“Guerrilla” may have wrapped up Sunday night on Showtime, but Freida Pinto sees endless life in the tale it tells.
The series, set in London in the 1970s, chronicles the story of a couple whose passion for political activism evolves into something deeper and darker after the death of a friend at the hands of police.
Pinto plays one half of that couple — a woman named Jas who is overcome with anger and frustration by the racial and social injustices of the time.
She stars alongside Babou Ceesay, who plays Jas’s boyfriend Marcus, and Idris Elba, who as Jas’s ex Kent.
“Learning more about the historical part of the British Black [Power] movement, made me think of exactly what [executive producer] John Ridley was saying — that this may have happened in the ’70s but history keeps repeating itself over and over again, and it seems like we don’t learn much from it,” Pinto told CNN in a recent interview.
The 6-part series concluded with the kind of introspective finale that one has come to expect from the deft hand of Ridley, also creator of ABC’s acclaimed “American Crime.”
“I was really proud to be part of this project, in a way to distance people from what is happening right now and take them back to a time and show them how this has not changed,” Pinto said. “We’re still somewhat stuck in the same rut. We keep making a little bit of progress, but fundamentally we keep faltering at the same point over and over again.”
Like he did with “American Crime,” Ridley used “Guerrilla” to give voices to those who are little heard from, polarizing as they may sometimes be.
Pinto found herself confronting some hard truths in playing the character, with whom she said she didn’t always agree.
“In playing [Jas], you ask yourself this question over and over again, ‘How much is too much before the lid blows off?'” she said. “That’s what struck me about Jas. She’s at the tip, she’s being pushed over the edge over and over again by history, by politics, but also what’s happening within her group.”
The show faced some controversy at its start when Ridley was criticized for not showcasing a black woman at the front of the story.
Ridley responded emotionally when faced with the question, but stood by his decision.
Pinto pointed out that the movement was “an all-inclusive struggle for not just black Brits.”
In all, she thinks every character and point of view featured in the series was important to the story they told.
“A lot of things that John brought in the script felt like voices of today, voices of 2017,” Pinto said.
“Guerrilla” is now available on Showtime.