Angel

There Must be an Angel playing with Wolfram & Hart - Dreamwatch #110 November 2003

words by Ian Spelling - Transcribed by SETJE

Angel has been revamped in more ways than one for its fifth season, which sees the titular heroic vampire becoming head of the evil law firm Wolfram & Hart and sharing the limelight with another Buffy alumnus, Spike. Star, David Boreanaz, offers dreamwatch a preview of Angel’s latest adventures.

What can viewers expect from Season five of Angel ?

There are a lot of changes, internally and structurally. As far as character dynamics are concerned, things will change to a certain extent because we’ve lost two characters and got a couple of new ones. Cordelia [Charisma Carpenter] and Connor [Vincent Kartheiser] are gone. Those characters’ storylines ran out, according to Joss [Whedon, series creator/executive producer]. We’ve now got Angel in charge of Wolfram & Hart offices in Los Angeles. He’s been handed the keys, so to speak, to the paradise and he’s a bit leery about that. He doesn’t understand why that’s happening and why everybody is on board for it so quickly. So he’s fighting within himself and questioning a lot of the things that are happening around him.

The first episode of season five [Conviction] takes off from the last episode of season four [Home]. Joss directed the season opener and we’ll meet some new characters. Sarah Thompson is playing a character named Eve, a new girl at Wolfram & Hart, who is the conduit between the senior partners and the group. She tells us what we need to do. Mercedes McNab is back as Harmony. She’ll be playing a pivotal role, kind of working for Angel. And then we have Spike [James Marsters], of course, which is huge. We’ll see Angel and Spike annoy each other. You’ll see the two of them battle a little bit. "Why are you back ? What are you doing here ?" It’ll be a lot of that kind of stuff.

Is the tone of the series going to be different this year ?

I think it will be a little lighter, but not extremely different. I’m sure there will be some lighter moments, especially as far as stand-alone episodes are concerned. We won’t be going into as much heavy, dark stuff as we did in season four. Season five will have a bright tone to it, and that goes for the look of the show too. We’ll still be fighting downtown and a lot of the show will still take place at night, but it will be a little lighter because we’ll be able to be at Wolfram & Hart during the daytime. I won’t burn up because of the Necrotempered glass. So that enables us to lighten the show up a little bit.

Story-wise, we’ll probably take on more clients’ jobs on a stand-alone basis, rather than follow huge arcs. But we will have smaller arcs, like conflicts between Angel and Spike and the possibility of having Buffy come over for a couple of episodes.

What will Angel’s relationship with Spike be in the new season ? Are they allies ? Reluctant allies ? Or are they enemies ?

Well, at first they’re going to be questioning things. Angel will be saying things like, "Why are you here ? I thought you’d died. You are annoying to me." Angel can’t stand being around Spike, and there are a lot of reasons for that. They have some history, obviously. All of those things will unfold. Spike will be pretty much stuck in the spiritual world for a while. So a lot ot it is going to be funny. There’s a lot of humour to it.

What was it like for you to go back to appear in the Buffy The Vampire Slayer series finale ?

It was fun. It was a reunion of sorts between Sarah and I and some of the cast people that were still there and the crew members. It was stepping back into those shoes and seeing those two characters together again, which I’m sure the fans will really like. It’s good to give them that which they’ve been asking for quite some time now. We had a good time. It was pretty painless.

How are you and James getting along ?

Fine. There have been no problems whatsoever. It’s good to have James back. I really enjoyed being around him during the time I was on Buffy, doing the show with James and spending time with him. So for me, this is a blast. He’s always been very well prepared. He knows his material. He knows his character. I can’t say enough about him. He’s been great.

From the sound of it, it would seem that Eve is essentially replacing Lilah (Stephanie Romanov) and that Harmony is replacing Cordelia. Is that fair ?

Well, that’s not altogether correct. They’re similar in nature, but also quite different.

