Warning: this article contains spoilers from the first two episodes of Pluribus, which streamed Nov. 7 on Apple TV — read at your own risk!
By the end of the second hour of Vince Gilligan’s high-concept drama series, Rhea Seehorn’s Carol Sturka, a fantasy romance author (who’s named after Carol Burnett), has reached her wit’s end with the happiness and uniformity that has plagued humanity. So then, why does she decide to forego her solo trip home and follow the always-smiling Zosia (Karolina Wydra) aboard Air Force One?
“It’s not a choice that’s born out of some deepening relationship with Zosia,” Seehorn tells Gold Derby. “It is not specific to her. I think she’s feeling completely alone, and she’s gonna need some kind of tool. She’s certainly not ready to completely give up. She’s just been dealt this massive blow that the other people like her — that she thought were going to help and lead the charge — didn’t want to do anything. Right now, Zosia is the closest to her to even try to figure out what the hell is going on. She’s grasping at straws and feeling very desperate.”
Karolina Wydra and Rhea Seehorn in ‘Pluribus’Apple TV
Seehorn received two Emmy nominations for playing Kim Wexler on Gilligan’s last show, Better Call Saul, plus another bid for the short form series Cooper’s Bar. For Pluribus, she will competing in the lead actress category for the first time at the 2026 Emmys as well as the upcoming Golden Globes, Critics Choice, and Screen Actors Guild Awards.
With the way online fandoms operate these days, how is Seehorn addressing the potential for people to start “shipping” an improbable romance between Carol and Zosia? “Well, it’s certainly a funny coupling,” she laughs. “There’s such a straight-man/wackadoodle-man comedic energy sometimes. Carol’s justified in her frustration and her anger, but she’s behaving like a five-year-old having a temper tantrum the calmer Zosia gets. That energy is just so comedic and so funny, and I do think I have great chemistry with Karolina.”
Seehorn says that Wydra, the Polish-American actress known for projects like House, True Blood, and Europa Report, is a “fantastic actress doing a deceptively difficult part.” Seehorn confirms that Zosia’s kind are “not robots or aliens,” but are “sentient and thinking” people who are “hearing me and taking in what I’m saying, but they’re never mirroring me, which is the actor response, to listen and react.”
She adds, “That’ll be fun if people root for them to get together. Plus, Karolina happens to be one of the most gorgeous people I’ve ever seen on the planet, so there’s that.”
Karolina Wydra in ‘Pluribus’Apple TV
Carol is “definitely struggling” with what to call human beings now, ultimately settling on the generic term, “others.” Seehorn confirms, “I believe she keeps referring to Zosia as Pirate Lady. That’s how much she doesn’t want to give them any kind of human designation.”
In the first episode, Helen (Miriam Shor), Carol’s longtime manager and romantic partner, fails to survive the transition from normal human to “other,” and dies in front of her. Seehorn now tells us it was “awful” for Carol to say goodbye to Helen in that way. She declares, “I had never gotten to work with Miriam, I’d never even met her before we did this. She’s so great and so funny and so smart. We had a great time bonding. We wanted to make this relationship seem real and lived-in. You’d be surprised what you can bond over.”
Seehorn recalls, “When we filmed that scene, in the wee hours of the morning, her tremendous stunt woman would take over and do that fall when she hits her head. It was horrible to read, it was horrible to witness on the night that we shot it, and equally horrible when I when I watched it. The panic that goes through Carol and the drive to get her help any way she can, and the sandwich board — that was all physically really, really hard stuff to do. Shout out to my stunt woman, Heather Bonomo. Most of the stunts and the lifting of her and all of this had to be done as me, because Vince’s shots include my face so often, and we didn’t do any CGI face replacement. But Heather would come in and do a take where maybe you’re swiping camera, because I don’t know if you’ve ever lifted a steel frame sandwich board with a person on it from a deep squat, but it’s really hard on the low back.”
Rhea Seehorn in ‘Pluribus’Apple TV+
The actress also talks about the “emotionally demanding” aspect of Carol “trying to resuscitate Helen in front of the ER,” explaining, “The grief of losing her carries a heavy weight throughout the series, and so it was important to Vince, and I understood why, that we let it have that power it should have. It’s not glossed over. It should look horrible. It should look unbearable for somebody. And that’s what we were trying to get across there.”
Carol’s relationship with her book fans is something the actress “had a lot of conversations about” early on. “While it sometimes might seem like she is mocking them, it is born out of self-loathing,” Seehorn confesses. “If you’re going to believe the hype about you, then you’d have to believe when people say you’re terrible, and she’s scared of that. She’s also scared to think that she deserves the success she has. So, she’s developed a pretty defensive reaction to all of it.”
And, for the record, Seehorn suspects that Mandovian spice fruit, a fictional food from Carol’s novels, is “probably a spice that feels sweet, but then it ends bitter. You’re happy that you took a bite at first, and then at the end, you’re like, now I wish this wasn’t in my mouth.”
Pluribus will stream new episodes every Friday on Apple TV until the Dec. 26 finale.