Marisol Nichols had to hang up the claws for her newest role. While “Teen Wolf” fans know her as the vicious Desert Wolf, “Riverdale” fans now recognize her as Hermione Lodge. The newly single mother isn’t quite as deadly—and she definitely isn’t trying to kill her daughter—but she still isn’t a force to be messed with.
“Hermione is on the opposite end of that spectrum where she wants to protect her family, and she can be ruthless in it,” Nichols revealed during an interview with International Business Times. “But we’re going to see her kind of become more ruthless as it goes on… She falls flat on her face and she fails a lot, but that’s going to fuel her fire and her [metaphoric] claws and her teeth for what’s to come.”
“Riverdale” is the CW’s newest dark teen drama. The small town is suddenly anything but quiet when a student is murdered. Nichols’ character Hermione is one of the few townspeople who isn’t a homicide suspect. Viewers met Hermione in the first episode when she and her daughter Veronica (Camila Mendes) returned to town after spending more than a decade in New York. After Hermione’s husband Hiram ended up in legal trouble, it’s up to Hermione to raise her teenage daughter.
“I think that the tragedy that [Veronica and Hermione] went through in New York brought them together, and so by default they’ve become very close,” Nichols explained. “They have a really cool relationship that you’ll see as it goes on, but she’s certainly not as tightly wound and controlling as say Alice Cooper [Mädchen Amick].”
Hermione (Marisol Nichols) is close to her daughter Veronica (Camila Mendes) in “Riverdale” Season 1. Photo: Katie Yu/The CW
Hermione’s ex, Hiram Lodge, isn’t as out of the picture as she might like. Despite leaving the Big Apple for her small hometown after his corrupt business dealings were revealed, the shady businessman is still in control. He even sent Hermione a massive bag of cash to help her get by in the first episode. Viewers will hear more about Veronica’s absentee father soon. But will we actually meet the mystery man?
“I believe you will,” Nichols said. “I can’t give away too much. But I will tell you that he’s not just off at prison and we don’t hear about him. He is very much still running things from behind bars and is still very much a part of Veronica and Hermione’s life, not always in the best way.”
Hermione, however, is trying to do her best to move on. In episode 2, viewers will see that she has a new gig as a waitress so that she and Veronica can make ends meet without using Hiram’s bag of money. It’s not just financial independence that Hermione is working towards, though. Running into her former flame Fred (Luke Perry), Archie’s dad, will bring up some old feelings.
“She’s struggled with her feelings for Fred that come into play when she comes back to Riverdale and the fact that she’s still married,” Nichols teased. “She still has that belief that she needs to stand by her man. And she’ll waffle and waver, and we’re going to see really fun stuff between Hermione and Fred, which made me really happy because that’s always fun to play. And romantic stuff. When I say ‘fun’ I mean like, romantic, good stuff.”
Viewers will have to wait a little while before “Riverdale” delves into the parental storylines. Veronica and her new friends are the focus of the first several episodes. However, fans will definitely see hints about the drama to come with the parents.
Marisol Nichols helped form her character’s story lines in “Riverdale,” the CW’s new murder mystery. Photo: Art Streiber/The CW
Fans can’t really predict what story lines are to come, despite “Riverdale” being based on Archie Comics. Though the characters are on the small screen, the story lines are going in a different direction. Executive producer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa gave actors like Nichols an opportunity to help shape their arcs.
“I had asked our show creator, ‘Is there a lot of Hermione in the comic books?’ And there really wasn’t,” Nichols noted. “So to make sure that I didn’t sort of skew my view point of what she was like in the comic books, I just sat down with Roberto and we sort of came up with our own concept of who she was just based on other people. So we sort of mainly created her from scratch, just based on what Roberto had written down.”
Aguirre-Sacasa and Nichols created a character with plenty of layers. Though audiences are seeing Hermione try to live an honest life with her daughter in these early episodes, there’s more to her story.
“[When] this money that comes, she’s trying to do her best to ignore it and not use it to lean upon and just like cushion their life. But again, nothing is always as it seems in Riverdale, so we’re going to see a different side to Hermione than is completely presenting itself. She’s not as squeaky clean as maybe we want to believe,” Nichols laughed.
Tune in to “Riverdale” on Thursdays at 9 p.m. EST on The CW to see the drama unfold.
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