There Will Be Blood

Deborah Ann Woll vamps it up on HBO.

If your first impression of Deborah Ann Woll comes from watching her throw otherworldly tantrums and suck blood on camera, it's an unexpected treat to speak with the actress behind-the-scenes. Unlike her unruly onscreen counterpart (the petulant Jessica Hanby from HBO's vampire phenomenon, True Blood - the striking strawberry blonde is nothing but sweetness and charm. "There's nothing cool about Jessica," Woll says with a laugh, "I mean, she's just working her way through it. And it's sort of fun to struggle with her sometimes."

With True Blood's third season back this month, and several films in production, this Brooklyn native (she now lives in Los Angeles) is well on her way toward big things in Hollywood. With roots in theater and a diploma from the University of Southern California, the 25-year-old made a few network television appearances on My Name Is Earl and The Mentalist before landing her role on True Blood, a series lauded for its not-so-subtle social commentary. As a champion of the underdog, Woll embraces these altruistic efforts. "With HBO, we can get 5 million [viewers] a week, which is really pretty cool, you know? You can use that... as a tool for subtle revolution, as I call it."

What kind of revolution are we talking about here? "Anything that asks you to open your mind to other perspectives and other ways of life is subtly revolutionizing you, in a way," she says. "You think you're being entertained, but you're also being asked to look outside yourself, which is a hard thing to do. I think things that are unknown are scary to us, and therefore we judge them."
Giving voice to the unique and fantastical is a common thread in Woll's work. One of her forthcoming big-screen projects, Little Murder, which co-stars Josh Lucas and Terrence Howard, centers around a disenfranchised ghost in post-Katrina New Orleans. Returning to the realm of horror in a remake of Charles Kaufman's gory thriller, Mother's Day, Woll tackles the subject of emotional abuse and the consequences of parenting gone terribly wrong. "I love any story that peters along that edge of reality and fantasy," she says, "That can use both worlds to its advantage."

JULIA MCCARTHY