Category: Interviews (Page 41 of 46)

A Chat with Carla Gugino (“The Mighty Macs”)

October 24, 2011 /

Bullz-Eye: We met very briefly in person when you were at the TCA tour for the “Californication” panel.

Carla Gugino: Yes! Very good…and a totally different project! [Laughs.]

BE: To say the least. So how did you find your way into “The Mighty Macs”? Was the script pitched directly to you?

CG: Yeah, you know, my wonderful agent – his name’s Mike Nilon – he’s actually from Philly, so he kind of knew the story and said, “There’s this filmmaker, Tim Chambers, who wrote and is gonna direct this, and he’s really interested in meeting with you for the role of Cathy Rush.” And I was doing a play…I was doing “Suddenly Last Summer” off Broadway with Blythe Danner at that time, so Tim came to see the play and took me out to dinner afterwards, and he basically told me the story. And, of course, then I read the script, and we went on from there. But he was so passionate about this story and had done such extensive research and was just really galvanized to tell it. And I think that’s the thing for me: it’s always about looking for a person with a vision at the helm, and a character that I have not gotten to play yet. That sort of scares me in a great way. [Laughs.] And in this particular case, you know, Cathy’s a pretty phenomenal woman – she’s still alive and thriving – so to do justice to her story felt daunting in the most fantastic way.

Continue reading »

Entertainment, Interviews, Movies

A Chat with Norman Reedus (“The Walking Dead”)

October 13, 2011 /

ALSO: Check out our Season Two preview, as well interviews with actor Jon Bernthal and executive producer Robert Kirkman.

Bullz-Eye: I know you won’t remember me, but we met fleetingly at the New York Comic Con, during the press roundtables.

Norman Reedus: Oh, right on. (Laughs) The craziness that is Comic-Con…

BE: Yeah, there’s no way you’d remember me in the middle of all that. But it was a good time nonetheless, so it’s good to talk to you again. And I’ve had a chance to check out the first episode of the new season…

NR: Oh, yeah? What’d you think?

BE: I think I should’ve gone straight on to the second episode.

NR: (Laughs) Awesome!

BE: So when you leapt into Season 2, how enthused were you to get back to work? It seems like it’d be a lot of fun to do.

NR: It’s a blast. I wanted to go a month early and just wait for everybody to show up. It’s such a fun job. It’s by far my favorite job I’ve ever done. The crew and the cast, everyone is so tight there. We’re all just one big family, for real. I just wanted to get back to it. I’ve never really had an acting experience that’s just so…fun. It’s so engaging. I’m really into it.

BE: Do you get used to the humidity down in Atlanta pretty quickly?

NR: You know, you kind of just suffer for the show. The heat and the surroundings are definitely a character on the show, so we’re out there surviving for our lives already. But, you know, I…I’m in Los Angeles right now, getting ready to go back to George to finish the season. But it started getting cold the last night we were there, and I shot ‘til about 4:30 in the morning and took an 8 AM flight to California, so I was exhausted. But it was freezing. It didn’t feel right. I prefer the heat.

BE: I think it was Steven (Yeun) who was telling the story about how he actually passed out his first day of filming.

NR: Yeah, he did. He had a long running scene, and he just sort of fainted. It was pretty crazy. Of course, we all teased him uncontrollably forever after that. (Laughs)

BE: So do you have to get into a Daryl mindset when you go back to work?

NR: Yeah, you know, it’s interesting, ‘cause last season, it was all ‘fuck you, I hate you,’ and this season you sort of see Daryl form alliances with certain members you wouldn’t necessarily expect. Damaged people recognize other damaged people, so they have a kindred spirit going on. It’s not just so one-noted this season. He really kind of bounces all over the place, and it’s really interesting. It’s like he needs a hug, but if you tried to hug him, he’d stab you. He’s really fragile, like a little kid in a lot of ways. You see certain members of the group trying to tell him his worth, that he’s worth more than he thinks about himself, and you find a little bit about his back story, his family history, and you see how truly damaged this guy is. It’s interesting to play all those levels. It really makes for an interesting day of work.

