Rachel Brosnahan is best known for playing ’50s housewife turned stand-up comedian Midge Maisel on Amazon's The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, but IRL she's every bit the modern millennial woman. She grew up idolizing Lizzie McGuire and Avril Lavigne. She favors black nail polish over anything else. And she wishes more people would embrace the makeup-free selfie lifestyle.
Her new partnership with Cetaphil helps with that last one. "I love that it's gentle," says Brosnahan of Cetaphil's facial cleanser, which she started using in high school. "I have really sensitive skin—I have my entire life—and this doesn't irritate it. It's something I've always been able to rely on, even as I get older and my skin changes."
What other beauty tricks does Brosnahan swear by? Turns out a lot. Below, she answers Glamour's Big Beauty Questions. Find out the new hair tool she's loving, the beauty trend she'll never do, the color polish that instantly makes her feel like Midge, and more.
Glamour: OK, first thing—what's one beauty trend you love, but would never try?
Rachel Brosnahan: I can't say I love it without having ever tried it, but I've seen people swear by those vampire facials. I would never do that, but people look amazing after they have them. I'm fascinated by it—from a distance.
What’s a beauty trend you wish you had never tried?
Oh, the Avril Lavigne black eyeliner. I went through a real phase with that when I was, like, 12 years old. It was not a cute look for me.
So I assume you were a big Avril fan?
Oh, yes. I loved Avril. I tried to emulate her and Lizzie McGuire—and, I guess, Hilary Duff—in every way.
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What’s one beauty rule you swear by?
Less is more. Less is more when it comes to skin care, when it comes to the number of products you use, and the number of ingredients in them. Less is more when it comes to how much makeup you use.
What's a beauty rule that you think is B.S.?
Oh, that's a good one. I suppose it's the flip side of the previous answer: that you need a lot of makeup to look glamorous.
Fill in the blank: "I love my hair..."
I love my hair when it's fresh out of the shower and smells like shampoo. I use John Masters Organics, and I love the way the shampoo and conditioner smell. I don't know exactly what it smells like it, but I associate it with clean. I also really love the way that Olaplex smells. What is that smell? It's just its own thing, but I like it. I mean, obviously, when I take Olaplex out, my hair feels soft and smooth and silky, so maybe I just love it because I know what's coming next.
You travel constantly. What city or country gives you the greatest beauty inspiration?
France. Paris. This sounds kind of odd, I suppose, but I love the way that women get older in Paris. I find Parisian women to be so beautiful at every age. I get the sense that they...I don't know if this is true, but I feel like they put their makeup on with their fingers. You know? I feel like there's something really organic about the way that Parisians use makeup, to enhance their natural beauty, but also during Fashion Week, for example, they have so much fun with makeup as a part of fashion. But particularly, I love the way Parisian women get older and the way they use makeup to enhance their natural beauty.
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In a way, that was shown on The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel last season when Midge's mother moves to Paris.
Totally. I don't know what they do there. I don't know if it's all the wine and the cheese or that, culturally, they appreciate how women age naturally. There's something in the cheese, I'm not sure. [Laughs.]
Okay, you’re stranded on a desert island. What are the three products you bring with you?
Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser, the Caudalie Beauty Elixir—just to make myself feel cool; that's a go-to summer thing—and sunscreen. I would desperately need sunscreen.
Do you use the highest possible SPF?
Oh, yeah. I tried a new one recently, actually. This winter break my family and I went to St. Kitts, and I always get really scared about beachy places—like, is my SPF 1,000 sunscreen going to work? But Coola makes a sport sunscreen, and it's organic. It smells incredible, and I didn't get sunburned.
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What colors are you loving on your nails right now?
I'm mostly in what I've dubbed Maisel red these days. We're shooting season three, so I have red nails almost all the time. But when I have a minute, I like my nails black. I always have. I like fingers and toes black or nude. I guess I'm boring. Right now I'm wearing a Chanel nude, and Essie makes a really good jet black.
Do you feel differently when you have black nails? What does it evoke for you?
I don't know! It makes me feel cooler than I am. [Laughs.] No, I don't know. I just feel like myself. I used to not wear any nail polish at all, and as I've gotten older black nails have kind of replaced that same feeling.
So do red nails just feel associated with work?
Yes, absolutely. Once I have the red nails on, the red lipstick on, the high heels on, a corset on, and my hair done, it's Midge. So it's nice sometimes to take Midge off for a minute and put on a different nail color. Maybe that's what the black is—maybe it's just the opposite of Midge. It feels like a neutral, but a New York neutral.
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What's your getting ready music?
Any kind of ’90s playlist. I love a good playlist on Amazon Music or Google Play.
Do you have any particular favorite songs or artists to start the night off?
You know, the Spice Girls always put me right back in the ’90s. Spice Girls, ’90s Britney Spears—or was that early 2000s?
She started in the late ’90s!
It's funny, the late ’90s and the early 2000s kind of blend together for me because I was like 9 and 10, you know?
The Backstreet Boys for sure started in the ’90s.
