Hello From Toronto!

Enjoy loranc's report from the FanExpo in Toronto! --chris

Hello from Toronto!

Earlier this month, Chris asked if I would be interested in doing an interview with the creators of Durham County at Fan Expo 2010. Well, how could I say no? The interview was originally with writer Laurie Finstad Knizhnik, but because the show was such a collaborative effort, director Adrienne Mitchell and producer Janis Lundman themselves suggested to be part of it as well, to create a more complete piece.

With a list of 16 questions, sent to me by Chris, and a shiny new voice recorder in hand, I set off early Saturday morning for the Metro Convention Centre downtown. When I arrived, I found line ups several blocks long and general confusion everywhere, which pretty much set the scene for the rest of the day. Infact, it was only 15 minutes before the interview that I got confirmation on where and when to set up. And it wasn't until we were actually setting up in the hotel hallway (where our interview was to now take place, instead of the mysterious room 204 that none of us could find) that I was told Laurie could not attend and I only had 10 minutes with Adrienne and Janis. So, I turned to my little entourage of Forbes fans I met along the way that day (Deb from the Miranda Zero blog, a woman from the Propworx forum, and another woman who had travelled all the way from Germany) to assist me in quickly scrapping 11 questions and choosing the best 5 that applied to Adrienne and Janis only.

The result is what you hear on this audio file, lol. That rustling of papers sound was me flipping back and forth between sheets of questions while balancing myself as I knelt on the floor. It appeared the con ran out of chairs. The laughing and clapping in the background was from my little entourage, who were also on the floor, but were very supportive and clearly enjoyed the opportunity to sit-in on the interview.

Despite the initial fluster, it was a great experience and I was inspired by what these two trailblazing women had to say. Many thanks to Chris and the Durham County crew for making all this happen!



Update :: You can find a transcription of the interview here:
--> This Moment Of Tenderness

Note by chris: Sorry, no interview picture of Janis & Adrienne, instead: Michelle Forbes signing autographs for fans at the Anchor Bay booth, taken by loranc:

Canada, eh

* Watch the Zack Taylor Interview with Michelle who is currently in Toronto, CA:

ZackTaylor.ca Interviews Michelle Forbes

She can't talk yet about her upcoming project (they'll be filming in Vancouver) - ....

* And more news: Durham County season 2 coming to DVD
DVD, eh !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

* Update ::
Michelle on 'The Hour' (CBC)



Go here to watch the video:
http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/

Michelle in the UK

This afternoon in London, live on BBC Radio 5 - Michelle talked about In Treatment, True Blood and more:





I listened at work - if you missed it, you can download the interview from the BBC site ... link dead, sorry.

On Saturday Michelle accepted an award for True Blood at the SFXWeekender:

Tragedy, Laughter and Acceptance

Below are the best parts of another insightful interview with Michelle on Durham County:

"The beauty of her acting is that we see the character, not the actress...she disappears behind their personalities. 'My [project] choices are instinctual a lot of the time,' she said.

'[Pen Verrity's] confronted with her own failures as a wife, a mother, a psychiatrist. Pen's so far gone; she's drowning...'

'It's still not acceptable for women to express outrage,' she said. 'It's just not socially acceptable. They're expected to keep a lid on it.'

'[Finstad]'s not afraid to walk boldly into this world,' Forbes said. 'She's able to show the frail, dark side of the human condition...'

'...I wanted to be part of [DC],' she said.'It was something you won't find in Hollywood, which I love.'

...despite the serious nature of Durham County, 'The great thing is Laurie and Adrienne have such a great sense of humor, and Michelle Forbes has an incredible sense of humor...'

'My way of dealing with tragedy is laughter...Directors sometimes worry when they see me laughing before a scene.'"
Source: chicagonow.com

Police shows are almost always just about the crimes. But what are the psychic after-effects? That's what we're exploring.

Note: Dear reader, you may have noticed that this and the previous post
have been edited a number of times. I received a bollocking by Chris, [-: I've quoted too much. - Randy

Michelle Shines in Durham County

Season 2 of Durham County has just aired and there are already two interviews with Michelle. Enjoy!

"On Durham County you play a very conflicted woman - part victim/part villain and very sad -what do you think of Pen Verrity?
Michelle Forbes: It was an amazing opportunity to play someone as tricky and as complicated as Pen, and how [series creator] Laurie Finstad-Knizhnik came up with this character, I have no idea. But I think Laurie takes a cold stark look at true womanhood on many different levels, including the ugly parts of being female that we don’t want to look at. I think one of the things that fascinated me the most is what happens to a woman’s psychology when she’s not a good mother. It’s the one thing you are biologically predisposed to do, and if you don’t have that maternal instinct, what happens to you psychologically when you fail at being a mother and at being a wife? She truly explores the darker side of what happens to us as human beings.

What do you think makes this series so special?
I think that Adrienne [Mitchell], Laurie and Janice [Lundman] have an uncompromising vision. They want to explore the darker aspects of our humanity and they do it with a beautiful visual style. They have a unique voice that belongs just to them and they haven’t had to compromise it yet. So I think it’s just their voice. that’s what makes Durham different. And Adrienne Mitchell’s visual stamp - that bleak landscape sort of lends itself to the story and created a full environment for it...

What have been some of your favorite roles?
There have been so many. I would say those on Homicide: Life on the Street, True Blood and In Treatment."
Source: channelguidemagblog.com

[...]“I thought [Durham County] was so visually stunning and haunting - the music was haunting, the visuals were haunting - I had to be a part of it,” Forbes said... “It was something outside of the Hollywood box, which I love. It was psychologically daring, and I am really, really pleased and proud to be a part of it.”

[...] “I don’t like the ‘Twin Peaks’ parallel,” Forbes said. “A lot of people have said that, and I’m a little perplexed by it. It’s misleading. People expect to see a Log Lady. ‘Twin Peaks’ is one of the most phenomenal series America’s ever produced, and I think ‘Durham County’ is fantastic. They’re just not anything alike.”

[...] “It was an entirely new group of actors and an entirely different production team,” she said. “Because I’ve been around so long, it’s rare to walk onto a set and not know half the people, whether they’re crew or actors. But it was delightful to walk into an entirely new company and not know anyone. I love walking into new companies and countries and cultures. It was very different in that sense, having the Canadian outlook.”
Source: BostonHerald.com

Following last night's premiere, what (some) people are saying (while others remains speechless):

oh man, you'll love it. Michelle is scary amazing as Pen.
Watching Durham County. So far, highly recommended
Creepy, dark & twisty.
this Durham County shit is crazy!!!
It pains me that Durham County commercials say "True Blood's Michelle Forbes" and not "Homicide: Life on the Street's Michelle Forbes."
Source: twitter

Also, S2 of BSG has been acknowledged as one of the Top TV Seasons of the decade thanks to the wonderfully-written and performed story arc involving Admiral Cain.

#6. Battlestar Galactica, Season 2 (Sci-Fi, 2005-06)
Probably the most engrossed I've been by a TV series this decade...The characters all got deeper, darker, more complex, and the critiques (of the Iraq war, specifically) never more trenchant.

Top Episode: "Resurrection Ship, Part 2," where the conflict between Adama and Michelle Forbes's Admiral Cain came to a chilling conclusion.
Source: Low Resolution Blogspot

(9) Season Two is Battlestar Galactica at its best...the "Pegasus" saga, where another Battlestar commanded by the royal c-word Admiral Cain (played to perfection by Michelle Forbes of Star Trek: TNG and Homicide) shows up and starts really ****ing everything up. These episodes really could be the best of the whole series.
Source: www.cultureblues.com

Emotional Impact

"Emilie Lopez : Vous avez tourné dans de nombreuses séries particulièrement appréciées du public. Êtes-vous habituée au succès?

