On March 19, 2002, I spoke on the phone with Penny Johnson Jerald from Sars's apartment. She had just finished shooting "8:00 PM -- 9:00 PM." After our interview, Penny's agent made a point of calling me that very evening to pass on the news that Penny was raving about how polite and respectful I was. Now "polite and respectful" are adjectives that rarely describe me. I was thrilled to hear that Penny liked me, but I have to wonder, who the hell would be rude to Penny Johnson Jerald? She runs a Christian theater company, for crying out loud! She plays Lady MacPalmer on TV! Even I don't fuck with people like that. And no, I didn't have the guts to ask her about GLOW.
Gustave: Are the Palmers Democrats or Republicans? [The episode where Palmer reveals he's a Democrat had not been aired at the time of this interview.]
Penny Johnson Jerald: [Laughs.]
[Laughs.] I guess that's a bit of a loaded question.
He better be a Democrat. [Laughs.] It's high time we had a Democratic African-American in the White House.
But then it's been said that if an African-American ever makes it to the White House, he'd have to be a Republican.
We're gonna turn that. [Laughs.]
Well, wasn't Clinton our first black president?
Oh yeah. He was a light-skinned brother. I enjoyed Clinton's presidency.
And he's a bit like Palmer in that, unlike Bush, he wasn't part of a powerful established family, so he had to make some unholy alliances with people like [Kreepy Karl] in order to level the playing field.
Exactly. We weren't born into this. We're not insiders, so we had to work hard for twenty-five years to make it happen. All of that is important to Sherry. It's the fuel behind her fight.
How did you find out about this part?
Well, in the entertainment business, you go through your agent, your agent submits you and then you go and interview. Oftentimes when an actor reaches a certain caliber, a part is offered to you. During the pilot season, which is when this interview took place, it was just an idea that Joel Surnow had. [Laughs.] He interviewed people and actually I didn't take it very seriously. I mean, I take all of my auditions seriously but I didn't take it as a heavy hitter.
That's what Karina said. She said she was told about the audition at eleven and she had to be there by two, and she was like, "Okay, whatever."
It was that kind of thing, because I was about to leave town to go and do another pilot which I was very excited about. And when I went to the 24 audition, I didn't see the "old faithful" -- the usual women that I usually see at auditions -- and I thought [laughs], "Hmmm, maybe no one's interested in this one. Why am I here?" But then I walked into the room and I met Joel [Surnow] and Robert [Cochran] and Steven [Hopkins] and they were fans of The Larry Sanders Show, and I was just enjoying the project. It was just a little project -- just a pilot -- and I thought I'd just go on to Seattle and shoot the other project. But they were interested in me and so they tried to work it out around the other project. For a moment it was not going to work out scheduling-wise and they wanted me to choose and I said to my agent, "I don't want to choose!" [Laughs.] I liked them and I wanted to do their project but I just didn't think it was something [laughs] big. I didn't even know that Kiefer was involved. I just said, "Oh, who's playing the husband," and they said, "Dennis [Haysbert]," and I said, "Oh, yeah, I want to do this!" Dennis and I have been husband and wife before.
Have you? Should I have known this?
In Germany, we did a miniseries. [The Writing on the Wall, 1994] We had a great time.
You guys have wonderful chemistry.
Yeah, and so I said, "I can just fly back down to L.A. and do this." And that's how it worked out. For the pilot, they only had me for a day.
They only had you for a day? Now that I think about it, you didn't have a lot of screen time in the first episode.
But it was good screentime. I realized when I was shooting that this wasn't television. We were making a movie.
That was one of my questions for Karina. I asked her if making 24 was more like making a series of related movies or an interesting television show.
Well, because what we are doing is making an interesting television show, that's the given. But when you're there shooting -- the atmosphere, the way the directors, producers, and cinematographers have created the environment -- it's more like making a film.
Also, the acting is more like film acting than television acting.
