17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- South China Morning Post
Natasha Lyonne on her role in Poker Face season 2, and leaning into her eccentricity
Her hair is red, voluminous and wild. She walks with a swagger. Her voice is raspy, and not in a sexy kind of Lauren Bacall way but more like Peter Falk.
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Long before finding her groove with unconventional roles in
Orange Is the New Black
Russian Doll and now Poker Face, there were not many options for a free spirit like Natasha Lyonne, especially when she aged from a pliable child actor into a self-aware adult.
'It's weird that all of a sudden, one day, everybody looks at you differently and you're aware of it,' says Lyonne, 46.
'I remember the Lolita audition, and it was like, 'Will you slowly eat this apple?' And I was like, 'I know what you're asking of me. I can eat it for you comedically'. But no, I will not simulate sex with an apple on camera.
'I mean, I'd studied the history of film. These were not revelations.'
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Lyonne forged a career by finding and later creating projects that capitalised on her undeniably intrepid personality, wrapping the roles around her eccentricities rather than conforming to what was expected of a female performer in Hollywood.
