WEBVTT - 43 - Jake McDorman (The Right Stuff) 0:00:00.900 --> 0:00:03.630 From CurtCo Media: there's no place like Hollywood. 0:00:15.190 --> 0:00:18.959 Welcome to another special episode of Hollywood unscripted stuck at home. 0:00:18.970 --> 0:00:21.790 I'm Jenny Curtis and today I'm virtually sitting down with 0:00:21.790 --> 0:00:25.930 actor Jake McDorman who you've seen in Greek, The show Limitless, 0:00:26.040 --> 0:00:28.050 Lady Bird, American Sniper, 0:00:28.120 --> 0:00:30.880 Shameless, and most recently we got to know him as 0:00:30.880 --> 0:00:34.210 Alan Shepard in the Disney Plus series The Right Stuff. 0:00:34.210 --> 0:00:36.490 Jake thank you so much for joining me today. 0:00:36.490 --> 0:00:39.100 Thank you for having me. Very very willing distraction. 0:00:39.220 --> 0:00:43.390 We are recording this the day before the election so 0:00:43.390 --> 0:00:45.640 hopefully by the time this comes out the world will 0:00:45.640 --> 0:00:47.169 still be intact. We have. 0:00:47.710 --> 0:00:50.740 I regret saying that I know every time you say 0:00:50.740 --> 0:00:53.490 anything optimistic I can only hear it. It fades away 0:00:53.500 --> 0:00:57.370 a horrible regret later. It's not even like. Well hopefully 0:00:57.510 --> 0:00:59.110 you know we'll know the results. I'm like oh you're 0:00:59.110 --> 0:01:00.820 going to eat your words never to get into the 0:01:00.820 --> 0:01:01.880 results for a year. 0:01:02.050 --> 0:01:06.550 So my first question then cause we're stuck at home 0:01:06.550 --> 0:01:10.179 specials other than the fact that it's an election year 0:01:10.209 --> 0:01:12.819 and you know the world has gone crazy. How has 0:01:12.819 --> 0:01:14.709 quarantine been treating you. 0:01:15.590 --> 0:01:19.360 It's seems kind of appropriate for such a cataclysmic kind 0:01:19.360 --> 0:01:22.750 of apocalyptic election cycle to have this once again like 0:01:22.750 --> 0:01:27.720 plague vibe leading into it. But I've been pretty good. 0:01:27.750 --> 0:01:30.729 Look my immediate friends and family are say that's kind 0:01:30.730 --> 0:01:32.470 of enough for 2020. 0:01:32.560 --> 0:01:34.720 I think I've been in L.A. the whole time pretty 0:01:34.720 --> 0:01:36.820 much and this is more turning I spent in L.A. 0:01:36.819 --> 0:01:40.160 and a really long time I shot the show last year. 0:01:40.180 --> 0:01:43.060 The Right Stuff in Florida and three shows this year 0:01:43.060 --> 0:01:44.130 that we're all in New York. 0:01:44.140 --> 0:01:46.550 So it's been OK. Being here. 0:01:46.630 --> 0:01:48.790 You know I moved here when I was 16 so 0:01:48.790 --> 0:01:51.880 I had a huge social circle in L.A. in those 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:54.460 17 years. People have gone to New York. They've gone 0:01:54.610 --> 0:01:56.590 all over the place. But I'd say most of them 0:01:56.600 --> 0:01:59.410 still not here in L.A.. So even though I can't 0:01:59.410 --> 0:02:02.230 see them it feels nice to be insulated in a 0:02:02.230 --> 0:02:03.220 familiar place. 0:02:03.280 --> 0:02:04.950 Good that they're nearby at least. 0:02:05.030 --> 0:02:07.930 Yeah yeah I've been doing a lot of walking outside 0:02:08.169 --> 0:02:11.920 that's new since Ginger closed been taking Bob such a 0:02:11.919 --> 0:02:16.880 huge development. Never was about guy all about the self care. 0:02:16.930 --> 0:02:20.260 It's all about me on a lot of podcasts obviously 0:02:20.260 --> 0:02:21.530 a ton of podcasts. 0:02:21.580 --> 0:02:25.120 So I'm having to overcome the medical hurdles of now 0:02:25.120 --> 0:02:27.850 being a listener of so many podcast giving this interview 0:02:27.850 --> 0:02:30.810 and not judging myself as a listener right now of 0:02:30.820 --> 0:02:33.070 like is this a podcast I listen to it this 0:02:33.070 --> 0:02:35.200 gets interesting if you. 