Michelle Forbes : J’ai vraiment eu de la chance d’être dans de telles séries, auxquelles je croyais et que j’aimais. Après avoir passé 16 à 18 heures par jour, parfois 6 jours par semaine à faire ces histoires, et que tu vois l’impact qu’elles ont sur le public, que tu vois tout le monde tellement excité à l’idée de te rencontrer, que tu les voies si respectueux, comme cela peut-il t’énerver ? C’est ce que l’on fait, c’est ce pour quoi on travaille pendant des jours et des jours : avoir un impact émotionnel sur le public. Donc quand cela arrive, c’est toujours extrêmement touchant."
Source: toutelatele.com

My attempt to translate it. I apologise in advance for any mistakes.
"You have played in many TV shows which are particularly appreciated. Do you get used to success?

I was indeed lucky to be part of shows in which I believed in and which I loved. After working 16 to 18 hours a day, sometimes 6 days a week, creating these stories, and seeing the impact that they have on the public, when you see everybody so keen with the idea to meet you, and how respectful they are, how does this thrill you? That's what you do, that's why you're working day after day, to have an emotional impact on the audience. Because when this happens, it's always incredibly touching."

I'd like to say that it's equally moving as a viewer how Michelle Forbes makes us laugh and cry, scream and lament, or squee with delight. And sometimes let us become absolutely silent.
How does she achieve this? What is her secret, what are the techniques to attract, engage, and fascinate us?

Since it's quiet on the blog in these December days, you'll get an unrelated Sunday picture. Yesterday in Amsterdam, on my way to work. Tonight it's bitterly cold, and it's snowing :)

More of Michelle in France

This weeks edition of the L'Hebdo Séries programme on Canal + is dedicated to Michelle. L'Hebdo Séries brings you current TV news, interviews etc. in the scope of just 7 minutes...in French. Aside from featuring interviews with Michelle and Alexander Skarsgård on True Blood, the episode also announces the Global Frequency adaptation news. You can watch it online here.



Transcript of the Interview with Michelle:

Looking at her from the outside in, she could be seen as predatory, but, in playing her, standing in Maryann's heart and her body for so many months, I never felt that. It was always a loving gesture. It's just different. It's a different kind of love than what we're used to.

Like any good writer, he [Alan Ball] raises the questions, and he lets the audience answer for themselves. Luckily, in the meantime, we get to have a lot of fun.

Credit and many thanks go to Emilie who contributes to the programme and also our blog. :)

Salome in the Garden

Michelle Forbes: True Blood asks us about our beliefs

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, 'The Day Dream', 1880.

Michelle Forbes is a beautiful woman who resembles her characters. She punctuates her sentences with an attentive and patient smile, but it can not dissipate the intensity of her gaze. She smiles and speaks in a deep voice, husky and warm, which she modulates at will and without effort. She smiles and looks at you with her dark eyes, shining with a dusty glaze. We imagine her slipping easily into the skin of Salome and demand the head of John the Baptist from Herod Antipas. Because she carries an element of mystery that one may construe her as a femme fatale. The role of Maryann Forrester in Season 2 of True Blood fits her like a tunic a Greek god.

Before that, she was the wife of Paul Weston (Gabriel Byrne) in the first season of In Treatment. She was also an enigmatic and tortured mother in Season 2 of the excellent but little-known Canadian series Durham County. The time of three episodes, she was Admiral Helena Cain on Battlestar Galactica, but also among other things Dr. Julianna Cox in seasons 5 and 6 of Homicide: Life on the Street set for NBC by David Simon, the father of The Wire.

The actress was visiting Paris for the launch of Season 2 of True Blood which starts broadcasting on Tuesday, 1 December on Orange cinema series.

How important is the role of Maryann Forrester in your career?

My first important role on television was that of Julianna Cox in Homicide: Life on the Street, which is certainly one of the best crime series that has ever been filmed. In Treatment has also been a role I enjoyed playing. At the same time I turned to True Blood. Maryann is certainly the most flamboyant character I had ever embodied. But Helena Cain on Battlestar was so iconic that people remember me most for this character than the one I played in True Blood.

In hindsight, how do you see her?

It was only last week that I really realized what was the character of Maryann. It is a cliché to say that, but all the actors agree and that's true that you can not see a character that you embody as absolutely evil. When Maryann makes Eggs and Tara eat the soufflé, she really believes in giving them a gift. She is sincere in her whole approach. She is really convinced that it gives them freedom. And she really wants to get closer to the God. When she prepares the dish for them, she does so as a mother would do in preparing gifts for her children. For me, it was love.

Season 2 revolves around several different stories.

In this second season of True Blood, there are actually three distinct parts. The first season tells of a wretched little village, and we learn to know the people who live and work there. During the second season, three stories are pursued simultaneously. It is the journey that Bill takes to Dallas, there is the story of the Fellowship of the Sun, which for me was the funniest one to watch, and then there is the story of Maryann and the people of Bon Temps. What I like about this season is that it clearly addresses the question of our belief system. The purpose of Maryann is to challenge the moral beliefs and ideals of each of us. At the same time, the entire section on Fellowship of the Sun denounces the belief systems that require blind adherence from its followers. With regard to vampires, the question is about being judged, being regarded as different, and this questions our beliefs on the status of minorities. This forces us to ask us questions about our willingness to lead ourselves in a sheep-like manner, to follow a leader, one who can be very disruptive.

Music plays an important role in True Blood.

Yes. It is an essential element. What was amazing during the shooting was that we had one of the best sound engineers, Nathan Barr. In the series, the music is extremely important for Maryann but also for all of us. And the music was already included in the script when it was received. Each week we downloaded music from the episode that we will be filming next. This gave the impression that we had a sort of a soundtrack. And that immediately put us into the mood of the episode. I could not remember the B 52's, I had completely forgotten and when I downloaded the song, I said 'damn, it's really good'. "

To prepare for filming, I read about the maenads on Dionysus and Greek mythology, but what is interesting with Alan Ball and Charlaine Harris is that you can carry out all the searches you want, when you end up with the script in hand and you read that you'll need to dance to the B 52's, you try to understand how two things can agree with each other. And finally, you let yourself be guided by the text.

Working on HBO is a particular experience?

This may sound strange but I tend to work better when you're in a somewhat military environment. It is very difficult for an actor to find a series in which they believe. And when I discovered HBO, I almost felt too weak. They have a philosophy so strongly marked, they have such determination and at the same time such humanity. They really want to tell stories and they support their creators, they maintain their projects and they do not throw them out if they do not seem to work immediately. I am really impressed by their willingness to produce stories. This is not about money, it is like family to me. Perhaps I do embellish things a bit, but the more I worked with them the more I discovered on a personal level and I'm still admiring them.

What are you going to do now?

It has been almost two years since I have been shooting without interruption and I need to take some time for myself. I love gardening and I can not take care of my garden when I'm not in Montreal. I would also like to learn the joy of reading without having to memorize the text. I'll take the opportunity to cultivate my garden, in both senses of the word.
Source: Le Monde des Series (translated from French by me)

We hated to kill her but we had to

True Blood S2 Finale - Beyond Here Lies Nothin' :: Reviews - Quotes - Recaps - Interviews



Q: As much as I loved Michelle Forbes’ portrayal of Maryann, the story felt like it dragged on a little long. Why did it take her so long to get to the endgame?
BALL: That’s part of what the queen talks about. They’re always improvising. She really can’t conjure up a God. But she’s so fervent in her belief; she keeps trying this sacrifice and that sacrifice. She’s completely delusional. She killed Miss Jeanette and I think she thought that was going to work. She always thinks it’s going to work. It never does because the God who comes never actually comes. But she so fervently believes that he will, and she’s been believing it for thousands of years. That’s how they were able to outsmart her.
Q: Have we seen the last of her?
BALL: Yes, she’s gone. They destroyed her. She will never rise — which I hate because I love [Michelle], and she was so much fun to work with. She’s really delightful and everyone loves her and we hated to kill her but we had to.
Source: ausiellofiles.ew.com