BE: Yeah, I mean, I wouldn’t call him a delicate flower or anything, but even in the first episode of Season 2, he feels like a slightly different Daryl than we saw last season.

NR: Yeah, but, you know, even last season, I tried to tear up between squirrel throws and whatnot, just to make him still be, like, he lost his big brother. Even assholes have big brothers. I tried to make him more than just an angry guy. It was, like, show some reasons why he’s so angry and damaged.

Continue reading »

Entertainment, Interviews, Television

A Chat with Jon Bernthal (“The Walking Dead”)

October 13, 2011 /

ALSO: Check out our Season Two preview, as well as interviews with actor Norman Reedus and executive producer Robert Kirkman.

BE: I’ve seen the Season 2 premiere, and from what I can tell, it seems like you guys are still playing at the same level that you were in the first season.

Jon Bernthal: Aw, thanks, man, I appreciate you saying so.

BE: So you guys got to play the love triangle in Season 1, and it’s obviously still ongoing in Season 2. Is it a challenge to play something like that in the middle of a zombie thriller?

JB: I don’t really look at it so much as a love triangle. I look at it more as a family that…these horrible circumstances, this disease that’s turned the world into this apocalyptic state, I look at it more as a family that’s been severely fractured by it. I think that it’s not as simple as two guys in love with the same girl. I think Shane is very much in love with Lori, but I think he loves his best friend, too, as well as their little boy, Carl. I think these are relationships that are immensely important to him, and unfortunately, they’re forever tainted and they’ll never quite be the same. In this world that we’re trying to create, all of these characters have lost so many people. I think what’s very interesting for Shane is that the people in the world who mean the most to him are still alive. It’s just that their relationships will never be the same because of what’s gone down.

BE: Shane is a pretty complex character because of his situation. Do you find it hard to find that balance of personality when you’re playing the part?

JB: No, man, I love it. As an actor, it’s the kind of part you look for. When I first talked with Frank (Darabont) about this, our goal was to not just make him sort of this one-dimensional villain straight out of the comic. We wanted him to be a layered, nuanced character that wasn’t a good guy, wasn’t a bad guy, but was a real guy. I think he’s just operating from a place of being a loyal friend and trying to do what’s best, trying to protect these people that he loves so much. I think he’s always coming from a place of trying to do the right thing, but it’s fractured. It’s just such a different, cold, brutal world now. Also, what’s very interesting about the character is that he’s the first one in the series, I think, to just sort of recognize the lawlessness of this world they’re living in now. He does it when he beats down Ed by the water in Season 1, and also when he trains the gun on Rick in Season 1. I think he recognizes that there are no real circumstances for your actions in this world, and I think Season 2 is very much about Rick and Shane splitting on how they feel the best way to go forward in this world is. I think Shane feels that, to survive, you have to make very brutal, very harsh decisions, and you really have to abandon emotion and morality and just do what’s best for survival, whereas Rick, I think, is kind of plagued by trying to do the right thing. They really become at odds with each other over those philosophies.

Continue reading »

Entertainment, Interviews, Television

A Chat with Robert Kirkman (“The Walking Dead”)

October 13, 2011 /

ALSO: Check out our Season Two preview, as well as interviews with actors Jon Bernthal and Norman Reedus.

Bullz-Eye: I know you don’t remember me, but you and I met briefly when you were doing the press roundtables at the New York Comic-Con.

Robert Kirkman: Oh, good! I hope I did okay.

BE: Oh, yeah, you did great. It was a lot of fun. I just got the Season 2 press kit, and I’m 95% of the way through the first episode, so it killed me to have to get on the phone with you.

RK: (Laughs) Awesome!

BE: So how excited are you about the premiere of the show’s second season?

RK: I’m extremely excited. I mean, you know, there’s a lot of pressure to follow up our first season. It was a big success, and, you know, knowing what I know of the second season and seeing what I’ve seen, I’m fairly confident that we’re still going to come out of the gate and impress people, so I’m really anxious to see what people think of it. A lot of hard work has been going into this season, and it’s great that it’s going to finally be enjoyed by some people. So I’m really excited.

