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Working on the Netflix show “Hollywood” was a tearjerking experience for actress Michelle Krusiec. “The fact that I’m getting emotional should tell you a lot about how raw it is and how empowering it is to see people of color — people who are underrepresented — get a moment of justice and a moment of …
Working on the Netflix show “Hollywood” was a tearjerking experience for actress Michelle Krusiec.
“The fact that I’m getting emotional should tell you a lot about how raw it is and how empowering it is to see people of color — people who are underrepresented — get a moment of justice and a moment of visibility,” she tells the Post.
Set in post-World War II era Tinseltown, Ryan Murphy’s “Hollywood” co-stars Darren Criss, Jim Parsons, Jeremy Pope, Dylan McDermott, Joe Mantello, Queen Latifah and beloved Broadway trash-talker Patti LuPone. The story follows various up-and-coming dreamers struggling to make it in showbiz — and often brushing up against society’s challenges to their race and sexuality.
Krusiec, 45, plays a fictionalized version of Anna May Wong, whom she calls a “fashion queen” considered to be the first Chinese-American movie star. (The bulk of her career was in the 1920s until her death in 1961, at age 56, from a heart attack.)
“Even when she was wearing her Oriental dresses, there was something modern about her,” Krusiec says. “It was something in her ability to wear clothes that was both of-the-period and yet modern, and that’s what I think they tried to capture.”
Krusiec was most impressed with the transformative power of her character’s hair.
“My favorite part was the wig — the bangs,” she tells Page Six. “I didn’t like sitting there and having all these bobby pins piercing my scalp, but honestly, it was worth it. Because every time that wig went on … I felt like I became her.
“And when I looked in the mirror, I was her — and that was really important for me.”
She also gushes about working with show creator Murphy, 54, and his ability to marry his artistic interests with his social sensibilities.
“It’s been fantastic to have Ryan behind the show. He has such power, and he’s using it on behalf of representation. He has found a way to create entertainment and also find a message that resonates with who he is as a person,” she says.
“Hollywood” is currently streaming on Netflix.