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:37.540 Apart from you is going to love this podcast. 0:02:37.540 --> 0:02:39.570 I hope that me love that podcast. 0:02:39.700 --> 0:02:42.310 OK so let's talk about the right stuff which is 0:02:42.400 --> 0:02:45.429 on Disney plus and we'll have really six episodes by 0:02:45.430 --> 0:02:48.280 the time this episode comes out OK. In my mind 0:02:48.340 --> 0:02:49.900 the fun part of being an actor is getting to 0:02:49.900 --> 0:02:52.510 explore all of these lives that are so far away 0:02:52.510 --> 0:02:56.020 from our own. And it's such a fantasy of so 0:02:56.020 --> 0:02:58.930 many people to be an astronaut. So what was it 0:02:58.930 --> 0:03:02.200 like stepping into those shoes of someone who was going 0:03:02.200 --> 0:03:03.160 to space. Yeah. 0:03:03.210 --> 0:03:05.920 There's I'm sure that's true depending on what the role 0:03:05.919 --> 0:03:08.230 is depending on what the project is you might pick 0:03:08.230 --> 0:03:11.170 up a special skill here and there and getting to 0:03:11.320 --> 0:03:13.300 actually put on a spacesuit and sit in this space 0:03:13.300 --> 0:03:15.609 capsules that fly like a little bit of wish fulfillment 0:03:15.639 --> 0:03:18.910 for a younger person. I think most kids at some 0:03:18.910 --> 0:03:21.060 point imagine being an astronaut. 0:03:21.090 --> 0:03:23.230 So that was definitely part of it but for this 0:03:23.230 --> 0:03:25.419 story that the right stuff is about it's an adaptation 0:03:25.419 --> 0:03:27.790 of a book and then that book was adapted into 0:03:27.790 --> 0:03:30.580 a movie in the 1980s but I hadn't read or 0:03:30.580 --> 0:03:33.250 seen the book of the movie. So this was all 0:03:33.250 --> 0:03:37.300 an educational experience for me. And there was clearly not 0:03:37.300 --> 0:03:40.840 a shortage of research to do about this period American 0:03:40.840 --> 0:03:41.480 history right. 0:03:41.500 --> 0:03:43.210 You already have a book in a movie about it 0:03:43.240 --> 0:03:46.630 but just the whole entire world was watching the space 0:03:46.630 --> 0:03:49.900 race and I think for me and probably people in 0:03:49.900 --> 0:03:53.440 my generation especially people in younger generations are so familiar 0:03:53.440 --> 0:03:56.920 with Apollo and Apollo 11 and Neil Armstrong and Buzz 0:03:56.920 --> 0:03:59.650 Aldrin Michael Collins those guys landing on the moon the 0:03:59.650 --> 0:04:03.070 Mercury program and even the Gemini program are kind of 0:04:03.100 --> 0:04:06.190 untold stories even though they have been adapted many times 0:04:06.380 --> 0:04:08.440 our book their movie it's still to me when I 0:04:08.440 --> 0:04:10.600 came into the project I had really only heard of 0:04:10.600 --> 0:04:13.140 John Glenn as far as the Mercury 7. 0:04:13.210 --> 0:04:16.570 And so to get to start to learn about this 0:04:16.690 --> 0:04:19.580 is definitely one of the perks of a job that 0:04:19.630 --> 0:04:22.570 you immerse yourself and hopefully you've got a good script 0:04:22.600 --> 0:04:24.820 which was something that we had from the get go. 0:04:24.820 --> 0:04:28.089 Mark Lafferty wrote such a great first episode and subsequent 0:04:28.089 --> 0:04:29.979 episodes but you know when we were auditioning we only 0:04:29.980 --> 0:04:32.280 had that first episode and it provided this kind of 0:04:32.290 --> 0:04:34.810 it was like since I hadn't read the book and 0:04:34.810 --> 0:04:37.840 seen the movie my introduction to the project was the 0:04:37.839 --> 0:04:40.900 script and I know there's other actors on our show 0:04:40.900 --> 0:04:43.719 that were obsessed with the book obsessed with the movie 0:04:43.720 --> 0:04:44.390 coming in. 0:04:44.529 --> 0:04:47.990 But I was grateful not to have Ed Harris's performance. 