Matthew Rhys on Brothers and Sisters

21/01/2010

The Welsh actor discusses moving from Cardiff to California and starring in the hit US drama series.

Luke MacFarlane, Matthew Rhys and Marion Ross in the US drama series Brothers and Sisters.

“I love and embrace the cultural differences,” says Rhys – now almost a California native, after four years’ worth of Brothers & Sisters (shown here on More4). “In some ways, they’re so profoundly different from Britain. In other ways, very similar.”

Rhys plays Kevin Walker, a glossily gay Californian in his mid-thirties, and one of the siblings of the show’s title. He’s sitting in a Disney conference room joshing with actor Luke Macfarlane, who plays his on-screen husband Scotty. Though Rhys’s American accent never slips on-screen, his voice now is straight from the valleys. “When I speak to people from Britain, that’s when I feel like a fake, speaking with an American accent,” he says, slightly sheepishly.

Macfarlane, who hails from Canada, joins in. “Matthew’s also exceptionally talented at all accents,” he says archly.

“Yes. Even neighbourhoods of Canada,” says Rhys.

“Not just neighbourhoods – specific hockey teams,” quips Macfarlane.

The pair’s good-natured off-screen banter is exactly how fans of the show would hope. Brothers & Sisters has no time-travelling cops, no jets crashing on desert islands. It rivets more than 10million American viewers with nothing more than the intertwined stories of one family. Warm, prosperous and sentimental, the show – and its high-octane, often tear-jerking emotion – is kept from descending into soap opera not just by polished scriptwriting, but by a classy cast: Calista Flockhart, Rob Lowe and, crucially, Sally Field as materfamilias Nora Walker. On Facebook, there’s a “Which Walker are you?” quiz – and, quips Macfarlane, “everyone just keeps taking it until they get Nora.”

As British viewers start season four tonight, they will catch up with Kevin and Scotty’s newest storyline: the quest for a baby. “We’re lucky that that storyline is relatively uncharted,” says Rhys. “The whole journey of going about it makes very interesting TV.”

“And so do the different ways one goes about it – adoption versus surrogacy,” adds Macfarlane.

Along with the gay couple on ABC’s new sitcom Modern Family, Kevin and Scotty are blazing a trail for gay parenting on American primetime television. But, says Rhys, he doesn’t feel like a “poster child” for gay rights. “The press we’ve had has been very positive,” he says. “A very healthy, very nice response – that what we’re doing is on the right track.”

Macfarlane agrees. “The cultural significance is always surprising,” he says. “We just show up and do the work, and they tell us it’s groundbreaking – but it doesn’t necessarily feel groundbreaking.” Certainly Brothers & Sisters doesn’t trumpet itself as a genre-altering show. It is executive produced by Ken Olin, who appeared on screen as self-obsessed ad exec Michael Steadman in the Eighties-zeitgeist series thirtysomething. Brothers & Sisters reflects a more mature version of the same sensibility, with enviable suburban houses and beautiful knitwear as much on show as Rhys’s American accent.

Rhys himself is evidently having the time of his life. “I feel comfortable here primarily because I think Los Angeles is made up of people who don’t come from here, so you can find kindred spirits very easily,” he says. “It’s a town of gypsies.”

But Rhys has a more versatile CV than some TV actors, having played Dylan Thomas in the 2008 film The Edge of Love – and opposite Kathleen Turner in the West End version of The Graduate. “I definitely want to go back to the theatre. It is hard work, it is repetitive, but it is intensely rewarding,” he says.

His career as a chameleon extends even to talking to journalists. “You play to whatever publication you’re being interviewed by,” he says cheerily. So who is he being today, for The Daily Telegraph. “Upright Tory. Bring back Maggie!” So… does he hunt and shoot and fish? “I do, yes. I actually do! Well, I don’t hunt on horseback. In Wales, it’s a little more practical. It’s vermin control.” As Rhys is called back to the cavernous sound stage, it’s hard not to think: you can take the boy out of Cardiff…

Brothers & Sisters is on More4 tonight at 9.00pm

Source: The Telegraph

Side Dish: Pig Candy (January 18, 2010)

18/01/2010

Last night I took my future Baby Mama Michelle (Barack and I have things in common, you know) out for a celebratory dinner at a fantastically unpretentious little restaurant tucked away in the corner of a strip mall. Their menu features a uniquely thoughtful wine list (no booze for Michelle though!) and dishes that have probably been described by adjective-loving food critics as New Southern, artisanal and sustainably-minded fare. Although here’s what I think: This place simply rocks! I’m not sure I want to tell you all the name of it for fear of losing my little gem, but for careful readers I promise to pepper this post with subtle hints.

So the thing that hooked me on this place and made me want to write about it here in the first place — was a little something they call Pig Candy. If you’ve never heard of it (and I hadn’t), Pig Candy is thick strips of smoky bacon covered in brown sugar and broken into bits.

