In You and The Handmaid’s Tale, Madeline Brewer Is No Damsel in Distress

Brewer was filming Handmaid’s during both the 2016 and 2024 elections, and is struck by how prophetic the show has been. “Unfortunately, it makes you feel a bit, like, ‘Have we meant nothing to the world?’” she says. “I’m going to choose to not believe that because I think that this is…What does the internet call it? An extinction gasp—that last gasp for life of severe right-wing misogyny before it crumbles. I’m so tired of having the show be so relevant, actually. I think we all are.”

This season, Janine faces recent challenges after being ousted as handmaid to Bradley Whitford’s Commander Lawrence and separated from her teenage daughter. She’s forced to live as a Jezebel, sexually serving other members of the ruling class—most regularly, a recent character played by Veep’s Timothy Simons.

Thankfully, Simons and Brewer’s unsettling onscreen interactions were buoyed by their playful off-screen animated. “Handmaid’s Tale is very considerate about the fact that, in this world, the power dynamics are very different between men and women and offers us, as the women actors, a lot of power to express what we’re comfortable with,” she says. “We chatted before the season started. He wanted to try a lot of different stuff, and his ideas for the character were so fun. He’d mess with my eye patch. Or there was one point where I just grabbed Tim’s tie. I was, like, ‘Oh. Was that okay?’ He was, like, ‘That was amazing!’”

Though, in theory, she likes the idea of doing less politically resonant projects, Brewer embraces how Handmaid’s has pushed her. “It’s not just, ‘Here is my Instagram post and then I’ve done my activism for the day,” she says. “[The show] forced me to become more aware, and to also just protect my heart.”

It’s been months since Brewer wrapped You and Handmaid’s, but her desire to advocate for Bronte and Janine lingers. By the end of her six-season run on the latter show, “I truly just hoped that she would find peace, whatever that looks like,” she says. “We’ve seen June allow anger and hatred of Gilead to shape her—make her do things like murder people. Janine wouldn’t have survived without her friends who were willing to kill people, but she was able to make it through without compromising herself.”

Bronte, meanwhile, seems comfortable playing the role of manic pixie dream girl. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this,” Brewer says with a smile, “but: Nietzsche is quoted as saying something about how women are deceptive. Yeah, well, because we don’t have brute force. We’ve had to evolve, take care of ourselves. When we feel danger, we kind of code switch. We fawn. It’s a survival mechanism. We want to believe that men can be good, and it’s to our detriment sometimes. A man like Joe, who is successful, attractive, vulnerable, chivalrous, checks every box of what a good man should be—even he’s not a good guy. He’s actually the worst kind of guy. Bronte understands that really intimately and plays all the right notes.”

Before she heads home for an upcoming Zoom audition, Brewer releases some hopes for herself out into the ether. “I want to work with great writers and actors, see the world, have kids, get married,” she says. “I just feel more possibility at this point in my life than I ever have. Maybe that’s because my bank account reflects the fact that I just did two big shows.” Brewer shrugs. “But for so long, I was white-knuckling my career. God, I wanted it so much. I was Lennie with the mouse. If you hold on that tight, you’re going to kill your own career or yourself.”

With two potential breakthroughs now in the rearview, she feels ready to step into a recent kind of spotlight. “I have so much gratitude for the work I’ve been allowed to do. And why shouldn’t I be allowed to do more?” says Brewer. “I don’t know what that’s going to look like, but I want to try a bit of everything.”