Reader beware: This interview with Christine Lahti includes major, major spoilers for Evil 4×10. If you haven’t watched yet, go do that. Then, come back here. (Or, you know, risk the wrath of the series’ many demons. Up to you!)
When I interviewed Christine Lahti about her character’s final moments on Evil, the usual niceties to get the ball rolling had a slightly different flavor than usual. Because our call came the day after, as the actress joked, “a very, like, low news day” in which, as we put it, “absolutely nothing happened.” Just like absolutely nothing something very major happened to Sheryl in “How To Survive a Storm.” When asked, I couldn’t help but admit that yes, I was shocked…and kinda a little bit crushed. “That makes me feel good that you had empathy for this very, very hard to like character,” Lahti responded.
Which, conveniently, led us right into our main topic of interest and one we revisited multiple times: Redemption. After everything Evil Grandma has done, does Lahti think Sheryl did enough to get there, in the end? The answer? A definitive “I do.” Was it “everything she wanted”? Probably not, “but the fact that she got a moment of connection with her daughter and what, from my point of view, [was] some understanding and forgiveness was everything to her.”
“I haven’t always shown it.”
Let’s start with a reminder of why Sheryl needed a redemption arc in the first place. Specifically, how could she let so many things happen to Kristen — her daughter — but finally initiate a full battle to the death with Leland after she figured out that he tried to get Andy to kill Laura? “The worst thing she’s done,” Lahti told us of Sheryl, “is go along with this antichrist plot with Kristen’s egg. But…I don’t think Sheryl ever believed that this was going to be the antichrist. She doesn’t believe in any of that.”
From here, things took a surprising turn, as Lahti brought up something we never really considered. She explained that it’s possible Sheryl “went along with it to potentially reconnect…with Kristen. I know it’s completely misguided,” but that may have been “in the back of her mind.” Another explanation is that she spends a lot of time “pretending to go along, in a cunning way, with Leland’s antics surrounding the antichrist as a way to potentially, eventually, bring him down.”
But, again, that’s secondary to the kids’ safety. “What she has said to Leland in the past is, ‘if you ever touch any of my granddaughters, I will cut off your dick.’ And she meant that. She really did mean it. So, when she discovers that he tried to actually kill Laura through Andy, that something snapped in her. And that was…’okay, all bets are off. You’re coming down, motherf*cker.'”
Most of Sheryl’s actions, though, are simply part of what Lahti calls Sheryl’s “quest for power.” And “it didn’t matter at what cost — she just needed power. Over men, over Leland.” In fact, “the legacy she wanted to leave to her granddaughters was to be strong, fight back. Don’t let men f*ck you over.” Which, actually, gives us a (frankly valid) reason for helping with (nearly) everything Leland did to Andy. Kind of like us, Sheryl “hated Andy. Because she thought he was a horrible father, absentee father…absentee husband as well. And so, putting him on the shelf and draining his brain fluids was like, okay, maybe not the best thing to do to your son in law?”
(At this point in the interview, we both may or may not have laughed. So, maybe there’s a little bit of Sheryl in both of us? Although, for the record, Lahti’s evil laugh is obviously superior.)
“But she didn’t kill him,” Lahti reminded us. To Sheryl, a lot of what she and Leland did “kept [Andy] away from her family. Which, to her, was a good thing.” Because, in her mind, “he was not a good influence.” In fact, “if you remember, she would give advice to her granddaughters about being strong and standing up to sexism. and patriarchy, and bullies. And ‘fight back with a rock in your hand.'” So, because Sheryl “was scrappy and a street fighter,” as well as someone who “had dealt with so much abuse from men,” Lahti told us, “she thought that Kristen, in some ways, was weak.” So, “she wanted to make her more of a fighter.”
(Imagine if she ever got to see our beloved Unhinged Kristen the way we get to…)
But all she saw was a “Kristen would put up with this husband who was not around, was not respectful, not a true partner, not supportive.” And to her, why her daughter would do that “was an enigma to her. So, again, I think…she found a way to rationalize all her evil.”
And her justifications “had a positive spin,” Lahti told us, “because of her lust for power.” Or, another way to explain all of Sheryl’s, well, evil deeds is, “she was blinded by her need to be more powerful than the men that were mistreating her.”
“…I’ve been killed off in many a show.”
Sometimes, actors know their characters’ arcs are ending way ahead of time; others, it’s as much of a shock to them as it is to us. What happened with Christine Lahti and Evil? She found out about Sheryl’s death “the night before the final episode was released” to the cast. So, she really “had no idea.”
