Cate Blanchett as: Phyllis Schlafly

Directors: Anna Boden and  Ryan Fleck (eps. 1-2, 7, 9), Amma Asante (eps. 3-4), Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre (eps. 5-6), Janicza Bravo (ep. 8)
Selected Cast: Rose Byrne, Margo Martindale, Uzo Aduba, Elizabeth Banks, Tracey Ullman, Sarah Paulson, John Slattery, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Ari Graynor, Melanie Lynskey and Kayli Carter.
Created by: Dahvi Waller
Release Year: 2020
Genre: Drama
MPAA Rating: TV-MA (US)

 

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Mrs. America tells the story of the movement to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), and the unexpected backlash led by a conservative woman named Phyllis Schlafly, aka “the sweetheart of the silent majority.” Through the eyes of the women of the era – both Schlafly and second wave feminists Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, Shirley Chisholm, Bella Abzug and Jill Ruckelshaus – the series explores how one of the toughest battlegrounds in the culture wars of the 70s helped give rise to the Moral Majority and forever shifted the political landscape.

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Inside look; Behind the scenesRelated Videos

The videos after the trailer are playlists of selected interviews and conversations with the cast and creators and inside look at the series, just click on the playlist icon/thumbnails to see the other videos in it.

Quotes from Cate Blanchett

• “I had tangentially heard about her. I had seen this little old lady, in her late 90s, being trucked out at the tail end of Trump’s campaign. And there was a standing ovation for her, and she seemed to be very, very important and treated with profound respect by members of the Republican Party. And I found out that that person was Phyllis Schlafly. And then I saw Trump attending her funeral, and I thought who is this woman? And parallel to that, I had met with Stacey Sher and Dahvi Waller to talk about this project. And I like you, I didn’t know much about her at all, but I wondered about why she was so internally important to the Republican Party but yet not so widely known outside of circles. And I think it’s partly because her influence has been so absorbed by the Republican Party. I mean a lot of her achievements, whether you call them achievements, some people will say they are dubious achievements, but achievements nonetheless, is that she has a past on preventing the ERA from being modified, she has quite, singlehandedly I think, embedded into the spine of the Republican Party, the notion of pro-life, pro-family and being pro-American.
  All of that discourse came out of Phyllis Schlafly’s activities in the 70s and the early 80s. And I think that what has happened is her achievements has been absorbed by the Republican Party, whereas I think there’s been quite a lot of public rejection of second wave feminism that those women had their own identity. Whereas Phyllis, from my point of view, I didn’t know much about her outside her circle, so it was a really journey for me and one of the primary reasons that I wanted to make the series was to understand what was so terrifying and abhorrent that Phyllis Schlafly and the people who were like minded around her, what was so terrifying about the notion of equality and that was the reason I wanted to make it.” (Emmanuel Levy, April 2020)
• “It is a gift as an actor to get the opportunity to play roles and characters who outside your frame of reference. I think every time you do that your world view gets expanded.
  At the time Phyllis Schlafly was alive and incredibly active and influential, she was speaking to a whole group of people who felt their voices weren’t being heard. I found the investigation of her home life, her political views, what she said to be incredibly eye opening.” (KGet, April 2020)
• On portraying Phyllis Schlafly, whose ideologies are opposite of hers: “The way you create ambiguity and juxtaposition in a character is to simply borrow two contradictory thoughts or actions, butt them together, and then present them to an audience. We’re all full of contradictions and hypocrisies. No one is perfect, including Phyllis — although her hair was mostly always perfect.
  But it is a challenge, I think, when you’re playing a figure who is so polarizing. In the end, how polarizing she became was the very thing that prevented her from getting in place in Reagan’s cabinet. It was definitely a challenge to find those nuances and not to play one note. But that comes from the script and the other actors you’re working with because in the end you just have to play those situations in a human way. Because she’s a human.” (The Wrap, January 2020)
• “We are all women of contradictions. My mother was saying to me, ‘How can you play someone like this?’ And I said, ‘Because you just asked me that question. I want to find out who she is.’” (New York Times, April 2020)
• “There’s no point in delving into this period unless it’s going to reveal something about where we are now. The reason for me to want to do this was to reverse-engineer how we got to a place where equality was such a political hot button and also reverse-engineer how we got to the backlash that we’re living in right now. And living through, I hope.” (Los Angeles Times, April 2020)
• On the team behind the camera: “We had a female cinema- tographer for the majority of the shoot. We also had all female directors, apart from one, who was an honorary woman. That doesn’t necessarily mean that women are better directors, but they are as good, and I was very excited to work with them. I was like, ‘Why haven’t I been doing this for the last 20 years?’ You realise it should be normal but it’s not yet, so we have a long way to go to cement that level of equality. “It’s important to remember that it’s not just a fashionable moment in time. We bring brothers along with us, so that we realise it’s not a choice – but we are all doing this together and it doesn’t mean that it’s threatening to them. It’s just a much more inclusive way of working. I absolutely loved it.” (Radio Times, July 2020)
• On her favourite scene to film: “I loved the pie scene [where Schlafly gets a cream pie to the face from a protestor disguised as a waiter]. For sure. Watching Sarah [Paulson’s] face, her trying not to laugh. But I guess my favourite was the couples’ debate between Brenda and Marc [Feigen Fasteau and Fred and Phyllis [Schlafly]. Bobby [Cannavale, Rose Byrne’s partner] was such a mensch coming in to play [American TV host] Tom Snyder. He was out-and-out brilliant. And I finally had a scene with Ari [Graynor, who played feminist and activist Brenda Feigen Fasteau]. There is so much high-tension subtext for both couples, so much at stake, and the situation is so public and exposing. It was thrilling. We filmed intensively then ate falafel.” (Vogue Australia, June 2020)
• On her favourite look or one that felt most uncomfortable to her in the series: “I was blessed to have the unparalleled master of coiffure, Kerry Warn – Ilove that man. And Morag Ross, my dear friend with whom I have also worked on every film (she’s a make-up genius). It nearly killed them both, as the hours were insane, and they are perfectionists. Kerry had to build the hair on my head every morning. Like a hairy bombe Alaska. I think the red suits felt most Phyllis. But it was important to find the more undone side of her – going through menopause in her swimmers. Sweaty. Alone. Bina [Daigeler’s] costumes are beyond. Can you believe she found the exact Oscar de la Renta dress on eBay that Phyllis wore to the Over the Rainbow gala? But also Mara LePere-Schloop – the production design held us all; the atmospheres were extraordinary.”
• On the wrap party: “Darling, darling Bina organised [drag queen] Miss Moço to perform, and made her a costume exactly like one I wore as Phyllis. I was blown away. I came late to the wrap party, as we were filming, and out she jumped. I screamed with joy, and nearly peed my pants when she ripped off the dress and was in a USA bikini. Given Phyllis’s stance on homosexuality, the irony was incredible.”
• On Uzo Aduba during the table read for Shirley Chisholm-cenrtric episode: “You could hear a pin drop. It’s like she had already imbibed the spirit of Chisholm, and that was a really remarkable moment for all of us. Everyone left the read and we couldn’t speak. It was jaw-dropping.” (Los Angeles, March 2025)

