Skylar Gray is no stranger to the entertainment industry, she’s been acting her entire life and now portrays series regular Lila Bouchard, daughter to main character Dr. Kristen Bouchard in the supernatural drama Evil.
Evil is a psychological mystery that examines the origins of evil along the dividing line between science and religion. The series focuses on a skeptical female psychologist who joins a priest-in-training and a contractor as they investigate the Church’s backlog of unexplained mysteries, including supposed miracles, demonic possessions and hauntings. Their job is to assess if there is a logical explanation or if something truly supernatural is at work. The second season brings evil closer to home. Kristen struggles with her darker nature, while David suffers temptation as he gets closer to his ordination. Meanwhile Ben is visited by night terrors that prey on his greatest fears.
Katja Herbers, Mike Colter, Aasif Mandvi, Michael Emerson, Christine Lahti, Kurt Fuller, Brooklyn Shuck, Skylar Gray, Maddy Crocco and Dalya Knapp star in the drama. Evil is produced by CBS Studios in association with King Size Productions. Robert King, Michelle King, Liz Glotzer and Rockne S. O’Bannon serve as executive producers.
Check out my Q & A with Skylar!
How does it feel getting to do a second season?
Skylar: It feels very good because I think, as far as I can remember, this is my first show that I’ve been on with a successful season two.
Can you tell me a little bit about your character, Lila?
Skylar: I auditioned her to be the artistic one as it said in the character description. She’s a bit of a scaredy cat but she’s brave when it comes to saving her family and her friends. And she’s very, very adventurous and a lot like me.
You also have a few sisters in the show, what’s it like working with all of them?
Skylar: I’m so glad that I got this show because I love that they incorporated multiple kids into it. Usually when you’re a little kid working on set as the daughter of the main character, you’re usually the only one and you don’t really get to do anything. If you’re lucky, you’re going to get a bunch of like 16 year-old kids, but none around your age. But in this show, I was lucky enough to get kids my own age and I’m really glad because I formed a strong bond with all of them.
Do you all hang out when you’re not filming?
Skylar: All the time. I remember last season we all went to Serendipity together and it was pretty fun. We hang out all the time and we go to the park together, and we play in our rooms together and we call each other all the time.
Katja (Herbers) plays your mom, what’s it like working with her?
Skylar: Katja is the best. She’s the most fun person I’ve ever worked with. And it’s just super duper cool for her to have a bond with me because she’s like, the best person ever to work with.
What’s your favorite part about filming the show?
Skylar: My favorite part is definitely the people. All the directors and actors I’ve worked with have always been so good to me and they treat me professionally instead of infantilizing me and acting like I’m just a little kid walking around. I’ve hung out with all of them and we all have our jokes, we all have our fun, and none of them are bad or mean and I really liked that about them.
What’s the most challenging part about the show?
Skylar: It’s definitely getting into character, well, not necessarily getting into character but more of getting into the scared or sad mood because there’s a lot of that, especially in a horror show like this one. So, I have to cry a lot and I have to look scared and every time I’m watching myself back I’m like, ‘Oh, why did I look like that? Why didn’t I do this instead?’ It’s kind of hard to watch myself back when I was acting scared cuz I looked really weird.
Do you have any special tricks or anything to get you into that scared mood?
Skylar: Yeah, when I feel the emotions I need to feel, I’ll just monitor them and look at myself in the mirror when I feel those emotions. Like, I’ll see how my breathing is and I’ll see how I cry and what faces I make and how I look, and I’ll just portray that on TV. I also do this technique called “What If,” and it’s like whatever mood I need to be in, I’ll just say like, ‘what if this happened,’ and that would help get me into the mood.
So I heard you come from a family of actors, both of your parents and your aunt, Ariel Winter. Do they give you any advice or help you out when it comes to preparing for your roles?
Skylar: Definitely, 100 percent. My mom and dad coached me, since they’re acting teachers, and they’ve helped me along the way, I think they’ve really helped me a lot. And my aunt Ariel has been super awesome to me. Now she’s trying to become a producer and stuff and she’s taking my recommendations and we kind of have a sisterly bond since she’s super young. She could be like my sister.
Are you two going to be collaborating on anything soon?
Skylar: I mean, I hope so, but no promises.
What are you most excited for people to see in season two?
Skylar: Definitely the new things that the writers and producers and especially the special effects people added, because we have this new intro that I can’t really go into detail about but it’s super awesome. And also the new characters that they added, and how legit side characters can make a difference and how they gave the daughters bigger roles and how they’re adding a bigger storyline onto the smaller storylines of the episodes.
I can’t wait. That is awesome. Is there anything else that you would like to say about the show?
Skylar: I would just like to say, I mean, go watch it. It’s very fun, you can get addicted very fast. It’s still super fun once you get like five minutes into it because there’s a lot of cool stuff that happens. It just hooks you right in the first episode.
Fans of Skylar can follow her verified account on Instagram @theskylargray.