In fact, “all I knew was that they were writing the hell out of Sheryl’s character this season,” Lahti told me. “I was so thrilled. And, oh my God, the journey! The arc was complex, and redemption, and heroic, and kickass, and…emotional. And, and…” But then, she got the news when co-creator and showrunner Michelle King called her. “And [King] said, ‘you know, I hate to say this, and I’m really sorry to say this. But just want to give you a heads up that Sheryl’s going to die in the next episode.’ I was completely shocked, but she explained it well. And I understood, finally, in a show called Evil, in a showdown between Sheryl and Leland…guess who’s going to prevail. It’s gotta be Leland. And then, ultimately it’s going to be…up to Kristen to bring him down. “
Sometimes, these tragic endings simply make a terrible sort of sense. Unfortunately, this is one of those times. Continuing with more about that conversation with Michelle King, Lahti told us, “I think, ‘organically,’ she said, ‘it just feels right story-wise. And we are so sorry to see [Sheryl] go because we all love her.'” But it’s not like it’s unfamiliar territory for the actress. “Hey, it happens in shows. And I’ve been killed off in many a show. So it was not like something I’m not used to. I get it. “
And that, very naturally, brought us around to Law & Order: SVU‘s Sonya Paxton. Because that’s twice, now, that some of us have had to watch Christine Lahti die a horrible onscreen death. So, which one was more difficult to film? While she admitted that “dying in the lap of Mariska” was “really hard,” Sheryl’s death comes out on top (or on bottom, depending on how you look at it) here. “I think this was harder. Because this was four seasons of a character,” so Evil Grandma “was just so much more in me than the [ADA Paxton] character,” who she only spent seven episodes with. That made Sheryl’s journey, and Sheryl herself, “just a little more profound and a more beloved character to me.”
Makes sense. Would like to state, once again, for the record: Neither is fun to watch.
Sheryl’s last rites
And speaking of watching Sheryl die, that scene with David Father Acosta is yet another great one for Lahti and Mike Colter. One moment that really stands out, especially in the context of a show like Evil — which always leaves at least a little something about its supernatural element open to interpretation — is when David looks up and asks, “do you believe that?” So, does Sheryl believe, there at the end? In any of it? Has she changed her mind, at all, in the short time since the confessional scene? Because, at that point, she was so adamant that she didn’t believe and baptizing Timothy was all about how Leland might react.
According to Lahti, “the confessional was a huge deal for her. And I think what she wanted was help. [But] she doesn’t know how to ask for help.” In addition, “I think she wanted redemption.” (There’s our theme again.) Sheryl “wanted forgiveness. And she doesn’t really believe in God, but the fact that David could hear what she had done and still believe in her and, in a way, forgive her was monumental for Sheryl.” And after that experience, “there was a connection to David, not necessarily to God, but to David.”
So, as Sheryl takes her final breaths, “I think she’ll take forgiveness from wherever it can come. And if it’s from God, or from David, or from Kristen, it’s all needed and soothing.”
Sheryl’s “heroic” move
After her (gutting) death, we do get to see just a little more from Sheryl, in the form of her messages to Kristen and Andy. Or, rather, we see a snippet of her video message to Kristen before we transition to that cop knocking on Leland’s door. During our interview, Lahti noted that leaving the tapes behind “to make sure that, whatever happened to her, that Leland would be stopped was really, I think…to me, that was heroic.”
So — and this is a thing we rarely care to ask here — what about Andy? Will we find out anything about his message? His “was a little more specific to Andy and what happened to him” with all the demon…stuff. And it’ll hopefully make sure he’s “aware of…his challenges ahead.”
Final thoughts on Evil‘s Sheryl with Christine Lahti
“As we said, I think she found redemption. I think she tried to do the right thing at the end. And she got what she wanted, which was, I think, forgiveness from her daughter. Because it was out of… — as misguided and f*cked up [as her actions were] — there was so much love there. And I love Sheryl…I never judged her. I’m so moved when people say that they cried at her death scene. Because she’s not an easy character to like, I think.”
And this point, I shared how my own grandmother helped raise me and was both complicated and tough AF, so I was able to see some of that in Sheryl. But, even with that, and with also being a member of the Andy Hate Club for a lot of the same reasons as Sheryl, she went…a bit far. “She realizes at the end, though, that the means to her end, they weren’t always the best choices. That she did it out of a kind of blind lust for power…and I think has regret and remorse,” Lahti said. And, in the end, “to me, she ends up heroic.”
So, how does it all end? “I don’t really know what happens. I have — I’ve heard things of what happens. But I’m excited to see the next four episodes.”
Pretty sure we can all relate to that excitement part. Now, let’s all go cry in the corner while we wait and just hope Evil Grandma didn’t die in vain.
That’s it for Christine Lahti on Evil. Don’t miss the final episodes, streaming Thursdays on Paramount+.
Do you agree with Lahti? Did Sheryl go out a hero, or was it too little, too late? Leave us a comment!