That sounds strange I know, but believe me: this stuff is better than a backstage stage pass to Wicked. (Don’t tell Kevin I said that, he would divorce me immediately.) As I enjoyed the Pig Candy with Kevin and Michelle, it started me thinking about all of the other unexpected food combinations I’ve tried over the years. Some popular, some not so much. Have you ever tried:

– Pumpkin pie filling seasoned with bay leaves
– Watermelon and feta cheese
– Tomato and peanut butter
– Melon and Prosciutto (Of course! Yummmmm.)
– Cantaloupe with chili powder
– Oysters and Raisins
– Apple pie cooked with duck meat
– Strawberries and Balsamic Vinegar
– Nectarines and Basil
– And Justin’s favorite: French Fries dipped in a vanilla milkshake

As Kevin and Michelle raced to see who could eat more of the Pig Candy (Michelle won) I couldn’t help but thinking that our lives are full of these seemingly random pairings. Who would have thought a handsome lawyer would end up marrying an unemployed and homeless cater waiter? Or that the biggest party girl I knew would end up not just as our surrogate, but laughing and joking with my husband. My own grandparents probably would have never thought they would see the day when guys could have a kid.

SCOTTY’S PIG CANDY
1/4 cup light brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne (optional)
1/2 pound thick-cut bacon, 8 slices

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Mix brown sugar, cayenne, and black pepper together in a medium bowl. Add bacon and toss. Line a baking sheet with a wire rack and lay bacon on the rack. Pat any remanding spice mixture on the bacon. Put the baking sheet on the top rack of the oven and bake until crisp, about 15 minutes. Remove from the oven to a serving dish and let cool slightly before serving.

If using thick cut peppered bacon, omit the pepper in this recipe.

Side Dish: When life hands you lemons, make lemonade (January 11, 2010)

11/01/2010

“When life hands you lemons, make lemonade.” We have all heard that old proverb, but in my case life has recently handed me a truckload of lemons.
Let me just apologize upfront for what historians will probably call the Great Lemon Shortage of 2010. If you live anywhere in the Western Half of the US and have gone to your neighborhood grocery store in the last week, you may have noticed there are no more lemons. It’s a mystery that has had farmers scratching their heads. Of course, there is no mystery. There is just Kevin Walker.
You see if you’re married to Kevin Walker, when he hands you lemons you DO make lemonade, but then you are faced with a new problem. After you’ve made more lemonade than you could possibly drink or give away in two lifetimes and you still have lemons lying around, what do you do then?

After gallons of lemonade you can graduate to acres of lemon squares before moving on to other things: Lemon Cheesecake, Limoncello, Lemon Garlic Tilapia, Lemon Sorbet, Lemon and Herb Risotto Cake, Lemon Meringue Pie, Lemon Curd, Lemon-Berry Trifle, Lemon Drop Martinis, Lemon Zucchini Drops, Blueberry Lemon Cakewell, you get the idea. I’m starting to sound like Bubba talking about shrimp on Forrest Gump!

But did you know you can use lemons for other things around the house too?

* Use lemon juice to get the smell of garlic or fish off of your hands.
* Run lemon halves through the garbage disposal to make it smell great.
* Add a teaspoon of lemon juice to dishwashing soap to increase its grease-cutting power.
* Squeeze lemon juice onto a stained cutting board, rub and let stand for 20 minutes to get rid of stains.

Lemon juice also can be used to clean grout, brighten whites when doing laundry and bleach stains from things like tomato soup on dishwasher-safe plastic food containers.
So lets not disregard the wisdom of the”when life hands you lemons” proverb, but lets also expand on its meaning until our laundry is bright white, our grout is clean and our garbage disposal has never smelled better. Because lemonade is always just the beginning.

SCOTTY’S SIMPLE LEMONADE
This is more a guide than a recipe. It’s always a 1:1:1 ratio of sugar to water to lemon juice.

Ingredients
1 cup sugar (can reduce)
1 cup water
1 cup lemon juice

3-4 cups of cold water to dilute

Method 1. Make a “simple syrup” by heating the sugar and water together in a saucepan until the sugar completely dissolved.
2. Extract the juice from 4-6 lemons. You want one cup of juice.
3. Combine the juice and simple syrup in a large pitcher. Add 3-4 cups of cold water, depending on the strength you’re looking for.
4. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before enjoying. If it’s too sweet, adjust the flavor with more straight lemon juice and/or water.

Serves 6.

Side Dish: Red Velvet Cupcakes (November 30, 2009)

 30/11/2009

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I see gourmet cupcake shops everywhere these days and feel like I’m always hearing from one friend or another about some insanely good cupcake they’ve just eaten. It seems that the cake in its classic sliced form has been demoted; the cupcake is the confection of our time.

