Melissa Benoist Explains How The Girls On The Bus Stands Out From Supergirl

The Girls on the Bus follows four female journalists as they follow a presidential candidate through the democratic primary elections. Sadie is an ambitious young journalist who idolizes the reporters of the past; Grace is a seasoned veteran with a knack for scooping the others; Kimberlyn is an outsider working for a conservative cable television news channel; and Lola is a social media influencer who is looking for purpose. The four journalists bond while on the trail and discover unexpected scandals that could have implications for the future of the country.

The Girls on the Bus is based on Amy Chozick’s book Chasing Hilary, which chronicles her own experience as a journalist on the campaign. Chozick co-created the series with Julie Plec. The Girls on the Bus features a phenomenal cast led by Arrowverse alum Melissa Benoist, who also produced the show, Mike Flanagan vet Carla Gugino, Natasha Behnam, and Christina Elmore as the titular journalists. The series also stars Brandon Scott, Griffin Dunne, and Scott Foley.

Screen Rant interviewed Melissa Benoist and Natasha Behnam about their new Max series, The Girls on the Bus. Benoist explained why she was excited to play a journalist, praised her co-stars, and shared her thoughts on the new Supergirl. Behnam broke down how Lola’s trauma impacts her and how the three other women helped her character evolve as a journalist.

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Screen Rant: This show is so good. I watched it in a day and my only complaint is that I need season 2 now.

Melissa Benoist: I’m so glad you liked it.

Natasha Behnam: Love that for us. Yes.

Melissa, my first question is for you. What were you excited to explore with the character, Sadie, that stands out from other characters you’ve played before, and what attracted you as a producer to this project?

Melissa Benoist: I was so attracted to Sadie’s tenacity and how passionate she is for what she does, and how she’s a journalist with a capital J. She’s the second reporter I’ve played, but it was very different from Supergirl because Supergirl we didn’t really get to focus on what it actually means to be a reporter and what that feels like and what the lifestyle is.

I was really drawn to that. I love how spunky Sadie is. I love how she’s just super tenacious albeit really neurotic, but I also find that charming about her too. I was really charmed by her and I think maybe because it’s a lot of Amy Chozick’s voice, and Amy has a great voice as a writer, so I was very attracted to that.

I love that. Then Natasha, Lola is such an interesting character because she’s survived really, really hard tragedy and is trying to move forward and make a change to the world without that overshadowing everything. How did you want to infuse the trauma into your performance without allowing it to overtake the character?

Natasha Behnam: I give a lot of credit to the writing. I think they did a really beautiful job with the way they wrote the character. What I loved about Lola is the way that she would snap. I think episode 4, there’s a funeral scene and she apologizes later.

She’s like, “I’m sorry that I was so b—hy during that. I get really triggered at funerals. I’ve been to so many of them.” To me, it was really cool to just layer that into the character. She’s so snappy. She’s very whatever, kind of off the cuff, but a lot of that is she’s triggered and is a trauma response of “my walls are going up”, because she’s been through so much. It was a very cool way to color her as a character.

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I completely agree. Then Melissa, I love that Sadie’s skills as a journalist are never questioned. She’s clearly a great journalist from the start. Can you talk about why she’s so enraptured with the old school journalist legends and why it’s important for her to bring her voice into her stories?

Melissa Benoist: Well, I think she romanticizes this somewhat bygone era because I think she romanticizes history, and she wants to be a part of telling it, and she wants to do it with integrity. The irony is now that she’s joining the industry when everyone says it’s dying and, “The second it’s not a boys’ club, the industry is dead.” I think that these four women are showing that there is still a drive and a passion to tell the truth, and that is her driving force.

I love that. Then Natasha, how does Lola’s understanding of the world of journalism change not only by being on the bus, but specifically from her friendship with Sadie, Grace, and Kimberlyn?

Natasha Behnam: I think she learns so much. She learns everything from these women. She doesn’t know anything about being on the trail, and so they essentially teach her everything. Episode three, we have the pool moment. She’s just taking things for what they are and then being like, “Oh, okay, I didn’t realize that.”

