Taylour Paige Wanted Charlotte to Get the Hell Out of Derry, Too

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Be warned, this article contains spoilers for the HBO series It: Welcome to Derry, covering everything up to and including the season finale, “Winter Fire,” which aired on December 14th.

The first season of It: Welcome to Derry features returning Stephen King characters like Leroy Hanlon (Jovan Adepo), Dick Hallorann (Chris Chalk), and Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård). It also introduces Leroy’s wife, Charlotte Hanlon, played by Taylour Paige (known from Zola and The Toxic Avenger), and her presence proves invaluable. Throughout the eight episodes, Charlotte emerges as the most level-headed and rational character, essentially acting as the audience’s voice and consistently helping to save others.

As a big fan of the series, I was really drawn to Charlotte’s story in Welcome to Derry. She’s forced to uproot her life in Shreveport, leaving behind her activism, and arrives in this incredibly unsettling town. You can feel her apprehension right away. Beyond just trying to keep her family afloat – with Leroy on this mysterious military assignment and her son Will dealing with his own struggles – she finds purpose in fighting for justice for Hank Grogan, a man wrongly accused of murder by Derry’s prejudiced police. It was so satisfying to see her hard work pay off in the finale, finally getting Hank to safety. Honestly, she deserves a lot of credit for helping Leroy and Will make it through that final confrontation with Pennywise relatively okay. Paige even jokes that Charlotte’s the only one in Derry who makes any sense! It’s funny, but true. As Paige points out, ‘Somebody’s got to do it,’ and on a show as wild as this one, Charlotte’s the voice of reason we desperately need.

I understand you don’t usually watch horror. Before filming, did you research the mythology behind the story at all?

No, I didn’t. I was more focused on developing Charlotte’s character – she’s the outsider who moves to town with her husband and is trying to hold her family together. I built her reactions based on her first impressions of the environment. She immediately feels that something is deeply wrong, that this town is very strange. It’s already a turbulent time – the year is 1962, and the country is unsettled. She’s coming from a chaotic life in the South, and while this town seems quieter on the surface, it actually feels even more intense.

You’ve described yourself as someone who gets easily frightened, and I think that vulnerability informed your performance. As a person, there’s already so much to be afraid of, and I explored that in my work. The historical context of 1962, especially as a Black woman, offered a rich backdrop. I focused on creating a very detailed and truthful portrayal of the character, starting with her physical presence – how she walked, spoke carefully, and presented herself in starched clothes – and her underlying loneliness. She was subtly falling apart, which created a complex and unsettling reality for her.

You mentioned your grandmother inspired your portrayal of Charlotte. Could you tell us more about how she influenced you? My grandmother was a truly unique and funny Southern woman with strong faith, but she was also a complex person. She had my mother very young and, honestly, wasn’t very maternal. However, I always admired how she looked at the world – she was a keen observer and had a lot of life experience, having been born in the late 1930s.

I adored my grandmother, not as ‘Grandma,’ but as the wonderfully unique person she was. She was opinionated, had a strong perspective on everything, and a truly quirky way of speaking. It’s amazing how her voice would shift depending on where we were – different at Kroger or the pharmacy than when a kind gentleman helped her at her condo. Thinking about episode two with Charlotte, that montage of her just being in a space really captures it – you could practically hear her personality even without words. I always hear my grandmother’s voice in my head. She was hilarious, like a real-life Lucille Ball. The show deals with serious themes, but I really wanted to inject a little humor into Charlotte’s character. When she was quietly taking everything in, I wanted the audience to almost hear her thinking, maybe a slightly rebellious, “What the heck is going on here?”

She has a unique ability to quickly understand the true nature of the town, seeing the darkness that most other adults ignore. This insight comes from her experiences as a Black woman and a mother. Becoming a parent, especially as a mother, awakens a powerful instinct and a deeper understanding. It’s often a feeling you can’t explain – you simply know things and act on them, driven by an intense need to protect the vulnerable heart that now exists outside of yourself.

Charlotte is incredibly passionate about fighting unfairness, and we hadn’t encountered a character quite like her. When developing her backstory before she arrived in Derry, I imagined she was a teacher in Shreveport. I considered how frustrating it would be to leave that behind – to move because her husband was stationed at a military base – and feel like her work wasn’t finished, like she still had so much to contribute. I pictured her constantly thinking about it while doing mundane tasks – cleaning, shopping, or just being alone – and eventually realizing there was a limit to how much she could do from afar.

