Lots to Love About Sophia Black-D’Elia and ‘Single Drunk Female’

Single Drunk Female Freeform © 2021 Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved. Credit: Koury Angelo

Freeform introduces the charming and heartfelt dramedy Single Drunk Female (Thursdays at 10/9c beginning Jan. 20, next day on Hulu) starring Sofia Black-D’Elia in the lead as 20-something alcoholic Samantha Fink, whose only chance to avoid jail time is to sober up and move back home with her overbearing mother (played by Ally Sheedy).

“I had one bad day that turned into a Class A misdemeanor [aka reckless assault],” tells 28-year-old alcoholic Samantha “Sam” Fink to her probation officer in the pilot. That drunken workplace meltdown almost blinded her coworker and definitely solidified her termination from a New York media company. The series is based on writer Simone Finch’s real life and is equally cringy (you want Sam so badly to stay sober) and laugh-out-loud funny (her supporting friends and family are precious).

“Simone did such a beautiful job of exploring the mother/daughter dynamic in a really real way with all of its complexities. We often think of these addiction stories as, as soon as you say you have a problem, everybody comes running to your aid,” Black-D’Elia adds. “But the truth is that a lot of people who suffer from addiction have been @#$%heads to a lot of the people in their lives for a long time, and forgiveness isn’t always that easy.”

At its core, the series gives an honest look at the struggles of alcoholism, dysfunctional families and friendship. It’s a must add to your watch list!

Here we caught up with the former Gossip Girl star to learn more as she answered our “5 Questions.”

1. Your character Sam is charming yet cringy to watch [she’s made a lot of bad choices]. What was your initial reaction to her when you read the script? I felt like I knew her. I felt like she was in my life already, and very familiar to me, and grounded but funny. And I didn’t feel like she fit into any one specific box that I often read in female characters of that age. She was a lot of things at once, which I was pretty excited by.

2. Was it hard to channel your inner drunkenness?  No, kind of freeing, kind of fun. My main concern was that it didn’t feel like a pretty, polished, TV drunk. I felt like this was a girl who really takes it too far, and you should feel that when you watch it. I didn’t want people to feel like, ‘Oh, she’s kind of fine when she’s drunk, and it’s normal and cute or whatever.”

3. There’s such an emotional level to this series. There’s a scene when your character is talking to your TV mom (Ally Sheedy) and she explains alcoholism as a disease. My heart sunk for her in that scene. What was going on there? This character and this story is based on Simone Finch’s real life, who wrote the pilot. And I think she did such a beautiful job of exploring the mother/daughter dynamic in a really real way with all of its complexities. And I think we often think of these addiction stories as, as soon as you say you have a problem, everybody comes running to your aid. But the truth is that a lot of people who suffer from addiction have been @#$%heads to a lot of the people in their lives for a long time, and forgiveness isn’t always that easy. I was really happy that the script didn’t shy away from that, and specifically the scenes with Ally and I, I think, get maybe a little bit darker and gnarlier than you might imagine them to be.

4. When you were growing up [in New Jersey], what did you love watching on TV?  I loved watching Seinfeld, a lot. I loved watching The West Wing with my parents, and The Sopranos, of course.

5. Tell us about a time when you were starstruck, and when a fan was starstruck with you.  I almost literally ran into Jack White at a hotel once and I was not able to speak. I had a really fun encounter with a young gal who was super excited to take a picture of me. And she was shaking, near tears, and I thought, “Well, no one’s ever had this reaction to me before. I can’t really believe this is happening.” And as she walked away, I heard her say to her friend, “I can’t believe I got a picture with Selena Gomez.” That was my favorite.