Kim Coates as Tig Trager, Tommy Flanagan as Chibs Telford, Charlie Hunnam as Jax Teller, Rusty Coones as Quinn, and Mark Boone Junior as Bobby Munson in ‘Sons of Anarchy’ (Photo Credit: Byron Cohen/FX)
I kicked off my interview with Kim Coates from FX’s Sons of Anarchy by letting him know that season five of the series served up a ‘Tig’ that – for the first time – I actually liked. A lot of it had to do with his saving a dog, but Tig’s emotionally devastating journey over the course of the season also made it difficult to not root for the character.
Tig’s a survivor…but will he survive the final two seasons of Sons of Anarchy? Only series creator Kurt Sutter knows the answer to that question, but Coates has his ideas about Tig’s destiny.
Will he remain standing at the end? “What a great question. I don’t know,” answered Coates. “This is Hamlet, metaphorically, right? I mean, it is. And that means if it’s Hamlet we’re all going to die. Everyone’s going to be dead at the end. Maybe not… Who knows? All I know is it’s been a great ride.”
“Sutter has done a genius job of making Tig whole. I’m the complete gambit – I’m f*cked up, I’ve got issues, but I’m loyal. I love the club. Me and Gemma, what’s going to happen? Clay’s on the way out and I’m framing him. I’m bawling my eyes out. Charlie doesn’t kill me, I’m still alive. So, yeah, I think that when Sutter writes for me it’s a great day for Sons of Anarchy because it’s hard to write for 10 leads, and it’s hard to write for some amazing guest stars all the time,” said Coates.
Check out the rest of what Coates had to say about the critically acclaimed series and his future plans:
Isaiah Washington began our interview for the new The CW sci-fi series The 100 by straightening out all of our tape recorders. Washington likes things orderly, and his approach to characters is meticulous.
Washington was interested in the soul of his The 100 character and above all else doesn’t want to let the audience down by delivering anything less than credible in his performance. “I’ve always been terrified of not having credibility with you guys. If you don’t believe – like or love the character – if you don’t believe it, if you’re not feeling it, then I’m not doing the job that I was hired to do, and I’m certainly not serving the audience,” explained Washington on his approach to taking on a role. And as for taking on The 100, Washington had high praise for the concept. “I’m most interested to see, yet again, how humanity, how the world responds,” said Washington. “If I’m right, then it will be bigger than anything I’ve ever done.”
Washington also talked about the appeal of the character and the challenges faced by his ‘Chancellor Jaha’ in our interview from the 2013 San Diego Comic Con:
Season three of Syfy’s Being Human found Meaghan Rath finally getting a break from the wardrobe she’d worn the previous two seasons while playing Sally the ghost. It also found Rath’s Sally alive yet decomposing. Gross? Yes. An interesting twist? Most definitely.
At the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con, Rath promised this upcoming season will be just as twisted and entertaining.
Meaghan Rath Being Human Interview:
What can you say about season four?
Meaghan Rath: “We start off three months after we left off in season three. Let’s talk about my character…so when we left her, she was sucked down her death spot. What’s happened is Sally seemed to absorb quite a bit of Donna’s power. She’s quite different this year. It’s sort of amazing how far she’s come in four years. And so what she does is she tries to harness that power and use it to get out of where they are. That’s where we start off.”
We heard Amy Aquino is going to be back.
Meaghan Rath: “Yeah.”
How much interaction do you two have?
Meaghan Rath: “I think quite a bit. I hope, I don’t really know. I’ve only read four scripts, but I love her, and I think she’s incredibly talented. I would love to just be around her. […]We have a very similar sense of humor. It’s weird because last season our stories were so closely tied, but we barely had any scenes together. So, it’s nice actually. She hasn’t shot yet with us; we’ve only been shooting a week, so I’m excited to see her.”
Will your character progress dramatically this year from last season?
Meaghan Rath: “Yeah. I think, yeah. I think so in terms of her capabilities, yeah, there’s a huge difference. I also think emotionally she’s been through so much that you can’t possibly be the same person that you were after losing everything, everybody you love over and over and over. I mean, my character’s died like four times, you know, and it just sort of shows me how resilient she is because she manages to retain that essence of her personality. And this year I feel like she may be using that to sort of mask some really deep pain just because of everything that she’s been through. I think Sally is really good socially and knows how to fake it.”
