to do some
preproduction stuff in rehearsals, and thenultimately the show that I discovered it and
I played around a lot. Andthough I don't want to tell you you
know, exactly what I found,it would give some things away. But

(38:05):
I do think, Stacy, thatyou're picking up on things that I think
we're are quite purposeful on my partabout having her be someone who is a
lot of a person wedged into anormal life and given the extremities of what

(38:27):
she's gone through in her life andgoes through still with her son and a
serial killer. I think that hercoping mechanisms work for her at times better
than others. I think there isa self centeredness to her and even indulgence
in her which is pretty intense,and that therefore I think that even doctor

(38:51):
Strauss can say something to her.I think there is some defense. I
think, like I always thought whenI walked down those stairs at the first
time, and I don't even introducemyself at first, he says I'm doctor
Strauss, and I apologize and saidI'm you know, I'm Sam's mother.
That I think she knows when shesays, I'm Sam's mother that you know,
that's kind of insane. I thinkshe knows that. I think she's

(39:15):
half prepared therefore for him to berude to her or to say, you
know, you're a crazy bitch orsomething. You know what is going on,
And the fact that he doesn't,which is of course very smart on
his part, also throws her offguard a little bit but makes her able
to open up. But every nowand then when he gets into realms of

(39:39):
things where he pokes a little bit, Yeah, I think she can go
to a place of defensiveness because Ithink actually probably in her daily life,
I think she probably has a lotof that kind of thing. I think
she's probably very I think there isa victim aspect to her victimize and she

(40:00):
really is a victim. And alsothere's a part of her that has fallen
into that world. And I thinkin her reading there's probably ways in which
she's gone down a road of selfindulgence, because I think some of that
makes sense to me that that iswhat can help her to overlook some of

(40:22):
the common sense aspects of I mean, anybody obviously who has too limited a
view of the world is going tomiss the you know, literally the larger
perspective of what is going on,and that limited view can sometimes be because
the cameras all are turned inside,turned toward oneself, and I think for

(40:44):
her, the cameras are turned verymuch to herself and her son and making
it much harder for her to puteverything that's happened into some kind of perspective.
But I will add that I alsothink it's maybe impossible for her to
open the camera lens let's say wide, because I think it would kill her,

(41:05):
you know. I mean, Ithink that's the thing that your story
of talking about creating a character whilethe writing of the episodes we're still in
process, is fascinating to me becauseyou're really sort of building this character arc
without necessarily even knowing where it's headed, and you really have it's a huge

(41:27):
sort of leap of faith, Ithink, to jump into that and to
just sort of make it make upthe parts of your character's personality based on
the revelations as they come through thescript, and much in the same way
that we're seeing those revelations as viewers. In the end, you do you

(41:50):
remember a moment or something that theJay's might have said to you that really
made it click for you, whereyou really thought, Okay, I get
it now, I know what I'mdoing. Yeah. No, I was
by myself, and it was Iwas still in New York where I live,
and I knew that they are suchgood writers, and I could tell

(42:15):
that it was in there even ifI didn't yet have the story. I
felt like they know, they doknow something fundamental about what she is,
even though you know, we wereall still kind of finding it and where
it sat. But I did.I just kept experimenting for over a period
of days in this one point whereI just thought I have to crack through

(42:35):
something here, and I experimented withjust saying her. I can't remember how
many episodes I had by that time, maybe six or something, and I
just kept going through all the scenesand I just kept reading them, and
I would even just experiment and readingthem in different ways. And it actually
was a day in which I sortof went for all of the humor and

(42:59):
made her you know what. Iknew she couldn't end up being completely but
I made her really sort of ridiculousactually in her self involvement, and I
made her kind of ridiculously, youknow, the kind of person for whom
everything just overwhelms her and well,you know that kind of thing. And
it was it wasn't it, exceptthere was something in it that I recognized

(43:24):
was her, And I think,to answer your question, it was that
in it was the amount of actuallyself involvement, her own, you know,
self involvement in herself. That madeit start to make sense to me
because that began and it was reallyit was like, I could have made

(43:47):
the part really funny, like ithas the potential to be that. And
although it's funny in places because theywrote some of that in for sure,
there are parts of it that areso audacious and ridiculous that they're there.
But I do think they're there asthis sort of pressure cooker kind of internal
stuff that's going on with a humanbeing that is, you know, kind

(44:12):
of ridiculous. But she's deeply,deeply self involved. Wait, does that
make sense when I'm saying, actually, it's kind of poetic in a way
that in order to find your characteron a show about material killers, you
have to go to an extreme,which is basically what the whole show is.

