“Formidable” is often used to describe Gina Torres’ onscreen presence whether she’s playing the unflappable second-in-command on a ramshackle spaceship in Firefly, a midriff-baring Sumerian princess on Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, or a high-powered layer intent on making the most of her second chance on Pearson. And the statuesque actor, whose genre-laden career now spans three decades, certainly emanates competence and poise, making her look like every bit the natural-born leader. But a closer inspection of the DNA of a Gina Torres character reveals as much warmth and vulnerability as poise and prowess – it’s not for nothing that Firefly’s Zoë and Wash are one of the most beloved TV couples in the ‘verse.

Adapted from the popular and prestigious (it won the Newberry Medal) Kate DiCamilo (“The Tale of Despereaux”) novel, “Flora” has Hannigan as Phyllis Buckman, a beleaguered single mom whose only child, Flora (Matilda Lawler), hasn’t adjusted to her parents’ recent split.

The Buffy the Vampire Slayer star added: “Kissing a girl on camera is way better because when you kiss a guy, all your makeup rubs off and then in between you have to get these touch-ups. But [when] it’s a girl it’s, like, you’re good to go.”

The New York native went on to tell Us that the “first month” with the new dogs was harder than raising kids. “My kids are at an age where they can go the bathroom by themselves and they don’t pee and poop in the middle of the kitchen,” Gellar joked of daughter Charlotte, 11, and son Rocky, 8.

“Buffy was so long ago, I don’t know. That was a tiny, little show on a small network that ended up having this huge life. It started to build when it was on, but there was no huge support system or fanfare or built-in audience with it,” the actress told Heroic Hollywood. “So it’s not even in the same ballpark as entering in the Marvel Universe. It’s a whole other world.”

“At this stage, as times have changed, as we are changing the landscape and experiencing people of colour in a wide variety of situations… and not just people of colour, but of LGBTQ ad women and all of that… now I get to be this beautifully, fully fleshed-out human being in this show,” she continues. “I do get to be a wife, I do get to be a mother and a bada** all at the same time.”

“She [said], ‘You’ve got this icy prettiness, and you’re really funny, and then if someone’s awful to you or awful to someone you love, you’re so mean […] just want that icy mean.’ I [said] ‘Thank you? Thank you, Jac,'” Caulfield recalls for Looper with a smile.

“I’d come back from shooting a pilot that will never see the light of day, and I kind of went into that place that we all did. ‘Will I ever work again? What’s that going to look like?'” Torres, 51, exclusively told Us Weekly, noting that it was when “everything was shutting down” due to the pandemic. “Then I got a call that Tim wanted to talk – and it was the best phone call of the year.”

“Daddy, why are there wood boards over all the store windows?” my eight-year-old daughter Evan asked as our family walked our dog along Venice Boulevard. Two-and-a-half months into the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, the streets were quiet, as a curfew was in place. Stores all over Los Angeles were being boarded up after looting had followed a peaceful Black Lives Matter protest in nearby Santa Monica the day before.

“I really decided to use the vampire genre for a number of reasons in this project,” Landau said. “First of all, to make an entertaining movie. Second of all, to lull the audience into a sense of safety to explore unsafe and radical ideas. Third of all, to bring in my history from Buffy and Angel and all the other actors’ histories such as Gary Oldman, Ron Perlman, Robert Patrick, Lance Henriksen, Joss Whedon and bestselling authors Charlaine Harris and Anne Rice both appearing for the first time ever in a scripted narrative film. So it was a way to bring all of their histories in.”