Carrie Preston - producer, director, and all-around scene-stealing actress - is currently at work on the second season of HBO’s True Blood, a very adult vampire series based on the books by Charlaine Harris. But Preston’s not just keeping busy playing barmaid Arlene in that popular series. In addition to True Blood, Preston was recently seen in Woody Allen’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona, the Oscar nominated film Doubt, and starring opposite Julia Roberts and Clive Owen in Duplicity. Preston also just earned recognition from the SXSW Film Festival as part of the cast of That Evening Sun. Preston and her That Evening Sun co-stars picked up the Best Ensemble Cast award as well as the Audience Award for narrative feature at SXSW, and the film has been earning rave reviews on the festival circuit. Plus, she also formed her own production company, Daisy 3 Pictures, and is busy behind the scenes on projects close to her heart.
Those she’s hard at work balancing films and TV, Preston took the time to talk about her current projects for this one on one interview with the Georgia-born actress:
That Evening Sun did so well at SXSW, have you heard anything about a wider theatrical release?
Carrie Preston: “No, but everywhere it goes it keeps winning awards. I mean it won South By Southwest and got the Audience Award and then went to Sarasota International and won the Audience Award there, and then it’s just won the Atlanta Film Festival yesterday. So, it’s doing good.”
What do you think it is about this particular film that’s winning over audiences everywhere it plays?
Carrie Preston: “You know what? I’m really pleased to see that they are because when I first saw the film I said, ‘Oh my god, this is such a beautiful character study and such a gorgeous film, I’m not sure who’s going to watch it?’ You know, because it’s just not what you immediately think of a movie starring an 80 year old man is what people are going to grab onto. But I think it might just be that, you know? Because it is something that you don’t get to see that much and Hal Holbrook, I think, is pretty riveting. It’s just a really universal story about raging against death and also about regrets, and I think people can relate to it.”
And it’s from a first time director?
Carrie Preston: “Yes. He’s done some short films that are really good, and then he adapted it from a short story by William Kay called I Hate To See That Evening Sun Go Down. And he adapted it from that, and he had adapted another one of Kay’s short stories into a short film so I guess he really relates to that material. He really expanded it but yet he really honored the story too, so I think he did a great job.”
Can you talk a little about your character in it?
Carrie Preston: “So I play this woman called Ludie Choat who is a lower-class Southern farmer’s wife, really. Her husband is played by Ray McKinnon, a bit of an ne’er do well, but he’s just trying to get by, you know? He’s just trying to make it in life. And that’s what kind of makes the story interesting because he butts heads with the Hal Holbrook character, because Hal Holbrook’s character has been put in a nursing home at the beginning of the film. He sort of blasts himself out of the nursing home only to find out that this, you know, sort of what he calls white trash family has rented his farm from his son. So it is very much about males butting heads, trying to claim what’s theirs, and I’m the wife who’s just trying to keep the peace - especially with my husband being a bit of a short fuse and has been abusive in the past.”
“We have a daughter who’s played by Mia Wasikowska and I’m just trying to protect her and myself, and trying to support my husband. It’s kind of nice when you see movies usually where there’s an abusive situation, the wife is usually kind of weak or she’s been beaten so much that she doesn’t have a spine anymore. What we really worked hard for in this movie is to show that they actually have a lot of love for each other and that they are just trying to make it and they have so many things going against them.”
And that love is why she stayed with him, even though he’s abusive?
Carrie Preston: “I think so. I mean he hadn’t been abusive for a long time and it’s like the sort of age old, ‘Oh well, he hasn’t hurt me in a long time…,’ but things are really looking up for them until the old man comes back.”
It sounds interesting.
Carrie Preston: “It’s really good and it’s really beautifully done.”
You’ve done a great job of going in between huge studio films and independent productions. Do you have a preference when you’re picking projects?
Carrie Preston: “No. I really just try to go for the roles and however they land, whether it’s a big film or a small one. You know, I’m happy for the work most of the time especially in film and TV, just because I have done a lot of theatre in the past and then over really the last, I would say, three years, really just 100% focused on film and TV. That’s been really great because it actually has paid off.”
Do you miss the stage?
Carrie Preston: “Honestly, not right now. I’m really enjoying doing these other things. I don’t know if you read that I’m also a director and a producer, but I also direct some theatre. That, in some ways, kind of gets my theatre desires fulfilled - and I don’t have to do eight shows a week.”
Why did you decide to get into directing?
Carrie Preston: “You know what? I’ve always been interested in, and I mean even when I was a kid, like when I was in seventh grade I started my own theatre company in the backyard with all the neighborhood kids. So I guess I just always had this need to or this kind of passion for creating the whole thing and not just the one part. I directed in college and then I sort of put it on the back-burner for a long time, and then about five years ago one of my classmates from Juilliard, James Vasquez, he wrote a script called 29th and Gay, a film script, and he asked me if I wanted to help him get it made. We tried to raise money but no one would give us money because we didn’t have a track record, so we just did it ourselves. Which was really naïve, but at the same time it was like, well, there was no reason we thought in our minds that we couldn’t. Everyone kept saying, ‘You can’t do this,’ and we were like, ‘Yes, we can.’ And so we did it and we sold it. Then we made a short film and that did a bunch of festivals, and then James wrote Ready? Ok! which is our latest film. He wrote and directed it and he wrote it for me and for my husband Michael [Emerson] and my brother John. So I star in that one and executive produced it.”