"True Blood fans have been rooting for evil Maryann, the mythical maenad creature played by Michelle Forbes, to bite the dust in Sunday's finale. But the actress didn't expect to wind up playing her swan song scene with a 3,000-pound Brahman bull as her co-star.
"I wasn't that scared," Forbes told Lifeline Live last week in a top-secret pre-finale interview. "I'm a massive animal lover." But she says, "It is intimating when you're standing directly in front of him -- when you see those horns! One quick movement of his head and you're on the ground."
There were two Brahmans hired for the job -- just in case. "Belle and Luke," says Forbes. "Belle got a little funny and aggressive so they decided to bring Luke instead. Ii didn't hear that until I went to shoot and thought, 'Oh boy.'"
There were animal wranglers on the set. "I wasn't concerned until I realized there were 10,000 people on set looking at each other oddly and they were making me nervous." In the end, she says, the "glorious, gory love scene" turned into a death scene. "It was just so much fun to do. I really hope people are satisfied and sated."
Source: usatoday.com

"God with Horns - worship him, bitches!" -- Lafayette



I'm sad that Maryann is gone, mainly because Michelle Forbes is so wonderfully compelling in everything she does. But dragging out that arc any further would have been a disservice to the character and to the audience, so I'm presuming the maenad and her nutty parties are gone for good.
Source: The Watcher by Maureen Ryan

I still find it a profoundly dumb show, and a donut show at that (Bill and Sookie make it empty at the center), but I have to admit that, on a purely pulp fiction level, there was some fun stuff going on this season. Now, most of it involved either Michelle Forbes or Alexander Skarsgard, but still - it's gone from a show I hated to one I... don't hate.
Source: What's Alan Watching

R.I.P. - Di-Meat-Tree



“You mess with the bull, you get the horns.” And so it was on last night’s “True Blood” Season 2 finale.
The big day’s finally arrived for Maryann and the God Who Comes and she has just about everything she needs for her holy union: Mothball-infested old lady wedding dress? Check. Bloody ostrich egg? Check. Slighted, contrary maid of honor? Check. Human sacrifice? Ch—dammit! Sometimes you can do all the planning in the world and still end up waiting til the last minute for everything to fall into place."
Source: creativeloafing.com

The cliffhanger egg from two weeks ago was an ostrich egg, a fertility symbol, that completed what Andy would later refer to as the “giant statue of meat” that Maryann had built on Sookie’s lawn. Sam, as many of you thought, was indeed meant to be sacrificed (”the perfect wedding gift”) to Maryann’s god, Dionysus, who was to take the form of a white bull.
Instead of a white wedding, however, Maryann got her black heart gored and pulled out of her by a shape-shifted Sam. I was sorry to see Michelle Forbes go, but what a great performance she gave: her Maryann was scary, funny, and creepy, and the actress was able to go over-the-top and pull her performance back to human-scale. Her character’s death closed out the first half-hour with such finality (”It’s all over now,” said Sookie as Maryann lay in a heap and the townspeople came to their senses) that I thought, “Where do we go from here?”
Source: ivillage.com

'Electricity - do it again!' -- Maryann



[...] the Maryann character made this season thrilling; but she had served her demon-of-the-year purpose. If Alan Ball, aware that Michelle Forbes was making Maryann into a camp classic, found a way to keep her around for another season, the result would have been forced and disappointing. Maryann left us wanting more, always the better choice. Did anyone else think Maryann seemed almost touchingly pathetic as she stood expectantly waiting for her god, ready with her egg and her meat statue, deluded into thinking she was about to wed? A little supernatural Miss Havisham, with her “old, borrowed, and blue” zombie bridesmaids?!
Source: buzzonthetube.com

And while I absolutely loved how Sam dealt with Ms. Maenad, I was bummed to see it go down so early in the hour -- and even more upset that nothing really happened in the aftermath. Everything that led to Maryann finding herself on the business end of Sam's bull horn was perfection -- Maryann forcing Sookie to search within herself, the whole sacrifice scene, Michelle Forbes gleefully enduring her character's goring ... amazing.
Source: nypost.com



"You're marrying Sam?" Sookie asks Maryann. Nope, Sam is just the ideal wedding gift, she reports. Michelle Forbes hilariously shifts between Dionysian zealot and Ibiza party girl in this scene. She recites an austere oration of the virginal vessel that perfectly segues into her concerns that her crying will smudge her mascara. She explains coldly that Sookie is the bait, that once Sam finds out that she is being held captive, "he'll come running like a dog — maybe as a dog," she says with a cackle. [...]
Maryann is not pleased, and turns her wrath on her followers. "Allow me to sacrifice all of them for you!" she tells her god, as they all cringe and writhe. She plunges her hands into the earth and out pop those gnarly claws. In a flash, a chase ensues that echoes an earlier episode. Just as Maryann is about to bury her claws into Sookie again, a giant white bull appears in a clearing. Dionysus has arrived... maybe?
Her claws retract, and suddenly she's all moony-eyed and in lurve with her bull-headed suitor. "My lord, my husband," she says. "Oh, come, I'm here, my love. We're together at last." I wish I could see the blooper reel from this episode. They must have laughed their asses off between takes with all this ridiculous dialogue.
Source: tvguide.com

* ebassi: and true blood is done for this season; climatic finale (michelle forbes is above and beyond fantastic)
* itsjoewelch: Michelle Forbes should win an Emmy for her role on True Blood... Spectacular performance every episode!
* MewNeko: I'll miss Michelle Forbes. She was divine in that role. Sooo good.
* bananacylon: Soon, so soon, true blood season finale! MICHELLE FORBES!!!!!
* jimstoic: Michelle Forbes deserves a 2010 Emmy for her maenad Maryann on True Blood.
* RoushTVGuideMag: Michelle Forbes nailed that role to the last creepy moment.
* Megalicious09: Michelle Forbes deserves an award. Someone damn well better give her one!
* benelie: Not sure what to think about last ep of #trueblood Michelle Forbes was soooooooo beautiful and classy!!
* thecoldgun: True Blood finale: Michelle Forbes may be the greatest player of villains breathing. Admiral Cain and now MaryAnn Forrester. BEAST.
Source: Twitter

Instead of a white wedding, however, Maryann got her black heart gored and pulled out of her by a shape-shifted Sam. I was sorry to see Michelle Forbes go, but what a great performance she gave: her Maryann was scary, funny, and creepy, and the actress was able to go over-the-top and pull her performance back to human-scale. Her character’s death closed out the first half-hour with such finality (”It’s all over now,” said Sookie as Maryann lay in a heap and the townspeople came to their senses) that I thought, “Where do we go from here?”
Source: ew.com

'Never say never when there's the Internet.' --Sam

Beyond Here Lies Nothin'

True Blood Episode 02x12 Beyond Here Lies Nothin' :: Preview



This finale will be 98% incredible (extra 2% reserved for the inevitable elimination of this Grecian beauty) and anyone who thinks otherwise is nothing more than wrong and probably socially retarded (the two go hand-in-hand).
Three to One

That says it all. :)



The official synopsis:

Bon Temps reaches a fever pitch as Maryann prepares for her ultimate bestial sacrifice, conscripting Sookie to be Maid of Honor at the bloody nuptials. Meanwhile, Sophie-Anne warns Eric to keep the lid on Bill’s inquisitiveness; Jason leads Andy into the heroic abyss; and Hoyt struggles with Maxine’s endless stream of insults. Deliberating on what may be his final move to save Sookie and the town, Sam places his trust, and his life, in a most unlikely ally.

People magazine caught up with Michelle Forbes for yet another interview:

As Bon Temps’s resident maenad, Michelle Forbes has been freaking out True Blood fans since she appeared naked in the road with a pig at the end of season 1. But, “I’m really very nice,” she tells PEOPLE. “Everyone’s getting so scared when they meet me now. I could kill [show creator] Alan Ball.”

