The Morning Show's Julianna Margulies on the upstairs-downstairs world of TV news
Margulies plays the seemingly snooty reporter Laura Peterson on the new season of the Apple TV+ show
Julianna Margulies is shaking up in the new season of Apple TV’s The Morning Show. Margulies plays highbrow reporter Laura Peterson, who Jennifer Aniston’s Alex Levy sees as a threat and Reese Witherspoon’s Bradley Jackson sees as a new love interest.
In this week’s episode of The Morning Show, Witherspoon’s character is publicly outed by a tabloid, something that echoes some of Peterson’s own experience being outed decades before. The A.V. Club sat down with Margulies to talk about her character’s experience.
“I think she learned a lot,” Margulies told us. She continues:
“It was devastating to be outed and then fired, but the doors that opened for her because of what happened made her who she is, which is completely comfortable in her own skin. She had to come to terms with the fact that hiding her sexuality wasn’t an option and really owning her sexuality was the only way forward. And doing that, I think, is why she found so much success in her professional life.”
Margulies says Laura Peterson acts as “the calm in [Bradley’s] crazy storm of chaos,” saying that “Bradley’s life is chaotic because she’s ashamed of her past, she’s ashamed of her mother, and where she comes from.” Margulies says, “Laura comes in and she’s just this voice of calm. She’s completely comfortable in her own skin because of what she went through. She’s at the top of her game professionally and she has no skin in the game when it comes to Bradley and Alex.”
Margulies also talks in the video above about some of the “upstairs-downstairs” nature of network news, saying she envisions Peterson’s show and The Morning Show having, “a healthy competition.” “I always felt like Alex was a little afraid of Laura,” says Margulies, noting it’s “probably [not] because of…why Alex is paranoid.” “I think Alex is really insecure around Laura because Laura is exactly who she appears to be and Alex isn’t,” she says.
There’s more from Julianna Margulies in the video above. New episodes of The Morning Show hit Apple TV Plus every Friday.