Melora Hardin Previews Hulu’s ‘Clock’ and Reflects on ‘The Office’ [Interview]

Melora Hardin’s latest project isn’t comfort viewing like The Office. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Hardin stars as Dr. Simmons in the film Clock, which will be available to stream on Hulu this Friday. Directed and written by Alexis Jacknow, Clock is the story of a woman (Dianna Agron) who enlists in a clinical trial to try and fix her seemingly broken biological clock after friends, family, and society pressures her to have children.

I recently spoke with Hardin about what we can expect from Clock and what makes the story unqiue and relatable. We also talked a bit about the upcoming Monk reunion movie and her role as Jan Levinson on The Office. (You can watch the full interview below.)

“It is definitely a challenging ride,” Hardin said about the film. “It’s really a story about a woman who has a perfect life, and loves everything about her life, and doesn’t have the urge to have children. And so, she goes to an experimental clinic that’s very edgy, run by me, a doctor who claims to be able to fix your biological clock.”

“It’s a very fresh conversation. I’ve never seen that conversation had by women about this sort of pressure that women can feel to have children.” 

It’s an intriguing, relatable premise, but if you’ve seen the trailer, you know this film also has an element of horror. However, Hardin confirmed that the film is ultimately more of a psychological thriller than it is a horror film.

“I don’t want to give everything away, but basically I think that my character is able to affect change. But there are things that go wrong, let’s put it that way,” Hardin said.

“I’m not so certain that my character really knows about those things. I think that it’s really a conversation about the pressure, societally, and familial pressure, and peer pressure, that women feel,” Hardin explained.

“This woman feels in this movie, like she should want to have children — that she should have children. So I think that desire to conform to that idea is so front and center that she’s trying to not pay attention to the other things that might be not going so well.”

Watch the full interview with Melora Hardin:

Hardin said she feels her character, Dr. Simmons, is “very well-meaning.” 

“I think she’s incredibly smart. She’s really cutting-edge. I think she really thinks she’s doing a good thing for women. This is something that women really want. And I think she sees in Dianna’s character — I think she sees someone that is going to be an excellent candidate for her trial. And I think she feels this is really going to help a lot of women.”

Hardin also recalled her first day of filming and the very memorable scene she walked into. 

“When Dianna’s character goes into a tank, she kind of has some hallucinations and there’s some pretty strong visuals. And when I came onto the set, my first day on the set, we were doing that sort of hallucinogenic sequence. So it was a pretty funny way to start the movie, with this prosthetic baby that was swinging, and a clock. Just very strange, bloody. Alexis [Jacknow] was like, ‘Welcome. Welcome to Clock,'” Hardin laughed.

Hardin will also be seen on the upcoming Monk reunion movie, which she said would begin filming soon. 

“Oh, I’m so excited. I mean, I loved my time on that show. I love Tony Shalhoub. He’s such a wonderful actor, but he is also just such a wonderful person. He’s so wonderful to work with, lovely, grounded, real, kind, connected person,” she said.

“It’s been a while since I’ve seen him, so that I’m really looking forward to. The director Randy Zisk, who also I’ve known for so many years, also just a lovely, lovely guy. I mean, everybody involved in the shoot, everyone is just really, really good people. And I know we’re all super excited to come together and just enjoy each other’s company.”

“The script is really fun. I think the fans are going to be satisfied and happy,” she added.

Of course, I also had to talk to Hardin a bit about her memories of working on The Office, especially considering how pervasive the iconic comedy remains in our culture.

“It’s amazing to be a part of a show that’s sort of become an iconic American comedy. And because of streaming, it’s just had this incredible life that is extraordinary. I mean, I don’t know how that happened. It was just a lucky situation. Because when I did that, I was a guest star on the pilot, a possible recurring character that became a series regular in Season 2. That was just a wonderful, lucky, luck of the draw kind of thing.”

“And then when you think about the other things that happened, that if those things had panned out the way that they were meant to pan out, The Office wouldn’t have happened for me because I would’ve been on a different trajectory,” she continued.

That trajectory might have included a part on Back to the Future.

“A lot of people asked me about Back to the Future,” she said. “But I think if I’d done Back to the Future, I would’ve been on a different trajectory. So that was kind of, I don’t know, perfect for me.”  

It was the spark between Jan and Michael on the pilot that set things in motion for her to return in a more significant way later on.

“I think Steve Carrell, and Greg Daniels, and I — I remember on the pilot, [on] the set of the pilot, we really felt that there was a spark between Michael and Jan. And we just thought there’s something that’s oddly, weirdly off, but right about them. If we get an opportunity to come back and do this more, we should explore that. I think that was where the seed was planted, and I think we all thought that would be a fun idea.”

Unsurprisingly, Hardin noted The Office Season 4 Episode 9, the infamous “Dinner Party” episode, as one of her most memorable. “The Dinner Party episode was just an amazingly fun episode to film,” she said. 

Another episode that stands out for her is The Office Season 3 Episode 17, “Cocktails.”

“[It] was the first time, and really the only time I think Jan ever said, ‘That’s what she said,’ in the show,” Hardin recalled.

“The whole show was written so well. Yeah, I have a lot of incredible memories from that show, of course.”

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Clock premieres Friday, April 28th on Hulu.

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