Note: This story contains spoilers from “9-1-1” Season 8, Episode 9.
Maddie, Jennifer Love Hewitt’s character on “9-1-1,” has been through some very trying times, including when her abusive former husband Doug (played by real-life hubby Brian Hallisay) almost killed her. But being abducted by a serial killer makes all that trauma seem like a “lunch date,” says the actress.
Hewitt spoke to TheWrap before the first of the two-part episode aired on Thursday night, and explained how much fun it is for her to play Maddie when she’s in distress.
“It’s awesome. Most people don’t get handed things like this at their normal TV job, and [showrunner] Tim [Minear] always gives us the best stuff. I’m just so deeply grateful,” she told TheWrap. “These episodes are the most Maddie,” she added, “because this is what she was put on the planet to do, unfortunately, to survive over and over again and fight like hell.”
Here’s more of our conversation with Hewitt:
TheWrap: Where does this rank on the scale of the most awful things that ever happened to Maddie?
Jennifer Love Hewitt: Oh, the most awful, like number one. Doug seems like a lunch date compared to what happens to me. I literally didn’t think that anything could ever top that. And even Brian, when he read it, he was like, “Oh, what we did was nothing.”
This is by far the worst thing that’s ever happened to Maddie, and it’s the biggest fight of her life.
There’s extra peril for her because she’s pregnant, which very few people know at this point.
Right. It’s not a public thing yet at the call center. But it is definitely another reason to fight so hard.
When you got this script, what did you think?
I was, like, “Oh, wow, how am I going to do this?” I was nervous and excited about the challenge. We want her to be happy and we want her to find calm and goodness in her life. But the truth is, these episodes are the most Maddie, because this is how she came to be. When we met her, that was in peril, she was on the run. She was living a very dark life and was a fighter and survivor at that point.
For me, these episodes are really fun, even though I know that the audience wants her to be happy. It’s when I feel like Maddie is the most Maddie, because this is what she was put on the planet to do, unfortunately, to survive over and over again and fight like hell. And she’s good at it.
Definitely. The show is always putting the characters through the wringer. Is Maddie kicking herself for getting too involved in this particular case, which started with a “9-1-1” call from the killer asking her to stop him from killing a girl he had abducted?
Yeah, it was a normal call that turned very dark very quickly, that somehow ended up under her skin in a very severe way. Anyone that’s held captive against their will is a trigger for her obviously, given her domestic abuse background and the stuff that she went through with Doug.
So when it switches into that territory, it becomes different. It’s not just a dispatcher handling a call, it’s a victim, it’s a survivor, it’s a trigger point.
Later in the episode, when the killer calls back, Maddie thinks she’s talked him into taking his own life and she’s wondering if she did the right thing or if she went too far.
Right. When he brings up her own child, and then her knowing that she has another one on the way, then the mama bear thing also gets triggered. And it’s a little bit like, “Well, now I have to save everyone.” Because if this continues to go on, there’ll be more victims.
Sometimes her humanity finds itself in the job, maybe more than it’s supposed to. She stops being a dispatcher, and she starts being a woman and a survivor and a fighter, and it doesn’t serve her well at all.
What was your reaction to the reveal at the end of the episode, when we learn that the real abductor is very much alive and is actually the Missing Persons detective played by Abigail Spencer?
I loved it. She’s tremendous in these episodes. I had worked with her on “Ghost Whisperer,” like 100 years ago, so it was really fun to see her. We had a really great time shooting these episodes. As crazy as that sounds, it was bananas. I was chained to a pole for 10 days. I kept making the joke to the crew, “If you guys leave me here and break for lunch, I will never forgive you.”
But we were a safe place to land for each other. Because we had that trust and friendship, I feel like we were both able to push our limits in ways that maybe we wouldn’t have been able to had been someone else. I’m very grateful that it was her. She really gives a beautiful performance.
Will Maddie have to take some time off work to recover after this?
We’ll see. I feel like the things that are happening for the main characters this season are as traumatic and dramatic as the emergencies that we’re dealing with. Sometimes it feels like [the rescues] are actually more the [focus] and we’re like the stuff that attaches to your heart or gives you a little bit of a break from the craziness and the emergencies.
This season feels like every character is really going through it in all these different ways. Everyone is transforming. Tim is a genius. He really knows how to say to the audience, “Don’t get comfortable.” This season feels very much about these people and who they are and how they’re growing and [what] they’re being put through. Lots more of that coming.
“9-1-1” airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC and streams the next day on Hulu.
The post ‘9-1-1’ Star Jennifer Love Hewitt Calls Serial Killer Abduction the ‘Worst Thing That’s Ever Happened to Maddie’ appeared first on TheWrap.