(44:34):
No, I'm totally I'm totally wowedby what you said, Linda,
because I think that was I mean, I just think that was the totally
right way to go, because ifyou had made her funny, I don't
think we would have had any sympathyfor her. And it's really really important
that we kind of, you know, we have to have a little bit

(44:55):
of sympathy for Candice because she's inthis position and it's really easy to hate
her and be so mad at herand just say just unlock him already.
But you know, she's deeply woundedherself, and you had to find some
you had to find some way tofor you. I mean, again,
I don't know anything about acting,but for you, for you to be

(45:17):
able to connect to her so thatyou could play her authentically. Yeah,
there are there are There are placesto where they are in in upcoming seasons
where there's even just a single linehere there where it it's encapsulated. It's
suddenly encapsulated. And as I wasdoing that thing of reading through and was
reading in a particular way, therewere certain lines that just suddenly came to

(45:39):
wildlife. And so it's a meetingof you know, the creative process basically
with a great piece of text andyou land on something that opens a door,
and that's what it feels like.And then that door opens, another
door opens another door. And thatwas for me a turning point was recognizing
that and was recognizing and again thereasons for the self involvement a kind of

(46:06):
either well, I'll just say selfinvolvement, you know, can be tragic
and or deeply awful and are deeplypainful and or because of trauma, and
or there can be many reasons whyhuman beings go to certain levels of that
where they just can't. It's verydifficult for them to see beyond themselves or
beyond a very small world that theybecome very attached to that they feel okay

(46:30):
in. And I do think thatCandice's deep love of her son, how
much guilt is there is I thinkto be answered and clarified as time goes
on, maybe, but her abilityto even deal with levels of that or
what she allowed her son to gothrough and that how you know, all
those are questions that are out thereand that certainly had varying levels of impact

(46:54):
along the way. But the placethat she feels like things are possible bow
which goes back to when you askme Stacy earlier. You know, what
would she what does she really want? Is when you live in the world
of what's possible, you know,you just ache for some kind of normalcy
and for those who are closest toyou and that you love, and that's

(47:15):
what she aches for desperately. Wow. Yeah, Wow, I didn't realize
there was so much psychology and acting. There's a lot. Oh yeah,
no, you have to know,you know, no, when you come
in a door or any door,you know. I mean, there are
zillion different ways of studying acting ordoing acting or but I think some friends

(47:42):
of mine were just saying this,but I've heard that I've had this conversation
with people through the years. We'resort of surprised that the that the psychiatric
world, the therapeutic world doesn't studyactors more because it's absolutely an enormous amount
of what we do. Just theprocess of what we do is we is,
you know, strange, and thefact that we can inhabit another person
in a sense, the fact thatwe create these other beings with yes specific

(48:07):
psyches. Because when you again,there's very different ways of creating characters,
and I use different ways in differentprojects, and there's very different ways of
working and even basic you know,obviously there are tons of different ways of
teaching acting and methods of acting,let's say, but fundamentally, there's certain
things about you know, there's astory, and why are you in the

(48:29):
story? What is your responsibility andthe telling of the story. And then
on a smaller level, when youwalk through a door, yes, what
do you want? What is itthat you are seeking in that? Because
that happens to all of us wewalk in a door. And obviously stories
for dramatic or comic purposes are storiesthat are more elevated, where the stakes
are higher, and this particular storythe stakes are wildly high. But you

(48:52):
know, yeah, when Candice walks, when Candace agrees, when she hears
him call her and agrees in thatmoment to go ahead and in that door
and go down there, which Samsays later she doesn't usually come down come
down there? You know, whatis it that's in her mind? And
as an actor you are you're workingfrom all of those steps. You also,
frankly, it helps you to thinkof all the things around that too,

(49:15):
by the way, like what wasshe just doing, what was she
doing upstairs? What was she doinglast night? What was she doing when
doctor Strouss was screaming? She wasin the house. He was screaming that
first night, we know he was. You know, what is she doing?
So you have all of that thatyou build those things in and then
yes, you come through the door, and then you're thinking, what is

