(CNN) -- Kerry Washington knows you have been waiting. The star of the hit ABC series "Scandal" is fully aware that there is a legion of "gladiators in suits" (as fans call themselves) eagerly awaiting the return of the series. She, too, is pretty excited to be back playing Washington, D.C. insider and crisis management expert Olivia Pope. Pope is a "fixer" who formerly worked for her lover, Republican President Fitzgerald Grant. When told that there are many women who try to emulate both Pope's sense of fashion and take-charge personality, Washington laughs. "I do, too," she said. The series ended its first season with the revelation that the character Quinn Perkins, an employee of Pope's (and played by Katie Lowes), was not actually Quinn Perkins.
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"Scandal" returns for season 2 on Thursday
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Kerry Washington says there will be plenty of mystery and surprises
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She says she grew up with an interest in politics
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Her next project is the Tarantino film "Django Unchained"
It was a part Washington said she's not sure she would have been able to portray were it not for having the balance of the @placeholder role on "Scandal."