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 "Syringes, Christopher Durang and Poetic Villains, Oh
My! - Part 2"
07/15/2000
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Jeff Ricketts has had quite a year starring as Weatherby (a Watcher's Council Member) on Buffy and Angel as well as guest appearances on Charmed and the Huntress.
What's the hardest part of being an actor?
"Not doing it is the hardest part, not doing it. It is a transformation of everything about you so when you're not doing it, it's really easy to feel that you will never be able to become another thing (someone else) again. What's fun about doing theses
t.v. shows is that it's more of a "quick" mentality. You get the script and you do it. With Buffy in particular, I would get the script the night before. I was nervous playing a Cockney, so the pressure was on," said Jeff who started his acting career in New York City.
What were your auditions like?
"I had one audition for Buffy. I read for the head honchos- Joss, Fran, Kaz and David. The speech I read wasn't even in an episode." I tried to imagine how nerve-wracking this must have been. "It's a very tiny room. I was terrified, but not so much so that they didn't cast me."
"On Charmed, I went to read for Black (one of the Four Horsemen of the
Apocalypse), which represents Death. I was cast as Yellow, which represents Famine. When you go on an audition, you're just not auditioning for that part but everything else too. Sometimes you try to stuff yourself into this character or that character, but smart producers, like those on
Buffy, will pick up on an actor's essence and do something with it. In
t.v., they try to tailor things to your essence."
Tell me about your character on Buffy and Angel.
"I'm Weatherby, one of three Watcher's Council members which includes
Collins and Smith. Weatherby's a zealot. Angel's a vampire to me I don't care whether he's good or bad. I was trained to kill vampires. Faith is even worse than Angel because she's perverted (what the Watcher's Council believes in)."
What does your character think of Buffy?
"I respect her from a distance. I'm quick tempered and quick to judge. But I think she's honorably stayed within the bounds of the Watcher's Council. I really like my job (as a Watcher) in terms of cleaning up these messes."
Did you enjoy working on Charmed as one of the Four Horseman of the
Apocalypse?
"I had a ball! That was a real gas because one of the other actors was
Geoffrey Blake who plays Strife. He was such a mensch and fun actor. The
tone on the set was very playful. Great fun to work on it."
In my previous column, I covered some of Jeff's outrageous experimental
theatre work in New York. I am amazed how he can play something as nebulous as "Famine" in Charmed.
"It's hard to find actors in L.A. who can step into some of these arch
characters from mythology," said Jeff while pondering the challenging acting assignments he had in New York.
Any fun on the set stories you can share with us regarding working on Buffy, Angel or Charmed?
"With regard to Charmed, when the Horsemen are in the field discussing what to do about the fact that a witch saw them… whenever they would do a close-up of me, the frogs in the area would start croaking loud, so they couldn't get the take. My voice was too loud, and I'd disturbed the frogs so they'd start croaking. I had to ADR (do automatic dialogue replacement in a studio) everything," laughed Jeff
What was the Huntress like?
"It was a blast. It was great fun because normally when you're a guest star, the make up and hair people are more concerned with the stars than
necessarily with the guest stars. With this show, it's a new show, and the make up artist was so brilliant. He had just come from doing Nash Bridges for many years, so he's creating the look of the show."
"I was playing a prison inmate having a philosophical discussion with other prisoners about
O.J. Simpson's attempt at a getaway. The make up artist spent nearly an hour doing scars and really making it look like I was someone who was in a few scuffles. I got lots of coverage from the camera as a result. Adam Nimoy (Leonard Nimoy's son who directed the episode) was fun to work with. He had the expertise of a cameraman and knew how to dialogue with the actors very intelligently."
What are some of your favorite t.v. shows?
"I like big suspense law shows: Law and Order and the Practice. My wife
turned me onto reruns of Columbo. I'm one for the format. I like shows with the format. When they stray from it, I'm disappointed, except for Ally McBeal which plays with format consciously all the time and brilliantly."
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- by Ariel Penn
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