Dylan Bruce

Part 1

0:05Snoopy Doggy Dogg. That's me. How you doing? This is going to be fun. Let's do it. Let me know. Do we have a yellow shirt with black stripes on it? Oh, I should do. You know what? I should do that for every guest this weekend. You should. Yeah, you should. And we'll credit you. We'll credit you every time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp. So when Ms. Lohan interviewed you, did you give her advice as well? Or am I just the only lucky one? No, I didn't give Ms. Lohan any advice. She was actually a really good interviewer. She was really sweet and very engaging. And I thought she did a good job. I told her afterwards, I think you found a second career in hosting a show because I thought she absolutely nailed it. And she was a really, really sweet girl in person. What was it for? Why would it happen?

0:51It was just to promote, or from black. Yeah. Yeah. So I was there. And she was a fan? Or they sent her? No, she saw the DVDs. And she was a fan of the show. And she actually, God bless her, used her. She thought that it would be a great platform to use her appearance on this show to promote a show that she had a lot of faith in and she really liked. So that was really sweet of her. And I was just blessed to be in town and be able to do it. Switching topics entirely. But not really. Still talking about this show. Yes. Just because I've been asking everyone, the big story in the news, well, in my life was, John Lennon's tooth, a Canadian bought it and wants to clone Lennon now, because you can do that. So no, wait, didn't the Supreme Court come down with a ruling about cloning? No, you definitely know more about cloning.

1:37Well, they can't clone human genomes now, cannot be patented. Excuse me. In Canada? In the United States. I think this is here. Oh, this is here. Yeah, I think it was made in. How much did John Lennon's tooth self? No idea. Probably quite a bit. More than I'll ever see in my life. Wow, that's amazing. But good or bad idea? I think that's a great idea. John Lennon is one of the best musical talents of all time. I mean, the Beatles. God, one of the greatest rock bands of all time that he was the front for. Would the clone be as talented? Given all your cloning expertise? Well, that's a good question. Because the science is really still flawed, right? So it might not pass on. But I don't know. No, I don't think anyone does. It was a very deep question. I don't think you could have fought.

2:23My high school chemistry knowledge can't really help you out here, Snoopy. Sorry. Yeah, it's very hard to ask serious questions for us like an idiot. I realize that's what I like it. I appreciate it. I appreciate it. I've heard you say, and I think you were talking about today, too, about wanting your character to go good next season. But do you think about Paul often? Do you think about where things can go and how you can portray him differently? Always. I always want to stay true to the character. This offseason on our hiatus, I've been training with a Navy SEAL for doing a Navy SEAL inspired workout regime, which is good. Tough mudder. They do do tough mudder. I probably crush tough mudder right now. I've been training really hard for the last three months, and I've been doing a lot of kraa maga. So I'm hoping Paul has a lot more fight scenes next year.

3:09I really do, because I want to actually use the skills that I've been learning while we were on hiatus. But as far as going good, I just don't know. I don't think he's ever really good. He's got such a conflicted background. And sometimes he goes almost to the sociopathic frame of mind. So I think that's a lot of fun to play. More torture scenes, I think, with nail guns would be a lot of fun, too. Yeah. And then throwing a little niceness. So where do you approach a character when you don't really know where he's coming from? You know what? You just have to make your best guess you possibly can. And hopefully you're guessing right. I mean, we get, you know, you have a basic understanding of who this guy is and from season one, right? But I just guess.

3:55And hopefully I don't make too broad of choices. And hopefully I'm just preparing myself the best I can to come in and kick some serious ass. What did you like about him when you got the role, other than it being pilot season and a big show and the fun of all that? The best part about being Paul was the turn in the middle of the season. Episode five where I find out that he's the monitor. And I knew he had like a military background. He's like CIA intelligence, you know, special forces. He was a private contractor. Yada, yada, yada. And I'm actually really interested in what's going on in Afghanistan. And I just got my hand on every single book I can about the war in Afghanistan from the start to now. And I read a lot about Navy SEALs, Delta Force. And I was also my girlfriend.

4:41She's friends with the XCIA operative. So he took me out and taught me how to use some pretty cool guns. And he wouldn't tell me really anything else other than that. But you know, I just like playing a badass. I played doctors. I played lawyers for some reason. I don't know. I guess I have that aristocratic look, even though I grew up in a house where with a lot of a very smart mother and a father that was a mill worker. So I don't know. I don't know where the rich vibe is. Or is emanating from me. But it's fine to play something different than I've never played before, more than anything.