Is there a favorite episode you have of Sally’s?
Meaghan Rath: “Yeah. One of my favorites was in season two, Dream Reaper, like, when Sally goes to the alternative reality. It was really a special episode for all of us. I really, really loved all of last season. I liked episode 11…12 was kind of fun to shoot when we go to the portal. That was like a movie. Last season was my favorite season so far.
Last season I got to experience so much, so many different things than I had so far. I got to work so much with prosthetic make-up and more visual effects in different ways. It was really fun.”
Different outfits.
Meaghan Rath: “Different outfits. I got to really experiment with outfits.”
Are you going to have another love interest?
Meaghan Rath: “Something’s happening. Yeah. I’m definitely not talking about that.”
You’re separated from the guys?
Meaghan Rath: “Yeah.”
Do you know how long it will be? Any idea?
Meaghan Rath: “It won’t be too long.”
It’s interesting the way that they’re together but separate.
Meaghan Rath: “Yeah. I mean that’s definitely one of the big themes of this season is the fact that we’re talking a lot about destiny, and whatever was meant to be was meant to be. We’re sort of finding that we’re definitely stronger together and when you look back, every time we’ve been separated, all we’ve been trying to do is get back to each other. That’s really all we want at the end of the day. We’re really looking this season at the specific events that have happened in all of our past that bring us all together and show us that we were meant to be together for a reason.”
Meaghan Rath: “They had quite a few moments. You mean the one with eating?”
Will that be explored again?
Meaghan Rath: [Laughing] “I don’t think I’ll eat him again. I mean, you never know. Yeah. I mean Sally and Aidan definitely have chemistry. It’s funny because [Sam Witwer] and I when we’re in a scene together, it’s like our relationship is so different than it is in real life. We definitely have chemistry, the two of us, and I find that’s where we really connect on a different level through these characters and that’s like what in life brings us close, which is really strange. I don’t think I’ve had that with anyone.”
Did you feel that like this season you guys really hit a plateau?
Meaghan Rath: “I don’t know. I definitely think we have hit our stride in season three. I think we’re understanding more about what was working, what people were responding to, and we’re sort of riding that wave. But there’s always a pressure to change it up as seasons keep progressing, keep working year after year. You need to change things; you can’t play it safe in your comfort zone, so I think we are trying new stuff this year.”
Showtime’s new drama series Penny Dreadful has cast two lead roles. Bond Girl Eva Green and Josh Hartnett will star in the eight-episode psychological thriller set to air in 2014. John Logan (Hugo) created the series and is writing and executive producing Penny Dreadful. Skyfall‘s director Sam Mendes is also involved as an executive producer. Juan Antonio Bayona (The Orphanage, The Impossible) is directing episodes one and two.
Filming will take place later this year.
Per Showtime: “Hartnett will take on the role of ‘Ethan Chandler,’ a charming American who finds himself trapped in the darkest corners of Victorian London, while Green will play ‘Vanessa Ives,’ a seductive and formidable beauty full of secrets and danger.”
It’s possible James Purefoy won’t be back controlling a killer cult in season two of The Following, if what seems to have happened to ‘Joe Carroll’ in season one’s finale actually did happen. And yes, I’m being as cryptic as possible, but even Purefoy’s unsure what’s happening with season two.
One of the possibilities is that Valorie Curry’s character, Emma Hill, will step up and take command.
“Who knows if the Carrollism movement is even still in existence anymore. I mean, I don’t know exactly what Emma’s place is going to be in the world. At the end of season one, the cult essentially disbanded. Joe is seemingly dead, although she holds out hope that they’ll be reunited,” explained Curry during our interview at the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con. “What I’m more excited about is who Emma is when she’s on her own.”
The First Snap on 'Helix' (Photo by: Philippe Bosse/Syfy)Helix has begun shooting in Montreal and Syfy has announced the final cast members. Joining Billy Campbell in the thriller will be Kyra Zagorsky, Mark Ghanimé, Jordan Hayes, Meegwun Fairbrother, Catherine Lemieux, and Neil Napier. Battlestar Galactica‘s Ronald D Moore along with Steven Maeda and Lynda Obst are executive producing. Jeffrey Reiner’s (Friday Night Lights) directing the first episode from a script by Cameron Porsandeh.
