There’s something so sad about the way Kaitlin Olson tries to spin a certain profane jab into a catchphrase in this week’s new Hacks episode, “The Roast of Deborah Vance”—and so strangely triumphant at the end of it, when she actually pulls it off: “What a cunt!” Portraying the neglected and at times desperately needy daughter of Jean Smart’s legendary Vegas comic, Olson has always seemed like a natural fit for the role, having spent most of her career breathing furious, painfully funny life into women on the verge. (She received an Emmy nod for her performance last season.) But as Olson’s DJ nervously prepares to burn her famous mother before a live audience, she gets to show what’s underneath DJ’s despair. She’s still a riot, but she gets to break your heart a little too.
For fans of Olson, it’s no surprise to see her find those nuances. The Groundlings alum made a name for herself in the early 2000s with sharp improv work on sitcoms like Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Drew Carey Show, then a defining role as “Sweet” Dee Reynolds on the ruthlessly funny It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia—which remains on the air, with season 17 on the way. She’s currently in production on a new network TV vehicle (ABC’s High Potential), having already led Fox’s The Mick, and has more juicy Hacks material on the way, with DJ newly pregnant and her mother starting to think about healing some old family wounds.
As ever, for Olson, there’s a lot going on. In an exclusive chat with Vanity Fair, we begin with “The Roast of Deborah Vance.”
Vanity Fair: As a fan of your work for a long time, I’m wondering, to start, how it has felt to play notes that are a little deeper, as they are in this episode. You’re mostly known for broader comedy than what you get to do on Hacks.
Kaitlin Olson: It’s great, if not just for the sheer boredom of it all—of just doing the same thing over and over. [Laughs] I love playing characters who are loud and nuts and mean and irrational. I don’t ever want to stop, but it’s fun to mix it up. Everything that goes into desperately trying to get the attention of the one person in your life that matters the most can be hilarious and totally heartbreaking.
Hilary Bronwyn Gayle/Max.
You star in a recurring capacity here, so I assume you know you’re going to be in a set number of episodes. What do those preliminary conversations look like with the producers of Hacks?
The collaboration I’ve created with Paul [W. Downs] and Jen [Statsky] and Lucia [Aniello] is so lovely, because I said from the beginning, “I love your show so much that I don’t want to be in a whole bunch of episodes where I’m just in the background. If I show up, I want to be able to contribute something special.” So when they told me about this episode, I was like, “Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about.” I knew that my character was going to be pregnant this year, which was awesome. That brings in so many more layers to a person. So I just kept talking to them about what it was that they were looking for and what I was going to be able to contribute. It feels collaborative, and it’s not always like that.
I know you came from an improv background. Have you ever done stand-up?
Once. In my 20s. It was a disaster. An absolute disaster. Public speaking and stand-up comedy—you would think I’ve never been on a stage before. I hate it. I do not like being myself in front of people, I like being a character. Have a ton of respect for people who are good at it. But no, thank you. Not interested.
So this was a little bit of redemption, then.
Correct, that’s right. I got to pretend, and now probably I’ll nail it the next time I give it a shot.
You just needed a catchphrase.
And it should probably always be “what a cunt!” because it was just a giant hit. [Laughs]