The second season of Burden of Truth makes its Season 2 U.S. debut tonight (June 2) at 8PM ET/PT on The CW. The series stars Kristin Kreuk of Smallville and Beauty and the Beast fame as an an attorney who, in the show’s first season, successfully helped the people of a small Canadian town in a case after several young women experienced illnesses. Now, she’s in a new setting — Winnipeg — and she’s trying to recover from the family revelations and life changes that hit during Season 1.
We were able to talk with Kristin Kreuk about the summer series, which was recently renewed for a third season, to find out more about where Joanna is and what new characters she’ll be meeting and interacting with along the way. And, yes, we did get in a Smallville question. Enjoy!
KSITETV’s CRAIG BYRNE: Can you talk about how Joanna’s life has changed after the events of Season 1?
KRISTIN KREUK: Her life has changed pretty dramatically. She’s moved cities; she lives in Winnipeg now, and it’s where her mom Joanna’s mom lives, in Winnipeg. She’s at a law firm that’s a little bit smaller than the one she was at previously, and it’s got a different mandate: It’s a more human oriented law firm.
So Joanna’s kind of being forced to be more human, something that no one’s ever asked her to do. And it’s in fact, like, against everything she’s ever thought was proper or right or good in the world.
The way she hadn’t changed, is that she’s still focused fully on work. That’s kind of everything she does. She lives in a very sparse apartment and goes to work on this case. She’s working on a case right at the top of the season with this young hacktivist kid – a case that puts her in a lot of danger.
Can you talk about some of the characters you’ll meet at this new law firm and how they tell her that she needs to kind of open up?
Her boss’s name is Teddie Lavery, and she’s a really great lawyer. She’s also… she behaves almost the opposite of what Joanna’s father taught her to behave like. She checks in on how people are doing, she asked them about their lives, to the extent that there’s a scene in the first episode where Teddy fully confronts Joanna about her being closed off and her perhaps lack of a sex life that she needs to get one. [Laughs] Th is her weird, personal way. Like, if you can imagine, Joanna just doesn’t know how to handle that.
There’s also a young lawyer at the firm called Sunil, and kind of looks up to her and she bosses them around, but they have a funny little relationship and in her attempts to reach out, she tries to be a human being with him, which results in a pretty failed attempt at human interaction.
How uncomfortable is it for Joanna to see her father again in the season premiere?
Really uncomfortable. She’s avoided them since we last saw them together, since she found out that he had multiple affairs, but it also slept with someone who is underage and that Luna was the result of that interaction. And, obviously, him choosing to fight against her at trial, all of those things.
So she’s avoided him. She’s changed her name She’s done everything she can to separate yourself from him. So, the fact that he shows up at our workplace, it’s really hard for her. I mean, I love doing that scene. It was a great scene. But it was like he’s trying to bait her into their old interactions, into their old way of bantering and talking, and she’s refusing to do it, because he refuses to acknowledge what he has done.
Is there a parallel with both Billy and Joanna having siblings to deal with this year?
Yeah, I think there is. I mean, the show’s very much about family. It’s very much about intergenerational trauma and how things are passed down. Billy dealing with his brother is a big storyline this year. I can’t spoil it, but it gets into a bunch of stuff about their family history, which is emotional and intense, and they’re both so good. And, then with Joanna and Luna, there’s also a very intense storyline that we reveal what it is, I think, around Episode 4.
Where are Joanna and Billy is the new season starts, and is he a reminder of all that she’s been through in this past year?
I mean, they haven’t been talking much. I think Joanna bolted. Just left. And it is because of what you said. It was a really hard year for her.
The reason they come back together in the first episode is that they’re getting an award for all the hard work they’ve done and, but for Joanna, it’s just a reminder of how they won that case, and what her father is, and who she is not. And Billy is a representation of that, but also, I don’t know. He’s someone who makes her feel like she’s not a horrible, sh***y person, and she’s scared of that feeling.
Does it haunt her that the award actually has the name Joanna Hanley on it?
Oh, yes, it does. It definitely haunts her. Especially when we see that moment, it’s like a terrible moment for her to be confronted with that, in the chronology of the episode. It’s like a symbol that she can’t escape her past, that she can’t just move and change her name and stop associating with people. All of that is all still inside her.
Eventually, I think she’ll learn it’ll take greater effort to like transform herself, but at this point, it just reminds her that she is who she is, and maybe she can never change it.