0:04:48.040 --> 0:04:51.460 Scott Glenn's performance sitting on my back judging me through 0:04:51.460 --> 0:04:53.919 the entire preproduction process I kind of got to go 0:04:53.920 --> 0:04:58.040 in with the framework of our script is the version 0:04:58.040 --> 0:04:59.859 that these men and the version to be stories that 0:04:59.860 --> 0:05:03.810 we're telling and then go out extra curricular and pull 0:05:03.810 --> 0:05:06.400 in all the research that I felt helped me as 0:05:06.400 --> 0:05:09.400 an actor believe that I was of the time period 0:05:09.490 --> 0:05:11.110 and of the ilk of the kind of people that 0:05:11.110 --> 0:05:14.830 do this and apply it where it belongs in the 0:05:14.830 --> 0:05:17.529 established framework of our script what kind of stuff do 0:05:17.529 --> 0:05:19.120 you use as inspiration for characters. 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:20.609 Do you kind of dive into other mediums. 0:05:20.620 --> 0:05:24.460 You know it's weird it's dyed shades different. Every single 0:05:24.460 --> 0:05:28.180 project one of the more unique aspects of a project 0:05:28.180 --> 0:05:31.930 like this is that it's period and it is a 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:36.580 highly publicized period of American history. So that provides different 0:05:36.580 --> 0:05:40.179 things that you can draw on. It also provides some restrictions. 0:05:40.180 --> 0:05:42.370 You don't have this blank canvas and you just are 0:05:42.370 --> 0:05:45.070 going to decide your character. This person is there's some 0:05:45.070 --> 0:05:48.970 clear outlines and limits based on who he is as 0:05:48.970 --> 0:05:49.870 the reality. 0:05:49.870 --> 0:05:53.740 But as far as pulling in other mediums I don't know. 0:05:53.740 --> 0:05:56.580 Probably one thing that we got to do when we're 0:05:56.589 --> 0:05:58.870 in Florida. So we shot this whole thing in Florida right. 0:05:58.930 --> 0:06:01.450 I always really like shooting on location. It kind of 0:06:01.450 --> 0:06:03.610 takes you out of your life routine and put you 0:06:03.610 --> 0:06:06.070 in a weird porn place for the sole purpose of 0:06:06.070 --> 0:06:08.230 making a movie or making a TV show. So we 0:06:08.230 --> 0:06:10.419 did that with this project when we were in Cape 0:06:10.420 --> 0:06:13.730 Canaveral Florida in Orlando right where these events actually happened. 0:06:13.810 --> 0:06:16.630 And apart from all the books we read leading up 0:06:16.630 --> 0:06:21.110 to production and apart from news footage podcasts interviews with 0:06:21.110 --> 0:06:23.349 these actual people we got to go talk to some 0:06:23.350 --> 0:06:26.620 of the astronauts who idolized and had met these people 0:06:26.680 --> 0:06:29.290 in real life so they had a lot of insight 0:06:29.500 --> 0:06:32.890 just anecdotally about oh when I met shepherd you know 0:06:32.890 --> 0:06:35.140 and you was playing on a golf course in Orlando 0:06:35.140 --> 0:06:36.310 and told me to get fucked. 0:06:36.339 --> 0:06:37.890 When I asked them for an autograph you know I'm 0:06:37.900 --> 0:06:41.040 like little things like that. You start the peripherally piece 0:06:41.060 --> 0:06:42.099 in OK. 0:06:42.300 --> 0:06:44.560 He was a little like that is like that or 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:47.020 a story about him you know buying drinks for everybody 0:06:47.020 --> 0:06:49.150 at the bar at the Naval lounge and stuff like 0:06:49.150 --> 0:06:52.750 that I guess. Apart from the like hard record of 0:06:52.750 --> 0:06:55.570 what happened you'd get little pieces of info like that 0:06:55.589 --> 0:06:58.029 that came from just talking to people and talking to 0:06:58.029 --> 0:06:59.710 people who live in the area. 0:06:59.710 --> 0:07:01.150 How long did you get to be in the area 0:07:01.180 --> 0:07:03.849 before you had to be on set. Pretty long time. 0:07:03.850 --> 0:07:06.039 I know one of the actors Colin O'Donoghue who plays 0:07:06.040 --> 0:07:07.070 Gordon Cooper. 