Press Archive

The Deadbolt
18 November 2008
By Troy Rogers
Source

Crime and Peace of Mind with ‘Life’ Cops Damian Lewis and Donal Logue

In a world where threats and criminal acts occur by the minute, it must be a Herculean feat for a cop to take a Zen-like approach hunting down bad guys. But if you were perceived to be one of the bad guys in prison before being given a second chance to return to the world of law enforcement, would you re-think your quest for vengeance when you returned to the force? For actor Damian Lewis, stepping into the role of Detective Charlie Crews on NBC’s Life was a challenge in going against the grain of conventional TV cops. After all, if your character is a wrongfully accused ex-con cop, it’s not like you could draw inspiration from an officer gone sour like Harvey Keitel’s character in Bad Lieutenant.

As for actor Donal Logue who plays Lewis’ boss, Captain Tidwell, taking a Zen-like approach to his own life has been the best approach to not only his character but also his career. In many ways, Life has been good for both of them.

With Life fitting nicely into its new Wednesday, 9 pm timeslot on NBC, our own Troy Rogers spent a few quiet minutes alone to get into a Zen-like state before opening his eyes and ears to find himself on a conference call with Life actors Damian Lewis and Donal Logue.

THE DEADBOLT: Which mall did you guys shoot Black Friday in?

DAMIAN LEWIS: It was a mall down in Delano. Was it Delano? Yeah, that’s right.

DONAL LOGUE: Delano, yeah, Redondo Beach area, kind of Manhattan Beach. South Bay.

LEWIS: It was in South L.A. Why, did you like the look of the stores? Are you going to go do your Christmas shopping? There were some good bargains going on. I did some shopping, I’m telling you.

THE DEADBOLT: I read that the addition of Donal would lighten your workload. How has that turned out?

LEWIS: They lied.

LOGUE: That’s not true at all.

LEWIS: Well, it lightens my workload in that – and he’ll never hear me say this again – but it’s such a joy working with him. And I think it’s really just improved the dynamic in the police station. Donal’s character, Tidwell, he has no responsibility to the conspiracy story. He’s kind of like a floating satellite and he can come in and wreck things, and influence things, and affect things, and then leave again as much as they want him to.

And, you know, already we’ve seen him be integrated into our lives in a more personal way with his relationship with Reese, which is fantastic. And he’s got his whole fish-out-of-water story going, which is this abrasive, un-PC, Manhattan cop landed in PC LA. So there are a lot of fun dynamics there. I mean it just makes it more enjoyable. Do I get half days off now? No, I’d be lying if I said that. Usually because if there’s a half day then Donal, then I’m doing scenes from episodes we haven’t finished yet. So…

THE DEADBOLT: How do you see Charlie and Ted’s relationship evolving?

LEWIS: Oh, well, I think they will for the time being remain firm friends. Ted has a financial acumen that Crews does not have and I think there’s potential for Ted to be set some kind of challenge which may affect his relationship with Charlie. He may be asked to make a choice. People might try and get to him in order to get to me. Already we’re seeing a little bit of that with his return to prison, which will be coming in upcoming episodes.

Don’t give that away to the viewers just yet, but there’s possibility there because he holds so much of Charlie’s money and is really a trustee of Charlie’s money. So there’s potential there. But otherwise I think they’ll remain good friends. And, you know, they’re kind of like Oscar and Felix.

THE DEADBOLT: Donal, you mentioned that Tidwell is a character that you’ve never really played before. What drew you to him when you first read the script?

LOGUE: I was more drawn to – because I didn’t know who he would be exactly – I was kind of more drawn to Rand Ravich and Far Shariat, who I had met, because I had discussed with them the possibility of doing the show called [MR7] they did, which was actually a really neat show [that] ended up being with a mutual friend of mine and Damian’s, Donny Wahlberg. And so I liked those guys.

And I was always a fan of Damian so, you know, it was more just talking to them about what the possibilities could be, because I didn’t know exactly who he would be – how bombastic, how crude. And I’m not saying he’s really those – he’s as much as I thought he might be in that way, but it was just interesting. It was very different from stuff I had been doing, kind of immediately before it, so I think the juxtaposition felt even more severe.

But I really kind of love the dynamic and I haven’t really thought about it as much as – I think Damian described it really well. You know, I get to be this like free-floating satellite who isn’t tied to some of the broader conspiracy things. And it’s fun because every week of television there’s kind of an [option] to re-invent yourself, or there’s a chance for them to show something about your character that had been …

You know, I always feel like he has some things that we haven’t revealed yet that make him who he is. And so you always have this chance to redeem yourself, and I look forward to kind of in serialized acting the way one-hour television is. So unlike a film where if you’re kind of plugging through a film two-thirds of the way through and you have no clue where you’re going, and you’re in trouble, here it kind of actually works to your advantage.

THE DEADBOLT: What can you tell me about your upcoming project 1%?

LOGUE: I don’t think it’s going to happen. It’s not going to happen at HBO. It was a really exciting thing, and it was kind of a really cool project, but maybe they felt like there are too many biker shows on the air right now or something like that? But it was neat because it wasn’t very “tough guy”, it was more character driven. And this guy Michael Tolkien, who’s a brilliant writer, wrote it.

I haven’t even been in that world for so long. I’ve just been enmeshed in Life and I love finally being able to give myself completely to Life in my mind, because in this work, as we go through as actors, sometimes there’s something behind you and something ahead of you that’s affecting where you’re at. And so now I can just kind of just be Zen-like, like Charlie Crews, and just kind of go with the flow of what I’m doing on this show.

Other Conference Call Highlights:

Donal Logue on his many comic book movie roles:

“It’s interesting because I really wasn’t a big comic book guy. And I think people assumed I am and I have been. But I have a lot of respect for the genre and I have a lot of friends who were really into comic books. And I kind of existed on the periphery of a scene of guys who were into fantasy and comic books and D&D and things when I was in high school and college.

“I think just being in Blade, trying to put me in that comic that Marvel world and Ghost Rider and things like that. But I love comic book villains because this English comic book writer, James Robinson, wrote a script about the people who have given their lives to comic books and how there’s kind of a broader world out there.

“And, you know, it’s really fun… there’s a real joy in acting to be able to just give yourself to being a vampire. One thing absurd sometimes is on Ghost Rider, for instance, a lot the fans come down hard on the film adaptation of the comic book. And part of me, honestly, has to say, ‘Look, you’ve got a skeleton on fire on a motorcycle. At what point do we really need to get too nit-picky about the criticism dramatically?’ I actually enjoy doing something like Life a lot more because it’s just realistic. It’s just kind of this element of ‘the real’ to it that I like.”

Damian Lewis on fans still recognizing him from Band of Brothers:

“Yes, I’m still convincing people I didn’t win the second World War. It can be quite overwhelming. But I mean, yes, what a privilege to have been involved in telling that story. I’ve said before I was slow to realize the enormity of the [scope] and the importance of the project and of the story and the task in hand to represent those guys well and responsibly.

“So having committed it to it like that with thirty other guys, we kind of developed our own band of brothers. And those guys are good friends and we got married together and had children together over the last seven, eight years and we all hang out together.