Tea Leoni, star of movies Deep Impact (1998), The Family Man (2000) and Fun with Dick and Jane (2005), returns to the small screen as America’s (fictional) fourth female secretary of state in the series Madam Secretary (Sony Channel, Thursdays at 8.50pm).
It has been 16 years since you last starred in a television series (The Naked Truth). How is it going? “I think I’m coping quite well but I’ll tell you one thing – my feet are killing me. There’re a lot of high heels in this show. [Real-life Secretary of State] John Kerry had some real heels to fill when he stepped into this role [Hillary Clinton being his predecessor] and I don’t know how he’s doing it either.”
Are there any similarities between you and your character, Elizabeth McCord? “I think anything that’s good about her is mine, and anything that’s bad about her is foreign. I don’t think she’s as thrilling as I am. I think I might be more fun … we’ll see, maybe we’ll make her more fun. Elizabeth is very busy.”
How did you feel when you were offered this role? “I’m always apprehensive about taking a role. You can look at my career and probably guess as much; I don’t work that often. I like my kids a lot and I like fishing, but sometimes I enter into things backwards, and such was the case with Madam Secretary. I read the script and I thought, ‘I can’t not do this.’ I had been considering television [again] for a while and I had a few rules: it would have to be shot in New York, so that I could be with my kids as much as possible. And I was so encouraged by what I was seeing portrayed by my peers on TV – it’s much more in depth with TV now, I think people are doing really good work. So I was very excited to get this role but I’m also scared about the amount of time I need to be away from my kids. You want to be successful but it’s also daunting because, for film, you can see the end, but with a project like this, I guess you have to just go with the flow.”
What do you think your character says about working women in general? “Elizabeth McCord may be in a spectacular job but she’s no different from us. Most of the women I have ever met around the world are doing the same thing – we are balancing our careers with raising children and being a part of a significant relationship. I think it is historically true, in film, that women in powerful positions often have deviant partners behind them. We need to break that myth and I think this show will be a first in many ways. There are lots of men who are supporting their wives to be fulfilled, successful and to make incredible change in the world. I think a lot of men recognise the potential in their partners for diplomacy and support them, whether it’s on the scale of the local school or in politics, in the White House.”