0:07:07.089 --> 0:07:09.970 He actually was replacing other cast member that for a 0:07:09.970 --> 0:07:11.890 variety of reasons wasn't able to do it. So he 0:07:11.890 --> 0:07:14.230 really had like zero time which I'd been in that 0:07:14.230 --> 0:07:17.080 position before. I did a movie called American Sniper and 0:07:17.080 --> 0:07:19.060 it was something like you get cast Friday or in 0:07:19.060 --> 0:07:21.910 Morocco Monday you're on set with Clint Eastwood on Tuesday 0:07:21.910 --> 0:07:23.720 and you're just like all right holy crap. 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:25.930 So that has its own set of challenges and benefits 0:07:25.960 --> 0:07:28.090 but for most of us I think we were in 0:07:28.090 --> 0:07:31.440 Florida probably for me to an actor three weeks which 0:07:31.440 --> 0:07:33.550 is a good amount of time for how fast TV 0:07:33.550 --> 0:07:37.210 shows would now. And I took a road trip from L.A. 0:07:37.240 --> 0:07:39.220 to Florida instead of letting them fly. 0:07:39.580 --> 0:07:43.270 I wanted to drive just because as I said earlier 0:07:43.270 --> 0:07:46.060 like I've shot so many different projects in New York 0:07:46.350 --> 0:07:48.940 and in Florida and in Toronto and you run the 0:07:48.940 --> 0:07:51.250 risk of your life getting whipped up into a frenzy 0:07:51.280 --> 0:07:53.400 preparing to move somewhere for six months you get on 0:07:53.400 --> 0:07:56.680 a plane you land your slam right into the frenzy 0:07:56.680 --> 0:07:59.330 of unpacking and kind of getting your footing before you start. 0:07:59.400 --> 0:08:01.960 Then I thought maybe a road trip cross country would 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:05.530 be a way to kind of unwind that time and 0:08:05.530 --> 0:08:08.530 slow me down by force. So on that road trip 0:08:08.650 --> 0:08:10.660 along with the time we had in Florida was the 0:08:10.660 --> 0:08:12.820 period of time that I used to kind of steep 0:08:12.820 --> 0:08:15.700 myself in the research to read the book to read 0:08:15.970 --> 0:08:18.970 the biography of Shepherd of light this candle which is 0:08:18.970 --> 0:08:20.890 really interesting because he's one of the only astronauts who 0:08:20.890 --> 0:08:23.560 didn't write his biography it wasn't an autobiography it was 0:08:23.560 --> 0:08:26.290 an actual biography written after he had died. It had 0:08:26.290 --> 0:08:29.620 a really objective look at the man and then obviously 0:08:29.620 --> 0:08:33.060 just familiarize yourself with your take on the character entrances 0:08:33.070 --> 0:08:35.170 and stuff like that. So I was it was nice 0:08:35.170 --> 0:08:37.840 to have that time I think anymore and that would 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:40.199 have been too much time and any lessons that would 0:08:40.200 --> 0:08:45.730 have come to pass the Goldilocks time to prepare in 0:08:46.270 --> 0:08:48.880 the show we get to see the astronauts going through training. 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:50.830 Did you do the training. 0:08:50.830 --> 0:08:52.720 We did some of it. I mean we didn't do 0:08:52.720 --> 0:08:54.220 as much as I know all of us would have 0:08:54.220 --> 0:08:55.120 liked to do. 0:08:55.120 --> 0:08:56.740 I mean we would have wanted to do all this 0:08:56.740 --> 0:08:59.500 stuff like zero gravity bomb and comments. We would have 0:08:59.500 --> 0:09:01.120 wanted to do the thing that goes round and round 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:03.850 around to simulate G for I would have done anything. 0:09:03.850 --> 0:09:06.520 It's probably really hard to ensure in our cast of 0:09:06.580 --> 0:09:10.120 seven regulars at least being spun around that high velocity. 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:11.640 There was a spinning thing right. 