I mean, you are the true queen of the supernatural TV.
So with that in mind, when picking a project from
within this world, from within that kind of genre,
does it take is it even more kind of consideration
has to take place to make sure it's really right?
Or can you still go off instincts like like maybe you always have done?
It's a good question.
You know, it's a little bit of both
because choosing this project was actually was a combination of the two.
It's not that I've stayed away from it for any other reason.
It's really hard to live up to or do something that's that different.
And what I realized ultimately was it doesn't have to be something
that's that different, because the reason that I loved it stayed the same.
So I think all these years
I was looking for it to be so
different, to realize that it just needed to be different.
But the core was the same.
And what I always said that I loved about Buffy was
the monsters were the metaphor for the horrors of adolescence,
where in Wolf Pack, using these monsters for the metaphors of the horrors of sort
of what we're all experiencing right now, which is high levels of anxiety,
isolation, this whole idea that as we become more and more digitally
connected, we're becoming ultimately more and more emotionally disconnected
and fires and what it's doing to our earth and to our animal kingdom.
And and what I really traced
it back is it's really about the horrors in our mind.
We make up these stories to explain the things that scare us.
And so when you go through all that, it just this project hit in a way that
and I think also post-COVID, it
especially the whole isolation idea of finding your pack and having those people
and what it's like when you're drifting kind of alone without that
and it's just on impulse, that's where the impulse came.
And I was like, I kind of want to do with it.
Like it was just I think I think I shocked everybody.
I shocked myself.
I shocked my team.
I shocked Jeff Davis when I said yes.
Yeah. Because, I mean,
do you think that's what keeps us kind of a forever kind of relevant?
Is it because it's reflecting?
Because the monsters are manifestations of all of our fears and anxieties?
Because it's reflecting back.
That's exactly why I think it still works, because what scares us will always stay
the same.
It's the things
we can't explain, the things in ourselves, the things that are out of our control.
That doesn't change.
What makes us laugh might change.
In fact, we were just talking earlier.
What made us laugh a long time ago is so inappropriate now
that we would see it and we wouldn't laugh because we'd be horrified.
Right?
Or things that made you or didn't make you emotional did or didn't
years ago make, you know, all that changes.
But the things I like ultimately really do scare us that those don't change.
No one's ever like, Yay, fire coming at me and exorcism.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just.
I don't even think people go, yay! Exorcism!
I mean, this is obviously I mean, I get the sense
I've watched two episodes, so I guess it's a bit of a slow burn now.
And I was wondering about for you,
did you kind of
get all the scripts at first and did you kind of get to go and experience that?
The audience is slowly going onto that.
The script kind of trickled through as you were making it?
No, I knew I had it all.
I mean, bits and pieces, but I had it all.
But for the for the rest of the cast, a lot of it was a surprise
because, I mean, in terms of like your character,
because not too much is kind of given away,
does that give you in some ways even more freedom, more license
to create a kind of a world and a backstory for her?
No, because she has a story and a backstory that I knew.
And so for me, it was an interesting
way to go about normally at my characters.
It's so upfront, like, you know, why they're there,
what they're doing, what their goal is, and this is the total opposite.
So I had to play just straightforward.
But when you watch it later, it all has to make sense what was happening.
And there are some scenes that you've seen in these early episodes
that will then get repeated at the end
and you'll understand what was really happening.
So it has to work for both versions.
And I interviewed Rodrigo Santoro last week.
It was great. We spoke about football for a
little while, which I always have a habit of doing.
But you forget I'm an American. Yes.
So you were discussing something else in my world.
That's true.
Something you spoke about. Something I don't understand.
But one talk football.
I gotcha.
But I just play if you felt because obviously
because now the most of experience heads on the set,
did you almost feel like a sense of responsibility
now at this stage in your creative with the kind of younger performers?
And with that in mind, did you have someone
when you first started that really helped
give you some sort of guidance in that regard?
I always feel a responsibility on set, especially as a producer.
I think you are responsible.
I think that the safety and wellbeing, all of it, it comes from there.
So I any set that I'm on, I think I take on that responsibility.
I think that I am sure rodrigo said the same thing.
People keep asking us that and it's actually the reverse.
It's what we could learn from them and remembering how
to see the world the way they see it, and to be open to new ideas.
Because when you were doing it a long time, you kind of have your ways,
but it doesn't mean that there aren't better things to take from other people.
