Dead to Me has always been a grief continuum: random, wine drenched, and filled with enough twists to give us a constant feeling of whiplash. But, more important, it’s the story of two women who found each other, who survived because of each other, when they needed it the most. Which makes the show’s third season all the more tragic. Despite Jen (Christina Applegate) and Judy (Linda Cardellini) seemingly steering the police away from all of the crimes they’ve committed, that ultimately becomes a peripheral plot when Judy gets diagnosed with stage 4 cervical cancer. Judy doesn’t want to be a burden, but Jen won’t stand for it. They lean on each other throughout the grueling months of chemotherapy — which was reflected, quite literally, in their real-life relationship as Applegate battled multiple sclerosis while filming the season — giving Judy a stable sense of family for the first time in her life.
And yet the worst still occurs. Judy’s diagnosis is terminal. She accepts it, but Jen refuses to. As one last hoorah, the women road-trip down to Mexico for a beach vacation, which turns into a profound reckoning of how much they’ve grown with each other in their lives. It’s here where Judy decides she doesn’t want Jen or herself to suffer any longer — she takes a boat out to sea one morning and drifts off into the unknown. She’s finally free as a bird. It’s unclear where Judy sailed off to and how many days she has ahead of her, but Cardellini has a few thoughts about what her “ambiguous†ending could mean.
In Christina Applegate’s recent New York Times piece, in which she discussed the struggles of working on Dead to Me after her MS diagnosis, she described you as “my champion, my warrior, my voice.†What was she, for you, during that time?
Christina would do the same for me. I think that’s what friends are for. During any challenging time, that’s what you hope and wish for, that your friends will be there for you. We were lucky enough to be friends and be there doing it all together.
One of the most prevailing values Judy holds on to throughout the course of the show is having a family and a home. Is this something you feel she was finally able to experience?
I do. I think that’s a really important point. She has always been searching for that feeling. She definitely finds that in the most unlikely place — with Jen, the person whose husband she killed. That’s what’s so amazing about the show: Here are these two people who should never be able to be friends who yet become the most incredible friends. Because of how the show ends, I do think that Judy is set free by the fact that she feels that much love. Her whole life, she’s looked for that kind of love. She never got it from home, and she’s been on a search desperate to find that feeling and fill that void. Jen does that for her. I think, in a lot of ways, they’re not similar in any way, but they’re similar in every way. They both need each other. It’s a really incredible love letter to friendship.
When Judy told Jen, “You filled a hole in my heart,†I was a wreck. Was there any other role she was filling besides that family aspect?
I think they complete each other in a lot of different ways. I know that’s an overused way of saying it, but it’s true for them. They compliment each other, they help each other, and they lean on each other. That’s what great friends do. I think that unconditional love is something Judy never really felt like she had. That void was so large in Judy because she clearly was born a person who was very openhearted, but people don’t respect that about her, so she’s constantly hurting. For somebody to sort of recognize who she is and what she’s capable of despite actually doing something terrible, it lets her be her most genuine self. That’s what true friends bring out in you — they’re able to make you feel okay with being your most genuine self. No matter how messy it is.
I often find myself struggling to describe Jen and Judy’s relationship, but messy is a good word for them.
That’s what life is like, too. You can never quite put your finger on exactly why you love somebody. You can think of all the reasons why you should or why you shouldn’t, but it’s just a feeling. The same goes with friendship. There are some friends where you don’t have to speak for years, and when you see them, it’s as if no time has passed. I still have a lot of the same friends that I’ve had since I was born or in kindergarten. Sometimes we go a while without seeing each other because we’re living very different lives. But when we do get back together, it’s as if we’ve always been there. You know that person’s soul somehow, and that doesn’t go away. That’s the really magical part of true friendship.
You can’t take everybody along with you every single day even though you wish you could. Life changes. That’s part of what’s hard about saying good-bye to the show — we’ve made these incredible friendships and bonds, and we’ve been through a lot of things together, and the idea that we’ll no longer see each other day to day is painful. We’ll be friends forever. That bond is real, and it will stay. So then, especially knowing the show is coming to an end, you know that that chapter is closing. It’s bittersweet because you’re happy to have had the experience, but you also know that you have to say good-bye to it. It’s also nice to say good-bye to it before it’s overstayed its welcome. Lucky enough, we’re in a business with a lot of openhearted, vulnerable people being vulnerable for a living, so you make connections quickly with people that you end up loving for life.
