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Hunter Parrish is vying for a role in Transformers 4

Posted on: November 15th, 2012 0 comment

“Transformers” is moving on with a brand new cast of characters, but of course we need new incarnations of the archetypes that worked in the first trilogy. Michael Bay is on board to direct “Transformers 4″ and Mark Wahlberg has taken on the male lead role as a dad with a teenage daughter, but now comes time to cast that teenage daughter and her racecar driver boyfriend, who will be taking over for the roles that launched the careers of Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox. Testing for these roles will take place this week, with actors being told they will be signed to three-picture deals and they need to be available for an April-November shoot. Unsurprisingly, a lot of the actors testing should be familiar to U&C readers.

For the role of Wahlberg’s daughter, Abbie Cornish’s younger sister Isabelle Cornish will be among those testing. The 17 year old only began following in her older sister’s footsteps this year by signing with major US talent agency United and is in now making the transition from Australian acting jobs – including a stint on famed talent exporter “Home and Away” – for Hollywood ones. Slightly more experienced American actress Nicola Peltz, who’s probably most known for her role in “The Last Airbender”, will also be testing for the role of the daughter. Peltz also has a role in new “Psycho” TV series “Bates Motel.”

UPDATED: Two more names vying for the daughter role are Gabriella Wilde, who starred in the latest “The Three Musketeers” adaptation opposite Logan Lerman, and recently wrapped up shooting on Kimberly Pierce’s “Carrie” remake starring Chloe Moretz; and Margaret Qualley, daughter of Andie McDowell. No word on if she has any acting experience, though she has modeled.

The role of the race car driving boyfriend is casting a slightly bigger net, with five actors currently lining up to read. Hunter Parrish of TV’s “Weeds” fame, was part of another high profile shortlist for the role of Peeta in “The Hunger Games.”Luke Grimes, last seen on the big screen opposite Liam Neeson in “Taken 2″, has been on the brink of these tentpole roles for a while, the last being Roland Emmerich’s now dead sci-fi epic “Singularity.”Landon Liboiron played that really annoying teenage kid on Fox’s short-lived dinosaur series “Terra Nova”, so we’re kinda biased against this possibility, ahem. And lastly, Brenton Thwaites and Jack Reynor should be very familiar to everyone. Yes, they are also up for the male lead role of Four in YA adaptation of “Divergent” opposite Shailene Woodley. It will be interesting to see what happens if both franchises want the same up and comer.

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Hunter talks Sex, Drugs, and Ending this Role

Posted on: August 3rd, 2012 0 comment

My very first on-camera celebrity interview was with Hunter Parrish. We met to discuss his role in Broadway’s Spring Awakening when he took over for Jonathan Groff (bless those casting Gods) in 2008. Here’s what I remember about our first meeting: Hunter was a charming guy who hadn’t yet been corrupted by the business. Four years later I’m happy to report he is still the same affable, funny and open person.

We sat down after Showtime brought out his entire Weeds cast for their final appearance at The Television Critics Association as the series is set to wrap up an exhilarating eight season run this September. Hunter and I looked back on Silas’ evolution, the massive volume of flesh he bared over the years and what he considers his best on-screen moment (spoiler alert: those last two things have nothing to do with one another).

TheInsider.com: How do you feel about the end of Weeds?
Hunter Parrish: I’m pretty sad. It’s hit me hard. I love these people, I love these characters. I’m sad to never share these character’s experiences again. It’s way more the bitter side of bittersweet than I expected — but we couldn’t do Weeds forever.

RELATED – Guillermo Coming Back To Weeds

Insider.com: Looking back on the series, what are your favorite Silas-centric moments?
Hunter: I love anything that I did with Megan Beals, who played Megan (Silas’ deaf girlfriend). I loved poking holes in the condom; it was so dramatic [laughs]. I don’t like my work, ever, but one of my favorite scenes was in the first season after Megan and I had been doing ecstasy. I had no idea what I was doing but it worked – that taught me a huge lesson about acting. I thought, “Whoa, I’m actually funny.” [laughs] I liked season six. I know it wasn’t everyone’s favorite, but that was the year Silas finally got to be his own man, which started a succession of other things I got to do that I enjoy. But this season is by far my favorite and I think that’s because we’re taking advantage of every moment we have left to share moments.

Insider.com: Speaking of moments, last week introduced an idea fans have been curious about for years as Silas’ gay tendencies were tested. What did you think about how that was explored?
Hunter: I loved it. As an actor, I crave moments – it doesn’t matter what they are or how different they are from what you think your character would do. Any time something is happening with your character, it’s better than just sitting around. Early on, Silas didn’t feed the storyline as much – I was just there a lot. So I love how involved he has been over the last few seasons. No one told me about the RJ thing before I read the script, so my heart was pounding. That can be scary for an actor because you have to get out of social ideas and just focus on the character but I think Silas responded exactly how I thought he would — and exactly how I would have as well.

RELATED – Is Hunter The Perfect Finnick?