0:09:11.710 --> 0:09:14.500 Yes to that stuff that says Yeah I know. Don't 0:09:14.500 --> 0:09:16.870 worry we're getting this funny thing misstating things called the 0:09:16.929 --> 0:09:20.770 mastiff and what the spinny thing does is then which 0:09:20.770 --> 0:09:23.439 I guess you could call that ja and then it 0:09:23.440 --> 0:09:26.920 also pitches forward and rolls to simulate an aircraft spinning 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:27.460 out of control. 0:09:27.490 --> 0:09:30.640 So me and Carl and got to do that. The 0:09:30.640 --> 0:09:33.160 other astronauts or actors did not get to do that 0:09:33.520 --> 0:09:35.230 and call them was supposed to be his character in 0:09:35.230 --> 0:09:37.810 the script and be very adept at it and because 0:09:37.809 --> 0:09:40.240 of my character and the real life Alan Shepard had 0:09:40.240 --> 0:09:44.179 me many years disease and inner ear problem in the script. 0:09:44.200 --> 0:09:47.290 Shepherd has a serious problem with it throws him off 0:09:47.290 --> 0:09:49.210 and he has to put the chicken switches what they 0:09:49.210 --> 0:09:51.839 call it where you just kind of emergency stop which 0:09:51.850 --> 0:09:54.250 worked out great for me because I had no experience 0:09:54.250 --> 0:09:56.800 and I was naturally pretty awful at it. So I 0:09:56.800 --> 0:09:58.930 didn't do much we just had to sit there get 0:09:58.929 --> 0:10:02.050 thrown around and suffer for about 12 hours a shooting 0:10:02.050 --> 0:10:05.090 on camera and it looked great. 0:10:05.110 --> 0:10:07.260 It did look great. So it was a great downside 0:10:07.320 --> 0:10:09.240 is great great Downs. 0:10:09.610 --> 0:10:13.030 Very little that I was warned not to eat anything 0:10:13.330 --> 0:10:16.040 I did not heed those warnings in the first half 0:10:16.040 --> 0:10:19.679 of the day very much heeded those warnings at last. 0:10:20.000 --> 0:10:21.800 I want to go back to the casting process because 0:10:21.800 --> 0:10:24.350 I know originally you weren't being called in for Alan 0:10:24.350 --> 0:10:25.290 Shepard right. 0:10:25.580 --> 0:10:28.790 Yes actually I was being called in for Gordon Cooper 0:10:28.850 --> 0:10:30.770 the role that Colin had played. 0:10:30.770 --> 0:10:32.630 And it had been a minute since I had auditioned. 0:10:32.660 --> 0:10:35.319 I was on a show for a year before that. 0:10:35.390 --> 0:10:37.400 And so being on that show was really unavailable to 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:38.989 be on anything else. So it just had been a 0:10:38.990 --> 0:10:41.600 minute since I auditioned which is like a different rhythm 0:10:41.600 --> 0:10:44.280 to get into auditioning and you get into it or 0:10:44.300 --> 0:10:46.850 you hopefully snap into it after you get a few 0:10:46.850 --> 0:10:48.560 in a row to kind of warm yourself back into 0:10:48.559 --> 0:10:49.280 the process. 0:10:49.340 --> 0:10:51.950 Like all right you're going out and you're making choices 0:10:51.960 --> 0:10:55.160 that broadcast the character is a short amount of time 0:10:55.179 --> 0:10:56.850 cetera et cetera et cetera. But I hadn't done that 0:10:56.850 --> 0:10:58.810 for like a minute. And so I got called in 0:10:58.809 --> 0:11:01.610 for Gordo. I think there was an actor in mind 0:11:01.610 --> 0:11:03.829 to play Shepherd at the time. So when I read 0:11:03.830 --> 0:11:06.860 the script I was pretty honed in on Gordon Cooper. 0:11:06.860 --> 0:11:09.890 I wasn't even thinking about Shepherd and I went in 0:11:10.100 --> 0:11:13.449 and really thought I did that which I know is 0:11:13.450 --> 0:11:15.290 just such a tragic thing to hear an actor say. 