By now, most true crime aficionados have heard of Candy Montgomery, but even if they hadn’t, David E. Kelley‘s latest HBO collaboration, Max‘s Love & Death, will surely fill them in with the help of Elizabeth Olsen and Jesse Plemons.
She plays Candy, a well-liked member of her late ’70s-set Texas community where she’s an active member in the church, a wife, and a mother. He plays Allan Gore, also a member of the church, he’s the husband of Candy’s friend Betty (Lily Rabe) and the object of her desire when the show kicks off as Candy propositions Allan to have an affair.
Their tryst is considered at length before the pair ever acts on their mutual attraction, but the resulting events ultimately lead to the second half of the show’s title, Love & Death. For Olsen, it was about striking a balance between the version of Candy that the public has presented over the years and honoring the storytelling of the script crafted by Kelley.
“All the choices I made about the character were based on her participation in this book called Evidence of Love,” Olsen tells TV Insider. “She ultimately regretted participating,” she says of the real Candy. “It was really the only place I [could] pull a curtain back and gather information from so that I could figure out how all these strange choices could align with how a person looks at the world, themselves, and what their value system is.”
(Credit: HBO Max)
As the actress points out that there are no recordings or audio from Candy available to reference, so she had to improvise and make that side of the true-crime figure her own. “So I hoped to make those decisions and understand how this woman navigated based on other people’s opinions of her and based on how she speaks of herself and her childhood. So it was a marriage of both,” Olsen clarifies said of her approach to the role.
“Ultimately, what we end up doing is gathering all these facts, and at a certain point, you hope that that is a part of how you have chosen [to play] the character.”
“[When] you’re dealing with a true story, you have to consider both,” Plemons chimes in, pointing out, ” [you have to] remember that you’re not making a documentary. And obviously, there are varying levels of styles and tones of whatever you’re working on. But it’s a combination of both,” he adds in regards to approaching these roles based on real individuals.
Plemons adds, “Sometimes there’re really interesting tidbits that you stumble upon that you’re really excited about, and you look back at the script or what you are making, and it’s not necessarily relevant, so it’s a constant back and forth in the beginning.” Over time, he notes, “you just have to let it go otherwise you can get to a point where you just get really heady about all of it, which doesn’t help either.”
That reality these performers are working with is reflected in their adulterous relationship, which Olsen says is “such a part of human behavior.” And in Texas, she says adultery “is almost a greater sin than murder. So, what happens when a story has both? Those who aren’t familiar with the famous case are likely to be shocked by the series of events that unfold.
As to what draws Candy into this affair, Olsen says, “There’s lots of reasons for it. And I think Candy knew that she was gonna be married for her entire life when we start this show. And I think she was trying to figure out how to feel, I think she lives a life of validation and that she just wanted that from another man deeply.”
Find out where that search for validation brings Candy as Love & Death plays out on Max this spring.
Love & Death, Series Premiere, Thursday, April 27, Max
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