“The Handmaid’s Tale,” Bruce Miller’s Emmy-winning Hulu series based on Margaret Atwood’s seminal dystopian novel, follows June Osborne (Elisabeth Moss) as she attempts to escape from Gilead, a fascist post-America where women are valued only for their childbearing ability. In his sequel series, “The Testaments,” also adapted from Atwood’s novel of the same name, Lucy Halliday stars as Daisy, a young woman doing the reverse: willingly entering Gilead under the guise of a convert on a clandestine mission to free other girls from tyranny.
It’s a juicy part for Halliday, a 22-year-old Atwood fanatic from Scotland making her TV debut.
“Getting to be a part of anything that has been touched by Margaret Atwood is a joy,” she told TheWrap. “I’ve always been in awe of her work, and to get to enter her universe is extraordinary.”
Halliday’s affinity for the Canadian author began when she was about 12 and borrowed 2005’s “The Penelopiad” from her older brother. When “The Testaments” was released in 2019, a friend of Halliday’s brought a copy to school for them to read together at lunch. Back then, she loved acting, but she temporarily put that passion on hold to pursue medical school at 17. “I regretted my choice,” she said.
A year later, Halliday landed a role in Georgia Oakley’s 2022 British indie “Blue Jean,” which opened the door to more opportunities. Last year, she appeared in fellow Scottish actor James McAvoy’s directorial debut, “California Schemin’.” Now Halliday dives headfirst into “The Testaments.” Some of her earliest scenes were opposite Moss, a passing-of-the-torch moment from the rebel who got out of Gilead to the young woman courageously journeying in.
“They were quite often sparring scenes,” Halliday said. “It’s Daisy and June going back and forth, and we were trying to create a specific dynamic in those scenes. I’m getting to work with Elisabeth Moss, who is incredible and I’ve watched growing up on TV and I’ve seen her in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale.’ That is quite daunting as an actor.”
From the show’s first episode, Daisy bears witness to the harsh punishments inflicted upon those who defy Gilead’s oppressive theocratic laws. As a spy (a term Daisy likes but her handlers do not), she is bursting with information, trying to conceal key parts of herself as she pretends to be drawn to Gilead’s culture.
“Every single thing that she’s saying is calculated,” the actress explained. “She is constantly, actively putting on a front and trying to integrate with these people and not appear out of place. Having that level of fear in her was quite interesting to play because I was just constantly thinking, What is Daisy trying to hide in this moment, and what is she trying to find out? Her true self can be volatile and sarcastic, so trying to keep that down was quite fun.”
Daisy attends the Aunt Lydia School under the thumb of its stern namesake (played by Ann Dowd). There, young girls are trained to become the submissive wives of powerful (and often much older) men. She finds a friend in the kindhearted Agnes, the daughter stolen from June at the dawn of Gilead and played by “One Battle After Another” breakout Chase Infiniti.
“Daisy’s fatal flaw is that she comes into Gilead with very strong preconceived notions of who she believes these girls are,” Halliday said. “As far as she’s concerned, they’re lesser than her. I think that emulates a lot of how we, as a society, view other people.”
But this notion changes for Daisy throughout the season as she comes to bond with her peers (in much the same way, the actress pointed out, as she bonded with her co-stars). Though the indoctrination runs deep, Daisy eventually finds empathy and strength in Gilead’s young citizens — traits that could potentially give way to revolution.
“Daisy is weighing the risk to herself against the benefit to these girls,” she said. “One aspect that Daisy has recognized is that what these girls lack is not intelligence but rather information. If she can provide them with information, then they are more than capable of achieving their own takedown against this regime.”
Hulu has renewed “The Testaments” for a second season, and Halliday is ready to keep up Daisy’s fight. “Raising awareness against the wrongdoings that we participate in in society, or about the oppression of groups of people, is such a privilege,” she shared. “I’m having the opportunity to publicly demonstrate why we need to take better care of each other, why we need to stand up for each other more, why we need to use whatever position we have to highlight wrongdoings. In a way, this show is my position.”
This story first ran in the Drama Series issue of TheWrap’s awards magazine. Read more from the issue here.
