Finn Wittrock On Ryan Murphy: "As Soon As You’ve Nailed One Thing, He Throws You Something That Stretches You" | Meet Your Nominee - video Dailymotion

Hollywood Journal

Wittock is nominated for outstanding supporting actor in a limited series for 'The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story.'

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00:00Hi, welcome to Meet Your Nominee.

00:02I'm Mariah Gullow from The Hollywood Reporter,

00:03and I have with me today Finn Widrock.

00:06Hi, Finn.

00:06Hi.

00:07How are you?

00:08Great.

00:08How are you?

00:08Good.

00:09You are nominated for Outstanding Supporting Actor

00:12in a Limited Series for The Assassination

00:15of Gianni Versace, American Crime Story.

00:18Congratulations.

00:18Thank you so much.

00:19How does it feel to be nominated?

00:21It's a real honor and a wonderful surprise.

00:26Yes.

00:27Yeah.

00:27I really wasn't expecting it, and it came my way.

00:29It was a drop from the heavens.

00:32American Crime Story has 18 nominations.

00:34I know.

00:35It's amazing.

00:36So many of your other actors are nominated.

00:39I know.

00:39Are you excited to have the nominees?

00:40I feel like half my competition is from the show.

00:43It is, absolutely.

00:44I'll be so happy whoever wins.

00:46Yeah, absolutely.

00:48Are you excited for any of the other nominees for Emmy Night?

00:51Oh, yeah.

00:52I mean, everyone.

00:53I think, I mean, obviously for Darren Criss.

00:55I think seeing him kind of up close and personal digging into that character was really a cool

01:03experience, you know?

01:04And really a great, he was so great to work with and play with, and he kept things very

01:10light off camera so that I think he could sort of go to the darkness on camera, you know?

01:15Yeah, he had a technique.

01:16It's cool to be in that process.

01:17He had a technique where he had to go kind of switch out of that.

01:20I actually have heard from a lot of people that when they are doing the more darker dramatic

01:27performances, they need to keep it light on set.

01:29Yeah.

01:30Yeah, because otherwise you kind of lose yourself and also you don't want it to ever be morose

01:34and you don't want it to, you don't want to fall into playing the darkness, you know,

01:42like as a habit, you know?

01:43It should be a, because people don't naturally want to be sad or depressed or angry.

01:50They try to not be and, you know, keep getting sucked down the vortex.

01:55Yeah.

01:56You can get, if you're getting into your character, you can get sucked down the vortex.

01:59Yeah, yeah, easily.

02:00Yeah.

02:01Especially with material like this, which was, you know, heavy and real and, yeah, intense.

02:08Yeah.

02:09Tell me a little bit about working with Darren when you had your scenes together.

02:13Your scenes were intense.

02:14You had some more intense scenes than that, which we will get to.

02:18Yeah.

02:19But the scenes with Darren, like how was it to, you know, how was that exchange with him?

02:25Every take was sort of different.

02:26It was very playful in a way of like, we don't quite know what it is.

02:31We're going to figure it out together.

02:33And I think he, you know, he's a very, he comes from music and theater and I come from

02:40the theater and I think that that kind of loving the process of like finding it together

02:46was sort of mutually beneficial for us.

02:49Many days where I was covered in this crazy prosthetic makeup of him having bashed my head

02:57in with a hammer.

02:58I mean, that's a spoiler, but that happens.

03:01Yeah.

03:02And so I was like, my whole, I could only see out of one eye and it was like this big

03:07rig that they put over me to be like, you know, mangled, tortured flesh.

03:13And when they rolled me up in a rug, that was really me.

03:16I really, I really, they had a dummy, but they rarely used the dummy.

03:21They were like, Finn, don't worry.

03:22We're going to use the dummy.

03:23And then I was so good at being dead.

03:26I mean, they just kept the cameras rolling, you know?

03:30Yeah.

03:31Really rolled me up in that thing and dragged me behind the couch.

