Like her character Lara Featherstone on AMC’s Preacher, Julie Ann Emery is a chameleon with the ability to transform into any character she plays. In 2017, she joined the breakout series in its second season and has played a pivotal role ever since. This August, Preacher heads towards its final chapter, and Pop Culturalist spoke with Julie about the show, why it’s been one of her most challenging roles to date, and why this is Featherstone’s biggest season yet.
PC: For readers who may not be familiar with the series, tell us about Preacher, your character, and what drew you to this project.
Julie: Preacher is about a man possessed with a power, an entity, his assassin girlfriend, and a vampire best friend on a hunt for God to hold him accountable for abandoning heaven and the human race.
Really, Preacher is the humor of Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg mixed with the deep dive characters and grounded drama of Breaking Bad’s Sam Catlin. It is a tone and genre mash-up that shouldn’t necessarily work together, but it does, oh so deliciously.
In terms of what drew me to the project, Featherstone. I mean who reads the character of Featherstone and doesn’t want to jump up and down to play her?
PC: What can you tease about the upcoming season and Featherstone’s arc?
Julie: I can’t tell you about arc, but I can tell you season 4 is my favorite Featherstone season. It pushes her to her limits, both physically and emotionally. One of my favorite things about our show is that I am continually surprised by the writing, including the varying directions of my own character. I love discovering new layers of her as the seasons roll out.
PC: It’s the series’ final season. If you could share some parting words for Featherstone, what would they be and why?
Julie: It has been an honor and a privilege to climb into your head (sometimes your various heads). I have no idea how I will follow Featherstone with a role that doesn’t seem boring to me. And for the kids out there: don’t be a zealot! It leads to…bad things.
PC: What’s been the biggest takeaway having been involved with the series?
Julie: That a comic book series could hold this level of deep-dive character work, drama, and a prestige cast that challenged me every day to be better. I honestly didn’t think I would find my most challenging role to date on a comic book series.
PC: Besides Preacher, do you have any other upcoming projects that you can chat about at this time?
Julie: If you aren’t watching Catch-22, all episodes are streaming on Hulu right now. I play George Clooney’s wife who is having a torrid affair with Christopher Abbott. It is a lot of fun and unlike any character I have ever played.
Larry Clarke’s Life Support will be out in September with a comedy cast that I am THRILLED to be a part of: JK Simmons, Mike O’Malley, David Koechner, Brian Dennehy, Lesley Ann Warren, the list goes on and on. And just before Preacher season 4 started production, I wrapped Walkaway Joe with Jeffrey Dean Morgan and David Strathairn!
PC: How did you discover your passion for acting?
Julie: When I was growing up, the only theatre for about 100 miles was in my hometown, The Cumberland County Playhouse. It was a community theatre with some on staff pros who played all the leads. My sophomore year in high school, the National Endowment for the Arts gave the theatre a grant that included providing a drama teacher for the local high school, a woman named Mel Michel. She saw me sing in a choir concert, recruited me for her plays, later took me to my first audition for the local theatre, the whole shebang. She completely changed my life forever.
PC: Guilty pleasure TV show?
Julie: Supernatural! Hot guys in a cool car fighting demons and ghosts. Sign me up!
PC: Guilty pleasure movie?
Julie: Galaxy Quest…but I don’t feel one bit guilty about it.
PC: Favorite book?
Julie: Latest favorite is NK Jemisin’s Fifth Season trilogy. Considering reading it again this summer.
PC: Favorite play or musical?
Julie: Les Misérables (and anything my husband is in)
PC: A band or artist that fans would be surprised to learn is on your playlist?
Julie: Kacey Musgraves, and I work out to the Hamilton cast recording.
PC: Last show you binge-watched?
Julie: Fleabag
PC: Hidden talent?
Julie: I am a hell of a baker. I just don’t do it very often.
To keep up with Julie, follow her on Twitter and Instagram, and catch Preacher every Sunday on AMC.
Photo Credit: Lachlan Moore/AMC/Sony Pictures Television
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