Broadcast or cable, primetime or anytime (thanks to DVRs), television is now the best place for actresses. The Hollywood Reporter’s Ray Richmond and Matthew Belloni invited a diverse panel — Rose Byrne (FX’s “Damages”), January Jones (AMC’s “Mad Men”), Regina King (NBC’s “Southland”), Mary McDonnell (Sci Fi Channel’s “Battlestar Gallactica”), Anna Paquin (HBO’s “True Blood”) and Sigourney Weaver (Lifetime’s “Prayers for Bobby”) — to discuss the challenge of shooting a scene in three takes and the strangest things they’ve read about themselves in tabloids.

The Hollywood Reporter: You’ve all worked in both film and television. What’s the biggest difference?

January Jones: We get the material literally a day or two before we shoot it. So, it’s very spontaneous. It works, but — unlike a film, where you have the script and you have the beginning and end and hopefully an arc — you don’t know where the character is going.

THR: When did you all start thinking you wanted to be actors?

Jones: I’m from South Dakota, so having a dream that grandiose wasn’t really feasible. And then in high school I was quite shy and I didn’t want to stick my neck out. I didn’t want to get made fun of. (Then) when I was 18, I wanted to experience other things. I mean, I had never been on an airplane, I had never seen an ocean. So I went to New York and was doing commercials and a little modeling and I decided I really loved the acting process and made my way to L.A. I just got really lucky with the people I met. My representatives are still my representatives. I was very trusting and naive and I was very fortunate to have been put in a position where I was taken care of.

THR: How did you feel when you went in for “Mad Men”?

Jones: I didn’t know what it was; I just knew that the writing was so amazing. My character wasn’t even in the pilot. And I auditioned for Peggy twice. They said, “Oh, it’s between you and one other girl” and the other girl gets it. “But there’s this other little role, she’s the wife, we don’t know if she’s going to be on the show, but do you want it?” “Yeah, but just promise me that I’m not going to sign a five-year contract and do nothing.” And it worked out.

THR: Why didn’t he want you?

Paquin: He didn’t not want me. But I was a pale, pasty girl trying to pass myself off as someone who could possibly in some version of reality be a blonde, tanned, Southern Hooters waitress. And I was like, literally, to my manager: “Please don’t send me out on this if they’re just going to say, ‘You’re not blonde,’ because it’ll break my heart.”

Jones: You have no idea how often that happens. I can dye my hair!

THR: Any other frustrations?

Jones: My only thing is just the time constraints. In a film you get like a day to do a scene. In TV we get, like, three takes. Plus I’m smoking herbal cigarettes like they’re going out of style.

Byrne: Is anybody really smoking on the show?

Jones: They’re herbal. They’re called Ecstasy. No tobacco, no nicotine but they’re so harsh.

THR: What’s the worst story you’ve read about yourself in a tabloid?

Paquin: I was dating my brother once. There was a picture of me and him at a premiere!

Jones: You should never go to a premiere with your brother.

Paquin: I was 15! He was chaperoning!

Source : Hollywood Reporter

This has been edited to remove other actresses answers in order to save space!