Wednesday Season 2, Part 2 has finally arrived, and Nevermore’s enigmatic music professor, Isadora Capri, has howled her way into one of this season’s central twists.
Played by Billie Piper — the real-life English teen pop star turned Doctor Who companion — Capri was introduced in Part 1 as Nevermore’s new head of music, a free-spirited mentor with a sharp tongue. In the first batch of episodes, it was revealed that she’s an outcast herself, a werewolf. But Part 2 reveals an even deeper secret: Capri isn’t just a werewolf — she’s the daughter of a Hyde and a werewolf, a rare hybrid whose dual heritage places her at the center of multiple outcast factions.
Capri’s hybrid status gives her a unique perspective on both trauma and survival — wisdom she shares with her students. She reveals to Enid Sinclair (Emma Myers) that she’s an alpha — a discovery that both educates and challenges the teen werewolf. “I feel like it’s pretty tasty information, and it would be neglectful not to tell her,” Piper tells Tudum about the revelation. “But whether it’s just about Enid’s safety or something deeper … that remains to be seen.”
Capri also volunteers to teach music therapy at Willow Hill, the season’s central new setting. Her presence at the institution unintentionally gives Wednesday Addams (Jenna Ortega) and her friends cover to infiltrate and expose the experiments on outcast students through the LOIS Program. Capri’s true intentions were unclear at the beginning of Season 2, but she becomes something of an ally to Wednesday (knowingly or not), one who can move freely between Nevermore and Willow Hill — cementing her as a bridge between Nevermore and the wider outcast world.
As a former musical prodigy herself, Capri takes a special interest in Wednesday throughout Season 2. “Capri’s teachings, and message to Wednesday, are quite often about how she spent her life training as a musician from a very young age, and became very successful as a young musician, but at what cost? And I think this endless quest of Wednesday’s is something that chimes with her,” Piper says. “I feel like Isadora wants to really motivate and help Wednesday excel — at least for now. She is a tricky character to pin down, which in many ways was great, and I was up for the ride. It’s the kind of challenge that I relish, so I wasn’t too stressed about it.”
While their onscreen tension makes for some of the season’s sharpest exchanges, Piper says working with Ortega was the complete opposite dynamic. “It was a joy to be working with Jenna. She is such a brilliant actor. She is a funny, charming, professional young actor, very impressive,” Piper recalls. “And as for Wednesday and Capri, I suppose it’s not necessarily that opposites attract because they do share similarities, so they are drawn to each other.”
In fact, Piper was impressed by the entire cast, across the board. “It was absolutely beautiful to be working with young, fresh, optimistic, and playful actors at the beginning of their acting journeys. They’re quite seasoned, to be honest. They’ve been acting since they were very young. And then, obviously I also got to act with lifelong heroes like Joanna Lumley and Catherine Zeta-Jones. These were people me and my mum used to pore over when I was younger, so it is the best of both worlds.”
Zeta-Jones is also admiring of Piper’s performance. “I get to sing with [Isadora] Capri, who’s played beautifully by Billie Piper,” Zeta-Jones tells Tudum of their fireside duet cover of “Bad Moon Rising” by Creedence Clearwater Revival in Episode 3. Co-music supervisor Jen Malone, who helms this season alongside Nicole Weisberg, says of the musical moment, “Their two voices just work so well together.”
The Part 2 finale pushes Capri into even more mysterious territory. After Tyler Galpin (Hunter Doohan) loses his mother Francoise (Frances O’Connor), who was also his master, he has nowhere left to turn. Capri appears and offers him a radical choice — a new life beyond the destructive Hyde-master bond.
“She specifically says she isn’t interested in being his mother or master. At the moment, I do believe her,” Piper says. “But creating a safe space for Hydes could start innocently, and then become some kind of social experiment. With Isadora, it’s always hard to tell if she wants to destroy or save.”
In her final scene this season, Capri invites Tyler to join a hidden Hyde community she’s helping to build — one that aims to reject violence and servitude. “I just feel like they’re going to start something,” she teases. “They’re going to start a riot, and they’re going to change the rules. Maybe she’s trying to preserve Tyler. Or maybe she just doesn’t want him to burn the way her father did.”
By opening that door, Capri gives Tyler something he’s never truly had before: the possibility of another way forward. “He owes it to himself and to his mom to explore if there is another way. We’ve seen him try every other path in this life, and so he’s like, ‘OK, I’ll give this a shot,’ ” Doohan tells Tudum about his character’s cliff-hanger ending. “I am a Billie Piper fan, and there is something so beautiful and mysterious about her. I think that at that moment, his interest really peaks.”
