Why Marianne Jean-Baptiste Wanted to Hit Her Character in ‘Hard Truths’

TheWrap magazine: The Oscar-nominated actress reunites with her “Secrets & Lies” director Mike Leigh for a stirring, hard-to-swallow performance

Marianne-Jean-Baptiste
Photo by O'Shane Howard for TheWrap

Sitting at an outdoor table near the pool at the Beverly Hills Hotel in oversized sunglasses, sipping on English Breakfast Tea and nibbling on a Caesar salad with chicken, Marianne Jean-Baptiste couldn’t be any sweeter or friendlier. And frankly, that comes as a relief after seeing “Hard Truths,” the Mike Leigh film in which her character, Pansy, is the embodiment of anger and depression.

Pansy wakes up every morning with a gasp and a muffled scream, can’t have a civil conversation with her son or her husband and turns a trip to the grocery store into a vicious verbal assault on just about everyone who gets in her way.

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