Cake is more stuffy, formal and reserved for “functions.” Unencumbered by the fork and plate, the cupcake is really another expression of our freedom. It is the desert of the masses, offering something for all occasions and people. Today, you’re as likely to find the ubiquitous treat at a wedding as you are at a child’s birthday party, as the energy-boosting study group snack or the forbidden sweet that derails a diet, eaten in secret behind the boiler in the basement.

And flavors? Vanilla and chocolate are so 1983. How about a cupcake that tastes like a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup? Why drink a Pina Colada when you can eat a pineapple cupcake with a rum/coconut cream cheese frosting? I even saw a $4 cupcake meant to look and taste like a Hostess cupcake. This is what we’ve come to: Cupcake-flavored cupcakes. How meta.

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Don’t get me wrong. I love eating cupcakes almost as much as I love making them. And as some of you know, I bake a mean cupcake. Back when I had that toucan hairdo, I even toyed with the idea of opening an overpriced (I mean “gourmet”) cupcake shop of my very own. When I first met Kevin, his sister invited me to a party at their house and did I bring flowers or wine? No. I brought the one thing that I knew would win him over if my charm and good looks failed: red velvet cupcakes. They were both rich and sweet. I, on the other hand, was just sweet.

Sure when I first bit into a Creamsicle Cupcake or a Grape Bubble Gum Cupcake or even a Chipotle Chocolate Cupcake with Maple Glazed Bacon I knew I was tasting something special. But (and I never say this about things with bacon in them) I couldn’t help but feel like something was missing. It’s hard to believe that a cupcake the size of a softball could be missing anything, but after the initial excitement faded and my blood sugar levels returned to normal I was left feeling like they were all show and no substance. The Paris Hilton of desserts.

I’ll take one of my mom’s cupcakes – which she made from a box – any day. I envy pastry chefs’ patience and their eye towards precision and perfection, but when my mom made cupcakes she had to find the time in her busy day to do it. She did it out of love. So maybe that’s what’s missing. Maybe that’s why I made red velvet cupcakes for Kevin rather than buying a dozen at Crumbs. My cupcake might, at first glance, have seemed like one I could get at a store; they both would have had the same colors, textures and taste. Maybe the difference, as corny as it sounds, is love. I guess you could say I was looking for love at first bite.

Red Velvet Cupcakes Recipe

Cupcakes
2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 tablespoons red food coloring*
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon vinegar
1 cup buttermilk**
* You can also substitute beet juice or beet puree to achieve the red color and retain some moisture.
**If you don’t have buttermilk you can add a tablespoon of distilled white vinegar to milk and let it stand for 10-12 minutes.

Cream-Cheese Frosting
8 ounces cream cheese (one bar)
1/2 pound unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups confectioner’s sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
(Optional) Cupcake toppers or colored sugar

Cupcakes
Preheat oven to 325° F. Line muffin tins with wrappers. Mix all dry ingredients together. Mix all the wet ingredients together. Combine the wet and dry mixtures together thoroughly. Fill each wrapper about two-thirds full will batter. Bake 15 to 20 minutes. Let them cool completely. (This is hard for Kevin!)

Frosting
Mix all the butter and cream cheese until smooth. Slowly add confectioner’s sugar, mixing as you go. Next, add the vanilla extract. Frost cupcakes the cupcakes and sprinkle with colored sugar or cupcake toppers.

Makes about 24.

Side Dish: Happy Thanksgiving! (November 23, 2009)

23/11/2009

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This week has been particularly cold for LA. I imagine that this is what autumn in New England feels like: the approaching cold, coming indoors rosy-cheeked after a pickup football game, raking colored leaves into piles and drinking hot mulled apple cider.

“I can see my breath,” Kevin demonstrated with characteristic gruff as we left the house this morning to head over to his mother Nora’s house. So much for global warming. When we got to Nora’s, Kevin was still complaining about the cold and so I got an idea. One quick look at Nora’s pantry assured me that she would not miss a few ingredients (and we all know how expensive nutmeg is!), so while everyone was in the other room undoubtedly spilling secrets they had promised to keep, I slipped into the kitchen and raided Nora’s pantry.

scottyfoodblog-burglary

I filled the crockpot with about a gallon of apple cider and stirred in 1/4 cup of brown sugar. Then I stuck about 20-25 whole cloves into the skin of 1/2 an apple cut into wedges and 1 whole orange.

To the apple and orange, I added 2 whole nutmegs, 3 cinnamon sticks, 4 pieces of crystallized ginger wrapped it all in cheesecloth and dropped it into the crock pot, topping it off with the rest of the gallon of cider.You can use other spices too star anise, lemon zest or allspice berries, for example but make sure you use whole spices; ground spices will leave the cider gritty and cloudy. Let this simmer for a few hours, enjoying the autumnal aromas as they fill your house.

scottyfoodblog-kevin_and_scotty_cider

Next, pour a healthy mug two-thirds full, top off with Brandy and enjoy with someone who needs a little warming up.

