In order for Cinemax's Banshee to work, it needs an actress like Ivana Milicevic. She's a full throttle performer. There isn't a cute or polite way to put this. Milicevic, a Croatian-born actress raised in the United States coming in at 5 foot 9 and weighing in at "not your business", is intense. When you see her throw a punch on the show, she looks like she is bringing down the fury of a thousand suns down upon that person. It's an all in performance that is known around the land of television as "The Banshee Way".
When the show premiered back in 2013, nobody had a clue what it would turn into. As it it closes out its fourth season with the final two episodes this month, it's interesting to look back at the grit that started it out. A show like this requires a certain amount of buy in from the cast and the crew, and Milicevic felt that effort come full circle in the first season.
"During the first season we were doing everything handheld. When we were running, they were running with us with cameras on their backs. I don’t know of another show that is this tiring. We don’t have the time to do many takes. We have a couple cameras. There’s no sitting around on this show," Milicevic told me back in 2015 before the third season started up.
Milicevic had a series of small roles before Greg Yaitanes(Executive Producer/Director) casted her as Carrie Hopewell aka Anastasia. A former thief who grew up under the watchful eye of her crime boss father(Ben Cross's unforgettable Rabbit) and fell in love with Antony Starr's fellow criminal. It is the first role that Milicevic made her own after only a handful of episodes. Banshee requires a certain physicality that contains grit and more importantly, truth.
Unlike your run of the mill network show, the good guys don't always win after a brief tussle. They don't get hit six times and show no bruising. Banshee exists in a heightened reality but it throws a blanket of vulnerability over its action. Milicevic's true value came front and center in Season 1's brutal fight to the death with Christos Vasilopoulos's Olek. An entire room was destroyed, faces were broke open, and a newfound love for the series was born.
Milicevic was the highlight of that melee. There was a blend of rabid torture, bloody lust, and an adrenaline going through Carrie right there. She wasn't just channeling Ana. She was literally fighting off the urge to let Ana take over her completely. A true virtuoso performance.
The more subtle parts of her work on the show are also appreciated and frequently on display. The slow painful nod to Lucas in "The Truth About Unicorns" for him to finish off an assassin sent to kill them. The slow collapse of her face when she saw her beloved Gordon(Rus Blackwell) fall at the end of Season 3. She mixes the slow boils with the fast rages better than most actresses on network or premium television.
However, the best parts Milicevic shares on Banshee are the ones she shares with Starr. The New Zealand bred actor didn't get much American television exposure before Banshee, but like his female cohort, he has dug inside this role of Lucas Hood and slept inside the body of this character for four straight years. Methodic Doubt's melancholy score always awakens when they share a peaceful if heartbreaking moment of violent inevitability.
Take last Friday's episode for instance. Their daughter Deva nearly gets killed and the first thing Lucas wants to do is blame Carrie. After a fierce exchange of words, he just pulls her into his arms and she just lets go. This came after another brutal hand to hand combat scene with another femme fatale in Ana Ayora's Deputy Nina Cruz. Inside one episode, #36 of the series, Milicevic found a new way to blow my mind. That's a common occurrence with this show.
Who can't love the sight of Milicevic picking up a flame thrower and dousing a truck full of drugs in flames? Carrie has taken on a new role of vigilante in Season 4. It's almost as if she is refusing to be Carrie Hopewell or Anastasia. She has found a middle ground between the two lives she took part in. Unlike the Mother of Dragons on HBO's Game of Thrones, she brings the fire on a torch attached to her leather jacket.
Did I mention Ivana is gorgeous and makes men and women alike want her? Keep that in mind folks as you decide what to do with your remote this weekend.
After all, Banshee is a 52 minute weekly film that is shown on TV. Its storylines are laced with cinematic dynamite. It's not your normal sitcom or series. More like a series of bad decision by its characters that lead to wonderfully insane entertainment for its viewers, which have grown over the years from casual to addict like. It's a ruggedly brutal action packed pulpy novel of love lost and dreams shattered. Milicevic is a big reason the show works. She is just one of the bold strokes that co-creator Jonathan Tropper works throughout his masterpiece.
Wherever she goes from here, I'll be watching. So should you. She's adept at action, romance, and drama. She feels you hurt for the characters she plays on screen. Go back and watch the pilot. 35 hours later, you'll feel like Milicevic has played this woman her whole life.
When she retires Carrie Hopewell/Ana on Banshee next week, I'll be sad yet assured. A series ending doesn't mean it can't be appreciated for decades. There's someone out there that doesn't know how good this show is. Someone out there hasn't truly discovered Cinemax's gold mine.
Someone out there doesn't know how dominant of an actress Ivana Milicevic is. Not yet. Stop waiting and plug into Banshee. Forget the Red Bull or Monster. Cook a steak, grab a bottle of whiskey and let this show slam into you like one of Milicevic's fierce right hooks. She's the real deal.
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