This season, her character Maryann used mind control to turn an entire town into lust-crazed zombie-like revelers with black eyes. In a recent phone interview, the actress talked about bringing a mythical creature to life (and into pop culture), hosting TV’s wildest orgies (and a furry uninvited guest who showed up on set one day) and what’s cracking open on Sunday’s finale on HBO (9 p.m. EST). “It certainly went to a place that I wasn’t expecting,” she says. Caution: May contain spoilers! –Aaron Parsley

How was this role described to you?
It just mentioned the more basic points of what a maenad is … That women of this sort tended to run through the woods tearing children and animals to pieces, and they were known as the “wild ones” and the “raving ones.” That was pretty much it.

Did that appeal to you?
It did! It didn’t necessarily line up with what was on the page and that was the exciting thing that sort of gets the hair on the back of your neck standing up. You start looking for a shovel because you just want to start digging to figure out what this riddle is all about.

What do you think of the current vampire craze?
In this age of vampires, what I love about True Blood the most is that it’s a post-modern take on it. [Sookie Stackhouse series author] Charlaine Harris and [True Blood creator] Alan Ball turned that whole mythology upside-down … It’s not just about vampires. It’s about a lot of different things. And that’s what I love about the show … It’s great to see the interaction between all these different creatures and humans.

Do you believe in supernatural creatures?
Not really. No.

If vampires represent forbidden love, what, if anything, does Maryann represent?
I think Maryann represents things going on in the real world since the beginning of time — Woodstock, Paris in the ’20s, the transgressive movement of cinema and music in New York in the ’80s — when people were just really trying to shed all moral boundaries.

Well, you certainly shed a few. How awkward is it to film those wild orgy scenes?
It sort of flip-flopped between very disturbing and just another day at work, as odd as that sounds. You just sort of get used to it and everybody was very respectful … At one of the orgies there was this bunny — there was a rabbit, who was just sitting there staring at us. We all kept saying, “Look that bunny’s still there.” And after about 45 minutes, I thought, “Maybe he’s hurt,” and I started to walk over to it and it took two hops and I was like, “Nope, he’s just a pervert.” … He was pervy Peter Rabbit!

Tell us about Sunday’s finale. What’s up with that egg?
What is up with that egg? I can’t talk about the egg! All I can say is that it was so much fun shooting it. We had one hell of a time. It was pretty surreal at times. I don’t want to say anything because I don’t know what people are expecting, especially after that last glimpse of that egg. It certainly went to a place that I wasn’t expecting. … You can’t say that our gang didn’t take a risk that is really exciting. All we can hope for in life is that storytellers take risks and tell the story that they want to tell and that they need to tell. I think that we did this. We took a risk and it’s bold.
Source: People.com

Just a little update to tickle you with before the finale...

Expert Witness: Michelle Forbes

On labelling, storytelling without constraints, and what True Blood is really all about...



Book love! :D

"Forbes has been stealing scenes in the finest television shows ("In Treatment," "Battlestar Galactica," "Lost," "Boston Legal," "24," "Alias," "Wonderland," "Homicide") for a very long time now; her participation on a TV show seems to practically translate to a Michelin star rating. Along the way, she may have cut a more imperious figure through the world of pop culture than just about any actor of her generation (Forbes is 44) .
When she sat down to talk to us, she expressed some bewilderment at why she's alway cast as such strong women, such as Battlestar's power-mad Admiral Helena Cain. She said her recent role as Kate, the vulnerable -- and exasperated -- wife of the conflicted therapist Paul on "In Treatment" was more like the real her than just about any character she's played."
Source: Salon.com

Maryann's Quadruple-alic Glory is in the Audience

"Excuse me, but f—k awards!" says Forbes, who plays the very evil but deliciously sexy Maryann Forrester in the hit vampire series.

"That's not where the glory is. The glory is in the audience," she adds. "That's who we tell the stories for. It's not for, with all due respect, the critics and not for the awards shows, but for the audience."

[...]

"[Maryann] doesn't have a duality, she has a quadruple-ality," Forbes says with a laugh. "They came up with this character that is running around in evening dresses and playing in the dirt and she has mad domestic skills and a butler and then there's dancing and the food. It's been so much fun."

Also fun? Getting to watch the real-life romance blossom between Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer.

"It really is a beautiful partnership to witness, and I don't say that lightly," Forbes says. "It's not often that you meet two people so wholly suited for each other."
Source: E! Online

So Long, Maryann?

Renée Nault - Crowned

I stopped to listen, but he did not come. I began again with a sense of loss. As this sense deepened I heard him again. I stopped stopping and I stopped starting, and I allowed myself to be crushed by ignorance. This was a strategy, and didn't work at all. Much time, years were wasted in such a minor mode. I bargain now. I offer buttons for his love. I beg for mercy. Slowly he yields. Haltingly he moves toward his throne. Reluctantly the angels grant to one another permission to sing. In a transition so delicate it cannot be marked, the court is established on beams of golden symmetry, and once again I am a singer in the lower choirs, born fifty years ago to raise my voice this high, and no higher. - Leonard Cohen



Well, you know that I love to live with you,
But you make me forget so very much. - So Long, Marianne

People haven't really been liking the Maryann storyline. What's your reaction to that?

I'm baffled because I think she's a fantastic character and a fantastic actress. I also know a lot of people who really love her. I think people are impatient, you know what I mean? When her story pays off, it is really, really gratifying.
Source: Alan Ball for TV Squad

Michelle Forbes is so overwhelming as a force of evil on the show that…I mean, it’s reached a point with some of the readers of our “True Blood” blog, where they’re, like, “Okay, she’s good, but she needs to go.”

(Laughs) Yeah, she’s so good. She’s really one of my favorite actresses on the show. She’s just fantastic. She really embodied that role, and she had such an ease with it. She really just kind of captured the fun of Maryann as well as the evil…because Maryann’s all about fun, really. It’s just that, to have that fun, you have to manifest the evil. But she’s great, and we got to work together a good bit, so that was fun.
Sam Trammell for bullz-eye.com

True Blood's 'Maryann': Cut out Sam's heart or have sex?

As HBO's True Blood barrels headlong toward its second-season finale on Sunday, audiences are on the edge of their sofas waiting to find out how Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin) and her cohorts will survive the wicked chaos summoned by Maryann Forrester. The deliciously decadent and rather insidious maenad (an immortal follower of Dionysus), played by sci-fi veteran Michelle Forbes (Battlestar Galactica), has been creating a lot of trouble in Bon Temps, La., this season. (Spoiler alert!)

In her initial guise as a helpful social worker, Maryann managed to prey on the most vulnerable in town, including Tara Thornton (Rutina Wesley). But now she possesses a magical hold on the majority of its denizens as they're helping her prepare to sacrifice local bar owner Sam Merlotte (Sam Trammell) to her god.

Kinky, violent, seductive and just plain bizarre: Forbes has played it all as Maryann this season. "I've gone to some deep and dark places where I have had to be fairly brave in the past, but it's always been emotionally internal," Forbes said in an exclusive phone interview with SCI FI Wire. "This [show] is a different animal, but boy, is it fun!"



With Maryann as the instigator of many a Bon Temps orgy in the last 11 episodes, Forbes said that she's been surprised by everything executive producer Alan Ball and company have asked of her this season. "Before I started the show at the end of last season and I was talking to a director, and we were chatting about how far we would go, and he said, 'You'll be asked to do things you've never been asked before.' I remember thinking, 'Yeah, sure.' I've been asked to do some pretty crazy things. I didn't take him seriously. But I opened that first episode for the second season and went 'Okayyy. Now I understand what he meant!'"

Forbes added: "What's wonderful is that everyone is so game and fearless on that set that it just galvanizes you and makes you excited about being fearless, too. It makes you feel silly if you feel shy. By nature I am a fairly shy person, but I think Alan and the writers may have knocked that shyness right out of me," she said with a laugh.

Forbes added: "What's wonderful is that everyone is so game and fearless on that set that it just galvanizes you and makes you excited about being fearless, too. It makes you feel silly if you feel shy. By nature I am a fairly shy person, but I think Alan and the writers may have knocked that shyness right out of me," she said with a laugh.

