Zooey Deschanel Is Tired of Being Likable
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Zooey Deschanel doesn’t need you to like her.
Sure, the California native has spent almost two decades bringing her signature deadpan comedy and effortless emotion to screens big and small. She went from a few television appearances to a part in the rock film Almost Famous, and followed it up with major starring roles in Elf, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to The Galaxy, and 500 Days of Summer — all of which became cult classics. In 2011, she toplined the sitcom New Girl as kooky kindergarten teacher Jessica Day, a character that, aided by the dynamic with her all-male and wildly ridiculous roommates, grew into an Emmy-nominated series that dominated the millenial pop-culture scene. But what’s emerged from her consistent repertoire is an actress who represents some of the more agreeable characters in the zeitgeist — even when she didn’t mean to. Likability made her a star. According to Deschanel, it’s also felt like a trap.
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“New Girl is likable. But I was never like, ‘Oh, I have to make her that,’” Deschanel tells Rolling Stone. “Likability sometimes becomes this heavy weight. I think that if you sacrifice what’s interesting about a character at the altar of likability, then it misses the point.”
Now, in her big return to television since New Girl’s 2018 finale, Deschanel is dropping the pressure, expectations, and nostalgia for something brand new. Starting August 2nd, viewers can tune in to see the actress shed her signature locks and lilting voice for a starring role in the Apple TV+ dark comedy Physical as the big blonde southern soap star turned fitness guru Kelly Kilmartin. And in a wide-ranging interview with Rolling Stone (conducted prior to the SAG-AFTRA strike), Deschanel says the move — and other supporting roles coming up — are a chance to return to what she first fell in love with at the start of her career: telling interesting stories.
“Filming [Physical] was such an amazing, positive experience for me. We had lots of super smart women on set, our main cast, our show creator, our director, Rose [Byrne]. It was just such a nice collaboration,” Deschanel says over Zoom. “But what I liked about my character was that for me, it was an exploration of femininity, of artifice — what’s artificial and what’s real.”
Deschanel had plenty of lived experience to draw from. As Kilmartin, she technically gets to play two roles: the biting, caustic, and hurtful voice in the back of Byrne’s head, and an ex-sitcom star pivoting her brand. Sound familiar? Deschanel says the opportunity was difficult, but made comforting by the fact that for once in her life, she didn’t have to be the star.
“It’s nice not to be the protagonist,” she says. “You don’t have to be likable all the time. You don’t have to be understood. You’re there in support.”
That desire to dive deeply and freely into a part has also inspired Deschanel’s moves outside of Physical. The actress also stars alongside Casey Affleck in the upcoming Bill Pohlad-directed biographical film Dreamin’ Wild as Nancy, the drumming wife of real-life songwriter Donnie Emerson. The film first premiered at the Venice Film Festival.
“The [process] was great. It was nice and I felt like I could be helpful because I was really the only person on set who was a touring musician with experience,” Deschanel, who is one half of the group She & Him, says. “It’s also interesting to play someone whose influence is very much involved in the film. I haven’t played a lot of real people before. The only one I really played was in Almost Famous, and I never actually met her because Cameron didn’t want me to be influenced and change my performance. But that was also a fictionalized account, like a version of a sister. This, I was actually playing a real person and I wanted to have respect for that.”
It could be said that Deschanel is choosing supporting roles for an easy lift. It’d be the wrong assumption to make. Deschanel is very technical in her approach to acting, and makes hours of work seem easy. For Physical, she developed two different accents for Kilmartin to represent the change between Byrne’s inner voice and the character IRL, working with her longtime acting coach Warner Loughlin. Even for her part as Nancy, she acquired pictures of the actual drum kit she used and recreated it at home so she could practice.
Much of Deschanel’s consternation comes from how popular her projects have become, so much so that people assume she genuinely is the characters she plays. She’s been the face of the sweet best friend, the face of manic pixie dream girls, even the face of the twee renaissance (and its current revival). Sure, Deschanel inhabited Jessica Day in a way that could only come from 6-plus years of playing the same character day in and day out. But she’s unique in that as many of her roles have become cult classics, and seen multiple resurgences in popularity, her level of fame has never subsided. As someone who wants to keep working, it’s great. But as a mom of two who thrives on being able to observe, Deschanel tells Rolling Stone that the feeling of being watched can sometimes be intensely uncomfortable.
“I was sort of uncomfortable with [fame] at first,” she says. “There are times when it feels like you can’t go anywhere without people knowing you. And as an observer, observing is such an important part of my job. I love disappearing and watching people interact and how people behave. And when all eyes are on you, you can’t do that.”
There are things that help — like time with her family. Her two children think she’s mainly a voice actor, as they’ve seen Elf but are only old enough to appreciate Trolls and other animated offerings. But they are vocal that their mom, via She & Him, is in their favorite band.
There’s also her partner, Property Brother Jonathan Scott. The two aren’t married but built a life together after first meeting in 2019 during the filming of an episode of Carpool Karoake. And it’s not just a figure of speech. Deschanel is zooming in from the literal house the two designed and built together — her thick, black-framed glasses matching perfectly to floral wallpaper, an old chandelier, and black crown molding in the background. She cites their relationship as a driving force in her life and career.
“[Jonathan] is always a cheerleader and a positive voice in my world,” she says. “When I was younger, I might not have taken in as much. Now, I really take it in and I actively appreciate it. Because I know how special it is.”
Still, Deschanel isn’t afraid of the nostalgia factor, even when the advent of streaming meant that people started to approach her on the street again. She admits she’s genuinely proud of her past roles — and even happier that they’ve created such a surplus of lifelong friends. She even mentions that prior to our call, she was chatting with her New Girl co-star Jake Johnson. (She finally saw Triangle of Sadness and thought he would have made a great addition.) And she’s in regular contact with the rest of her old crew.
“Everyone talks about this New Girl group chat, but Hannah [Simone] and I aren’t on because I think there are some very colorful words. I don’t know,” she laughs. “Basically, ladies can’t be present. So we’ll get on a group chat about this or that. But I’m in regular contact with everyone. I was with those people every day for like seven years. Every single day. I saw them more than my family. To me, the people that I did New Girl with are my family.”
For some people, Zooey Deschanel will always be Jessica Day. Others might view her as Summer. Some might even call out to her on the street as Jovie from Elf, or deep cuts like Failure to Launch or Our Idiot Brother. But for Deschanel, no longer a rising star but an established talent, she no longer cares about all that. She’s just excited to do something new — and even more proud that it feels so right.
“People used to always say this about me when I was, like, a kid, and I think it rings true in my career: you marched to the beat of your own drummer,” Deschanel points out. “Which is like a nice way of saying, she does her own thing. But I would definitely say… it’s me. It’s unique. I think you go along doing things in a certain way and people get to know you for certain things. But I like to switch it up and surprise people. I also can’t control what other people think of me. So if they don’t like me, that’s their business.”
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