Category TV Show

This season, the KGB agents will don punk rock garb. It’s a shocking ensemble for Elizabeth and Philip Jennings, even though the pair of Russian spies have worn a milieu disguises on The Americans, the acclaimed FX espionage series set in Washington at the height of the Cold War.

“We’ve gone on a lot of missions dressed as bureaucrats and business people, who often look mainstream and a bit boring,” Keri Russell, who stars as Elizabeth Jennings on the hit drama, tells Paste. She adds that The Americans’ third season (which premiered on January 28), features some more extravagant getups, especially during one scene in which Philip and Elizabeth infiltrate a college campus. She laughs, adding, “Our marks are young people and we have this rocker look, just like Sid Vicious and Nancy. It required Matthew and I to use very similar eye liner.”

Russell is referring, of course, to co-star Matthew Rhys, who plays her husband and KGB cohort Philip (the two actors are also an item off set). Rhys tells us that he and Russell frequently come up with their own small narratives to go with the disguises, before describing the backstory for his most frequent alter ego—a moustached, ponytailed hitman named Fernando.

“I have him coming from Spain. He was a flamenco dance teacher in Pasadena, before becoming a professional hitman. So that tends to inform his walk, and the boots he wears,” Rhys says drolly, his real life Welsh brogue making him sound entirely different from his character. Rhys adds that he and Russell have, on occasion, spent many hours in makeup and hair chairs on set, as their disguises were finessed. “So, to keep ourselves occupied we gave these alter egos little biographies, more than anything, just to make ourselves laugh.” Continue reading Keri Russell And Matthew Rhys Talk Subtlety and Disguise on Season Three of The Americans

No one who watches The Americans can claim Philip and Elizabeth Jennings — Soviet spies posing as married American suburbanites in the 1980s — are a perfect couple. They have crippling trust issues due to the secretive nature of their work. They routinely have sex with other people as part of their jobs. And they’re not above killing innocent people to maintain their cover.

But just because they’re bad people doesn’t mean they’re a bad couple. If you look beyond all their homicidal cloak and dagger honey trapping, and their frequent lies to their children (who have no idea what their parents do for a living), you’ll see Philip and Elizabeth, “Philizabeth,” possesses many admirable couple qualities. Heck, if Walt and Skyler were this functional during their own suburban criminal activity, Breaking Bad would have ended much differently.

So without endorsing murder, spying, child neglect, and serial infidelity, we submit that Philip and Elizabeth from The Americans are one of the best couples on TV — and they can teach us a lot about marriage. Here are 10 lessons we’ve learned:

1. Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answers to.
Both Elizabeth and Philip frequently have sex with their intelligence assets to pry information from them (Philip has even married one of his sources — Martha, a naive FBI secretary who thinks Philip’s name is “Clark”). Both are fully aware of the other’s extracurricular activities in the service of Mother Russia, but they talk about it only when necessary. In last month’s season premiere, Philip… er, “Clark” spends the night practicing the Kama Sutra with his other wife. After he returns the next morning, Elizabeth simply asks him if he got any usable intel. Philip responds with a simple “no,” and they move on. So the next time you’re tempted to, say, quiz your significant other about her exes, or ask him which one of your friends he’d “Shag, Marry, Kill,” think of Elizabeth and Philip, who know it’s OK to keep some matters on a need-to-know basis. Continue reading 10 Things We Learned About Marriage From ‘The Americans’

“Think of all the military families… it would be perfectly normal for a 16 year-old to say, ‘I’m going to go into service,'” she said.

The Russian spy couple is back.

The Americans star Keri Russell promises that the third installment of the FX period drama, bowing Wednesday, will be just as much about marriage as it will be about turning tricks and kicking ass.

In the previous season, Phillip and Elizabeth Jennings were starting to look like an actual married couple. But that sense of normalcy doesn’t last long. A wedge, once again, is driven between the two when they respond differently to the Center wanting to recruit their daughter, Paige. Phillip, less loyal to his homeland, can’t bear to see his daughter enter into their dangerous world, while Elizabeth believes Paige deserves to know the truth about who she is.

Russell says that upcoming episodes explore challenges that any married person can relate to, with more top-secret missions, affairs and, of course, wigs along the way. “For me being a woman that reads films, this is a good f—king job,” Russell said of her complicated female character. “Of the last things I’ve read, you’re a girlfriend. You got two scenes going, ‘Are you OK?'” This is so much better than that.”

Here, Russell explains Elizabeth’s perspective, talks her onscreen sexual relationship with co-star Matthew Rhys, and reveals her favorite cover identity. Continue reading ‘The Americans’ Star Keri Russell on Season 3: Is it Sexist to Not Recruit Paige?