Netflix/David LeeGabrielle Dennis will be one to watch on the second season of Marvel’s Luke Cage. The black superhero series, which officially launches today, will feature Dennis as Tilda Johnson, the estranged daughter of disgraced Harlem councilwoman Mariah Dillard, played by Alfre Woodard.
“She’s regal. She’s funny. She’s talented. She’s just.. amazing,” Dennis tells ABC Radio of Woodard. “And when I found out I was playing her daughter, I was like, ‘What? What TV mother jackpot have I hit?’ You know, first I had Lorraine Toussaint on Rosewood and now Alfre Woodard and she’s just… great.”
Part of what makes Woodard so “great” is the Emmy-winner’s ability to captivate an audience. Dennis agrees.
“We have some very powerful scenes in the series. It was very exciting,” she says. “And just watching her work and her character is so dynamic and interesting this season. [Our] mother-daughter dynamic and like how we butt heads… it’s very interesting.”
While Woodard’s character faces some major challenges during Luke Cage‘s second season — including facing off with Cage himself, again played by Mike Colter, and dealing with a new and powerful opponent named Bushmaster — Dennis says her character will also undergo some life-changing experiences.
“So there’s all of these things that she’s learning about her family’s past that’s a little darker than she thought,” Dennis explains. “So it’s kind of like, ‘Is it that nurture versus nature? Are there things in her DNA… Or is she going to make a decision to do things or her own way?'”
Dennis continues, “So…a lot of the characters this season go to that point of like, ‘To get the good I have to do something bad?'”
Luke Cage season two is available today on Netflix.
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