Fans of Charlaine Harris' novel Living Dead in Dallas will know that Maryann is based on the book character Callisto, who is a similar supernatural maenad with a dark agenda. Alan Ball decided to tease Maryann's introduction at the end of season one to set up her expanded arc in season two. Forbes said that she was approached for the role not long after she completed work on another HBO series, In Treatment.



"I'd heard rumblings about Alan Ball's new series, but I sort of walked in rather clueless," the actress said about her audition. "What I remember most about the meeting, to be honest, was that Željko Ivanek [the Magister in season one] was in the waiting room, and I hadn't seen him in ages. I was really happy to catch up with him. But I did go in and meet with Alan. It was mysterious, and it wasn't clear what or who she was, but we chatted, and it worked it out fine, because I got the call later that day."

Her first scene as Maryann was taking a naked, late-night stroll on a rural road while walking a huge pig. Not a bad entrance, but Forbes says it didn't give her much to work with in terms of character motivation.

As season two has evolved, Maryann has since been revealed to be the Big Bad of the story as she's manipulated and possessed the townspeople to give in to their carnal, basic instincts through wild parties and hedonistic behavior. With her sexy Grecian togas and sumptuous temptations, Forbes is playing the rare role for her—a girlie girl—and she admitted that she loved it.

"Finally!" she enthused. "It's either five-inch heels or bare feet, and that sums up Maryann for me. She either wants her feet firmly in the earth or to be high in the air. There is no middle ground. These gowns and jewelry, the Maryann hair and makeup, as soon as that happens, you fall into this environment."



But Forbes admits it was hard to embrace Maryann's fearless ability to just let go. "The thing that was the most difficult for me to settle into was Maryann's freedom," she explained. "She has ultimate freedom, and strangely that's a very difficult thing to play. She has a different moral construct and a different construct altogether from the rest of us. She is not shackled by any of the things that we are shackled by."

As the finale looms, the stage is set for one hell of a battle as the only good guys left in Bon Temps—including Sookie, Bill (Stephen Moyer), Jason Stackhouse (Ryan Kwanten) and Andy—try to stop Maryann and her minions from carving the heart out of Sam so that Dionysus will finally appear. How it will all end Forbes won't tell, but she does rank the character as one of her favorites.

"She loves her mischief and having her fun along the way," Forbes said with a laugh. "She has a different understanding of the world and this particular plane. She doesn't see an end in the road the way everyone else does, because she has no time constraints and no moral constraints. And in playing her it is impossible for me to see her as a villain. But the same can be said of any character that I have played. Admiral Cain [of Battlestar Galactica], you could say she was a villain, but the beauty of Ron Moore's writing is that there was logic in what she did and said. The thing about Maryann, too, is that the writers have always given her a beautiful logic in what she says. I just love the entire story. I had no idea where it was going in the beginning. I, however, especially with Maryann, really enjoyed the sense of not knowing."
Source: Sci Fi Wire

Excess is a Maenad's Quest For Purity

TV Guide caught up with Michelle yesterday for a quick interview and had her reveal a little on the upcoming finale, the adventures of being onTrue Blood, the Maenad's weakness and what she is in a nutshell. TV Guide urges you to submit questions (as comments to the article below) after the finale since Michelle has kindly agreed to answer them.

Her time has come…we think. After months of cooking up trouble -- and a bloody heart soufflé, True Blood's Maryann Forrester may be going down on this Sunday’s second season finale. Before we lose her, actress Michelle Forbes took some time off from vibrating her body to speak with TV Guide Magazine.


So, what was it like shooting the finale with your cast?
We were all out in the woods having so much fun. I kept losing focus because I was watching them do these hilarious and insane things. Anna Paquin (Sookie) and I were in stitches through most of it because we had some pretty loony things to do together.

What’s up with that vibrating egg we saw in bed with Tara and Eggs in the last original episode? There’s gotta be a connection to Eggs’ name, right?
I’m going to pass on that one because I want people to be surprised as they go into it.

Speaking of eggs, you’ve been doing about as much cooking this season as Meryl Streep does in Julie and Julia. Have you learned a few culinary tricks?
My cooking skills are not to be discussed. That’s what God provided restaurants for. I did however
have a 5 a.m. flambé lesson to cook that heart. I thought I’d better have some coffee before I started. I was nervous I was going to burn the studio down, but it was pretty easy.

I assume you weren’t cutting into an actual human heart. Please tell me you weren’t.
No, no. I’m not sure what it was, but we all got creeped out when I cut into it because it made the worst squishing sound in the world. The irony is that I’m a 30-year vegetarian. I’ve been an animal activist my entire life, so the role of Maryann has been a bit challenging – especially with the lovely meat tree – Di-meat-tree, as he became known.

That tree is repulsive. Tell us about it.
It was filled with real meat and reeked as the weeks wore on. There are bobcats and coyotes roaming around that ranch where we shoot, so they had someone sit by the tree with a gun at night to protect it.

That’s the wors[t] job ever.
I know.

So, we learned from Vampire Queen Sophie-Anne that Maryann is actually a maenad. What the heck is that?
A maenad is also known as the raving one or the wild one. They’re mythic creatures in Greek mythology who followed Dionysius and Bacchus and revel in chaos and destruction. They drink wine, have sex and have no boundaries. That excess is their quest for purity. As they sing their praises to their god, they hope that he comes.

And how can she be destroyed?
Once she believes the god is finally coming, that will be her vulnerability. Or shall I say her Achilles’ Heel.

The whole town of Bon Temps is gunning for Maryann. Should we be worried for her?
Sure. The whole town does want her gone. She has the whole town in her clutches except for a few stray ones like Sam and Sookie. Her final goal is to grab everyone so that she can achieve her goal. But she should have cause for caution.
Source: TV Guide

"Initially it was suffocating to sit in her expansiveness..."

Rohin Guha, from BlackBook.com has just talked with Michelle about her portrayal of one of the most horrific forces in contemporary culture, a force that appears immortal no less, but remains frightening in her moral ambiguity. Keep reading, if you would like to find our more about how does an actor prepare to play The Maenad (I'm listening to Lydia Lunch as I type ;)), what is her view of the world, the 'Cooking with Carl and Maryann' project, Michelle's favourite characters on True Blood, an upcoming love scene...and much, much more.

There's a clue at the bottom of the post. ;)

In True Blood, you play Maryann Forrester—a character we now know to be god-like and malevolent and essentially diametric to your portrayal of Kate on In Treatment. How did you adjust to the part of Maryann Forrester?
Kate was down-to-earth and had no self-esteem whatsoever. Bless her heart. Maryann is quite the opposite. She tends to laugh at all the things that would fill the rest of us with terror. Initially it was suffocating to sit in her expansiveness. Most of us are led by fear or guilt or sorrow. She’s absolutely fearless. Then it became the most fun game in the world.

How did you prepare for this role—were there any characters you drew inspiration from?
I watched a lot of Ken Russell films. These women are running around dancing and drinking. Running through the hills of the countryside of England—being mad. Those were the two places thinking about “abandon” and hedonism in a way that certainly we’ve experienced time and time again. I also thought a lot about Lydia Lunch in the 80s in New York. She was a woman who had no boundaries and was very sexually free. And sort of revolutionized music with all of that chaos and destruction of rules and boundaries and limitations. So many people in New York City were doing the same thing, really trying to breakdown these social ideals and be creative in a different way. It came through the funnel of chaos and destruction.

What do you find liberating about playing a character with so few limits?
For 18 hours a day, you’d have to be completely free. It was a joy to go to work. Run around in evening dresses. Causing mischief. I went to Montréal to do this dark series called Durham County—it’s about a woman who’s in the middle of all this loss. It’s about trauma and dead children. Sorrow and pain. And then I popped into In Treatment before stepping into True Blood. I don’t take my characters home with me. It was nice to shake it off and get dirty and dance a little.

