Raise your hand if you discovered BBC's The Fall on a quest to deepen your knowledge of Jamie Dornan. [Raises hand.] Raise your hand if you stuck with it for its awesome leading women. [Raises hand while noting that Jamie Dornan did a really good job though.] Finally, raise your hand if you have no idea what I'm talking about. [Explains:] The show, which is set in Belfast, follows a serial killer (Dornan) as he's hunted by a brilliant and alluring detective (played by Gillian Anderson). It's thoughtful, moody, and creepy as hell: Not only does the killer, Paul, strangle women, he does so while living a double life as a grief counselor and family man. Cosmopolitan.com spoke Irish actress Bronagh Waugh, who plays Paul's wife, Sally Ann, about season two (now available on Netflix), Dornan's casting in Fifty Shades of Grey, and shooting sex scenes with a newfound sex symbol. 

I have a lingering season-one question: Why do you think Paul married Sally Ann? What was it about her?
I think it comes down to the fact that she is a neonatal nurse. She gives life to young babies that are in distress and she has the ability to give life. And he takes life away. And, not to make it religious or anything, but Paul's character has such huge ideas about life and death, and justifying when it can be taken away and when it can't. I guess she's the yin to his yang.

Do you think they have a good marriage? Or do you think Sally Ann thinks they do? It seems comfortable, but not particularly good.
We discussed this quite a lot [shooting the first season] and we wanted to portray that they were in a relatively secure, happy marriage. In the first season, you see them laughing and smiling, in bed together. That's what makes it all the creepier, is that on the surface — and certainly to Sally Ann — they had that kind of marriage. That's what's so heartbreaking. When you research cases of serial killers, or people that were in their family or close to them, that's one of the things that they find hardest to deal with: that in their eyes, everything was OK. They had no idea about this person's life.

Did you do a lot of research into the family of serial killers?
Yeah. From the research that I did, the wives of some of the serial killers, I think, were the biggest victims. That's quite a controversial thing to say, but do you understand what I mean? As in, they're tarred with the brush of the identity when it finally comes out who their husband is. So I'm very defensive over anyone sort of going, "Oh, well, the wife's stupid, she didn't know." Well, actually, I raise the question, How would you know?

At one point Stella calls Sally Ann dumb for not knowing, which shocked me.
I know! It really shocked me too. I think that says more about Stella's character than it does about Sally Ann … It's funny how women can shoot each other down. As a woman, you would hope that a female detective would go, "Hold on a minute." But it's so easy to dismiss [Sally Ann]. 

Stella does have some empathy for Olivia, the daughter, though. I know you weren't in the room for this scene, but when Sally Ann brings Olivia to say good-bye to Paul — it was one of the more emotional moments of the show.
It was hard. Because you're torn between empathizing with a frigging serial killer, going, "Oh my god, this is heartbreaking, he's saying good-bye to her," but at the same time, you're remembering what he did. When we were filming stuff, it raised so many questions in all of us; we were constantly debating stuff.

Like this scene? Or what stuff?
That scene was really uncomfortable. The babysitter scenes, as well, raised a lot of questions about morality. A lot of people asked me about Sally Ann forgiving her husband for the affair, and would go, "How could you do that?" Another female, a crew member, was like, "There's no fucking way I'd forgive him. That's disgusting. She was underage." And I said, "It's a very easy walk when it's not in your shoes." I mean, my god, if I think about my friends and the secrets I know about them and their husbands and things that they don't know about — yet they've carried on and managed to forge a very solid marriage. Nobody is perfect, and things happen. 

When you started working with Jamie, he was not cast as Christian Grey, right?
That's right. No, he wasn't. It's a big change, I guess, for everybody — for him, especially. It's very weird. I never thought when I did this show that I would be asked more about Jamie than about Gillian. Like, I find that really interesting. 'Cause I think — I'm a bit of a feminist, as well, so I'm, like, I think Gillian is fucking incredible.

I'm a feminist too! I spoke to Gillian yesterday. But most of your scenes are with Jamie, not with Gillian. I actually thought about this and justified the line of question.
[Laughs.]

I did! Even though you don't have anything to do with Fifty Shades directly, you're now attached to in some way. That's a unique experience. 
Yeah, it's so weird, isn't it? Because this thing has happened in the middle of us doing our little independent show that is from the grass roots up, and I think everyone liked that because there was no pressure, and we were all putting our heads down and producing some really fucking good work. And then Jamie goes and gets cast as Christian Grey! And it's like, Oh my god, the world has turned upside down. And I feel like I can't answer anything because I'm not him. I'm always kind of flummoxed when people ask me about him, because I feel like Jamie must be so fucking sick of hearing me talk about him. He has no control over that. He has enough pressure on his shoulders with his huge job that I feel bad for him. He's such a fucking awesome guy. And I love it when I see people I know do well and get good work. As opposed to someone where you're like, Ugh, he's such a dick. Why did they have to pick him? But Jamie's not. He's a really good guy. And he's a great actor. I think he fucking excels in the second season [of The Fall]. His confidence really shows. It's grown. 