The Plot:
Helix is an intense thriller about a team of scientists from the Centers for Disease Control who travel to a high-tech research facility in the Arctic to investigate a possible disease outbreak, only to find themselves pulled into a terrifying life-and-death struggle that may hold the key to mankind’s salvation or total annihilation. However, the lethal threat is just the tip of the iceberg, and as the virus evolves, the chilling truth begins to unravel.
Billy Campbell (The Killing, Killing Lincoln) stars as Dr. Alan Farragut, leader of the Centers for Disease Control outbreak field team called upon to investigate and control a potential “hot zone” at a remote Arctic research facility. Hiroyuki Sanada (The Wolverine) also stars as Dr. Hiroshi Hataki, director of the outpost and its mysterious viral research program.
Sundance Channel has set Stephen Rea, Janet McTeer, Lubna Azbal, Eve Best, Lindsay Duncan, Andrew Buchan, Katherine Parkinson, Tobias Menzies, Genevieve O’Reilly and Igal Naor to co-star with Maggie Gyllenhaal in The Honourable Woman. The eight part mini-series has just begun 18 weeks of shooting, with Sundance Channel aiming to air the drama in 2014.
The Honourable Woman was written and directed by Hugo Blick.
Details on the New Cast Members:
Stephen Rea (V for Vendetta) will play Hugh Hayden-Hoyle – “a top M16 spy on the verge of retirement, digging deep into Nessa Stein’s family. His bitter ex-wife Anjelica is played by Lindsay Duncan (The Hollow Crown).”
Janet McTeer (Damages, Albert Nobbs) plays “the Head of MI6 Julia Walsh — who has a personal hold over Hayden-Hoyle (Rea).”
Andrew Buchan is set to play “Nessa Stein’s (Gyllenhaal) brother Ephra Stein — seemingly over-shadowed by his sister within the Stein family business. Katherine Parkinson is his “highly strung pregnant wife Rachel Stein.”
Eve Best (Nurse Jackie) is Monica Chatwin, “a key MI6 agent from the Washington Bureau — spoiling for a fight with her UK counterparts. Multi-award winning Belgian actress Lubna Azbal plays Atika Halibi, nanny to Ephra and Rachel Stein’s two young daughters and close friend to Nessa.”
Tobias Menzies (Game of Thrones) plays opposite Gyllenhaal as “Nessa’s trusted personal body guard Nathaniel Bloom. Genevieve O’Reilly plays Nessa’s loyal personal assistant Frances.”
Igal Naor (300: Rise Of An Empire) plays “Shlomo Zahary, a close long-time ally of the Stein family.”
ABC’s confirmed Kelly Reilly will star in their limited-run drama series The Black Box. The 13-episode series will air in 2014 and will be directed by My Week with Marilyn‘s Simon Curtis. Amy Holden Jones (Indecent Proposal) wrote the script.
The official plot: “Elizabeth Black, world-renowned neuroscientist, appears to have it all. In an impossible journey to find balance in her life, she is constantly haunted by her own struggle with mental illness. On the outside, Elizabeth has a special touch for the patients she treats at The Center for Neurological Research and Treatment, otherwise known as ‘The Cube.’ However, Elizabeth’s mental illness is not the only secret she’s kept locked away from her family and her new fiancee.”
Anne Thomopoulos, Bryan Singer, Ilene Chaiken, and Oly Obst are executive producing the series.
Reilly’s credits include Flight, Sherlock Holmes, Me and Orson Welles, and Pride and Prejudice.
Ryan Kwanten (‘Jason Stackhouse’ in True Blood) stars in the 17-minute short film Truth in Journalism, written and directed by his Knights of Badassdom helmer Joe Lynch and produced by Adi Shankar. Kwanten plays Marvel’s Eddie Brock, a reporter being shadowed by a foreign documentary crew.
According to the official description, Truth in Journalism is a pure passion project, “a dream come true for a comics ‘n cult-film-loving fan to work within two distinct worlds I grew up loving,” stated Lynch. “As a lover of mixing pop culture into storytelling, in a Warholian way, Truth in Journalism is pure ‘Pop Art’. I’ve rarely been as proud of something I’ve created as much as I had with this project and thrilled the TRUTH has been unleashed to the world. To CineMAAA!”
