As a star on the buzzworthy series “Scandal,” Kerry Washington has a had a few encounters with celebrities who are big fans of the show and talked to OTRC.com during a visit to the show’s set on Thursday, April 4, about an encounter she had with Mary J. Blige.
In “Scandal,” Washington plays Olivia Pope, a former White House Communications Director for the president who leaves her post to start her own crisis management firm. She is a professional “fixer” who makes problems go away before anyone even knows they exist. Pope struggles to resolve her own problems, like her on-and-off-again affair with President Fitzgerald Grant (played by Tony Goldwyn).
Darby Stanchfield, Joshua Malina, Guillermo Diaz, Columbus Short and Jeff Perry also appear in the ABC drama series.
“It’s fun to go to the White House correspondents dinner and bump into someone like Mary J. Blige who is like, ‘What’s going on? I love your show!’ It’s really fun.”
Blige has Tweeted about the series often and even sent a few Tweets to Washington about the show.
She Tweeted in September, “Can’t wait to get home to watch Scandal!”
“@kerrywashington love this show,” she wrote in October.
Blige isn’t the only major celebrity to come out as a fan of the series. Oprah Winfrey, Bill Clinton, Lena Dunham and Pink are also fans of the show.
“Yeah, yeah. The fans keep coming out of the woodwork. It’s really fun. It’s exciting for us,” Washington said. She later added, “It’s really an honor that people who are really creative, intelligent, fun people, love our show.”
Washington also said that the show has “the best fans on the planet” and the cast often live Tweets the show.
“We feel really grateful, to be honest. We just have the best fans on the planet,” Washington said. “We are so aware that it’s tough out there for TV shows and we wouldn’t be having the success we were having unless people are tuning in, they’re setting their DVRs, they’re watching at 10 o’clock on Thursdays — they’re not missing a beat … so we’re just grateful.”
Washington’s co-star, Tony Goldwyn, was in the middle of directing an episode of the series during OTRC.com’s set visit. Goldwyn has directed several episodes of “Dexter,” “Justified” and “Grey’s Anatomy” as well as feature films like “Someone Like You” and “Conviction.”
When asked how Goldwyn was as a director, Washington joked, “Don’t tell him I said this but Tony’s a really tough director, it’s really hard on us. We haven’t eaten in three days. Someone save us. We’re not allowed to drink water. He yells. He’s awful … just kidding!”
“Tony’s a dream, on camera and off,” she added. “It’s not fair, I wish he had flaws.”