‘Sunny’ Exclusive Interview: Rashida Jones

Rashida Jones stars in ‘Sunny,’ now streaming on Apple TV+.

Premiering on Apple TV+ on July 10th is the new dark comedy ‘Sunny’, which was based on the novel ‘The Dark Manual’ by Colin O’Sullivan.

The series stars Rashida Jones (‘Parks and Recreation’), Hidetoshi Nishijima (‘Drive My Car’) and Joanna Sotomura as the voice of Sunny.

Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with Rashida Jones about her work on ‘Sunny’, her first reaction to the premise, her character’s grief, and working opposite a robot.

Rashida Jones in ‘Sunny,’ now streaming on Apple TV+.

Moviefone: To begin with, can you talk about your first reaction to the premise of the series and why you wanted to play this character?

Rashida Jones: I loved the premise. I loved the whole world that was already constructed when I read the scripts and I got a cool deck and a playlist and all this stuff, and it just felt wholly new to me, original and kind of nothing I’ve really been given the opportunity to do before. I’ve been very lucky to work in comedy for many years, and this is something slightly different because it is kind of a mystery thriller. There are comic elements, but they come out of a pretty dark place, and there was something kind of twisted and dark and transgressive about the show that I really liked. A lot of it took place at night. There’s a bit of sitting and isolation and grief in a way that I find interesting, where most people want to get away from that this whole show takes place in the most uncomfortable parts of being alive, which I enjoyed.

Rashida Jones in ‘Sunny,’ now streaming on Apple TV+.

MF: Can you talk about the grief that Suzie is experiencing and what happens when she meets Sunny?

RJ: I mean, I think you meet Suzie and she’s just experienced unimaginable loss, her family’s missing and she’s rudderless and hopeless. Then she’s not the kind of person who is likely to reach out for help. So, she gets this robot, which she does not like, and she’s not really interested in having in her home, and she tries very hard to get rid of it, but it’s a gift from her husband. So that begins this sort of mystery about who her husband really was because she didn’t even know he worked with robots and what he did every day. Also, for him to have spent all this time creating this thing that she now lives with, I think kind of catches her off guard. So, it sends her on this sort of new adventure to figure out everything while she’s also just processing the fact that her life is completely upended.

Rashida Jones in ‘Sunny,’ now streaming on Apple TV+.

MF: Finally, how does it all work? Who are you acting with when you are filming scenes with Sunny?

RJ: I’m acting opposite Sunny, believe it or not. She was practical, not all the way practical, but Joanna Sotomura, who’s the actor who played her voice, she was just a little bit offset and her expressions would be transferred via camera on a helmet to Sunny’s face simultaneously, and then her voice would be piped into the set. So, I got to act with Joanna the whole time, which was great, but then it took a lot of people to make her really move around and follow directions. I wouldn’t say she was the easiest actor I’d ever worked with. But it works, on camera it really works. But thank God for Joanna because I think I’m not the kind of person who can do green screen tennis ball acting. I can’t just act with nothing. It was very great to have this wonderful actor behind the curtain.

“Its first memory is meeting you.”

TV-MA1 SeasonsJuly 9th, 2024

What is the plot of ‘Sunny’?

A woman (Rashida Jones) living in Kyoto whose husband and son vanished in a plane crash is given a domestic robot from her husband’s robotics company.