Love that journey for her! Annie Murphy recalled doing some mental “spring cleaning” after her role as Alexis Rose on Schitt’s Creek came to an end in 2020.
After six seasons on the comedy, the Canadian actress, 34, landed the lead role of Allison McRoberts on Kevin Can F**k Himself, which premiered in June. Ahead of filming the dark comedy, Murphy remembered thinking she made a “terrible mistake,” because she wasn’t in the proper headspace to deal with reporting to work.
“When I got the part, I was not doing super well in the mental health department,” the actress told HelloGiggles on Friday, September 24. “I booked the part and they said, ‘You’re gonna be in Boston next week, No. 1 on the call sheet.’ And I genuinely was like, ‘I can’t do this. I’m not in a place where I can show up to work with a smile on my face every day’ — and then the pandemic hit, like, four days later.”
Murphy recalled in a “very selfish way” that she felt grateful to have filming put on hold amid the COVID-19 crisis, because it gave her time to focus on herself and her well-being.
“I didn’t want to need antidepressants,” she admitted, noting she now takes pills and goes to therapy to deal with her anxiety. “But I could not recommend them more. It doesn’t mean you have to be on them forever, but they truly helped me get through a very difficult chunk of my life.”
The Emmy winner explained that getting assistance isn’t something to be embarrassed about, especially if it helps you.
“I think that if you’re a feeling human, of course you’re anxious and of course you’re sad, [because] it’s a really scary and really wonderful world that we live in — and it’s hard to process that a lot of the time,” Murphy said. “It has been really encouraging for friends to casually say to me, ‘Time to take my anti-anxiety meds,’ because you take pills for everything else.”
The Russian Doll actress’ mental health isn’t the only thing she’s vocal about these days. Murphy recently teamed up with Phexxi, the first hormone free birth control gel to prevent pregnancy, as the face of its new campaign. Her goal is to help make female reproductive talk more mainstream.
“The female reproductive system is one of the most basic things ever,” Murphy told the outlet. “It’s been around forever, and the fact that people are still trepidatious to say ‘vagina’ out loud is like, ‘OK, we have some work to do.’”
The TV star, who welcomes viewers “inside” her own vagina in Phexxi’s commercials, added: “But I think the more we talk, the more we realize that we have so many shared experiences and that we’re not alone in it — and that builds strength.”