Part 2

0:06I saw her go kill herself. She looked exactly like me. Tell me who are we to each other? How many of us are there? You really have no idea, do you? They're not me. They're not. Who is the original? Who created us? Who's killing us? We're property. Everything we are belongs to them. It's such a spoiler-ific show that it's like you can't say anything. I know. I want... are we rolling it? Because that's how I want to start. I want you to ruin it for me, but I don't want you to ruin it for me at the same time. Exactly, exactly. You must be in such an interesting place with that kind of thing. Yeah, it's weird. It's... It makes it use a little difficult, but at the same time, it makes me stay on my toes because I have to really think about what I'm saying. So I won't prod in that direction. Maybe... Last time we talked, you talked about Navy SEAL training and

0:53Crowd McGone going through all this stuff for the second season. Right, right. So what was that like? I've been doing it even more so this year. I really geared it up because obviously I want to portray this character as realistically as possible. And I think I training with Navy SEALs and going out to the gun range and shooting and doing all that kind of stuff. I think it really lends itself to the character because I want to be as honest as I can in my portrayalism. But it's definitely... I'm freaking sick of it. I'm sick of working out. I want to just go and I want to eat a lot of crispy creams and just do my thing. But yeah, it's season two is gonna be good. It's gonna be good. The one fight scene I remember from last year was you trying to take the gun from Vic in the garage. So with all this training, I'm assuming you're getting more of a physical role this season.

1:39Well, I was hoping for a more physical role. Okay. But as our showrunner and head writer Graham Manson likes to say, he's Paul's more of an art of war kind of guy. Based on the ancient war tactical book, Art of War. Yeah. So he really thinks of him as he wants him more of a thinking man's fighter. Do you like that? I love it. The intellectual side of war and combat really seems to lend itself to this character. But at the same time, I'm like, can I just unleash for a little bit? I just want to do something crazy. Like one of my friends was just shooting a pilot and he was like, yeah, I jumped out of Blackhawk and I had this crazy machine gun and I was taking all these guys out.

2:27And I was like, wow, that sounds like so much fun. But I also get to work on Arrow and I don't play one of those guys that gets to do that. So I get to watch it firsthand. So I'm just itching and I'm like, guys, please just let me do something crazy. Talk about watching. How do you watch the shows? I mean, now it's season two's going to premiere. You know, it's season one. I watched all the episodes in advance. I saw them all. And then I re-watched them. I, you know, as most actors are, they're very super critical of themselves. And it's really hard to watch yourself. But at the same time, it was really fun to watch it with my family and with my girlfriend and see all the different reveals and to see their reactions. But season two, we saw the first episode on lunch before we broke for Christmas. And then after that, I didn't want to see anything.

3:12I just wanted to be surprised as the season folded. So the only things that I've seen are basic little snippets when I'm doing ADR to catch certain lines that they didn't catch correctly throughout the season. So I'm just going to be as surprised as the viewers are as the season progresses to see what made the cut. And I've read all the scripts, but just to see what they've done with it and to see the finality of the finished product is. It's just going to be fun. I'm going to have my Margarita and I'm just going to be enjoying the show as it progresses as everyone else. Margarita is an orphaned wife. Well, that's what I call Margarita Saturdays. Yeah, I make a mean Margarita. Not alcoholic though. No, not alcoholic. Of course. Margarita Saturdays. Margarita Saturdays. Virgin Margaritas. But orphaned black Margaritas is mine and my family's favorite way to watch the show.

4:00That's nice. I was watching the Clone Vortation I think is what it was called. We'll be hosting the show with you guys. Yeah, yeah. And you were talking about, you do get to work with two clones this year. I do. I want to know about this techno, I mean, a bit of a geek, the techno dolly thing, so they shoot everything. You explain it. Well, basically, I mean, that was my first experience working with the techno dolly. And it's obviously a really long day because it's a very, you know, intricate process where they, Tatiana's double is in there and then she works with her, doesn't seem with her. And then when they flip it around, Tatiana pretty much has to mimic that image without the double in there now and do everything the same. And then they flip it over and do the same thing. I mean, I am the worst person to explain that process because I've only seen it once. What was it like working with it though? Because that's going to be different, isn't it? It's a very, it's very temperamental, you know.

4:48It's of course. It seems temperamental. Yeah, weird. It's a long day. Tatiana, you know, has to jump in between different characters and get dressed as one character. It's amazing to see how she's mastered that process though. So my favorite part about being a part of that process was just to see a masterful and how talented this young lady is at doing it. She's the best. I mean, she put Hayley Mills to shame. I'll tell you that much. Parent trap. Thank you. Come on, the original. Let's go. Sorry. Not talking about the Lohan version. We talked about Lohan last time. We want this time. You said she was very nice though. She's very sweet. Yeah. You had another movie premiering in a few weeks too. There's a lot of arrows finishing up. This is about to start. Yeah.

