Nicole Ari Parker on Lisa’s ‘And Just Like That’ Funeral Breakdown

SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for “Silent Mode,” Season 3, Episode 6 of “And Just Like That,” now streaming on Max.

Lisa Todd Wexley, the paragon of control, is, ever so slightly, spinning out. And that suits Nicole Ari Parker just fine.

The actress, who recently moved with husband Boris Kodjoe to the Hudson Valley after years in Los Angeles, is in her third season of playing the supermom known as LTW on “And Just Like That.” The Upper East Side documentarian has spent the season working on her dream project — a series about undersung Black women in American history — while experiencing the destabilizing departure of her film editor, and the yet more destabilizing arrival of a new editor, played by Mehcad Brooks.

All of those threads, as well as the loss of Lisa’s beloved father in the season’s sixth episode, has given this veteran star plenty to play. (Overcome with emotion, Lisa cannot bear to deliver a eulogy, and stands onstage physically supported by her husband, played by Christopher Jackson.)

Lisa was among the characters introduced in the first season of “And Just Like That” — new friends for Carrie, Charlotte and Miranda that had the effect of broadening the show’s aperture, allowing it to tell new and more inclusive stories. Parker remembers those Season 1 days with a shudder: “I didn’t realize the fans were so insane about this show!”

“And Just Like That” — overseen by showrunner and executive producer Michael Patrick King — remains hotly debated for everything from Carrie’s decision to continue pursuing a romance with Aidan to Lisa’s ultra-fab styling worn on evenings at home. But one thing that seems beyond dispute is that Parker has found her place in the ensemble. Parker spoke with Variety at the series’ New York City press junket in May and then, in a longer conversation, on Manhattan’s Upper West Side in June. The conversations touched on LTW’s new direction, the startling fan reaction to the cast’s new additions, Parker’s history in projects from “A Streetcar Named Desire” to “Boogie Nights” — and what it feels like to be a part of the “Sex and the City” legacy. As Parker puts it, “I feel like I’ve been given something that I have to take care of.” 

It’s interesting seeing LTW knocked off her game a bit this season, because viewers are accustomed to her handling everything with aplomb. Has this given you new notes to play? 

Yes. And the lovely Mehcad Brooks definitely is a destabilizer. 

Did you feel anxious about your and Mehcad’s storyline, wherever it may go, potentially upsetting the Wexleys’ placid home life? 

I was excited to explore that — how you manage it. When you’re in a long-term relationship and you meet someone else, there’s only two choices: Yes, I’m going to do this thing, or no, I’m not. But then there’s a middle-ground struggle. And that’s what MPK is interested in. He loves the Wexleys as much as we do. 

You were trained in theater at NYU. What productions did you do after graduating? 

I did everything — God didn’t give me a singing voice, but he put it in the rest of my body. I did “For Colored Girls” in a basement, directed by my friend. I was a Lower East Side actor, and then I moved to Harlem — I was working all the time, with that energy and excitement about doing everything. My big break on Broadway was “Streetcar.”

That was in 2012 — you’d been working onscreen before then. 

I was in independent films. My first film was “The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love” — it’s so funny, when I called home, I said, “Mom, I got my first movie!” She said, “What’s it called?” I said, “The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love,” and she said “That’s great! In love with who?”

“Who are their boyfriends?”

I got into NYU early, and I was going to be a journalism major. My dad was a hardworking guy, a dentist — I went to private school, from a working-class family. But second semester, freshman year, I auditioned for Tisch and got in. This is right when “Dead Poets Society” was out, “carpe diem,” so I called him and he gave me this speech that has taken me through my career: “Listen, Nikki, you’re about to enter the territory of ‘no.’ So you’ve got to tell me right now that you’re going to stick around for the ‘yes.’” 

That sounds very perceptive of him!

My son is 18, and my daughter is 20. That would be like my son telling me he wants to jump feet-first into some crazy business.

What are your kids up to now? 

My daughter just finished her sophomore year at Howard and she’s in the city this summer working at an investment firm; somebody in the family has to be the finance girl! And my son graduated at 17, and because he’s German, through my husband, he started playing for the German national basketball team. Now he’s going to play in the World Cup in Switzerland in two weeks. I’m shooting “Lanterns,” so I’m going to miss the first four or five games, then I’ll fly to Geneva. If they were here right now, my kids would be like, “Mom, please.” My nickname is “Funny you should ask…” — you could say, “I’m going to have the salad,” and I’d say, “It’s funny you should say that. My kids are good at cooking.”

