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Ariel Winter has spent a good chunk of her career growing up in front of America, but these days, she’s finding that some of her most interesting characters don’t have to grow up at all. The Modern Family alum is back as the voice of Sabrina Grimm in Season 2 of Apple TV’s The Sisters Grimm, an animated fantasy series based on Michael Buckley’s bestselling books. The show follows two sisters navigating a world where fairy tales are real, their parents have mysteriously vanished, and happily ever after isn’t exactly guaranteed. Winter spoke with Kyle Meredith about finding the show’s emotional center beneath all the magic, embracing Sabrina’s gloriously bad attitude, and returning to another beloved animated character with Disney+’s Sofia the First: Royal Magic. Listen above or wherever you get your podcasts.
For Winter, Sabrina’s cynicism isn’t something she had to manufacture in a recording booth. “I think I am a little bit more similar to Sabrina in the sarcasm and the snark and maybe the cynicism,” she laughs. “It came pretty naturally to me.” Finding the character’s voice was similarly uncomplicated. Winter essentially reached back to her younger self and pitched her natural voice up slightly. But beneath the wisecracks and supernatural chaos, she sees something deeper in the series. “The fact that they’re essentially foster kids, their parents have gone missing. That is something that I feel like we don’t have a lot of height on in media,” she explains. And while the fantasy elements might get viewers through the door, it’s the family dynamics that keep them there: “Just two sisters getting the job done. I love that.”
Meanwhile, Winter has become something of an accidental ambassador for animated fantasy, with fans of Sofia the First discovering her work in the considerably darker world of The Sisters Grimm. It’s a strange kind of immortality, playing characters who remain forever young. “It’s me, but it’s not me,” she says of watching her animated performances. “Whereas I watch something else where I’m on camera and I’m like, ‘Oh, no, that’s me.’” There’s also something wonderfully liberating about the prospect of revisiting these characters indefinitely. “It’s something that I could do forever,” she says. “If we wanted to do 100 seasons of the show, we could.” Of course, she quickly acknowledges that a century’s worth of television might present some logistical problems involving her own mortality. But that’s the beauty of animation. Sabrina Grimm can keep solving mysteries, throwing shade, and refusing to age a single day, even if the rest of us aren’t quite so lucky.
Listen to Ariel Winter talk about The Sisters Grimm Season 2, Sofia the First: Royal Magic, and more in the new episode above or by watching the video below. Keep up on all the latest episodes by following Kyle Meredith With… on your favorite podcast platform; plus, check out all the series on the Consequence Podcast Network.