“Happy Ending” has only been on the air for three seasons, but Elisha Cuthbert is grateful that the sitcom even reached this milestone.
“What I like is that he found another home in streaming [on Netflix], which in my opinion is probably where we should have started. I think we would have thrived, but I look at it and say, “Three seasons, we’ve done three seasons.”
“Therefore, the fact that we passed the pilot project and spent three years together was just magic. I really honed my comedy skills. To do this, I learned a lot from the rest of the actors. And then I left this show with such confidence that I can’t even tell you because I had such a good time. And I said, “Oh, maybe I’m a little funny.”
The ABC comedy pilot began with Cuthbert’s Alex Kerkovich leaving her fiance, Dave Rose (Zachary Knighton), at the altar and eventually had to figure out how to stay cordial with the rest of their dysfunctional thirty-year-old friends in Chicago. Casey Wilson, Adam Palley, Damon Wayans Jr. and Eliza Coop have added to the cast.
“My favorite was actually when we weren’t filming, and we were behind the scenes, kind of just fooling around. We improvised a lot. These moments are so special to me because they really made me explore what’s on the page. It’s not even an option for me,” Cuthbert explained to Us. “You go from 24, where everything is so well written and it’s so important to stick to the storyline, and then you start working with creators like David Kaspe and Jonathan Groff, and they give you license to take a brilliant script that’s already there. page and go crazy with it. It was really just jokes between us crazy, crazy kids who were the best.”
The series was eventually shut down in May 2013 due to low ratings, but still enjoys a cult following. Although Cuthbert doesn’t know if Alex and Dave will be together today (“I hate hypotheses. Leave it to David Kaspe. I want to know what he thinks about it, because I don’t want to sound like a dodo!”), the ranch star can still laugh at Alex’s Halloween costume in the season 2 episode “Creepy Endings”. In this particular year, a sick but determined Alex dressed up as Marilyn Monroe at a party. But because of her hoarse voice, a potential boyfriend and party-goer mistook her for a man.
“Fred Savage directed this episode, and our Halloween episodes were always on top. They have always been a big event for us,” she recalls. “So Fred and I just thought: “Will I really be voicing? And then we’re going to mess with that in the post later? Or can you really make a deep, husky voice?” And I just did what I did. I gave him what I had and he said, “No, let’s do it.” Let’s just use you to scratch.”
Cuthbert has been jumping from television to the big screen for years, and now steps into the role of the matriarch in The Basement, who is desperate to find his daughter after she mysteriously disappeared in the basement of their new home.
“I think there’s a permanence in television that’s very comforting, that you’re in it for a long time and that you can build and develop a character, while a movie can be fast and fast and you can get it. done, start finishing and get back to your life,” she explained. “But you really have to know what you’re facing when you’re making a movie, as far as the character is concerned. There’s really no place to start saying, “Hmm. I wonder if she has a long-lost sister?” On TV, you can find out that you have four children in the next episode, and make a very quick turn.”
Over time, Cuthbert began to trust comedy more thanks to the “Happy Ending”, which made her more open-minded about the roles she chooses.
“I think I always go with my intuition. You know, I’m better at getting rid of the fear of not being able to do something. I think that many times in my former life, in my early career, I was lucky. I was 24 years old, I was working and doing something, but scripts came and I said: “I don’t know if I can do it.” I think I was going my own way. And now I find that when I read things that scare me and think I shouldn’t do it, I probably should,” she explained to Us. “I remember being kind of asked about filming sitcoms in front of an audience. I went: “There is no way. I’m not comedic enough. I can’t do that. I can’t perform in front of—I’m not a theater actress.” And then, many years later, a comedy is played every night at the Ranch in front of a live audience in the studio. I mean, every week. It was one of the best experiences of my career. So I really find ways to go, not get ahead of myself and block myself from trying to do things that scare you, because there really is some magic in it.”