20th Century Fox brought Apes veteran Andy Serkis along with newbies to the franchise Jason Clarke, Keri Russell, and director Matt Reeves to the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con to talk about the latest edition to the iconic Apes franchise, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Serkis reprises his role as Caesar in this sequel which is set ten years after the end of Rise of the Planet of the Apes and catches up with the ape and human population as they attempt to work out an uneasy peace.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes Press Conference:
Can you talk about the specific vision for this sequel?
Matt Reeves: “It’s interesting because to me even though the movie deals with the viral apocalypse that comes from the end of the last film, the movie is not a post-apocalyptic movie. What it is is it’s a story that starts in the world of apes and you see what they’ve built. You see this kind of primitive majestic kingdom. You see a family and a way in which they come into being. Then they are thinking and wondering in this new creation, are the humans gone because it’s all from their point of view.
And then not too long into the story they realize that there are still humans and it becomes a question of survival. That’s what the whole is about is how can these two populations exist and will it lead to violence. In that sense I really don’t think it’s strictly a post-apocalyptic movie; that’s just an aspect or one part of it. That’s what it looks like in the city. But it’s really much more about the nature of these two populations and whether or not they can find a way to live together.”
What can you say about the evolution of the apes and their language skills?
Matt Reeves: “The thing that was important to me was that the story not jump too far in a certain way from where things were in Rise. In Rise when Andy says ‘no’ in Rise it was so startling that it blew me away. And I think the thing that was exciting to me was watching the apes learn how to speak, watching all that happen. Obviously, there are only three or four words in the first movie. We wanted this to be somewhere along the continuum toward the ’68 movie where, of course, they’re fully conversing. So that’s really what we worked on. One of the things, in the beginning, was just to spend time exploring that aspect.”
Keri, were you ready for a full-on action-hero movie now?
Keri Russell: “I’m an action hero in this?”
Matt Reeves: “Very Lara Croft. What we tried to do is tell a story about all of these characters in a way that even though it’s a grand action story and she does have to do some action in the film, it’s really about…the thing that was exciting for us about it, the thing that blows me away about the first movie and why I was so excited to work with Andy…is that it’s really about character. The reason that Jason is here, the reason that Keri is here is that we wanted characters who had the level of depth that Andy brought to the first film. She brings some action, but really she’s here because she brings a lot of character and depth.”
Keri Russell: “I climbed down that ladder fast. I was fast, wasn’t I? To me, it’s really a story of survival is where I’m coming at it from. And the thing I was reading a little bit about before I started was more about this woman who’s been through a war and has lost a lot of people. That’s where my character is in the movie. You lost a lot of people you love, and you’re just trying to create an existence from that at that place, and then trying to survive.”
Will we be seeing overt references to previous Apes films?
Matt Reeves: “I’ll put it this way, we don’t do it in a sort of winking way. There is a reference to…first of all the franchise is something that as a little kid I was obsessed with. I wanted to be in it. We all love those movies so much, but what was done so brilliantly in Rise was to take it and they call it a reboot, a reinvention…
I always wanted to be a gorilla when I watched the first movie, and what was amazing about what Andy did and WETA did and Rupert [Wyatt] did in Rise was that you did become an ape; you became Caesar. You cared about him and connected to him. Really, the thing we wanted to carry forward was the emotionality within the grander context of the story that that movie had. You all know that it leads to The Planet of the Apes not The Planet of the Humans and the Apes, so the story’s really about, ‘Where does this fit along that?’
So, in that way, this references just the knowledge of what that first film is. And within that, there are certain things within the canon, I guess you might consider them almost commandments and things that it does reference. They did it very cleverly in the first film. Our references are much more about trying to create a context for the world that Andy leads.”
Andy, can you talk about the evolution of Caesar?
Andy Serkis: “Because of the way that Caesar came into the world and brought up by human beings, for me he was always an outsider. There’s a sense of not knowing who he was. He was brought up by human beings and he believed himself in many ways to be a human being with our attributes. He learns human belief systems through his father, James Franco’s character Will, who he believed to be a good man.
