‘Anniversary’ Feels Like a Real-World Extension of ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ [Exclusive]

The dystopian series The Handmaid’s Tale finished its run in 2025 with a gripping conclusion to the jarring story of June Osborne, and her escape from the hellish authoritarian government of Gilead. Although the series revolved around June’s journey, there was another character who stood out throughout the entire series. Madeline Brewer‘s Janine saw the worst of Gilead’s monstrous rules, and in the end, the writers fortunately gave her a peaceful ending. Now, Brewer has explained how her latest release, another dystopian thriller titled Anniversary, feels like a natural extension of the series inspired by Margaret Atwood’s groundbreaking novel.

In an exclusive interview with Joe Deckelmeier for MovieWeb, Brewer shares her thoughts on the movie directed by Jan Komasa, the acclaimed Polish director behind Corpus Christi and The Hater. In Anniversary, a family’s dynamics are disturbed by a new social movement rising in the country. Brewer plays Anna, one of the family members who witness the collapse of the group. When asked if she felt that the film’s plot was eerily close to the country’s state in terms of freedom of speech, she said:

“I was talking to Jan [Komasa], our director, about this. This conception of this movie was like 2018, and we shot it in 2023. And it’s getting more and more prescient. It’s becoming more and more, unfortunately, or fortunately… relevant? I was looking for a different word, but relevant is probably the better word.

“I feel really lucky that I’m able to do work that takes on a life of its own. Like The Handmaid’s Tale fully has taken on a life of its own outside of the show that we’ve shot and the show that we made. I’m glad that it’s falling in line with that kind of resume of mine. You know, I enjoy doing work that can be discussed more widely than just ‘That was a great movie,’ or ‘That’s a fun TV show.’ Because this is, I mean, this really is a big form of activism for me.”

Madeline Brewer Connects ‘Anniversary’s Anna to ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’s Janine

Although Anna and Janine seem radically different as characters living through different stages of a collapsing dystopia, Brewer says that the two characters do share something. It’s the “dark cloud of oppression” that they’re both forced to confront when trying to survive something that sadly feels a bit too real. Fortunately, and the actor fully agrees, Janine had a much “happier ending”:

“I was just talking about this earlier, and I thought, ‘Oh, no, there’s nothing like them. There’s nothing similar about them. They’re not alike in any way.’ And I realize, of course they are. There is, like a dark cloud of oppression that’s coming down upon them. And they resist. Their resistance and their bravery, this courage looks very different. We’re in two very different spaces with two very different characters, but that undercurrent, that fire, that will not be extinguished.

“I’m very proud of both of them. And the ways in which Anna rages against the machine, she is loud, she’s provocative, she’s very intense and profane, and Janine, her resistance is in her inability, and her refusal to allow them to take her away from herself. Janine is much more quiet. There are a few moments here and there when she says, ‘Suck my d*ck and all that.’ But she never stopped seeing the bright side. She never stops hoping for the light. And that in and of itself is resistance. They can look very differently and achieve the same goal. Happier ending for Janine.”