Actors talk about their ‘Affair’
RUTH Wilson admits getting bored with sex scenes.
(First of two parts)
LOS ANGELES—Equal-opportunity nudity, sexual positions and actors being bored doing sex scenes for the nth time were among the topics that inevitably came up in our recent separate interviews with the four leads of Showtime’s drama series, “The Affair”: Ruth Wilson (Alison Bailey), Dominic West (Noah Solloway), Joshua Jackson (Cole Lockhart) and Maura Tierney (Helen Solloway).
Winner of two 2015 Golden Globe Awards—best TV series-drama and best actress-TV drama series (Ruth)—“The Affair” tackles the emotional effects of an affair between a waitress (Alison) and a teacher-novelist (Noah), who are both married. We begin our two-part series with Ruth and Dominic.
The following are excerpts from our interviews in The London Hotel in New York.
Ruth Wilson
What’s more challenging—the dramatic scenes or the nudity?
They’re all hard, really. This show does require you to dig deep and to be emotionally vulnerable and open. It does that on a week-to-week basis. It’s not just one episode. It’s every episode that you’re in. You have to go somewhere, which feels like a risk, or it feels very exposing in some respects, whether it’s nudity or it’s emotional.
So it’s been hard but essentially gratifying. We have an amazing cast there to support us during that.
You have spoken up about why there’s more emphasis on female nudity.
There should be equal opportunity for nudity, definitely.
And how are things on the show in that regard?
WILSON (left) says West brings lightness to bed scenes, which she describes as “completely absurd.”
It was a major challenge for me having to face sex scenes every week. I had only done one sex scene before this show. I feel that sex scenes are often the least interesting. There’s only so much you can keep playing with in a way.
So when we have sex scenes, I always ask, “Is it necessary and why is this in here? Is it moving the story forward? Or is it just titillation in some form?” I’m not interested in being part of something that’s just titillation. Both Dominic and I and everyone else who had to be involved were quite insistent upon it.
It doesn’t mean it’s any easier, to be honest. I kept saying, “Let’s put the camera on his (Dominic’s) face for the orgasm.” That’s equal-opportunity orgasm face (laughs). If women are uncomfortable with it, then they should say so.
It’s one thing to do a sex scene in a movie and walk away but this is for a series with the same partner so you’ll have sex scenes as the story develops.
It’s very hard because Dominic and I are like, “Well, what position do we do now (laughs)?” We’re like, “Oh, I don’t know.” It’s like in a real relationship—getting bored of each other (laughs).
You are lucky that you and Dominic trust each other.
We’re incredibly lucky. The four of us get on so well. It’s a real relief because those (sex) scenes are vulnerable. They’re not enjoyable to do. Of course, they’re not real time. All sex scenes are kind of odd and completely unbelievable in some respects.
To have trust with the other actor and to be able to laugh about it—that’s what Dom’s great at—making light of the fact that what we’re doing is ridiculous (laughs)—and completely absurd. He brings lightness to it which is necessary in those scenes. I’m so thankful.
We got on instantly partly probably because we’re both Brits. Not similar background but we’re both theatrical Brits. We also have similar work ethic. It’s the same with Maura and Josh. We all get on incredibly well. But it does get to a point—what are we going to do now? Aren’t people bored of this? We’re bored and it’s almost like, I’m too old for this…
On the kitchen table again…
On the kitchen table again. It’s like, on the couch again. I’m hoping the showrunners are getting bored as well. I leave it to the new characters to come in and bring some fresh blood into the show (laughs).
Have you had any experiences with angry followers of the show?
Well, no (laughs). No one’s attacked me yet or threatened to kill me for being the image of infidelity. But I have come outside of a play—I used to get people screaming at me, shouting as I exited the theater.
They (the show’s viewers) will say, “Who killed Scotty (Lockhart, a character played by Colin Donnell)?” There’s this obsession with who? The only thing I hear is that couples find it interesting.
Do you think an affair is excusable?
As an actor, you have to empathize with every character you play. So with Alison, I understood exactly why she had an affair. I understood why she met this man and needed to escape from her life. I don’t judge her actions. If someone told me he had an affair, I wouldn’t judge him.
