Gone star Leven Rambin on playing a survivor turned heroine

Leven Rambin portrays an abduction survivor turned FBI heroine in Gone, and explained how she crafted such a powerful character for the new drama.

Tonight WGN America premieres Gone, the intense new series that stars Leven Rambin as the survivor of a childhood abduction who joins an FBI task force to rescue other abductees.

It’s an incredibly complicated and resonant series, based on the novel One Kick by Chelsea Cain, and not like any other crime drama on TV. Hidden Remote spoke to Leven about how she brought Kit “Kick” Lannigan to the small screen, and what it meant to her to tell Kick’s story.

Hear more about Gone from Leven Rambin below, then don’t miss the Gone premiere when it airs on WGN this Wednesday at 9 p.m. You can find the channel in your area here.

Hidden Remote: What drew you to Gone and playing this character?

Leven Rambin: I saw the description and I just thought that is unlike anything that I’ve read for a young woman my age and I am blown away. The dynamic is complex and I must do it. That was really exciting to me. I don’t really respond to a lot of material in that way, so I just knew I was going to do anything I could to get it.

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HR: Kick is such a complex character who goes through a lot. Where did you even start figuring her out? What was your process?

LR: When I first got the audition, I was really unprepared for the level of work that I was going to do on it. I started reading Jaycee Dugard’s books, and I just realized the depth of history I needed to include in my character and my being and how much [abduction] effects you for the rest of your life. Day in and day out, it’s a struggle for peace and a struggle for happiness. It’s a battle [where] you have to pick yourself up, or you give in to the depression and hopelessness. For Kick, she’s taken up this cross of I’m not going to fight only for my own sanity and life, but the well-being of the future generation that needs protection from this kind of trauma.

There were a lot of emotional details I wasn’t familiar with until I met with a consultant, Alicia, who was a survivor. She illuminated so many opportunities for me to include in my character, like different reactions to things that you would never guess. She said her abduction, it was around Christmas time and her abductor drank Coke or Diet Coke or something. Now every time she sees a Santa [or] a Diet Coke or Coke, it triggers her. She can’t really celebrate Christmas or doesn’t want to. She can’t have a Coke can around.

That to me was so specific in detail, I was like there’s so many things I can include that make this more dynamic. Then I studied with this NYPD homicide detective that I know; he took me around to police stations and [explained] how he deals with sexual abuse victims and kidnapping victims and how that goes. It was interesting to study that side, too.

HR: Is there anything that you’re particularly proud of with Gone? Anything to highlight as the show makes its WGN America debut?

LR: Some of my favorite parts were Kick with Noah [Christopher O’Shea], her love interest, where she allows herself to feel vulnerable with someone again in a romantic way. Her feminine side that’s been sort of repressed to protect herself. She begins to allow someone in, and that girlier side of her I really enjoyed playing. It was unexpected and cool sometimes, the things that came out that way. He was getting so close to her that it was almost uncomfortable for me.

HR: You’ve been part of other dark, complex shows like True Detective and The Path. Did any of your past experience help with your work on Gone?

LR: I don’t think I’d ever pushed myself to this level. This show really depends on Kick and her believability, so I treated this like a film I was doing and I prepared so long and hard for it. This role was so personal to me and so special to me. I made it my mission to be truthful to survivors so that any survivors seeing this would be able to identify and relate and feel heard and seen and understood and [felt I] represent them well.

There’s a reason I gravitate towards pretty dark material; I think there’s a very wounded part of me that likes to revel in itself. But ultimately this is a story about hope. This is a story about a woman who overcomes the most extreme forms of pain in her life, to be brave and courageous and choose to have a better life.

HR: So is there a particular message you hope Gone leaves viewers with? Something that it has to say more than being entertainment?

LR: When we shot this [in 2017], it was before the Me Too movement. It was before this real feminine push for content, and I don’t think it would have been as impactful if it had been released two years ago.

I think everyone on the creative team knew what needed to be out there right now: a strong courageous woman who overcomes the most intense trauma and tragedy in her life and how does she rebuild herself? How does she move on? How does she inspire others? What does she make of her life after that? How does she face this fear and not be a victim?

I think that’s a huge metaphor for what women are doing now with the Me Too stuff. We’re facing our fears. We’re standing up for what we deserve. We’re demanding our seat at the table. We’re equals in this. That’s what Kick has been doing, saying no, you don’t get to own me, you don’t get to identify me, and how do I spin what I’ve been dealt into something that’s going to empower me?

I haven’t seen that on TV right now, to the depth that we go to in this show. And I think it has a really cool procedural element that, at the core, is a Silence of the Lambs-style journey for Kick and she has to face her demons to become who she’s supposed to be. I think it has a really cool duality that I haven’t seen before.

The Gone premiere airs tonight at 9 p.m. on WGN America. For more about Gone and every WGN series, follow the WGN category at Hidden Remote.