How very Lisa Todd Wexley. 

Yeah, the mom element is very familiar. 

The show is really leaning into Lisa’s fashion this season — most notably with one necklace, if you know the one I mean…

While cooking. With an apron. 

Is it fun to play around with the somewhat outlandish wardrobe? “Give me the necklace. I can act in this.” 

Once you’ve played Blanche, a necklace is nothing!

What was doing “A Streetcar Named Desire” like? 

Ben Brantley ripped us apart. But I was trained in the classics — and when is a Black actress going to get to play Blanche on Broadway? When am I going to do Chekhov on Broadway? This is all I know — and yet there was no work for me at all. I knew these plays inside and out, Shakespeare, all of it. And [director] Emily Mann gave me two of my favorite jobs, where I was using what I know; “Streetcar,” and [“Antony and] Cleopatra,” at Princeton.

LTW is epic to play, and I feel like Michael Patrick King saw me. He gives me notes like “A little more Carole Lombard, and a little less Sonny Liston.” And he knows I know what he’s saying. 

Was it frustrating, not having the opportunities your white counterparts might? 

It was always layered — like my dad said, I was ready for all of those “nos,” but I had a “yes” inside of me. I just felt sorry for them that they didn’t know this person could play Yelena. 

In the sixth episode, when Lisa breaks, she really breaks — in just the way grief can feel, messy and painful. Did your theatrical training come into play there? 

Those moments have to turn on a dime — because it’s a comedy show, and it’s 40-something minutes long. There’s no time to fully Shakespeare, right? I had to read that email from Jenifer Lewis’ character inviting me to my father’s funeral and then go right into “This is war.” I love the writing — it’s using what I have and keeping me on my toes. And while the wardrobe is fantastic, I have to manage a clutch bag and hug Charlotte, and play a woman who always carries a bag.

You can’t look ungainly with it. 

What I love about her is that she dresses magnificent — for her. You never get the sense that she’s trying to show off. She’s showing out — living her best self. 

The first thing I ever saw you in was “Boogie Nights” —

Becky Barnett.

What was it like to take that on, relatively early in your career? 

I used to live on 108th Street, laying in my sixth floor apartment, where you couldn’t see anything but the backs of the other apartments. The African musicians from Paris would be practicing; my Dominican friend would be blasting her music and laughing with her daughter; there were clotheslines hanging. And I was laying on my twin bed, on the phone with Paul Thomas Anderson. 

I love how the film really conjures the sense of a company of actors. What was it like working with your costars? 

One of my best professors at NYU was Tony Greco, who taught Philip Seymour Hoffman. So it was bittersweet, that whole process. I was so lucky, I was so blessed. We went to a live porn set before shooting — you had to be polite. In one of the girls’ dressing rooms, she was fully naked, legs open, getting ready for a birthday party scene. 

Was that an eye-opening experience? 

It made me have respect. She said “I feel free; I’m safe; I take care of myself.” She was Becky. 

Becky knows how to take care of herself. 

Did you ever see the scenes that were cut? 

No, I haven’t. 

There’s a version where she has an abusive husband and he beats her up really bad and she beats him with a frying pan. Paul really wanted it to go there. And it was so deep and so moving to play. But the movie was really long.

While “Sex and the City” was first airing, you were on “Soul Food,” on Showtime. Both shows were breaking ground in a way as premium cable series. What do you remember about the experience?

I have to give my mom props. I was a New Yorker who didn’t drive. I didn’t get my license until I was 31. I’m in L.A. in a little Neon, and my mom was driving me around. I had to go upstairs to the casting office, and when I came downstairs, my mom gave me a piece of paper. She’d written, in the lobby, “Dear God, I know my baby is ready for her big break.” 

The show lasted five years; I met Boris. I’m still sister friends with Malinda Williams and Vanessa [E.] Williams, and Vanessa tells this story: “I called it first.” 

In her speech at her father’s funeral, Lisa is forced to confront not having handled her father’s death perfectly. What do you think the longer-term implications of this are for her? 