I’ll never forget reading the script for the first time and seeing the trajectory of that character, the arc of that character, and what an amazing character he is, and then realizing and it’s an ape. Take that away and you’d still have an amazing character who’s going on a phenomenal journey. Here’s this creature who was going through all these recognizable human emotions of being an outsider, of being rejected, and then finding his people.
So now, going through to this next stage, it’s very much about Caesar having become leader and not throwing away everything that he has grown up with as a human being. So in a sense he’s finding his way by galvanizing this group of orangutans and chimps and gorillas 2,000 strong and trying to evaluate that on a daily basis. And, not go about it absolutely but be open and empathetic. ‘How can I respond to this situation that I need to tend to?’
He’s also a father to a teenage son, he also now has an infant child. He has a wife, he has a council, he has a very, very big community he’s responsible for in their survival. And then he has the choice of reaction to human beings who he adored in a sense and still, deep down, he wants to be able to communicate with. And then on top of that, I suppose, how to communicate that.
One of the things that last time around, one of the beauties of it is the fact that they didn’t speak. So it’s a very pure and innocent way of experiencing what their thoughts and feelings were in the last movie. This time around there’s an evolution; there’s an evolution in linguistics. I’ve found that that has been one of the biggest challenges: how Caesar is spiritually, philosophically, how he commands, how he responds on a personal level. So, we worked very, very in great detail in terms of creating that level of sophistication versus finding language.
We find it through the sign language that he was taught which is becoming a way to unify the other apes. Then also human words that he’s beginning to be able to use. All the other apes are beginning to use gesture and ape vocalizations, and of course the younger apes have been brought up in human society and learn to speak even better and faster than their parents, because that’s what happens. It’s a very rich and complex world that Caesar exists in and he’s under huge pressure as the movie goes on.”
Jason, what was it like landing the lead role in this Apes film?
Jason Clarke: “It feels good. I mean, four months in it hurts. It feels really nice. I’m playing, in a funny kind of way, a different mirror of Caesar. There’s many ways to talk about that. I play Malcolm, who was an architect, who has a son and lost a wife, who now has a new partner who is trying to find a way for his family to stay alive. That broadens to find a way to his community. He wants his community to stay alive, so he assumes a role in that. And then through the story, he finds his inner ape as well. Through the 10 years that we’ve had this apocalypse, this virus, this civil war and everything else that’s gone on, he’s lost a lot of people and finds a lot about himself through his interactions out in the woods.”
Matt, how tough was it to balance a believable story and genre escapism?
Matt Reeves: “To me, the great thing that you have going for you immediately is that they’re apes; you’ve got that and it’s amazing to me, what WETA does and how they can transform them. But the key to the whole thing is what’s going on under it, what Andy does and what the other actors do when they’re playing apes in a way that’s emotionally authentic. […]I asked them to show me the footage of everything that Andy had done wearing the markers, wearing the camera on his face, wearing this crazy gray suit that they wear.
I just wanted to see what he was doing. I watched it up against the footage and I realized that the reason I was affected emotionally was because Andy, regardless of the fact that he was acting like an ape, he was just a brilliant actor. It was just so emotionally real.
The thing that is always important to me in whatever I do is trying to find the reality in that. And the key is that you take the one element that is the fantastical, which is that they are intelligent apes, and you let that be the one fantastic element. Everything else is about trying to realize a way that feels grounded and real. The first film was shot much more on stage, it was smaller shoot. This film because of what they’re creating, that kingdom, is out in the woods so we went out to the woods. I wanted to use as much available light as possible so you could create all that reality.
And then of course the key to everything was just about the emotional reality of the characters that these actors play. Once you do that, you forget about the fact that they’re apes. That’s the thing: we tried to create a story that we would connect to, that would mean something to us, and then on top of that you look back and you go, ‘Oh, yeah, and they’re apes.’ That’s the thing that takes you to this other level because it allows you to tell a story that matters to you.”
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Dawn of the Planet of the Apes opens in theaters on July 11, 2014.
Sundance Channel has set Stephen Rea, Janet McTeer, Lubna Azbal, Eve Best, Lindsay Duncan, Andrew Buchan, Katherine Parkinson, Tobias Menzies, Genevieve O’Reilly and Igal Naor to co-star with Maggie Gyllenhaal in The Honourable Woman. The eight part mini-series has just begun 18 weeks of shooting, with Sundance Channel aiming to air the drama in 2014.