03:34So, yeah, you know, he's, he's also did that.

03:38Let's talk a little bit about your character, Jeff Trail.

03:42When did you know that he was more than just a victim of a killing spree, that you were getting

03:48a role that was, you know, pretty interesting and complicated?

03:53Yeah, well, I mean, I think I read the first four scripts first.

03:58And I basically die at the very end of the fourth one.

04:03And I assumed that that wasn't going to be the very, like, the last thing I did.

04:07Since, since it's aired, friends have called me and been like, that, that's it?

04:11I mean, you were filming that thing for so long.

04:13And you just like had a scene and then you died.

04:15It was like, no, I promise there's more.

04:18That's what Ryan Murphy does very well, is he kind of, he kind of hooks you in and then

04:22he's like, don't worry, I promise there's more.

04:24And then you're kind of, like, waiting on pins and needles for the next script.

04:27And then the next script, like, really did not disappoint, you know?

04:30It really, uh, fleshed him out and opened him up and, and, um, I think the show just

04:35kind of worked in an interesting trajectory where, you know, kind of, kind of worked backwards

04:40following, uh, Andrew and Versace as sort of the parallel lines.

04:45But then kind of went off into these different tree branches of different storylines.

04:50Um, and Jeff's storyline I think was, I think for Ryan Murphy, like, was a bit personal.

04:56Cause it is sort of about a, a guy who was, he was very patriotic.

05:00Like, he believed in the American dream, he wanted to, um, he wanted to be in the military

05:06and, like, serve his country and I think he was actually, like, kind of, uh, leaned a bit right

05:11in his, like, in his belief system, you know?

05:14He just had this secret that he kind of couldn't tell anyone and it kept eating him up

05:20and he finally had to come out and reveal it.

05:23And he did, like, um, in the show there's, that reenactment of the CBS interview that he gives

05:30where he's, like, in the blackness, you know, you can't see his face.

05:33That's almost verbatim what really happened and he really did that.

05:37And it was a huge risk that he took coming out like that.

05:41Uh, well, not coming out, but coming out and saying that don't ask, go and tell was wrong.

05:45Right.

05:46It was, like, always a lot of good stuff to chew on as an actor.

05:50Uh, and an interesting history to learn about, you know?

05:53I mean, we didn't know, sort of knew the bare bones of the Versace thing.

05:56Like, the guy, a guy killed him.

05:58People were like, was it the mafia, you know?

06:00Mm-hmm.

06:01And then, uh, Marine Worth has this great novel about it

06:04and that was sort of what the scripts were about

06:06and we just learned a lot.

06:08Yeah.

06:09Yeah.

06:10What, why is it important that we, uh,

06:12that we see Jeff go through what he does in the military?

06:16Like, why is it important to see how, um, gay men are mistreated in this series?

06:22Um, it happens a lot.

06:24Yeah.

06:25You see a lot of the different aspects of how gay men are mistreated.

06:28His storyline's specifically interesting because I think there was a sort of

06:32underlying thing as the police were investigating, like,

06:35oh, this is a gay murder, you know?

06:37Mm-hmm.

06:38And not that they didn't work hard or, like, but it was sort of, like,

06:43you know, that was their excuse.

06:45It was like, well, it's the, it's a, it's a gay thing.

06:47They got, like, they pet whips and chains and someone died, you know?

06:50Like, but when you have a guy who was in the, in the Navy

06:54and was an upstanding citizen and, um, could have been a cop, you know,

06:58could have been one of those guys and he's gay and he's saying,

07:03this is wrong, what's happening, uh, he, he breaks the mold, I think,

07:07of what they thought homosexuality was in the 90s, you know?

07:12Yeah.

07:13And it also shows that Andrew was in, he had his hands in lots of

07:16different pies.

07:17Like, he was, like, such a social, uh, pariah.

07:22He was, like, into so many different worlds.

