Fans are counting down the days until the new season of Ted Lasso arrives this month. And for breakout star Hannah Waddingham, it can’t come soon enough!
“It felt like losing a pal,” muses the British actress, who feared the show wouldn’t return after its third season aired in 2023.
But after a three-year hiatus, the fourth season of the feel-good comedy is set to drop on Apple TV+ on August 5 and Hannah, for one, hopes it won’t be the last we’ll see of her dazzling “boss lady” character Rebecca Welton.
“I’d do it until I’m walking on a zimmer frame when I’m 80,” she laughs.
“I love it!”
Life has been a roller-coaster ride for Hannah, 51, since she shot to fame in the first season of Ted Lasso in 2020. Before then, she’d had a successful, but not particularly lucrative, career in musical theatre. Now, her work calendar is bulging – so much so, she’s turning down jobs.
“And it’s driving me nuts because I form attachments to roles when they feel right,” she says.
“You do get a bit of a twitch on when you see somebody else do it!”
The career highs
Of course, there’s been plenty she has said yes to – including a supporting role in last year’s Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, opposite Tom Cruise. And last month, her new eight-episode series Ride or Die dropped on Prime Video.
Like her 64-year-old co-star, Hannah performed all her own stunts for the high-octane comedy caper, but she refrained from asking Tom for advice.
“I didn’t,” she laughs.
“But God, he makes it look easy and it’s absolutely not. It mangled me senseless! “I gave myself fully to the stunts. I’d work on a stunt for a week, then shoot it, and the next day, I’d have to learn the next one. There were times when I thought, ‘What on earth have you got yourself involved with, woman?’ But when I watch it back, I can’t believe I did it.”
From becoming suddenly famous at 45 to winning an Emmy and two Critics Choice awards, Hannah’s successes have been mind-blowing. But nothing means more to her than coming through the early years of single parenthood in one piece. She split from her 11-year-old daughter Kitty’s dad when the child was two.
She was aware her career could falter, “because you’re left holding the baby”.
Why Hannah refused to give up
Hannah explains, “But I found in myself a strength. I thought, ‘No, I’m not going to sit in the corner with a duvet over my head and think poor me. I’m going to come out fighting.’ “I talk about single motherhood all the time because it’s not the same as two parents. I know that sounds ridiculous and obvious, but I think people forget it. People go, ‘Oh, yes, I’m by myself most of the time.’ But that’s not the same as being the sole provider. She is undoubtedly my greatest achievement because of that.”
Hannah also doesn’t hold back on the subject of menopause.
“Sure as life, sure as death, there’s menopause,” she reflects.
Hannah’s honest take on menopause
“There has to be in order for us extraordinary female beings to bring life into the world. So I don’t know why people brush it under the carpet. While I was shooting Ride or Die in Prague and doing all this physical work, learning all these stunts, I could feel my mood dipping – and that’s not me.”
She also had brain fog.
“It creeps up slowly,” she says.
“It’s easy to not really notice until the wheels have come off.”
The simple habits keeping Hannah feeling her best
Hannah manages her symptoms with HRT, supplements and exercise.
“I’d be lying if I said I did a lot,” she smiles.
“Just calisthenics with my own body weight and some light weights for 20 minutes in the morning. But I’ve always said to my friends: activate your muscles every day and never underestimate the value of doing squats the whole time you’re brushing your teeth!”
After eight years being solo, Hannah is dating surgeon Nick Beresford-Cleary.
She says, “I didn’t have the space mentally or emotionally for that. I’ve focused on my girl and me. But now I’m ready to stick my head above the parapet a bit more.”
Stream Ted Lasso on Apple TV with a seven-day free trial.
