Scandal icon Kerry Washington talks new show and real-life family revelations: “I think secrets are always rooted in shame”

This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine.

Born in the Bronx in New York, Kerry Washington’s breakthrough role was as political fixer Olivia Pope in Shonda Rhimes’s Scandal. On the big screen, she’s appeared in Django Unchained, American war drama The Six Triple Eight about an all-Black, all-female battalion, and Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery.

Her latest role is Eleanor in Apple TV’s Imperfect Women, which concludes this week, alongside Elisabeth Moss and Kate Mara. An adaptation of an Araminta Hall novel, the show features three friends grappling with deception and a shocking crime...

Imperfect Women began with your character talking about how deep the friendship is between three women – do you think there’s something specific about that female bond?

For so long our narrative traditions have centred on men’s experience. We’ve been the love interest, the wife, the mother, or the sister. When you centre women’s stories and our emotional complexity, it feels refreshing and revelatory. I also love the title because there’s so much pressure for women to be perfect. When you have material that unpacks women’s complexity and our messiness and the fact that we are not perfect, it can be really riveting.

Is that what made you sign on for the show?

Well, I got a call from Elisabeth Moss. She’s tremendously talented. I’ve been a fan of hers for a long time but I’ve never had the opportunity to work with her. We’re two women who have carried our own shows [Moss led The Handmaid’s Tale]. A lot of times when you’re in that number one position, you don’t have a chance to collaborate. When she reached out to me, I thought, “This could be extraordinary.”

How was it working with her and Kate Mara?

So special. We weren’t friends but I’ve known Kate for a long time and obviously I’ve met Elisabeth. But now we have become obsessed with each other. It was really fun for us three women to carry the show together.

What makes this series particularly relevant right now?

Well the show models the novel, and the novel switches protagonists. When you shift to another character’s point of view, you realise that we all have very different versions of the same situation. I think we’re living in a world where that’s something we all need – the ability to imagine someone else’s point of view and be curious about their perspective.

The characters have been friends since college. In real life, do you find it hard to keep up with old friends?

For me, the friendships that have lasted are the ones where we offer each other a lot of grace. Life is life-ing all the time and grace is really important in friendship.

Speaking of old friends, is it true you learnt to dance from Jennifer Lopez?

I did. Jennifer and I went to the same after-school centre. She’s older than me so she was one of the big girls. Our dance teacher was hospitalised when I was eight, so Jennifer would step in and teach the younger girls. So yeah, I learnt to dance from her. I wish I had better moves to prove it! Jennifer is very dear to me.

You wrote in your 2023 memoir Thicker Than Water about finding out that you were conceived by a sperm donor, and that your dad wasn’t your biological father. What impact has that had on you?

It has illuminated for me why I’m so drawn to truth in my work and to work that explores themes of honesty, transparency, authenticity and emotional intimacy. The themes of [Imperfect Women] resonate deeply for me – the idea of the secrets we keep from the people we love the most, because that’s an experience I had to walk through with my family.

Do you think secrets are always damaging?

I say to my kids that we don’t do secrets in our family. Surprises are OK, but secrets are not. I think secrets are always rooted in shame.

There were a lot of secrets in Scandal – was there a moral to that story?

The search for truth was a real throughline in that show. I always feel like jobs come to me when there’s something I need to learn and explore. Towards the end of the show, I kept asking myself: what are all these themes of fatherhood? Why does this keep coming up? I look at my notes on the finale and marvel at how it was as if my subconscious was ready to deal with my own issues around my father.

You found out about your father after Scandal finished – what was that time like for you?

It was fascinating because when Scandal ended I was in this period of asking myself, “Who am I now?” And the universe was like, “Well, you’re not who you thought you were”. There was an opportunity to take on myself as the main character in my life. I had been devoted to Olivia Pope and so many different characters through the years. But I had never really devoted myself to understanding me – and now I had the room.

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