‘Palm Royale’s Leslie Bibb Says the Writers Are Working on Season 2

[Editor’s note: The following contains some spoilers for Palm Royale.]

The Big Picture

• The Apple TV+ series ‘Palm Royale’ showcases Maxine’s struggle to fit into high society in 1969 Palm Beach.
• Lesile Bibb discusses the sensory experience of the show, working with a talented ensemble, and hopes for a second season.
• Bibb delves into Dinah’s character and the realistic view of life for women in the 1960s, and shares excitement for ”The White Lotus’ Season 3.

The 10-episode Apple TV+ series Palm Royale tells the story of Maxine Simmons (Kristen Wiig), who so badly to be a part of Palm Beach high society in 1969 but quickly learns they aren’t very accepting of outsiders. The harder the former beauty pageant contestant fights to be friends with women like Evelyn Rollins (Allison Janney) and Dinah Donahue (Leslie Bibb), the more they try to shut her out, regardless of the fact that she’s married to the heir (Josh Lucas) to the Dellacorte fortune. But Maxine is not one to be dismissed easily and her desperation combined with an accumulation of society secrets makes her more determined than ever to leave her mark.

Firmly a part of that elite circle, Dinah spends some time with Maxine, giving a glimpse into how these are two women that could be great friends, but Dinah’s own insecurities keep her from fully embracing Maxine. During this interview with Collider, Bibb talked about how Palm Royale is a feast for the senses, what made her want to be a part of this project, the great learning experience it was to work with this ensemble, why every actor should be more like Carol Burnett (who plays Norma Dellacorte), Dinah’s realistic view of life for women during this time period, and her hope that they’ll get to do a second season. She also discussed the showrunners and writers who have gifted her with such incredible characters to play with, being directed by Clint Eastwood for Juror #2, and why she wanted to be a part of Season 3 of The White Lotus.

Collider: I love everything about this show and I’m obsessed with all of it. The characters are all fantastic and the locations and wardrobe are absolutely to die for.

LESLIE BIBB: It’s like a feast for the senses. When we were filming it, I would walk onto the sets and feel it. Sometimes you wonder if it translates, but it makes me really happy that it seems to have been translated.

Leslie Bibb Loved Getting To Explore ‘Palm Royale’s Bonnie & Clyde Dynamic With Kristen Wiig

Watching the finished product, it’s easy to see all the reasons why you’d want to do this, but you don’t necessarily know how all of that will work when you sign on. What was the thing that you were most excited about getting to do and explore by playing this character, and how did it ultimately exceed your expectations?

BIBB: The writing was the first thing for me. My audition scene was the monologue I have with Kristen [Wiig] at the bar when I’m talking about love and marriage and men, and that love is not something I can afford. I just remember thinking, “This writing is incredible.” And then, Kristen was the other part of the equation. That was really exciting for me because I’m such a fan of hers. I’m always at odds with her. We’re either teaming up together or we’re at odds. If they just figured out that they could be the best of friends, they could rob banks together. They’re like Bonnie and Clyde. I don’t think I really even understood the world until I went into my first fitting with Alix [Friedberg], who was our costume designer. I remember that first fitting and trying to find Dinah and realizing, “Oh, these are her colors and these aren’t her colors.” When I put on the underpinnings, they were from 1969. That sort of character work, I didn’t even really comprehend. I’d done something before that was period, in 1929 and 1930, which was very fun and the costume designer equally did an amazing job on that, but we would go from flashbacks of that time to modern day. So, to only live in this world was so incredibly fun. I never have fingernails. I just always have short fingernails. So, when they put on those nails, my sister was like, “All you do is talk with your hands. Can you please stop doing that?” The shape of my nails was like our mother’s fingernails. Being in that wig was also something I loved. Only when I had the wig on for hour 13 was I like, “Oh, why did I pull this thing so tight? Why did I make it so tight?”

