“In that moment you see her partner with their kid and it’s like, ‘Jesus, don’t do it,'” Montgomery says. “And she doesn’t, which I think is really redemptive. Because for Billy, he’s not really going out on that much of a limb. He’s a single guy, a young dude. He’s flirting with her—but for her, there’s so much more at stake.”
Buono says the scene wasn’t originally scripted that way, though. Karen was supposed to walk down the stairs and only see her husband, Ted, sleeping in his chair. But Buono felt that actually could have given her more reason to meet up with someone, so she asked co-creators Matt and Ross Duffer to include Holly in the scene. That way Karen would really have motivation to stay.
“There are few things that really spark a strong feeling for me, but it was important,” Buono says of her decision to ask the Duffers to alter the scene. “I immediately said to them, you have to put Holly in there. If not, it might give her pause. But to see Ted with their daughter, it’s like, ‘That’s my family.'” Buono points out that Karen is the head of the household, and the Wheelers are a source of stability in Hawkins. “People have family meals there. It’s safe, it’s together, and she realizes she can’t do this to her family. She realizes it’s not about her. She’s the grownup, and she has to make the grownup decision for her and Billy.”
However, Buono says she would have liked a few more flirtatious scenes with Karen and Billy. “That flirtation would have been fun to do,” she says. “Maybe a scene in a diner…you know, not straight into a hotel room. Like, ‘Let’s have a cheeseburger and flirt a little bit more!’ Just a little more courting.”
That said, Buono says she still see Karen turning Billy down in the end. “It’s a different show if it goes in that direction of Karen having an affair, as fun as it would have been to explore.”
And while it seems Karen and Billy’s storyline has ended—although, it’s not called Stranger Things for nothing—Buono hopes her character will get a chance to evolve in season four. “I always thought Karen was someone who would have gone to law school and be a public defender to give people a voice. Or, after everything that happens in Hawkins—because people are moving away and real estate has gone down—she becomes a realtor. Like, ‘I know things seem a little unstable here, but now’s a great time to buy!'”
Jessica Radloff is the West Coast editor at Glamour. Follow her on Twitter @JRadloff and on Instagram @jessicaradloff14.