Propelled to fame more than 30 years ago when she became a pop culture icon by portraying welder/dancer Alex Owens in Flashdance, which earned her a Golden Globe nomination, Beals has played ever since a series of strong female characters on TV and, more recently, in the digital space — the openly gay, sophisticated art expert Bette Porter in the groundbreaking lesbian drama The L Word; the first female Superintendent of the Chicago police Teresa Colvin in the short-lived Chicago Code; and the less-than-empathetic Maj. Jo Stone in the intense web series Lauren.
Her performance on The L Word stands out as one of the most defining roles of her successful career to date. Beals made a difference not only as a powerful character she inhabited for six seasons on Showtime’s critically acclaimed series, but also by becoming a loud voice for the LGBT community. “I’ve learned to stand up for other people,” confesses Beals. “I was able to work with really wonderful activists. I’ve learned that it’s incumbent upon you to stand up and do what’s right. I’ve learned that love is love, and love is a gift. And to thwart anyone’s love for someone else is a crime against humanity.”
The seasoned actress complements this solid selection of roles in what is a shortage of female-driven shows on television, by playing Dr. Carolyn Tyler in TNT’s new summer drama Proof, executive-produced by yet another powerhouse woman, Kyra Sedgwick (The Closer).
It seems like there’s a combination of the characters finding her, and her wanting to delve into a more complex realm. “I think it’s even more complex with Carolyn,” remarks Beals. “Unlike Teresa Colvin or Maj. Stone, there’s a tenderness and a woundedness that‘s pretty clear, and she tries to cover up with her intellect and as much work as she can possibly handle.”
Tyler has suffered the recent, shocking loss of her teenage son, the breakup of her marriage to Dr. Len Barliss, played by David Sutcliffe (Gilmore Girls, Private Practice), and a growing estrangement from her daughter, Sophie (Annie Thurman). To top all that, she’s had her own near-death experience when she almost drowned while helping tsunami victims in Japan. Matthew Modine (And the Band Played On, Weeds) plays Ivan Turing, a terminally-ill tech billionaire, who hires Tyler offering her full control of his $10 billion estate, to investigate cases of reincarnation, near-death experiences, and other paranormal phenomena, in the search for evidence of life after death.
With everything Tyler has been through, one can only wonder—what makes this woman get out of bed in the morning? What’s her source of strength? “Oh, she’s extremely strong, very very strong,” explains Beals. ”Because people’s lives are depending on your strength, your intellect, your ability to go do your job. So you suck it up and go help someone. Part of the strength comes in duty. You have a duty to help someone. So you cannot be canceling surgeries just because you want to stay in bed and cry. There are people depending on you.”
It’s not until the third episode of the series that we get to witness the heartbreaking magnitude of Tyler’s grief— competent and laser-focused in the OR, yet deeply broken on the inside, a mother who wants nothing more than to see her son again.
Despite exploring the profound subject matter of afterlife, Proof also offers some much needed comic relief through the interaction between Tyler and her African surgical intern and sidekick, Dr. Zedan “Zed” Badawi (Edi Gathegi).
Playing a cardiothoracic surgeon was a great learning experience for Beals who elaborates: “You realize that when you’re the team leader, you don’t have a lot of tolerance for people screwing up their jobs, because it could mean someone’s life. That informed a lot of the character, for sure. And then to couple it with having that person on this journey of exploration, to her finding an answer to a question we all face, and to have that person on this journey of exploration of searching for answers in the wake of the tragic loss of her son, is really interesting. Those are two seemingly very different people. You wouldn’t think that person would take that journey. And yet she does.”
Tyler and Turing share a captivating relationship in the show. They both connect in that they’re really accustomed to getting their way, and to thinking that they’re always the smartest persons in the room, which makes for some interesting conversation: “To see the battle of the wills is fun sometimes,” Beals adds. “And I think that we’re also both tied by the notion of loss, and that combination of things is really intriguing to me.”
Beals and Modine go way back to a movie they shot in Italy in the late 1980s, called La Partita. The film tanked, but many years later, the existing understanding and trust between them were instrumental in the way they gave life to these new characters. “That’s the key thing between two actors, that trust that we’re going to create this thing, and dive in as fully as possible,” acknowledges Beals.
Genuinely passionate about many subjects ranging from science (like the Large Hadron Collider) to gay rights, from photography to chemicals in products we use every day, Beals attributes her broad spectrum of interests to a childlike curiosity she inherited from her mother: “I think my mom is the same way. We’re here on the earth for such a short time and everything is so fascinating. I feel like there’s not enough time in the day to pursue all the things that fascinate me. I think it’s my mom’s ability to ask questions all the time, and be curious about the world and the things that are in your day to day life even. Life is fascinating. We’re so lucky to be here. And you don’t have forever in this body, so you might as well enjoy it, and find out about a few things while you’re here, and try to be helpful.”
She can’t contain her excitement as she speaks with so much passion and pride about working on the set of Proof: “It’s really my favorite project that I’ve ever done! It’s really interesting and fun and fascinating. (…) Even when I had 103-degree fever and I had a virus that was just insane, I was like, ‘My God, I get to go to work on this show. How lucky am I?’ And then I would fall over when I would get home.”
Does she believe in afterlife? “I believe that we go on in some form. Obviously, I won’t know for sure until I die,” Beals says with a laugh. “I have a tremendous amount of faith that this is not all that there is, and that this energy changes. And it perhaps takes another form, and that may not be a human form or an animal form, it may be a different form. So I just think that if you stop asking questions, that’s when you’re starting to die prematurely. And it’s really our ability to question that makes life more vibrant. But we can’t presume to know everything.
“My suspicion is there is something else. If only by virtue of watching a blade of grass grow through a crack in the sidewalk, it’s some evidence of life going on in some form. But there’s a part of me, the science nerd, that loves playing that part of Dr. Tyler that’s constantly questioning the science of everything.“
Proof premieres in the US June 16 on TNT at 10/9c, and in Canada June 24 on Bravo at 10pm ET.