Yes, the Backstreet Boys! I get really thrown back when you get into like a Lyft or an Uber and they're blasting the Backstreet Boys.
Yes! Okay, let's move on: Your hair is gorgeous. What do you do to keep it in such great shape?
Olaplex, Olaplex, Olaplex. Especially while I'm coloring it. Also, hair masks are kind of a new thing for me. I never, ever used hair masks until about a year or two ago. But I've been coloring my hair since I was 16, so the addition of masks to my routine has changed everything. Now that I'm blond, I've been using the Christophe Robin purple hair mask. It's really great. It helps keep the brassier tones and the yellow out of my blond.
I was going to ask if switching from brunette to blond has changed your routine...
That's been new for me, the Christophe Robin. It's used the same way as Olaplex, so I'll try to do Olaplex maybe twice a week and do the purple mask once a week. I leave it in for 30 minutes, and it really cools out the blond. I prefer my blond a little bit cooler because I'm so fair.
What about in terms of styling your hair? Are you a wash-and-go person?
I'm useless when it comes to styling my hair. I just brush, put something that keeps flyaways down, and I'm out the door. If I'm going out somewhere sometimes I'll throw…actually, I'm obsessed with the T3 curling wand. I'll just throw a couple curls in my already air-dried hair with the curling wand.
How much time do you spend getting ready?
Fifteen to 20 minutes. I like to pick my clothes out the night before. My skin care routine is really simple. I try to use just a few products. Basically, I use Cetaphil's cleanser and Vintner's Daughter Botanical Oil. I'll put on some sunscreen and maybe a little bit of concealer, and I'm out the door.
What's your favorite way to take a moment for yourself?
I love to take a really long walk with my dogs. I'll take them to the park. It gives me time to think and also just to spend some time with them. Dogs are great therapy that you can have at home. I also love to read. One of the hardest things about becoming an adult has been less time to read for pleasure. So if I have a minute, I love to just pick up a book.
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Do you have a favorite genre to read?
Anything. My to-read list is about 7,500 books long at this point. I'll just pick one off the list and try to buy it from a small bookstore. Keep bookstores in business!
Love that. Screw, marry, kill: mascara, lipstick, highlighter.
This is hard. Kill highlighter. If you have great skin care you have natural highlight. Screw lipstick for some fun every once in a while. But marry mascara.
What's the last Instagram rabbit hole you went down?
I went down the Broadway stan Instagram pages rabbit hole recently. I do that fairly often when I need inspiration or I'm feeling low energy. I just am so in awe of Broadway performers, and I love theater. Theater is my first true love. I often go down the Broadway legends rabbit hole. I went really far down the Dear Evan Hansen "Waving Through a Window" hole the other day—I watched Ben Platt do it and then like every subsequent Evan Hansen sing that song. The problem with Instagram is that once you find one, then your home page is only recommending Broadway videos. So I'm in really deep.
Next question: What's your favorite emoji?
I like the smiley poop. Who doesn't love the smiley poop? It can convey so many different emotions. It can be like, "I feel like a shithead" or "You're a shithead" or "I'm feeling silly right now." [Laughs.] It means a lot of different things.
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You've got $20 and free roam of a drugstore. What do you buy?
Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser. I love Psssst! Dry Shampoo. It's really good. It's my favorite, and it's a couple bucks at the drugstore. I buy the travel size, so that saves me. I might have some dollars left. Oh, my mascara. I need my mascara! I'm really obsessed with the Maybelline Volum' Express The Mega Plush mascara.
If you could change one thing about beauty perceptions on social media, what would that be?
I would ban filters—not filters, actually, because they are just about changing the color. I would ban FaceTune. It's so deceptive because it's very good at what it does. It can really change the way you look. And it's not just unhealthy because other people see that on social media and think that's what they're supposed to look like all the time—I actually feel like it fools the user too. If you FaceTune enough on your photos and see yourself looking like that, and then take photos where you don't look like, I feel like it's terrible for your self-esteem. I just announced my partnership with Cetaphil with a photo where I'm wearing absolutely no makeup. The lighting is great, but it's not filtered. There's no makeup on my face. I wish we would celebrate photos like that more.
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Who are the people who inspire you the most right now?
Janelle Monáe. She's such a great role model. She's so cool, and she's talking about things that are important and she's really unapologetic about it. She has a great sense of style too. Who else is inspiring to me right now? There are so many people. You know, we can rag on social media a lot, but one of the things I love about social media is that I've been introduced to so many more people who I find inspiring. That's one of the things that keeps me on it. I'm really inspired by Billy Porter. We recently got a chance to sit down and talk about his journey with fashion and Pose for Variety. I loved getting to spend the afternoon with him and learn a little bit more about where he came from and hear him talk about his journey with fashion and how it's helped him discover his voice. But he's having fun with it at the same time. He's so unapologetic about how much fun he's having with fashion, and I'm really inspired by that.
Anna Moeslein is a senior editor at Glamour. Follow her on Instagram @annamoeslein.
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