Jennifer Garner, star of Peacock’s “The Five-Star Weekend,” tells USA TODAY “there’s no life that is going to reach the halfway mark without having its fair share of bumps and bruises.”
Jennifer Garner on friendships in ‘Five Star Weekend’
Jennifer Garner on friendships in “Five Star Weekend”
When considering actresses who could lead Peacock’s adaptation of Elin Hilderbrand’s “The Five-Star Weekend,” Jennifer Garner beckoned like a lighthouse on the coast.
Series creator Bekah Brunstetter noticed similarities between Garner, 54, and popular food blogger Hollis Shaw, who invites friends from different stages of life to her breathtaking Nantucket home months after the loss of her husband.
Over eight episodes (now streaming), Hollis attempts to execute a thoughtfully curated agenda as childhood bestie Tatum McKenzie (Chloë Sevigny), college pal Dru-Ann Jones (Regina Hall), mom friend Brooke Kirtley (D’Arcy Carden) and new confidant Gigi Ling (Gemma Chan) anticipate being shoulders to lean on.
Meanwhile, Garner hosts the online “Pretend Cooking Show,” which gives fans an honest and relatable look at cooking. “This is taking six years,” Garner quips while hand-picking fresh thyme leaves to recreate Ina Garten’s lemon chicken.
Garner is also “very warm and relatable and open,” having gone through her own set of challenges in life, Brunstetter, 44, says.
“She has lived her life in the public space, and she’s dealt with [rumors about her ex-husband’s] infidelity,” the showrunner adds, alluding to Garner’s headline-spurring split from Ben Affleck in 2015, after 10 years of marriage. “The way that she navigates her fame is just really inspiring to me.”
Jennifer Garner show had parallels to her own life
Garner, feeling more settled than the fictitious Hollis who found a following during the pandemic, tells USA TODAY, “I have been around the block for a long time.”
“Hollis does, though, have to go through losing her husband and figuring out how to navigate grief publicly, how to come back. How do you come back into the world once you’ve suffered some kind of huge loss or moment of grief in your life?” she says. “And I have had to go through some hard things in the public eye. And I can tell you, Hollis has it right: you call your friends.”
“Whether it’s examined publicly or it’s lived privately, there’s no life that is going to reach the halfway mark without having its fair share of bumps and bruises,” Garner adds. “And luckily mine have been superficial. I’m standing and A-okay. And definitely, without a doubt, your girlfriends are the stuff of life. Romance − all of those things − they’re all lovely, but when it comes down to it, you need your girlfriends.”
Chloë Sevigny, D’Arcy Carden, Gemma Chan on relating to characters
Even though Hollis’ crew is desperate for the cook to open up and grieve, each is cautious about what they reveal over the weekend. Brunstetter loved exploring the theme of control and its influence on how people present.
“I think that resonates particularly with women, the way in which we try and avoid what is going on inside of us by cleaning the house or hosting a party or baking something,” she says. “For Brooke, buying lots of clothes and trying to control the way [we’re] perceived. I just find that to be so relatable.”
Tatum keeps a health issue close to the vest, and Dru-Ann minimizes being professionally canceled, while Brooke is mum about marital strife. Gigi has the darkest secret of all, which we’ll abstain from divulging to preserve the viewing experience.
“Each of these characters is putting on a bit of a brave face for different reasons,” Carden, 46, says, “and I really do think that’s just such a relatable way to be.”
Sevigny, 51, says her upbringing prioritized toughness.
“I think I was raised in a way to think that showing certain vulnerabilities or certain… pains was kind of a weakness,” she says. “So I do struggle with that sometimes.”
Chan, 43, is also trying to shake the instinct to simply muster through challenging moments in life.
“I have always been like, ‘The show must go on. Put a brave smile on. Doesn’t matter what’s going on, no matter how sad you might be, you just show up, you grit your teeth, you smile, and you carry on,’” she says, “And I think as I’ve gotten older, I’m trying to be better at showing vulnerability and also asking for help. I still find it really hard.”
‘Five-Star Weekend’ cast’s bond during filming
The costars were able to let their guards down with each other during production.
As the crew worked to set a scene, Garner says, “our chairs were all pushed together and we were in the back room, making sure our mics were off because we were going deep into any conversation and every conversation.”
One of those topics involved their kids. While filming, Sevigny spent “all summer” away from son Vanja Sevigny Mačković, 6.
She says Garner, a mom of three, “understood what I was going through and was always supporting me and asking me how I was doing.”
“The fact that [Garner] is who she is, let us be who we are,” Carden says, “and it was really beautiful. She’s very special. We’re all quite obsessed with her.”
