From Firefly to 9-1-1: Lone Star , Gina Torres looks back on her decades-long career
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Gina Torres has been fighting for freedom, maneuvering as a savvy lawyer, and much more during her decades as an actor. While many first got to know her for playing Zoë Washburne on Firefly, she has been acting on television and film since 1992. Her early roles include appearances on Law & Order, One Life To Live, and Xena: Warrior Princess. EW spoke to Torres about her prolific career and she shares stories about playing a pirate queen, a successful attorney, a corset-wearing freedom fighter, and more.
<i>Firefly</i>
Firefly is a beloved show that unexpectedly endured in the minds of its growing number of fans. It not only developed an iconic cult following as a one-season show, but in 2005 it was given the follow-up feature film Serenity to wrap up the story. After 14 episodes the space western was canceled in 2003 and the cast of the adventure series set in space was convinced it was over, but creator Joss Whedon never gave up. "It was this feeling of complete and utter disbelief because that never happens," Torres, who played second-in-command Zoë, says about Whedon assembling the cast at dinner to share the news. "Successful television shows get reboots, get movie of the weeks, but certainly not a feature film."
The cast's connection has lived on after the show. "The cast of Firefly has continued to have our own little text message thread," she says. "We really are each other's friends and allies and cheerleaders." While Torres has yet to reunite with Nathan Fillion on screen on The Rookie, she did appear on an episode of Castle with him. "What's weird is I know a lot of people that have gotten to work with all of my co-stars, but, of course, I would love to see them all again."
<i>Hercules: The Legendary Journeys</i>
Landing the role of pirate queen Nebula on Hercules came at the perfect time for Torres. It was early on in her career when she was in her 20s and got to explore the beauty of New Zealand while playing an absolute badass. "Sidebar, I was a huge [Greek] mythology freak growing up," she shares. Torres saw a Shakespearean take to the storytelling and found it freeing as an actor. She played the character in 9 episodes during the show's run.
Plus, the opportunity resulted in two roles. "When I got the call that I got cast to be Nebula they were also writing a script on Xena for Cleopatra," Torres says about how she landed the guest role on Xena: Warrior Princess. She would go on to appear on Xena before rolling into her recurring role on Nebula.
<i>Cleopatra 2525</i>
Armed with corsets and lasers, Cleopatra 2525 was a unique gem in Torres' storied career. A 20th-century exotic dancer named Cleo (Jennifer Sky) lands in the middle of a fight for mankind in the future after complications from her plastic surgery land her in suspended animation. Waking up in the year 2525, Cleo joins a team of freedom fighters led by Hel (Torres).
Similar to Hercules, Torres was working with New Zealand actors who has vast theater experience like her. "Victoria Pratt [who plays Hel and Cleo's teammate Sarge] would tease me that I was – God rest his soul – the Alan Rickman of the show. I would often stand there in my silver corset and rubber hot pants and think "how did this happen?'" she says about the eccentric series, "A show like that for someone like myself really requires distance and perspective."
Despite its unique energy and silliness, Torres loved how the action sequences and stunts allowed her to use her athleticism. While Cleopatra 2525 was created in the wake of The Matrix changing the industry in terms of visual effects, the television didn't have the budget of a feature film. What it did have was actors and a team committed to go all the way in an effort to make a thrilling show. "In terms of the stunt work we did, I was up on a wire. I primarily did my own stunts, but we did all of our fight sequences," Torres recalls. With a mix of practical effects and imagination (the actor remembers lots of staring at an x on a board), the team brought what viewers watch to life. Torres admits the actors often saw the end result alongside viewers.
<i>Alias</i>
K-Directorate spy Anna Espinosa was tweaked after Torres landed the role on Alias, which she received thanks to casting director April Webster's belief in Torres being able to embody Anna. In lieu of her casting, there was a belief that the character had to be changed, but Torres chimed in to say she didn't need to change that much. "Being of Cuban descent, [I understand] the relationship between the Soviet Union and Cuba," she explains, "I had a cousin that studied engineering in the Soviet Union, so I knew that there were relationships that were there." In that respect, Torres looks at getting to play Anna and provided that representation as part of the legacy she is creating in the entertainment industry. Torres' Cuban-born Russian operative appeared in several season 1 episodes before returning for final two seasons of the spy drama.
In addition to the significance of her existence, Torres loved getting to play the twisted villain because "it's great to play the villain." Anna got to battle it out with Sydney Bristow (Jennifer Garner), and Torres recalls how "game" Garner was to play and get into the characters as they worked against each other on missions. Their dynamic was set from the moment Anna showed up in episode 3, which included a memorable moment where Anna kissed a window after besting a frustrated Sydney and leaving a lipstick mark behind. A moment that Torres shares was improvised and not in the initial script. "That's probably the closest I will ever get to being Catwoman and I just relished every moment of it."
