Elisabeth Moss
Age: 26
Hometown: Los Angeles, California
Currently: Making her Broadway debut as an ambitious Hollywood secretary opposite Raul Esparza and Jeremy Piven in the revival of David Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow.
All That Jazz: Born into a family of musicians, Moss never had to worry about getting her parents’ approval to perform—they already had first-hand experience with show biz. “My mom plays blues harmonica and my dad [trombonist Ron Moss] manages jazz musicians and plays music. There was always some rehearsal or tour. So being an artist wasn’t that crazy of an idea,” she explains. Mom and Dad supported their precocious daughter through 10 years of ballet classes and didn’t bat an eye when she landed her first professional acting gig at age eight on a TV series called Bar Girls. Younger brother Derek followed suit, going on to run the comedic short-film web site www.funnymovieinternet.com. “[The films] are hilarious,” she brags. “You gotta check it out.”
Girl, Employed: Though Bar Girls fizzled, Moss’ career blossomed. The young actress nabbed dozens of voiceover and TV guest spots before being cast in her first major film role opposite Harvey Keitel in 1994’s family drama Imaginary Crimes. “Harvey is a genius. Here was this actor who practically is a legend doing a tiny indie-film, but taking it as seriously as a huge Scorsese project. I learned that [commitment] from him,” she recalls. While continuing to work steadily, Moss breezed through a progressive high school program, graduating two years early at age 15. Soon she got her big break, playing a suicidal burn victim in an asylum in Girl, Interrupted. “Here I was, 16 years old, working with Angelina Jolie, Winona Ryder, Brittany Murphy—it was a great experience, but pretty bleak as far as atmosphere. We were shooting in Pennsylvania in the winter in an abandoned wing of a real mental institution! Thank god the girls were all awesome.”
West Wing University: Soon thereafter, Moss was cast on a new political drama called The West Wing, playing the First Daughter of the United States. “There were all these amazing actors, like Martin [Sheen], John Spencer, Bradley [Whitford] and Allison [Janney] around, and I got to know them before the show became THE WEST WING.” Moss, just 17 at the time, admits she considered “for a second” pursuing college over continuing with the show. “Then I was like, ‘I could go to school or I could work with Martin Sheen?’ I definitely chose Martin Sheen!” Toward the tail end of West Wing’s seven-year run, Moss also began working on the short-lived sci-fi series Invasion. “It was so much fun! I was this evil, pregnant alien mom, and I ran around like a total bitch! I loved it!” Despite the show’s short life, Moss notes it sparked a passionate cult following. “What’s funny is I have had more people say they were disappointed that Invasion got cancelled than West Wing ending!”
It’s a Mad, Mad World: Moss began filming the pilot for AMC’s ad-man series Mad Men immediately after the last episode of West Wing. As the show’s distinctive mid-century aesthetic and unpredictable storylines took shape, she felt thrilled but cautious: “It was a show about advertising in the 1960s, on a network that nobody knew, without any celebrities. We all were like, ‘Well, here’s hoping!’” They needn’t have worried. Mad Men nabbed the Golden Globe and Emmy Awards for Best Drama Series. Moss’ character, Peggy Olson, thrived as well, climbing from secretary to junior copywriter and getting a juicy subplot about secretly giving birth to a colleague’s baby. “I love representing women of that time, the ones who were breaking through the glass ceiling. And I love working with all those boys,” she says of the castmates who turned out en masse to support her on opening night of Speed-the-Plow. “They’re like my older brothers.” The only downside to Mad Men? Donning retro undergarments. “I hate the girdles!” she admits with a laugh. “I like comfortable clothes, so those costumes aren’t always fun.”
Plowing to Broadway: Moss had no misgivings about taking on yet another ambitious secretary for her Broadway debut. “You don’t not do Mamet if you can,” she says of playing the role originated by Madonna. “He actually said that [Karen] was one of the hardest roles he’s ever written for an actor, so in my mind, if I bring what I’ve learned [playing Peggy] to it and add something new, I’ve taken on something very exciting and challenging.” She believes Karen, an office temp who upends the relationship between Hollywood producers played by Piven and Esparza, is completely earnest, differing from Peggy in her openness. “Karen is like an open book! Peggy would never speak about something she loved for three pages the way Karen does.” Given her resume, Moss also felt well-prepared to take on her formidable co-stars. “On West Wing I worked primarily with [the guys], on Mad Men it’s all boys all the time, and now I’ve got these two guys on stage,” she points out. “I don’t know what it is about me that keeps me in those situations, but I’m honored that I’m the girl who gets to stand up with these dynamic, amazing actors and tell these stories.”