‘Palm Royale’: Kristen Wiig, Ricky Martin & More Weigh in on Finale Twists
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Palm Royale Season 1 finale, “Maxine Throws a Party.”]
Palm Royale‘s Beach Ball arrived in the Season 1 finale and delivered more than one explosive cliffhanger surrounding Maxine (Kristen Wiig), Norma (Carol Burnett), and their complicated societal entanglements.
After spending most of the season preparing to throw the annual event, Maxine’s world was blown apart with the revelation that her husband Douglas (Josh Lucas) had cheated on her with manicurist Mitzi (Kaia Gerber), resulting in a pregnancy. The metaphorical bomb was dropped just seconds before Maxine took to the stage to deliver her performance of “Is That All There Is?” which soon turned into a monologue about her observations on life.
At the same time, viewers learn that Norma, Douglas’s wealthy aunt, isn’t in fact a Dellacort, and seemingly murdered her former boarding school classmate, assuming her identity and inheritance. How do we know this? Robert (Ricky Martin) has a conversation with one of her old acquaintances and learns that Norma’s roommate at boarding school, Agnes, was a diabetic and found dead at the bottom of the stairs on the property years back.
Apple TV+
Putting the pieces together having been Norma’s caretaker, Robert calls her out on the hidden identity amid Maxine’s performance. But with that power of the secret comes a crushing blow as Robert becomes an unintended shooting target. Radicalized by the feminist activists, Mary (Julia Duffy) attempts to shoot Nixon, who is in attendance at the Beach Ball, but Linda’s (Laura Dern) interference pushes the gun in another direction, hitting Robert.
Needless to say, a lot was going on in the episode’s final moments, leading us to wonder, “Is that all there is?” The stars certainly hope not. “That cannot be my end. That cannot be it for me!” Martin tells TV Insider.
“You’ll have to ask Apple,” Wiig confirms. But as Lucas puts it, “I know that even Carol Burnett said the other day during an interview, she’s like, ‘We so want to go back and do more.'”
Martin echoes this sentiment, adding, “She said, ‘I’m not retiring.'”
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For Gerber, wrapping Season 1 was emotional. “I really didn’t want it to end,” she tells TV Insider. “We wrapped the show and I cried. I was like, ‘What do I do with myself now? I want to go hang out with all my pals again.'”
“We all want a second season, which is nice. And when Carol Burnett literally asks for something, you want to say yes, don’t you?” says Mindy Cohn, who plays Shiny Sheet reporter Ann Holiday. “You dream [of working] with people who elevate your game and who you can surprise. That happened on a daily basis. We all really enjoyed working and creating these fantastical characters with each other.”
As for what could be next following that cliffhanger, Martin says, “I don’t know, [but] the fact that we’re working with such amazing writers, they just keep bringing so many wonderful things to the story. Any direction we go, it’s going to be [impactful], I think.”
The series may be an ensemble project, but Wiig arguably did a lot of the finale’s heavy lifting with her emotional monologue as Maxine becomes aware of her husband’s infidelity onstage. The process was rather lengthy as Wiig shares, “We shot [the Beach Ball] for a week or two, but I feel like the monologue was maybe one day… but it was a long day because it was exhausting emotionally.”
“As an actor, I felt like it was something that I was scared to do,” Wiig admits, but it was the support of her costars that made her feel comfortable. Adding in Robert’s potential demise “made me even more emotional, if that makes sense, because it’s Ricky,” Wiig lamented.
Norma’s secret identity means that Douglas is the true heir to the Dellacort fortune. Could that mean something more moving forward? Only time will tell, but with a baby in the mix amid Mitzi’s pregnancy, there’s certainly a lot to consider regarding potential Season 2 storylines.
“He’s a mess,” Lucas admits of his character. “Even though Douglas is truly the heir to it all, I think that if we do get a second season, that will be what’s so much fun to explore.”
As for Mitzi’s future, Gerber says, “I have no idea what is in store. I just knew that [I] wanted to give Kristen a hug after filming the finale, and I would hope that with the beautiful relationship that [Mitzi and Maxine have] built, that there’s some kind of conversation. I just hate to see women being turned on each other like that.”
What did you think of the finale’s twists and turns? Let us know in the comments section, below, and let us know if you want to see a second season of the dramedy.
Palm Royale, Season 1, Streaming now, Apple TV+
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