<HR class=hr width="100%" SIZE=1>Lewis plays up contradictions in new role
Al Norton TV Editor
Boston Now
Damian Lewis is best known for his Golden Globe nominated performance as Major Richard Winters in HBO\'s Band Of Brothers. Currently he stars in NBC\'s Life as Charlie Crews, an LA police detective who has recently returned to the job after spending 12 years in jail for a murder he did not commit. Recently Boston Now talked to him about his new series and how it stands among the sea of cop dramas currently on TV.
BN: Is it easier to stay in Charlie\'s voice when you\'re on set (Lewis was born and raised in London)?
DL: I find it easier for my small brain to just stay as an American all day. Just when I\'m on set, not when I\'m at home. That would be weird (laughing).
BN: What were you doing when you got the for Life?
DL: What was I doing? I was at home, chilling out because we\'d just had our first baby, talking to my wife about what it would be like to move out of London for a few years. "Wouldn\'t that be fun, go and live abroad?" We were just kind of fantasizing about it and then I got a phone call from NBC saying, "we\'d love you to be in this show, here\'s the ." I read it and thought it was fantastic ... It was never my intention to go and do network TV in particular but I thought it was a great show
BN: There was no audition process; they just offered you the role?
DL: They just offered me the role.
BN: That\'s got to feel good.
DL: Well, that is nice. Obviously that should be enough, just to have your ego tickled like that, in such a satisfying way. It\'s always pleasing to be offered things outright because it shows passion and commitment. It\'s always a good sign.
BN: What drew you to Charlie?
DL: I had no real reference points for this genre. The cop shows I grew up with were different but the ones I remember being most enjoyable were character driven, like Colombo, Kojack, Rockford Files, Magnum ... I found Charlie Crew\'s ability to deal with his past through deflection and humor, using these devices which I found to be humorous like his Zen ways, trying to apply that to his life and his anger control, to be interesting ... I don\'t think he\'s a very good Zen master (laughing) ... I thought it was an interesting point to start out from, having such a dark, bleak back story, having experienced something that I hope most of us never experience, but approaching life with such optimism and joy, a sense of every moment being lived intensely and fully. I enjoyed the contradiction there, I enjoyed that he had found an antidote to his experience. He could be bitter, he could be vengeful, but he\'s not, he chooses to be open and enthusiastic.
BN: One of the things that make the show stand out is the pacing. A lot of other shows go for some dramatic cliffhanger each week, and on Life the writers are spending more time getting you to care about the characters as you follow them through the maze.
DL: I hope so. It was always the intention to make it a character driven piece - it is an ensemble piece but it follows Charlie\'s story - the idea being that we should enjoy him and want to know what he\'s doing each week, and to that end they have the crime of the week along with the bigger over arcing crime, which is who set him up. The episode that is on Wednesday ...
BN: It\'s the one titled Farthingale, right? It\'s a fantastic episode.
DL:I\'m glad to hear that. They wanted to steer away from just a regular procedural ... That\'s what drew me, I didn\'t want to be a part of just a regular procedural. This has an emotional life a lot of shows don\'t have and it also has, apart from this conspiracy thriller theme, it has something "other", something more poetic, and Farthingale, so far out of all the episodes, best presents that. It\'s very visual and almost dreamlike. The series when at its best has a dreamlike quality. It doesn\'t need to be naturalistic.
BN: Fans watching the show are getting to know Charlie but also wondering, "who was he before he had this terrible thing happen to him?"
DL: He is changed by an event is his life that enables him to have a rebirth. He comes out a radically different person. I think before he went to prison you can imagine he was just a regular Joe. He went to the police academy, came out and wanted to be a career cop, have his two kids and a dog, own a house in the Valley with his beautiful wife. He was going to have a nice, ordered, and fulfilling life.
This terrible thing happens to him and he goes away to a maximum security prison for what he thinks is going to be for life, gets out after 12 years, and is altered radically by it. He\'s changed and he\'s changed for the better. I don\'t think they should avoid the darkness of his story - I think his life there will always be with him - but the way he chooses to live after is a positive affirmation of his life. He wants to get the best from life, he wants to see the best in people, and in some way that gives him a child like quality, sometimes a naivety. It\'s a choice he makes and I think that makes him kind of heroic.
BN: A couple of weeks ago we got introduced to the character of Roman, played by Garret Dillahunt. It seemed like it might be a recurring part and not just a one time thing.
DL: We haven\'t seen him since but I get the sense we will. Not because of any conversation I\'ve had with the producers but like you, I inferred from the that he seems to know an awful lot and he was suitably cryptic about what he knows. I would imagine he\'s going to come back with a hat full of information.
BN: When you took the part did they map the whole story out for you or did you not want to know?
DL: They\'ve been very good at telling me general ideas about where it\'s roughly going. Sometimes I think they don\'t want to reveal anything but sometimes I think they don\'t know anymore. They\'re discovering it as they go along, too. There\'s already been an example of a storyline that\'s been developed and they thought, "how do we tie that in with where we are going?", so there\'s a certain amount of thinking on your feet from writers, producers, and actors. For my part, as long as I am absolutely on the same page and have the same research and references that the creators have, I am happy. What happens going forward is happening in real time, so I am happy to get the s and be enthralled and excited by the development of the stories the same way everybody else is. It\'s important I get them a few days ahead of everybody else so I can be prepared (laughing)...
BN: Can you give me a preview about what to expect for the rest of the season?
DL: Well you were just saying we were concentrating a lot on character, and we have been, but there\'s some very, very big revelations coming up in episodes 10 and 11. Before we get mid-way through the season you\'ll have some pretty satisfying answers about what happened to Charlie, who\'s behind it all, how high up the corruption goes, and start to get a sense of what was at stake.
Don\'t miss Life, Wednesdays at 10 pm on NBC.
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