(49:37):
she expecting? What might she see? What might happen? Yes, when
she introduces herself, is he goingto just scream at her? What's he
going to do? And all ofthat. You take these steps as you
move forward and make sense of ascene that carries you the end of why
that scene good writing though, eachscene is very purposeful in taking steps forward
in the story. So as anactor, you're trying to see how am

(49:59):
I part of that to take itforward? What needs to be told in
this scene to take this straight forward? And yes, an enormous amount of
psychological emotional journey, though again itvaries, you know, project to project
and material to material, but thisone was obviously packed with a psychological emotional

(50:23):
journey for all of us. Wow, sure, that's great, What will
happen next? I think this doesset us up really well for the next
episode of The Patient. We're soexcited to have you with us today,
Linda, thank you so much forspeaking with us. This has been great.
You're welcome. I'm really really Iwas really meaningful to be a part
of the show. It's such anincredible group. I think you will be

(50:46):
all the more taken with the showas it goes on. I felt as
I watched it. It's hard tosay this because the show is so good
already, but I think it justgets better and better and more and more
interesting and challenging and thrilling and sadand awful and also you know, all
those things as it goes along.But so I envy you the ability to

(51:09):
to be watching it with fresh eyes. Thank you so much. We really
enjoy talking to you, and goodluck with the show and all the other
projects that you're working on. Thankyou so much, you guys, it
was really a pleasure to talk toyou. To take care of Linda.
Thank you. That was freaking amazing. I loved every minute of that interview

(51:38):
with Linda. Yeah, I thinkthat I there were so many things I
loved about it, and I lovedthat she talked about One of the things
I loved was the way she talkedabout the psychology of acting. Which I
had to anticipated. Yeah, Imean it's it's definitely you know, I

(52:01):
think one of the things that youyou learn being an actor, and I'm
saying this as a former actor myself, is that it really is the study
of human beings and you have toyou have to figure out their logic in
order to be able to portray it. And I thought she did an amazing
job of really explaining not only hersort of philosophy, but her her process.

(52:25):
And also I thought it was reallyinteresting that this show clearly wasn't easy,
you know what I mean, Like, it wasn't the kind of show
where an actor just walks in andfeels like, oh, yeah, I
totally know what's going on here.You know that that really took some work
to find it with that work hasreally really paid off in these incredibly rich

(52:45):
and nuanced performances. Well, andI really appreciated the part of the conversation.
So I made this comment about whenhe when Alan asks for the keys
and she says, I don't havethe keys, and I was picking up
on something in her tone, andyou know, because I'm psychoanalyzing it,

(53:09):
right, and um, I lovethat she said I was right that that
that I was picking up on somethingand um, and then we had this
whole conversation about how she had toand you kind of just alluded to that
she had to figure the character out. She I would imagine, she had
to find some sympathy for the character, and how it didn't happen right away

(53:35):
for her, and she told usabout the moment when it happened, and
I just never like knew that,you know, why would I? But
yeah, that was really fascinating.Yeah, I mean I feel like that
right there was really like why ifif we were to go out and people
are saying like, oh, yeah, I watched the show, why should

(53:57):
I listen to your podcast? That, in a nutshell, is why you
should listen to the podcast, becausewe're getting this information that we wouldn't you
wouldn't necessarily get from the show.You your hunch on psychoanalyzing that moment and
being able to confirm that with somebodyis such a cool thing. Also,
I'm going to say my own personaltriumph, which I know is trivial compared
to that, but my own sortof personal triumph here is that my safe

(54:22):
word idea. As stupid as thatidea was actually led to us learning of
a cut scene from the show.Now, how else are you going to
figure this? Right? Right?So that was amazing. Yeah, I
definitely felt like, Okay, Ihave I have really accomplished something here.

