The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is one of Amazon's hottest series, featuring stand-up sensation
Midge Maisel and her fast-talking agent Susie Myerson, played by Alex Borstein.
If you recognized Borstein, that's for good reason, as she's been in the business for
a long time.
Here's why Susie seems so familiar.
Before playing Susie, Alex Borstein's big break was on the sketch comedy show MADtv,
which ran for 15 seasons from 1995 to 2016.
"Y'know I finally figured out how to get ahead in television.
A head in television!"
Borstein was a cast member from 1997 to 2002, and, during her tenure, she played a ton of
characters, including Shaunda the Las Vegas lounge singer.
"You're performing in the bathroom?"
"This is new Las Vegas, where the show never stops!"
If you're a fan of Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, you can thank Amy Sherman-Palladino and her
husband, Dan, for creating the quirky hit.
The pair also created the beloved series Gilmore Girls, which ran from 2000 to 2007, then had
a mini-series revival in 2016.
Alex Borstein had two small parts on the show, but she was originally cast in a much larger
role: Sookie, a role that ultimately went to now-mega-star Melissa McCarthy.
Because Borstein was busy with MADtv at the time, she wasn't able to take on the role.
She told Vulture,
"It probably worked out for the best, because the trajectory of what I got to do during
that time was pretty amazing.
It would have been great, I'm sure, to be Sookie, but you never know."
If you're of a certain age, you might remember Alex Borstein from the 2003 Disney film The
Lizzie McGuire Movie starring Hilary Duff.
In it, she plays Miss Ungermeyer, the stern school principal who chaperones Lizzie and
her classmates on a trip to Rome.
"When I get upstairs, and I will get upstairs, I expect to find Ms. McGuire in her bed!"
While The Lizzie McGuire Movie wasn't exactly a critically acclaimed Oscar hopeful, Borstein
has fond memories of working with Duff, who was just starting out in the entertainment
business at the time.
Borstein revealed in a Reddit AMA,
"She was just a little kid then, so funny that we both have toddlers now.
Life moves fast, people.
She was always a sweet girl."
Some movies have the unfortunate fate of being panned heavily by critics and tanking at the
box office, no matter how big their stars and budgets are.
Such was the case for the 2004 film Catwoman, which starred Halle Berry in the titular role,
with Alex Borstein as her right-hand woman.
"I gotta go meet my hottie doctor.
Tell me I look vulnerable!"
Alex Borstein enjoyed her time on the Catwoman set, telling Super Hero Hype,
"It was great fun to work on a film of this magnitude.
Big stars, big budget, big stunts."
In the end, the film ended up on Roger Ebert's list of most-hated films, which tells you
all you need to know about it.
One of the especially magical things about The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is the way the production
designers were able to capture the essence of New York City in the 1950s.
The same holds true for the 2005 film Good Night and Good Luck, which details the take-down
of Senator Joseph McCarthy by the famed broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow.
While Borstein didn't have an especially huge role in the film, playing a supportive CBS
employee named Natalie, she did have significant screen time.
She told Vulture the period research she did for the film came in handy later while filming
Mrs. Maisel.
The 2010 film Killers had just as much romance and comedy as it did action.
Starring Ashton Kutcher and Katherine Heigl, the film goes from straight rom-com to shoot-em-up
action when, after three years, Heigl's Jen learns that her perfect new man was a sanctioned
killer before they got married.
In addition to that, the couple soon become targets themselves and have to figure out
how to get out of the situation alive.
Alex Borstein plays Jen and Spencer's neighbor Lily Bailey, who presents as a kind, regular
neighbor with an effervescent personality... at first.
But eventually it's revealed that Bailey isn't at all what she seems - and she's seems - and
she's out for blood.
One of Alex Borstein's favorite projects of all time was the HBO series Getting On, which
ran from 2013 to 2015.
In the dark comedy, which was set in the geriatric wing of a hospital, Borstein played Dawn Forchette,
a nurse who helps care for older patients.
"'Found a feces in a chair.'
No, no, the incident reports need to be really, really, specific."
As Borstein tells it, she absolutely loved every second of working on this show.
She told the Daily Beast,
"That was like the perfect baby.
That was the baby that slept through the night, that cuddled.
[...] The location was seven minutes from my front door.
The group of people was tiny, the crew was dedicated and everyone was very like-minded.
We all knew the material was so special and the writing was special."
"Can I give you some feedback on those boots?"
"On these boots?"
"Yeah.
The first thing I thought when I saw them was 'pole dancer.'"
Alex Borstein hasn't played a lot of motherly characters in films and television shows.
But she has a specific reason for that: being pigeon-holed.
She confessed in an interview with ScreenSlam,
"I've been so hesitant to play moms.
I've been so terrified of getting stuck in that, of feeling like it would be the last
stop."
But that wasn't an issue for Borstein when it came to the 2015 family Christmas movie
Love the Coopers, as her character, Angie, had enough depth and dimension to keep Borstein
interested.
Additionally, Borstein was admittedly starstruck on set, as the cast included legends like
Diane Keaton, and John Goodman, to name just a few.
She told ScreenSlam,
"Every day's a little bit of a freak-out still.
I just try to maintain my cool and pretend like I got this."
"You were amazing."
"I was amazing!"
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