Veteran actor Frank Langella joined the cast of The Americans pretty late in its run and while the show already had a lot of prestige, he brought an added layer of gravitas to the cast. Gabriel had great scenes with Philip and Elizabeth that involved a lot of honest conversations and he was also a big player when Paige was possibly joining her parents.
9. KIMMY BRELAND
Before her breakout role on Ozark, Julia Garner was turning heads in a great supporting role in later seasons of The Americans. There was a lot of mystique to her character early on and it led to some questionable decisions by Philip. While some of those mysterious characters were given a little too much time on The Americans, I actually could have stood to see more of Kimmy because I liked her story and her impact on Philip's story.
One of the great things The Americans did was subvert expectations about what might happen to certain characters. Pastor Tim seemed like a dead character walking once he got roped into the Jennings' affairs via Paige. I was convinced he was going to die. But he didn't. He was able to keep having a life, albeit one that changed pretty significantly, and he ultimately became more of a morally questionable character. There was a lot more to his character than it initially appeared.
7. NINA SERGEEVNA KRILOVA
Unlike Pastor Tim, Nina did meet the fate we all assumed she would meet for quite awhile during the series. I know a lot of people were very invested in the Nina story. I just never could quite get into the stuff in the USSR as much as the scenes in the USA so when Nina was there, it was less interesting to me. But there was a great deal of drama involving the character early on with her connections with Stan and it was gripping at times coupled with Annet Mehendru's steely portrayal.
The great Margo Martindale can make every show better. Sometimes The Americans didn't quite know how to use her and yet she would consistently be the only one getting Emmy attention in early years. But every time they let Claudia become heavily involved in the story, it instantly got better because Martindale was just so darn good. She also could pull a wide variety of disguises and alter egos and occasionally even provided a little humor.
5. PAIGE JENNINGS
I feel like The Americans was up and down with how they used Paige. Sometimes she was one of the most compelling characters such as when she started to figure out the truth about her parents. But it often felt like they forgot about her for large stretches of times too. She's on this list though because Holly Taylor did a great job at showing us the conflicted feelings of the character. It was really hard to tell which way Paige would ultimately end up going, a testament to the writing and to Taylor.
4. MARTHA HANSON
Poor Martha. She was frequently a sympathetic character and sometimes a frustrating character. She was deceived for so much of the run through as she was in love with a person (Philip as Clark) who didn't actually exist. But the show did a masterful job at blurry reality and Philip's guise to the point that sometimes it was hard to tell if it really was all an act. Considering Alison Wright served a similar purpose throughout much of the series, she really gave it a layered performance.
Similar to Martha, Stan was deceived for much of the run of the series by the Jennings. The show was sometimes forced to go in circles with the character since they didn't want him figuring out until the end but they also gave him plenty of his own solid stories. His best moments though were when he was hot on the trail of the Jennings only to have something go awry. Noah Emmerich's best moments were in the final confrontation of the series. He remained a compelling character throughout the run.
2. ELIZABETH JENNINGS
Of course the two stars will come in at #1 and #2 on this list. I find it hard to believe most fans wouldn't put anyone else in the top two slots but which one gets #1 and which gets #2 would probably vary. I put Elizabeth at #2. She was certainly the most committed to the cause, she was the most ruthless and she certainly had better wigs and disguises. I think there was just the fact that she felt a little less conflicted made her just slightly less of a compelling character. But you needed someone with her mindset to make the two of them work as characters together and Keri Russell was magnificent.
Philip comes in at #1 on my list because Matthew Rhys' character was the most dynamic over the course of the show. Sometimes he was as ruthless as Elizabeth, sometimes he was incredibly morally conflicted and sometimes he was in a wishy-washy middle. Philip was also really interesting to watch when he was playing a disguise, most notably as Clark, but even in less permanent "characters." The story of Philip and Elizabeth was of course the heart of The Americans, but Philip's journey on his own was also a very compelling story.
Tomorrow: A One Season Wonder look at Camp Wilder!
Next Tuesday: Top 10 Murphy Brown Characters!
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