Have you ever found it difficult to root for Jen and Judy’s relationship?
For me, no, because I see it from my own perspective, and I know that Jen means the world to Judy. For whatever reason, when she latches on to Jen, she does not let go. She only ever lets go and relents in any way when Jen tells her to leave. I’m always rooting for them. Judy is always coming from a place of love. It might be different from how people think you should do it, but she’s trying to be honest all of the time, even when she’s lying. That’s just kind of who she is. Along the way, life has bumped and bruised her, so she doesn’t always know where the moral center is. But she does know if she loves somebody and is going to try to do anything in her power to help that person.
Unfortunately, some of her help is very misguided. She’s always talking to the wrong person or doing the wrong thing in terms of trying to help, but that’s how life is. That’s how you make your biggest mistakes. But, yeah, when you first meet them, you definitely think that these people should never be friends. But as the show goes along, you start to feel like these people don’t even know how to live without each other now. It’s just an inexplicable thing that happens with the chemistry of life. On paper, some people shouldn’t go together. But when they meet, it can be a totally different story.
How far in advance was Judy’s cancer diagnosis planned?
Liz Feldman said that it came to her in season two. I remember she turned to me one day and said, “I think I’m going to be doing this.†And I thought, Oh! All right. Because whatever Liz thinks of, no matter how much of a left turn it is, I’m always so excited to see how she does it. What I didn’t anticipate was the idea of Judy thinking it was somebody else’s diagnosis at first. I loved being able to play that moment of recognition of, Oh, wait, you mean it’s me? That whole moment, I think, shows you exactly who Judy is. She’s gotten this horrible news. And in the same moment as she’s processing that, she’s truly so relieved that it isn’t her friend. That says a lot about what you need to know about who Judy is. She’d rather it be her than Jen.
Was any aspect of Judy’s journey altered during the five months production shutdown?
Story-wise, no. We had shot almost half of the season at that point, but it was all out of order. We shot something from nearly every episode. So we were already sort of set on that course. Luckily, it worked out in the way that it didn’t need to be changed.
Judy’s chemotherapy nurse, in the hopes of boosting her spirits, offers the idea that maybe she was “chosen for something else.†Have you given much thought to what Judy was “chosen†for?
I have. I think Judy was chosen to help people through things and, at the same time, help herself feel loved. Judy was chosen to reaffirm Jen’s hope in life. Because when you first meet Jen, she’s pretty angry and sad. But by the end of the series, Jen has changed. A lot of that has to do with what they went through and how they went through it together. It ends on a hopeful note with new life.
How has Judy changed?
She’s definitely more honest.
In what ways?
Judy has learned how to stand up for herself and take care of herself in some ways. Judy doesn’t like to be alone that much, and she goes off on her own in the end. I think that’s a really strong choice for her.
And our girl can shoot at the Greek syndicate without hesitation.
That’s the thing about Judy: She could be this shape-shifter. We always laugh that Judy has this whole other double life that you would never know. She’s always surprising. I think that’s one of the most interesting things her mother says about her: “You don’t know Judy.†So there’s always this question mark about how reliable our narrators are. I think that’s a huge moment for her growth and her strength — being a defender.
Have you ever tried to fill in those question marks with a backstory for Judy?
Oh, yeah. Me and Christina have all kinds of theories. I’ll come up to Liz and I go, “I think it’s this.†She’s like, “No.â€
What theories do you have?
Sometimes I come up with things just to play around with Liz. Something like, “We find a time capsule right before Judy dies.†A really fun thing that she and Jen went to do, trying to give Judy extra life. In case we want to revisit Judy, we just find that time capsule buried somewhere.
How did you interpret Judy’s ending? Where do you think she went in the boat?