<i>Angel</i>
Returning to Whedonverse, Torres played rogue member of the "Powers that Be" Jasmine on Angel. "Doing Angel was really my wanting to create somebody that was the polar opposite of Zoë," she shares. Playing season 4's Big Bad gave her just that because Zoë was a hero who fought for her husband and her crew, and Jasmine, who Torres compares to a seductive spider, was anything but. "It's all about Jasmine. You're going to bend a knee, and you're gonna like it," she says. Not only was her character planning to enslave the entire world, but it was revealed that Jasmine had a hand in many of the events that brought the heroes of Angel together, including Angel's move from Sunnydale to Los Angeles.
<i>Huge</i>
Torres looks back fondly on working on one-season ABC Family series Huge. It starred Nikki Blonsky and was based on Sasha Paley's young adult series about a group of teenagers who were sent to a summer weight loss camp. "It was one of the most lovely insights into being a teenager and being an overweight teenager, and it was something that we'd never seen," she says. Torres played the stern and awkward camp director Dr. Dorothy Rand.
It was groundbreaking from Torres' perspective because it put an underrepresented community at the center of a human event. "That for me is why representation matters. It's at the core of the work that I do as an Afro-Latina, it's at the core of what Asian-American creators do, what African Americans do, as well as women, Indigenous creators." Torres has seen how storytelling can normalize who people are by showing what everyone has in common, including their dreams, goals, and disappointments.
<i>Suits</i>
After over 20 years in the industry, Suits was the first series regular show Torres had that "had a life." "There's an actor's life for you," Torres says. The legal drama, starring Gabriel Macht and Patrick J. Adams went on for nine seasons, with Torres playing partner Jessica Pearson for seven of them.
The role was originally for a man before getting retooled for Torres. "What I brought to the table being a woman at that time in her 40s, who had been doing the thing she loves for over 20 years informed [Jessica]," she shares. What the actress loved about her character was how unapologetic she was about her experience as a lawyer, her age, her wisdom and her sexuality. "She was fully in her body at all times," Torres says, "That is the biggest takeaway from playing that character, and it made her scary to some people. It made her aspirational to other people, sometimes both."
<i>Pearson</i>
After Torres left Suits, she thought she'd left Jessica Pearson behind, but then came the idea for spin-off series Pearson. From Torres' perspective Jessica was a part of Suits' foundation and very involved in its twisty plot points, but in regard to her personal life she was the least developed character. The idea for the show came to her about a year after leaving Suits and that got the ball rolling. "When the opportunity came about to do this spinoff, I said there's so many places we can go," she explains. Pearson took the action to Chicago and explored Jessica's past, personal relationship with Jeff Malone (D. B. Woodside), and showed her own values in terms of her love of the law as she entered the dirty world of politics. In addition, there was room to dive into social justice and how Jessica engages with how her communities are treated by the system.
<i>Hannibal</i>
"It was elegant horror," Torres says about how Laurence Fishburne described Hannibal, which she agrees with wholeheartedly. It was how she felt when on set as Phyllis "Bella" Crawford, the wife of Jack Crawford, played by Fishburne, describing some of the scenes looking as if they were hand-painted. "It's how Hannibal sees the gore that we would, within the real world, believe to be disturbing," she explains.
Honoring Bella's story as she dealt with her cancer diagnosis with strength and dignity was incredibly important to Torres. Her mother passed away after battling cancer, so hearing from cancer survivors that she had accomplished maintaining that sense of dignity in Bella's story was a measure of her success playing the character. Torres remembers having her brother on set while shooting one of her most difficult scenes. "I remember at the end of that, we had finished and he had tears in his eyes when I saw him," she shares looking back.
<i>9-1-1: Lone Star</i>
Jumping onto the "moving freight train" that is 9-1-1: Lone Star was a daunting task for Torres, but she was up for the challenge. Not only was the show a beast to film as it is full of high-octane rescue scenes, but she was replacing Liv Tyler who played Michelle Blake and left after season one. "The entire cast was incredibly welcoming to me," she says.
Tommy and Owen Strand (Rob Lowe) have developed a wonderful dynamic and commareadire since Torres the show, and she shares that their dynamic off-screen mirrors that. They both are veteran actors who want to do their best work and enjoy what their doing, but also maintain a balance with their lives at home. "We share that work ethic, which is great, and a king of naughtier sense of humor," she explains.
Going into the new season, Torres wants to see Tommy focus on her mental health and find equilibrium. After losing her husband at the end of her first season, last season centered on Tommy's grieving process. "You saw the pendulum swing all the way over to the other side with some help from her brother-in-law," she says on their short-lived romance, "Tommy is a work in progress." Tommy has some parenting to do on herself, as well as taking care of her two daughters. Torres does promise that we can expect great saves that 9-1-1: Lone Star is known for in 2023.
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