Sara Waisglass on Max’s season of change in Ginny and Georgia S3

There’s a scene towards the end of Ginny and Georgia season three, where we are invited into Maxine’s internal monologue. It’s a rapid firing of a million thoughts and questions at once – her battery is low, the chicken needs to go in the oven, do her friends hate her? Is her brother an alcoholic? Wait, she has homework to do? It’s a relatable moment, and one that Sara Waisglass is finding herself experiencing more and more after four years of playing Maxine [Max for short] Baker. “If I’m with my mum shopping, we’ll be like, ‘Oh, that shirt is so Max. Or, like, these trousers are so Max. Or, I’ll do a mannerism, and my mum will say, ‘that is completely Max’, which is fun. She pops out at many different moments,” Sara laughs. “If I’m going into a room with people I don’t know, or even doing this interview, I’m going to be honest, some part of me channels her. Her confidence comes out. I think that’s the thing I love most about her, her energy. It’s a very infectious and loving thing.”

After spending just half an hour with Sara, chatting over Zoom, it’s clear to see Max’s warm infectious energy is most definitely a Sara thing, too. It’s early in the morning when I call the 26-year-old in her native Toronto. She’s a few minutes late and apologises profusely before gushing about how content she’s feeling. “I’m great. I’m super. I’m actually so happy these days.”

She’s got a lot to be happy about right now. Her long distance boyfriend just arrived into the city and the couple plan to spend a few days together. “We’re going to go and look for outfits for him”, before travelling to Los Angeles for a full run of Ginny & Georgia press.

Netflix’s hit drama series Ginny & Georgia returned yesterday for its third season after two years away. Telling the story of a mother and her teenage daughter, the series which debuted in 2021, has had 967.2 million hours viewed across both seasons, and is sure to only explode with the release of its third season. The new series sees Georgia (Brianne Howey) arrested and facing trial for the murder of her neighbour’s husband. Meanwhile her daughter Ginny (Antonia Gentry) must deal with the fallout of her mum’s crimes and a new romance, all while trying to balance her friendship group. Sara plays Ginny’s best friend Max – a loud, outgoing, big-hearted girl with a passion for drama, both on and off the stage.

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‘Half a nepo baby’

Sara’s career began long before Max, though. At just six years old she was booking commercials, following a Dove advert she appeared in thanks to her mother. “I consider myself half a nepo baby, because my mum was a producer, and she still is for commercials. They’re very different industries, but still, she was doing a Dove campaign and she needed real people and my mum was like, ‘Well, you’re shooting at my house you might as well use my daughter’. At the end of the day, the director came up to my mum and was like, ‘Your daughter’s pretty directable, you might want to consider getting her an agent.’”

Months later, Sara had booked the Disney Channel series Overruled! which she appeared in for three years. Does she feel like a typical Disney kid? “I wouldn’t say it was one of the hit [shows], but it was really fun, and it shot in Toronto, which was amazing, because I still got to stay here with my family. They just treated me so well, and I got to do such wacky stuff and really get comfortable on a set, which has served me so well over the years.”

She ended up taking a break after Overruled!, happy to have skipped her teenage years being caught on camera. “I got the awkward phase out of the way. I had braces, I had the bad haircuts, so it was a good time to quit.” Skip to a few years later, and she was helping a friend run lines when the acting bug caught her again. She began auditioning and landed the role of Frankie Hollingsworth in Degrassi: The Next Generation, which she appeared in for four years.

The timing worked out well again, as just as she wrapped on Degrassi, she started university, studying screenwriting at York University in Toronto. In her final year, she booked the role of Max.

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Playing the divisive character

Since the character burst onto our screens in 2021, she’s been both loved and hated by the show’s legions of fans. During the early episodes of season one, Max is the enigmatic, energetic and supportive friend of Ginny, but as the show progresses, the pair’s relationship becomes fractured, and in season two they have a full on falling out. That, along with Max’s occasionally selfish attitude, has caused the fans to turn on her, with many tweets and TikTok criticising the character.

While Sara says she personally didn’t experience much backlash, she admits it hurt for her to see her character treated in such a way. “Most people were able to separate it, which is cool, but I care about her so much, and I love her so much, and so seeing her get beaten up by people who don’t know her was tough,” she explains. “But, you know, I also say that that just means I’m doing my job well. And she was supposed to be a little bit of a naughty little demon in season two. She was supposed to be acting out and being dramatic, that was the whole point. And so people calling her ‘annoying and overreactive’. It’s like, yeah, she is annoying and overreactive, because 15 year old girls can be annoying and overreactive.”

Having watched the majority of season three by the time I chat to Sara, I can’t help but admire Max’s shift in the new season. There’s both a newfound vulnerability and a strength she didn’t have in the previous two seasons. “I think what’s cool about this season is that she has less of her own issues, but she’s really attentive to what Ginny is going through, what her brother [Marcus] is going through, and she just wants to be there for them. She just wants to be that light for them, which I think is really special and a beautiful side of Max that we haven’t really explored before,” she agrees.

But we also see Max struggle with her friendship group. While Abby and Ginny grow closer, and at points Norah is also brought into the fold, Max is often unintentionally left out of the group. In one scene, Ginny and Abby happen to both be at the same shop and send pictures to the group chat trying on dresses together. The pain in Max’s face receiving the photo is heartbreaking and instantly relatable. Watching in my late 20s, I was instantly transported back to that sting of teenage pain.

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“There’s more of that in the next five episodes, and I think that is actually one of the things I’m most proud [of], just because I think that is so extremely relatable for high school girls,” she reflects. “I remember having those moments and seeing everyone hang out [without you]. Or they would all be talking about a movie they went to see and I’d have to be like, ‘Okay, well, was it good?’ You try so hard to be cool about it, but it hurts and it’s a harsh thing that everyone goes through.”

It’s a season of change for many of the characters, including Max’s friend Abby (Katie Douglas), who begins exploring her sexuality, though not – to the disappointment of fans everywhere – with Max, but instead with skater girl Tris [Noah Lamanna]. “The fans have always put Abby and Max together. And I’ve always been down for that. I always think that’s so cool, but we always thought Abby was completely straight, and so it never seemed like a possibility,” she says. “But now that we’re kind of seeing Abby explore maybe a queer identity, it’s kind of on the table again, which is cool.” But before you start planning the edits, Sara clarifies this is not a confirmed storyline for season four just yet.

As for what is on the cards? “After this season, she ends in a weird place with her friends. And so I hope they can mend that. And I also hope that she can repair her relationship with Marcus,” she says.

Life beyond Max

Though her diary is 24/7 Ginny & Georgia right now, Sara can’t play a teenager forever. “A huge source of inspiration for me is Phoebe Waller Bridge,” she says about potential future prospects. “Her career and the content that she’s brought to the table has been extraordinary. Writing, starring and directing in my own piece of work would be the ultimate goal.”

She also cites Benito Skinner’s Overcompensating as a recent inspiration. “I always love people who write their own stuff and star in it, just because they understand the story in a way no one else does,” Sara explains. “I’ve worked on a couple films that were written and directed by the same people and when it’s the same person, it’s just very clear, and I love that, so directing might be something I would want to explore someday. I love what I do. I’m never leaving this industry, it really is the best job in the world, and I’m so lucky.”

And we’re oh so lucky to have her.

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