The Testaments Reveals Lydia-Vidala’s Shooting, Aunts Backstory

SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for “Stadium,” Episode 6 of “The Testaments,” now streaming on Hulu.

It’s been clear since the beginning of Hulu’s “The Testaments” that Aunt Vidala (played by Mabel Li) is not Aunt Lydia’s (Ann Dowd) biggest fan — and now we know why.

During this week’s episode of Hulu’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” followup series, more backstory is revealed for Lydia — whom “Handmaid’s” viewers came to learn much about over that show’s six-season run — including the fact she actually created the Aunts program in Gilead to save herself in the early days. What’s more, she was willing to actually murder Vidala to make it work.

In a flashback to the exact day that Lydia and thousands of other women were rounded up in a stadium to be evaluated by the powers that be at the start of the Gilead regime, we see Lydia prove her willingness to the new cause by pointing what she thinks is a loaded gun directly at the head of her teaching colleague, Aunt Vidala (then known as Vivian), and pulling the trigger. Unbeknownst to Lydia, the gun is loaded with blanks. So Vidala’s life is spared — but no thanks to Lydia.

“I don’t know, so many times, so many times,” Dowd tells Variety when asked how many times she and Li shot that scene, noting that, for her, “each time was a state of shock.” “Like suddenly, the hood comes off [Vidala’s head], and there is my colleague, and I’m going to shoot her. I think that something very powerful and deeply intense happens to Lydia, then that changes her.”

Li says that sequence was filmed over the course of four to five hours, because “there was so much coverage” the crew had to capture of the dramatic scene.

“I felt like I was in a bit of a state of flow, because I could just be open to whatever,” Li says. “Like when that blindfold comes off, it is just genuinely scary to see even a fake gun in front of your face and a person holding it.”

Lydia commits her almost-murder of Vidala after first pitching the idea for the Aunts program to Commander Judd (Charlie Carrick), who has been tasked with the responsibility of figuring out what to do with all the women who have been rounded up under Gilead’s eye. She proposes that a team of women is necessary to guide the other women, including the Handmaids program, and that she can be the one to keep everyone else in line. Lydia even uses the story of her having previously had an abortion to her advantage when she twists the narrative to say she will use her own relationship with God and the redemption she’s found to help the girls with their “sins.”

“The first action was survival. The second was, if I’m going to set up something here that’s going to work for me, I’m going to involve others, too — other women,” Dowd says of Lydia’s choice to create the Aunts system. “She’s a teacher. She knows how to work with colleagues, but she’s going to be No. 1. That’s an absolute priority. So she gets busy writing the rules of how it’s going to be done, speaking to Judd as if she’s got complete confidence. And I think she does want to have other Aunts, create another group of women, not men, who will be here and in charge in their own way.”

Back in the present-day Gilead, Lydia and Vidala and the other Aunts at the school are picking the matches for their new group of eligible “green” girls out of this year’s plums. During those talks, it becomes clearer that Vidala does not agree with Lydia’s positions and, after encouragement from Commander Judd, Vidala now seems to be considering usurping Lydia’s role. In particular, Li says Vidala really hates the “pearl girl” program that Lydia has set up for Daisy (Lucy Halliday) and the other Gilead newcomers.

“Early on, she kind of criticizes Lydia. And I do think that Vidala thinks that Lydia has gotten too soft, and something’s going on there,” Li says. “But I think the root of all of that criticism is probably this deep resentment from the betrayal that happens in their past. All of that stuff is rooted in, really, that big betrayal.”

Li says Aunt Vidala’s “ambition is awakening” in this first season of “The Testaments,” and Judd is fueling it based on those early wedge he helped drive between them. “I think Judd opens the door a crack,” Li says. “And in this world, you kind of need male power to be able to gain more power as a woman. So I think when that happens, her ambition is awakened.”

By the end of the episode, another new revelation about Lydia comes to light: She’s got dirt on all the power players in Gilead. We can see that she’s taking notes and names and gathering secrets, all of which she writes down in a book — but to what end?

“One of the things I admire about Lydia is she is very aware and very alert, and she knows what’s going on,” Dowd says, teasingly. “And guess what: I’m going to put some of this down, and I’m going to keep it, because one day I’m going to use it. So I’m in no hurry, one step at a time. I know I can keep it safe and in secret, and that’s what I need to know when no one else needs to and one day, you will see what happens.”

Following this episode, which is largely told in flashback, “The Testaments” will dive back into its main plot at the school where Agnes (Chase Infiniti) and her friends will soon find out which Commander they are each going to spend the rest of their lives with, under the order of the Aunts. Agnes is in love with Garth, who is about to be promoted to Commander, but that doesn’t mean that’s who Lydia and Vidala have selected for her.

“Agnes might not be the most satisfied with her match,” says Li, whose Vidala delivers news of Agnes’ match to her family at the end of Episode 6 — though the audience will not learn who the lucky man is until next week. “I think it’s a really mixed reaction amongst that friendship group. I think some people will get who they want, and some people will be quietly disappointed.”