The first time Meghann Fahy ever stepped onto a television set, she was playing Devyn, a Dartmouth-educated personal assistant unimpressed by Gossip Girl’s glitterati. But in the opulent seaside limited series Sirens, Fahy portrays a very different Devon.

This Devon isn’t charmed by a designer suit or a slick attitude either. She’s a working-class outsider, whose distaste for the upper crust of society puts her in harsh contrast with her easily swayed sister, Simone (House of the Dragon’s Milly Alcock); Simone’s wealthy philanthropist boss, Michaela Kell (Oscar winner Julianne Moore); and Michaela’s billionaire husband, Peter Kell (Golden Globe winner Kevin Bacon).

Fahy is emotional when she considers how much she has grown as an actor between playing Devyn in 2009 and Devon in 2025. “To look back on the most nervous I’ve ever been on set with Gossip Girl,” she begins, “to now be able to say that I’ve worked with people like Julianne Moore, Kevin Bacon, and Bill Camp, who plays my dad [in Sirens] … it’s a pinch-me moment.”

Since that first on-screen appearance, Fahy has had quite the series of memorable acting moments, from an early role in the soap opera One Life to Live to her 2010 Broadway debut in the Pulitzer Prize–winning musical Next to Normal. She also appeared in the much-beloved dramedy The Bold Type. Then, in The White Lotus, she brought a raw humanity to jaded housewife Daphne, a performance that earned the actor her first Emmy nomination and a Screen Actors Guild Award win for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. Most recently, Fahy delivered a haunting turn in the Nantucket moneyed mystery The Perfect Couple. 

From Emmy-nominated Maid creator Molly Smith Metzler, Sirens follows the gutsy thirtysomething Devon as she travels from Buffalo to the Kells’ beachy summer compound, intent on retrieving her little sister. While Simone swears nothing is amiss at her job as Michaela’s loyal assistant, Devon is convinced that the affluent socialite is hiding dark (and possibly deadly) secrets. Executive produced by LuckyChap’s Dani Gorin, Tom Ackerley, and Margot Robbie, as well as Metzler, writer Colin McKenna (Maid), and director Nicole Kassell (Watchmen), Sirens follows the tug-of-war over Simone’s soul that takes shape between Devon and Michaela over the course of one explosive Labor Day weekend.

While the actor has delivered scene-stealing performances in other beachside thrillers, Fahy notes that Sirens is a different kind of examination of class, power, and gender. “The core of this show is not a murder mystery. It’s almost female trauma-laced. Sirens is really a show about relationships and the way people desperately try to outrun their pasts.”

An edited version of our conversation with Fahy follows.

You’ve always played such glamorous characters. But Devon, a cashier from upstate New York, isn’t exactly glamorous. What drew you to her?
That exact quality. There was something about the spirit of the character that I really connected to that I had always been really interested in exploring as an actor. I have played so many glamorous characters that I was really nervous nobody would want to let me try anything else. So it was really exciting to get to step into that space with Devon.

How did you end up in conversations to work on Sirens?
It was a project that I had heard about that I just very, very much wanted to be a part of. So I was pretty persistent and so was my team with our pursuit. This was one of the first projects where I was feeling like I really wanted to chase this. So I did.

How did you prepare to take on this role that could seem like a departure for you?
It was a departure from what people have seen me do. But it didn’t really feel like that much of a departure from my spirit. Devon didn’t feel inaccessible to me. I went through the prep process with Nicole, our director and executive producer, and of course Molly and her husband Colin McKenna, who both wrote the show and were super available and wonderful. But Nicole was really instrumental for me to set up the character and get into the feel of the show.

Photo by Elias Tahan

What was it like working so closely with Julianne Moore? 
Julianne is somebody who I’ve been obsessed with forever, and she’s somebody I’ve been wanting to work with for as long as I’ve been acting. One of my first auditions in LA was to play her daughter in a film. So when Sirens came around, I was just beside myself because I knew that I was going to actually have some real stuff to do with Julianne. During filming, I was surprised that I was at ease with her. I felt like I was going to be so intimidated and nervous — and I was those things — but I also felt so comfortable. That’s how she makes you feel. She’s so smart, graceful, and incredibly professional.

You share a lot of scenes with Kevin Bacon, too. What was it like working with him?
Incredible. He’s incredible. He has an ease about. He’s just that movie star that you’ve grown up watching for all those years. But not because he acts like it, just because, energetically, the space that he holds, he’s just on another planet. He’s so wonderful to work with. I had some of my most fun times in those scenes with him on set. He’s just such a pro, and he’s so fun — and he’s so funny.

I loved so much the relationship that Devon has with Peter. It was really, really fun to see Devon be so playful. I felt like they had a really sweet little friendship. It was really cool to see him having a certain affection for her, but in a very sweet, paternal way.

You and Milly have such an authentic-feeling sister relationship. How did you figure out your sibling chemistry? 
Milly is talented in such a natural way. She is moving with you in a way that is so beautiful to see. From the beginning, we easily fell into this sweet sisterly bond. And we still have that.

Who is Devon in this story? The hero? The antihero? A martyr? 
Not to quote Meredith Brooks’s song “Bitch,” but Devon is “a little bit of everything all rolled into one.” The women of Sirens are all a little bit of all of it and a little bit more alike than they realize at the beginning of the show.

A version of this story appears in Queue Issue 20.

[“Anxiety” by Doechii plays]

The trailer for ‘Sirens’