I think she has such great conviction in telling the truth in an authentic way to a younger audience, to a queer audience, to people of color. She’s like, “I’m just here for those people who historically have maybe been denied a seat at the table when it comes to politics.” But what she does learn is they’re so smart, these women, and towards the end of the season, I think they are influencing her to be like, “Use your connections.”

She’s all upset that she’s not in and doesn’t have these connections. Then they’re like, “Well, this is what you do as a reporter, as a journalist. How can you get to the thing you need by using what you have?” They teach her. She does a lot of growing up, I think, in this season, and they’re pivotal. All three of the women are pivotal in teaching her.

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I love it. Then this question’s for both of you. The cast is phenomenal across the board. Is there a specific moment you remember with another cast member where they really knocked you out of the park as a scene partner and helped elevate your own performance?

Melissa Benoist: I have moments like that with everyone.

Natasha Behnam: I got chills.

Melissa Benoist: Yeah, I had moments like that with you, with Carla, with Christina, with Brandon, with Griffin. A specific moment, I think, where someone — Brandon would consistently throw me. He’s really good at improvising, and his improvisations are not to be funny, they’re just incredibly informed of who his character is.

Natasha Behnam: I didn’t know that.

Melissa Benoist: Yeah. He would bust things out that I was like, “Where did you come up with that?” I was so impressed. I legitimately had moments like that with everyone.

Natasha Behnam: I did too. I got chills when you asked that. I was like, “Yeah, every single person I was like, ‘Whoa,'” as I’m acting with them. I remember feeling that way really when we were filming the pilot, the first episode, and I had a scene — Well, most of my scenes were with Christina, and she was so real and grounded. I remember being like, “Okay, got to stand a little taller. Really got to show up.” I felt that way with everyone. I really did.

I love it. Then one of my favorite parts of the show is that it deals with things like reproductive rights. It has the debate, the political debate between your characters, but then it shows how it actually impacts people. Why do you think it was important to show both sides of politics with the conversation, but then the actual action?

Melissa Benoist: Because I think that the actual action is not —

Natasha Behnam: Was the issue.

Melissa Benoist: Yeah. People don’t — Sometimes the conversation is so loud that we don’t think about the actual people going through the action. What I’m so proud of that we were able to do on the show in telling the story about reproductive rights and Sadie’s abortion, is that we are showing a very realistic situation of a woman who knows what is right for herself and has made the choice for herself without any shame. That is not the agony. The agony is that she literally can’t find a straightforward path to treatment.

Natasha Behnam: The lack of access.

Melissa Benoist: Yeah. She’s going through states that now all have different laws and that is a crying shame. We had our showrunner, Rina Mamoon, who did so well in bringing that story to the page. We had Kyra Sedgwick, who is a massive supporter of women’s rights, and she is such an advocate, and she was so passionate and really excited to tell the story. I’m proud of what we were able to do.

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Then my editor is going to have my neck if I don’t ask you this question, Melissa. We have a new Supergirl coming to the big screen. What are you excited to see with this new iteration of the character?

Melissa Benoist: I think any and all takes on the character are valuable because what she stands for, Supergirl as an entity, is she’s iconic for a reason and has been since the ’50s. I personally think that every iteration of her is valuable for young women to see. Hopefully, every take on her, someone will see themselves in it.

Natasha, is there one of the cast members that you maybe didn’t get to share screens with enough this season that you wish you’d been able to share more scenes with?

Natasha Behnam: Everyone. This cast is amazing. I mean, every time the four of us are together, it’s perfect, and I want to do that for the rest of my life. Me and Adam Kaplan became besties. He plays Gary in the show, and we had a lot of time being silly.

I think we always wanted to be able to have more scenes together, but we never had any together. Same with Cole Escola. I feel like me and Cole really hit it off. I really love them. I think they’re hilarious, and we never had any scenes together, but we had a lot of fun when the cameras weren’t rolling.

About The Girls on the Bus

Four female journalists who follow the every move of a parade of flawed presidential candidates, finding friendship, love, and a scandal that could take down not just the presidency but our entire democracy along the way.

Check back for our other The Girls on the Bus interviews:

• Carla Gugino & Christina Elmore
• Brandon Scott & Griffin Dunne
• Scott Foley
• Amy Chozick, Julie Plec, & Rina Mimoun

The Girls on the Bus debuts on Max on March 14.Source: Screen Rant Plus