“He just doesnotget it.”
Elle Fanningis lamenting the fact that herGreatcostarNicholas Houltdid not laugh at her appropriately crude joke.
The joke in question involved another princess, albeit a fictional oneCinderella.
Nicholas Hoult and Elle Fanning, stars of Hulu’s ‘The Great,’ photographed at EW’s digital cover shoot in September in Savannah, Ga.Ren Adkins for EW
Instead of a slipper, though, this version was in need of a tampon.
She goes to the ball and returns much later than midnight, much to the fairy godmother’s surprise.
“Where on earth were you?
How did you do it?”
To which Cinderella replies with a wink, “Oh, I was with this guy.
I think his name was Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater.”
Nicholas Hoult and Elle Fanning, stars of Hulu’s ‘The Great,’ photographed at EW’s digital cover shoot in September in Savannah, Ga.Ren Adkins for EW
Hoult’s confusion is still written all over his face as Fanning recounts this.
This competitive dynamic exists between the actors both on and off screen.
“The characters of Catherine and Peter are always trying to one-up each other,” Hoult explains.
“Elle and I have a healthy habit of doing the same to each other as actors.
Just before their lips can meet, he pops a macaron into his mouth with a cat-ate-the-canary grin.
Oh, and there was the small matter of her being pregnant with Peter’s child.
It’s obscene but enjoyable precisely because of that, not in spite of it.
In other words, this new season has big shoes to fill.
“We were just like, ‘Swab me here, swab me here, swab me there, whatever.
Just swab me everywhere,'” Fanning jokes.
One thing he definitely doesn’t do, however, is watch edits.
It’s something that I’m learning,” he says.
“We’ve got 10 regulars, so it’s kind of a big cast to manage.
And, true to the first season, every character has their own hidden world of motivations.
None of them are going, ‘I’m about to go do evil.’
They all just think they’re doing the right thing,for them,” McNamara says.
Basically, “Don’t trust anyone.
They’re all coming from a good place, but they’re all coming from their own place.”
“I think that would be too simple,” he says finally.
“Obviously, he messes up a lot and does terrible things.
That’s why he is quite a likable character.
He has a stream of consciousness in terms of what he says and believes in.
You always know where you stand with him.”
“That was really fun for me in some of the scenes this year,” Hoult says.
And Elle was so wonderful at doing that in a really funny way.
“I think you should ship it,” Fanning admits.
“They are a complicated bunch.
and Mrs. Smithin the 18th century.”
But asking if they are bad or good together is perhaps the wrong question, Fanning suggests.
“They push each other along.
They understand each other.
I think that’s what it is,” she says.
“I just wanted to join in with the fun, really.”
To put it bluntly, she is “appalled” by the news.
Anderson says her character’s motives should probably be questioned.
“I wouldn’t trust her, and I think her motivations feel suitably contradictory.
Suffice to say, she fits right in.
Anderson’s two-episode guest stint is complemented byJason Isaacsas Peter’s father, Peter the Great.
(History buffs will point out here that Peter the Great was actually his grandfather.
ButThe Greathas never had a problem playing around with history.)
“His father was this great ruler and man and built up to mythic proportions,” Hoult explains.
He was always in his shadow.
To prepare, she talked to a midwife and watched birthing videos, including one starring her own mother.
So it’s scarred in my brain of what that’s like!”
“It’s about Peter and Catherine.
It’s sort of a dark last episode,” he says.
Adds Hoult: “There are some switch-arounds that you just wouldn’t expect.”
The real Peter III died under suspicious circumstances just eight days after Catherine’s successful coup attempt.
We’ll see."
Hulu hasn’t officially greenlit a third season yet.
But should it happen, McNamara already has an abundance of ideas.
“We end the [second] season with everyone in a very, very different place.
As is common with television productions, both seasons have so far featured several different directors.
Might a third season see its star and EP step behind the camera?
“I don’t know.
I’ve thought about it.
It would be fun.
I could boss Nick around once and for all,” she says with a smile.
The star already has one very apropos suggestion for future seasons.
“Have you seen the real Catherine the Great’s furniture?”
“Oh my God.
It’s literally carved with penises and vaginas.
I want that furniture in there.
Tony, get the furniture in.
Directed and Produced by Alison Wild & Kristen Harding.