I'm interested to when you sign up to a new series, do you have to do that
thinking this could be something that sort of
is quite a commitment that could go on a few years?
Or do you always just have to treat every project
just as a kind of one off or do?
Because I mean, like with Buffy, when you signed on to that,
did you ever envisage how many years it could have run and how, sort of dedicated, and
a big part of your career
It could have been.
Well, it's different
because when you're new and up and coming, you have to sign for seven years.
It's different now because I don't have to do that.
And it does get us to I mean, just go back to Buffy quickly,
but just could you tell it was because now we've got the kind of benefit of times.
It's such an iconic kind of character.
Could you tell in the moment it was an iconic character?
Was it ever something new, even a character?
Yes. Did I think it would have be what it was and had legs?
No, I no, I mean, you have to remember, we were a midseason replacement
on a network nobody knew about in America based on a failed movie.
Like the odds were not in my favor.
I just loved the character and I wanted to be a part of it.
It was the best script that I had read in so long
and not that I had my pick and choose of anything.
I was auditioning and auditioning, auditioning.
But that script, I just was like, Wow, that's there.
And you know, the rest was all a pleasant surprise
as one of the things that could sort of come out of Wolf Pack is it could
potentially bring in another new audience that could then go back and watch Buffy.
Do you ever sort of go back and watch your own stuff ever
or find yourself something, Not you,
Just because I feel like if I had that kind of time,
there's got to be something better I could be doing than watching myself.
But I was actually just saying earlier,
sometimes now I've gotten to the point where like
if I'm flipping and it comes on, I stop for a couple of seconds
because it's not so much about watching the performance
or watching or any of that, but it's about remembering
where I was at that time, who I was at that time.
There's always these like great stories
that sort of come up, so maybe for a little bit,
but most of them, because my stuff is usually not Child appropriate.
It wasn't that I quickly change the channel
because, you know, enjoys always remember where.
So if you watch a scene, do you always remember, like what happened that day.
No, no, no.
In fact, I've seen the whole episode of Buffy
and been like, Was I in that episode?
No, I wish I might say I'm such a disappointment
to people sometimes, because I'll be they'll remember that.
But I'm like, okay, sure.
Does it ever get normal?
They sort of mention
that you might be flicking around on the telly
and you just go to channel and then as your face just pops up.
Is that something that just after being in the industry a number of years
or being in enough projects that that just becomes quite normal?
But is it still.
That's funny you say that,
I guess I never thought about it Like that would be weird
for you to turn the TV and I've never seen that, but it's not.
What's weird is that it's good
because otherwise might be you never know where you might read the news.
Yeah, that's right.
Thank you for explaining the joke. Thank you.
That's the explainer over here.
That's why I've never thought about it from that.
Because for me and like a lot of people, my life, like,
sometimes I flip and I'll see somebody else,
you know, or my kids will be like, and he's always on TV or whatever.
That's so interesting.
Yeah. Sometimes I also need to remember that I need to see it from.
That's actually really cool.
I don't take that and I don't think about that next time.
Now, of course, if I see you on TV, I'm not going to f you see me,
you see me on TV, I get money.
You finally made the news.
And there's something about you...
Now is that thing that Could you imagine?
I would if you can do that.
Not that I'm asking for any reason,
but I was.
I was going to ask about werewolves.
What do you think it is about that?
Because we talking about earlier about monsters
and sort of different types of monsters.
But there's something that so reoccurring about Werewolf,
that throughout time has always appealed to people's imaginations, to storytelling.
What do you think it is about that
particular monster that keeps its place in?
Well, I think he's where it came from.
You know, you go back to a time when there were not street
lights and house lights and flashlights and all of that.
And, you know, one month a year, one child went into here.
This is what happens.
You've been speaking all day, one day a month.
The moon came out so bright that you saw things
and you saw things you didn't want to see or you saw things you didn't understand.
So that was the explaining, those things.
It isn't there always things in our mind that sometimes
we see much more clearly that we don't want to see.
And I think because of that, it just always works.
It's very funny.
Before I go checking, you can see more of Wolf Pack
as their hopes and aspirations for more seasons after this.
I think so.
I think I got maybe have one more in me.
I've been at it.
Well, I can't
I can't say anything because it's so hard to, you know, how
maybe maybe the werewolf gets me in episode three. I don't know.
It doesn't get to worry.
Episode four, I guess.
Yeah. Five.
No, thank you so much for talking to me.