BE: When it comes to adapting the original source material, you’ve obviously got an advantage, given that it’s yours… (Laughs) …but I’m sure it’s hard to pick and choose which bits actually make it onto television.

RK: It’s a process. There’s not really a way to nail down exactly what goes into it. But everyone in the room is familiar with the comic, and we all sit down knowing what happened in the book, and we look at where the show’s going and what the characters are doing, and we just kind of figure it all out. Sometimes we take things directly from the comic, and there are a lot of times when we’re talking about things from the comic, and things will go to different characters in the show, or it’ll spin off into something entirely new that wasn’t in the comic, but the starting point was something that did appear in the comic. So it’s an evolving process, and it’s neat to be sitting down to adapt something that I wrote awhile ago. The earlier material in “The Walking Dead” is something I wrote some time ago, so it’s good to be able to revisit that stuff.

Continue reading »

Entertainment, Interviews, Television

A Chat with Nick Swardson

October 11, 2011 /

It would be fair to say that the comedy of Nick Swardson is an acquired taste, as anyone who’s seen his films, including “Grandma’s Boy” and “Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star,” or his TV series, “Nick Swardson’s Pretend Time,” can tell you. With the latter now back in Comedy Central’s Wednesday night line-up for its second season, Swardson took a few minutes to chat with Bullz-Eye about what we can expect from Season 2 of “Pretend Time,” what he thinks of his lack of critical love, and more.

Bullz-Eye: To start off by kind of stating the obvious, I’m sure you’re psyched about your show returning for a second season.

Nick Swardson: Yeah, I am. I’m really excited, ‘cause I feel like, no matter what happens, this is the show I wanted to make.

BE: So what are the origins of “Nick Swardson’s Pretend Time,” anyway? Did you pitch them the idea, or did they come to you with the idea?

NS: My friend Tom (Gianas) actually pitched me the idea. He created “Human Giant” and ran that show on MTV, and he did “Tenacious D” on HBO. He’s an old friend of mine. He directed “Gay Robot,” this original pilot that I did years ago. He’s really, really brilliant, and he came to me with this idea. I’ve always wanted to do sketch comedy, and I trust Tom a lot, so I was, like, “All right, let’s do it.” And we just jumped into the show. We pitched it to the network, and they bought it off the pitch. We didn’t even get a pilot. They ordered six episodes. Which was kind of good and bad. I kind of wish we had a pilot, because it was kind of a tricky show to make. (Laughs) We didn’t really have that trial by fire. We were just kind of thrown into the volcano.

BE: You have a pretty vocal fanbase. I presume you’ve gotten some advice, either helpful or otherwise, as far as where to take the show in its second season.

NS: Yeah, it’s been interesting, because people didn’t really know what to expect from the show. My fans were kind of, like, “Well, wait, what is it? Is it stand-up? I don’t understand what it is.” They were kind of confused. Obviously, comedy’s subjective, and people either bought the show or they didn’t. (Laughs) But the people who got it, they loved it.

BE: So is Season 2 along the same lines as Season 1, or do you think you’ve kind of fleshed it out a bit more as far as what you want from the show?

NS: Um… (Long pause) I mean, it’s more aggressive. Like, there’s some really crazy stuff. (Laughs) It’s really aggressive. But we’ve kind of counterbalanced this season with doing more of a live element and more storytelling than stand-up.

BE: How much flexibility do you have with Comedy Central as far as your vision for the show? Has there been any point when they were, like, “Uh, can you dial it back a bit?”

NS: Uh, yeah. (Laughs) At the beginning, they were, like, “This is way too aggressive.” But that’s the whole point of having and doing a show. Why not make it the most aggressive thing you can do? I just didn’t want to play it safe. I wanted to just throw it against the wall, and hopefully it works. Hopefully people will dig it.

Continue reading »

Entertainment, Interviews, Television

« Older posts Newer posts »

BULLZ-EYE INFO

© 2026 Bullz-Eye Blog

Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