(54:43):
I feel very proud of myself andI feel like I can officially call myself
a podcast host now that we've gottena cut scene from the show, yeah,
into our podcast. Wait, lindsayit just occurred. Something just occurred
to me that I can't believe Ihadn't thought of before. These actors actually
got to get that really good food. It's okay, right, okay,

(55:07):
but now do you know about actorsand food? Do you know how that
normally works? No, don't spoilit for me, okay? Or none?
All right? So, so thething is is that that seems like
an awesome idea, Like the foodlooks great on the show, and you
think, like that looks delicious.I would like some of that. And

(55:29):
we even have a scene where Ican't where Linda's character says, is there
any more that pastizio? It looksgreat? And um, Steve Correll's character
Alan says, no, I ateat all, Like you have every reason
to believe that food is delicious.But what you don't know is that,
in the way that UM shows arefrequently shot, you know, you have

(55:50):
to take multiple takes sometimes, youknow, it can be many many takes
of eating food. And so whathappens is there's something in the business that's
called the bite and smile, andthat is an actor term. And what
that term means is that if youever watch a commercial and you see somebody

(56:13):
take a bite of something and thenthey look at the camera and they smile
and they're like, oh, it'sso good, what you don't know is
that as soon as the camera shotends of that shot, that actor usually
spits that food out immediately into abucket and does not actually eat it,
because otherwise, if they have toeat food twenty five takes, by the

(56:34):
twentieth take, they're no longer goingto be able to even accurately represent that
that food is tasty, because theywill be physically ill from eating food.
So chances are that they probably tastedthat food, but that they probably didn't
eat that much of it because theydidn't want to get sick of it.
I mean, I hate to saytunfil eating disordered in nature UM and you

(57:01):
totally no, no, Okay,so maybe that's the goal of our podcast,
is just to ruin everything. We'regonna completely No, no, we're
not gonna do that. Joy themagic of the show. Okay, Okay,
maybe not all right? Yeah,so I feel like um Linda also

(57:22):
gave us some insight into Steve Carrell, which was kind of fun. Yeah,
and how exhausting the whole thing wasfor him to have to, you
know, like basically inhabit the characterof um alan Um. So hopefully we'll
get to talk to Steve Carrell aboutthat. Boy, I hope. I

(57:45):
mean, is this the part wherewe openly beg Steve Carrell to come on
our show, because let's do that. We we could do Steve. If
you're listening and I'm positive you're notm please come on our show. We
really want to talk to you andlearn your experience. So call us,
text us, email us, sendsend a pigeon, whatever you need.
We're here for you. But alsodom Now, doom now, because I

(58:08):
want to hear how he was ableto find again, like, did he
just go into this thinking I'm justplaying this creepy guy and I'll hate him
while I'm doing it, you know, or did was he able to find
some nugget in the character of youknow, Sam, like he's a victim.
Yeah, also, and maybe thatwas how he was able to connect.

(58:30):
We can only we can only surmiseuntil they come on the show and
tell us themselves it's true. Butthat was the cool part of talking to
Linda is she was able to giveus a really full picture of her conflict
of portraying this person who obviously understandsthat her son is doing bad things and

(58:57):
that she is on some level enablingit by refusing to turn him in.
And yet because she has this twistedlogic of how she hopes he can get
better, she's come up with thisvery complicated way to support her son through

(59:19):
trying to get him to seek outa therapist, albeit in the wrong way
by kidnapping the therapist and chaining himto a bed. But but I thought
it was It's really interesting. Asan actor, you really do have to
come up with a way to beable to not just say, oh,
this character is a hateful person,but on some level you have to be

(59:44):
able to understand what that character isgoing through, even if you may not
personally agree with it or what's happeningand I wonder is that what it's like
for you sometimes in therapy sessions,are you are you doing that where you
have to try and identify with theperson even though maybe in the back of

(01:00:06):
your mind you're thinking like you're rollingyour eyes and thinking like, jeez,
I really wish this person could justget their act together. I mean,
um, I think that. Imean, empathy is really key, right,
so, you know, um,being trying to find a way to
you know, um, be intheir shoes right to understand it from their

(01:00:30):
experience. So that's that's one ofthe avenues into you know, helping.
It can be difficult if someone justcontinues to make the same mistakes over and
over and over again, you know, um, but you know it's still
it's not it's not going to helpif I'm not able to you know,

(01:00:52):
meet them where they're at. Basically, yeah, I mean okay. So
here's my question to you, psychoanalystperson. When you're dealing with a person
who is clearly making bad choices,choices that you disagree with or choices that
you can see are harmful to them, do you express that judgment or do

(01:01:22):
you hold it back and try tounderstand that judgment or understand they're predictable.
Well, I think it depends onhow long I've been seeing a person.
So if I've been seeing someone avery long time and we've had the same
conversation many, many times, theycontinue to make the same mistakes over and
over again, there might be apoint at which I say, you know,

(01:01:44):
we've been talking about this and I'vemade ABCD suggestion and at the time
you say, oh, okay,I'll try that, and then you don't.
And if this has happened over andover again, I might say,
I think we're maybe at an impasshere, you know, so I will
certainly it's not going to help meif I I And I'm not a softie.