We initially saw Maryann only briefly at the end of the first season. But then her influence continued to expand. Now she’s at the very center of the series. When you signed on, did you realize you’d assume such a critical role in the soap?
It was a little mysterious, that first season. But because it’s Alan and his wonderful writers, you just have massive trust. She still is a bit of a mystery to me. But in that second season—all of us were anxious about the next script. We had a few chats about what a maenad is and Dionysus and Greek mythology. I was told a lot of things that came into play. So you keep that knowledge in your heart but you kind of don’t know how that is going to play out. And it was really amazing because at the end of the season, all the storylines come together.



In the past you said that the character’s barbaric nature isn’t necessarily due to any evil predisposition, but because she lives in a different moral construct than us. Having seen how brutal she can be, do you still maintain that?
I do believe that she’s a character that’s all about perspective. If you think that this is an immortal being. She’s been around since the beginning of time. She’s lived in certain periods of our humanity, where there were people who would sit and watch other men tear each other apart for sport. Children were sacrificed. It’s not unheard of in history. In her mind, she’s seen it all. I think what’s great about the storyline is that it challenges our belief system. You and I can sit here in 2009 and say it’s outrageous that someone would sacrifice humans. My belief system, as a vegetarian, can’t believe that animals are being sacrificed. I stand by that in Maryann’s mind, there’s nothing malevolent. She has a different way of looking at the world.

And what are we to make of her relationship with Tara—why is she so intent on breaking Tara up from her mother?
This entire town for her is just a town full of crazies. It’s ripe for Maryann’s mischief. Everyone is so fragmented in such a wonderful and quirky way. Tara, as we see in the first season, is so susceptible to someone as predatory as Maryann. She’s the conduit to everyone in town, to Sam and Sookie. She’s had such a hard life and is so vulnerable and lost that when Maryann finds her, she’s an easy target. And it’s exactly why she targets her.

What surprises you the most about Maryann?
It’s the most fun I’ve ever had at work. I usually take part in more slit-your-wrists TV than True Blood. To go to work and run around in evening dresses and giggle and laugh and do all these insane things the writers ask us to do. It was a blast. You always look forward to going to work. I just went in and did some post-production for the finale—it was wonderful. It was so good to step back into her shoes again. And experience that glee and that freedom. It was a good feeling—to put those earrings and eyelashes back on. We had an amazing time this season.

Apparently, the appearance of Sophie-Anne—the vampire queen of Louisiana—is going to factor largely into Maryann’s undoing. Can you explain anything further?
In the last three episodes, Bon Temps has been turned upside-down. Now it’s just a matter of getting to the bottom of it and cleaning it up.

On another note, I was advised to avoid anything you cooked. Mostly because of Maryann’s Hunter’s Soufflé. How good are your cooking skills off-screen?
Absolutely deplorable. In fact, I had to go in and have a flambé lesson and cook that heart—a 5am. flambé lesson. My cooking skills are not to be discussed. I suggested to our writers to have a bad public access show with Carl and Maryann. Like Martha Stewart on crack—we would make doilies and scarves and headdresses with feathers. I love that duality of Maryann—that primal, feral wild-child side of her. Then this other side. That’s domestic and loves arranging flowers and fruit and the spread of food. And loves to dig in the dirt.



Off-camera, which character do you relate to the most?
I’m also a fan of the show. The storylines were so separate for most of us that we had such gifted actors and such gifted writers. I couldn’t wait to see what everyone else had done. I wanted to finish shooting—and see what the boys were doing. I’m critical. It’s also you stand back and objectively look at everyone’s work. I’m amazed by that. The production work and the costume designers. I’m lucky in the fact and see the entire production as a company and not be a narcissist. And see that the whole thing is working together. It’s so heightened sometimes and occasionally over-the-top. Everybody had these massive challenges on paper shouldn’t work but work beautifully—with scoring. I become a small portion.

What I know is that my favorite character changes by the theme. One minute Hoyt is my favorite; the next scene, it’s Hoyt’s mother. Then Lafayette. Then Andy Bellefleur. Then Jason—I can’t wait to see what he’s going to do next. I can’t really remember another show where I felt like that, where I’m fascinated by everyone and I get gooey. As far as identifying, maybe Tara, when I had a chip on my shoulder. Maybe Detective Bellefleur, mucking things up—when I’m going through a spell where I can’t get anything right. I identify with Sam Merlotte who’s always trying to do the right thing. I think that’s why so many people are responding to the show you can always find someone to identify with. I love how we saw the darker side of Bill Compton this year. He was wrestling with his past and his humanity. He’s going to be here for a long time figuring it out. I identified with him where we’re always trying to reconcile the past. And have a better future. We all want to be Sookie, getting up to all sorts of hijinks, being followed by all these gorgeous guys. On some level, I identify with all of them. Or want to be them.

That said, have you ever lobbied to have Maryann’s character end up romantically involved with any of the show’s leading men?
I will just say this. In the finale, I have one of the most interesting love scenes I have ever done. I still giggle about it.

What do you think about this disturbing character is making an impression on audiences?
I think it’s because we’re in a time right now that’s repressed—coming out of the last eight years of this administration. Christianity sort of ruling where we are and who we are and we’re coming out of it in a different way. It’ll be interesting to see where we end up in another five years.

What type of work does an actress seek after such a superlative role like Maryann Forrester?
It’s hard to find anywhere as fun as the world about Alan Ball has created. It’s about the town drunk, the shapeshifter-boss. It’s about Tara and her coming of age as a woman and understanding herself. It’s about a telepathic waitress. This entire community. The intelligence behind Alan and our writers, their ability to tell stories so beautifully and complex, will help with True Blood’s longevity.
Source: BlackBook.com

Ambiguous Fluidity

And so, yet another episode last night. Through Scratches, True Blood began to really warm up to me. Except, there wasn't enough of Maryann. This time around, I began loving it since Maryann went off into the darkness. It took me a second viewing because a spoiler proclaimed : " You will no longer be in doubt as to who the horned creature is". And then I saw it...them...claws.It was a very subtle reveal, one which I wasn't expecting from the series. I had been watching the attack scene on Sookie many times and I was almost sure who the outline belonged to, but not the movement. And could television be capable of making a 'bull-man' and a woman the same person?

Below is Part 2 of the in-depth interview by TVGuide:

Sunday's revealing episode of True Blood confirmed for us that the bull-headed monster who is stalking Bon Temps' ladies and Maryann are one and the same! How does the very pleasant Michelle Forbes reconcile her sunny portrayal of Maryann, "that Ibiza party girl," with the clawed she-beast who ripped out Miss Jeannette's heart? "Maryann lives in a different moral construct than the rest of us," she says, emphasizing that Maryann doesn't think of herself as a villain. Earlier, Forbes hinted that True Blood might look like Animal Farm by the season's end. Here, she talks about becoming the monster, why Maryann does what she does and, gulp, bestiality?

TVGuide.com: All right, level with us: What is Maryann really?
Forbes: I am maenad. [Wikipedia has a quick primer on what a maenad is.]

TVGuide.com: Is that really you under all those prosthetics?
Forbes: It is!

TVGuide.com: What kind of process did you have to go through to get into all that?
Forbes: Maryann, and what she turns into, was really created as we went along. They knew about the prosthetics for the claws, but it became something more as we went along. Some of the sounds the creature made were developed in post-production. But the claws just made everything come together, without a doubt.

TVGuide.com: How long did it take to get into all that?
Forbes: It really only takes an hour and a half, but it's very uncomfortable for the rest of the evening. You can't text; you can't make phone calls. People have to feed you sandwiches.

TVGuide.com: And there's a big headpiece. Is that removable?
Forbes: Yes, that's removable, but the claws aren't. You're buttoned into those.

TVGuide.com: Did you have any inspiration for the gait or how the creature moves?
Forbes: Maryann's movements are really important. I wanted there to be a hint of... not masculinity, but I wanted it to be ambiguous and asexual because Maryann is so sexual and so feminine. I wanted it to be totally different than the very fluid way in which Maryann moves, with her long hair and long dresses.

