iHorror Interview With Myk Watford
Ryan T. Cusick: You’ve played a police officer in just about every cop show on TV. What is it about the role of a police officer that draws you in?
Myk Watford: The benefits. Pays better than being a real cop and is a whole lot safer. No, honestly, I’ve played a lot of cops and I’ve played a lot of bad guys. I think everyone has a duality, ya know? A contradiction about them. For me, it’s probably always been the line between order and chaos that drew me in… love and hate… lawlessness and obedience. I think in a good story, both cop and criminal walk those lines between good and evil, sinner and saint. And that duality is probably what attracts me most about these kinds of roles.
RTC: How long have you been an actor? How did this all start for you?
MW: Well the first role I ever played was the big bad wolf in my first-grade play. Typecast from the start. But growing up the woods of Alabama, I really didn’t have much shot of being a child star. So about 10 years later, I saw my sister who was a great actor, in the high school’s production of “fame”. It was like the sky opened up and a light shone down on me. I said, “I can do that”. And so I did. I trained in classical theatre at the University of Utah under a brilliant man named Kenneth Washington. Studied Shakespeare in Washington DC, with Michael Khan, and then went to NYC to start a career. I moved up in the middle of a blizzard, literally had $40 in my pocket and just rolled the dice. I think I was probably too naive to know any better. Sometimes being naive can be a gift.
RTC: I had read that when you’re not acting you have performed in a band? Tell us more about that.
MW: Yeah! I have a band here in LA called Stumpwaller. You can find us at stumpwaller.com and on iTunes, Spotify, Facebook, all the usual places. We’ve been playing the LA area for a while now. Its a sort of revved up rockabilly swamp rock. It’s a lotta fun. I have some real badasses in my band. Grammy and Emmy winners. Some of The best players in LA. Very energetic show. I sort of have this “rock & roll preacher man” alter ego that kind takes over. It’s a lotta fun. We really get down. We go there. We’ve been lucky to get a lot of really good and loyal fans… it’s a very immersive experience and not really like anything you’ve probably seen in a rock ‘n’ roll show… Lotta fun… Definitely, something to check out if you’re in the LA area.
RTC: You have a new horror film coming out, Portal from Horrorhound Films. Can you tell us more about the movie and your experience working in horror as this marks the third horror film you’ve been in?
MW: Portal is the story of a low budget ghost hunting team, who are tired of chasing down the same old “haunts”, coming up empty-handed every time. So they decide to explore a mysterious mansion that’s been off-limits to the ghost hunting community for decades, and they end up finding a little more than that bargained for. I came into Portal a little late in the process. I had actually just gotten home from shooting True Detective, and I think I was at the zoo on a Sunday afternoon when I got a call from Chris Sergi, the producer. And when the producer calls you on Sunday… you know he’s serious. I think I was shooting just a few days after. It was one of those films where we didn’t have a lot of time, and we didn’t have a lot of money… But we had a great script, by Peter Dukes… and we had a lot of talent in front of the camera with Ryan Merriman, Jamie Tisdale, Najarra Townsend and myself, and a team with a solid vision behind the camera, who knew what to do with it all… we all worked long hours, but we were lucky in that the cast really enjoyed working together. We all got along fantastically and just loved making the movie together. Dean Alioto, the director, and Ignacio Walker, the DP, really got on the same page quickly and the look and feel really came together. I was very happy with how it turned out, and can’t wait until everyone gets to see it.
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