Absolutely. It's an internal, realistic acting style that I'm in love with. Ever since The Larry Sanders Show, it's been my acting choice.
I asked Karina about this. I had initially thought that you were all giving these wonderfully restrained, internal performances because of strong direction, but she said that the consistent acting was in the casting…
I strongly agree. It was in the casting. We have generous direction and respected direction. What I mean by that is that when you desire more information, it's given to you freely, but at the same time -- because we are starting to live as these people -- we are given the liberty to go with our own instincts. It's definitely encouraged. I love it when a director knows that I am probably learning this character and knowing her a bit more than anyone else…besides the writers, of course.
What did they tell you about the part when they first contacted you?
There was very little information. And I didn't really ask because as I said before, I didn't really grasp the importance or the excitement of this particular project. I liked these people and I wanted to squeeze in another project while I was doing Citizen Bates, because those were my friends from ER and that was much more exciting. But when I came into town to film 24, I changed my mind completely. I got really excited about this project. And then there was all this public excitement about it and started to look like, "We have a winner here." Now I've been in some very nice shows before, but when the studio is behind you on this it creates a wonderful environment. We had the best cinematographer, the best director, the best actors [laughs]. We had the ingredients for one of the best shows.
What did they tell you about what your character would become? I mean, I know they didn't give you actual plot information, but did you know you were going to turn out to be this bad-ass?
No. Absolutely not. I mean, I gathered that she was strong from the writing. Past that, not a lot of information was given to me about her. For instance, I had no idea that I was keeping this seven-year secret from my husband. No idea whatsoever. When he says to me, "You knew about this the whole time!" It's like, "Well no, I really didn't, but okay." [Laughs.] So then I have to find a way to make that work in my performance. I have to think about how I played certain scenes the week before and figure out a way to make the transition believable.
But I think that's smart of the writers, because they don't know if their pilot is being picked up and they want to be able to go wherever they want to go. They have to see what the hub is. They have to test it. They listen to people, but they do have their own vision. I just pray that they stick to their vision. That is why this show is different than any other show.
I'm enjoying the real time, because as an acting task it's very exciting. Minutes are passing, and now that we're at the umpteenth hour, hours are passing. Relationships are changing from hour to hour instead of day to day or year to year.
Technically, what's the difference between acting in a real-time format, as opposed to shooting a scene and then shooting another scene that's supposed to take place, say, two weeks later?
It's real continuity. When we're shooting, we always come to the table to discuss where we left off five minutes ago…ten minutes ago…twenty minutes ago. Were we fighting? Were we lovey-dovey? We have to constantly examine where we were. I mean, in acting you always have to examine where you were a few minutes ago -- whether it's real time or not. But here it's especially true. You can't skim on the cream of that acting style. We have sharp people around us to remind us. And hopefully we do our jobs, which make it easier to do their jobs.
And you have to keep wearing the same outfit.
[Laughs.] But I've managed to change a few times.
Right. You had the robe, and then the other robe, and then the suit with the sleeveless top underneath…
And who knows? I may have to change again?
And you had that towel over your head for an episode.
After seeing the pilot and seeing where we were headed, I wanted more of a First-Lady hairstyle. You know, straightening and stuff. So I felt that putting the towel on was a good way to go for that. I was thinking, you know she's going to put some curlers in that. Those are the tricks that you're always thinking about as an actor. Also [laughs] you come on the set every day and you're always wearing the same thing. You're like, "Didn't you have that on yesterday?" But it's good to be on your toes where continuity is concerned. How do you have that outfit on? Jacket on? Jacket off?
You seem to be putting your shoes off and putting them back on.
That's because when I come into my home, I don't wear shoes. It's a threefold thing for me. First there's how I behave in public as part of this campaign. Then there's how I am in this suite with all of these people around who are familiar to me. And then there are the truly private moments with my family.
And even then, it's not like we're this totally open happy family. Let's face it. We're an African-American family. [Laughs.] There are certain cultural differences and I don't want to ignore those things.