Happy Thanksgiving!
Scotty.

Side Dish: First blog (November 16, 2009)

16/09/2009
scottyfoodblog-scotty

Dear Friends,

It’s 6:00 AM and I’m sitting cross-legged on my couch while my husband sleeps quietly in the next room. Usually this time of day is relaxing for me, but not today. In fact, today I feel panicked because I’m typing the first tentative lines of my food blog and, as my closest friends can tell you, writing has never been my strong suit. Some of you may recall my attempt in high school at self-publishing the comic: Johnny Truth and the Big Secret Squad.

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I don’t want to call it a dismal failure, but let’s just say I couldn’t even convince my parents to buy a copy. But I’ve been poked enough times by friends and colleagues to put a few of my kitchen and culinary musings into print to reconsider my literary ambitions. I know you were hoping for a cookbook, but after Johnny Truth, this seems like a more manageable first step. Who knows? A blog today, a cookbook tomorrow…

Part of the deal with my little online journal is that it remain amongst my friends. The truth is that as much as I love my slumbering husband, I’ve become entangled in his family’s life rather profoundly and I’m looking for a bit of an escape. I want to talk about my thoughts on cooking, recipes, restaurants and all of my culinary adventures free from the Walker family’s web of gossip. As much as I love my Mother-in-Law she has her way of making a Hollandaise sauce and I have mine.

Because it’s my first post and it’s so early in the morning it seems fitting to start with breakfast and a few thoughts on a kitchen classic that is all too easy to get wrong: the poached egg.

And, believe me, over the years I’ve gotten the poached egg wrong. In fact one of my first recipes was a Zucchini Summer Stew with a poached egg on top. I first made it for my Dad when I was 9 and my Mom was out of town visiting Granny. It was so good he hasn’t stopped asking me to make it for him since. Coming up with the recipe (which I can share later) was the easy part – poaching the egg proved a good deal harder.

So here are my favorite egg poaching pointers – I wish I had these when I was 9:
• You need to use a fresh egg. There’s no substitute for that. Trust. Me.
• I always add a tiny bit of vinegar to the water first (about 1 TBSP per pint). Something about the chemicals helps to keep the egg together as it cooks.
• Bring the water only to the slightest boil. A roaring boil can pock the egg and leave bubbles.
• To make sure your egg is perfectly shaped, crack it into a small bowl first, and then tip the egg from the bowl into the boiling water.

Two other things. First, I’m not a believer in the whirlpool technique for poaching eggs. I’ve tried this “chef secret” many times and just find it messy. I used to work with a sous chef who liked to say: “Whirlpools are for happy blokes, not cracked yokes.” I couldn’t agree more.

Second, don’t overcook the egg. It probably needs a maximum of 3 minutes, covered. A runny yoke is always preferred, unless you are classless. (You know who you are.)

I like to serve my eggs with salt and pepper on toasted bread smeared with the slightest bit of White Truffle Butter. My sister-in-law just brought me a tiny jar of the stuff from a recent trip to France. Now don’t think that I am one of those people who thinks that everything taste better with truffles. But I do think that starting your day off with a bit of class can only lead to good things.

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And on that note I think I may just open up that bottle of Champagne that has been sitting in the back of my fridge, make a Mimosa, and bring sleeping beauty some breakfast in bed.

Scotty.

OVER THERE a television series by STEVEN BOCHCO AND CHRIS GEROLMO (DVD, 2005)

09/11/2009

OVER THERE a television series by STEVEN BOCHCO AND CHRIS GEROLMO (DVD, 2005)

A couple of years ago, if you had driven an hour north of downtown LA you would have been in a war zone, a slice of hellish Iraq right there in the arid desert of California.

An American unit of young men and women is pinned down by insurgents holed up in the mosque on the hill, all around them a parched landscape is peppered by gunfire.

A jeep explodes, a soldier in full combat gear rolls in the dry earth under a sweltering sky — and then a guy in jeans and a t-shirt ambles past with a cheese platter, biscuits and a range of cold drinks. The shooting stops and all the players in this human drama head for the shade to shelter from the 35 degree heat.

This was the location of Over There, a controversial television drama series by producer Steven Bochco and writer Chris Gerolmo.

Set in the battle zones of present day Iraq, the uncompromisingly realistic series drew flak and praise from all sides in the American media. Some saw it as undermining the morale of the young men and women on the front, others argued it glorified the excitement and drama of war for the purposes of a television series.

Some said it was a necessary piece of television drama and noted that during the Vietnam era only a couple of films were made where that war was the setting.

If the first casualty of war is truth, then in America at the time fiction was not far behind.

Over There – about a company of young soldiers in Iraq – was first wounded by an unsympathetic audience, then put out of its misery by Fox executives after just one season.

there2More than four million in the US watched that uncompromising opening episode, but only 1.3 million viewers tuned in for the final.