That part of it was so fun. You would walk on the sets that Jon Carlos created and they didn’t nick one corner. Every single nuance of the show, they just did such an exquisite job with. That became a wonderlust for me. I loved getting to go to set and seeing what everybody had on, including what the extras would have on, I have to give a shout-out to all the extras on our show because it’s a club, so you had to have the same people. You can’t have a rotating door because a club only has so many members, so these lovely background artists would show up for six months and went to every place with us. They became a real family, too. I didn’t even really think about the acting process and was so grateful for all of that because it was so authentic. It took a little bit off my plate with the things like the way you hold your body and the way you sit. You just do that instinctually. And how about the cars? There’s a funeral scene where I remember walking into the house where the funeral was taking place and the cars parked in the driveway, and one was cooler than the other. It was just incredible. I don’t even care about cars, but I was like, “This is so cool.”

When I interviewed Kristen Wiig, I told her that I don’t think there’s been a female ensemble this excellent since Bridesmaids. What was it like to have this group of women to collaborate with and to play off? What are your most memorable moments together?

BIBB: It was a really great learning experience to get to watch people like Allison Janney work, take in and take out. I’ve always been such a huge fan of Allison’s, and to get to see Kristen work, they’re both really giving actors. Unfortunately, I didn’t have anything to do with Laura Dern, and I would really like to do that. Fingers crossed for Season 2. I don’t know if people remember Julia Duffy in Newhart, but I do and she’s incredible. Mindy Cohn is amazing. Weirdly enough, I did a movie with Mindy ages ago, called Sex and Death 101. It was great. There were just all these incredible women. And then, you have Carol Burnett and you’re like, “What is happening? What magic potion did I drink? What fairy tale has just come true?” To be in a scene with her really is a dream come true. It’s incredible, and she also reminds you at the level you should be operating at. The level of professionalism she lives her life by is really remarkable.

Leslie Bibb Feels Carol Burnett Sets An Example That All Actors Should Follow

What actor doesn’t want to be in a scene and have Carol Burnett be deliciously mean to them?

BIBB: I know, right?! Also, Carol Burnett is in a state for the first few episodes, and she still showed up for our first table read to moan and groan. I just remember thinking, “Oh, my God, that’s the way every actor should be.”

It’s so great to watch this ensemble because you’re all on fire in this and so on point.

BIBB: That’s due to Abe Sylvia, who’s our showrunner and creator, and Laura Dern and Jayme Lemons, who are producers, and Kristen, who’s also one of the producers. I really feel like those guys created a space to give us room to run and they weren’t yanking us back by the reins. We had an incredible writers’ room, and I think Abe really knows how to run a writers’ room and nurture them and their writing. It felt like everyone was working in a very creative space, and it started in the writers’ room. If the head of your production is nurturing that, it’s gonna trickle down to everybody being able to feel room to be creative and try to be fearless. You need to be fearless anyway, as an actor, but especially in comedy, you don’t wanna sit on an intention or an idea, even though it might not work the way it should. Those guys never made you feel dumb for trying something, and not everybody nurtures you like that. I really give it to Abe Sylvia for that. I really toot his horn for that because it starts with him, and he’s a very generous human being.

Between her husband, her boyfriend, and her fiancé, Dinah is juggling quite a lot.

BIBB: She would love to have love. She just can’t afford it.

Does she even know how her life got her into this mess?

BIBB: I think she does know. Dinah is very aware of the way life works for a woman and where she’s operating. When I was doing research in this time period, I learned that women couldn’t open a bank account. We take for granted now that, as women, we can do anything. Of course, we can. But back then, you couldn’t. You were a mother, and you couldn’t even complain about being a mother. You couldn’t complain about anything. You were just lucky to have a seat at the table. So, I think Dinah weirdly has a very realistic view of what she’s got. She’s like, “I’ve gotta use this to my benefit.” She’s married to Perry, her sweet husband, played by the amazing Jordan Bridges, who is so funny and so insane. I love Jordan. He’s so good as Perry. Dinah wants love. She wants a little bit of what Maxine says but knows that she can’t have it. It’s just not in the cards for her. I know Dinah is insane. She can be catty and bratty and nuts, but there’s also something heartbreaking about her not being able to figure out the way to really find great love in her life because that’s what she wants. She wants to have great friendship and she wants to have great love, but she ends up with none of it. She ends up with Perry and her Rolls Royce. And then, I was so lucky to have the man she’s courting by the end, Paul Sand, who was on The Carol Burnett Show. He’s just incredible, and it was a joy to work with him, as well.