TVGuide.com: So if her goal is pleasure or ecstasy, why is she also violent?
Forbes: Maryann lives in a different moral construct than the rest of us. Tenderness, violence — they're the same to her. The more that somebody is feeling alive and in their adrenaline and feeding that appetite for what we're not supposed to do, the more that they're in what she considers purity. That is her life blood; that is her excitement.

All those things that people hold themselves back from — food, sex, booze, drugs — she wants to push people into their vices, their purity, their ecstasy. That's what she considers happiness. It's not a nefarious or villainous thing in her mind. She wants everyone to feel the same glory and joy that she feels. She wants everyone to join the party.

TVGuide.com: In one scene, we see that Maryann can vibrate and will Sam to shape-shift. So why, in the flashback scene, does she vibrate when they're having sex? Was she trying to have sex with a dog?
Forbes: That is a season-revealer, so I can't say anything. That's a really important scene; people will be going back to that scene when they see the entire season.

As far as Wikipedia goes, you better ignore it if you haven't done so already. The name Maenad demands a new definition, if it even must be defined. And the way Michelle says - I am Maenad - not 'a' follower of someone. She is her own leader...She is a God/dess.

Maryann' s Creativity of Destruction and Mutual Energy

The first part of the highly anticipated TVGuide interview with Michelle Forbes is finally here.

Michelle Forbes likes that her True Blood character, Maryann Forrester, is such an enigma. It reminds her of how she got the acting gig. "I was told a lot, yet very little, and that is the riddle of Maryann," she says, quixotically. "I was so lost initially." Join the club. You may have heard that Maryann is a maenad, and that's technically accurate — but it's certainly not the whole story. Forbes was gracious enough to help us understand Maryann's maybe-not-so-evil-after-all ways in this two-part interview. (After you watch Sunday's episode, come back Monday morning for the juicy bits of Part 2.)

TVGuide.com: When I heard Alan Ball was going to be doing a vampire show, I thought: Oh, no! I'm not generally a fan of goth or genre-type stuff.
Michelle Forbes: That's what's so fascinating about [True Blood]. For someone who seems to be known for her sci-fi career, I had not thought of vampires for more than five minutes in my entire life. But this show is not about vampires. It's looking at all these different beings — a telepathic waitress, a shape-shifter bar owner, or, you know, Stephen Root's lonely accountant vampire — and it gives such a real face to this world of the supernatural that I always found rather goofy.

TVGuide.com: And the end result is both fun and sophisticated.
Forbes: You have this landscape for social commentary, for questioning injustice, compassion and our pack-mentality thinking allegorically.

TVGuide.com: What did they tell you in advance about Maryann?
Forbes: There were discussions about Greek mythology, and yet you open a script and you're dancing to the B-52's. It was a little hard trying to understand how the two mesh together, but with these writers and [series creator Alan Ball], the trust factor is massive. Everything became evident the more I sat still.

TVGuide.com: What exactly did you talk about?
Forbes: We talked about Bacchus and Dionysus; what a maenad is, how they're led by appetite, how they thrive off other peoples' appetites, chaos and destruction. But, you know, that was the diving board, but it wasn't the pool.

TVGuide.com: So then how did you make Maryann contemporary?
Forbes: I watched a lot of Ken Russell films. I thought a lot about New York in the '80s, [avant-garde punk singer] Lydia Lunch, when there was just freedom and excess and people were just knocking down walls, and there was chaos and destruction. On the Lower East Side, there were rats running through the street and people loved it! Stepping over bodies to walk home! The burning trash cans. There was just this creativity.

TVGuide.com: What do you like about playing her?
Forbes: I tend to play a lot of tortured people, so it has been liberating playing Maryann. There is a sense of contentment that was, to be honest, initially horrifying and frightening to me. She's not afraid of anything, and not in that clichéd way, she's truly just OK. She's not afraid. She can eat what she likes, she can have sex with whom she likes, she can play with whom she likes. She can dress in beautiful clothes. She has everything at her fingertips. There's nothing she doesn't need.

TVGuide.com: Speaking of the clothes, did the wardrobe help you find her?
Forbes: Yes. She is that Ibiza party girl. She's the girl who never left the party, but it hasn't hurt her. Those people are usually quite tragic, but she's not. She doesn't give one blink as to what people think of her. She's free of all those constraints.

TVGuide.com: What exactly is happening when Maryann vibrates?
Forbes: The vibrations are very integral to who she is. She thrives off the energy of the people around her. When they are in a place of ecstasy, that feeds her. Her appetite is fed off the appetite of others.

TVGuide.com: But isn't she also creating their behavior?
Forbes: It's a mutual energy flow, if you will. She sets it in motion and then she receives the energy from it.

TVGuide.com: Are those vibration scenes really weird to film?
Forbes: You do feel a little nutty. There's some green screen; it depends because it happens in different ways at different times. It's a bit technical at times and you have to brace yourself for the fact that you're standing there shaking in front of the crew.

Full Interview

Durham County - Confusion and Pain

Michelle Forbes in a recent interview about Durham County:

"This is a woman who is not only living in intense fear all the time but she is constantly recycling her failures like a mantra in her head," said Forbes, describing Pen as a "dream" role that's affected her deeply.

"When she goes into her manic episodes and into her delusional episodes, it was challenging in a beautiful way, because that's what you're looking for as an actor - to go as deep as possible and to plumb the depths of the thing that a lot of times we want to avoid as human beings."

Season two focuses on women and "how rage and confusion and pain and trauma manifests in us, which is usually through self-harm, initially."

On the creative team Laurie Finstad-Knizhnik, Janis Lundman and Adrienne Mitchell:

"I've never seen a full-on female creative team like this," Forbes said. "It's still a very male-driven industry and that was really wonderful working with these women - these very interesting, thoughtful, passionate, dark, eccentric women on 'Durham County.' "

I've seen the first episode. Breathtaking. You witness an intense inner turmoil, the gradual disintegration of a human soul. It's got a quality that I've only seen on the best British Crime dramas, like Prime Suspect, Messiah or Touching Evil.

Durham County is the very antithesis of True Blood in how the portrayal of violence is handled. Sinister, gritty, disturbing, truthful and appallingly real. Here, violence is not fun and doesn't entertain, and it certainly doesn't 'hurt so good'. Adrienne Mitchell in an interview about the first season of DC:

“Wir konzipierten ‘Durham County – Im Rausch der Gewalt’ bewusst als Gegenentwurf zu Formaten, in denen Gewalt als Selbstzweck vorkommt, in denen sie unsensibel eingesetzt wird, als wäre sie etwas ganz Alltägliches. Unsere Serie erlaubt es den Zuschauern nicht, die dargestellte Gewalt als harmlos abzutun oder sie als Unterhaltung wahrzunehmen. Dazu sind die Protagonisten zu komplex und dienen als Identifikationsfiguren, mit denen man mitfiebern kann, deren Lebensalltag nachvollziehbar ist.”

(DC was an intentional counter-draft to formats where violence is presented as an end in itself , insensitively and as if it was an average everyday occurrence. DC doesn't allow the viewer to perceive violence as harmless or entertaining.)

The six-part second season of Durham County debuts Monday, July 13 on The Movie Network and Movie Central.

A Truthful Way

Since a few days the first episode of Durham County's second season is available as a free online preview at moviecentral.ca, unfortunately access is restricted to Canadian viewers, or to rephrase it technically, restricted to people with Canadian IP addresses. So, use your imagination if you can't wait until July 13th.
I couldn't wait and watched the streaming version. You can read my personal, unfiltered first reaction as a comment to the latest Durham County post here on the blog.

In a new interview Michelle Forbes talks briefly about DC and playing complex characters:

There are not a lot of parts out there for smart actresses, the kind who like their characters complex, challenging, and even dislikeable. Movies today, at least the sort made with real money, relegate most actresses to the “girlfriend part.” Likewise, the current slew of much-vaunted serial dramas produced for cable television are, with a few exceptions, primarily about complex, challenging, and dislikeable men.

