‘The Bear’ and ‘Mr. & Mrs. Smith’ guest actress Sarah Paulson could join a select company with double Emmy nominations
It’s always a good time to be in the Sarah Paulson business, but that’s especially true this year. The acclaimed performer recently scored her first-ever Tony Award nomination for her performance in “Appropriate” and she is widely predicted to land double Emmy Award nominations for her guest acting appearances in the FX comedy series “The Bear” and Prime Video drama series “Mr. & Mrs. Smith.” If that were to happen when the 2024 Emmy nominations are announced in July, Paulson would join a select few performers to receive concurrent guest-acting nominations since the categories were standardized in 1989.
So far, only 10 actors have received guest-acting nominations in the comedy and drama categories in the same year. The most recent example is Harriet Walter, who collected nominations last year for roles in “Succession” and “Ted Lasso.” Walter is the only person to have achieved this double-dip twice: She was a previous double nominee in 2022.
Before Walter, Laurie Metcalf landed double nominations in 2016 (for “Horace and Pete” and “The Big Bang Theory”). Nathan Lane is the last male actor to have earned the double designation (for “The Good Wife” and “Modern Family” in 2013). The other seven performers Paulson hopes to join in this illustrious and rarefied club include Michael J. Fox (for “The Good Wife” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm” in 2012), Cloris Leachman (for “Joan of Arcadia” and “Malcolm in the Middle” in 2005), Jean Smart (for “The District” and “Frasier” in 2001), Marlee Matlin (for “Picket Fences” and “Seinfeld” in 1994), Gwen Verdon (for “Homicide: Life on the Street” and “Dream On” in 1993), Colleen Dewhurst (for “Road to Avonlea” and “Murphy Brown” in 1991), and Jack Gilford (for “thirtysomething” and “The Golden Girls” in 1989).
Paulson is a prolific performer and past Emmy Award winner (for “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story”) among eight nominations. But despite her history of diverse work across genres and mediums, both guest performances provided Paulson with fresh challenges, she tells Gold Derby in an exclusive interview.
“The experience of working on ‘The Bear’ was so exciting to me – and also a new, unchartered way of working for me,” Paulson says.
The actress appeared as Michelle Berzatto, cousin to Carmy (Emmy winner Jeremy Allen White) and Natalie a.k.a. Sugar (Abby Elliott), on the standout Season 2 episode “Fishes.” The flashback episode – co-written by creator Christopher Storer and executive producer Joanna Calo and directed by Storer – takes place during a contentious and ultimately violent Christmas Eve dinner at the Berzatto household. Paulson is one of several big names who appear in the episode as part of the Berzatto extended family, including Jamie Lee Curtis, Jon Bernthal, Bob Odenkirk, John Mulaney, and Gillian Jacobs.
Asked about creating the fractured family dynamic depicted in the episode, Paulson admits she was “scared” at the prospect of working with the large ensemble. “I so revere each and every member of the series cast, and each and every one of the guest stars assembled for the episode, I just didn’t want to be the weak link!” she explains. But she had spent time with Odenkirk while filming Steven Spielberg’s “The Post,” has known Curtis “from around the way,” and co-starred with “The Bear” star (and Emmy winner) Ebon Moss-Bachrach in the upcoming film “Hold Your Breath.”
“So ultimately it was just like being at summer camp with the greatest actors on Earth,” Paulson says. “We all just sat down at that dinner table and went for it. It was some of the most memorable days I’ve had with a big group of actors. I felt truly lucky to be with them. We had a blast.”
Michelle comes to visit the Berzatto family from New York, where she lives with her partner, Stevie (Mulaney). After a particularly volatile moment, Michelle reaches out to Carmy and suggests he come to live with her in New York to escape some of the family’s toxic dynamics. It’s an offer Carmy presumably accepts since he winds up in New York to hone his kitchen skills before returning to Chicago following his brother’s death by suicide.
“The scene between Carmy and my character wasn’t in the script,” Paulson reveals. “Chris just came up to me and said, ‘I wanna add a scene with you and Jeremy, and let’s just shoot it now, and here is the gist of it…’ And then we were shooting it four minutes later and we just improvised the whole thing.”
Paulson says working with White, who won an Emmy for Season 1 of “The Bear” earlier this year and is expected to win for his Season 2 work in September, “even for that brief moment was actually really nerve-wracking – because I am such a crazy fan of his. I just didn’t want to blow it!”
On “Mr. & Mrs. Smith,” Paulson had a slightly different challenge: trying to keep it together during some hilariously awkward exchanges with series stars Donald Glover and Maya Erskine. Paulson plays a couples therapist on the drama series, and her character’s attempts to mend the onscreen relationship between the show’s leads hit many roadblocks since they’re both deadly spies lying to her about their real lives.
“What was so amazing about this was that Donald was really open to improvising if it occurred to us,” she explains. Paulson stepped in during the show’s sixth episode and says she tried to follow the lead set by Glover and Erskine in terms of her flexibility.
“I come from a different world, where improvising wasn’t always on the table, so it was REALLY fun for me,” she says. “But there are several takes I ruined from laughing!!”
But even amid the improvisation, Paulson committed fully to her preparation for the part. She was inspired by Dr. Orna Guralnik from the show “Couples Therapy” in creating the character, particularly the way Dr. Guralnik leans forward in her chair to show her attention.
“I decided to incorporate that physical element of her ‘listening’ and then, of course, all the head nodding and physical things, that all therapists seem to do to let you know they are ‘with you,’” she says. “I work with a movement coach named Julia Crockett and I texted Donald after he asked me to come and be part of the show, to see if he would be cool with it if I brought her to set – and he was like ‘hell yes.’ That was incredible because she got to be with me every day and kept encouraging me to go further with the physical stuff.”
Paulson says she relished the opportunity to go there with the character. “Her encouragement, I believe, helped me push it a bit more into the comedy of it all. Which I never get to do!! So I was in heaven.”
“The Bear” streams on Hulu (and returns for Season 3 later this month). “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” is available on Amazon.
Additional reporting by Joyce Eng
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