We can judge and you can stigmatize it but really, if you go in and ask the questions then you often understand why people have affairs. It’s not necessarily excusable but I myself wouldn’t judge it.
If you had an affair, what’s the best way of not getting caught?
I’ve got no idea. Well, yeah, deny it. If I’m going by the characters, they’ve failed enormously in trying to keep anything quiet. Don’t write anything down because the note gets found. That’s how she got found out. He (Noah) wrote a note so perhaps don’t write anything down.
DOMINIC West says he took a revealing transcript from the writers’ room.
Dominic West
Can you talk about working with your two leading ladies, Ruth and Maura?
Maura is endlessly great. I get to do a lot more with her this (second) season which is nice. She has an extraordinary style. My acting seems so jittery and superficial compared to hers. She has a great way of anchoring you down into a scene. She takes her time and she knows how to absorb a moment. So I love acting with her. She’s also really funny and cynical.
Ruth and I have a great rapport. We’re getting very good at having sex with each other (laughs). That’s always a good way to get to know someone.
Ruth mentioned that she’s getting bored with the sex scenes. Do you guys make suggestions to the director?
Yeah, we do. A lot of the sex is quite detailed—worked out in quite a lot of detail by the writers. God knows what the writers think about all day and night. But we seem to have done most things by now.
So it’s mainly with me and Ruth—it is a battle as to who’s on top because I always want to be on the bottom. But I always end up on top so that’s the first battle. Then the second battle is what position have we not done yet (laughs). We’re getting really good at it—we should be porn stars, really. I think porn is calling.
Ruth wants the show to have equal-opportunity nudity.
Yeah, it would be me, wouldn’t it, that gets the equal-opportunity show? It always was an issue. You watch some shows and see actresses who are doing their first job and they’re being made to do everything. I don’t think that’s a very good development.
There should be as much responsibility on the man or on me (to be nude) basically which is a real shame for me. But it’s probably good for the show. I know I’m never going to have to go totally nude, whereas a female actor doesn’t know that. So I’m doing my bit for feminism (laughs).
Why do you think men cheat more than women?
One of the people we were talking to about the show said women get bored of marital sex much quicker than men. She said that in her research, women are bored of a marriage just as much, if not quicker, than men. But I don’t know.
How do the show’s writers come up with story ideas?
Don’t tell anybody (laughs) but at the start of this season, I happened to be in the writers’ room for another reason. They weren’t there. There was a transcript of one of their meetings when they talked about an episode. I thought, oh, that’ll be interesting so I took the transcript and read it in the car. It was this thick and it was what everyone had said in the meeting.
God, it’s torture what they talk about but they talk very frankly about their own experiences, love lives, marriages and everything. That absolutely feeds what they write. I’m glad I don’t have to be in that room (laughs).
Most of the time, when we have an issue with a scene, it’s always resolved and we play pretty much what the writers write. They don’t change very much. Usually, we cut a few lines. But it’s just so that we can find a way to play these scenes which very often—for me, anyway—I find it difficult to understand why he would behave like that.
I’m always persuaded or the most persuasive thing is when they come up with a story from their own lives. We had it the other day. One of the writers said, well, actually this happened with my husband last night.
WILSON (left) says she and costar West easily got along because they’re “theatrical Brits.”
If you had an affair, what’s the best way of not getting caught?
I think if you do have an affair, very often you want to get caught. It’s a way of saying, I am not happy with the marriage. That’s probably true of Noah. Outwardly, everything was fine but inwardly, he was feeling suffocated.
You can resolve that in mediation and talking but very often you can’t. You may feel the need to do something more drastic or more reckless.
I think guilt—what’s destructive about affairs is what it does to the person having the affair. It destroys a lot in the person who does it, the dishonesty.
Like a friend of mine had one—he broke up with his wife recently. It was because he’d had an affair. She’d forgiven him and they got back together but his guilt turned into incredible jealousy and paranoia. He was convinced she was having an affair and it destroyed their marriage. Ultimately, it’s the person having the affair who suffers—which is why it’s interesting playing Noah.
(To be concluded on Sunday)
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