The Testaments took a big swing with a shocking death right before the season finale.
During the Wednesday, May 20, episode of the Hulu show, Agnes (Chase Infiniti) opened up to Becka (Mattea Conforti) about how her friend’s father was secretly assaulting girls who came to him for dental treatments. Becka was so upset by the revelation that she murdered her father, came to Agnes’ house and was ultimately taken away by the Eyes.
“I remember having a lot of conversations about how I should go about the lead up and that is the kind of switch that Becka goes through mentally,” Conforti, 19, exclusively told Us Weekly.
Conforti broke down how she approached the sequence, adding, “The way that I interpreted it is that she has been involved in this world where she has been told that she doesn’t belong here because she feels differently. She doesn’t want to get married, and she should be excited about all of these things, but she’s not. When she finds out this news … she’s been told her whole life that men who do this deserve to be killed. They deserve to be punished.”
The actress saw the moment as a “divine calling of reasoning and righteousness.”
“It’s an act of justice for her, if you will,” Conforti explained. “She’s thinking, ‘This is my moment. This is my time to prove why I belong in this world and how I fit in.’ So she thinks she’s doing the right thing.”
She continued: “And there is also Agnes. She loves Agnes, and she’s protecting her. This is where her loyalty lies. So there’s a lot of things that she thinks that she’s doing right — and maybe even eventually beat the system of not having to get married because she’s committing this act. But it doesn’t work out that way.”
Before diving into the second half of the season, Conforti built out Becka’s backstory.
“Her family life and household and lifestyle — in that sense — differs a lot from the other girls. Her father isn’t a very powerful commander. He’s actually just a dentist. So she doesn’t feel like — at least in the way that I interpret it — there’s a sense of formality that she needs to uphold in her house constantly,” she noted. “She doesn’t really need to watch her words or reveal too much about what she’s nervous about in terms of marriage and meeting these older commanders. That is all because her father isn’t necessarily surrounded by that all the time.”
Becka’s supportive household is what makes her decision that much more surprising.
“She has had more of a free space to be herself and let her guard down when she’s home,” she continued. “I think that’s what also makes finding this news so heartbreaking and earth-shattering for her is because her father was in this role that a lot of other fathers can’t be to their children.”
It was important for Conforti to invest in who Becka is, telling Us, “She is a super, very complex character. She has a lot of layers to her. … She’s a character that I feel like a lot of audience members can find themselves in. I really wanted to do due diligence to make sure that I’m accurately portraying a character that can resonate with a lot of our viewers.”
The Testaments airs Wednesdays on Hulu.
