By Kenneth Pastushyn
When Canadian character-actor Sarah Booth isn’t playing bad-girl/tough-girl roles, she’s playing a victim.
In the upcoming second season of the CBC Gem TV series Plan B, she plays both a victim evolving into a strong woman in a dramatic role.
It’s quite the contrast for Booth, 37, playing what is described in a press release as a “cooky Quebecois rookie-cop” in the Amazon Prime series mystery Three Pines starring Alfred Molina.
On NBC’s Law & Order: Special Victims Unit opposite Mariksa Hargitay, Booth’s character was a rugged Army Ranger as a tough-girl role in one episode. The filming took place in New York.
In Los Angeles as a side-job, Booth was a stunt woman at the Universal Studio’s Hollywood Water World Stunt Show attraction “kicking a lot of butts” in various fight scenes. Other tough-girl/bad-girl roles were on Star Trek: Discovery, SWAT, and American Horror Story.
Fifty-two acting credits to date according to The Movie Database.
After living in L.A. for seven years, Booth and her filmmaker husband Gavin Michael Booth, originally from Amherstburg, returned to Canada. They made the horror movie Scarehouse (distributed by Universal) where she co-wrote the script and played yet another bad girl. For her, the fun part was the makeup, special effects and the stunts.
In a more dramatic role, Sarah co-starred with Daved Wilkens who wrote and produced the 2019 suicide hot-line thriller Last Call with Gavin as the director. It sold out at the Chinese Theatre in Hollywood and became a hit on the independent film festival circuit.
Earlier this summer, Last Call was shown as part of a tribute to local filmmakers for the Windsor International Film Festival’s 20th anniversary events at the Capitol Theatre. While
in 2022, Sarah won the Montreal ACTRA (Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and
Radio Artists) Award in the Outstanding Onscreen Performance – Feminine category for her role in Last Call.
Sarah grew up on a farm in Ormstown, Quebec bordering near upstate New York – and if
there is anything she loves as much as acting – its horseback riding. It was a dream come true appearing in an episode of CBC’s Heartland. Other Canadian credits include Murdoch Mysteries on CBC and Hudson and Rex on CityTV.
Recently she returned to one of Last Call’s filming locations – the St. Clair College MediaPlex’s school of journalism – for a sit-down interview with the LaSalle Post/Lakeshore News/Tilbury Times about her role in Plan B which was filmed in Montreal. (This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.)
Talk about the new series?
So, the new series that I’m in is called Plan B and it’s the second season of the English version. Each season is its own season with different characters, but the entire series is that there is a mysterious agency, Plan B, that you can call which can take you back in time and change something if you made a mistake in life.
What is your role in the show?
I play Keri who is the wife of what we would describe as the bad guy and basically the show this season is about a police officer played by Vinessa Antoine who is a fantastic actress. She answers a domestic violence call. Her and her partner talk to me, talk to my husband, we don’t want any charges to be laid and they leave the scene. Later, they hear about a horrific tragedy that happened to me and my husband and Mia, who is the main police officer decides she must go back in time and change what happened.
What is it like working on the series?
It’s fantastic. When your part of an entire series or a season of a series, its really fun because you become very close with everyone. Your there for a few months together and you just go through this experience in a different way, and I feel as an actor I also become a lot more comfortable playing my role.
Any particular challenges?
For this show the subject matter was really heavy. Its about domestic violence. There is a lot of mental health issues in what the main character goes through. So, I feel like some days you’ll shoot a scene that’s really emotional or hard to do, but what was really nice and helped you get through it was the crew and technicians on the set. I just find the people in Montreal who work behind the camera are always keeping everything light and fun. That kind of helps us get through those difficult days.
What’s next for you?
I worked on a couple of projects this spring and I have a movie of the week coming out this fall. I also worked on a series in one episode for Fox. The show will come out in the fall and I’m in the later part of the year. It’s called Doc and stars Molly Parker who is Canadian.
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