Tiny Beautiful Things has arrived. The highly anticipated Hulu series based on Cheryl Strayed’s bestselling novel premieres April 7 on Hulu. With Agatha: Coven of Chaos star Kathryn Hahn at the helm, expect equal doses of humor and heartfelt drama. The always enjoyable Hahn stars as Clare here, a struggling writer who winds up becoming a revered advice columnist while her own life completely falls apart. Fun.
Strayed serves as an executive producer alongside Hahn and Morning Show star Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern, among others. In addition to Hahn, Tiny Beautiful Things also stars Sarah Pidgeon, Quentin Plair, and Tanzyn Crawford, with guest stars Owen Painter, Merritt Wever (The Drop), Elizabeth Hinkler, and Michaela Watkins coming along for the emotional ride.
Pidgeon (The Wilds), Plair (Welcome to Chippendales), and Crawford (Servant) shared more about the series with MovieWeb.
A Series with Depth and Levity
Viewers first meet Clare as her marriage to Danny (Plair) is evaporating in front of her eyes. Her teenage daughter, Rae (Crawford), is filled with resentment, and her job at an elder care facility is shaky. Somehow during her tumultuous descent toward rock bottom, Clare accepts a befuddling offer to become an advice columnist for Dear Sugar. Let’s wax philosophical, shall we?
Sarah Pidgeon says she was immediately drawn to the show’s script. For starters, Hahn was attached to the project, but she was really jazzed to portray a younger version of Hahn’s Clare in a show that floated back and forth through time as its main character dealt with grief and trauma at different ages.
“I was so excited to be a part of this, and I hoped I could rise to the occasion,” shared Pidgeon. “It’s one thing to tell yourself that you’ll be vulnerable [in scenes] and be able to get there. But it’s another thing to actually do it. It was challenging at times [playing Clare], just considering the subject material.”
Enter the incomparable Merritt Wever. The Severance star plays Frankie, Clare’s mother in the past. A loving, kind, and devoted mother, Frankie can’t shake fate: She has cancer. The bond between teenage Clare and Frankie is evident throughout the series, especially as it informs adult Clare.
“What draws me into certain projects is when there’s this sort of raw look at the human experience, and it can be quite intense, ugly, and emotional,” added Pidgeon. “I was eager to explore that. And willing to, I suppose.”
Quentin Plair and Tanzyn Crawford Chime In
Quentin Plair and Tanzyn Crawford are significant throughout the series. Playing Clare’s husband and teen daughter, respectively, the characters are often left in the wreckage of Clare’s emotional downfall. They’re still a family, though, albeit one that’s teetering on the edge. The actors bring great moments of humor and humanity amidst all the other fuss going on around them.
Plair hailed Hahn, who, in his eyes, can do no wrong. “Kathryn is absolutely wonderful. I was going through the audition process, and I read it so real, so grounded, but in a messy kind of way. And honestly, I was like, ‘Oh, they’re not going to cast me, but Kathryn is going to be great and incredible in this!’ When it did actually go my way, I just wanted to breathe. There was so much there that I didn’t have to add anything to it. I could just feel what this guy would have been feeling.”
Crawford related to the material the moment she read the script. “Immediately what struck me was the conversations in the series. I auditioned with an argument scene, and it was an argument that I’ve had with my mom a million times. It was written so ‘normal.’ I had to call my mother right after the audition and tell her, ‘We literally just had this conversation.’”
The actor also noted that viewers will appreciate the way the series unfolds, considering some of the contentiousness swirling around the world at the moment. “The past couple years have been so strange. It’s just nice to be reminded that you don’t have to be on track; that you have to just jump back into how things were supposed to be. It’s okay to be a little bit disheveled for a minute before you pick yourself back up.”
Plair said he resonated with the source material, noting: “I think the way Cheryl’s novel gives ‘advice’ by not coming from a place that really judges someone is unique. The show does the same thing as far as offering a look into a family dynamic. It highlights some issues, but not in a judgmental way, not from an ivory tower looking down at people. So, like the book, different people are going to get different things from watching the show. Different things will affect them. With where everything is in the world right now, people just need to relate and connect.”
Connecting to Cheryl Strayed’s Source Material
As the series progresses, we see how Clare, through Dear Sugar, is able to help her readers. Maybe even herself. Like Plair, Pidgeon also was captivated by Stayed’s novel. “I connected with Cheryl’s story, and, by default, Clare’s. I’ve experienced losing someone very quickly, and at the same age that Clare lost her mother, so I was able to really find a commonality between that and understand what it feels like. It was different in some ways. I didn’t see them struggle. But understanding the magnitude of loss was something that felt very real for me, and something I understood.
“Grief is an emotion we like to speed up, and it rarely works,” continued Pidgeon. “My hope is that this series allows people to become more familiar with their grief, and maybe listen to some the advice shared. And for me, as hard as that intense loss was in my own life, I was able to make a tiny, beautiful thing out of it.”
Tiny Beautiful Things streams on Hulu beginning April 7.
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