The big screen beckons

With her distinctive red hair, and trademark New York rasp, Lyonne gradually rose up the Hollywood ladder, appearing in various TV series and films including Woody Allen’s Everybody Says I Love You (1996); Slums of Beverly Hills (1998), which has gone on to become something of a cult classic; and Kate & Leopold (2001) starring Hugh Jackman and Meg Ryan.

But she was forced to take a step back from the acting world in the 2010s when some of her on-screen antics began to bleed into her off-screen life. Lyonne received drug and alcohol rehabilitation treatment, and underwent open-heart surgery in 2012.

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Finding her groove

Far from hiding her past, to say that Lyonne wears her scars with pride is an understatement: the long one across her chest was written into the script of the third season of Orange is the New Black, where her character has the surgery as the result of a heroin overdose.

A six-year stint on that comedy-drama, set inside a women’s prison, made Lyonne a celebrity. But it was with the heavily autobiographical Russian Doll that we got to see the real Lyonne – a time travel dark comedy which she co-created, as well as writing and directing key episodes – earning nominations for Emmy, Gotham and Golden Globe awards, to name just three.

Playing it smart

Topping that adored show’s two seasons (2019 and 2022) won’t be easy, but Lyonne teamed up with Looper and Star Wars: The Last Jedi director Rian Johnson for her new outing Poker Face, a 10-part murder-mystery that debuted earlier this year. Talk of a second season is already buzzing.

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Lyonne plays Charlie Cale, a casino worker-turned-amateur sleuth with an uncanny ability to detect lies – though the actress laments that a human lie detector would be too much of a good thing. “It’s a shame society values small lies so much,” she says. “Sometimes I think when people ask each other ‘how are you?’, it would be more loving to tell one another the truth. But life is often complicated, we’re often full of joy and full of tears simultaneously, or we’re really excited about the future but also really overwhelmed or tired.”

Stylised as a “case-of-the-week” caper, each episode sees Charlie set out on a fresh road trip in her vintage Plymouth Barracuda, putting her unique skills to use to solve a murder at each stop along her journey. With tongue firmly in cheek, Charlie has been fashioned as something of a modern-day Lieutenant Columbo, a character played by Peter Falk in the eponymous show which became a firm fixture on TV screens between the 1960s and 80s.

“What’s so special about Charlie is that she uses her ability to help the people who can’t help themselves,” adds Lyonne. “Charlie is someone who hates injustice and will do everything she can to defend the little guy. So she uses this incredible ability of hers to solve puzzles even though she doesn’t know exactly how she’s going to get where she needs to get to to solve the case.”

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How Rian Johnson does it

Johnson and Lyonne’s collaboration was essential to the show and, according to Lyonne, came naturally. “It felt like we were at the beginning of what could become a 20-year artistic collaboration,” she says.

The premise benefits from Johnson’s mastery of the mystery format, which has been the key to the success of his Knives Out (2019) and Glass Onion (2022) films. “Rian has established himself as the master of the puzzle box. I love when he says, ‘It’s a howdunnit, not a whodunnit.’ I just think that format is really fun and satisfying for an audience,” says Lyonne.

It may seem formulaic – even one which had fallen out of favour for several decades before Johnson took up the reins – but ultimately it appears to be a winning formula with viewers.

“It’s a bit like being on a roller coaster or something, you know?” says Lyonne. “Because it’s all right there. You can see it before you sit down in the seat and you sort of know something wild is gonna happen. But it’s not until your stomach drops out that you really have the experience of having lived through it.

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“I’ve always been a great fan of noir storytelling and films like Robert Altman’s The Long Goodbye with Elliott Gould and all those Philip Marlowe kinds of classics,” says Lyonne. “Both Rian and I share a deep appreciation for that great detective dramas of the 1940s, 50s and 70s.”

Fresh direction

While Johnson played no credited role on Russian Doll, the pair’s “bestie” relationship began when the director stopped by the studio. “Rian came to the edit to give me notes,” remembers Lyonne. “Then I had the opportunity to see an early cut of Glass Onion, and I also make a brief cameo. It all starts to feel like a body of work.”

In Poker Face, the series format requires a revolving door of notable guest stars that includes Benjamin Bratt, Adrien Brody, Chloë Sevigny, Ron Perlman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tim Meadows, Luis Guzman and even Nick Nolte – who appears in an episode that Lyonne directed, which she described as a “sensational” experience. “Each new episode sees somebody new come on the set and it’s just really joyous. It’s like making music with this really cool musician you didn’t know you were going to play so well with,” she says.

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“Directing was always something I’ve wanted to do, but it got pushed to the side when I started acting and having success in that area,” says Lyonne. “I want to keep on working both sides of the camera.”

Despite having been in the spotlight for as long as she can remember, Lyonne’s fame is today only growing, even as she enters the midpoint of her fifth decade. A third season of Russian Doll hasn’t been ruled out, but the success of Poker Face has audiences excited to see what zany twist she pulls there next.

Importantly, Lyonne is appreciative of her success. “I always dreamed about [this level of success], though it was hard to see exactly how I would get to that point. I’ve been able to go on this wonderful ride and realise a lot of my ambitions,” she explains.

Never one to rest on her laurels though, Lyonne promises she already has a lengthy pipeline of creative projects ahead – she’s far from done yet.