Robin Weigert Feels the Power of Love and Family in ‘We Were the Lucky Ones’

Robin Weigert, 54, felt the power of history, family and especially love while making the new Hulu miniseries We Were the Lucky Ones. The series is based on Georgia Hunter’s bestselling 2017 novel of the same name, which was inspired by the true Holocaust experiences of her family in Poland, where 90 percent of Jewish people were killed (including all but 300 of the 30,000 Jewish people in her family’s village of Radom). Weigert, who earned an Emmy nomination for her performance as Calamity Jane in Deadwood and played the motorcycle gang’s lawyer in Sons of Anarchy and Nicole Kidman’s therapist in Big Little Lies, portrays matriarch Nechuma Kurc, who endures the heartbreak of watching as, one by one, her five children flee or go missing as the war unfolds.

​Weigert spoke with AARP about how making We Were the Lucky Ones enriched and deepened her understanding of life and love, and her own Jewish heritage.

(Left to right) Lior Ashkenazi and Robin Weigert in "We Were the Lucky Ones."

Vlad Cioplea/Hulu

​Family heirlooms opened up connections between cast members and Hunter

​Weigert may not have met Hunter’s relatives, but she says their presence was deeply felt during filming. “Georgia came with a lot of artifacts from her family,” says Weigert. “There were pictures and things to touch and relate to on the table. That had its own magic for us all, I think.” For her part, Weigert used a necklace in a Passover scene that belonged to her own mother’s mother. “There were little pieces that the cast brought in that were from our own stories, our own lives,” she says. “I think what you’re seeing is a bit of a tapestry of our families and Georgia’s.”

​Weigert inhabited memories of her own ancestors to connect to the role

​Like the resonance from family heirlooms, the memories of her own ancestors brought depth and meaning to Weigert’s portrayal. “I had such a fondness for my maternal grandfather, who lived to be nearly 100,” she says. “His mother, Sophia, is someone I thought about when accessing Nechuma, because she was a Polish Jewish woman with four children, and she made beautiful things with her hands — doilies and other things that my grandfather had.”

Robin Weigert as Calamity Jane in "Deadwood."

HBO/Everett Collection

​That sense of family took hold of the cast and remains even after filming

​Weigert and her fellow actors formed close bonds while making the series. “I remember having a very familial feeling with the cast of Deadwood as well,” she says. “I have a similar feeling that these people will always be in my life, even though we’re so far-flung – a third of the cast from Tel Aviv, a third from London, a third from Los Angeles. The chances of all of us being together in one place are going to be few and far between. But in this group chat that seems to be continuing, I can feel us all reaching for each other and dreaming of a time when we might be together again. It’s very beautiful.”