And that one’s just coming out on DVD, right?
Carrie Preston: “Yes, it just came out last week so we’re very excited about that.”
Is it being able to control more of where your career is going and what you’re working on that led you to producing?
Carrie Preston: “Oh absolutely. Absolutely, yes. I mean with 29th and Gay that came at a time when I wasn’t doing a lot of acting work. It was just like a godsend because although I didn’t act in it - I directed it - it was just like something I had to put all of my creative energies into, so that I’m not sitting around waiting for the phone to ring, you know? It was very empowering, and so I started doing that more. I would direct plays here and there and just kind of try to have my own projects going so that I’m not dependent on other people to tell me how my life is supposed to go.”
So then you formed Daisy 3 Pictures. How are you choosing your producing projects?
Carrie Preston: “Well, so far, two of them were written by James, my producing partner. And then it’s just kind of organic. I mean he’s developing my script right now, I’m developing a script that I’m writing with a friend and then another friend of mine wrote a script that actually I directed it as a stage piece and we’ve adapted it for the screen. And so we’re going to try to get that done. It’s all like within my little circle of friends, really. There’s so many talented people that are around me that it’s just like, ‘Let’s just do something. Why do we need to wait?’”
But do you ever sleep?
Carrie Preston: [Laughing] “That’s so funny - my husband would ask that. Yes, of course. Like right now I’m working on True Blood but I don’t work that much, so I have a lot of downtime. I mean, I work maybe a couple of days per episode. But I’m still every day at the computer, on the phone, like trying to get things going. But no, I do take a lot of time down too.”
And with True Blood, because your character’s not in every scene, it should allow you all that extra time.
Carrie Preston: “Yes, it works out well, especially since Michael shoots [Lost] in Hawaii most of the time.”
Do you get to go with him?
Carrie Preston: “I do. I go and visit him as much as I can. He’s on hiatus now and we still have some more to shoot. So, you know, he’s going to hang out with me while I’m shooting. It’s working out pretty well.”
Does that mean we’ll see him as a vampire or something in an episode of True Blood?
Carrie Preston: “I hope so.”
That would be very cool.
Carrie Preston: “Yes, exactly. I know that they’ve been talking about it because Alan’s a big fan of Michael’s - Alan Ball - so I know that they were sort of talking about trying to find something for Michael. But I don’t know if it’ll be this season or what.”
Well I hope there’s going to be lots of seasons of that show.
Carrie Preston: “I hope so, I hope so. I hope it doesn’t get too expensive for HBO to keep it going.”
Don’t they have the money?
Carrie Preston: [Laughing] “You would think so. I mean Deadwood got to be too expensive and they let that go and Carnivale. You know, it’s sort of like we’re all kind of nervous that the show’s going to get too expensive and they’re just going to go, ‘We’d rather just stick with In Treatment because it’s cheaper.’”
I was addicted to Carnivale. I was so mad when they took that off.
Carrie Preston: “Me too, I loved it. And Deadwood I loved.”
They always do that though. They take off the ones that I fall in love with and I vowing I’m never watching anything on TV again, and then you get hooked.
Carrie Preston: “And then you get hooked. But True Blood seems to have a pretty big fan base.”
We wouldn’t want to give away any spoilers from the second season of True Blood, but you are not done filming that yet, right?
Carrie Preston: “No, we’re just up to number seven. We’re shooting number seven right now of twelve.”
When I was talking to Alexander Skarsgard at the Independent Spirit Awards he said they changed some of the sets this year. Did they change anything about Merlotte’s?
Carrie Preston: “No, Merlotte’s is good, old Merlotte’s. I love it in there. It’s an amazing set. You really do feel like you’re in a bar.”
Did you read Charlaine Harris’ books before you got the role of Arlene?
Carrie Preston: “When I got the part I read them, yes.”
Are you interested to see if they’re going to keep the same type of storyline for Arlene or do you know if they’re going to veer away from Harris’ books?
Carrie Preston: “You know what? It’s so interesting because they are really departing from the books right now. I mean they’re sort of keeping the main kind of theme of the second book, but they’ve already just taken a lot of liberties. They spent the first season really establishing the characters and now they’ve added all these new characters, and it’s getting really wild in there.”
If they stick with any part of the second book, then we know Merlotte’s is not going to be in it very much, right?
Carrie Preston: “It’s not in it as much as it was the first season.”
Which makes sense with the Living Dead in Dallas storyline.
Carrie Preston: “Yes, but Sam still works there.”
They did a great job of casting these characters, but it cracks me up that so many of these actors are from outside the United States. The accents must be crazy when everyone drops character on that set.
