Eliza Dushku

TVGuide.com: You say on the Nobel Son web site, "I fought my ass off for this role." Why exactly was that?

Eliza Dushku: I just loved the script. It’s sort of rare when you turn that last page and go, "I have to be in this movie, I have to play this character." I called up my longtime coach and friend and we got to work. I prepared completely to go in and do whatever [writer-producers] Jody [Savin] and Randy [Miller] wanted or needed me to do. I brought props, including these two masks, because one of the key scenes is when I ask Barkley to put on a mask and...

TVGuide.com: Yeah, that moment is only a little creepy.

Dushku: I had a whole supermarket bag filled with masks and a rope and a knife. I was the last audition of the day, and it was like an hour long! When they invited me to come on the film, I was pumped.

TVGuide.com: What I liked about the film is that from the onset, you have no idea where it’s going. There’s no predicting what story is really being told here.

Dushku: It’s a really extraordinary movie in that way, and thank God, because there’s a lot of the same old stuff out there. To be a part of something that is so original and twisted is super-exciting.

TVGuide.com: Why is City Hall such a damaged young woman?

Dushku: You get a little bit of that when she talks [to Bill Pullman’s police detective]. She had a father. He died. He burned all of her diaries, and then ... well, she sort of just flips on a dime and talks about something else. She’s a twisted little bird! [Laughs]

TVGuide.com: You once said that people have "a better chance of seeing God than seeing me naked." Yet in Nobel Son, you come kinda-sorta close.

Dushku: Oh, I think it’s pretty clear I’m wearing underwear in that scene. They’re not granny-pants, but.... Those are my own, and I kept them on! [Laughs]