Kush Jumbo may be best known for her work as Luca on “The Good Wife” and its spinoff series “The Good Fight,” but now she’s heading beyond acting.
Jumbo made her debut as a podcast host earlier this month with the launch of “Origins with Cush Jumbo,” a Sony production. Each episode features Jumbo interviewing a boldfaced person about three experiences that have had a significant impact on their lives.
Her first guest was Anna Wintour. “I emailed her and said, ‘I’m going to do a podcast about really inspiring people that I love, who are wobbly, wobbly, original stories,’” Jumbo told me on the “Just for Variety” podcast this week. “I’m not doing a podcast about my career path. I’m not doing a podcast about how I got there and how you can get there, too. You’d be surprised by this person’s origin stories and how they make sense now when you look at them.”
Additional guests include “Bridgerton” star Golda Rosheuvel and actress and model Poppy Delevingne. Also on the guest list is Jumbo’s “Good Wife” co-star Julianna Margulies. “Jules has become one of my best friends since we worked together,” says Jumbo, who currently stars in the Apple TV+ series “Criminal Record” with Peter Capaldi. “We only did it together last season, but we really bonded on the show. She’s been a great mentor and inspiration to me in a lot of ways. I think I’ve learned a lot about taking care of people, being a leader, things like that.”
Jumbo says she didn’t ask Margolis about the backlash she’s received recently for comments she made about the war between Israel and Hamas, which critics have called racist and transphobic. “It’s not in my best interest to ask anyone to come in and feel uncomfortable,” she says. “It never crossed my mind. Personally, I didn’t feel like asking that question in the interrogation, because I know Juliana so well. I know her heart. I know who she is. I know what the misunderstanding is. I know the context. So it wasn’t interesting to me, to be honest.”
Kosh Jumbo with Anna Wintour.
Jumbo also revealed that it took her some time to get over the ending of “The Good Fight” because the COVID-19 pandemic brought an unexpected end to the cast and crew’s filming together. “I did one last episode, but it was in London,” Jumbo recalled, breaking down in tears. “The same day they told us to leave the set, they said, ‘You’ll be back in three weeks.’ I never came back. I actually went back to pack up and leave. And I really struggled with that for a while because I spent years with this woman. I had a standing desk with her stuff. I knew where all her pens were. I knew where she worked. I knew where her clothes were. I lived in that building. I had my son there. I was pregnant like her. And then within 20 minutes, it was gone. I actually felt like I had abandoned her in the building for a while. It still makes me really upset.”
The pain was so intense that she never considered playing Luca again. To move on, Jumbo wrote Luca a letter and watched the entire series of “The Good Fight,” which she didn’t have time to do while filming the show. “I think I would love to do it with Jules again,” she says now. “I would love to have Alicia and Luca back together.”
You can listen to the full interview with Jumbo above or find “Just for Variety” wherever you download your favorite podcasts.