I’ve been such a fan of your work since Popular. That show was great because it really gave you a chance to do comedy and drama, and to find the funny in the dramatic things. You did that so well in Palm Royale, and I’m tremendously excited about you being in Season 3 of The White Lotus. What made you want to do that series?

BIBB: I’ve gotten really lucky to work with these showrunners and writers. You mentioned Popular, which started with Ryan Murphy creating Brooke McQueen and giving me all that to work with. I was a kid then, and he trusted me and helped to nurture that with me. Without that, I wouldn’t be here. That started me on a course. And then, there was GCB with (show creator) Bobby Harling. And then, Will Farrell and Adam McKay trusted me with Carley Bobby (in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby). Great comedy comes from great pain. What I try to seek is something that is not just funny, but that is covering something much darker and is from great loss. With Abe, I got that with Dinah Donahue. For The White Lotus, it was a chance to work with somebody like Mike White. It’s the first time I’ve gotten the luxury to have the writer/creator also be the director for all the episodes. I’m finding, in that process, what a luxury it is to have that visionary holding your hand the whole way. What’s really interesting about The White Lotus is that it’s truly Mike’s vision. These great showrunners and great writers have held my hand as I walk down the road with them. That’s what I feel lucky to be able to do right now. It’s really why I pick a job. I have to connect with what I read on the page, and then it’s about who I’m gonna work with.

I did this Clint Eastwood movie (Juror #2) that’s gonna come out because every actor I meet talks about working with Clint as being one of the greatest experiences of their life. My partner (Sam Rockwell) worked with him. My partner was doing a movie with Matt Damon, and I met Matt and hung out with him and I brought up Clint, and he said, “Oh, you’re about to have the greatest work experience of your life.” I think Matt signed up for a second movie without even reading the script because he just wanted to work with Clint again. That’s something that really is exciting to me, as an actor, because you leave the experience better at your craft. I feel pretty fortunate, along the way, to have gotten to work with these people, and also these other actors, like Kristen Chenoweth, Kristen Wiig, Allison Janney, Nicholas Hoult, get to work with these people and also these other actors, like Kristen Che with Kristen Wiig Allison, Janney, Nicholas Holt, Toni Collette, and Chris Messina. To get to work with those people and watch them work is incredible. I’m still friends with Carly Pope (from Popular). She came to the premiere of Palm Royale. I will always be forever grateful to Ryan Murphy for making her my sister because she still is.

Leslie Bibb Says That Season 2 of ‘Palm Royale’ Would Be Even Wilder

Have you thought about possibilities for Season 2 and what you could get up to with Dinah?

BIBB: There’s a writers’ room that’s open, and we’ll see. Apple doesn’t okay anything until they see numbers, but I’ve heard rumblings. Wiig said, “Oh, my God, I can’t wait for you to see what would happen.” It’s pretty wild. It’s pretty exciting. From what I heard, I was like, “Oh, my God, no, she doesn’t!” What I love about the show and what feels like you can glean from the show when you watch it is what I felt when I walked into the writers’ room. I was in the writers’ room, pre-writers’ strike, and it was like no writers’ room I’d ever walked into before. Everybody was so happy. Abe said they always end on a high note. Even when they’ve beaten down an idea, they stop when they’re at the top, so everybody can go home with their brains buzzing with the what ifs. It was all these cool human beings in this writers’ room, and they were all excited and pumped. Abe really knows how to nurture a creative spirit. From the writers’ room to the actors, he’s a very generous person. I think if we get a Season 2, it’s gonna be pretty wild.

Palm Royale is available to stream on Apple TV+. Check out the trailer:

Watch on Apple TV+