Linda Hamilton has been a huge fan of “Stranger Things” since the show premiered on Netflix in 2016, but if it had been completely up to her, she may not be playing one of the main antagonists for the show’s fifth and final season. For one, she told her agent she was retiring. For another, she doesn’t watch her own work, so being on the show means she can’t watch it.
“There’s a part of me that would almost rather watch it than be in it,” she says. “So during our script readings, I am watching everything, because I’m never going to get to see it on the screen and to watch it unfold.”
Not much is known yet about Hamilton’s character, other than she’s a military scientist named Dr. Kay. When she spoke with Variety during production in July 2024 — part of the magazine’s Oct. 15 cover story — she was already sporting her wig and costume, for a scene she was about to film involving Millie Bobby Brown’s Eleven. During her break, she talked about why she’d wanted to retire, why she was so relieved when she got to meet Brown and how she almost self-sabotaged her chances of being on the show.
So you’re a big fan of the show?
I am!
From the beginning?
From the beginning, and it never subsided. I know a lot of people that just sort of checked out after Season 2 or 3. I don’t know why, because I just find it mesmerizing.
What is it about the show that you’ve loved so much?
Well, the concept is fantastic, and it does bring back the ’80s, but really, it’s Millie. She is just stunning to watch. I’m just her biggest fan. I really am.
Had you met her before?
I had not met her before. And you know, truthfully, I was just hoping she wasn’t a little diva who had somehow become completely soured by all the early success. And I was not disappointed. She was just so lovely. And really good.
I loved her, just immediately. Thank God she’s not an asshole, because that would just cripple me. She’s so unspoiled and as talented as I have witnessed. She’s got it, man, that girl has got it. So she invited me to her trailer where I met her family and all the dogs — well, not all of the dogs, apparently they are, like, 10 more that I haven’t met. She’s just open and kind and sweet and all the things that we would like our young leading ladies to be, right? I have worked with some children — not that she’s a child now — who, from the first to the third time I worked with them, just became little assholes. Because this business — if you don’t have your head on straight, and it’s hard to when you’re a child — can really fill you up with the wrong notions of what matters, and she seems to be really grounded in the things that truly matter. I’m just proud of her.
So what was your reaction when you got the call about being on this season?
It’s funny, because I had called my agent maybe a month before and said, “Dude, I gotta retire.” I was heading up to Vancouver to shoot “Resident Alien,” and I was having a really bad hip problem. It just takes so much. The year before, I had made eight trips to Vancouver from New Orleans during that season. It’s just really hard. And I was like, I just can’t tough it out anymore. And of course, my agent was like, “Oh, you don’t mean that.”
Then he calls me, and he says “‘Stranger Things’ called and asked if you were available. And I said yes.” So I laughed at that, like, no one takes me seriously at all. He signed me up for a year.
Did you speak with Matt and Ross Duffer?
I did have to meet with the Duffer brothers on a Zoom call — I really shouldn’t even say this out loud, but it was so much like sabotage. I get the word that I’m gonna meet with them, but it’s not till next Friday. So seven long days go by, and somehow my three o’clock Zoom call became a five o’clock Zoom call in my mind. So I’m ready, but I’m just trying to keep my mind clear and strong, and I take a little rest. I get up at 3:15 to all these texts: “They’re waiting on you. Where are you?” I had completely messed up the time. I mean, what kind of sick self-sabotage is that?
So I faked it, and said that I that my computer was downloading the new Zoom. I mean, because what do you say? I was a hot mess by the time I met with the Duffer brothers. I haven’t checked my hair. I’m like an insane person stabbing at buttons. They want me to check the toolbar. I don’t even know what a toolbar is. It was a disaster. Then I finally get them, and there’s no audio, and I figure that out, and then I’m like, “So, I hear you’re looking for a scientist.” I was like the farthest thing from a scientist at that moment in time. But they were very pleasant. There are a lot of men who would just say, “Fuck her, we’re not waiting if she can’t be on time.” So it was a bit of a fiasco. But it worked out.
How does making the show compare to anything else you’ve done?
It is beyond vast. I actually have trouble interpreting the schedule for the first time in my career. There’s so many bits and pieces. But I’m on my toes waiting and ready for the whole year. I’m thrilled every time I come. But there is this, like, “Are they going to need me this week or the next week?” The schedules are released in tiny little increments, so you might get a three week understanding of what’s going on, but it is complex. And bully for them for just getting it done. Really, it is just so huge.
How does the complexity rank against some of the biggest other projects you’ve done?
The only other time I’ve had trouble understanding what’s going on — time to retire, Miss Hamilton! — is the last Terminator, [“Terminator: Dark Fate”]. There were so many huge stunts and special effects pieces in that show. They would have to show us a previz of how it’s going to lay out. I had never had had previz before, but it saved our lives, because we’re like, OK, where are we now? It’s like, “We’re in a what? Falling into what? From a what?”
What is it like working with the Duffers?
They are chill. They are such a well-oiled machine, just the two of them, but then they have this great network around them. I’ve never quite seen camera and grips and people so all about how this is going to work like as a team — a team that has worked together for many years. It’s just wonderful to watch. They’re quiet, they’re thoughtful and fun. I mean, my first day was kind of insane. I just can’t really explain, but I’m wearing a mask, but it was a 1980s mask, so there’s no elastic. You have to tie it and just literally, that entire first scene that was very complex was all about getting the mask down and back up with a wig to make it look realistic. I had a lot to do the first week that I worked, really a significant amount of work, and it all became about this damn mask. We pretty much cut it off and burnt it at the end of the day.
Have you observed how they talk to each other?
A little bit, because who wouldn’t want to watch the way that they work? They’re just a team. I have a twin.
This is what I was leading up to.
Yeah, that twinship thing has fired my imagination. What happens when you partner with your twin? Do you read each other’s minds? Can you finish each other’s sentences? Something tells me, although I don’t know them well enough, that they each have the thing that they bring to the other to make each other stronger.
So what has it been like for you to go from being such a huge fan of the show to getting to be on the inside of it?
It kind of steals my joy, because I really like seeing it. There’s a part of me that would almost rather watch it than be in it, because now that I’m in it, I won’t get to see it. I don’t watch my work. I cannot separate myself and my critical inner person from just someone that’s enjoying watching it. And it’s such a feast to watch this show. So during our script readings, I am watching everything, because I’m never going to get to see it on the screen and to watch it unfold.
To build it is great. I’m as happy as I’ve ever been, just so happy to be part of it. Support. I don’t care. But it is quite different. I mean, it’s not that I imagined it would be different, yeah, because it’s obviously huge. And you know, you come in knowing that that’s the game, and you’re only just a very small player. Actually, the first week, I thought, we can’t be doing this whole scene. It was a huge scene. It was like, they can’t be starting with that, can they? It’s like, stunts and special effects and this and that and it’s so vast — I just keep using that word, but it is.
And then I realized that pretty much every scene that they do is vast. It’s vast to me, yeah, but to them, it’s what they do every day. There is a definite part of me that was a little intimidated to come in to a show that already has a certain rhythm and a momentum and all kinds of a history that I didn’t share. And to walk in and just feel like you’re the big pretender really coming in.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
