Christine Baranski on playing "The Good Fight's" Diane in the Trump era
Emmy-winning actress Christine Baranski has played dozens of roles on stage and on screen over her three-decade career, but she is perhaps best known for portraying lawyer Diane Lockhart on the CBS drama, "The Good Wife." She brought back that character for "The Good Fight," the first scripted series for streaming subscription service CBS All Access.
The show's second season, which premieres this Sunday, deals with topics like sexual harassment, guns, and racism -- all with the backdrop of the Trump presidency.
"Well, I don't see how if you're doing a show with characters that are living in this -- in our surreal time, how you cannot address what is, you know, a world off its axis," Baranski told "CBS This Morning." "They're lawyers. That is their reality. They have to do cases on sexual harassment and white supremacy or gun violence."
Diane Lockhart, in Baranski's words, is typically "pulled together, beautiful clothes, always the grown-up in the room." But this season, she gets "unhinged."
"I've been playing this character for nine years and I've never had more fun," Baranski said. "She's addicted to cable news. She can't believe what she's watching ... She doesn't know how to cope. That takes her to even doing some micro-dosing and having a little gun in her desk and getting very paranoid."
Asked what the "fight" in the show's title means for Diane Lockhart, Baranski said it's the idea that she's "desperately" holding on to her value system amid the chaos of the world.
"The interesting thing is for the writers, they have to chase the news in order to stay on top of it. They almost have to anticipate what's going to happen. We just did an episode on impeachment. We just finished an episode on the golden shower tape," Baranski said.
Despite her liberal-leaning character, Baranski said the season also features pro-Trump characters.
"They're being really brave this year, but why shouldn't they be? We're not on network. We can afford to be brave. And we're living in times that are so unabashed and audacious -- as artists, writers, as actors, we have to go to that place."