Sunday Conversation: Mandy Moore On The End Of ‘This Is Us,’ New Music, Joni Mitchell And Emmy Buzz

This Is Us fans might not be anywhere near ready for the beloved NBC show to end this Tuesday, May 24. But series star Mandy Moore, who plays the family’s matriarch, Rebecca Pearson, has had her coping mechanism in place for some time.

“It was a very intentional plan to finish the show and have some new music out and be able to go on the road immediately,” Moore tells me. ” I’m excited, because I feel like I’ll be able to take this time to really process this very seminal chapter that’s closing, and be able to use the music and being able to play songs every night as a way to process what I just lived through instead of being a shell in the fetal position in my bedroom. I get to go out and do something.”

The show wraps this Tuesday and Moore will be out on the road by June 10 in Atlanta in support of her superb new album, In Real Life. She is excited for many reasons, including the fact this is her first full tour in 15 years.

So much has changed for the one-time teen star in that long period. For starters she is finally recognized for the gifted actress she is. She laughs modestly when I bring up all the Emmy buzz for her performance this season, but I am only half joking when I say if she does not get the award this season for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series there may be a riot in the streets.

Read social media and one of the only things everyone can agree on in this divided time is that Moore should be a slam dunk for the Emmy for her astonishing portrayal of Rebecca this season. The way she aged on the show and played a woman we watched slowly deteriorate from Alzheimer’s is not just the best acting of this season on any TV show, but one of the most profound performances you’ll ever see on TV over the course of a season. She was brilliant, like the rest of the best cast on TV.

That is another reason Moore is looking forward to throwing herself back into her music. You don’t follow an all-time great TV show with an all-star cast and award-worthy writing by jumping into another role.

So while everyone is despondent to saying goodbye to the Pearson family after six incredible seasons, at least fans get the opportunity to see Moore in person and celebrate her music. I spoke to the incredibly gracious and humble Moore this week about her new album, working with her husband on the songwriting, the end of This Is Us and why Joni Mitchell is the soundtrack of her life.

Steve Baltin: I think you’re doing better than most of us this week.

Mandy Moore: Why is that?

Baltin: Because unlike the rest of us, you had time to prepare for this week’s episode, ‘The Train.” The rest of us who got waylaid by it were not ready.

Moore: I tried to warn people. I told them I threw up after I read it. I thought that would give people enough of an indication of what was in store.

Baltin: You could not have prepared people for it. But that’s okay, we’ll survive. Congratulations on the record. But I have to ask first, do you pay attention to social media?

Moore: Sometimes. I think it kind of ebbs and flows. It’s really fun to be on a television show that airs weekly, instead of a streaming service that kind of puts everything out all at once. It’s fun to kind of watch along with the audience, or at least see the reaction. So that’s I think been fun for all of us as a cast to kind of week-by-week see what people are saying or being a part of the conversation. I’m gonna actually miss that. I didn’t really think about until now that we’re almost at the end, like, “Oh yeah, this isn’t the way that entertainment really works anymore.” But other than that, no, I’m not really keeping tabs on social media.

Baltin: The reason I ask is at this time when no one in the world can agree on a single damn thing, at least it’s good to know that if you do not win an Emmy, the entire country will storm the Emmy Awards and riot in the streets.

Moore: (Laughs) You’re very kind. I’m not sure that the kind words of Twitter are the indication on the temperature of the entire voting block that would vote for award stuff. But the people are extremely kind. Listen, I am just so glad that after almost 106 episodes, people still love our show, they have followed it from the jump, they have entrusted us to tell this story. And I think we’re finishing it out with the season that I’m the most proud of as a collective. And that we’re still even a part of any of those kinds of conversations, like there are no other network shows that are in the mix with all these fancy, expensive streaming shows. I think we all are just really proud of the work that we get to do, and that people have continued to follow us for so long. It’s wild. It’s wild.

Baltin: Was there one show that you followed in the same way?

Moore: Maybe Lost. But then I, no pun intended, lost interest in later seasons. But it was appointment television for me for the first three or four seasons for sure. I would just not miss an episode and would get on message boards and read theories and talk about it with friends. And that was, yeah, that was “Can’t miss television” for me.

Baltin: If in fact the train from the last episode is real, and hopefully 100 years from now when Mandy Moore is on the train, who is the artist playing, and what’s the song they’re playing?

Moore: Oh my gosh, I’ll be 138. That’s wild. Maybe we’ll all live that long. I would never be mad at Joni [Mitchell]. When I watched the episode for the first time a couple of days ago and heard the entire version of “Circle Game” play, I was just like, “This is made for me.” So I would say it would definitely be some sort of Joni song, probably off of Hejira. I don’t know if it would be “Amelia” or “Coyote,” but yeah, she’s just the soundtrack of my life.

