‘Outlander’ Postmortem: Meet The Actress Behind The Other Feisty Fraser

Jenny Fraser is no frivolous Highlands honey. In the wake of her brother getting himself added to Black Jack’s most wanted list, baby sis had to fend off Jamie’s tormentor, step up to keep the Fraser family home Lallybroch afloat, sate the surly watchmen, and tend to her husband and child. And she did it all while pregnant and wearing a corset. The Irish actress who portrays her, Laura Donnelly, is no slacker herself either, having, in addition to Outlander, recently starred in a Broadway run opposite Hugh Jackman, The Fall with Jamie Dornan, and a Lance Armstrong biopic.

Related: ‘Outlander’ Postmortem: A Look at Bringing Lallybroch to Life

Glad she’s no longer relegated to flashbacks alone, Yahoo TV tracked down the series’ newest fantastic female via telephone to talk fake pregnancies, sibling rivalry, and being murdered by Christian Grey.

As you were murdered by Jamie Dornan’s Paul Spector and manhandled and almost raped by Tobias Menzies’ Black Jack, I think it is fair to say your characters aren’t having the greatest luck with men?
That is putting it mildly. The irony is that they were both very evil characters played expertly by very nice and lovely men.

Had you read the Outlander books?
Not before the audition came up. But since I got the role, I read the first one to be familiar with the story, the underlying subtext, anything that wasn’t in the script itself, and just to inform me more about the character. But I didn’t read beyond the first book because I didn’t want to know what happens to her next. I just wanted to know what was relevant to me right now. I’ll be reading the second one before I begin the second season.

Did you become a fan?
Absolutely. It’s unashamedly romantic, and I think that so very rarely happens, particularly in TV. I can really see why the fans have latched onto it so much. It has so much more to it as well with the battles, and time traveling, and just how epic the whole thing is. That’s what makes it very difficult to pin down as a genre — and that’s a good thing. I like that it doesn’t follow any formula. It does its own thing.

What drew you to the part of Jenny?
She’s a flawed character, and her flaw and her power come from the same place, which is determination. She is very headstrong, courageous, and fights for what she believes in and for the things she loves. And when she loves, she loves hard. There’s no messing with her. All those things mix into her and drive her in one of two directions — she’s either completely wrong [Laughs] and has to go back and apologize because she’s been insensitive, or it can bring her to fight for what she believes in. It was something I really admired in her.

Related: 'Outlander’ Star Laura Donnelly Explains Her Sibling Chemistry With Sam Heughan

Is she happy that Jamie returned? Can you discuss the rift in their relationship?
I think it’s a very mixed bag of emotions. She loves him very, very deeply, so she’s thrilled that he returns and is safe — for a long time, she didn’t know whether he was dead or alive. But it’s more complicated because he comes back with an attitude of knowing what he’s doing and being the Laird. He’s literally lording it over everybody. She knows better. She doesn’t want him to come in and disrupt a life she has struggled very hard to get and which works well for them. She’s defensive over what feels like her own territory and family. She doesn’t want him coming in to disturb that. That’s compounded as well by the fact that she’s made certain assumptions about how he left in the first place and what he had to do with their father’s death, directly or indirectly. She has her own personal issue with him still to be dealt with. She certainly has all of those kinds of barriers to being completely happy with his presence.

Plus, he comes in throwing accusations and ‘tude, too.
It certainly doesn’t help that he accuses her of having a child with Black Jack Randall. He was incredibly insulting, very insensitive, and with Jenny’s temperament, she definitely doesn’t take that very well.

She doesn’t seem to like Claire much when she first arrives. Why?
I think it has a lot to do with the fact that Claire’s English. Scots at that time, and perhaps rightly so, were wary of any English person in their presence. Jenny’s personal experience with the English has not been great, so she’s disconcerted by the fact that Jamie suddenly married a Sassenach. On top of that, Jenny would possibly feel threatened by any woman coming into the fold at that point because Jamie’s wife is suddenly the lady of the house, and that is stepping on Jenny’s toes. I don’t see Jenny as being much of a girl’s girl, so she would feel threatened by any woman in that situation. The fact that Claire’s English adds fuel to the fire.

But that mutates.
Very much so. They become friends and gain a mutual respect for one another. That’s mostly based on the fact that they both recognize each other’s love for Jamie. They want to protect him and they bond over that.

What is the hardest part about going back to 1743?
I would definitely agree with Cait [Balfe] that the costumes are quite difficult to manage, and particularly in my case because for most of the shoot, I also had a big baby bump underneath my corset. I had the weight and the heat of the baby bump, extra layers of skirts, a corset — which even with the pregnancy, is still incredibly restrictive — and heavier outer clothes on top. And then I’d have to try to jump on top of a horse. But it also really helped me [get into character] because Jenny has to deal with that: She has to run an estate while almost nine months pregnant. For that to physically weigh me down, and make everything harder, and make me more tired all the time was actually a benefit.

The childbirth scene was intense. Have you experienced that, or were you winging it?
Pretty much me winging it. Our wonderful director talked a lot about his experience of having been in the room with his wife the couple of times she’s given birth. We wanted to make it realistic. We didn’t want it to be a glossed over, slightly glamorous version. We wanted it to look painful, and as unglamorous as possible, and just have it there in all of its reality — particularly because the baby’s breech, and it would be even more difficult labor.

The day that Black Jack came to Lallybroch must have been intense to shoot, too.
Yeah. The important thing about a scene like that is that it’s handled sensitively by everybody, and it certainly was. Tobias was very good at making sure that I was comfortable, that I knew exactly what would be going on. We discussed it and rehearsed it a lot with the director. It was a closed set, so there weren’t a lot of people around that day. It’s just a case of trusting each other and knowing the story you’re trying to tell, and then really going for it. You can’t approach a scene like that in a meek way if you want to do it justice, and if you want to get it over and done with as soon as possible [Laughs], which you really do. We went for the extremes. Obviously, you have to go somewhere quite difficult, emotionally and physically, and that has its effect on that day. But as long as you know you’re doing it for a good reason, as long as you believe in the story that you’re telling, then it feels necessary and justified.

Is it easy to cut and just be normal at craft services after a shoot like that?
An underlying element of what you’ve just done may sit there for a little while, but it’s part of the job to carry on and break through that, and be as normal as possible. Everybody knows the actor had a job to do, and that has nothing to do with each other personally. But it does take a little bit of time to settle. You may not go straight off to craft services or straight off to the pub together. There’s a need, a lot of the time, to talk to each other afterwards to make sure everybody’s comfortable. For Tobias to go to that kind of place and be that brutal, that’s a very difficult thing for him to do as well. So I need to be sensitive about that as well.

Do you think Black Jack has fans?
Probably. I haven’t come across any of them, but yes, I’m sure there are. After The Fall, I had people come up to tell me I was lucky to have been killed and have my nails painted by Jamie Dornan. There’s always somebody that can find that — I wouldn’t say attractive — but can find entertainment in that. That’s testament to Tobias’s acting. I would hope that people can separate the difference between him and Black Jack.

Outlander airs Saturdays at 9 p.m. on Starz. The Fall is streaming on Netflix.