Jennifer Connelly Interview: Snowpiercer Season 3

Warning: This Interview Contains MAJOR SPOILERS for Snowpiercer Season 3, Episode 9 – “A Beacon For Us All”

Melanie Cavill (Jennifer Connelly) returned to Snowpiercer in season 3, episode 9 and she immediately derailed Andre Layton’s (Daveed Diggs) dream of taking the passengers to New Eden. Believed dead for most of Snowpiercer season 3, Melanie was miraculously rescued and reunited with her loved ones, including her daughter Alex (Rowan Blanchard) and her love interest, Bennett Knox (Iddo Goldberg). But when Melanie realizes that Layton lied to Snowpiercer about New Eden, she takes matters into her own hands and sabotages her frenemy to save the train in a jaw-dropping twist.

Screen Rant interviewed Academy Award-winner Jennifer Connelly about why she and her character were absent for much of Snowpiercer seasons 2 and 3, working with Rowan Blanchard, and why Melanie turned on Layton, which sets up Snowpiercer‘s season 3 finale.

Screen Rant: Before we talk about episode 9, I want to ask you how you reacted when you found out you and Melanie would be gone for most of seasons 2 and 3?

Jennifer Connelly: It was more of a conversation that we had together. So it wasn’t a revelation, it was more the result of a process of conversation about what would happen with Mel and the storyline.

Was it purely a creative decision or did you have scheduling conflicts?

Jennifer Connelly: I think it was a creative decision.

How did it feel to be officially back as Melanie, not just a dream version of Melanie? To slip back into her skin after so long? 

Jennifer Connelly: I really enjoyed [episode 4] where she comes and she helps push Alex towards confronting this part of her past and sort of walks beside her. But I enjoyed more (laughs), if I’m allowed to say that, being there in reality and that reunion. The reunion of seeing her daughter again because she thought she might never see anyone again.

I love the scene when you came back to the cockpit. The homecoming scene where you’re getting to sit back in your train, basically. I thought that was such a great scene.

Jennifer Connelly: Aw thanks! Yeah, I enjoyed that. I just thought, imagine what that must be like, to be in that state of just everything that you see, all the people, all the relationships, all the places that you thought you’d never be able to see again. As much as she’s an optimist and really stubborn and believes that she’ll make it through, I’m sure there are times of serious doubt. I think that it was a huge reset [for Melanie] in terms of gratitude and appreciation. And just joy at being with those people in those places again.

As a Snowpiercer diehard, I live for Melanie and Alex scenes. I think Rowan Blanchard really stepped up her game in season 3. She’s really a heavy hitter. Can you talk about your mother/daughter scenes together?

Jennifer Connelly: She’s great. I adore her. She’s a lovely, wonderful person. And I agree, I think she’s done such a great job on the show. I love working with her. I feel that she’s really available as an actor. She’s so open, she’s so wants to connect. I feel that when I’m working with her. She really wants to connect. She’s really listening. She’s really available in every way. And I think for [Melanie and Alex’s] relationship, it works so well. When I look at her, I can just feel here all there (laughs). It’s really a joy. I have a great time working with her.

Obviously, a lot has happened while Melanie was away and Snowpiercer doesn’t resemble the train the way she ran it. She has a line about how there are no classes anymore and she saw a Snowpiercer she’s never seen before. What have you liked the most about how Snowpiercer has turned out while Melanie was away. And what have you disliked?

Jennifer Connelly: I think [no more classes on the train] she likes. I think she’s in a really difficult place. She can see what this hope of New Eden has given to the passengers. It’s a wonderful thing. But at the same time, she doesn’t trust it. She doesn’t like the fact that the truth was kept from the passengers, and they’re clinging on to something that may or may not be true. May or may not correlate with reality. I think that’s very disturbing for her to come back to.

All she wants is to be in that state that we talked about where she’s full of joy and witnessing this hope, and this train without borders where there’s promise. She’s so grateful to be there, so grateful to be with people that she loves. And at the same time, she has to take that hope away from them because it’s so disturbing to her that they don’t know what’s at risk.

I love that turn where it went from so many happy reunions, then Melanie watched the science, she checked out what really happened, and then she got really grim. She became Melanie “I’ve gotta do what I’ve gotta do” again. I love that character.

Jennifer Connelly: I love that about her too. She just can’t… And she tries to. She tries to along with it, and she gets dressed up, puts on the makeup, goes to the party, and she really wants it to be so. But she just can’t deny the facts and the science. She doesn’t know for sure that she’s right. She just knows for sure that the version of truth that Layton has presented is not accurate. And she doesn’t feel that that’s fair so she has to intervene. Which is so frustrating of her. But I love that she makes that choice. (laughs) It’s so frustrating and so noble at the same time.

Snowpiercer lost a lot of castmembers in the last two seasons. Is there anyone you wanted to act with but you can’t now because they’re dead? Like, Asha [Archie Panjabi] died last episode.

Jennifer Connelly: I know! We didn’t have anything together. She did a great job. I thought [Asha] was such a great character. So, yeah, that’s a shame. I’ve had such a great time working with the people that I have been working with. I’m really looking forward to working with them some more. Let’s see what happens in season 4.

Going into the finale, it’s Melanie vs. Layton and Wilford [Sean Bean], of course. That train is 1,029 cars long. Is it honestly not big enough for the three of you?

Jennifer Connelly: (laughs) Those are three very big personalities. Yeah, well said. I think that Layton and Melanie have really come to respect one another. They find themselves in oppositional positions in this episode. But I think, fundamentally, they are people that can work together. And respect one another. And that can talk [to each other]. I think that she’s very frustrated that he won’t talk to her when she comes back and so she forces the issue. And it happens again as it happens in the past that once they’re able to sit down together and begin some negotiation that they’re able to get somewhere together.

SnowpiercerSeason 3 is available to stream on the TNT app.

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