Julia Ormond Talks The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Ruthless Ambition

Julia Ormond, who plays Lt Colonel Kublek in The Walking Dead: World Beyond, just spoke to AMC about her role in the show with the second season coming soon…

Q: Season 2 starts off with a literal bang and we quickly learn just how ruthless Lt Colonel Kublek can be. What went through your head when you initially read the script for this first episode? 

A: Well, first it was holy crap, I’ve got about six pages of dialogue! My favorite scenes as an actor are when you don’t have any dialogue and it’s all just emotion. I think that probably comes from my arts background. So I was a bit stressed about all the dialogue. But the reality is, it was very interesting to me because it was the follow-through of what I’d kind of known was going on all along. The writers had shared her story arc with me. They’d been really generous on that front, and I feel like that’s not common. Sometimes creators do this thing when they’re like “oh no no no no, we think it’s better if you don’t know what’s coming,” but as an actor then it’s like “okay, but how do I make choices about my character if I don’t know what’s coming?” So, I was just really thrilled that they shared so much about Lt Colonel Kublek with me.

I was also really appreciative that they weren’t attempting to soften any of it. There’s often a social, cultural trap—that I don’t believe The Walking Dead Universe at any moment ever falls into—that female characters need to be likable. A concern around “ah, but if people don’t like them, then it’s not going to be successful.” I think that’s why I relish playing someone who you love to hate. I see Elizabeth as someone who understands the importance of names. I’ve given her a middle name, Emily. So her initials spell EEK—I feel like that adds another layer of perspective to her character.

When I look at the situation set up in Episode 1 from a military perspective, they’re not a military protecting a nation, they’re protecting the last of the human race as they see it. They’ve not had any communication from across the world. As far as they know and as well as they can deduce, they are the last of the human race. They will do anything to protect that, and they have to carry the burden of those decisions. So from Elizabeth’s perspective, she’s all in. I think it makes a lot of sense to her from a family perspective too. As a military family, they’re taking the risks and risking the cost—it’s one level of justification for the choices they make.

As you get to know Elizabeth and Jennifer’s relationship, it’s a little bit more sinister than that isn’t it. Does it feel sadistic? Does it really feel like noble sacrifice or is it just sadism? Is it just narcissism? I think she sees it as “we go out and kill people who we think are our enemy, and we accept a certain amount of collateral damage.” From a military perspective, that coldness manifests as “yep, I’m watching [the explosives go off],” and there’s a dissociation there. What she has to deal with that’s new, is the impact that it will have on her loved ones.  

Q: It seems that the two sides of your character—Elizabeth the mother, and Lt Colonel Kublek the soldier—are often at odds with each other… and sadly, the solider usually wins. Can you talk a bit about working with Annet Mahendru and building that very unique relationship on screen? 

A: Yeah, she’s so wonderful. I really appreciated the way that she created this undercover character of Huck, and then she arrives back to home base as Jennifer. She’s very, very present. The wounds that have been this child’s life were just so ever-present—they were at the surface and palpable. I’m not sure that Elizabeth is capable of taking ownership of those wounds, but I think there is this pragmatism there  that is born of “well this is the life that we have.”

What I see in Jennifer is this gentle child that perhaps had other needs that weren’t met. Her toughness doesn’t come from a natural disposition to it. It comes from something that’s broken. I always felt that something happened to Huck when she went and found a new family. She found it with Felix, and she found it with the kids when she takes on a maternal role. She takes on these different roles that I think make her question her blood family, and I think that that’s not often something that we see. I guess we do see it with Alpha in some way.

It makes them question: what do you need to be loyal to your family? What is it that makes us loyal to family? There’s definitely something questionable about how Elizabeth is with Jennifer and how oblivious she is to what has been asked of her or what she has let Jennifer do. So working with Anett, I think she was perfectly cast for that role. There’s something about Anett that is so confident when it comes to the physical stuff. She’s very believable as a soldier—she’s powerful and capable—but at the same time there’s an inescapable vulnerability there.

Q: You can just tell she wants love and acceptance from Elizabeth so badly.

A: You wouldn’t need her to express that verbally as a character to read it. It gets played in so many different ways throughout the season, and she is so consistent in the way that she plays it.

Q: What’s so interesting about Lt Colonel Kublek, is that even as we enter Season 2 her intentions really aren’t that clear. Are they self-serving in hopes of gaining further authority in the CRM? Altruistic in hopes of saving humanity? In Season 2, Episode 1 she says: “The bad things we do must be done. We carry that burden so that others don’t have to so there can still be good in the world.” Do you think this implied martyrdom is real or is this just another one of her manipulations? 