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:17.840 But it's real when you're halfway through and you're like 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:18.939 this is very bad. 0:11:18.980 --> 0:11:21.140 And I was very much in that place. I had 0:11:21.140 --> 0:11:25.000 actually just flown back. So this was last year 20 0:11:25.050 --> 0:11:28.460 19 I had just flown back to L.A. to test 0:11:28.460 --> 0:11:32.350 for this right after shooting some of HBO as Watchmen. 0:11:32.390 --> 0:11:34.459 So I was on an episode of Watchmen and they 0:11:34.460 --> 0:11:37.490 had to dye my hair bleach blonde and it was 0:11:37.490 --> 0:11:41.370 long and they'd given it like a 1920s parted haircut. 0:11:41.420 --> 0:11:43.910 And so all my actor friends that were back in L.A. 0:11:43.950 --> 0:11:45.770 and had auditioned for the right stuff and I was 0:11:45.770 --> 0:11:48.950 hearing all about it. So I flew in to test 0:11:48.950 --> 0:11:51.650 for it and not only was it out of shape 0:11:51.650 --> 0:11:55.660 auditioning I just looked like Todd Gary and trailer trash 0:11:55.660 --> 0:11:58.520 and something which is great because the director that was 0:11:58.520 --> 0:12:00.890 supposed to direct our pilot at first was David Nutter 0:12:01.100 --> 0:12:03.950 who I'd worked with on shameless but he directed excellent 0:12:03.950 --> 0:12:06.199 episodes of Game of Thrones. So I think he dubbed 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:09.329 me a white trash Targaryen when I walked in. 0:12:09.510 --> 0:12:12.230 So I had this audition that felt really funky and 0:12:12.230 --> 0:12:15.860 weird and walked out just kicking myself and called my 0:12:15.860 --> 0:12:18.890 agents and said you should drop me which is terrible. 0:12:18.890 --> 0:12:21.260 They called them back before I could even get to 0:12:21.260 --> 0:12:23.270 my car in the parking lot of Warner Brothers. They 0:12:23.270 --> 0:12:25.459 were like No tell me to come on back which 0:12:25.460 --> 0:12:28.160 at that point I thought my agents had been like 0:12:28.340 --> 0:12:30.620 oh he thought he did bad. He'll come right back 0:12:30.620 --> 0:12:32.270 in and do it again which was not what I 0:12:32.270 --> 0:12:34.490 was saying. I was confiding in them that I was 0:12:34.490 --> 0:12:37.380 probably never going to act again let alone 15 minutes 0:12:37.380 --> 0:12:39.579 who all in the same room that I thought I bombed. 0:12:39.870 --> 0:12:43.130 I like went back in there kicking and screaming so 0:12:43.130 --> 0:12:45.469 embarrassed thinking that I was going to be asked like 0:12:45.559 --> 0:12:48.949 try again which happens. I've called them like that was 0:12:48.950 --> 0:12:50.920 a nice let me do it again. You make it 0:12:50.920 --> 0:12:53.060 self paper you go in again but that's not what 0:12:53.059 --> 0:12:55.730 this call was at all. It was like I never 0:12:55.730 --> 0:12:57.980 want to see those people again. This is a nightmare 0:12:57.980 --> 0:12:58.870 situation for me. 0:12:59.210 --> 0:13:01.059 Why did you think it was so bad. 0:13:01.070 --> 0:13:04.730 I don't know. I mean I think asking the actors 0:13:04.770 --> 0:13:07.400 it's going a while without having a typical audition like 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:10.250 already and audition is just a weird thing to do. 0:13:10.280 --> 0:13:12.320 You can have some where you feel like you nailed 0:13:12.320 --> 0:13:14.120 it and you don't hear anything you've never where you 0:13:14.120 --> 0:13:16.280 think you did terrible and you get the job so 0:13:16.460 --> 0:13:19.670 you're not the most trustworthy barometer all the time. It 0:13:19.670 --> 0:13:21.860 was just that I think and there is an action 0:13:21.890 --> 0:13:25.670 for Gordon Cooper. He's from I believe Oklahoma. And I 0:13:25.670 --> 0:13:28.070 was just coming from a job raising a trans Atlantic 0:13:28.070 --> 0:13:31.280 accent and so I have accent traffic in my mouth 0:13:31.400 --> 0:13:33.750 and like it was and I looked like an idiot 0:13:33.790 --> 0:13:35.880 for the blond hair. It was a lot of stuff. 