Staying Fit
Hope Davis began her acting career in the 1990 film Flatliners, and has since appeared on Broadway and in critically acclaimed movies (American Splendor, The Daytrippers) and TV shows (HBO’s In Treatment and Succession). On Showtime’s Your Honor, now in its second season, the 58-year-old actress is embracing her darker side as the matriarch of a dangerous crime family seeking to avenge the death of her son.
In Your Honor, your character, Gina Baxter, is the wife of a crime boss, but she might actually be more dangerous than her husband. Truth?
That’s kind of where we are headed. She’s just one of those people waiting in the wings, ready to grab power, frustrated with her long-term husband and everyone else around her. She’s ready to step in and take over the business. The show is exploring what happens to a couple when they’ve experienced incredible tragedy, and what direction do they both head in. In the case of the show, they head in really different directions. Gina is really angry.
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Gina’s story — along with many others featured on screen recently — seems to prove the Hollywood issue of not knowing what to do with actresses over age 50 is no more. Agree?
It does. My whole family has been watching [HBO’s] The White Lotus. It’s so exciting to see Jennifer Coolidge leading the show. More stories are being told. Certainly, as a viewer, I’m much more interested in that than in just watching beauty queens floating around. I'm interested in watching complex characters, whether they are males or females. We’re all seasoned watchers at this point. … While movies are struggling, it feels like these limited [TV] series are in their heyday with great writers, lofty concepts and actors who are really happy to sign on.
What else is on your family binge list?
With all the homework, it’s not a nightly thing, but we have some special shows we watch together. We watch [Netflix’s] The Crown, we watch [BBC’s] The Great British Bake Off.
What do you like to bake?
I’ll make absolutely anything. We had friends over and we made homemade doughnuts. Nothing like a fresh fried doughnut. I love to bake bread. I love to bake cakes and cookies. [When] both my kids are home — when my daughter is home from college — we like to have afternoon tea at 4 and sit down with anything fresh baked. We did a little too much baking during the pandemic. We had to pull back once the world opened up again.