It's funny. I don't think as much about the black thing when I'm watching. I'm always thinking about how you guys are this political family, in that when you're part of a family that's in the public eye, your actions are being judged on these other levels. On the one hand, Keith did something wrong and there's the private morality of the situation that his parents have to deal with, just like in any other family. On the other hand, he's actually ruining his father's chance at being president, so it's more than Keith simply being "in trouble." He's pulling the family down with him.
In future episodes, how this family acts together will be shown in a very good way. When I say that we're an African-American family, I mean that it's my hope that people who aren't familiar with that will say, "Oh my God, they act like we do." [Laughs.]
Yeah, the kids screw up and Mom tries to hide it from Dad.
Yeah. Or "they do hug their children." That's a good thing, because we don't get that on "regular television." Usually, black families are shown fighting physically or selling drugs. I've been given a wonderful opportunity to show another side of that. I take my hat off the Joel and Robert for making this political family an African-American family and it's not treated like, "Oh my God, they're African-American!" It's something that you see and you go, "Why not?"
It's interesting how race hasn't really emerged as an issue in the plot. I mean, we just had that episode where Palmer realizes that he's not being shot at because he's black, and I was thinking, wow, that never gets discussed.
Well, keep watching and see if we ever talk about that ever again.
Sherry Palmer's nickname on our forums is "Lady MacPalmer."
I've been told that. [Laughs.]
Were you thinking consciously about Lady Macbeth while creating your character?
Not consciously. We did an episode and I said to David Palmer, "I am just as ambitious as you are." While I was filming that, the words came out of my mouth and I literally turned around and said to myself, "It's that Scottish play!" [Laughs.] It was a key, and it's great when you find little keys. You go, "All right!"
She isn't her, but she has her ambition…plus the smarts and intellect of Hillary. Those are the main ingredients of Sherry Palmer. Sherry is becoming more and more exciting and multidimensional. I would not want her to turn into a Lady Macbeth and be just about greed and ambition.
What I loved was how at first you're very much in the background. You're writing thank-you notes and being…
…the perfect wife?
Yeah. And I'm thinking, "Oh yeah, she's evil," because this was too much of a set-up. And then the claws come out and it looks like you're just as ambitious as he is, and you think that you're really up to something. But then you call Carl and he's all, "I've taken care of it," and you're taken aback. You're not really evil. You're out of your league with people like Carl. That's what's so politically sophisticated about the show. We're so used to seeing the evil ambitious wife that we're automatically assuming that you're much worse than you really are.
But that's the excitement of playing her. I don't know from week to week what I'm going to do. I've been naughty and I've been looking, like, one week ahead, but that's because Penny Johnson Jerald wants to make sure that if she's playing a married woman with children, there still is a certain image that I would love people to get about the strength of family unity. I strongly believe in family -- personally -- and so I take a look at that. I look at the realistic relationship of a marriage that's lasted twenty-five years. I've been married for many many years. Happily, happily married. Crazily happily married. I have a daughter. I have a nephew as well and so there are realistic things I keep in check. I keep that very real.
You mentioned Hillary. Are there any other "real people" you think about when playing Sherry?
Hillary and Lady Macbeth are the clear-cut individuals that inspire my performance. But then a lot of it comes from [laughs] Penny. It comes from Penny the teacher, the disciplinarian, the perfectionist, the workaholic. [Laughs.] It comes from sides of me that I don't care to bring to light in my everyday personal life, but they're parts of me that can rear their ugly head if I can cultivate them with the help of my director.
I notice at times that there seems to be a reference to the Nixon era -- mostly the clothing and the sets. The guys wear these wide ties like young Republicans from the early seventies, the women wear sleeveless tops and pearls, and you had that one assistant for a couple of episodes who had what seemed to be a beehive. Is that a conscious reference?
