‘Scandal’: Bellamy Young Reveals Scoop On Mellie’s Love Life & Teases Olivia’s ‘Collateral Damage’

‘Scandal’s final season is in full swing, and HollywoodLife.com talked to Bellamy Young EXCLUSIVELY about Mellie and Olivia’s partnership, romance, and more. Does Bellamy know how ‘Scandal’ ends?!

It’s hard to believe that there’s only a handful of Scandal episodes left. The final season started out strong and continues to get better and better. Mellie has been settling in at the White House as the first female POTUS, but that hasn’t come without its complications. She’s got one strong team with Olivia and Cyrus by her side. HollywoodLife.com chatted EXCLUSIVELY with Bellamy Young about Olivia and Mellie’s partnership, and she is all about it.

What about Fitz? He’s made his way back to D.C., and Bellamy hopes the exes will get to work together again. As for romance, it’s complicated with Mellie. She definitely has feelings for President Rashad, but it’s not that simple for single female POTUS. Check out our full Q&A below!

Mellie and Olivia are working together, but there has been a bit of tension. Do you think Mellie maybe thinks Olivia is getting a little too out of control by wanting to be in control so much?
Bellamy Young: I think Mellie is smart enough to know that, and as much as she is headstrong, she has never been a person who has to do it all by herself. She’s smart enough to use the best in everyone around her. I loved her interactions with Marcus. They really relied on each other, and they could really listen to each other and really change each other’s point of view. I feel that she and Olivia together are unstoppable. They’re formidable. They have such similarities and also such differences that they really complete each other in a beautiful way, and I don’t feel like Mellie is competitive enough to like cut off her nose to spite her face to figure out who really wears the crown in the Oval. I really think at the end of last season she made a huge ego swallow to realize that, if she got the chance to actually become president after getting so close and then failing, that it was really about service. It wasn’t about her. I think she really wants to do the best job in office, and she also knows she’s under heightened scrutiny because she’s the first woman, so she doesn’t want to make errors of hubris because she’s got to do it her way. She really is trying to be thoughtful in her position, and she knows what an ally Olivia is in much the same way she knows that Cyrus is an ally. She knows she can’t trust him as far as she can throw him, but she knows he knows his stuff. I love the thought of them in power. I love showing everyone what women supporting women looks like. And, yeah, it’ll be a struggle because I feel like this season is existential for Olivia, right? She’s fighting for her soul. Is she going to go to the light? Is she going to go to the dark? Everyone is sort of collateral damage in that maelstrom, but I don’t ever feel like there’s true adversarial energy between them. I mean, who knows, though? I only know as much as I know. It might be around the corner. I might get a script tomorrow, but I love them when they’re allies.

For the majority of the show, Fitz and Mellie had a great partnership. At the beginning of this season, Fitz has been off doing his own thing, while Mellie has been taking over the White House. Will Fitz have more of a presence in Mellie’s life going forward?
Bellamy Young: I will say, who else in those quiet moments, who better to reach out to, you know? Someone you know so well, who has also been in the position that you’re in. I really hope that Mellie and Fitz can be there for each other, and she was always such good counsel to him. I feel like he’ll need her almost as much as she’ll need him. But I really hope so. I also really love their friendship. I am a believer in a complicated world. Yes, they’re divorced. Yes, it’s complicated. But they have kids together and decades together and that just doesn’t evaporate. I feel like that relationship is foundational, and I hope it’s something that they can continue to come back to.

Can you tease about anything Mellie’s possible romances? Mellie’s got her plate full on that end.
Bellamy Young: It’s interesting! She complains about being single female POTUS and then she has a lot more options than the rest of us maybe. I think Rashad suddenly showing up in her world is nothing that she could have expected ever. It’s like a feeling she never thought she’d feel again. So we’ll see where that goes. Of course, now it kind of weighs in the balance. But she’s Mellie, she’s always wanted to find a way to have it all.

Okay, there’s only a handful of episodes left. Do you know how Scandal ends? Has Shonda told you how Mellie is going to end up?
Bellamy Young: I have no idea. You know, I’ve come to love that, honestly, because you meet it like life. You just do the best with the knowledge at hand. You can’t foreshadow anything or spoil anything. You literally don’t know. You stay present and listen. Actually, I’m going to go to work later today shooting episode 706 because Shonda watched it and realized there was a better way to tell the story. I feel so lucky to be working for someone who didn’t just say, “Oh, you know. We should’ve [done this] but it’s fine.” She doesn’t ever say that. Ever. She says, “I rewrote 20 scenes. I’ll have a script by midnight.” It’s astonishing that she keeps surprising us. It’s astonishing that she keeps having really important conversations.

Bellamy also talked about her struggle with Chronic Dry Eye and how she got it under control using Restasis MultiDose. See below!

How did you figure out that you had Chronic Dry Eye? 
Bellamy Young: Here’s the thing, I just thought it was something that happened to everybody as you get a little older or was maybe circumstantial. I spend a lot of my time under really bright lights or on really dusty sets, and I just thought it was what it was. So much so that I never even asked my doctor about it, really. I thought it was something I had to live with and just how life works. I’d go through bottles of artificial tears, switch contact brands, coming at it from that angle. You know, I finally mentioned something in passing to my doctor, and she was like, “Back it up, because that’s something we can talk about.” I said, “What? Wow, okay.” And I got diagnosed with Chronic Dry Eye, which is an actual condition that has actual options. For me, now I take Restasis MultiDose twice a day, and I’m hoping I can start making my own tears, so I don’t have to use all those artificial tears. I was happy to partner with Restasis because I figured that other people would have a story similar to mine and they wouldn’t be talking to their doctors, either. So I just wanted to encourage everybody to have the conversation.

Scandal airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET on ABC.

HollywoodLifers, how do you think Scandal will end? Let us know!