Elisabeth Moss is pregnant with her first baby. The actress confirmed the news during a Jimmy Kimmel Live! appearance on Tuesday, January 30.
“Are you pregnant or just an incredibly committed method actor?” host Jimmy Kimmel joked. Moss, 41, responded, “A little bit of both.”
When asked how she’s been feeling, Moss said “not bad,” noting she’s been “incredibly lucky” throughout the pregnancy. “It’s been going really well,” she added.
Moss has remained tight-lipped about her love life following her split from Fred Armisen in 2010. The former couple tied the knot in October 2009 and separated in June 2010, finalizing their divorce in May 2011.
The West Wing alum, however, has been vocal about wanting to raise a family. “I do want to be a mother,” Moss told Marie Claire UK in May 2018. “I like the idea of passing on what my mother passed on to me.”
Moss noted, “It’s not for everybody, and I didn’t know if it was going to be for me, but lately, I think it is. I have no idea how I want to do it though, or what the plan is.”
The Emmy winner confessed that part of the “problem” was that she had no time for dating, explaining she was “very focused on [her] work, so it’s difficult to find the time to give yourself to somebody.”
Four years later, Moss revealed that she still planned on welcoming a child into her life after having such a close bond with her mom, Linda Moss, a musician.
“I definitely want to have kids because I’ve been very inspired by the kind of mother my mom is,” Elisabeth shared with You magazine in April 2022. “She did a beautiful thing with me.”
The former Mad Men star joked that whenever she had a baby of her own, she would “give the child to my mom and she can raise it because she’d do it very well!”
Elisabeth’s role as June Osborne/Offred on The Handmaid’s Tale also prepared her for motherhood — although her character on the show is forced to have children under dystopian rule. She previously revealed that one of the hardest scenes for her to shoot was her naked birthing scene in season 2.
“People kept asking me, ‘Are you OK? This must be really hard for you!’” she recalled during an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! in August 2019. “I was like, ‘You know I’m not really giving birth, right?’ Like, ‘I think this is really easier than actually giving birth!’”
Elisabeth revealed that the most uncomfortable part was working with the baby who had to look like a newborn. To achieve the proper “guck” that a baby has after delivery, she said, “They put cream cheese and jelly on the baby.”
Not only was the baby “not having it,” but Elisabeth remembered that the concoction “smelled.”
Despite its dark story lines and complex birthing scenes, Elisabeth told Kimmel she felt happy to work on such a powerful show. “It’s important to us. We love it, it’s an incredible opportunity,” she added. “And I think that for us, it’s a great challenge but very, very fulfilling.”