[Laughs.] No, that's not consciously said. And I'm not sure if that's a conscious decision or not.
What I do think about a lot in terms of the Palmers is the recent election we just had when Bush was holed up in his room and Gore was holed up in his room and they really didn't know what the outcome was going to be. It's that tension and adrenaline that we're going for -- you know, keeping the television on all the time, the biting of the nails, the not wanting to go to a commercial break because you might miss something…I get that same rush that I got a year ago shooting this now.
Since the show is primarily plot-driven, do you ever feel that Sherry's character development has to be truncated in order to fit within the plotline?
No, I don't feel that way. There are three plotlines and they all fit together, and that's where you have to solely rely on the director and the producer for the total vision. If we're trying to figure out where our characters fit into the scheme of things, we're no longer doing our jobs. We're trying to do someone else's job. It's a trust issue.
I'm not going to ask you what happens, but do you know what happens?
No. I don't. I know what happens up until the end, but I don't know the end itself. But what I'm reading is so very exciting. I can't wait to do it. We have the best writers. Robert and Joel are driving this bus. Everyone is incredible. I don't know where all of these people come from, but they come from a very exciting place. They shouldn't be able to stand themselves. [Laughs.]
But I will say that there's a big climax, but I don't actually know if there's going to be a resolution to the season. Cliffhangers don't resolve themselves. It will be like an arc with an upward inflection.
How much interaction do you have with the other actors who aren't in the Palmer plotline?
It depends. We bump into each other sometimes, but mostly I know them from watching them when the show finally airs. Sometimes you see someone and you go, "Oh, you're still alive! You made it!" or "Oh, I hear something happened to Jamey!" [Laughs.] We talk about the show like we're fans of the show. If I weren't on it, I'd still watch it.
Are you recognized a lot? Are you famous?
My name is not a recognizable name -- except among my peers in the industry. I get recognized a lot, though. They don't know my name but they know they've seen me on TV. I'm good with the public but I am a really private person. I get stopped at the supermarket or on the street, and everyone has been wonderful. No one has offended me. No one has been too pushy. I'm always with my husband and my husband is very protective. He's wonderful with people. Normally it doesn't bother me. I'll sign autographs and talk to people. But not when I'm eating. I like to enjoy my food with my family.
Oh, and I have one little stalker but that's under control. Sometimes it's scary. She can be aggressive, but other people are aware of it so I feel very safe.
What's it like to work with Kiefer? Sorry, I have to ask about this.
He is absolutely adorable and generous. There was this one incident that sums up his character completely. We were shooting in Long Beach -- that's where the assassination attempt on Dennis takes place -- and some of the actors and crew stayed over because it's a bit of a schlep from where we usually shoot. Someone was looking for Kiefer because we were all hanging out and enjoying each other's company. He was finally found in the laundry room with the maids…folding laundry.
Yeah? What did these maids look like?
No! He was having a great time just hanging out with the entire help -- the maids and the busboys. That's him. He's cool.
What is the mood on the Palmer set like? Is it as serious as the plotline? Are people trying to get into character?
No, Dennis and I like to cause trouble. We're the loud ones. We joke around a lot. The make-up people said to me once, "Oh, you always know when the Palmers are coming because it's fun time." But when we get onstage it's about the work. We pick our times to have a little fun. There's a shot where Sherry is coming down the hall because she forgot to tell David something he should do, so she has to pass the Secret Service. Well, some crew member had left a prop toilet in the hallway. It was supposed to be used in another set for something else. So right before the cameras roll, I'm sitting on it and the two Secret Service men are on either side of me. We had a laugh about that really quickly and then we got back into character and started shooting for real. We have fun.
Is or was Palmer sleeping with Maureen Kingsley?
[Laughs for a long time.] That's my only comment.
Is there more to this "accident" of Keith's or the rape of Nicole?
All I can tell you is that it gets gooder and gooder. [Laughs.] There's no other way to put it that's grammatically correct.