0:13:35.890 --> 0:13:37.860 There's a lot of things I felt really good about. 0:13:37.980 --> 0:13:39.310 Yeah exactly. It just wasn't. 0:13:39.320 --> 0:13:41.590 Did you feel like something that was as important as 0:13:41.590 --> 0:13:45.130 this job you know. Nat Geo and Dave are happy 0:13:45.170 --> 0:13:48.110 in way. DiCaprio's a great script. You know you walk 0:13:48.110 --> 0:13:49.760 in there and you want to make sure it's your 0:13:49.760 --> 0:13:51.859 best foot forward it didn't feel like that. So they 0:13:51.860 --> 0:13:54.110 called me back in and sat me down to tell 0:13:54.110 --> 0:13:56.510 me like we think maybe you don't make the best 0:13:56.510 --> 0:13:59.880 Gordon Cooper but what do you think about playing Alan Shepard. 0:13:59.890 --> 0:14:02.540 So that was a really unique audition experience when you 0:14:02.610 --> 0:14:04.720 might care about where you think you did that because 0:14:04.750 --> 0:14:07.219 it offer you another job so it took me a 0:14:07.220 --> 0:14:09.050 minute to really wrap my head around what they were 0:14:09.050 --> 0:14:11.600 telling me. And also like I said there was another 0:14:11.600 --> 0:14:13.790 actor in the role of Alan Shepard when I wrote 0:14:13.790 --> 0:14:15.810 the script first. So I had to like replay the 0:14:15.809 --> 0:14:17.870 script in my mind even kind of homing in on 0:14:17.870 --> 0:14:20.510 who they were talking about. It was very exciting and 0:14:20.510 --> 0:14:23.570 they kind of mapped out the entire arc between Shepard 0:14:23.570 --> 0:14:25.910 and Glenn and I think the next day the actual 0:14:26.030 --> 0:14:27.510 official offer came through. 0:14:27.530 --> 0:14:30.010 That doesn't happen often obviously. 0:14:30.040 --> 0:14:32.330 Was it a conversation that said or did they have 0:14:32.330 --> 0:14:33.690 you go out and read sides. 0:14:33.690 --> 0:14:36.350 No absolutely it's just a conversation. You know David didn't 0:14:36.350 --> 0:14:38.660 end up directing our pilot Chris Long did our pilot 0:14:38.700 --> 0:14:39.790 Chris Long's great. 0:14:39.860 --> 0:14:41.550 But at the time it was David and David and 0:14:41.560 --> 0:14:44.210 I worked together on shameless so we knew each other 0:14:44.210 --> 0:14:46.729 we had worked together before and they'd seen some of 0:14:46.730 --> 0:14:48.920 my other work and then seen the audition that I 0:14:48.920 --> 0:14:51.020 just gave for Gordo which I think according to what 0:14:51.020 --> 0:14:53.600 they told me was the indicator that it was less 0:14:53.600 --> 0:14:56.450 about maybe not being a competent audition. It was like 0:14:56.510 --> 0:14:58.640 oh this has more of the traits of this character 0:14:58.640 --> 0:15:00.860 than that. So no I didn't have three and four 0:15:00.910 --> 0:15:05.330 Shepherd that's a great experience but it also has weird 0:15:05.420 --> 0:15:07.760 consequences with the two who never even hear an actor 0:15:07.760 --> 0:15:11.820 complain about being offered a role. But let me just get. 0:15:12.990 --> 0:15:15.390 Since I'm not used to that I'm still very much an. 0:15:15.520 --> 0:15:18.760 That is part of the audition process vies for roles 0:15:18.760 --> 0:15:22.030 that are competitive. It's just a shift of pace to 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:24.100 all of a sudden have one that you never had 0:15:24.100 --> 0:15:26.710 that kind of experiment. Like if you think of an 0:15:26.710 --> 0:15:29.830 audition as a chance for not just them to experiment 0:15:29.890 --> 0:15:32.800 with this actor in a role it's also your personal 0:15:32.800 --> 0:15:35.740 experiment to try the roll on. And even though it 0:15:35.740 --> 0:15:37.810 is uncomfortable you're not on the set you're not in 0:15:37.810 --> 0:15:39.550 the wardrobe and all the pitfalls that come with the 0:15:39.550 --> 0:15:44.560 audition process are still their baseline. You start to either 0:15:44.710 --> 0:15:47.620 make a connection with that character or you don't and 0:15:47.620 --> 0:15:49.450 then you get a callback and you tweak it a 0:15:49.450 --> 0:15:51.400 little bit and then maybe another call to that. So 0:15:51.400 --> 0:15:54.250 there's a process that you start to at least get 0:15:54.250 --> 0:15:55.600 the roots in the ground. 