Carrie Preston: “Oh yes, it’s like the United Colors of Benetton. It’s just insane. Everybody’s from all over the place, yes, so it’s funny. And then Anna [Paquin], she’s from New Zealand but she kind of sounds like she’s from the valley. I mean she’s kind of got this like real California accent. But then when she’s been with Stephen [Moyer], she kind of gets a little British accent in there sometimes too. It’s so funny.”
What do you think about how they handle the Louisiana accent because you actually know the accent?
Carrie Preston: “I do, yes. I’m from Georgia so I’m not really doing my native accent. I’m really doing something…I chose to do something a little closer to, because Bon Temps is fictitious but it’s supposed to be sort of near Shreveport - closer to Texas - so I chose to kind of make her a little bit more along the Texan lines. Just because it seemed right for her to have super hard R’s and it just feels right in the mouth, you know, to have her be like that. And yes, some people have a little harder time with the accents of other people. And then, you know, like Ryan [Kwanten] I think, who’s from Australia, he does a beautiful accent. It’s amazing because when he speaks in real life, I mean he’s got a total Australian accent!”
What do you think about how far they took the graphic sex last season?
Carrie Preston: “Oh my goodness.”
Good thing it is on HBO.
Carrie Preston: “Yes, that’s more for grownups. This is not Twilight.”
Definitely, definitely not. You haven’t really done horror in the past, so why are you doing something that’s in that genre?
Carrie Preston: “Well, it was a role and it just happened to be a part of this thing, and also I was really wanting to do a series. And I’d done…that must have been my seventh pilot, so you just don’t know. I’d done like seven pilots and this was only the second one to get picked up, so you just don’t know. It’s kind of like a crapshoot, you know?”
Yes. Do you get a feeling when you’re working on that many pilots which ones might hit and which ones you know there’s no chance it’ll get picked up?
Carrie Preston: “You know what? I thought I had some kind of barometer on that kind of thing and I’ve been wrong every time. I can’t see any rhyme or reason but this one, because of Allan Ball’s history with HBO, I figured, ‘Okay, this is going to be good.’”
Alan Ball has a very impressive track record.
Carrie Preston: “Yes. I met him because I’m in Towelhead which is the movie that he wrote and directed. That’s how I met him and we hit it off. I really wanted to work with him again. So it just worked out even though like when I read the script I honestly did not know what character he was talking about for me. I mean you see what I look like in real life, right?”
Yes.
Carrie Preston: “I mean I’m not anything like Arlene. Nothing. It all has to be created, which is really fun. I go in the makeup trailer and an hour and a half later, I’m a completely different person and. You don’t ever get to do that on TV, you know? And then the costumes…they put this huge push-up bra on me and the fake tan and the fake nails and the drag queen makeup. My own mother didn’t even know who I was at first. She had no idea.”
Is she a fun character to kind of transition into, because she is so different than you?
Carrie Preston: “She is, but I oddly have no problem getting into her mindset.”
Really? She’s not the sharpest tool in the shed.
Carrie Preston: “She’s not, but you know what? She’s street smart. You know what I mean? Like she’s a single mother and she’s a survivor. She speaks her mind, and I don’t know… I grew up with women like that so I just wanted to honor those women. Also it’s a comedic role and I really always feel in my element when I’m doing comedy.”
What do you think it is that makes so many people just fall in love with vampire stories?
Carrie Preston: “Well I think there’s obviously a lot of romance involved. There’s that idea of, you know, I think women are really attracted to it because you get lost in a character like Sookie who has been chosen by this person who has been living for 500 years, and she’s the one he chooses. That’s really hot that you, of all the women in all the centuries, are the one that gets chosen. And then, he protects you. You’re protected. There’s that kind of thing. And then there are a lot of people who are drawn to that sort of erotic nature of the blood sharing. Like more than just talking about sharing your flesh. It’s like your whole insides, you know? I don’t know. I mean they’re very sexy, I guess.”
Did you feel that way before you started work on True Blood?
Carrie Preston: “You know, I was a big fan of the Anne Rice books. I read those back in the day. And I’ve always sort of been into sci-fi kind of stuff, so I like it. It’s a show I would have watched even if I wasn’t on it.”
Do you have any input whatsoever into where they’re going to take Arlene, since they are veering away from the books?
Carrie Preston: “No, I don’t.”
As a writer/director they should let you have some input.
Carrie Preston: [Laughing] “I know. We have good writers so you kind of trust what they’re doing, and they’re open to discussion. The writer, when you’re shooting, whoever wrote the episode is there the whole time, which is not the case on a lot of shows. So if something’s not working or if something doesn’t feel right in my mouth, like, ‘Oh, you know what? I think I would say it like this…’ You can go to the writer and talk about it.”
Do you think we’re going to see Arlene fall in love again?
Carrie Preston: “Arlene’s never that long without a man. She’s just that type of woman who just can’t deal with being single.”
That is true.
Carrie Preston: “There’s just a lot of women like that who they really just have their whole kind of ambition is to [be part of a couple] and they kind of don’t feel complete unless they have a man. I think she’s like that, you know? Even though she’s a total survivor. But she also knows how to get a man, so why not?” [SOURCE]
Leave a Reply