Transcript of Interview with Gina Ross
Transcript of Interview
with Gina Ross
Gina Ross: All right, Cohen. Iced tea to your liking? Room temperature just right? What else can I do to make you more comfortable after my ten-hour day filming the same two-minute scene in the Village?
Madeline: I’m good.
Gina Ross: You have your moments. Seriously, though, I’m beat, so can we get to it? What haven’t we yet gone over, back, around, and through again fifteen million times already?
Madeline: Following up on some new information, I’d like to go back to that night. February 19. That hour you spent moving between Lillian’s apartment and your own.
Gina Ross: I have to assume you’re referring to my breakdown in Lillian’s hall. Yet again. The whole “why I felt compelled to mourn my friend” conundrum? You’re really grasping at straws with this, kid. And it’s really starting to irk me.
Madeline: I spoke with your old doorman, Carlos Ortega.
[Gina closes her eyes.]
Madeline: And based on that conversation, along with—
Gina Ross: Did you seriously pester an old man in his nursing home?
Madeline: Glenn Martin let me know that the Jane Doe they found in the river was never formally identified as Lillian.
Gina Ross: Jesus, Cohen, what—
Madeline: I’m fairly certain you know where I’m heading with this, but I’d love to hear it from you.
Gina Ross: What the hell do you think we’ve been doing for the past eight weeks? I am telling you the truth, just like I am fairly certain that you’re one hundred percent losing—
Madeline: Not the whole truth. It’s the in-betweens, Gina.
I know I have Lillian in my head, using that word, but I do keep thinking about those gaps.
You, down at the bridge, all that fuzzy time.
The hour between going to Lillian’s place and your own, only a quarter of a mile away.
According to Stevie, the time Sally was away from her apartment. When I look at it together, it adds—
Gina Ross: I’m gonna cut you off here before you go full Holmes on me, Cohen. What are you accusing me of? Say it. You think I murdered Lillian.
Madeline: No, that’s just it. I don’t. I think you’d prefer me to think that.
I don’t think anyone killed Lillian. I don’t even think the toxic patriarchal culture of comedy killed Lillian. Not in the literal sense.
[Gina stares at me for a long beat, silent.]
Madeline: I just want the full story, Gina. That’s all I was ever after.
Gina Ross: Okay. Right.
[She stands.]
You want the full story? Maybe, maybe, I can make that happen. On one condition: You’ve gotta press pause before running off to that big-time editor of yours with your cover story. Do we understand each other?
[I nod. Gina calls into the office.]
Hey, Sally? Did you book our flights to Nice yet?
Sally Schumacher: I was going to do it today. Why?
Gina Ross: Just hold off a sec.
[She turns to me with a sigh.]
All right, Cohen. Before we go any further, moment of truth: How’s your French?