0:15:55.990 --> 0:15:58.900 The choices I think you make it feel right and 0:15:58.900 --> 0:16:02.260 wrong in that character whereas it's just we trust you 0:16:02.260 --> 0:16:04.360 we'll see you on set. It's just a different kind 0:16:04.360 --> 0:16:08.110 of ballgame. So that's what this was. And obviously this 0:16:08.110 --> 0:16:10.800 for me at least way more research went into this 0:16:10.810 --> 0:16:13.660 and having a template of the real guy and reconciling 0:16:13.660 --> 0:16:15.790 that with the version of the guy in the script 0:16:15.940 --> 0:16:19.270 was a fun terrifying exciting process and getting the voice 0:16:19.270 --> 0:16:21.520 down and I don't have anybody in the military in 0:16:21.510 --> 0:16:24.580 my immediate family and just reintroducing that chain of command 0:16:24.580 --> 0:16:28.420 in your mind posture mannerisms things like that but all 0:16:28.420 --> 0:16:31.150 that had to be worked out to basically test run 0:16:31.240 --> 0:16:33.540 on the first day of shooting. And that was different. 0:16:33.550 --> 0:16:35.620 Was there a rehearsal process at all or you just 0:16:35.620 --> 0:16:37.380 showed up on set and had to work it out. 0:16:37.390 --> 0:16:40.660 There really wasn't. Luckily we've got a cast of actors 0:16:40.660 --> 0:16:44.680 that all love the process. They love the filmmaking process. 0:16:44.680 --> 0:16:47.530 We all have a tremendous amount of respect for what 0:16:47.530 --> 0:16:49.720 a team effort it is to bring script to life 0:16:49.840 --> 0:16:53.350 cast and crew alike. And so no there wasn't a 0:16:53.350 --> 0:16:56.680 big preproduction rehearsal phase. A lot of that was because 0:16:56.680 --> 0:16:58.990 our first episode was thrown into a little bit of 0:16:58.990 --> 0:17:01.960 turbulence because we lost our director. So there was a 0:17:01.960 --> 0:17:04.359 little bit of a scramble at the beginning which all 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:06.520 the other things that had to be squared away before 0:17:06.580 --> 0:17:09.190 shooting on day one rehearsal which is something that kind 0:17:09.190 --> 0:17:11.830 of had the fall of the wayside because of scheduling. 0:17:11.830 --> 0:17:14.350 But as we got further into the series and realized 0:17:14.350 --> 0:17:18.040 that everybody we were working with Patrick Adams and Colin 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:20.500 and Mike all the rest of the guys we started 0:17:20.500 --> 0:17:23.380 rehearsing on our own time to episode five. There's this 0:17:23.380 --> 0:17:27.010 big confrontation between John Glenn and Alan Shepard. It's something 0:17:27.010 --> 0:17:30.040 that Mark Lafferty our showrunner told Patrick and I about 0:17:30.220 --> 0:17:33.010 honestly from day one even when they pitched the road 0:17:33.010 --> 0:17:35.950 to me in that bad audition. Right. He said OK. 0:17:36.010 --> 0:17:39.700 So Shepard Story is this it's this rivalry between these 0:17:39.700 --> 0:17:42.520 two men. And that scene in there being 12 pages 0:17:42.520 --> 0:17:46.570 long you spent the entire day filming it and because 0:17:46.660 --> 0:17:49.119 we had at that point worked together on the episodes 0:17:49.119 --> 0:17:52.090 one through four. And we're familiar with each other's processes 0:17:52.210 --> 0:17:55.840 as actors on our own time. Patrick and I because 0:17:55.840 --> 0:17:58.120