I don’t know that I would judge her reaction to her father’s death like that. It comes as a surprise, and like any human, losing someone you love is earth-shattering, no matter how old you are. It does shake her ground in a way that makes her a little bit more focused — maybe a little hyper-focused. And now her marriage is, you know, not in trouble, but someone else can get her attention in this vulnerable place. So I think the death made her unsteady in a way that she might not even realize.

When the show began and you, Sarita Choudhury, Karen Pittman and Sara Ramírez were announced as new cast members, many perceived it as a sort of Band-Aid to address the lack of diversity on “Sex and the City.” Did you feel any trepidation going in?

I didn’t have trepidation, because I didn’t realize the fans were so insane about this show! I was like, “Yay, I got a job! Call home, just like when I was 20!” 

The fans have a great attachment to the show, as I’m sure you’ve figured out. 

I was just as excited as the fans were when I was in the scenes with SJ and Cynthia and Kristin. And then… the wrath! 

Did it feel like wrath? 

Yes! People lost their minds! I felt totally normal, as the character was written. I didn’t feel like a Band-Aid. 

Three seasons in, you think people have calmed down? 

I think they have not calmed down, but they can’t stop watching. They’re mad about age, they’re mad about races, they’re mad about Samantha being gone. I’ve seen a lot about the age part. I was saying to one reporter, who was probably 35, “Have you had a crush on someone recently?” and she was like “Yeah.” “Did you work with him or her, and then you texted, and he or she texted back…” All of that still happens when you’re 50. Don’t be mad about this! Some people choose to be in long-term relationships. Some people struggle. Some people change their mind.

Just as you said, it’s funny that people who are frustrated with the characters’ decisions watch every week. 

The show has always had this cheeky, subversive quality of showing, in a sweet, naughty way, what you don’t want to admit about yourself. People don’t always want a mirror. They want a selfie with a filter on it. [Carrie and Aidan] is a girl and her ex-boyfriend narrative, and we love and we hate that it’s exposed. It makes you nervous. 

You’ve worked on a lot of TV shows. Does “And Just Like That” have a different feel to it? 

I feel like I’ve been given something that I have to take care of — as opposed to barreling through it to show my best skills. I have to do the work, but — I feel like I’m interested. That’s how I approach it every shoot day. It always surprises me when the peanut gallery is like “They’re ripping it apart!” I’m like, “We’re wearing kid gloves — are you kidding me?”

Prior to your and Karen Pittman’s characters, there had never been a major Black professional character on the show. Did that lead you to treat the performance with a special level of care? 

The other day on my Instagram feed, a Black woman was watching the five of us on “The View,” and she was like, “I really like these ladies. Carrie was always my favorite. She was the Blackest of the group — she had the swag, the curly hair, and she was who she was.” It really touched me because — I’m just going to simplify it — the show was a white show. It wasn’t trying to be anything but that. A show like that, or “The Partridge Family,” or “Three’s Company,” or “Happy Days”: I’m not mad that I don’t see myself. I would be mad if you tried to write that without bringing in that voice in the writers’ room. 

It feels authentic to you.

I don’t know that I could have stayed on the show as a new Black character if it was wrong. If the words that were written for me were empty; if they didn’t give me parents, my husband. They really know that we’re not just this isolated human, the “Black friend.” We have products in my fabulous walk-in closet that I do my little girl’s hair with. When those things are omitted, Black people feel it. Even if LTW is not like you, she does her hair, she makes breakfast, mashes potatoes, goes to work, loves her husband, fights with her husband, disciplines her kids. You know? It’s full. 

What kind of research did you do when you first dug into the role?

That’s the thing about all of the backlash about the diversity on the show — this is New York City. I know all of the fancy Black Upper East Side women who look like this, dress like this, collect art, have enormous portfolios, this is not a made-up character. I didn’t have to research the validity of that. I had to get comfortable in the luxuriousness, because I have a great life now, but I’m still very much that 25-year-old on the phone with Paul Thomas Anderson. But I think of her as someone who wears what she bought because she likes it. It’s not a trend; it’s not living up to someone else’s standards. She bought a beautiful, handcrafted necklace and wore it with her Dior dress. It’s her wardrobe versus her life. I think the beautiful part is that I know she exists. And I want to do her justice. 

This conversation has been edited and condensed.