The white characters in Derry repeatedly tell Charlotte, “This isn’t the South.” While seemingly meant to be comforting, it comes across as unsettling as the story unfolds. The show explores how Charlotte, who faced blatant racism in the South, also sensed a stronger sense of community there.

I recall a conversation I had with my grandmother where I asked about her experiences growing up in America during the mid-20th century. She had a surprising perspective: she believed segregation, at one point, fostered a different kind of strength within the Black community. She explained that everyone – rich or poor – was united, and that division came later, imposed by outside forces. They had their own self-sufficient systems – doctors, dentists, pharmacies – because they were excluded from white establishments. While these institutions often faced destruction and sabotage, I could understand and respect her viewpoint.

While filming those scenes, I kept thinking, “This isn’t the same as the South, but it’s still America.” It’s important to be clear: we all know our country’s history and what it was founded on. I understand what it’s like to live here, to experience being seen a certain way, and to feel like you have to hold back your intelligence or instincts because that’s just how things are. All of those feelings and experiences informed my portrayal of Charlotte.

A really interesting storyline this season is Charlotte’s determination to free Hank Grogan. It makes you wonder where she gets the courage to challenge the Derry Police Department and insist on helping him. It’s reminiscent of figures like Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks, who risked everything for a better world. When it comes to Charlotte, I think it’s a combination of things. Honestly, a big part of it is that she’s bored. She’s stuck in this strange town and decides she needs to do something. But it’s also that she’s one of the only Black families there, she has the means to help, and she sees someone’s brother, someone’s child, being treated unfairly. It’s both of those feelings driving her. I definitely explored the idea that she’s both restless and quietly frustrated with her husband for bringing her to this place. She feels like she can’t escape her Southern roots, no matter where she goes.

In the final episode, Leroy discusses the strong relationship between a mother and son, and the chemistry between Charlotte and Will is really palpable. I was asked how I developed that motherly connection with Blake Cameron James. He’s a very polite young man – he kept calling me ‘ma’am’ and ‘Miss Taylour,’ which made me laugh because I don’t feel that old! I focused on being the kind of supportive figure I wished I had at his age. We spent time together like any mother and son would – we went to the mall in Toronto and out to eat. I naturally connect with children, and I made an effort to get to know him as a person, asking about his music, friends, and what life is like in Alabama.

Charlotte and Leroy’s relationship is complex – they have a strong connection, but also a lot of tension. I was asked how I managed to portray that mix of love and resentment while working with Jovan Adepo. Jovan and I became good friends, and we playfully argued and challenged each other a lot during filming. We have very different working styles, and I think that contrast actually helped create the feeling that Charlotte and Leroy were a believable married couple.

It’s funny, but we often found ourselves mirroring our characters. I’d usually be the one trying to keep things in perspective, reminding us it’s just a show, it’s demanding, and we want to do a good job, but it isn’t real life. We were arguing as part of the show’s premise, even over small details in the script. He asked why our characters were fighting, and I pointed out that we’re on a horror show – conflict is literally what drives the story, so it wasn’t a surprise.

I really want to believe Charlotte and Leroy can find some happiness together now that he’s home from the military. I’m picturing a good stretch for them, honestly. It was surprising when they decided to stay together – I, Taylour, was definitely shocked! But thinking about it, that’s kind of what people did back in 1962, right? You put on a brave face and just kept going, focusing on things like cooking and getting ready for holidays. You did what you had to do to keep things together. It makes you think – we’re all here today because someone, somewhere, a grandmother or great-grandmother, made that choice to stay and keep building a family. Those women, the matriarchs, really held everything together.

I found her decision to stay the most unexpected part of the ending. Honestly, I was really hoping she’d leave. I kept wondering if she could, and even imagined a scene of her driving away with a sign saying “Welcome to Derry” – suggesting it’s impossible to truly escape. I just couldn’t picture her choosing to stay. The only way it made sense to me was to connect it to the idea that we’re all stuck because of someone who held things together and remained, sacrificing their own freedom for family.

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2025-12-15 06:59