Lesley Ann Warren is known for her work in both television and film, participating in projects ranging from the movie Secretary, to appearing in shows such as Desperate Housewives and Will & Grace. Warren can now be seen playing Jinx Shannon, the less then traditional mother of Mary Shannon (played by Mary McCormack), a US Marshall, in the new USA show In Plain Sight.

Even with an acting career that has spanned over forty years, acting was not Warren’s original choice.  “I was going to be a ballet dancer.  And I was born in New York, Manhattan, and I was studying ballet from the time I was six to about fourteen and then when I was fourteen, I saw a Broadway production of Bye Bye Birdie and I saw all these kids my age on stage doing this singing and dancing and acting and I became enthralled.  And I decided that that was what I wanted to do and I started studying acting and I started studying singing at sixteen and then I started seriously auditioning.  I did my first audition when I was fourteen, but I started auditioning when I was in my last year of high school I was sixteen and I got my first Broadway show.  The ingénue lead in 110 in the Shade on Broadway when I was seventeen.  So that’s really how I began.”

The character of Jinx is different than the other roles Warren has played, but that is part of what drew her to the role.  “When I first read the pilot, my character had a really small role in it, but I loved the writing of the show.  I thought the show was really smart and sophisticated and edgy and very sort of cool and a unique tone for television, or anywhere actually.  So I went in and met with David Maples, the creator, and it was his revealing to me where this character goes and the journey that she takes and the sort of heartbreak that’s at her core and that’s what really drew me to her.  So, I don’t feel like, in fact, I have ever played a character like her before and as an actress, that’s what is ultimately the most challenging to me…She is so much more complex a character than is apparent initially, and I knew that going in because I had talked with the creator.  But what you will get to see is, what is revealed along the way, is her broken dreams and her sort of heartbreak and what motivates her to behave in the ways that she does initially, which seems like she’s just this great party animal.  But she adores her daughters, but has no clue as to how to raise them and gave up her own dreams in order to try to do this mothering.”

Part of Jinx’s background story Warren knew going into it, but some has come from her.  “I did know a sort of general trajectory of the character because I had talked about it with David, but it was pretty general at the time that we discussed it because he hadn’t written the scripts yet.  But I had a sort of sense of where she was going and then with each new script I work with a coach, I always do, and we would fill out some of the pieces of her history that maybe weren’t apparent in each episode so that I could come into it with a knowledge of her background.  And so some of it is fabricated by me and some of it is supplied by David.  The interesting thing about doing a series for me, which I’ve never done really, is that each episode reveals some other facet of your character to you, which is kind of exciting.”

Warren often draws from herself in her portrayal of Jinx.  “I look for the identifying feelings and then I look to my own life to help me to create those, but then I also create from my imagination or from people I’ve observed, a character’s qualities and bring them all together to help recreate a new and unique character.”

Warren feels different things for her character.  “Well, I guess what I like most about her is her child-like sort of sense of wonder and enthusiasm and adventure.  My own mom has that and she’s 91, and she still has that, and I think that’s something to be admired.  What I think I like least about her is her inability sometimes to see the difference between what is real and what isn’t, and how that’s led her into some really painful and difficult situations.”

Even though she enjoys working on the series, there are still things Warren finds challenging.  “I opted to not relocate to Albuquerque because I have a family, an animal, you know, mother and son and husband and I didn’t want to relocate.  It was hard jumping on a plane almost every week.  That was the most difficult part of it and I guess sometimes when you don’t relocate, you don’t really make temporary roots so every time I went there, I had to reacquaint myself with where to go to eat and what and I felt a little lonely sometimes, but that was the only difficult part of it.  The rest of it was an absolute wonderful experience and I actually like Albuquerque.  I found great places to go and they have a collage town there so that they have some really great restaurants and movies and whole food type places.  So it was great.”

Comedic timing is something that Warren didn’t have to learn.  “I don’t think, and this is just my opinion, but I don’t think you can learn comic timing.  I think you are either blessed with the sense of what’s funny or not.  I think you can learn how to do gags and pratfalls and that whole thing, but I honestly think it’s like having musical ability, you either have it or you don’t.  I just feel like I’ve been just lucky to have been blessed with that, but I also think that a part of it has to do with a certain kind of willingness to jump off into the void.  You have to be willing to take what you think is funny and go with it and hope that other people are going to think it’s funny, too.  And then the other part of it is that I really try to invest my characters with the truth, even when they’re comic characters.  I really try to invest them with what is truthful to them in the situation and the combination can work well.”

One moment of the series stands out for Warren.  “It was the scene where I get to audition for Sweet Charity, which is a community theatre production of Sweet Charity that’s being done in the area.  So I got to sing, which is something I love to do, and then my daughter, Mary, walks in on me and I don’t even know that she knows that I’ve gone to audition, and I feel humiliated and disgraced, and all the pain of the past comes bubbling up inside of Jinx and she lets it all out.  And I think it was very revealing and very difficult, but very revealing and sort of heartbreaking thing to shoot, and that, in combination with the singing, I think, was my favorite moment.”

Warren has really found a home with the cast.  “It’s so rare that you walk into a cast of people that you all get along.  It’s really rare, trust me, and in this case, we all totally got along.  It was crazy, I mean Mary and I; it was love at first sight.  We went to the table read before the pilot and I had never met her and she looked at me and said, “You can’t play my mother, you look young enough to play my sister.”  And I was like okay you’re in.  We totally get along.  There’s like a deep respect for each other’s work and camaraderie, and I would say that unfortunately when you’re shooting a new show, there isn’t very much time for jokes and pranks off camera, but it’s definitely a company that loves to work together and collaborate.”

Even though Warren loves working in television, she has still enjoyed working in theater and film as well.  “Working in movies it is the director’s vision.  You answer to the director and it was very surprising to me and really different that in television, it’s really the creator and the producer that really are the responsible voice in the show’s tone and style and direction.  And so I was so used to going to the director as being the person at the helm and that’s not true in television, it’s really not true.  So that was an adjustment.  And, of course, in theatre it’s an extremely collaborative medium, and the actors really ultimately are the ones that have the final voice because they’re on stage and nobody can stop them doing what they’re doing.  So I like them all for different reasons.  I do love working intensely with directors that I trust and respect, which is no easy case, but in this case, it’s David Maples who has that position in a way.  So that was equally interesting and challenging.”

In Plain Sight is a show that Lesley Ann Warren believes everyone can enjoy.  “I think it’s a really smart, very funny, very unique tone for television in general.  I think the writing is sophisticated, clever, heartwarming, moving and as the show goes on, these characters become more and more complex and richer in their relationships to themselves and to each other.  And there’s a new reverence about it that makes it kind of very modern, very edgy, very sort of cool and I think that all of those reasons are what are going to grab people and keep them, hopefully, engaged.”

There is more to come in the future for the actress as well.  “I just finished a movie for Hallmark, which will be on in January, and I’m very proud of it.  It’s a very, very different kind of piece.  It’s about a woman who is dying of cancer and who comes home to spend time with her best friend and the daughter that she never raised.  And so it’s very serious, very emotional and very beautiful.  It’s about female friendship and so that’s coming up, I know, and we’re hoping that we get a second season and a third and a forth and fifth.”

For now, you can catch Lesley Ann Warren on In Plain Sight Sunday nights on USA.