A: I think that is absolutely her M.O. So put yourself in her shoes. She’s looking out for a population that is still trying to maintain and uphold the vestiges of the life that was before, including electricity, law, all of those things. They’ve been able to go beyond the feudal and agrarian societies that many have had to go back to. They have helicopters, right? They’ve got flight. They’ve got fuel. They have to come up with a strategy that will get them through to the other side, so that people can return to humanity. The way Elizabeth has seen it and has experienced it, she understands that it’s going to be brutal. Otherwise, they’re not going to make it.

So as military, they’ve basically run every scenario they can and they’ve mapped it out. They’ll have the sophistication, training, and skill set to map out a projection of where they want to go, and what resources are needed to continue  that journey and survive. Are we going to make it? Maybe not. So if there’s anything that jeopardizes that plan or disrupts it, then they have to switch tack on behalf of everyone else. So seeing her be like, “yeah I’m going to stand here and I’m going to watch the bombing because that’s my job, I have to do that.” It’s an amped-up version of Maggie standing in the subway watching somebody be eaten alive by zombies, because if they open the door, then they put everyone at risk. The bigger the organization, the more powerful the organization, then the bigger those moments have to be. The problem is it’s innocent people that are taken out, and that is enough to make you crazy, so they have to take that on. I think there’s a decision that is made that that has to be the way. The question is how much does that destroy the soul? How much does that skew their decision-making? How much power is good for anyone to have? And then by the end of it, it’s like “did we succeed, was it all worth it, or have I just been drinking the Kool-Aid?” I think all of those questions start to surface. So yes, I think it’s something that she absolutely believes. It’s so painful, but it’s what they have to do.

Q: Even 10 years after the fall, the disturbing power that groups can wield in this post-apolcalyptic world is immense. There’s a real cult-like dynamic about so many of the groups we’ve met in TWDU—from the Saviors and the Scavengers, to the Whisperers and Season 11’s Reapers. The CRM seems benevolent from the outside, but as we learn more about them they start looking like a cult pretty quickly too. What are your thoughts about the CRM and their intentions? 

A: The characters that we know, love, and support are not like that, right? We know that they really are aspiring to a society that takes care of each other. Societies like Hilltop are the ones that we want to succeed. But then when our characters travel or wander, they come across other societies, so there’s always this learning curve in terms of figuring out is this going to be another Negan-led society? Look at Alpha! I think that’s part of the challenge of The Walking Dead Universe. These communities that survive have to be super careful about who they bring in, and there’s always the question at the back of their minds: are we ever going to get to a place where the world comes back?

I think what’s super exciting about The Walking Dead: World Beyond is that you get to see more of the science side of things, and how the scientists could potentially get everyone out of this situation. You see the characters in The Walking Dead: World Beyond embrace the idea that perhaps science is the answer. That’s got to be one track that the CRM have to pursue full-heartedly, but to what degree can they manipulate people or can they inspire people? What is it that they have to do with their populace in order to get them to function best?

If you look at a study like the Stanford Prison Experiment, you’ll see that people fall into victim and abuser very, very quickly. People followed orders in the experiment because somebody in a white lab coat with a clipboard who says they’re a doctor, told them to. Studies that followed showed that people who had been involved in the study had so much shame. They didn’t really understand why they followed orders so blindly. The same thing that enables birds to swarm, bees to swarm—that collective consciousness—that’s something that as humans we can tap into too. I think we sometimes think we’re so fricking smart as human beings that we’re not vulnerable to it, but we are and we’re unwilling to admit that we are that easily influenced.

Q: What was the most challenging thing about working on a limited series like this, knowing that there’s a defined end point? What will you miss most about playing Lt Colonel Kublek?  

A: I’ve got to tell you, it’s hard playing somebody who is that hateful. I socially isolate as an actor, because there have been a couple of other characters who I’ve played that when I would go home there was no amount of washing that could get into my soul well enough. I once worked with this young actress on a horror film who did beautiful indigenous meditations to protect herself, and she was so much better at keeping the ew out than I was.

I wish they there was one more season, but I do think there are pros and cons to having a definitive end. I think it’s sometimes actually really good for story because it challenges you to bring it home. That’s why I think Matt Negrete and Scott Gimple are just so extraordinary. To find a way through that, and during Covid? Amazing.  

I’m still keeping my fingers crossed there’s going to be more Elizabeth! And I can say that with confidence, because in The Walking Dead Universe there’s always the possibility of flashbacks, so you never know. You could come back some other way in some part of the universe. So yeah, Elizabeth has stepped into professional immortality, is how I like to look at it.