Created by Gerolmo and Bochco (the latter devised the innovative Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue and LA Law), Over There proved too uncomfortable for an American public with increasing doubts about the war, but even less interest in a series in which their troops were portrayed as often unheroic, sometimes confused and occasionally nasty bastards.

Any show in which a central character gets his leg blown off at the end of the first episode is almost asking viewers to change channels. And when one American soldier, the fatalistic Mrs B, stands over the body of an insurgent, slowly crushing his dead fingers beneath her boot, we are invited to think that the humiliations at Abu Ghraib probably started with just such small but calculated incidents.

Despite conforming to ensemble clichés – the unit includes two women (one white, one Hispanic), two blacks (one from the ’hood, the other educated and sensitive), and two white guys (the wide-eyed Texan football hero, and an intellectual who ponders the heart of darkness that war reveals) – Over There didn’t flinch from uncomfortable truths.

One captured leader of an insurgent group screamed, “Now you will take me to Abu Ghraib. Do you have a bag for my head? Do you want me to take my clothes off now?”

there3   Much of what unfolded on- screen, which was often filmed through night-vision lenses and filters to imitate news footage, seemed ripped from frontline soldiers’ reports home.

The nail-biting second episode, in which the unit manned a roadblock and, faced with civilian vehicles speeding toward them, had to make quick judgments with fatal consequences, was lifted from Generation Kill, Rolling Stone journalist Evan Wright’s account of travelling with a Marine Corp special operations unit in the first days of the war.

The series’ technical consultant was a Marine staff sergeant who served in Iraq, and those who have been in the war zone testify that Over There was often disturbingly accurate. It was justifiably acclaimed by TV writers for its realism.

Even so, it drew criticism from all sides of the American media, some accusing it of glamorising the camaraderie and excitement of war, others angered that it refused to take a clear political position.

Bochco insisted he was never going to be drawn into that debate, and Gerolmo set himself clear parameters.

“It is about war and the human consequences of war, and that doesn’t have anything to do with the politics of left and right or Democrat or Republican, or American foreign policy. We’re not writing about American foreign policy makers, we’re writing about 20-year-old privates.

“Once you write about war and the human consequences, you are going to offend people who don’t want people to see this kind of material, so on that level it is going to be controversial.”

Over There also dealt with the boredom of soldiering, the folks back home – the alcoholic wife, loyal partners and worried parents – and attempted some perspective on Middle East opinions.

When the Arab-American soldier Tariq tries to explain to his colleagues why young Saudis have joined the conflict, Gerolmo gave him an analogy that viewers on the couch might understand: it’s like being a hippie in the 60s and hearing about Woodstock. You can’t just not go.

“It’s jihad, the holy war against the Americans. For some of these kids, it’s like the most exciting thing that’s ever happened in their world.”

That wasn’t what many American viewers wanted to hear.

In the face of dwindling audiences, Gerolmo defended his lightning-rod programme: “I think we are doing exactly what television is supposed to do. We are bringing the world to your living-room in a powerful and sometimes harrowing, realistic way, and as accurately as we can. If we are affecting national and international conversation about the war by slightly raising the level of people’s acquaintanceship with what it would be like to be on the ground, that would be a result we’d be proud of.”

He argued news reports can deal with the facts of a military engagement and serve up a casualty list, but fail to address the human drama.there4

“We’re not exactly trying to fill the holes the news is leaving, but we’re telling stories about these young people in Iraq and putting them in situations in which a lot of people on the ground find themselves. We’re trying to give the audience a feeling for what that would be like.”

Then there is the knotty question of whose side Bochco and Gerolmo are on, if any.

The words Gerolmo writes for his characters catch some of the ambiguous nature of the series.

As the character Dim (sensitive white guy) says in a video message back home at the end of the first episode: “We’re monsters and war is what unmasks us. But there’s a kind of honour in it too, a kind of grace.“

The ambiguity meant the series wasn’t any easy target for political commentators and that pleased Bochco, an industry veteran.

“If we are an equal opportunity offender on some level, then I figure we are doing our job.”

But Bochco was also adamant they were simply making a television series just like NYPD Blue which was also about human drama.

“If you are going to say we are on shaky moral ground doing a show about a war in Iraq because it is on-going, then you’d also have to argue we’re on shaky moral ground doing a police drama about an urban war that is on-going. And I don’t think we are.

“Everyone knows what this show is about.”

Gerolmo — who wrote and sang the theme to Over There, in addition to directing some episodes — says to achieve realism, and avoid criticism from the military and veterans, Over There pays meticulous attention to accuracy.

The on-set technical advisor was Staff Sergeant Staff Sergent Sean Thomas Bunch, a 10-year veteran of the Marines who had two tours of duty in Iraq. He coached the cast in how soldiers react under fire, how to handle munitions and machinery, and put them through a training regime in full combat gear.

