Sarah Michelle Gellar is the embodiment of late ‘90s teen dreams thanks to iconic roles in “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “Cruel Intentions” and “I Know What You Did Last Summer.” After a self-imposed hiatus she recently returned to television with “Wolf Pack,” a show from “Teen Wolf” showrunner Jeff Davis which again deals with the traumas of teenhood. This time, however, she plays an ass-kicking investigator with a mysterious past as well as taking on an executive producer role on the project. “I like scheduling and budgets and all that,” she tells Variety in Cannes, where Gellar is in town to pick up a well-deserved Canneseries Icon Award. (Gellar says she was also offered an opportunity to direct “Wolf Pack,” which she turned down).

“I very much was ready to come back,” the actor/EP explains of why she chose this moment to return to screens, although she admits there was “some apprehension.” “Like, do people still want to see you? Does it still work?” The script for “Wolf Pack” initially drew her in but it was the show’s deeper themes that sealed the deal. “One of the things I loved about “Buffy” was that the monsters were a metaphor for the horrors of adolescence,” Gellar says. “And ‘Wolf Pack’ was taking that concept and doing it about [what they] face now: anxiety, depression, isolation. I really loved having a way to speak about that without being preachy, but sort of opening up that dialogue.”

Gellar’s already in talks for a second season – “the conversations are happening,” she tells Variety – and, for the first time, she’s seriously considering embarking on her directorial debut, if the right project comes along (“I think if something came my way where I said, ‘Oh, that’s my story to tell’”). As for the recently-announced “Cruel Intentions” TV adaptation? “I’ve learned a lesson with that,” she says. — read more at the source.

Comments are closed.