Joshua Jackson on Why He Needs a “Love Story” After Multiple Intense Roles

In the last three years, Joshua Jackson has played a husband and father with his home life in chaos in Little Fires Everywhere, a murderous surgeon in Dr. Death and, now, adulterer and accused murderer Dan Gallagher — the role originated by Michael Douglas in 1987’s Fatal Attraction — in the Paramount+ series adaptation of the film that debuted at the end of April.

“I don’t know what’s going on with me,” Jackson joked to THR recently. Whatever it is, he needs a break. “I’m shooting a romance right now; I needed a love story after [Dr. Death’s] Christopher Duntsch and Fatal Attraction. I needed to hold hands and make goo-goo eyes at somebody.”

That somebody would be Lauren Ridloff, whom he’s starring (and exec producing) alongside in an untitled Starz romantic drama series from Ava DuVernay (a project now temporarily on hold due to the ongoing writers strike, after starting filming in March and suspending production in mid-May). The half-hour drama follows two polar opposites who become intertwined in a love affair that turns their worlds, and those of everyone around them, upside down.

Jackson admitted that not only is it exhausting playing such dark characters, but the added emotional element of playing fathers, as he does in Fatal Attraction, is “was way more impactful because I have a different frame of reference obviously for this now, being a dad.” Jackson has a 3-year-old daughter with wife Jodie Turner-Smith. 

This story first appeared in the June 14 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.