And out on the set, the young cast were unanimously appreciative of a series which they saw as important, although none would be drawn on their own political view of the war.

In an curious piece of life imitating art, many of the actors’ lives bore uncanny similarities to the characters they play: actor Josh Henderson (the gung-ho Bo) comes from Texas and was a football player like his character; Luke McFarland (the intellectual Dim) graduated from the Julliard Drama Division and plays cello; Keith Robinson (the choir singer Angel) was in a group signed to Motown; and Kirk “Sticky” Jones (the ghetto graduate Smoke) is Brooklyn-born, was a member of the hip-hop group ONYX, and appeared in such hard-edge movies as Dead Presidents and Clockers.

All of them have friends who have served in Iraq or the military, and Omid Abtahi — the Middle Eastern GI Tariq who turns up the episode two and is met with suspicion by Smoke — has a brother who served in Afghanistan.

“He has a hard time talking about it,” says Abtahi sitting in his trailer escaping the desert heat. “He tells me about the racial comments he got and I kinda felt it was very similar to how my character feels about it. But [my brother] doesn’t feel comfortable talking about actual combat.

Over_There“He was nervous about the show at first but he saw the first two episodes and went, ‘My God, it’s so intense’. It gave him goosebumps at certain moments, like the truck going past before it gets blown up — and the roadblock duty. He said we’d done a really good job.”

Abtahi accepts that some people will be uncomfortable with the necessarily graphic nature and sudden violence of the show: in the first episode a man has the top half of his body blown off, in the second an Iraqi child is killed by the soldiers manning a roadblock. But he says Bochco and Gerolmo are trying to write an apolitical story about the reality of frontline war, and how soldiers are changed by the events in which they find themselves.

“We each have our own politics but Steven Bochco said it best, once you get into politics you lose half your audience and it stops being a television show. So I think they are being pretty smart staying away from [politics] . . . as much as it is possible to stay away from it.”

On the walls of Canadian-born actor Luke MacFarlane‘s trailer in the Californian desert is his homework: newspaper photos of Iraq, burned-out tanks and the aftermath of car bombs, of American soldiers moving along a road between swathes of smoke . . .

They aren’t pretty images, but they remind MacFarlane of the character he currently inhabits and the context in which that man lives.

Here in the gravel-strewn, barren desert MacFarlane is playing the thoughtful American GI called Dim by his fellow soldiers.

“One thing the military teaches you, for good reason,” says MacFarlane “is to follow the chain of command. That keeps you alive. But Dim has a hard time with that, he‘s very smart and he thinks outside the box. People do exist in the army that way — but I think it‘s not looked upon as a good thing.”

He scans the images on his wall and talks about how difficult this role is.

“You have an obligation to do a good job of it, so emotionally it is hard. What if someone standing over there had a son or daughter who died in Iraq and they saw me slacking off or being a diva. They would think, ’How dare you?’

“So in that sense it is very hard. And the material is hard. Dim goes to some dark places.”

MacFarlane says before shooting started he read books by embedded reporters such as Rick Atkinson (In The Company of Soldiers) and Wright (Generation Kill).

“One of the most interesting things about this war is it is the first where the infrastructure and technology has been set up in terms of communication. So I found early on I was actually reading a lot of web logs written by soldiers over there, both British and American.”

What MacFarlane learned and brought to his character was that in the downtime soldiers’ thoughts turn to home.

A scene which many find especially moving involves MacFarlane’s character sending a video message back home to his drunken wife whom we see in the background with another man.

“It’s everybody’s biggest fear and if it’s just a mess . . . What my wife is going through, the drinking, is a way of not having to deal with this constant fear of losing your husband, it’s a reaction to it. She wasn’t always a bitch. She medicates herself.”

The stories of the soldiers’ families is a large component of Over There, Bochco estimates almost half the series is about the people back home.

“We wanted to spend a significant amount of time tethering [the soldiers’ lives] to stories about husbands, wives, children and parents of those left behind at home. If we go back and forth we get a much fuller, more dimensional picture about what the consequence of war is to everybody who is connected to it.

“We have no problem with being controversial and doing a show about an arena which by definition will create a certain amount of controversy. What we are adamant about is not letting the show become a political forum for a point of view. That is simply not going to happen.”

It was a courageous series, but probably always doomed.

M*A*S*H, it wasn’t.

Coincidentally, when this Fox cable series ran in the US, the network was also screening Company of Heroes, a two-hour documentary about a Marine company taking Fallujah in November 2004. It was a graphic account of door-to-door fighting, death on the frontline and the fears of those back home.

It was Over There, but true.

And the www.goarmy.com recruitment ads running at the time looked scarily similar to Over There, Company of Heroes and CNN footage.

The lines between advertising, documentary, news and drama were effectively being erased.

