Actor Natalie Morales on the end of Roe: ‘I don’t want to sow divisiveness any more’

Comedy queen and director of Plan B talks about contraception, last year’s Dobbs decision and the importance of connection

It’s not yet noon in Portland when Natalie Morales repairs to a modest Airbnb and plops on to a couch next to a deep-slumbering lap hound named Taco, a very good dog. Morales is filming a feature about veterans with PTSD that’s only pressing on through the writers’ strike because it’s an independent film. Its small budget and tight schedule has Morales on call six days a week. But intense work schedules are nothing new for the 38-year-old multi-hyphenate dark comedy queen, whose deadpan acting credits run from Parks and Recreation to Santa Clarita Diet to The Morning Show. She also stars opposite Jennifer Lawrence in No Hard Feelings, which opened in theaters last weekend.

Two years ago, after marking her feature directorial debut with Language Lessons (a Zoom dramedy she stars in and wrote with Mark Duplass), Morales was behind the camera again for Plan B – the coming-of-age story about a sheltered high school girl who road trips across South Dakota with her slacker best friend in search of emergency contraception after a regrettable sexual encounter. The film, warmly received by critics, has taken on additional heft in the wake of the supreme court’s overturning Roe v Wade and putting contraceptive care under assault.