Caitriona Balfe Reveals Claire's "Conflict" in "Outlander" Season 5

From Oprah Magazine

• Caitriona Balfe returns as Claire Fraser on Outlander season 5, premiering February 16 on Starz.

• Claire's "mother-daughter" relationship with Marsali (Lauren Lyle) grows this season, Balfe says.

• In this exclusive interview from OprahMag.com's visit to the set in Scotland, Balfe discusses what's to come for Claire Fraser.

Caitriona Balfe and I are sitting on the butter-yellow front porch of the Big House, where her Outlander character Claire lives with her husband, Jamie (Sam Heughan), in season 5. We're in the scaled-down version on set, that is, not the home's exterior, built several miles away on the Scottish land that's doubled as North Carolina since season 4.

Balfe compliments my Prince T-shirt. Meanwhile, she's dressed in Claire's surgeon finery: A white apron covering a blue button-down and floor-length skirt, her hair pinned up in a sensible-yet-still-beautiful style. The porch's steps are mere meters away from a studio wall, but it's covered with a rather convincing forest backdrop.

Despite the crew tromping through set to prepare for the next scene, for a second it's easy to believe I'm actually chatting with the Claire Fraser—the time-traveling, headstrong doctor who is the heroine of Outlander and the Diana Gabaldon books the show is based on. Then the sound of frustrated grunts, followed by "YEAHHH," "WOOOOO," and one person clapping in the distance breaks my reverie.

"That's Sam, shouting at the rugby," Balfe tells me, with an affectionate half eye-roll and a smile.

The easy camaraderie that permeates the Outlander set, which Starz invited me to visit for the day, has had ample time to take root. Balfe has been playing Claire since 2014, and longer if you count the months of production that preceded the show's premiere. "It was my 'castaversary' on September 11th," she says. "It's so weird to think that six years have sort of flown by." The Irish actress calls the job "an absolute dream," given that her character has grown from a young woman into a grandmother over the course of four seasons.

"The show is so unusual in that we do have that time travel element, and to be able to play a character over a 20, 30-year period, I mean, it's amazing," she says. "It's a great challenge, and it keeps things interesting and fresh when you're not doing the same thing all the time."

Season 5 finds Claire settling into settler life, and becoming the resident healer at Fraser's Ridge. While Balfe says her character is happy to stay put in the 18th century—"she knows that Jamie can't travel, and her home is where they are together"—you may see Claire worrying about her daughter Brianna (Sophie Skelton) finding her own footing as a modern woman living in the past. Happy as Claire may be to see Brianna, Roger (Richard Rankin), and her new grandson Jemmy every day, "there's a conflict within that for her."

"I think Claire feels that while she has a calling no matter what time she's in, utilizing her skills as a doctor, she sees that it's hard for Brianna to find equal balance," she says. "In terms of being a mother and wife, while also having something for herself in terms of a profession."

According to Balfe, "one of the biggest things she wants for Bree is to have all sides of herself fulfilled the way Claire has." Between that, the low life expectancy of the time period, and how it isn't the safest era for children, "Claire feels that for them, it would probably be safer to go back."

Still, Balfe says Claire loves having Bree and Roger around, both as family and as anchors to her other life in the future. "The three of them have such a unique situation that they share—their ability to time travel, their experiences in Scotland together, and Boston," she says. "So there’s a real bond between them. Claire can see how much Roger loves Brianna, and more importantly, how much Brianna loves him."

Roger and Jamie are still working to find common ground in season 5. "For Jamie, it's all about this kind of honor," she explains. "His daughter is, in some ways, his property, and he feels very slighted in that way. Which is a much more traditional, old-school point of view."

Claire's growing closer to another extended family member in season 5, too: Marsali (Lauren Lyle), Fergus's wife and Jamie's former stepdaughter, who once regarded Claire with suspicion thanks to her mother Laoghaire's abject hatred for her. "It’s completely done a 180 since they first met, and that's been quite lovely to play with Lauren," says Balfe, who generally raves about Lyle's acting.

"It's funny, from the Marsali of season 3 to the Marsali of now, what their relationship has blossomed into. It’s a real mother-daughter kind of thing, and a friendship," she says. "It's really nice to see Marsali as a woman of her time, but having the practicality and just the open-mindedness to kind of go along with whatever Claire is showing her and teaching her. She would have come from such a small minded, superstitious household, initially. To see her sort of grow and blossom has been really cool."

The past two years have been the busiest of Balfe's career. In addition to acting alongside Christian Bale in the Oscar-nominated Ford v Ferrari and voicing a Gelfling named Tavra in Netflix's The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, she became an Outlander producer this season (as did Heughan). Though major season 5 storylines had been broken by the time Balfe and Heughan got their producer credits, they've started getting outlines and early script drafts ahead of the rest of the cast.

Balfe says having a hand in making the show has given her a "less myopic" view of plot line-related choices—and her own character's arc. "As actors, our only focus before was solely on, ‘What is my character doing? What does she feel?'" she says as Heughan wails at another rugby disappointment in the background. "It’s so interesting to see the process from this side, and to understand certain reasons why stories are changed. So much of it has to do with logistics, what can be shot, people's availability, or time."

And yes, she reads the books before each season, The Fiery Cross included. "It's such a wealth of information. Obviously, we divert from the book somewhat, and change things. But to have all of that knowledge before you go into the season, this time, it's golden."

Balfe is tight-lipped regarding characters we may be surprised to see again this season, but I have to ask which one has been her personal favorite. "Good ol' Tobes," she says with a laugh, after a moment of serious consideration. Tobias Menzies, who played Claire's first husband Frank Randall, now plays Prince Philip on The Crown.

"I miss Frank being in the show. I think it was such a great thing for Claire, having these two very different men in her life," she says. "We definitely miss having Tobias around. So yeah. Tobias is my favorite character."

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