07:24Like, Lee Miglin, this famous architect in Chicago, he, that was

07:28the second, third victim.

07:30And then he, there's also a random truck driver who's dead.

07:33Like, it's, it's this crazy web of following his path, um, that

07:38continues to kind of go in unexpected ways.

07:41Yeah.

07:42Yeah.

07:43Do you see any hopeful dialogue that can come out of American Crime Story?

07:47Uh, have you gotten any positive feedback from people or, or people

07:51coming to you with their own stories?

07:53What's funny, I, I, I was, when I first read the script, I will say,

07:57this was, like, probably a year ago.

07:59It was, like, last summer.

08:00And I remember reading it and being, like, ah, that Don't Ask, Don't Tell thing,

08:03isn't that a little bit dated?

08:05I mean, we're kind of past that.

08:07That was, like, a thought that went through my head.

08:09And then it was, like, a few weeks later, we found out about the

08:12transgender military ban.

08:14And it was, like, whoa, this is not over, you know?

08:18Like, this is, this is gonna be really relevant because this is a story that

08:22is, like, like, inches away from what's happening right now, you know?

08:27Um, so that, that made it very current for me.

08:30I have been approached by lots of, like, uh, like successful, but very successful

08:37gay men who lived through, like, this period and were closeted for a time in their life.

08:43And were, I think, really, really moved by that storyline.

08:47That it, it painted it in a, in a fair way, I think.

08:51Like, this sort of, uh, society not letting you be who you are,

08:57but also this sort of self-disgust and self-hate that went along with that.

09:02Um, you know, at one point I'm, like, trying to end it all, you know?

09:08And then give that up.

09:09And, like, I think that that was, there was a kernel of truth in that,

09:13that people were seeing about their own lives.

09:16Um, which has been very validating, for sure.

09:19Yeah.

09:20Um, so being part of the, my, uh, Ryan Murphy creative crew,

09:25um, what is that like?

09:27Are you, are you enjoying your time as part of an ensemble cast?

09:31The best family to be a part of.

09:33Yeah.

09:34Ryan, I think, is incredibly good at, uh, continuing to challenge you, you know?

09:39Well, the first thing I did with him, I was, like, dying of AIDS on a plane.

09:44And then, uh, and then he threw me this part of this crazy psychopath rich kid.

09:49And then he threw me this part of, uh, like, a coke snorting, uh, model who was in love with the actress played by Lady Gaga.

10:01You know, like, it's like, uh, as soon as you kind of think you've nailed one thing,

10:06he throws you something that stretches you in a whole different crazy way.

10:10Um, and that's what, that's, I think also what keeps great actors coming to him, you know?

10:15Mm-hmm.

10:16Because, uh, he, he, he knows how to, like, work your muscles.

10:20Yeah.

10:21As it were.

10:22Your acting muscles.

10:23And it's also a great, I mean, I've, you find yourself on set with lots of people that you know,

10:27even lots of crew that you know and have worked with because he's kept such a tight, cool family together.

10:34So, yeah, I'm very thankful.

10:35Thanks.

10:36Thanks, Ryan.

10:37Uh, one last question before I let you go.

10:40Is there anybody you'd like to dance with at the after parties at the Emmy?

10:43Oh, man.

10:45Penelope?

10:46Is that out there?

10:47I didn't really get to do much with her, you know?

10:49Mm-hmm.

10:50Uh, I think maybe Elizabeth Moss, too, we could, like, get down, maybe.

10:55She's cool.

10:56That'd be great.

10:57That'd be great.

10:58I think you all have something to celebrate soon enough.

11:00Knock on wood.

11:01Yeah.

11:02Uh, thank you for being here, Finn.

11:04The Assassination of Gianni Versace, American Crime Story on FX.

Finn Wittrock On Ryan Murphy: "As Soon As You’ve Nailed One Thing, He Throws You Something That Stretches You" | Meet Your Nominee

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