'Prison Break' Star Sarah Wayne Callies Recalls 'Toxic Misogyny' She Put Up with On the Show

The highs in life accompany some lows and Sarah Wayne Callies got candid about her "lowest" moment during her career's peak project, Prison Break. The actress recalled the incident in a new interview with Rachel Bilson and Olivia Allen on the Broad Ideas podcast on Monday, May 20, 2024, and shared the "rampant misogyny" she allowed herself to put up with. 

The Fox TV show which aired from 2005 to 2009 made it difficult for the actress to revisit the drama, "I couldn't get beyond the parts that were toxic and painful," began Callies, per Entertainment Weekly.

To prove her point, she revealed a distressing account from the series, "I've had an actor on that show spit in my face. And I was like, 'Holy s---!' We will get there on the podcast. We will talk about it someday."

Although she didn't elaborate further, Callies promised to be more open in a future episode of her Prison Breaking podcast with former co-star Paul Adelstein. "We will talk about it someday, but … there were things. Like, I would go home some nights and have to spend an hour talking my husband out of going to hospitalize somebody."

Since she was the only woman on the set, the Walking Dead star claimed, "Some of the guys were great, and some of them were totally gentlemen." Although she refused to name those who allegedly misbehaved with her if fans can recall, the hit show starred Dominic Purcell and Wentworth Miller, who rose to unprecedented fame after the success. 

But the mother of one still hesitates to rewatch the show because she fears it will bring back all the negative memories and will send her "into a spiral" of "'What did I let them do to me? What did I let them say to me? What did I put up with? What did I not report?'" However, she also made some lifelong friends, "So much of it was also great, and [I] made lifelong friends and all the things."

On the Fox drama, Callies played the role of Sara Tancredi, a prison doctor, who helps the prisoners (Miller and Purcell) break away from the cell. Although she was the OG, she exited the series after its second season, but returned for the fourth season and the 2017 revival. 

In an interview with Vogue, the 46-year-old actress shared her one non-negotiable when it came to playing the central character of Dr. Sara Tancredi, "The one thing that I asked for when I read the pilot – she was so good and devoted to humanity …  [but] something in the back of my brain [told me] there are always bodies buried and every angel has a pitchfork somewhere." 

"So I approached [show creator] Paul Scheuring with the idea of being an addict, actually I suggested [Sara] was an alcoholic. Paul went all the way to an opioids addiction," she added.

After the Prison Break chapter closed for her, she starred in shows like The Walking Dead, Colony, Council of Dads, and The Company You Keep. She has also directed two episodes of Fire Country.