Quotes from Others

• Dahvi Waller:
  — “I don’t think we benefit from painting the other side that we don’t agree with as monsters or painting heroes as perfect. What really struck me about all the women from this period, on both sides, was how messy they were. They’re complex and contradictory in nature. They quarrel and experience joy, love and pain, so it’s about understanding the conversation, not judging them.”
• Stacey Sher:
  — On assembling the cast: “Sarah Paulson was right after Cate [Blanchett], and she made an incredible leap of faith; she and Cate are close. She loved the first two scripts, but her character’s arc wasn’t completed. The great luck is also in having a writer that’s as talented as Dahvi Waller at the helm, and I was really fortunate that she wanted to do this when I pitched it to her. Where she took it and what she and her team of writers and researchers put together exceeded my hopes for what the project could be. When Sarah came on board, Margo [Martindale] was pretty close after that. Actually, Elizabeth Banks was in pretty early too. I think it was a combination of subject matter, Cate, Cate, Cate … I mean, who doesn’t want to work with Cate? We were really fortunate to have extraordinary director-executive producers in Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, who were just coming off of Captain Marvel. And then, Margo, Tracey [Ullman], Uzo [Aduba], Elizabeth [Banks], Niecy Nash, Kayli [Carter], Melanie Lynskey, Jeanne Tripplehorn. You could go on and on and on and on. It’s a deep bench. And then, we were incredibly fortunate that the actors stood up to support this incredible group of women because of the subject matter. Women often get offered the role of wife and girlfriend, but the fact that John Slattery, Jay Ellis, Adam Brody and James Marsden — all of them — just stood up … And it was Marsden who said, “We want to be here to support this extraordinary group of women.””
• Elizabeth Banks:
  — “I’m excited we’re telling the story of these women, upon whose shoulders as current feminists we stand. We get to work and sometimes – we can’t say all the time yet – we get equal pay and control over our bodies, and this is what this show is about.”
  — On what he hopes audience will take from the series: “The importance of this, I suppose, is ultimately to remind us of our common humanity. These aren’t people who should just be chucked in the bin. I’m about to do something on [US military prison] Guantanamo Bay, which is another instance of a government finding a convenient dustbin for people who are difficult, and I think that is very much what this is about. You can’t do that to people.”
• Uzo Aduba:
  — “I think that’s what makes the work from Cate [Blanchett] or Sarah [Paulson] or Kayli [Carter] or Melanie [Lynskey] or Jeanne [Tripplehorn], who are our anti-ERA-ers — and a host of other women. I don’t want to leave anyone out. But what makes their work beautiful, and what makes them all — obviously led by Cate — brilliant in what they do, is you can feel the honesty and the humanity of those women. It doesn’t come with judgment. There’s no critiquing of it. It’s not our job as artists to critique it. That’s literally what you do! That’s not my job. My job is to put it up there and create the space for you to ask questions or find the answer, even.
  What I think Dahvi has done beautifully, and our producers Stacey [Sher] and Coco [Francini] were insistent on pursuing, is the truth. And I think when you pursue the truth, you will find the truth of these women, the hearts of these women. What you will inevitably find will be things that you take comfort in, and things that stir things up in you. You can feel the complexity of that human being’s experience, that character’s experience. It would be amazing for people to watch and see how complex that issue was, how complex you may even find it within yourself if you’re being honest. The wrestling that every human being feels and finds themselves in, in various scenarios, that’s true for the characters on the right and the left. Not everything was placid, not everything was easy, not everything felt great, as is true for the left. Not everything was done tip top on either side, going back to your question about the blindside within our own movement on the pro-ERA side. So I would love for everyone to be able to watch and to really understand the complexity of the issue and those characters all around, and see that things aren’t always as cut and dry, black and white as you like to make them out to be, when we are in pursuit of the truth.”