More casualties of war.

Interview: Luke Macfarlane

20/10/2009

Luke Macfarlane is quickly establishing himself as a leading man in Hollywood by bringing a winning combination of charm, versatility and intelligence to his roles. He plays Scotty Wandell in the critically-acclaimed drama Brothers & Sisters – and with the season three DVD released this week, we bring you an interview with the actor about his role on the show.

You appeared in the first season of ‘Brothers & Sisters’ as a guest star. Did you know back then that you would become a cast regular by the third season?

It’s funny, but I never imagined I would be a cast regular on Brothers & Sisters – especially by way of marriage. I remember riding bikes over to one of the sets a while ago and asking Matthew Rhys [who plays Luke’s lover on the show], “What do they have in store for us?” And he said, “I think we’re getting married.” It was a total surprise to me.

Were you excited about the prospect of becoming a series regular?

Definitely. It’s always really nice when you come into something and your agents tell you, “There’s a possibility for you to become a series regular here.” However, it was a complete surprise because I had no idea where they were going with the storyline. In fact, I continue to have no idea where they’re going with it.

Was there an immediate chemistry between you and Matthew Rhys?

We always got along very, very well and there was never any awkwardness between us. Matthew was ready to jump into the gay love affair with great aplomb, which was fantastic. I don’t think we’ve ever had any tension between us. It’s always been great.

Do you receive much fan mail on the show?

I’ve had a number of letters from the gay community talking about the lack of role models for gay people on television and how happy they are to see Scotty and Kevin together. I really applaud the show’s creators for depicting a real romance for them. I’m glad they didn’t go for any clichés.

Do you receive more letters from women or men?

I’m always surprised that I get as many letters from girls as I do from boys. In fact, I’m always amazed at the care these people put into some of the letters. Sometimes I get drawings and it’s totally flattering. At the end of the day, we wake up really early in the morning and we go to work to do our thing. We sometimes forget that the show gets beamed out into the universe, so it’s always very touching and flattering to receive mail about it.

How long does it take to shoot an episode?

We usually work on nine-day episodes. Hopefully they give us the script about a week in advance, but as you approach the end of a season, it sometimes arrives about two days before we start on an episode. I think we’re very fortunate because we have such terrific writers and terrific actors – and there is a real sense of collaboration on the show.

Do you have much input into your character?

Sure. After the first table read, which they try to do for every episode, the actors can approach the writers and say, “I think I might want to do this.” I love the way it’s open for us to do that. From my experience on other television shows, I haven’t seen as much collaboration between the actors and the writers. We’re very fortunate on Brothers & Sisters.

Can you change the wording in the script if you’re not satisfied with it?

Well, you can talk about it with the writers and change things. With certain producers you have to say every line as it’s written in the script, but there are other producers who let you do your own thing. That’s not to say we don’t respect the scripts tremendously – but the longer the show goes on, the more the actor owns the part. The writers and producers start to encourage us to say what we want to say.

Your character marries Kevin Walker in the show, but that’s something that most gay couples in California cannot do anymore. How did this storyline come about?

I find this a fascinating story because I think the election happened about a week after the show aired in the States – and then Prop 8 didn’t pass. It was amazing that we’d done this thing that was, without foresight, very provocative.

Did you enjoy filming the wedding scene?

It was wonderful. It kind of felt like we were doing something big – and it was all done with great care. The writers spoke with someone who had officiated gay marriages, so the words were very accurate and in line. It was all really beautiful.

How well does the cast get along?

We all get along extremely well. There’s a great camaraderie on our set and everyone is very professional. We all get on with our work, but we also hang out together when we’re not working. It’s a great show in that respect.

What’s it like to work with Matthew Rhys?

It’s great. Matthew is an incredible actor and an incredible guy. We both come from theatre backgrounds, so our approach to the material is very similar. I couldn’t be happier.

And what’s it like to work with Sally Field?

Sally Field is amazing. She really makes you raise your game when you’re on set. She’s like a leader in some ways. I remember one time specifically when we were filming a dinner scene and there was a lot of chatter among the cast. It was late at night and we’d had a really long day, but she just stood up and said, “Everybody be quiet.” Everyone went quiet. She has that kind of effect.

‘Brothers and Sisters: Season 3′ is available to buy on DVD now.

Source: Entertainment Focus

Out of the closet and on to primetime

12/10/2009

Is it me or has everyone on Brothers And Sisters suddenly turned gay? Last week’s episode of the popular M-Net drama series saw an entire episode focus on every gay character in the series and the storylines that pivoted around them were heightened ten-fold.

Fans of the show already know that there’s a focus on gay relationships to the same extent that there’s a focus on straight relationships, and this is one of the first series to depict gay interaction in a way that it actually reflects real life.

