Kathryn Hahn on her 'fearless' role in 'I Love Dick'

Hahn knew there was something special about her new role.

ByABC News
June 9, 2017, 10:07 AM

— -- "I Love Dick" star Kathryn Hahn knew there was something special about her new Amazon Studios series role when she read the book of the same name by author Chris Kraus on which the show is based.

"As I read it, I was just flabbergasted that I'd never heard of it before, that I'd never been exposed to her writing," Hahn said in a recent appearance on ABC News' "Popcorn With Peter Travers." It was such a fearless, bombastic, loud, messy, maddening, contradictory, moving heroine that I just wanted in so badly."

PHOTO: Kathryn Hahn and Peter Travers at the ABC News studios, April 24, 2017.
Kathryn Hahn and Peter Travers at the ABC News studios, April 24, 2017.

"I knew it would be a ton to chew on," Hahn added. "It was about a woman on the other side of 40 just like struggling with feelings of desire and worth and all of those things. It felt kind of fiercely feminist."

In the series, Hahn plays the role of Chris, a filmmaker and wife in a struggling marriage. She joins her husband, Sylvere, played by Griffin Dunne on a work sabbatical at an art foundation in Texas where both fall for the same male professor, Dick, played by Kevin Bacon.

"He's just a profound actor," Hahn said of Bacon. "In the book, the idea of Dick is just like a placard for her to put all of her feelings and her desire in. And of course in real life you have Kevin Bacon who is so profound as a performer. So it kind of took on its own shape in unraveling from the book form into this kind of medium."

When Travers asked if there was someone in her life who offers that same inspiration, the answer for Hahn was simple.

"We all do. There's somebody whose respect and attention [you desire], that's always there, there's always an inspiration," Hahn said.

Download the all new "Popcorn With Peter Travers" podcasts on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Play Music and Stitcher.

Be sure to watch the full interview with Peter Travers and Kathryn Hahn in the video above as Hahn also looks back on her roles in "Bad Moms" and "Crossing Jordan."

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