Annie Murphy’s next role is nothing like ‘Schitt’s Creek’

Annie Murphy may have found the perfect follow-up gig to her Emmy-winning role on Schitt’s Creek. And that’s because as the lead in the anticipated dark comedy Kevin Can F**k Himself, she’s not even “A Little Bit Alexis.”

The trailer for the AMC series dropped on February 18 at the virtual Winter Television Critics Association Press Tour, introducing reporters to Murphy’s sitcom housewife character, Allison. The clip sets up a ripped-from-the-TV world premise (it’s low-key based on Kevin James’ Kevin Can Wait), in which Allison is the perfect doting wife to her husband Kevin (Eric Petersen). She cooks him breakfast, grabs him beers, and finds herself at the center of his jokes. Until one day she snaps and realizes that she actually just wants to kill him. The show then alternates between the typical laugh-track comedy from your childhood with all of its problematic tropes, and a grittier, single-camera offering that addresses those issues straight up.

“Being in that loopy world [of Schitt’s Creek] was a truly wonderful loopy world to be in,” Murphy told reporters, including etalk. “I loved every minute [but] after Schitt's Creek I was so worried that I was going to get stuck in this blonde loopy land. I really wanted to do something significantly different.”

A homicidal woman intent on giving sitcoms the finger is definitely different, but Murphy also revealed that the show was a chance to do so many opposite things onscreen than what she already got to do on the Emmy-winning Canadian series that fans everywhere are still swooning over. “Kevin Can F**k Himself [is] like an absolute 180. I get to do things like kick over a garbage can angrily, and fry an egg angrily. And, you know, do cocaine in an alleyway angrily,” she added. “These are all just such opposite things from what I was doing in Schitt's Creek. So, it felt like exactly the right thing to do.”

Series creator Valerie Armstrong had been mulling over the idea for the show for a long while, since before the #MeToo movement even hit Hollywood. “I wrote it three and half years ago, and I’ve been waiting for it to get less relevant,” she added. “I think stories about women being overlooked are sadly going to be relevant for a while, and it’s going to connect deeply with people for a long time.”

Murphy, who has never done a traditional sitcom before, agrees. “I have seen Allison in so many women in my life, to varying degrees,” she said. “She has just absorbed so much frustration and so much anger and pushed it down and pushed it down, because that’s what you’re supposed to do as a woman. She has put up with so much of the world around her and just kind of smiled through it. I truly think that so many women are going to be able to identify and see themselves in this character.”

Kevin Can F**k Himself debuts this summer.

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[video_embed id='2141643']BEFORE YOU GO: Emma Stone transforms into Cruella de Vil in first ‘Cruella’ trailer[/video_embed]