True Blood's Denis O'Hare on Villainous Monologues, Love Scenes, and That Rolling Stone Cover

As vampire king Russell Edgington, Denis O'Hare has always been one of the best parts of True Blood's third season, whether he was seducing vampires to the dark side, wooing Sophie-Anne into marriage, or calming his tempestuous companion-for-life, Talbot. Now that Talbot's death has sent Russell spinning, O'Hare's work has reached new, dizzying heights, culminating in last week's instant-classic monologue about vampire superiority, which O'Hare delivered while holding a bloody spinal cord. The Tony-winning actor told Movieline all about it.

Tell me about your reaction to that monologue Alexander Woo wrote for you at the end of last week's episode. What did you think when you first read it?

It's a total gift. Every time we got a new script, you'd tear through it to see where you were, how many scenes you had, if the scenes were any good, if you had to cry, if you had to be naked...Of course, I got that script and was tearing through it, and I was like, "Oh no, big mourning scene [at the beginning of the episode]. It's gonna be so hard to play. And then I saw the little scene on the roof and thought, 'Oh dear, I only have two small scenes?' And I kept flipping, flipping, flipping and saw nothing, nothing, nothing, and then suddenly I came to that monologue and thought, "Oh my God." And I read the whole monologue and literally dropped the script on the ground after I finished, laughing. I couldn't believe it.

It's interesting, because you have to be scary and dramatic but also funny at the same time -- in fact, a lot of True Blood is like that. How do you nail that tone?

I just try to keep everything real, oddly enough. Whenever a character is doing something, there has to be a real reason for it, and nothing can be arbitrary, because the character doesn't know that he's playing a style. For that line at the end of the monologue, "And now for the weather, Tiffany," it's Russell glorying in his power and glorying in his ability to make human beings scared.

Are you ready for people to come up to you on the street quoting that line? Because it's going to happen.

It's kind of happening already. I've had a couple people ask me to say it again. The day after it aired, I had to come into town to do a play reading in Manhattan, and some guy on the street stopped me to say, "Dude, it's all we're talking about at the office. It's like the most important television I've seen in years!" I thought that was pretty funny.

Obviously, you've had great success on stage, but what is theater fame like compared to True Blood fame?

[Laughs] Theater fame is lovely, but it's a little smaller in scope.

How did this role come to you to begin with?

You know, it's funny: I never even considered it because I didn't see a part for me in the world. Then I was shooting in Budapest, and I got a call from my agent saying that they had been in talks with Alan Ball, and how would I like to play the vampire king of Mississippi? It was so out of the blue, I was so shocked. I said, "Yes, absolutely, of course,' but then I was nervous that I wouldn't find the world, you know? I had never seen myself in that series, so there was a little bit of getting my head around it.

I think of you as a character actor with a whole lot of range, so why did you think this world would be so foreign to you?

I think it's just a matter of, when you're outside an experience looking in, it feels so different and you can't imagine how it might feel to be on the inside. Watching it as a viewer, I just couldn't imagine how I would suddenly show up. Once you get the script and begin reading it, you get an idea of how to do it, and when I got that first script, I was fine. But until then, it's all kind of a vague idea, and that's a little scary.

What did you think of the Rolling Stone cover?

It's pretty crazy. I was thinking about that today, how True Blood has penetrated so much of the cultural zeitgeist. It's truly amazing, it's incredible! The cover of Rolling Stone is major. What's next, the cover of Vanity Fair? When I'm in a New Yorker cartoon, then I will feel like I have made it. [Laughs]

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