AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
"Lucky" is a new limited series from Apple TV. The show stars Anya Taylor-Joy, who plays the titular character Lucky, a con artist who's on the run after a multimillion-dollar heist goes south.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "LUCKY")
TIMOTHY OLYPHANT: (As John Armstrong) I figured this line would be dead by now.
ANYA TAYLOR-JOY: (As Lucky Armstrong) Change of plans.
OLYPHANT: (As John Armstrong) Where are you?
TAYLOR-JOY: (As Lucky Armstrong) Seeing the country.
OLYPHANT: (As John Armstrong) Just you?
TAYLOR-JOY: (As Lucky Armstrong) Yeah.
RASCOE: Taylor-Joy is also a co-producer of the series, and she joins us now. Welcome to the program.
TAYLOR-JOY: Thank you so much for having me.
RASCOE: When we first meet Lucky, she's running from the FBI. We learned that her husband has split Town and left her to take the blame, or the money's gone. What drew you to playing Lucky?
TAYLOR-JOY: Reese Witherspoon reached out to me and said, there's this phenomenal book, Would you read it, and if you're interested, would you co-produce it with me? - which is obviously an incredible offer. So I went into reading the book really hoping that there would be something for me to sink my teeth into. Luckily, I fell in love with Lucky. I had so much sympathy for her. I think we're very used to seeing the American con or just the con in general as very glitzy, and it's George Clooney, and I love, love, love those movies.
But what interested me about Lucky was this was kind of the underbelly of what it is to live life as a confidence man or woman. You're never able to stay still. Nobody really knows your name. You're constantly getting by on the misfortune of others. And this woman trying to do the right thing whilst being blessed with this terrible gift - I just was really intrigued by how I was going to pull that off.
RASCOE: Yeah, and I mean, the thing about Lucky is she's not afraid to manipulate and deceive, and she does what she needs to do in order to survive. But how do you think she justifies her actions?
TAYLOR-JOY: I think that's the tricky aspect. It's almost second nature to her. It's all she's ever known. It's the only skills her father's ever given her. And that was also something that I was very interested to dive into, the relationship between Lucky and the men in her life, her father and her husband.
RASCOE: Well, her father is in prison. That's a complicated thing. And her mother-in-law, played by Annette Bening, is a mob boss and also Lucky's enemy.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "LUCKY")
ANNETTE BENING: (As Priscilla Masterson) You and I never got along. Why is that?
TAYLOR-JOY: (As Lucky Armstrong) Because I never liked you.
BENING: (As Priscilla Masterson) Where's my son?
TAYLOR-JOY: (As Lucky Armstrong) I don't know.
RASCOE: How do you think about playing this character who has all of these kind of difficult relationships?
TAYLOR-JOY: I think we all know, either personally or through somebody very close to us, what it is to love somebody that's just not good for you and what it is to have to learn that for yourself. People can tell you, oh, you know, your dad's bad news or this person's bad news, but you really have to - you have to figure it out on your own. And I think you're catching Lucky as the audience in this big revelation of who to trust, who actually has her best interests at heart, and whether love really is enough if somebody's just not good for you.
RASCOE: This was your first Hollywood producer role. What was it like working on that side of it, and how involved were you?
TAYLOR-JOY: Oh, I loved it. I kind of have a bit of a split personality. On the one hand, I'm very emotional, very esoteric, slightly away with the fairies, and that's wonderful for my acting career. But there's also this disciplined, obsessive ballerina in me that loves a spreadsheet, loves a call sheet, loves to fix a problem. And so the combination of acting and producing really suits me wonderfully. It's a great place to put my energy.
RASCOE: Apart from all of the family drama and the crime drama that Lucky was dealing with...
TAYLOR-JOY: All the drama.
RASCOE: Yeah. All the drama.
TAYLOR-JOY: So much drama.
(LAUGHTER)
RASCOE: So much drama - I mean, there were a lot of physical challenges. Like, she's fighting people. She's running on top of semitrucks. She's setting things on fire. Do you like that? Does it scare you? Are you kind of, like, an adrenaline junkie?
TAYLOR-JOY: A little bit. I think that's part of what I enjoy. I love the mental acrobatics you have to do in order to be able to convince yourself that you can do the thing. With stunts, it's very black and white. If you don't commit, you're going to get hurt. And I love that mental challenge. I have a wonderful stunt double named Hayley Wright, who I first met on "Furiosa." She and I did all of our training together, and we became really, really close. So since then, whenever I do something, she comes and helps me make it look really cool.
RASCOE: It can be tricky when you're adapting a book into a series and this character for TV. How did you go about translating that from the page to the screen?
TAYLOR-JOY: We basically discussed, how do we keep all of the aspects of the book that we love, all of the emotional truths within the characters but put them in this more muscular action thrill ride, really? We wanted to put our foot on the gas and never really let up. And it just felt like the characters could hold up to that and withstand it.
RASCOE: I have to say that Lucky as a character - she doesn't seem that lucky.
(LAUGHTER)
RASCOE: At times - well, there's luck there, but there's a lot of bad luck. But what she lacks in luck, she seems to make up for in strength and perseverance and just really quick thinking. Has there been a moment in your career so far where you felt like luck was not on your side, but you kind of took control of the situation and came out on top?
TAYLOR-JOY: Absolutely. I think it's always in how you frame something. If you can catch yourself in the moment and think, OK, do I want to believe that this is working against me, or do I want to believe that this is working for me? Pretty quickly, if you start reframing any situation in that way, you just gain this sense of empowerment, and it allows you to think more clearly.
RASCOE: That's Anya Taylor-Joy. She plays Lucky in the new Apple TV series "Lucky," which is out now. Thank you so much for joining us.
TAYLOR-JOY: Thank you so much. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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