Interview
Casting Director
“The Diplomat” Casting Director Julie Schubert on Building a Razor-Sharp Ensemble Around Keri Russell
Casting director Julie Schubert reveals how she built the ensemble behind “The Diplomat,” from choosing Keri Russell as its anchor to pairing her with Rufus Sewell and adding standouts like Allison Janney to create a cast that truly sizzles.
Interview
Screenwriter, Showrunner
“The Diplomat” Creator Debora Cahn on Refusing to Write Easy Villains in a World of Hard Choices
For Deborah Cahn, the journey from The West Wing to Netflix’s The Diplomat began with a simple encounter that revealed the extraordinary lives hidden within the foreign service. The former West Wing writer spent years cultivating relationships with real diplomats, ambassadors, and State Department officials, learning first-hand how complex the world of international politics was, and how much it demanded of the individuals who dedicated their lives to it. It gave her an idea of crafting a series around characters whose nuances speak to the complex crises they must navigate in their work...
Interview
Actor
Rufus Sewell on Playing ‘The Good Guy’s Bad Guy’ in Netflix’s “The Diplomat”
A proper English thespian who originated a role in Tom Stoppard’s Laurence Olivier Award-winning play Arcadia fresh out of acting school, Rufus Sewell has since excelled as a character actor with leading man looks. Over the past few years he’s played a sadistic aristocrat (The Illusionist); a Nazi (The Man in the High Castle); an astrophysicist (Eleventh Hour); and a drunken artist (The Marvelous Mrs...
Interview
Director, Producer
Director Alex Graves on Keri Russell’s Balletic Excellence in Netflix’s Hit Series “The Diplomat”
Keri Russell plays blunt but brilliant U.S. Ambassador Kate Wyler in The Diplomat. She’s often anything but diplomatic in the taut political thriller, loath to dress in fancy clothes or brush her hair, but Kate exhibits invaluable tenacity as she tracks down the perpetrators of a horrendous ship explosion and car bomb attack. The Emmy-nominated Netflix series, which aired its second season last fall, co-stars Rufus Sewell as Kate’s ambitious husband Hal, with David Gyasi as the British Foreign Secretary,...