Baltin: You’ve done this show that everybody’s so invested in. It’s hard to go straight into something else from an acting standpoint. So now you get to go out, and instead of being Rebecca Pearson, you get to be Mandy Moore and play these songs live and take them out, and sort re-introduce yourself to people.

Moore: Yeah, I haven’t toured in 15 years. It was a very intentional plan to finish the show and have some new music out and be able to go on the road immediately. COVID thwarted the plan to do that last time, four days before we were scheduled to play our first show. [So] I was just itching to get back out there as soon as humanly possible, and this was the first moment for that to happen. So it was intentional. And it’s also not just jumping to the next job. Because personally, I think it would be too tough. I need some distance to kind of figure out what I want to do next. ‘Cause I’m afraid I would just compare and contrast way too much. And I don’t want to do that. I want to do something really wholly different, and music is the perfect way to break that up.

Baltin: Having not toured in 15 years, are there songs that you are really excited to revisit or ones you have a different appreciation for now?

Moore: I think being able to play any song from the past with this band in this iteration is going to change everything. It’s really fun to visit “Candy,” ’cause obviously people are excited about hearing that song, there’s something sentimental about it for people, it brings them back to their childhood. But playing it with this band, it just in a new arrangement, it comes to life in a new way. And I kind of feel that way about “I Wanna Be With You” and “Extraordinary.” All of these songs that I love and feel like I can say “I Wanna Be With You” and “Candy” are good songs, ’cause I had nothing to do with them. But there are definitely plenty from the past that I won’t be revisiting ’cause I don’t feel that way. But I’m excited to use this opportunity on the road to tell my story and visit the past, and visit these different chapters. And play some stuff from This Is Us, ’cause I got to sing on the show and my husband helped write all of that music. And so it feels of the same thread, and I’m just excited to get that opportunity. I don’t know. We’re still in the midst of rehearsals and seeing how things are coming to fruition, and how exactly they’re gonna sound. But with an incredible band I’ll try anything.

Baltin: Are there any songs in particular from the show that you are really excited to do or bring in?

Moore: He and I wrote all of this stuff on the records together, but he wrote “Invisible Ink,” which I sang in the third season. He wrote “The Forever Now.” He wrote both of those with Sid [Khosla],the composer of the show. So it’ll be fun to just be able to play those in a more broken-down acoustic setting. And I also am well aware that there are probably gonna be people at the show who have no idea that I had a past in music and will be totally unfamiliar with anything that’s pre This Is Us. So I feel like honoring that part of my life in that chapter. And that part of my career is something that feels like a no-brainer. And they’re great songs, and so I’m excited to figure out how to loop those into the set list as well.

Baltin: Coming to the new album it does move from these great ballads to quite a few up-tempo songs that feel like when you get to play them live, they’re going to be a lot of fun.

Moore: Yeah, totally. I think when we got into the studio and sort of found this version of “In Other Words,” immediately I was like, “Oh, this opens the show.” Or at least opens the “B” part of the show or something. And I was like, “I don’t know if it opens the record, but maybe it opens the B side.” There were things that really were illuminated once we figured out the arrangement and what it was gonna sound like with the band, and not just sitting with an acoustic guitar or piano and kind of writing it on the spot. So yeah, I feel like that song in particular is one that jumps out. And even “In Real Life,” even though it’s not up-tempo, I think again, finding the arrangement live on the floor with the band, it became evident of like, “Oh, this is gonna be a fun one to do live and we can extend this intro with the synth, and I can walk out on stage and I can take my time as the band is sort of vamping.” Those are the kinds of things that only become evident when you’re figuring out the arrangements and figuring out what they’re actually gonna sound like on the record. But sure, I think so much of writing this record and even Silver Landings was really just writing music that we knew we would be able to take out on the road. Having new music out there is just a means for touring, and it was one of the big reasons of putting this record out in general, was like, “I want to go on the road, I didn’t get to go on the road with Silver Landings. It makes sense to have new music out there and not be touring with a two-year-old plus album.” And I had this collection of songs that I had been working on. It was like, “Okay, this makes sense to like, this is the next record and let’s figure out how to put it out there and take the show on the road.”

Baltin: Do you feel like you appreciate music more because you did step away from it for a minute?

