Kathy Bates doesn’t like getting older. She hates forgetting names. She feels self-conscious about others’ opinions of her stamina. She worries about her ability to remember her lines.
But in her mid-70s, the Oscar- and Emmy-winning actor has unexpectedly been called up as a power player. In the hit new CBS drama “Matlock,” a modern-day reimagining of the long-running series that starred Andy Griffith as a folksy but astute defense attorney, Bates plays another virtuosic legal mind — but with a powerful ulterior motive.
A decade after losing her daughter to opioid addiction, Bates’ Madeline Kingston reinvents herself as Madeline “Matty” Matlock, a quick-witted septuagenarian who says she is reentering the legal workforce to support herself and her young grandson after her late husband ostensibly gambled away all of their money. (In reality, Madeline is very wealthy, her loving husband of 49 years is very much alive, and her teen grandson is an architect of her master plan.)
Taking advantage of the way society tends to overlook older women, Madeline finagles her way into a job at a prestigious Chicago law firm, where she is hellbent on proving that her new colleagues buried documents that could have taken opioids off the market and, in turn, prevented her daughter’s death. But as she begins to form an emotional attachment to her newfound family at work, Madeline is forced to wrestle with the question: Does the end always justify the means?
“I know that there was some talk of possibly creating this character as a granddaughter of [the original] Matlock — someone in her 30s or 40s — so I’m incredibly fortunate that, at 76, for heaven’s sake, I’ve been able to play this role,” Bates says on a recent phone call.
Bates, by her own admission, never expected to return to network television. In fact, when the pilot script for “Matlock” arrived in her inbox in early 2023, she was actually planning to go into semiretirement.
Having always taken her work to heart in an all-consuming way, Bates has often ruminated about the unspoken emotional cost of being an actor. “You use the things that were painful or joyous in your own life, and you always spend a lot of yourself,” she says. A couple of years ago, while working on a film that she does not want to name, Bates gave herself fully over to a role — only to be so disheartened with the final product that she told her agents she needed to take a step back from the business. “It’s the first time in 50 years that’s happened in such a painful way. I just was so taken aback and disappointed that all the air went out of me.”
But when she read “Jane the Virgin” creator Jennie Snyder Urman’s new take on “Matlock,” Bates recognized an invaluable opportunity to examine the cultural invisibility of older women, and she felt acutely drawn to the protagonist’s fight for justice. While “Matlock” may largely follow the tried-and-true, case-of-the-week format of a procedural, Bates has found an unlikely outlet through which to channel a lifetime of pain. This role, as exhausting as it may be, feels like the culmination of her eclectic body of work.
“It’s like a little apothecary chest where there are all these different drawers in front of me that I can use,” Bates explains of her acting process. “For another character, I would maybe pick out three of the drawers that are on the bottom shelf, where the more dangerous things lie. But in this case, I can use all the drawers at different moments depending on who I’m working with, and depending on what the role of Matty or Madeline demands at that time.”
Bates has particularly relished the opportunity to play the double life of her character, who is constantly three steps ahead of those around her. Whereas Matty presents as a hapless, old-fashioned woman who hasn’t practiced law in three decades, Madeline is a high-powered San Francisco lawyer who has moved across the country and seemingly thought of every contingency to gain her colleagues’ trust. By the end of each episode, viewers are left to realize that they, too, have underestimated Madeline.
Bates knows that feeling of being underestimated — for her looks, for her talent — all too well. In high school, because she wasn’t considered a “beauty queen,” she was often saddled with the roles of older women, whom she eventually grew to love. Hollywood hasn’t always known what to do with her either. After winning an Academy Award for playing a depraved fan who kidnaps her favorite author in “Misery,” Bates became known for playing misfits. But wary of being pigeonholed, she always longed for an opportunity to transform and explore the complex inner lives of everyday women, as she did in “Dolores Claiborne.” Prior to “Matlock,” she had seldom played a protagonist who was a full-fledged hero.
“I think when one makes a splash with a certain kind of role, one is typecast in that role,” Bates says, referring to the unruly, nonconforming characters that have defined her career. “Although I’m very, very grateful that I’ve been able to play those roles with sensitivity and vulnerability, I’m glad now that I can play a modern woman, a professional woman, and a woman who has many different sides to her.”
Like most women of a certain age, Bates has dealt with her fair share of ageism. In 2012, around the time she was diagnosed with breast cancer, Bates learned that NBC executives decided to cancel her show, David E. Kelley’s “Harry’s Law” — even though it was the network’s highest-rated drama series — because its audience skewed significantly older. Bates was furious, if not slightly concerned, that her career would never recover. Times have thankfully changed.
Now, well into her golden years, Bates hopes the best years of her life are still ahead of her. Years ago, before she decided to star in “Matlock,” Bates, who is a two-time cancer survivor, decided to lose 100 pounds, so she feels physically fitter than ever before. While there are fewer things that she can now do on her own (such as opening a jar), Bates is determined to stave off the inevitable decline of her brain and body for as long as she can. She now wants to do Pilates after work, and the long hours she spends working and learning legalese have kept her mental faculties in check.
“Getting older is a concern, but I’ve been given a reprieve, oddly enough. I’ve given myself part of that reprieve in terms of getting healthy, but also Jennie has rejuvenated me, and the cast has rejuvenated me,” Bates says. “In different cultures, when the older people are venerated and part of the family, it keeps them young, and it helps the young people learn and grow wiser.”
On a recent trip to New York City to promote the launch of “Matlock,” Bates came to a stunning realization that put her career into perspective. In 1970, she worked at a temp agency in the city, hoping to scrape together enough money to support her theater career. Fifty-four years later, she found herself staring at a “Matlock” billboard in Times Square with co-star Skye P. Marshall.
“Well, phooey, I’m just really f— lucky. What a wonderful career I’ve had the opportunity to play. I can’t believe it’s almost over — and I hope it’s not,” Bates says, clarifying that recent rumors of her retirement were greatly exaggerated. “I hope ‘Matlock’ goes for a long time, and if there are other projects that I can find to do during the hiatus that turn me on, I’ll see what they’re like and if I can bring anything new to that.”