‘Elsbeth’ Star Carrie Preston Is Refreshing & Honoring The Procedural: “There’s A Bit Of A Wink With What We’re Doing”

Carita Rizzo
·8-min read

Since the first time Carrie Preston stepped into the shoes of quirky attorney Elsbeth Tascioni in The Good Wife and its spin-off The Good Fight — a role she won an Emmy for in 2016 — she has brought a smile to viewers’ faces with her character’s unusual approach to problem-solving. With Preston finally getting top billing on a show by Robert and Michelle King, Elsbeth has inspired one of the most joyous police procedurals on TV. Of the show that Preston feels spreads lightness and levity — despite being about murder — the actor says, “Before, I would be a flavor that was coming in, now I feel like the main course.”

DEADLINE: When you started playing Elsbeth in 2010, what did you enjoy most about this character?

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CARRIE PRESTON: The thing that I always love about her is her mind, how prismatic it is and how seemingly scatterbrained she is, but how she’s actually the smartest one in the room. It’s really fun to play with both of those things — that both of those things exist at the same time. It’s something that we don’t really see that much in characters. And figuring out the quick changes that her brain makes. It’s definitely inspiring to play her.

DEADLINE: What is the balance there for you? Can she both be scatterbrained and the most intelligent person in the room or is one just a show to disarm people?

PRESTON: I believe that one leads to other. The fact that she has so much going on in her brain speaks to how brilliant she is and, because she’s juggling all the things equally, it can be perceived as scatterbrained. She knows, though, how she is being perceived in the world, so she can use that to her advantage to disarm people. But I don’t think it’s in any way manipulative, Machiavellian or anything like that. I think she truly is that way.

DEADLINE: When did you start talking about doing this full-time, breaking her out into her own show? Were you fully on board with doing that?

PRESTON: Oh yes. I mean periodically, all through The Good Wife and The Good Fight, Robert would check in with me and say, “Hey, what would you think about doing this character on her own?” And I would say, “Great, great,” and then the stars just wouldn’t quite align. It really wasn’t until 2020, during the pandemic, that we started talking a little more earnestly about it. Robert and Michelle had been rewatching episodes of Columbo and they thought, “Oh OK. If, structurally, we were to be able to borrow that and take Elsbeth out of the legal world, drop her down into a police procedural, that might be our way in,” so that it’s a fresh new show while still having a wink and a nod to her origins.

DEADLINE: Did you see as the potential of playing her, not just as a character who comes in and disrupts, but the center of the show?

PRESTON: I mean, obviously, I was honored, humbled and thrilled by the idea, but also nervous to go from being a supporting character that came on once or twice a year to being the center of the show. But I trust Robert and Michelle King so completely — they’re geniuses. And Jonathan Tolins, who is our showrunner, I trust him just as much and the writers that he has assembled. So it was never something that I felt like I was doing on my own. It takes almost 300 people to create this show. Even though it’s called Elsbeth, it’s way more people that are behind her than you would think.

Carrie Preston interview
Carrie Preston as Elsbeth Tascioni.“

DEADLINE: What has been her evolution, since 2010, as a character?

PRESTON: Before, she was there to serve the storyline of another show, so she would come in as a supporting character, who had to be deferential to those storylines. So, I was limited in my parameters. That said, I always felt a lot of creative freedom when I was there, for which I’m very grateful. And in this case, the tone of our show is a lot lighter overall than The Good Wife and The Good Fight. I think before, I would be a flavor that was coming in to those shows and now I feel like the main course. I’m setting the tone for the show. That said, Robert and Michelle, and Jonathan Tolins, always say, it’s as if this light character has been dropped down into the middle of a police procedural drama. That’s what’s really fun about it, that there’s this contrasting thing going on. Like I said, we are doing a show where there’s a serious crime that happens at the beginning and we try to maintain the drama of the situation, but we drop this very bubbly character in the middle of that.

DEADLINE: In procedurals, character information is dropped very gradually into the story. Do you have a full sense of where she came from, who she is, her son, her family, or do you also learn about her from these nuggets?

