From The Haunting of Hill House creator Mike Flanagan, Midnight Mass tells the tale of a small, isolated island community whose existing divisions are amplified by the return of a disgraced young man (Zach Gilford) and the arrival of a charismatic priest (Hamish Linklater). When Father Paul’s appearance on Crockett Island coincides with unexplained and seemingly miraculous events, a renewed religious fervor takes hold of the community – but these miracles come at a price.
“I would describe Midnight Mass as a fascinating look at faith and morality and human behavior,” Crystal Balint tells PopWire in an exclusive interview about her new limited series. “It’s a horror thriller, but I would say it’s sort of more heavy on the human elements of the story. It asks a lot of an audience and it asks a lot of you as a viewer to come to it with an open mind.”
Among the small, close-knit residents on Crockett Island, her character Dolly Scarborough, is fairly highly regarded. “Dolly is a fairly regular face in the community, so people know who she is and she’s sort of relatively prominent,” Balint explains. “She’s had a really hard time over the last several years. Her daughter was injured in what we’ll call an accident, but we’re not sure that it was an accident, and is now paralyzed.
“She’s a woman of great faith and she’s really relied heavily on her faith to see her through some of these significant challenges that her family and her community have had to undertake over the last several years,” she continues. “Dolly’s motivating force is love. She really loves her daughter, she really loves her family, she really loves her community. That’s sort of what drives her decisions at every turn, even the poor decisions that she ultimately makes. It’s all in an effort to continue to see her community thrive. Dolly is a person who is a believer, and she believes in her family, she believes in her husband, she believes in her love, she believes in her God.”
Midnight Mass is heavy on religion, and while Balint shares that she’s not a practicing Catholic or Christian, she does understand that the subject matter may be a bit of a turnoff or ruffle feathers for some viewers. However, she says that the series is more of an analysis of human nature and asks that viewers head into it with an open mind. “Religion is just the vehicle by which we sort of tell that story. It’s the vehicle by which these characters go on their own specific journeys through their own experiences,” Balint says.
“I would say just try to see through that and look at the people, look at the characters. Watch them go through their journey. Religion is the playing field of the story, but it’s really not the crux of the story. The crux of the story is the people, the crux of the story is the relationships, and it’s the choices that those people make through those relationships that really is what we’re talking about and that’s the discussion that’s really being had I think by the show.”
The limited series is a mystery drama with elements of horror sprinkled throughout — and the actress says that if you’re interested in a show that’s character-driven and takes you on a ride (albeit not a fast one), then Midnight Mass is worth checking out. “It’s a fantastic ride with a lot of ups and downs and sharp turns and corners. There are a lot of really fascinating twists, there are a lot of tremendous performances.
“I would say it’s a character-driven story about love, about faith, about the things we do for love and for faith, and the choices that we make that for better or for worse, we do for those reasons,” Crystal Balint says. “I would say come for the ride, come for the journey that we all go on, each character goes on. Every single person in the show takes a journey and it’s a really exciting one.”
Midnight Mass is now streaming on Netflix.
