The Trio Behind 'Imperfect Women' Are Messy Onscreen—and Unstoppable Behind the Camera

It’s a February afternoon in L.A., and Elisabeth Moss, Kerry Washington, and Kate Mara are back in the same room. Five months after wrapping their Apple TV thriller Imperfect Women, the three sit around a table, between breaks in a photo shoot, slipping easily into conversation as good friends do—swapping notes on the latest prestige dramas.

For actors who’ve each anchored some of TV's most critically acclaimed shows, this project marks a first: sharing the screen as a trio. In Imperfect Women, they play longtime friends who realize how little they know about each other after one of them goes missing. Through illuminating flashbacks and switching POVs, viewers learn the secrets about their friendships at the same time as the titular women.

The newest addition to the rich-women-behaving-badly genre is a standout both in front of and behind the camera—Moss and Washington also served as co-executive producers on a set where the showrunner, directors, and top stars were all women.

Ahead of the series’ premiere (and its April 29 finale) Moss, Washington, and Mara sat down with Marie Claire to discuss adapting Araminta Hall’s novel for the screen, bringing the production to post-wildfires Los Angeles, and the importance of telling complex, female-led stories.

Marie Claire: I’d love to discuss how each of you came onto the project. What has it been like to work together—both onscreen and, for Kerry and Elisabeth, as producers?

Elisabeth Moss: I read the book at the end of 2019. It's highly likely I got it at the airport—I was flying to Hawaii to do Taika Watiti's film, and I thought, This looks like a good beach read—and I fell in love with it. I had just met my producing partner, Lindsay McManus, and we hadn't even started the company. This was the first thing we ever got together, so it's special to us because of that.

Kerry Washington: I'm a huge Lizzie Moss fan. Even just getting any correspondence from her was incredible. I feel like these opportunities to work with other women and really lift each other up and carry the weight together are so wonderful.

EM: It's really rare you get to go to another actress and say, "Do you want to partner up on something and both have great roles and have it be sort of an equal partnership as well?" I've never been able to do that before.

Kate Mara: The thing that I was most flattered by when you guys presented this to me before I read it was: "We need someone who presents as [perfect], but also has probably done some really messed up stuff." And I was like, "Oh my god, I'm so flattered." The thought that I could play that was much more exciting.

EM: There was literally one person that we thought of for Nancy, and luckily she said yes.

MC: Each of your wardrobes is very distinctive for your characters. Did each of you have a favorite look or element that really helped you embody your character?

KW: We need to lift up Tiffany Hasbourne, our costume designer. She was so committed to telling the story of who these women were through clothes and the subtle differences which also helped convey that we all were friends.

KM: Nancy's daily wardrobe is so fancy. Our rule for Nancy was she never wears pants unless she's just given birth. I’d show up [to set] in sweatpants and then put on these incredible dresses, and it does totally change your whole vibe.

KW: Eleanor came from money but didn't want to present that way in the world. She was very eclectic and kind of artsy in her choices, but underneath that it was like, 'Oh, that just happens to be McQueen, or it just happens to be Prada.' It was always mixed in with high-low and vintage finds.

EM: I presented Tiffany with a challenge with Mary. Part of me wishes I had said yes to some of her initial ideas because they were really beautiful; There was a lot of Zimmerman and things like that that I would have loved to have gotten to wear. But it didn't feel realistic for Mary, who is a stay-at-home mom and has two young kids. There were times when I had to dress up a little bit more to just look like I was going to the same party as these ladies, but the highest end we got was Dôen.

MC: Los Angeles is shot so beautifully in this series. How did the change from the novel’s U.K. setting to L.A. come about?

EM: I will point a very grateful finger at Kerry, who came up with the idea. It just worked creatively so well. I feel like I've seen the East Coast version of this show, and I thought, this is going to be different. And obviously to bring work to L.A. was really important to all of us. [Filming] ended up being after the [2025] wildfires.

KW: It was a gift to be able to give the crews here an opportunity to do what they do so brilliantly and not have to leave their families to do it. Also, I don't think people think of L.A. as being a place where there is old money and that's what I love about Nancy’s family story. Those families exist in Pasadena.

EM: It's a place too where you can reinvent yourself, right? You can be who you want to be, even if that person isn’t who you really are.

KW: It's part of our characters. We're all keeping so many secrets, like how much money we have or don't have, where we're from or not from. We're all sort of selling a misconception of those stories.

MC: Were there any elements of the original novel you really fought to make it to the screen?