  — On playing Shirley Chisholm: “It was an honour to represent Chisholm,” she says, “because she’s not often portrayed. I just wanted to get her humanity.”
  — “Revisionist history can be very powerful in completely erasing someone’s imperfections and faults. It’s worth examining the shortcomings of our feminist heroes. That doesn’t make what they did within the movement less important. It just recognises where their blind spots were and encourages us to know and do better.”
• Rose Byrne:
  — On the series finale: “It sends Gloria off to her life of continuing to devote herself to activism and use her voice to educate and be on the road. Where she began on the road as a child, you see her sort of set off again on the road as an adult to begin her life as the icon she’s become today. I felt moved by her ending, I thought it was a really emotional send-off. It was like when Trump got in and the Women’s March took place—one event really igniting another. I felt like they showed that with the ending for Gloria. And obviously Phyllis’s ending, she had hopes to work for Reagan and not getting into the cabinet was shattering for her. She probably recovers from that in a kind of way. I think it was a truthful look at what happened at that point, the successes and failures of both sides. I think it’s sort of bittersweet. It’s the tragedy of the Reagan administration coming in and the ERA ratification being stalled, but also this incredible legacy that begins for Gloria and how her fight continues. I feel like it has sorrow and hope on both sides.”
  — On the most surprising thing she learned while working on the series: “Phyllis Schalfly was such a fascinating character. You can’t dispute the woman’s intelligence or her ability to multitask. [Laughs.] She’s such a fascinating figure for so many strange reasons, not necessarily things I agree with or like. Everything from the history of how Gloria came to activism—I wasn’t as familiar with the story of her childhood and how unusual it was.”
• Margo Martindale:
  — “I did two months of research to [understand] the relationships between Bella Abzug and the people that were on her side of the fence, especially Shirley and Gloria [Steinem, played by Rose Byrne]. I knew very little about the other side. But the whole show was a complete education for me. I think I’m the oldest [castmember] and I should have known more, but I didn’t. I’m very, very, very grateful to have gotten to do this show for that reason, and to be with these incredible, fabulous women. And one man. No, there are more than that — two or three.”
• Sarah Paulson:
  — On Cate Blanchett: “She makes everything look easy, even when she’s shooting until three, four or five am. I think the hardest part for Cate was that we were a largely female cast and crew spending a lot of time together, because the rest of us weren’t working every day. We’d meet in the lobby most nights and all go to dinner. Poor Cate came out a few times but she was the only person who had a 5am call every day and lots of pages of dialogue to memorise. She also took her role as producer extremely seriously.”
• John Landgraf:
  — “She [Cate Blanchett] was a tremendous magnet for the rest of the fantastic [Mrs. America] cast.”
• John Slattery:
  — On being awe-struck by his first encounter with Cate Blanchett: “She came in looking like a million bucks and threw the script down and said, ‘OK, so the first scene here…’ It took me a minute to get over it. She was always protective and cognizant of the details, the human details.”

Trivia & Facts

• The series premiered on 15 April 2020.
• Cate Blanchett’s first major TV project in the US.
• Cate Blanchett earned her first Emmy nomination in two categories: Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie for her role as Phyllis Schlafly and Outstanding Limited Series for her work as one of the executive producers in the series.
• Cate Blanchett was also nominated for Best Actress in a Limited Series at the Golden Globes Awards and Screen Actors Guild Awards.
• The series earned 10 Emmy nominations, including three for Best Supporting Actress for Uzo Aduba, who won, Margo Martindale and Tracey Ullmann, more accolades here.
• The series is included in the American Film Institute ten best television shows of 2020.
• Cate Blanchett worked closely with costume designer Bina Daigeler to craft key outfits. She also pitched songs to be used in the series.
• Unlike the other real-life figures in the series, Sarah Paulson’s character, Alice, is fictional.

TCA Winter Tour FX Panel, 9 January 2020; Emmy Magazine 2020