‘Ozark’s Janet McTeer Teases Shifting Dynamics in Season 3

Janet McTeer in Ozark - Season 3
Q&A
Netflix

As if life couldn’t get more complicated for the crime drama Ozark‘s money-laundering power couple, Marty and Wendy Byrde (Jason Bateman and Laura Linney), they’ve got unnerving company.

Helen Pierce (Janet McTeer), the icy lawyer for the drug cartel to whom the Byrdes are beholden, spends more time in Missouri to keep an eye on their operation. McTeer submits to our interrogation.

Will viewers see a new side of the intimidating Helen this season?

Janet McTeer: We see her family, so that makes her much more in keeping with one of the themes of Ozark, which is how you keep your family life separate from the complicated world of the business that we are in.

She and Wendy grow close. What do they respond to in each other?

They’re working together on a day-to-day basis. And if you are a very high-paid lawyer to a drug cartel, there aren’t many people you can be yourself with. [Wendy is] probably the only woman that Helen knows who she can actually have a vaguely honest conversation with.

Netflix Ozark Season 3 cast

(Credit: Netflix)

What’s Helen’s dynamic with the Byrdes’ loyal loose-cannon employee Ruth (Julia Garner)?

I think it’s about Helen beginning to possibly, begrudgingly respect her. Maybe she sees a bit of herself in [Ruth]. I think there’s probably going to be a lot of testing going on.

Will we see Marty and Helen butt heads over Ruth?

You might be wise to suspect that. Helen becomes part of the group dynamic, and if you put another member into the main group dynamic…it’s gonna change that.

Ozark, Season 3 Premiere, Friday, March 27, Netflix