Elle Fanning and Nicholas Hoult dish on Season 3 of 'The Great' now streaming on Hulu

When The Favorite earned ten Oscar nominations in 2018, it signaled the rise of a new genre-- history as comedy.

"The Great" was created by one of the film's writers and it brings a comical sensibility to 18th-century Russia.

The show used to have a disclaimer at the beginning telling viewers it was an "occasionally true" story about Russia's queen Catherine the Great, but for season three that's been changed to warn the series is "almost entirely un-true."

Season three opens right after Catherine the Great has tried to kill her husband.

"Any time you survive murder it's a good thing," said Nicholas Hoult who plays Emperor Peter III. "I think what's really fun is actually the byproduct of that is watching how a relationship bounced back from that."

Moving past attempted murder means more fun for the actors.

"There are certainly points where I'm not going to be able to make it through a scene without just being in fits of laughter for both finding things funny and sheer embarrassment," Hoult said.

"I always want to push it," said Elle Fanning who plays Catherine. "I'm so game especially since we're on season three now. So I think feel very confident with our characters and are willing and feel safe enough to push things further and break those boundaries."

Fanning compares pulling off this show to walking a tightrope, but feels confident in their leader, who was an Oscar nominee for "The Favorite."

"It's Tony McNamara who created and writes this show," Fanning said. "It's his unhinged mind, and it's genius, but it's very twisted."

And she has some twists and surprises in store for fans of "The Great."

"Even in episode one there's a huge surprise that they're not going to see coming," Fanning said.

All ten episodes of "The Great" are available now on Hulu, which is owned by the same parent company as ABC7.