Ivy Mayfair-Richards

Ivy Mayfair-Richards is a woman struggling to keep the serenity of her family. She is a character in Cult portrayed by Alison Pill. Ivy is married to Ally, and the two women have a son named Oz.

Background

Ivy met Ally after 9/11 and helped her overcome the resulting depression and triggered phobias. The two opened a restaurant where Ivy would be the chef, and Ally the smiling face welcoming the customers. At some point, they married and had a child, Oz. ^[1]

During the election campaign for 2016 Presidential Elections, Ivy was very involved in protests and debates, creating some issues with her wife for their different approach to political issues. While Ivy wanted to be an active part, Ally was more relaxed about it, confident in Trump's defeat. During one of the protests, Ivy had a violent clash with a Trump supporter. Meanwhile, Ivy befriended another young woman with similar ideas on feminism and politics, and the two decided to enact their revenge on the Trump supporter. Followed him at the supermarket where he worked, the two knocked him out and tied him with duct tape in the basement. ^[2]

She is now a confirmed member of Kai Anderson's cult

Personality and Appearance

A young wife and mother struggling to make ends meet, Ivy is a woman who tries to be strong for those she loves, facing several difficulties when Ally's phobias begin to fracture their family's stability.

Story

Ivy supported Ally during her emotional breakdown caused by Trump's victory at the 2016 presidential election. At the same time, she reassured Ozzie that no harm would come to their family. Afterwards, Ivy tried to calm one of Ally's panic attacks triggered by the vision of a clown on one of Ozzie's comic books. Ivy found herself reassuring her wife once again when she was attacked by a gang of assailants with clown masks, although the police had confirmed that such aggression had not been recorded by surveillance videos. The following day, Ivy expressed her opinion about Ally's recent behavior while the two discussed the lower incomes of their restaurant, The Butcher on Main.

Reconciled, the two walk out of the restaurant where a guy threw coffee on them just as they were discussing again, this time because of Ally's inability to vote for Hillary Clinton, despite her hate for Trump. She voted for Jill Stein instead.

A few days later, Ivy and Ally talked about potential babysitters, hiring Winter Anderson as the best candidate after a pleasant conversation in which Winter won their approval.

Ivy and Ally went out for a romantic evening, and Ivy cooked for both of them at the Butcher on Main. Ally had another of her violent hallucinations, and Ivy could barely calm her before starting arguing with her wife. The two went home, only to find out that their neighbors, Thom and Marylin Chang, were killed and the police were investigating. Concerned about the safety of their child, the two discussed again. ^[1]

When Ally was apparently attacked by a clown in their home, Ivy, armed with a kitchen knife, searched the rooms but found no one. A sudden romantic idyll between the two wives was interrupted by Oz's cries, scared by a nightmare about clowns. Afterwards, returning from work, Ivy and Ally discovered that Winter had left Oz with the new neighbors, Meadow and Harrison Wilton. Alarmed, the women rushed to the other side of the road, only to discover that Harrison was showing his beehives to the boy. Ivy tried to calm her wife while trying to be a good neighbor, though she was quite uncomfortable due to the neighbors' odd behavior and the fact that the Chang had recently died in that house.

After the suspicious death of Roger, one of the employees of The Butchery On Main, Ivy organized an informal meeting between Dr. Vincent and Ally at their house, worried about Ally's paranoia. When questioned by Detective Samuels about the murder of the employee, Ivy defended the police's primary suspect, Pedro Morales, another kitchen worker of their restaurant. Trying to raise the incomes of the restaurant following the murder investigation, Ivy was working when there was a general blackout in the city and she did not care much about Ally's phone call, on the brink of yet another nervous breakdown. ^[3]

Ivy struggled to comfort and protect her wife after Pedro's shooting and the resulting media chaos caused by it. Unable to avoid the protestors outside the Butchery On Main, the most obvious solution was for Ally to avoid the restaurant for a while. The rising criminal wave in the city and the arrival - and premature departure - of an unexpected guinea pig as a pet for Oz were not ideal, especially when Ivy was full-absorbed in mitigating Ally's growing paranoia about poison gas spread in the neighborhood. Afterwards, Ivy lost her temper when she discovered a potential affair between her wife and the nanny through a video released as a virus on Oz's laptop. Decided to leave the house with her son, the Mayfair-Richards found themselves involved in the accusation for the disappearance, and possible murder of their neighbor, Meadow. ^[4]

Notes

This character marks the first appearance of Alison Pill in American Horror Story.
In the seventh season, Ally and Ivy are married and own a restaurant called The Butchery on Main, and if Ivy's promotional poster is any indication, they might not just be serving burgers. ^[5]
She is a Hillary Clinton supporter.
She is a confirmed member of Kai's cult.

Quotes

Ivy (to Oz)
Oz, you don't have to worry. 'Cause nothing is gonna happen to us.

Ivy (to Ally)
Are you insane?

Ivy (to Winter)
I hate this country. What it's become. I hate my fucking wife for letting it happen. The only thing I love right now is my son, and I will do whatever it takes to make the world a better place for him, even if it means burning it all down.