EM: The distinct changes in point of view were really important to me. When I read the book, I really thought that I had it all figured out, and I was totally wrong about who Nancy was. That to me was something that was really important to keep.

KW: In the world that we're living in right now, to understand that you can be two people in the same room, in the same moment, and be telling two different stories, it is a muscle we all need to be building. We all need to be understanding that perspective really dictates so much and that you might learn something from seeing a moment from somebody else's point of view.

MC: There’s an interrogation scene teased in the trailer, where Detective Ganz says she wouldn’t call the women’s dynamic a friendship. Do you ultimately think Eleanor, Mary, and Nancy were friends?

EM: Look, we made a TV show. As far as I know, none of my friends have done some of the things that these women do in the show, but we needed to add a little drama. I do think they're friends.

KW: I do too. I think friendship—like women, like humans—is imperfect. I feel like the closest friends I have are the ones where we have fucked up and we made it through to the other side. Then you really know somebody.

EM: Also, it's so relatable. The idea that you tell one friend something that you're not going to tell your other friend. Everyone has a friend they go to that is maybe slightly less judgmental.

KM: Even with family as well. I'm going to tell this brother and not that brother.

EM: Absolutely. And when I read the book, I was like, yes, female friendships sometimes are not great. Sometimes someone messes up.

MC: The scenes that impacted me most, in terms of their bond, were when you could see the village they built together among their families. What was it like bringing that dynamic to the screen?

KW: I just got emotional, because it made me think of what it was like to make the show. We were saying yesterday that it's almost like the show had three number ones. We held it up together. There were weeks that were really hard for me and these girls were like glorified background actors. And then it became all about Kate and [Elisabeth and I] were like, 'We're just going to hang out and do our nails.' But we were there for each other and that allowed us to tell this story together as a community, as a circle. The way these women are sort of helping to raise all of their kids, that's how we were building the show, creating that support network for each other.

EM: This accommodation behind the scenes that no one would ever see; that quiet placing the other person in front of you. I wasn’t surprised at all, but it was very cool to see.

MC: Tell me about that experience working on a female-led set where all of the leads were working moms.

KM: There were babies and toddlers showing up all the time.

KW: My [eight-year-old] son was on set one day, and decided to be our still photographer. He was taking pictures of the crew and interviewing them, like, “What's your job?” It was really, really sweet.

EM: I'm kind of newer to the game and so I would just like constantly be trying to think of questions to ask them as working moms. 'How do you prioritize this? How do you make time for this?' There wasn't enough time to talk to them about everything I wanted to talk to them about.

MC: In each of your opinions, why do you think stories about the inner workings of “unlikeable” women and complicated female friendships are so fascinating to audiences?

EM: I think we like to watch ourselves on screen. We like to find things that we relate to, and it can be more fun when it's a heightened version. This show has moments that are so honest, vulnerable, and hard to watch. And then it also has watercooler, I can't believe she did that moments. I love watching that mix of highbrow and fun.

KM: People enjoy watching a mess. I don't think every show and every movie needs to necessarily have a message. Sometimes that's really important, but it can also just be a really fun watch. You can get lost in the story.

KW: I do think for a long time in film and television, women have been relegated to being the best friend, the girlfriend, the wife. I think we're in an era of knowing that we are at the center of our own stories and our own lives. It's shown in a beautiful way through this show where there are three interesting, complicated women, and you don't get to say one of them is the lead. That idea of making room for everybody to have the value where they are worth their own story. I choose as a mom and as a wife to sometimes be a supporting character, but in my day-to-day life, I also know that I'm the lead of my life, and we all deserve to know this.

EM: I'd love to get to a point where that's not even what we're talking about as related to women. Without calling out anyone specific, there's a lot of directors and actors that no one has ever asked them what it's like to play a messy person. Instead it's, "Oh my God, you were brilliant." Maybe we get to the place where it's not even a part of the conversation.

Photographer Tracy Nguyễn | Creative Direction Alexa Wiley | Art Direction Montse Tanús | Entertainment Director Neha Prakash | Producer Luciana De La Fe

Elisabeth Moss: Stylist Chloe Hartstein | Hair Stylist Sunnie Brook | Makeup Artist Sabriana Bedrani

Kerry Washington: Stylist Rob Zangardi Mariel Haenn | Hair Stylist Davontae Washington | Makeup Artist Adam Burrel

Kate Mara: Stylist Johnny Wujek | Hair Stylist Mara Roszak | Makeup Artist Alisha Bailey