The role that “traumatised” Rachel Brosnahan’s mother: “She was so angry!”
The role of Lois Lane can be a poisoned chalice. Of course, the chance to play one of comic books’ oldest and most famous female characters isn’t something one should turn down lightly.
However, when the part is so often reduced to simply ‘Superman’s girlfriend’, it’s easy to get lost in the shuffle. That’s what made it so nice that Rachel Brosnahan was able to hold her own in James Gunn’s latest reimagining of the ‘Man of Steel’. Even if I thought the movie, on the whole, was a disgrace.
Though this was by far her most prominent role to date, Brosnahan didn’t just appear out of thin air to take the part. Before she entered the DC world and even before she led the Amazon series The Marvellous Mrs Maisel, she earned notoriety portraying Rachel Posner in Netflix’s House of Cards. A sex worker who becomes involved with the unscrupulous Chief of Staff Doug Stamper (Michael Kelly), Posner is a key figure in the show’s first three seasons.
Unfortunately, Posner’s social ambitions land her in more than a bit of hot water. At the end of season two, she is kidnapped by Doug, and even though she escapes and even injures her captor in a vicious assault, she is forced to go on the run and start a new life, and just when she thought she was safe, Doug tracks her down and, unfortunately, finishes the job. We never actually see Doug kill her, but it’s made pretty clear that’s what happened.
The saga of Rachel Posner was one of the best parts of the show’s early years. She was only meant to be in the first two episodes, but the writers were so drawn to the character that they decided to flesh her out. Everybody loved her… well, not everybody. In an interview with Imagista, Brosnahan revealed that a close member of her family wasn’t too thrilled to watch her go through hell.
“I think my mother is still traumatised,” the star confessed. “She actually called me after watching my final episode – she was so angry! She said that she had been driving around for hours and feeling really messed up, and how dare I not tell her that that was coming before she watched it!”
Sometimes it helps to have a family member be this honest with you, and Robert Pattinson has often spoken about how his mother has kept him grounded throughout his career, but when that family member is annoyed at you for something your fictional character did, you’ve probably got a right to protest. What was she supposed to do? Spoil an episode of one of the most popular TV shows at the time?
In the long run, it probably doesn’t bother Brosnahan too much that her mum was upset. Her role in House of Cards is what catapulted her to stardom. It earned her an Emmy nomination and led to every other success she experienced since.
The show would undoubtedly be much more fondly remembered if certain events surrounding Kevin Spacey hadn’t gotten in the way.
