It was only a couple of days back when we shared the news that MISERY star Kathy Bates had joined the upcoming season of Ryan Murphy’s AMERICAN HORROR STORY as a nemesis to Jessica Lange’s character. The news was met with much fanfare as Bates’ turn as Annie Wilkes in MISERY has long been a favorite of genre fans, and there is little doubt that Bates can recapture some of that diabolically evil energy and channel it into whatever demented character Murphy and company have dreamed up for the actress to portray.
Speaking to TVLine, Murphy shared more on the character, stating…
“Oh, Kathy’s never [played] someone this bad. Her character is a bad, bad woman.”
While most details surrounding the acclaimed actress’ buzzy new role are being kept under wraps, Murphy couldn’t help but raise fans’ expectations just a teensy bit more by promising that Bates’ AMERICAN HORROR STORY nemesis is “five times worse than [her] Misery character — which is why she liked it.”
“When I pitched this to Kathy, her mouth was drop-jawed because what I was pitching actually happened. It’s a true event… You’ll see. It’s some good stuff.”
As to how Bates came to join the AHS cast, Murphy recalls that Jessica Lange had mentioned that Bates was a fan of the show, so Murphy felt compelled to reach out.
“When we were crafting this season, I found this character — a true-life character — so I called Kathy and said, ‘I don’t know if you want to do TV again, but I’ve got this character…’ She said, ‘I love you and I love the show. Lemme think for two weeks’ — and then she called me in an hour and said, ‘I love it! I’ll do it!’ It was great.”
Season Three of AMERICAN HORROR STORY is again planned to run for 13 episodes with production slated to begin this summer and the season premiering this fall.