(01:02:09):
I mean, I hope I'm empathic. I think I'm empathic, but
I'm kind of known for being reallydirect with people, you know, and
forthcoming and you know, saying what'son my mind. I let people know,
you know, if I think,you know that doesn't sound right to
me, or something like that.So, yeah, it's almost back to

(01:02:32):
what our guests on our very firstepisode Frank Summer said, yeah, when
he said people want things to change, but they don't want to put in
the effort, right, It reallysounds like a thing that comes up a
lot. Yeah, yeah, forsure. Yeah, So I have a
big I have a big thing.I want to just I've like one more

(01:02:53):
thing that I want to talk aboutthat I didn't get to talk about when
Linda was on. So I wantto mention it to you, Lindsay,
because there was that whole scene withBeth right when she you know, brings
her guitar on stage, and youknow, we have to assume that she
knew going in that this was notgoing to be very well accepted, right,

(01:03:19):
that she's going to sing in frontof everybody, because you know,
they'd maybe even dating. She probablyyou know, learned learned some things about,
you know, being um orthodox.I'm guessing she knew already. But
she's very strong willed Beth, sheis. Yeah. I don't know,
though, I'm not sure I agreewith the premise that she knew that it

(01:03:43):
was going to cause that much ofa scene. I think my interpretation of
that moment is is that character thoughtpeople might be unsettled by it, but
that it would happen quickly, andthen it would and then people would move
on and she'd be able to expbreast herself in the way that she wanted.
I don't think she thought people wouldleave, and I don't think she

(01:04:05):
thought it would be as embarrassing asit clearly turns out to be for poor
Ezra, who just wants it tobe over. I mean, like everything
on his face, yeah, clearlysignals like, make this stop as soon
as possible. So I think Ifeel like they're setting up this parallel with

(01:04:26):
the moms. Like this episode couldhave been called you know, mother,
Mother, Mother, you know,which is the thing that like Sam kept
saying, like, so you havethis one mom, you know, played
by Linda, who's enabling her childbasically, you know, protecting him,
which basically means enabling him. Andthen you have this other mom who pushes

(01:04:51):
the boundaries, you know. Imean, she's she's powerless to like,
you know, she doesn't really wantI thank her so to marry this woman
or you know, it's my interpretationof that, or she has mixed feelings
about it at best. And thenshe you know, she's still gonna do
what she think is think what shethinks is right. You know, she

(01:05:13):
wants to sing her son and hisnew wife a love song, which is
what She's sang She's sang doty Lee, which is a love song to him,
her son and his wife. Soso two. So there's just something
I don't I don't know what itis, and maybe it's nothing, but
I feel like it's this very interestingdichotomy of the two mothers. It is

(01:05:38):
very interesting. I I was verystruck by the artifacts Judaism part of it,
only because I have I'm currently rightnow is we're recording this. I'm
currently in San Diego, California,working at the Old Globe Theater on a
brand new play called What We talkAbout When We talk About Anne Frank by
Nathan Anglerer, And the plot ofthat play is to people a couple Jewish

(01:06:01):
couple who are reformed Jews live inFlorida, are visited by former best friends
who have since moved to Israel andbecome Orthodox Jews, and they sort of
have to work out how their friendshipssort of dissolved as a result of one
of them choosing to go down onepath of Judaism and another couple choosing to

(01:06:27):
go down a different path. Andso to those of us who are not
necessarily Orthodox Jews, are really easyfor us to be like what, it's
no big deal. It's just asong. How bad could it be,
you know, Like a woman performsa song and that's pleasant and everything's fine.
But but that stuff is taken veryvery seriously, and some things are

(01:06:51):
not easily forgiven. And I thinkthat that theme of the content of forgiveness
and letting go of the past isa theme that we're going to see over
and over again, good for therest of the patient. That's my that's
my prediction. That's an excellent prediction. Thank you, Thank you very much.

(01:07:17):
All Right, I think we've hitthe end of this. I think
all right, I'm excited so um. Thank you all so much for joining
us for psychoanalyzing the patient, andwe will see you next session.