Italia Ricci plays April Carver, a woman in her mid-20s going through cancer, on ABC Family’s phenomenal series Chasing Life that airs Mondays at 9p. During the first season of the show, her character went through a lot of gut-wrenching moments as she is struggles with her Leukemia diagnosis. Those are really hard and emotional scenes for us to watch, but imagine being the actress who has to portray them. They are not easy. There are a few scenes that stuck out for her that were harder to film than others and she recently talked to me about them.
During the season 1 finale, she finds out that her cancer has returned and she needs to start Chemo the next day or she will most likely not be around two to six weeks from then. After she checks in to the hospital for her treatment, her doctor takes her to a part of the hospital that is under construction and gives her a sledgehammer. April picks it up and starts swinging at anything she can until all the anger is released. It is the type of episode that has you crying from the beginning until the end. So much so, I couldn’t bear to watch it second time.
The crying started for us when the episode aired, but it started for Italia at the table read. She couldn’t help but to get emotional as she read the script, so much so the paper was covered with teardrops. Then she talked about the scene that really got to her, “Don’t even start with the sledgehammer scene. I get goosebumps just thinking about it.” She explained, “It was so emotional. It felt so good. I was terrified to shoot it, but once I did and once I saw it…The whole episode is the most proud I’ve been of anything I helped make exist.”
That was the season finale, but there was episode earlier on that really got to her and her co-star. April and her best friend Beth (Aisha Dee) attend the fake funeral for one of the members in her cancer group whose prognosis is very grim. As the cast gets to the part where they have to sing Daniel Powter’s song Bad Day, it was too much for her. Italia started to cry so hard, she had to cover her face. She said, “This is remotely not something you should see on television because it was such an ugly cry.” Just because the director yells cut, doesn’t mean she can stop the water works. After that scene was finished, Aisha and her went into a corner and let it all out for the next few minutes before they could continue working.
She told me that she can’t hold that emotion in or it will come out in other parts in her life. For example, one time her fiance’ Robbie Amell, accidentally left the towel on the floor and she started to cry uncontrollably for no reason at all.
How does she deal with all of April’s emotions? She has a half hour ride to and from work, so she let’s the tears out in her car, and she also let’s them out in her shower. She earned the right to let them out wherever and whenever she wants. It’s her realistic performance that brings us to tears every Monday at 9p on Chasing Life.
I hope that during season two, as she plans her wedding to Leo (Scott Michael Foster), April will spend more time laughing instead of crying. Even though as we learned in last week’s season premiere, her cancer is not in remission after she finished the latest round of Chemotherapy.
Italia Ricci is so brilliant as April and her portrayal of the character is so honest and raw, that you can’t help but to respect her. Knowing that filming the scenes for her are as hard to do as they are hard for us to watch, makes me admire her even more. She truly is one of the greatest actresses on television today. Make sure to watch her tonight and every Monday at 9p on ABC Family in Chasing Life.
