How Dominique Fishback Fought for Lead ‘Swarm’ Role After Being Offered a Supporting Character

Dominique Fishback is sitting backstage waiting to discuss her latest role, starring in Amazon Prime Videos Swarm, when her ears perk up at a familiar sound: an engine revving.

On the other side of a partition, an audience watches a particularly tense scene from the shows fourth episode, titled Running Scared, when Fishbacks Dre a murderous super fan of Nijah, a Beyonc-esque pop star faces down a group of women who stand between her and attending the singers concert.

Fishback playfully re-enacts the scene, gripping an imaginary steering wheel and pressing her high-heeled foot down onto a pretend gas pedal that sends her speeding ahead and crashing into Dres latest victims. She pulls a funny face and hams it up for a reps cellphone camera, unknowingly demonstrating the type of darkly comedic energy that makes Swarm so buzzworthy.

Theres a lot of physical comedy that [Dre] gets to do, and it wasnt premeditated, Fishback says, once she gets in front of the crowd for the QA, sharing that her love for Lucille Ball and Jim Carrey helped her prepare to play aspects of the offbeat serial killer characters personality.

But creators Donald Glover and Janine Nabers didnt originally picture her as Dre. They offered her the role of Marissa, the characters sensitive sister. I told my team, Listen, tell them that Im thankful. But Ive got to play Dre, Fishback recalls.

From the moment she read the script, the character called to her. After playing charming characters in The Deuce, The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey, Judas and the Black Messiah and in the upcoming Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Fishback saw Dre as her chance to make a transformation like Charlize Theron did in Monster or Heath Ledger as the Joker in The Dark Knight.

I just felt that in my spirit that I could, Fishback says. We dont get that opportunity a lot as Black artists, as Black women to stretch beyond what weve been given the opportunity to do.

So, she stood firm.

I dont want to catch up to myself as an actor, Fishback told Glover. What could I do next that excites me? Im thinking about that kid that watched all these movies and said, I want to do that and didnt think about a box or limitations or one genre. She wanted to do everything. His response: If thats the role you want, thats the role you get. I know you can do it.

There was no fight, no re-auditioning. Fishback simply signed on for the part (with Marissa played by Chle Bailey), and then the real work began. Ill be honest, it was nerve-wracking. I was like, Man, whatd I do? Why did I want to do this? Fishback says.

Playing Dre was physically and emotionally challenging. The actor usually prepares by journaling in character, but this time she wrote as herself. I didnt understand her psychologically, Fishback explains. So, I had to journal as myself to remove any fear and any judgment, because I didnt want the camera to pick up Doms war with herself about playing Dre.

She also worked with Audrey LeCrone, the dialect coach who guided Fishbacks Judas co-star Daniel Kaluuya to an Academy Award. Together, they transformed Fishbacks Brooklyn accent into Dres southern drawl, which borrowed some of its softness from The Queen (a.k.a. Houston-native Beyonc).

Everything is really slow and pretty, Fishback says, slipping into the characters Texan accent, then reverting to her natural speech pattern. Every character that I play, Im trying to eliminate the Brooklyn, just for now.

As for the characters arc, Fishback unpacked Dres journey in real time because the writers delivered scripts for future episodes while the show was in production. She realized that she didnt have to know Dres backstory specifically, because she repressed it so much that she probably repressed it for me, too.

The seven-episode limited series chronicles a period of two years, as Dre hits the road in pursuit of her dream to meet Nijah. Fishback is in nearly every scene and, in most episodes, surrounded by a new cast of characters, with co-stars including Bailey, Damson Idris, Kiersey Clemons, Rory Culkin, X Mayo, Paris Jackson and Billie Eilish, in her acting debut.

It was bittersweet sometimes, because youd get used to Chle, then you get used to Paris, and get used to Billie, then everybodys leaving. But I just decided to look at it as a gift, she says. Getting exposed to their different energy and talents felt almost like an actors bootcamp.

Of Eilish in particular, Fishback says that the popstar is a natural actor. There was no air about her. She really cared about the character. That was important to me because Ive been giving months of this, and new actors come in and you hope everybody cares as much as you care. She really did.

Eilish had a big job, too. Her character, Eva the leader of a womens cult who Dre meets on her way to a Nijah concert is critical to the story. You have to believe that Dre can fall in the influence of these women, Fishback explains. Billie was very intentional with her lines. It helped me be able to sell that Dre could get caught up and not just kill everybody on sight.

Because there is quite a lot of killing on the show, Fishback, who is also a producer, requested to have a therapist on set for those intense scenes.

You dont know how people are going to be affected, she says. A lot of actors really give themselves over to their roles, and then you finish the show, and you go home and youre by yourself. You dont want to be left in pieces for giving yourself to a role.

The actors most challenging murder came in the finale. This was the first kill that she did with her bare hands and not an object, Fishback notes. It was very up close and personal, so, for me, that was really hard.

In fact, after the scene ended, she couldnt stop crying. Am I portraying something bad? Fishback says she wondered. I had been used to playing characters that are considered likable, or easy to love, or wrap your arm around. And I wanted the challenge to play a villain or an antihero, but when I was faced with what she had to do, it was hard. But I had a really good support system.

For as much as Swarm pushed Fishbacks limits as a performer, shes hopeful that audiences behaviors will evolve in kind. Back in the day, she explains, if you chose to talk trash about someone, youd have to meet at 3 oclock in the schoolyard or parking lot to handle it. In the current social media era, people can be so cold to one another, without considering that theres a person on the other end of that dig.

I call [Dre] the pull up queen, Fishback says, giggling as she makes her point. Dre is kind of like, Talk is cheap, man, and she pulls up to the house. I wonder if people who watch are gonna be like, You know that thing I was gonna say on social media, I aint gonna say it no more.