Joanna is given yet another impossible seeming case as Season 2 begins. Is she starting to get a reputation for these things?
Yeah, definitely. I think that Joanna has kind of positioned herself as of now being this, you know, kick ass lawyer, but also, like Noah says to her, he chose her because she fought the man and she won. Ahe went up against these big business guys and took them down. And that appeals to him, being a hacktivist, being anti-corporation. And so, he comes to her with with that kind of understanding of who she is, which is clearly not really who Joanna is – not completely – although I think she’s becoming more and more that way. S,o she’s definitely garnering a reputation reputation for herself.
Are we certain that we know who the threats are this year by the end of the season premiere?
No, you are not.
Will we be seeing the people of Millwood returning this season?
We’re gonna run parallel. Millwood and Winnipeg exist as parts of the show through the entire season, and we end up in Millwood for a particular reason. later on. So we’ve got you know, Billy, Joanna Luna, Molly.
Does it feel good to be able to practically reinvent the series for Season 2, with new settings and new characters coming in?
Yeah, it really does. I mean, Brad [Brad Simpson, creator] had a pretty good idea of what would happen this season. The thing that we didn’t really know a lot about was the hacktivist case. It’s really neat to be able to look at something so deeply, having come from a world where things [come from] in episodic storytelling where you only get to explore something, really, for an episode or a few episodes. I love that we get to explore something for the entire run of, like, eight episodes, and that we get to do it focused on a different thing every year, while maintaining our core themes, which is what how we choose the thing that we look at.
And how are things progressing with the Phoolan movie, and is there more fans can do to help that happen?
We’re doing pretty well right now. We have Lisa Ray doing the voiceover for the film. It’s actually Phoolan’s own words that she’ll be speaking, so that’s pretty great. But we’re getting there. I think that fans have done a ton and have been so helpful, and there’s just so much little more financing. I know that the team is out selling and getting some of the final financing to just get the last editing done and get the animation completed. And then it will be done. Fingers crossed.
What was it like to reunite with Smallville co-stars Tom Welling and Michael Rosenbaum on the stage for two conventions recently, for the first time in 12 years?
It was so funny. Michael is exactly the same. I don’t know that he has changed much at all, in the entire however many years I’ve known him – almost 20 years now.
And then Tom, I hadn’t seen since we wrapped the show, and it’s so nice to see him. He’s so happy, and in such a good place in his life. That was really nice to see. And then it was weird, because doing a panel with those guys, like falling into old patterns, and just the way that it was on set.
It was kind of a crazy experience, but I have to say, it is amazing to meet so many fans, and now that we’re all old, a lot of the people are old too, and their kids are watching the show with them, and and I just think it’s so sweet. And then you get to meet all the kids that were named after your character!
You had these fans who grew up with watching Smallville when were in high school, and they maybe watched Beauty and the Beast when they were in college. Do you think Burden of Truth is something that they could have grown up into, and would enjoy?
Yeah, I think some of them, and some people not as much. Not every show is for everybody, and this is a real departure from those shows. People who have jumped on board, I think really like it a lot. But you never know. The people it’s resonating for, it’s really resonating for. Especially people who relate to Joanna… I feel like they take a lot from the show. That means a lot to me. It’s definitely not the same kind of high adrenaline show, but I think that we do some deep work on the show, which I hope we get to continue to do.
Burden of Truth returns tonight (June 2) on The CW. Take a look at some photos from the season premiere below!
BURDEN OF TRUTH
KRISTIN KREUK RETURNS AS FORMIDABLE ATTORNEY JOANNA CHANG IN THE SEASON PREMIERE OF “BURDEN OF TRUTH” – Joanna (Kristin Kreuk) is working at a new law firm a year after her successful lawsuit against the steel mill in Millwood. Looking to start over, Joanna took up her mother’s surname and settled in a new city hoping for a quieter life. However, when her boss assigns her to a case for a brilliant, young, internet hacktivist, Joanna is dragged into a dark world of secrets that will turn her life upside down. Meanwhile, with the steel mill closed, the residents of Millwood are struggling to make ends meet and Billy (Peter Mooney) is doing all he can to stop the town’s downward spiral. Luna (Star Slade) and Molly (Sarah Thompson) adjust to living together. The episode was directed by Grant Harvey and written by Brad Simpson (#201). The CW original airdate 6/2/2019.
