Emily Browning said she’s not worried about people comparing her new show “Class of 07” to the Showtime hit, “Yellowjackets.”
“That’s fine by me,” Browning, 34, told The Post. “Because it’s not like you watch one and you don’t need to watch the other. If you watch ‘Yellowjackets,’ this is like the sort of lighter, warmer companion piece. Less scary and spooky and murder-y.”
Now streaming (Prime Video), “Class of 07” is a half hour comedy set in Australia, following Zoe, (Browning), who has been living off the grid after she’s embarrassed on national television – in a dating-show mishap that goes viral online.
During her time living in isolation, she sees a warning that an apocalyptic wave is coming to flood everything. While fleeing to higher ground, she unknowingly stumbles on her ten-year high school reunion, where she sees her estranged best friend Amelia (Megan Smart) and former mean girl classmate Saskia (Caitlin Stasey, “Please Like Me”). Zoe joins the party instead of adequately warning everyone about the impending wave, which angers all of the women when disaster hits.
Together, the former peers work to find a new way of life at their old high school, in a “Lord of the Flies” type of environment.
Zoe (Emily Browning) and Amelia (Megan Smart) in “Class of 07.” ©Amazon/Courtesy Everett Collection
Zoe unknowingly stumbles in on her ten-year high school reunion, where she sees her estranged best friend Amelia (Megan Smart) ©Amazon/Courtesy Everett CollectionBrowning has done a wide range of drama projects, including “Sucker Punch,” “The Uninvited,” “Legend” and “American Gods,” but this show marks her first foray into comedy.
“I had to do a solid week of improv games and comedy boot camp, in order to learn how to loosen up, because I’m used to doing drama,” she said. “I’m usually quite contained in my performances, and I had to let go of that completely.
“Just reading that opening scene, I automatically was like, ‘I’ve never done a role like this before, I want to just completely embarrass myself, and do something outside of my comfort zone.’ I was excited at the idea of doing comedy. I was just trying to bring out the most awkward, embarrassing version of myself. Zoe is definitely in me.”
Caitlin Stasey plays former mean girl classmate Saskia in “Class of 07.” ©Amazon/Courtesy Everett Collection
Zoe (Emily Browning) with Sana’a Shaik in “Class of 07.” ©Amazon/Courtesy Everett Collection Even though “Class of 07” deals with natural disaster and dystopian themes, it’s focused on the relationships between the former classmates who have years of resentment and grievances with each other.
“It’s really exciting to have these big epic stories that do concern the whole world, but then just watching the interactions between a select group of people and how they handle it. It can be a bit hard to process it, but this is a very contained story. It’s about the end of the world in a big umbrella sense, but it’s about how we handle it. This has a sci fi element to it, because its apocalyptic,” Stasey, 32, told The Post.
“The thing I think our show most closely resembles is ‘Orange is the New Black.’ It’s a comedy set in a high stakes environment, but it’s really about relationships. And all those apocalyptic shows that we’re seeing are well constructed, but they’re dramatic, for the most part. There’s a grittines sand sadness to it. This is pretty much joyful, even given the circumstances.”