Moore: Yeah. I think because music has never been the most successful part of my career. I’ve always viewed it as a passion. And the thing probably that I’m most passionate about, and it’s allowed me to have such freedom to kind of continue being creative on my own terms. There was no expectation from a record label or even quite frankly, an audience of how to follow a certain kind of success up. So I’ve always loved that music has been in my hands, and I’ve been able to really make it for myself knowing that hopefully it’ll see the light of day and other people will obviously enjoy it as well. But I love that, it really feels like the pressure is off in that sense. The stakes don’t feel as high. It’s not like this record has to make it or else I’ll never have the opportunity to make music again. That’s not the way the industry works anymore anyway. I can make music from my bedroom and put it out all on my own. And that’s having that control and having that power back in artists hands is kind of everything. So, yes, I love that my livelihood is not staked on whether or not this record achieves X amount of success. I’d love if I could continue making the kinds of records I want to make and writing the songs I want to write, and take the show on the road in some regard. That would be so much fun. But if not, I’ll figure it out. I’ll keep making music and just putting it out myself if that’s the case.

Baltin: Tell me about the writing of this record.

Moore: It was a very intentional exercise. ” I’m scared and I’m confused and I don’t know what’s going on in the world, and music has always been something for me to lean on. And it’s something I’m able to do with my husband and we can connect and collaborate on that level. Let’s find a way to make the most of this time and help us work out how we’re really feeling about what’s happening and unfolding around us.” So because it was so intentional and I found out I was pregnant shortly thereafter, this record was a way of processing how we felt about the world. And also how we felt about this impending next chapter and what that was gonna mean and how our life was gonna change and how we were gonna feel and it made me reflect on my own childhood and my parents. Everything was just colored with this new set of tools that I didn’t really have access to before. I was excited to explore that and I guess there were their own revelations in that just because there were so many new feelings. I wasn’t sort of rehashing or regurgitating things that I had experienced in one way or another before.

Baltin: As an artist, you have to write for yourself first, but what happens then, of course, is then you start getting the universal response. As an example I’m online now looking at a headline “This Is Us fan goes viral for revealing the true meaning of Rebecca and Miguel’s train scene.” What does it mean to you to get those responses?

Moore: There’s no higher compliment. I mean, whether it’s the show, whether it’s my music, like obviously with my music, it’s more personal, they’re my words and my intentions. But yeah, the greatest part of being an artist is creating something, with your own set of intentions for yourself, quite frankly, to make sense of something you’ve lived through and for people to be able to relate it back to their own lives, there really is no greater gift.

Baltin: When you go back and hear In Real Life as a whole album, what do you take from it?

Moore: To me, it’s such a snapshot of the last two years of my life, very personally speaking. I see the confines of living in this house with my husband, then I see my son, I see just sort of all of the lights that were turned on and all of the sort of cliche of life kind of becoming Technicolor from black and white. It feels like a step in a different direction, of really understanding and appreciating who I am as a woman, as a human, as an artist, as a new mom, as a partner. Yeah, there seems to be real growth and evolution there, which is all I could hope for, again, as an artist and as a human, and I hope that I’m able to take all of that and transfer it to the next set of songs.

Baltin: If you could tour with one artist who would it be and why?

Moore: I think it would be really fun to tour with Brandi Carlile. She’s just so unbelievably, phenomenally talented, and the twins, her band is spectacular. She just blows me away with her sense of musicality, and I think it would be fun to watch her play every night.

Baltin: As a fan, are we prepared for the series finale Tuesday? How can you prepare us now?

Moore: I feel like if you were able to get through last week’s episode, this week’s episode is a little warmer and more joyful. I feel like that last episode was just devastation. So I feel like you’ll be okay. It’s time to say goodbye, I think everyone’s prepared to say goodbye. So in that sense, it’s not gonna be as much of a shock.

Baltin: Do you have your Emmy speech prepared or no?

Moore: (Laughter) No way, no way. I just hope that the show is invited to the party; that’s what I have my fingers crossed for.

Baltin: Ken Olin pointed out on Twitter the other day that This Is Us writers have never been nominated for an Emmy. How is that possible? As a writer every time I watch that show, I’m like, “Damn it, you guys are too good.”

Moore: Right? I know. It is just so unbelievable to me that that has never happened either. I think things are so skewed towards streaming shows that there is a real bias against anything that’s network, and it’s unfortunate. When it comes to the writing and the directing, I’m like, “Come on! We are confined to 42 minutes and 30 seconds.” This last episode Dan [Fogelman] was telling me came in at 62 minutes, and we had to cut off 20 minutes of what that episode was supposed to be, how it was written, just ’cause it’s network television. So we have to stick to these very, very strict guidelines that none of these other shows have to, and it’s just like, “Come on! They deserve to be acknowledged.” The writing is just off the charts.

Baltin: It’s absolutely brilliant writing, but so was your performance, and again, I love the fact that people are going to riot in the streets if you don’t get it.

Moore: (Laughter) There are much more important things to riot about, but I’m very flattered.