With The Crown Season 4 now streaming on Netflix, I recently spoke with Gillian Anderson about joining the series to play Margaret Thatcher. If you’re not familiar with Margaret Thatcher, she was the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1979-1990), the leader of the Conservative Party (1975 to 1990), and the longest-serving British prime minister of the 20th century. She was actually nicknamed the “Iron Lady” because of her uncompromising leadership style.

During the interview, Anderson talked about how The Crown creator Peter Morgan manages to create such amazing work, what people might be surprised to learn about the making of the series, her thoughts on Thatcher, why she hates the first few days of filming, and the TV series she’d like to guest star on. In addition, she talked about filming Sex Education Season 3 during the pandemic, if she thinks it will go more than three seasons, and more.

Check out what she had to say below.

Collider: I try to ask some fun questions to start every interview off, and I'd like to start with this one. Is there a TV series that you would love to guest star on?

GILLIAN ANDERSON: Dave.

Does the cast of The Crown have a group text going? And, if so, who's the one who sends too many?

ANDERSON: Funny, yes we do. Who sends too many? That's... I don't know about too many. I'd say probably Emma sends quite a few.

 

Well, she's young, I get that.

ANDERSON: Yeah, so that makes sense.

I absolutely love The Crown. I can't say enough good things about it and you were fantastic on this season.

ANDERSON: Thank you.

As someone who's worked in television, it is really hard to make one season of exceptional television. Peter Morgan has now done four, and he's working on five and six. How the F does he do this?

ANDERSON: How the F does he do this? I don't know. I think anybody who spends any time with him at all, doesn't know how he does it. I think sometimes he absolutely feels like he can't and he doesn't want to. And he wants it all to go away, but then every morning he sits at his desk and he does a few hours. He's got an amazing research team, an amazing team that worked with him and they all manage to pull him along. They pull each other along and yeah, I know. It is daunting, but I do feel it's quite extraordinary that you can be four seasons in and have 10 episodes of such quality work. Four seasons in is pretty amazing.

It doesn't make sense because like I said, you've done plenty of television, you know how impossible this is.

ANDERSON: Yup.

So you come in on this season and maybe you'd visited the set before, I'm not sure. But what do you think would surprise people to learn, that are fans of the show, about the actual making of the show?

ANDERSON: That maybe surprised me? Gosh, I don't know. I was constantly impressed by how good natured everybody remained and how calm, adult, friendly, non-toxic the sets felt all the time. I had visited the set a couple of seasons before I worked on it and it's really an amazing thing.

I'm not sure how political you are but what did you think about Margaret Thatcher before signing on? And did your opinion of her change after playing the role?

ANDERSON: I realized when I started that I knew very little about her and that most of my opinions about her were based on other people's opinions. And experience with her and not on my own. But then also, I think that it's helpful as an actor to remove any preconceptions before starting to work on an historical character. Because it's important I think, to be able to really immerse oneself in their motivations and not be hindered at all. I think sometimes if one has very strong feelings against somebody, then playing a scene in a particular way might change the way that you're able to immerse in what their experience would have been.

So, I have found that it's important to leave all opinions and preconceptions at the door. And so I don't actually feel like my feelings about her were swayed, but I do feel like she's a much... I understand her as being a much more complex character, and certainly the show portrays her as being a much more complex character than I realized that she was, or than perhaps she's been portrayed before. I found that it just makes it more interesting to dive into as an actor when you've got so much to work with.

You've done such great work in so many different things, but how difficult was it to maintain her voice and body language and mannerisms during a scene?

ANDERSON: Not that difficult. Once you're focused on it and immersed in it, it's not hard to, that's just part of what one does. But there are certainly takes that you do where you go in and out of it. Where in a particular take, you might realize that you said a sentence or you did things that weren't particularly her. You ask for another take because you slipped out of her in the process, I think that's perfectly understandable. I think I certainly had many of those experiences where I was like, "Nope, sorry. I think we're going to need another one. I was being Jean Milburn during that take," or something like that.

I've been asking a lot of actors this question recently. When was the last time you were really nervous before filming something and why?

ANDERSON: Oh, well, I hate first days. I absolutely... I'm always nervous, I always think I'm going to be fired. Sometimes it's more than just a first day, it can be a first week. And so I would say every job between the first one and five days, I'm freaked out.

I've spoken to a lot of people that say they wish they could refilm the first two days of filming at the end of the shoot.

ANDERSON: Well, Donald Sutherland once told me that in his contract has it that any scenes that he does in the first two weeks are from the middle of the script.

That's so interesting.

ANDERSON: Isn't that interesting and incredibly smart and must come from someone who's worked a lot and knows what happens and decided to protect himself. He said, "because if the audience believes you for the first period of time, you can not necessarily be all there in the middle and they'll buy it because you've gained their trust in the first third of the film."

I've never thought about that, but it's brilliant.

ANDERSON: Isn't it?

Yeah, it's given me a whole different appreciate... I need to... This really threw me for a loop, it's so smart.

ANDERSON: Sorry. You didn't think you were going to get such a serious answer?

No, I think it's unbelievable, actually.

ANDERSON: It's great.

Before I run out of time with you, I absolutely love Sex Education.

ANDERSON: Thank you.

I have to talk about it with you just because I am curious how it's been going, filming the new season under the restrictions of the pandemic?

ANDERSON: Well, you know Netflix, they take care of their productions and they have pretty deep pockets. They have set a really well run protocol for how to film on their sets. So there's... Sex Ed has their own lab, people are tested multiple times a week, and they stay in designated cohorts. And knock wood, so far, nobody's gotten sick.

The thing about Netflix is a lot of their series are three seasons and done. Do you think Sex Ed will go more than three seasons, or have you guys talked about that?

ANDERSON: It has been discussed and I think, given how much people are enjoying it, I don't see why it wouldn't but things change. Things are changing at Netflix daily, as we speak. And so at the end of the day, it's nobody's call but those guys at the top.

What can you tease for people who are fans of the show, like me, about the actual third season? Something that I've learned recently is that because of the pandemic, a lot of the writers on a lot of the shows were able to complete more of the scripts prior to shooting. Was that the case on Sex Ed? Do you think it improved the writing?

ANDERSON: I don't necessarily think it was the case, but I don't know the reasons why, and I don't know what the complications were. So, I can't really speak to that.

What about teasing the storyline?

ANDERSON: Well, as we know, Jean is pregnant and she's still pregnant when we find her again. And so we see that Jean is trying to negotiate how to deal with that in relation to Jakob and also Otis.

Thanks a lot for you time.

ANDERSON: Thank you. Bye.

The Crown Season 4 is now streaming on Netflix. Click here for all our coverage.