PRESTON: Yes, I learn as I go along. We didn’t even mention Teddy, beyond the very first time I ever appeared on The Good Wife. He didn’t even have a name and we never talked about him again for the 14 years that I played her. So that’s been fun to flesh him out and to put myself in the hands of the writers. They’ve brought me all kinds of fun and interesting things. It’s like we’re taking a sketch and turning it into a full piece of art, and it’s really fun to see all these colors come to life and these dimensions start to flesh out as we go along. And I’m getting more and more comfortable with the character in all kinds of situations that I didn’t get to experience before.

DEADLINE: Has there been a scene that opened her up to you in a way that you maybe didn’t understand her previously?

PRESTON: I always feel like I understand the essence of the character. But the friendship that I have with Kaya, Officer Blanke (Carra Patterson) — we didn’t get to see Elsbeth beyond work mode very much in The Good Wife and The Good Fight, so to see her in that relationship, to see her as a friend, a mentor, a colleague, to have that warmth come forward, to have the vulnerabilities and the love, I think has really helped me understand who she is outside of her job. And she loves her work. We saw that in the Good Universe, and we’re really seeing that here. I like it that she’s kind of reinventing herself by moving to this new town, because that gives us some liberties in the creation of this new world.

DEADLINE: And then you have all these amazing day players and guest stars come in. How is that, having new people come in, to spar with you, every day?

PRESTON: More exciting than anything, because the caliber of actor that we’re getting here — from our special guest stars to somebody coming in to do just a scene — is beyond excellent. Finley Davidson, our casting director, is doing an extraordinary job. Jonathan Tolins really loves theater people, and he’s a playwright himself, and so he’s always leaning towards those actors that come from a strong theatrical background. Our scripts are very dialogue heavy, more than most television shows, so we need actors that can come in and be able to do a seven-page scene, all day long, 500 different ways. That’s not something that everyone is able to do. Theater-trained people, people who also have maybe gotten a formal training as an actor, those are the kind of actors that we’re getting on the show. And it really does help, because we don’t have much time to do all this stuff. And our guest stars are, as you’ve seen, really extraordinary for a police procedural. I mean, we’re getting a pretty high level of actor, so Carra and Wendell [Pierce] and I always sit around, [speculating], “Who’s going to be the next murderer?” It’s almost like we get a new series regular, in that character, each week and that’s really fun.

DEADLINE: How has this made you stretch professionally?

PRESTON: I’ve never had this much responsibility on a day-to-day basis. I mean, I’ve played the leads in films before and I’ve certainly been on TV for a very long time, but not with this much of a workload. So, it’s been really challenging, but I love a challenge. I love to work. I’m the same way as Elsbeth. I really throw myself into my work and that just has sharpened my mind and my creative juices have been flowing in a truly satisfying way, artistically. That’s been a thrill.

DEADLINE: Acting in procedurals long had this reputation of “hit your mark and park”, where the job of the series regulars was to move the plot forward. It feels like that perception is really changing — or maybe the challenges were always underestimated?

PRESTON: I think that might not be the case if you are somebody who’s acted in one. As soon as you get on one, even as a guest, you see how hard it is that those series regulars are working. I’ve never appreciated Mariska Hargitay more than I do right now. The fact that she’s been doing that for so, so long and so, so well is extraordinary. Now, I really get how difficult that is, and I appreciate it. When we have to do these big scenes, where we are summing up a murder or we’re coming in and we’re making sure that the audience knows all the details of the thing, I call it “Mission Exposition.” It is a singular set of challenges to be able to elevate that, make it interesting to watch and make it seem like real people talking.

For me, that’s fun. I like the challenge of saying, “Oh gosh, I have seven pages of a monologue. What am I going to do with that, how am I going to make that fresh and how am I going to make that active?” So, I have a great appreciation for actors who can do that. And I think with our show, it is very aware of itself. In other words, it knows it’s in an old structure that it’s making fresh. And I think there’s a bit of a wink with what we’re doing. I think that’s smart, and I think it’s fun and funny, and I think the audience knows that, too. They know that we are not trying to be a Law & Order. We have a great respect for that, but we’re almost honoring it and elevating that genre.

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