Do you think there will be a season three?
There's been rumor and talk, but until those get confirmed, we don't know anything. But I think there's room for it. There's room for one more. At the same time, the ending of the second, you could walk away from that never knowing.

Never knowing if he lives or dies?
Yeah.

Well, that's another way that Fifty Shades is the elephant in the room, because can Jamie even do another season?
Yeah. Well, Allan's such an amazing storyteller, I think he would tell it in a way that it's not necessarily about whether Paul dies or he lives. There's more to the story than that.

It probably wouldn't make sense if he lived. The third season could be about how Stella takes his death. Maybe there's a reconciliation between Stella and Sally Ann. Maybe Stella takes an interest in how she and Olivia are doing. 
I would be really interested in seeing where it went with Stella. But also, of course, selfishly, where they went with Sally Ann. And I'm fascinated about Olivia's character. It's kind of disturbing, some of the behavior that she is showing, and she is clearly a daddy's little girl.

I love her dance scene in the first season. 
Yeah! We had so much fun doing that. The little girl, Sarah [Beattie], that plays Olivia, is just awesome. For that particular scene, Sarah's older sister, who loves to dance, came to visit us, and me and her made up this dance routine for Sarah to learn. She was having so much fun doing it, but then when it came to doing it in front of all the crew, she got really shy. She's like, "No, I don't want to do it!" And it was really hard to get her to do it. So in the actual take that we've done, I'm dancing in front of her, and then when we cut back, I get back on the sofa. We really bonded as a family.

How so?
Jamie and I took the kids out to the zoo because we needed to get some photographs — family photos to use around the house — and we did that before we started the show, and I think it really helped. The two of us had a really nice relationship.

You have some intimate scenes together. One where you get into a bath completely naked and he washes you, another is a sex scene. What were the mechanics of these?
[For the tub scene] I did full nudity, but it got cut down a lot in the edit, I guess for compliance and for artistic reasons. Allan is a real advocate of not having gratuitous nudity or violence. We actually commented before we started shooting on how [on] so many shows it's like, Did we really need to see that? And why is it always the woman who is more naked than the man? Allan was like, "I do not want this to be like that." And when we do [show nudity], he said, "I want to see Sally Ann just sometimes walking across a shot in her panties and her bra, picking up the kids' dirty laundry or whatever." Letting it all hang out. Being natural the way you would be in the house. This is not in any way something sexy.

And then, obviously, I knew we had this big sex scene in the barn. We shot a lot more and the scene was a lot longer than what is actually shown. We saw Sally Ann in a much stronger light in that scene, you see her straddling Paul and being on top and being dominant in the sex, and I think that was really interesting to have explored that more, because she obviously didn't know anything about what he was into. So as an audience member, you watch that feeling very uncomfortable, going like, "Oh, god. She has no idea!" And there's actually one bit where I put my hand around his throat. I kind of wish that had still been in, because I think that was very provocative. Not provocative, but it was kind of controversial.

So this all got cut? Because in the scene I saw, he was on top, that was it. 
Yeah, the stuff that got cut. So, in the lead-up to doing that, I was really shitting myself. I was on a television show [Hollyoaks] for five years before that where I had to be in my bra and panties quite a lot of the time, but it was on a show that was on at 6:30 in the evening, so it was nothing like what this was. I didn't have to actually fully get my boobs or lady garden out. So, we had a tiny little plaster on my lady garden, which really didn't need to be there, 'cause it was so pointless. And nothing on the boobs. You could have pasties if you wanted them, but I'm from the Lena Dunham school of "Who gives a fuck?" But of course when it comes to the day, it's fucking terrifying.

I think it's the least sexy thing to do, to mechanically simulate sex with another person who is your colleague. Everyone's like, "Oh my god, that's so exciting that you got to." And it's like, "No! No! Where do you work? OK, you work in Walmart. Would you ever ask the guy who sits next to you in Walmart to pretend to have sex with you?" That is the most awkward thing in the world. 

Right. Lucky is you get to have real sex with Jamie Dornan, assuming he weren't married, of course. 
Yes! Exactly!

How was Jamie at making you feel comfortable? 
I mean, he was nervous too. It's awkward for both of us. But we're colleagues and we get along really good, so we just wanted to make it easy and get it done with as quickly as possible. It was fine and grand, and we kind of high-fived at the end and went, "Whew! OK. Job well done. Let's go play some football with the rest of the crew."

Was the mood of the set light then? Were you guys able to have fun even though it's a heavy show?
Yeah. I think that's a very Irish thing. Even amongst tragedy and horrific things, the Irish sense of self is to have humor through everything. And that that was a great way of getting through such a tough shoot.

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