Citizens of Mockingbird: Erin Wilhelmi on Capturing the Rage of Racism in Mayella Ewell

In adapting Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird for the stage, award-winning scribe Aaron Sorkin looked at the iconic characters of the recently named "best-loved" American novel with fresh eyes. In this exclusive series, Broadway.com talks with Sorkin and the talented performers who bring the citizens of Mayomb, Alabama to life every night at the Shubert Theatre.

ERIN WILHELMI AS MAYELLA EWELL
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CHARACTER: Mayella Ewell, a poor, abused daughter of a Ku Klux Klan member who falsely accuses Tom Robinson of rape, setting off the trial at the center of the story.

ACTOR: Erin Wilhelmi is a bright newcomer who made her Broadway debut in 2016 as Mercy Lewis in Ivo van Hove’s staging of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible. The following season, she took on the role of Emmy in the acclaimed A Doll’s House, Part 2. Off-Broadway credits include The Great God Pan, The Great Immensity and American Hero. She was seen in the film The Perks of Being a Wallflower and on TV in series including Gossip Girl, The Knick, The Accidental Wolf, Law & Order: SVU and Better Call Saul.

ERIN WILHELMI ON PLAYING MAYELLA EWELL: "She’s been through so much. She lost her mother five years before this takes place. She’s raising her seven siblings. She’s living in a house with an abusive father—physically and sexually abusive. It’s amazing she has the strength that she does, to be quite honest. I feel like if Mayella was in today’s world, she’d get to go to an in-patient therapy place for a long time because she needs so much help and no one’s giving it to her."

AARON SORKIN ON ERIN WILHELMI: "Erin gives a phenomenal performance as Mayella. Her rage at the end of her testimony where we hear her parroting things that we’ve heard her father say—trying to grab onto a branch any way that she can becomes as much about her circumstance as it is about her lying."

Photographed at the Shubert Theatre by Caitlin McNaney for Broadway.com