When the Brothers and Sisters first emerged three seasons ago, we were introduced to Kevin Walker (played with such ease by straight Irish actor Matthew Rhys), a lawyer and part of the hugely dysfunctional Walker clan. Kevin was also an openly gay character and, for the first time, it wasn’t a gay character dying of Aids or an uber-camp hairdresser flapping his wrists like he was guiding a Boeing into a parking bay.

With the exception of his sexual orientation, Kevin was exactly the same as the rest of his brothers and sisters – flawed, issued, sometimes irritating, always endearing. And as the character developed, Kevin soon met his life-partner, Scotty Wandell, played by Luke MacFarlane, and they eventually got married at the beginning of the third season, which we’re currently watching on M-Net.

I interviewed MacFarlane in Cape Town earlier this year and because he’s actually gay in real life, a lot of our talk turned to this very subject.

The fact is, America has a huge section of its viewership in what is referred to as the Bible Belt, and ratings from this sector often make or break a show.

Apparently, Dirty Sexy Money folded because these viewers believed it to be too focused on materialism and greed, Eli Stone was not re-commissioned because some Earthly being was playing God and Pushing Daisies wilted for much the same reason. The list goes on.

MacFarlane says this was a concern for the producers when they first mulled over the creation of these characters. But because there’s such a large, on-going conversation about same-sex equality in the US, this attempt to show a gay couple in this way meant a lot to American society in terms of finding real role models.

So the characters, MacFarlane says, have been received very well, just because there is this desire for people to have role models specifically in the gay community.

Another interesting fact is that Kevin and Scotty’s wedding was the first gay marriage in a recurring role on US television, so it was a very big deal. It was also the first man-to-man kiss on primetime television, that wasn’t a comedy, so they were breaking ground on so many other levels too.

MacFarlane, who has, in the past, been dogged with rumours that he’s dating Prison Break’s Wentworth Miller, says he brings a lot of himself into this role of Scotty Wandell. He says he admires Scotty’s sense of right and wrong, and his very strong sense of self.

But the thing he’s most pleased about is the fact that they actually get to show a gay relationship through a long process. He admits that very rarely do viewers get to see this kind of relationship in a show – them meeting for the first time, breaking up for the first time, getting back together for the first time and then getting married.

And MacFarlane feels that’s a very accurate portrait of any relationship out there, never mind a gay one, and that’s the due integrity that should always be given to these characters.

But are they milking the concept a little now?

Saul (played by Ron Rifkin), the brother of Sally Field’s character, Nora, has also come out of the closet. Saul is probably in his early 60s and is, for the first time, searching for the kind of relationship he was never allowed to have because of societal dictates earlier on in his life.

While the twist was unexpected, I think this storyline is becoming more about making a point than being dramatic.

I can’t wait to see who else they pull out of this closet next. A lesbian? A black woman? A back woman who’s Tonight, South Africaa lesbian?

I suppose I can live in hope.

Source: Tonight (South Africa)

Greg’s Celebrity Encounters: Rubbing elbows with Scotty and Kevin from “Brothers & Sisters”

26/09/2009

ABC’s Brothers & Sisters has its fourth season premiere tomorrow night and gay couple Kevin (Matthew Rhys) and Scotty (Luke Macfarlane) and word has it that they are considering becoming parents.

Both are such good actors and seem like good guys. I first met Luke at the 2007 LA Gay and Lesbian Center Gala. He was not yet out publicly but could not have been nicer. We spoke the next year at a TV Academy event shortly after he came out publicly as a gay man in an interview with the Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail.

He said of coming out: “I’ll say that I decided to do that interview, I decided to answer those questions in an effort to make my life simpler and that’s going to continue to be my motto.”

Scotty Wandell and Kevin Walker had instant chemistry from the minute the financially struggling waiter-turned-chef walked into his law office on a legal matter. He cut through Kevin’s veneer with quirky humor and charm and you knew he had Kevin’s heart when he bit into a red velvet cupcake and smiled at the end of one of their early episodes..

“My whole experience on the show started off as just a few episodes and it’s just become more and more and more and I’m so grateful for that,” Luke told. “…I do know that the fans had a lot to do with Scotty staying around as long as he has so I’m grateful for them.”

I’ve met Matthew om several occasions and it’s always a little surprising to hear him speak in a Welsh accent since Kevin is so Californian.

It just shows what a damned good actor he is!

In one of our interviews, Matthew talked to me about why Scotty and Kevin make such a good couple: “We do have (chemistry). It’s a real joy to work with him, a pleasure. As much as (Kevin and Scotty’s) drama came from their turbulence and the conflict in their relationship, being now in this (committed) relationship opens up a world of drama for them to play out.  … What’s great is they really have picked two very diverse characters, the two of us compliment us very well as characters. Kevin can be a little bit uptight at times whereas Scotty, is a little bit too much of a free-spirit. So when the two meet, it makes for humorous times.”

Source: Greg in Hollywood