Cordelia’s character took off in a direction that was different from what anyone probably expected. Things got very dark with the love interest story between Angel and Cordelia and with the whole Cordelia-Connor storyline. Harmony will be a little bit more like Cordelia was at the beginning of Buffy than Cordelia on Angel. Harmony is there to spice things up a little. I think there’s a bit more of an edge to Harmony as far as the type of character she is compared to Cordelia. Harmony is a vampire.

As for Eve, I think she’s very different from Lilah. Lilah was harsher, more abrasive.

But you can definitely draw similarities between Cordelia and Harmony, and Lilah and Eve. The most important thing is that all four characters will and have brought such great things to the show.

You’re going to make your directorial debut with an upcoming fifth season episode. How eager are you to get going on that ?

I was originally going to direct episode seven, but now it’s become episode 10. Episodes seven and eight have a big fighting arc between Spike and Angel, which is why they moved my directing a show to episode 10. They wanted me to direct an episode in which I could be a little lighter, and I guess that’s episode 10, though I have no idea what the story is yet.

I’m excited. I watch all these directors come in. We work with all different types of directors. I’ve watched the shots they picked and how they directed. This year, of course, we’re on some different sets, and that dictates new camera movements. Because we’re in such a large office there’s more room to have the cameras move around. So you’re going to see more Steadicam shots in the Wolfram & Hart scenes. I’m excited about all of that, and about incorporating what I’ve learned and what I’d like to try.

As for my vision [of the show], I’m sure that will change depending on the type of script I get and the writer who wrote the script, and of course, on whatever key points Joss feels we need to hit. I’m excited and at the same time very much afraid, which is probably good. I’m just going to let it unfold. Let the nightmare begin. And I know in advance that there’s light at the end of the tunnel, because after eight days, we’ve got to start another episode.

Angel narrowly escaped being cancelled at the end of its fourth season. Were you ready to move on if the show had not been picked up ?

I would have been fine. I was focusing on The Crow : Wicked Prayer, which is a prequel to The Crow. I was working on that project. So I just look at it all as the next gig for me.

How was your experience playing one of the villains in the new Crow movie ?

It was great. I had a blast working with Dennis Hopper, Tara Reid and Eddie Furlong. They’re selling it as The Crow : Wicked Prayer and not The Crow 4, because it’s a prequel. I had a great time.

It was a tough shoot. It was just 23 days. It was harder than my show. It was crazy. It was nuts. But I think the experience of having done four seasons of Angel helped me get through it. I wasn’t so stressed on Wicked Prayer because I know what it’s like to shoot fast.

Do you feel you’re risking being typecast by shifting between Angel and The Crow : Wicked Prayer ?

Well, they’re both dark characters and they’re both way out there, but Angel is so diverse and has so many facets to his personality. I look at Angel as a mini-cast of characters, and I’m looking forward to playing all of them in the future on the show. He’s dark yet funny. Was there typecasting in the 1970s ? Sure. Is there as much typecasting now ? No, I don’t think so. People from the film world come over and do television. People from the television world come over and do film. Both are pretty common now. And if there is typecasting now, I look forward to the challenge of overcoming it. I don’t fear it.

Also, I have to think about filling my hiatus. It’s not like, "Oh, I can choose between these different types of roles." I got an offer and had two months to do it, so I did Wicked Prayer. A couple of years ago I did a film called I’m With Lucy. That was a comedy. It was something very different. And I want to do more comedy, more everything. But right now, I don’t consider myself pigeonholed.

You also have to realise that Angel has been under the radar. Buffy was a phenomenon, but Angel hasn’t been an over-the-top, huge ratings success. It’s been consistent, but a lot of people don’t know the show or what it’s all about. That may help me later on.

Has working on Angel these past four years been everything you hoped it would be ?

Well, I didn’t go into Angel saying, "I want this to be this or that." But, for me, as far as the work is concerned, it’s been a great experience. I so enjoy playing this character because of his dimension and depth.

The show has gone through many changes. It’s been pushed around from night to night. It’s been frustrating being put on a certain night and then being told you’re going to be on another night. But you take it for what it is and you just go with it.