Octavia Spencer on Ride or Die, Never Reading Ahead and the Sisters Who Keep Her Grounded

Octavia Spencer doesn't read ahead. When she signed on to play Debbie Claybourne in Prime Video's Ride or Die, the Oscar winner learned each script only the week before she shot it, and she skipped scenes her character wasn't in. If Debbie didn't know something, neither did Spencer.

"I only want to know what the character knows at the moment," Spencer told me. "If I didn't know it, I found it out on screen."

In Ride or Die, which Spencer also executive produces, Debbie learns that her best friend, Judith Burton (Hannah Waddingham), is an international assassin. When a hit goes wrong, the two end up on the run across Europe. I sat down with Spencer to talk about Debbie, her chemistry with Waddingham and the women who keep her grounded.

Who Debbie is when everything falls apart

Debbie is good at managing her household, her husband and the law. On the run, Spencer wanted her to hold on to something deeper.

"I wanted her to be good at being true to who she is," she said. "Because once all those principles go out the window, then so does your soul."

That makes Judith's secret hard to live with. "Reconciling the fact that Judith killed people for a living was something very difficult for Debbie," Spencer said.

The chemistry? "That is the job."

Fans keep talking about the friendship between Spencer and Waddingham on screen. So I asked what the two did to build it. Spencer's answer was quick: "Nothing."

"I love that you guys love the chemistry so much, but I think that is the job," she said. "She is a brilliant actress. I think I'm a pretty brilliant actress."

With Waddingham living across the ocean, there wasn't much time to bond. They had lunch when Waddingham visited the U.S., and a massage together in New York. "But that doesn't a 20-year friendship build," Spencer said. "I think what you saw is two people who really, really understood the characters and wanted to have fun working together."

No crystal ball

I told Spencer how much it meant, as a woman over 50, to see two women our age at the center of an action comedy, and to see a Black woman on screen who gets to be messy instead of perfect. She connected that freedom to how she plays every role: in the moment, without the answers.

"If we had a crystal ball and we knew all the answers, then we would not have any problems and nothing to solve," she said. "Whenever I approach a role, I have to deal with the circumstances at hand."

Five sisters and a chosen family

Ride or Die is, at heart, about friendship, so I closed by asking what Spencer loves most about her own girlfriends at this stage of life.

"I was born into a community of girlfriends. I have five sisters," she said. "Each one has a strength that the other doesn't have when it comes to what I need, and I can laugh and talk with them at any time."

Then there are the friends she chose. "We're all going through something. Everyone that you know is enduring something," she said. "The fact that you can just pick up the phone, the fact that there is no judgment, that's what we want. That unconditional love that you have with your friends is the blood bond that you have with your siblings. And I'm grateful that I have both."

Ride or Die is streaming now on Prime Video.