5:33So what's this movie? Sequel to something. It's the sequel of Flowers in the Attic which is the novel based on VC Andrews novel that was almost like the Hunger Games in the late 70s. Like every young gal read this. It was banned from a lot of schools. In some schools it was mandatory reading but it really explored the incest theme. It's a pretty heavy theme. But I'm in the sequel as well. I just finished shooting that a couple months ago and it starts in May, Memorial Day weekend in the States. But we had a fantastic director. It takes place in the early 70s so it was really fun to get into. I think they're. It's where the bell bottoms and the heavy thunder. Yeah. The makeup department's visualized my characters is more of like a Steve McQueen guy.

6:20So it was 10 years in the future too. No, 15 years in the future. 10 or 15. And they grade me up. I felt like I looked a little cloonish. I'm not going to go that far because that's one handsome devil. But they put some gray in my hair and then wrinkle me up a little bit. It was pretty cool. I was like, okay, I'm looking forward to looking a little order now. That's one of the cool things about being an actor though. Because not many people get to see themselves as an old person. Exactly. But you know what to prepare for. I know what to prepare for. And I got to work with Heather Graham again who's fantastic and Ellen Burston is a living legend. So it was a really wonderful experience. I'm looking forward to that coming to Aaron. Yeah, I can imagine. I'm excited to see it too. I like the horror stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, well, horror incest is horror in my books.

7:05So yeah, I think so. I'm not going to argue with you. And I'm going to change topics to something entirely different. I don't want to go with that. I'm going to set away from there. Music. Oh, that's it. Because tap repairs for music. She does. She does. Every scene, every character rather, every clone. Right. She's different. Do you have some sort of preparation like that? I certainly do. I'm a big fan of soundtrack music. I think soundtrack music really helps me get into certain, certain mind states of mind. And I like, there's a song on the There Will Be Blood soundtrack done by Johnny Greenwood from Radiohead. Yeah, yeah. And it's one of the most creepy sounding songs. I want to play a really creepy side of Paul. I play that. If I'm going to go in and kick some butt, I like to throw in a little Metallica. Sometimes I throw in a little Tupac because who doesn't like Tupac?

7:52Ain't nothing but a gangster party. If Paul's also rolling deep. But yeah. Oh, my God. That's always good. And I'll even throw in a little Miles Davis or Johnny Coltrane in there because I love jazz too. And I think acting is like jazz. It's never one note. You just up and down all the time. That's one of my early professors at drama school was like, remember guys, acting is like jazz. You're like this, doo doo doo doo doo doo. And then you go doo doo doo doo doo doo doo. So, you know, I like the third jazz in there. That's interesting because a lot of the improv stuff too, a jazz. Yeah, yeah. You're playing off other people what they do. Right. I think music really helps as an actor too. It just lends a different feel to every scene. And if you think of acting as music, I think it makes it a lot more interesting. I remember at that fan expo thing, I talked to Graham and John as well.

8:37And I think we're going to give me much. But I'm wondering for you, now that you've worked with them for a year, you know Paul probably almost as well as they probably do this point. Do you have any say or more say than the first season rather into character changes or lines and that kind of thing? I think they're very good at making it a collaboration between themselves and the actors. Graham often comes into my trailer and he's like, do you like this line? Like what would you change it to? So really they ask you and they value your input. But at the same time, I mean I throw all the trust in the world into what these guys are doing and what these guys, what they want the story arc to be because they're like, listen, those are two of the smartest two men I have ever met in my life. I mean, what they know about everything in the world is will blow your mind.

9:26So if you sit down and have a conversation just one on one with these two guys, I mean, they're geniuses. They really are. Whole writing crew is geniuses. And I try not to, I really trust what they give me and I go with it from there. But you know, I try to put my two cents in there every once in a while though. Would you get in this season people will look forward to that it's a Dylan Bruce idea. Well, there was a couple Dylan Bruce's ideas that were shut down but I can't really say what those are. But you know, they really didn't take any of my ideas. But you know what, at the same time, I really would have loved to see certain ways play out as they did. But then when I look back upon them and what they wanted them to play out as, I was like, you know what, that makes more sense.

10:12They really did make more sense. And I really understood their angle and where they were coming from. Once again, and you know, I just trust them wholeheartedly. So, you know, I just go with the flow. I mean, Orphan Black is what it is because of those two gentlemen. So that's a good closing line. But we got to do something called five questions. Five quick questions. One more answer. Everyone gets the same ones. All right. Script or improv? Script. Stage or screen? Screen. Landon or McCartney? McCartney. Hitchcock or Kubrick? Kubrick. Kubrick. In one word, Orphan Black. Mind blowing. And that's a hyphenated word. Thanks, man. Appreciate it. Yeah, yeah. That's awesome.