‘Like I was hanging on the edge of a cliff’: Toni Collette felt like she was ‘drowning’ while filming The Power

Toni Collette felt like she was “imploding” while filming The Power, after joining the dystopian series following a last minute recasting.

Based on Naomi Alderman’s hit novel, the Prime Video series imagines a world where women receive electric power in their fingertips when they become teenagers.

You can read The Independent’s review here.

Hereditary star Collette plays mayor of Seattle Margot, a role she took over from Leslie Mann at the last minute, leaving her with just five weeks to shoot all nine episodes.

“I felt like I was hanging on the edge of a cliff,” she told Insider while discussing the intense shooting schedule.

“I had so much dialogue and it’s such an epic story. The rest of it had been shot, and it was just all on me, all the time. There was nothing else to shoot, so I felt like I was drowning.”

Showrunner Raelle Tucker also praised Collette, saying: “She has massive monologues, right? Many scenes, very talky person, and she had five weeks on the schedule to shoot all nine episodes.

“I’ve never seen an actor show up more and deliver every single word of that script.”

The Australian actor has previously spoken about joining The Power late in the filming process, saying that she “felt like some weird appendage”.

“Then I kind of slipped in at the last minute and shot the entire season in five weeks, which was a complete headf***,” she told The Times, describing the situation as “not ideal”.

“I think mostly when you’re shooting a series, you have other people doing their work and you get breaks where you can focus on your next scene. But it was just so constant. There was no break, no let-up.”

The Power is on Prime Video now.