Thank the goddess for Michelle Forbes – the closest thing to a true femme fatale to slink across the screen in years. Tall, handsome (yes, women can be handsome – it's an attitude) and eerily present, Forbes has brought her brainy acting style to many of the most critically acclaimed and popular television shows of the last decade – including Battlestar Galactica , Prison Break , In Treatment , Homicide , 24 and True Blood (wherein she plays a mysterious, demonic entity).

Forbes's latest role, Durham County 's compromised, compromising (and possibly murderous) shrink Dr. Pen Verrity, allows Forbes to be both evil and sympathetic, arch, unscrupulous and yet wholly believable.

What more could an actress want?

You're the new kid on Durham County. Any interesting hazing rituals?

I think walking into Laurie Finstad Knizhnik's [ Durham County 's writer] brain alone was enough. She's a pretty fascinating, interesting, dark woman.

Did you do any research into forensic psychiatry before you took on the part of Dr. Verrity?

Actually, because of some of the work I've done in the past, I was fairly familiar with it. I did a series about 10 years ago, called Wonderland , for ABC, that was set in Bellevue Hospital in New York, and I played the psychiatrist heading the emergency room. So, for quite a while I hung out with forensic psychiatrists, and spent a lot of time speaking to their patients. I once spoke to a man who killed his children ... so I had a fairly large grasp of that world.
[...]
What was interesting for me about Durham County was to look at a crime drama, a character study about violence and how it affects people, coming out of Canada. As you know, you're often perceived as being quiet pacifists who've got a lot of things figured out that the rest of us can't seem to figure out, and we never think of violence perpetrating your society the way it does others. But of course, it does. Violence is everywhere. Violence is a global issue.

Durham County is very much a show about men – it's full of tough guys, murderous guys, angry guys, dissolute guys. How do you create a space for yourself in such a male anxiety-driven show?

Because the writer has really explored the rage and violence within women – which we usually don't want to look at, or we'll look at in a cliché way, we'll look at it in a shallow way, but we won't look at it in a truthful way – I think the show's an extraordinary study of how violence affects women on a silent level, and how violence is usually turned inward by women, to a place of self-harm.

I agree, but I'm just wondering how you manage all that on-set testosterone.

God, it's rare that I'm not. If you think of Homicide, that was a set filled with testosterone. True Blood 's got a lot of testosterone on set. And Battlestar really had a lot of testosterone. I tend to fit in and just be one of the boys.

Are you drawn to creepy, repellent characters?

I don't know that I'm drawn to them, I guess I'm just drawn to the most complicated characters I can find. There are plenty of clichéd roles out there. I'm always looking for something that will fill up every part of me and use every cell of me.

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A Sense of Style

If you're impatient in waiting for the new episode of True Blood, pass some quality time at listening to two conversations with Michelle. While the first chat in April centered on In Treatment, her being too honest in Interviews and her "first gig on a bloody soap opera", in this second installment, Judith Klassen from Movie Entertainment magazine talked to Michelle Forbes about Canada, her intense experience working on the thriller Durham County and with the writer Laurie Finstad Knizhnik, and the fun of making "Vampire Porn".

You can find both podcasts with Michelle at movieentertainment.ca

Michelle Forbes Juggles Three TV Shows and Entrances

In a recent interview, Michelle Forbes sat down with IESB.net to open up about settling in with the very rewarding cast of True Blood, acting, her work with HBO (on True Blood, and In Treatment), and her intense experience in the role of Penelope Verrity in the upcoming second season of Durham County.

IESB: When and how did you know that you wanted to be an actor?

Michelle: As the story goes, I started off as a ballet dancer. I knew, pretty early on, that I needed another form of expression, and it just seemed that acting, and this idea of playing pretend and telling stories, was really fascinating to me. It was a natural progression, out of the dance world and into the world of theater and cinema.

IESB: For those who might not be familiar with the show yet, who is Maryann and how does she fit into the story?

Michelle: What I’ve been saying about Maryann is that she’s very mysterious and she likes her mischief. She has got quite an agenda, in this town, and she is going to have one hell of a time when it comes to light. She’s a wacky one. It’s been total fun to play.

IESB: What can viewers expect from Season 2, for your character?

Michelle: It’s so difficult to talk about this show without giving anything away. But, what I can say is that Maryann likes to have a lot of parties. She likes for there to be a lot of food around. She has a very strange entourage with her, at all times. She lures Tara into her world, but she’s just fascinated by everyone in Bon Temps and she wants to leave her footprints all over that town.

ESB: What was it about Maryann that you found so appealing? How can you relate to her?

Michelle: I don’t know that I can relate to Maryann, but I’m sure other people will. What I found so fascinating about her is that she’s completely liberated from everything. She has no sorrow, no guilt and no remorse. She doesn’t live with the same rules that we live with. Oddly, that was intimidating, at first. We always say that we want to be happy, free and content, and live with no rules, but when we’re given that, it’s terrifying because we tend to operate better with structure and guidelines. So, initially she was a bit frightening, but I didn’t realize what a gift she was until about half-way through the season. I had just finished doing this series in Canada, called Durham County, that was all about sorrow, remorse, guilt, regret, dead children and all sorts of light, fun things. You think you’re fine, but you don’t realize that you’re not fine until you’re back in the world, and I think if I had to go into another tortured role, I probably would have killed myself. So, playing Maryann, and experiencing her sense of fun, mischief and play, has been a lot of well-needed fun.

IESB: Now that you’ve been doing the show for awhile, do you feel like you have more of an understanding for why people are so intrigued by this genre?

Michelle: My theory is that we’re in a big national depression, with the economy and people being out of work. We have the hope of a new administration, but we don’t know what’s going to happen yet and we’re exhausted from worrying, and I think that it’s just a good bit of fun. It’s escapist, and it’s fun for smart people. Alan still asks questions about family and love, the pack mentality thinking, and how susceptible we are to judgement and having our minds changed about things we don’t understand. And, he’s able to explore these themes, but it never gets too heavy. There’s always a pratfall right behind it, or a really gross sex scene, or something that will shift the tone. There’s something to appeal to everyone, with this show. A lot of men watch this show, and they wouldn’t normally.

IESB: Can you talk about juggling True Blood, Durham County and In Treatment? How do those schedules all work out?

Michelle: I love to work. There’s an adventure that comes with every job, and you can never have too much adventure in your life. I have been busy this last year. I did the last couple of episodes on the first season of True Blood, and then I was on a plane to Montreal to do the Canadian series Durham County, which was very beautiful and I’m so pleased that I got to be a part of it. There was a possibility that I wasn’t going to be able to do it because of HBO. I was in Montreal for three months, and then I was in New York for a fitting for In Treatment, two days after I finished Durham County, and was just running on adrenalin from that job. I did a couple episodes of In Treatment, was in bed sick for the holidays, and then started on True Blood in January.

It’s wonderful. I’ll never complain about having too much work, but all three characters were so different and I’ve been living my own little repertory theater for over a year, jumping in and out of these different characters. It’s been a joy because they’ve all been such wonderful writers. Laurie Finstad-Knizknik, who wrote Durham County, is just such a brilliant woman. To jump from her pad and pencil over to Alan’s pad and pencil has just been a real joy.

IESB: Did it help that the characters were all so different?

Michelle: It really helped that they’re so different because they all helped me to shed the last one. This woman that I played on Durham County, Pen Verrity, held a lot of sadness and sorrow, and I didn’t realize how much I was carrying around with me. Maryann helped me to shed Pen, the more I became immersed in her. I think Pen would have stayed with me a lot longer, had I not been able to jump into Maryann right after.

IESB: Are there types of roles or specific genres that you’re still looking to do, that you haven’t gotten the chance to do yet?

Michelle: I want to do a period piece because I’ve never done one. I’ve always said that I just wanted to do one of everything. I got the Western out of the way. But, I have wanted to do one of every genre. I did the American cop drama, I did the British cop drama, and now, I’ve done the Canadian cop drama. I just always want new and different. I never know what I want, but I usually know what I don’t want, and what I don’t want is what I’ve already done before. I’m always just waiting to see what else is out there, to see what new adventure is going to be had.