Florence Pugh says she wanted to understand Cathy Ames before playing her in Netflix’s East of Eden. In a new Vanity Fair interview, the actor and writer Zoe Kazan explain why the seven-episode series spends more time on Cathy’s childhood than the 1955 film did. Their version does not ask viewers to ignore the harm Cathy causes. It asks them to see what happened to her first.
Pugh plays Cathy opposite Christopher Abbott and Mike Faist as brothers Adam and Charles Trask. The series premieres on Netflix on October 1, with all seven episodes arriving together. Pugh is also an executive producer, giving her a role in the project beyond acting.
Why Pugh connected with Cathy
Kazan told Vanity Fair that Pugh was the actor she wanted when she pitched the series. In the interview, she describes a change to Cathy’s early story: the show treats an incident from her childhood as abuse, not as a child manipulating the people around her. That difference helped Pugh find a way into the character. The actor said Cathy’s past made her behavior understandable to play, without making it acceptable.
Pugh was direct about the effect that childhood abuse could have on Cathy:
I can’t imagine for a moment after that abuse that she’ll ever be the same person again.
The line comes from Pugh’s conversation with Vanity Fair. It is her explanation of how she approached the role, not a claim that the series excuses Cathy’s later choices. Kazan’s adaptation gives viewers more of Cathy’s perspective while still showing how her actions affect the Trask family.
A much bigger story than the 1955 film
The James Dean film focused on a later part of John Steinbeck’s novel. Netflix’s series starts earlier and follows the family across generations. That extra time gives Kazan room to show Cathy as a child, an adult, and someone whose choices change the lives of Adam, Charles, and the next generation.
Pugh has played difficult characters before, including in Midsommar and Lady Macbeth. She told Vanity Fair that her job is to understand a character’s decisions well enough to make them believable on screen. She is not saying she would make those decisions herself. That distinction is especially important with Cathy, whose actions in the novel are often cruel.
What to expect when East of Eden arrives
The series also stars Joseph Zada and Joe Anders as Cal and Aron Trask, with Hoon Lee, Tracy Letts, Martha Plimpton, and Ciarán Hinds in the cast. Garth Davis directed the first four episodes; Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre directed the final three. Netflix has confirmed a global release on October 1, 2026.
If you have only seen the older movie, the central change is straightforward: Cathy is no longer a figure seen mainly through the Trask men. Pugh and Kazan have made her story a major part of this adaptation. Whether viewers sympathize with her is something the series will let them decide after watching.