I hate to say what I think it is because I don’t want people to believe that’s the truth. Liz definitely left it ambiguous on purpose, so I wouldn’t want to speak to her creative decisions. I think it’s wise because it ends on a cliffhanger, like Dead to Me always does. There’s still some loose ends there. But I do think that Judy tries her best to set Jen up for a brighter future — a freer and easier future with somebody who could love her. It’s funny because Judy and Ben have a lot of similarities. It’s very realistic to think, Oh, she would end up with Ben because they’re similar. They’re both kind of vulnerable and messy and willing to do things for other people. We always laugh because Ben and Steve look exactly the same, but Judy doesn’t even see Ben as attractive. She was like, Never mind.
I think it’s very important for Judy to know that Jen has a future that could make her and the children happy. She considers them her family, and like you brought up earlier, that is her greatest achievement: to have been considered part of a family and to be loved in that way and to feel at home somewhere. She’s been on her own and out in the world, moving from place to place, for a long, long time. Probably as far as she can remember. So when she goes out on that boat — and that is, as she talked about, her happy place — she’s trying to set Jen free from having to deal with the anguish and grief of what’s happening. But you can’t really get away from anguish and grief if you love people. Those feelings are still going to be there for Jen, but at least she has this new life with somebody who Judy knows will love her.
Is Judy staying in Mexico for good? Or maybe lurking around Laguna on occasion?
I think all of those things are absolutely possible. I definitely do. As long as Judy has a breath in her, she would always be trying to make sure that the boys and Jen were okay. But whether or not she wants to let anybody in on her own pain, she thinks it’s a wiser choice to let them try to escape all the pain that they’ve been in.
Why was it important for Judy and Jen’s final moment together to be a hallucination in the car?
First off, did you notice the dress that I’m wearing? There’s a line in an earlier season when Judy says, “Oh, this is my very favorite dress.†So we made sure that Judy was wearing her very favorite dress for that moment. Judy’s wardrobe was a huge thing. We really concentrated on that piece of her with our wardrobe designer. But for that final moment, it relates to the idea of somebody always being with you regardless of where they go. When you do lose somebody, you always hear them. If they mean a lot to you, you hear them in certain situations or you see them in certain situations or you feel them in certain situations. When somebody does leave, there’s a hole. There’s something that you can’t quite explain. You can only feel.
How is Judy’s wardrobe emblematic of who she is?
Judy doesn’t like to wear pants. I always said it’s because Judy doesn’t really like to wear underwear. She likes to be free, so she’s always wearing skirts. Judy’s an accessorizer, more so than I am. I think all of those pieces have memories for her. Her bird bracelet that she leaves for Jen at the end, we all decided that was a thing that she wore a lot and reflected who she was. There’s a freedom to the way she dresses, but there’s also sort of this eclectic version of it. In the first season, I was always saying she probably picked things up from the old-folks home where she lived. It was like, Oh, if nobody’s going to wear this, I’ll wear this! She’s moved through different economic moments throughout her life, and her wardrobe is reflective of that. More so than a lot of my other characters on the day-to-day, wardrobe really informed how she was trying to feel. There’s a light and airy way about it. Even in the darkest of times, she’s trying to lift herself up.
Tell me more about what it was like to film the finale with Christina. Did you both luxuriate at that beach house for as long as possible?
I wish. A lot of that was shot out of sequence. We didn’t get to go to Mexico, but we went to other beachy places in California. The funny thing is we started getting to know each other back in the first season on the beach. There’s a scene where Jen and Judy are talking and smoking a joint on a beach. And when they called “Cut†on the scene, we were just getting to know each other, so we would just sit there and talk. We didn’t even go back to our trailers. Even though it was freezing, we would just put a blanket on and keep going. We’d just sit there, laugh, talk, and bond. I think the same thing happens in that final season when we’re sitting on the beach. When we weren’t shooting, we just hung out as much as we could.
I’ll admit, I thought that Jen was going to name her baby “Judy.†And then I was immediately reprimanded with “this isn’t a Hallmark movie.â€
Yeah, right? It also might be a nod to their favorite show, The Facts of Life.
Were there any other endings considered for Judy?
I really don’t think so. Liz always talks about the themes of the show being grief, loss, friendship, and forgiveness. Because of the ending and because of Judy being gone, I think those themes come more highly into focus.
I would also add wine as the fifth theme.
Oh, of course.