But what’s on the other side of that door? Only Season 3 can answer. “At the end of Season 2, we see Tyler go off with Professor Capri. We’re not sure exactly where they’re going, but it’s potentially a new life without the onus of a master,” co-creator and showrunner Gough tells Tudum. “Like all things Wednesday, he will definitely be showing up again.”
Piper was originally drawn to Capri’s specific aesthetic — “I’ve always wanted to play a sort of floaty, liberal musician or art teacher,” she says — and intentionally gave her character an American accent, simply because she was “a little tired of playing English people.” She also gravitated toward the duality in Capri’s character. “I like the fact that Capri is a bit less buttoned-up than some of the other teachers. She’s a bit more available to the moon and the stars. She’s quite majestic. I really wanted to play her as this character who is very sort of porous and available to energy, feelings — but with a sort of steely core; someone who flits between two personalities.”
The actor was equally drawn to the creative team behind Wednesday. She had her first Zoom meeting with director and executive producer Tim Burton while she was promoting the film Scoop, and Wednesday Season 2 was still in pre-production.
“Tim talked to me a bit about the role, talked about how some of it was open to interpretation, what I could maybe bring to it, what I liked about it,” Piper recalls. “I was quite overwhelmed because I was, and am still, a big fan of Tim Burton. I watched Beetlejuice so many times as a kid that I actually feel like it inspired the interiors in my house. I feel like it inspired the clothes that I wear. I was fanatical about it. I love working with Tim Burton. I love his energy, and I am grateful to be inside one of his pictures, and that’s what it feels like; it feels like you’re being painted into Tim Burton’s piece of art, because it is a very specific composition a lot of the time, and it’s striking.”
As far as her preparation for playing piano onscreen, Piper practiced careful choreography. “Well, hysterically, I thought I was going to learn. I’ve never played piano in my life,” she laughs. “I’m not very good at instruments, even though I love music and am inspired by music. In my mind, I imagined that I would be able to learn close to grade eight by the time we came to shooting. It was so naïve of me, and I felt so unbelievably overwhelmed and wound up by how effing hard it is to learn piano. So I learned the moves. It just had to be choreography for me in the end, and then the piano was reliably deadened when it came to playing. And I always used to joke, ‘God, imagine if they could actually hear what I was really playing, which would’ve been appalling.’ But I have at least an ear for music, so I can physically mimic what’s happening in a song.”
For Capri’s very differentiated look, Piper and co-costume designers Colleen Atwood and Mark Sutherland drew inspiration from several famous musicians to play the enigmatic music professor. “I had Florence Welch from Florence + the Machine in my head. We used her a bit in our mood board, and a bit of Kate Bush and Stevie Nicks,” Piper says. “There’s this sort of zany sweetness about these women, but there’s also something that can sometimes come over as quite chilling, which I liked. I’m the perfect person for those costume fittings because I love costumes, I love fashion, and I’m always ready to really jump in and indulge a character. We went with warm tones, and we wanted that dreamy, Topanga-esque, musical quality. So there are a lot of ’70s influences in there. And I’m made by a costume, if I’m honest, as an actor. I don’t feel like I’m able to do anything without a costume. The floatiness, the too-many rings, the curly hair all just feeds into your soul and [makes a] contribution to the character.”
For Piper, all those influences came together most memorably in one look: her flowing Venetian Gala dress in Episode 7. “I had this beautiful, long, frayed, cashmere Balenciaga jacket that was just amazing,” she says. “Sometimes when you’re an actor, getting a piece of comfy clothing to swaddle in, there’s nothing like it.”
But the real sparkle was a tiny detail Piper added herself. “I got tooth gems for the first time, which was something I wanted to do for the character,” she says. “And they’re of the moon and stars, so I guess that’s a little Easter egg.”
Those touches helped establish Capri’s look, but playing her was a more complex challenge. “She’s porous, available to energy, feelings, and chaos — but with a steel core,” she explains. “She’s mystical, protective, and a little dangerous. And honestly, that’s what makes her such a perfect fit for Nevermore.”
Where Isadora Capri goes from here is anyone’s guess, but one thing’s certain: Billie Piper has given fans a character worth howling over.
Find out what’s next for Isadora Capri when Wednesday returns for Season 3. Until then, keep checking Tudum for all your Nevermore news.