Insider.com: Right. I think we always knew Silas was straight, but he’s been very flexible sexually (recall his season six underwear storytime). What has it meant to represent such a progressive incarnation of your generation, who by and large are much more relaxed about sexuality?
Hunter: I think it’s so fantastic, and such a great advancement. Obviously we have a ways to go, but it is the reality of today. I grew up in Texas, so it’s great to see that in their common experience, young men and women view their blooming sexuality as less cut and dry. I don’t know if that’s something people always understood, grow to understand as they get older or are realizing earlier now because of the current climate. Maybe it’s a mix of both. But yes, I don’t think Silas is hung up on any of that sh*t. Silas prefers women, but in that scene, he wasn’t disgusted by RJ. It was more like, “Oh man, I’m sorry … you just have the wrong idea.”

Insider.com: As a result of Silas’ sexual openness, you’ve become one of the most screencapped and GIF’d actors on TV. Is it bizarre that when people Tweet about Hunter Parrish, there are hundreds of half-naked GIFs at the ready they can include?
Hunter: [laughs] Yea, it is a little weird, but it can also be a little flattering. I was not the coolest kid in school, so to be 18 and on a show where people cared that I took my shirt off was pretty cool. It’s part of the job, so if you don’t like the attention, you have to get out. Of course it can be gratuitous at times, and I chose to not be naked this season because I want to be taken seriously. At a point, I realized I was only auditioning for things that involved nudity or a sex act. And don’t get me wrong, I love being naked. But career-wise, I hope that my part in this eight year show was not just “the guy who gets naked.”

VIDEO – Weed Takes Centerstage on D.U.I

Insider.com: As a result of that, Sunday’s episode might feature TV’s first fully clothed stripper (see clip below).
Hunter: [laughs] Yes, that’s right. They wrote in a stripper scene regardless of whether or not I would take my clothes off or not.

Insider.com: That comes about as Silas tries to get his stolen plants back — looking at the last run of episodes, what are you excited for fans to see?
Hunter: I’m very excited about the occupation he takes on this season. I don’t think this is a spoiler, but the family moves into the legal aspect of weed with the dispensaries. It’s so funny, when our show first talked about legal dispensaries, I thought it was a totally made up thing the writers invented. Two years later, there’s a green cross on every corner in California. I found it so awesome that we did it first.

Insider.com: I’m happy to hear that because I worried Silas’ trajectory was inevitably prison because he was so determined to sell weed.
Hunter: I know, me too [laughs]. Being able to fulfill his dream in a legal way changes everything for him. He loves weed but wanted to go straight and as it develops this season, he comes to terms with that, regardless of the legal issues. It ends in a really beautiful place.

Insider.com: You’ve also spent a lot of time performing and getting your music out there — now that the Little Boxes themesong has returned, will we get to finally hear your take on it?
Hunter: I do! I do! I didn’t think about it back then because I was young and just wanted to do my job. Then we had four seasons where we didn’t have the theme song, but when we brought it back, I told Jenji [Kohan, creator] I really wanted to sing it. And they were totally game! I mean, they got over 100 submissions from artists wanting to do the theme song, so I was really grateful they chose mine. I’m sure it’s not the best thing on the planet, but it’s so cool to be a part of that group now.

[source]

Weeds’ Hunter Parrish On the Series’ Final Season and Trying to Break Into the Recording Industry

Posted on: June 30th, 2012 0 comment

Hunter Parrish — an actor known to many as the dreamboat prodigal son on Weeds, Silas Botwin — may be taking one of the biggest risks of his young, but promising, career. You have to tread lightly when talking about risk in relation to an actor who made his name by playing a character that’s frequently semi-clad, romping around with a dance card’s worth of women or, at various times and seasons, stealing and dealing the series’ titular drug. Or, for that matter, when talking about an actor who’s also carried two musicals on Broadway (playing the lead in Spring Awakening and, most recently, taking a turn as Jesus Christ in Godspell). With all this in mind, Parrish’s latest move may still be the ballsiest one yet: attempting to break into the recording industry. On the verge of the eighth (and final) season of Weeds, which premieres this Sunday, July 1st, Parrish released his debut EP, Guessing Games, earlier in the week. We caught up with the actor-singer to talk about the upcoming season (including whether Season 7′s cliffhanger will be resolved), his new singing career, and what it was like to come of age on Showtime.

So let’s talk about this upcoming season on Weeds. Season 7 ended on a major cliffhanger — will we find out who got shot and who the shooter was during the premiere?

Usually with these, we pick up from where we left off. You figure out [who got shot] quickly and that sort of puts everything in place for the rest of the season. And I can tell you that [the shooter is] a character that people who have watched the show from the beginning will know and will recognize and be like, “Oh it’s that guy.” So that’s kind of exciting for people.

We did a “Best and Worst TV Mothers” post in honor of Mother’s Day and we put Nancy Botwin on our Worst Mothers list. Would you agree with that? Or do you think as her TV son, she’s actually a good mom?

I think initially on our show she made the choices she had to make, but it’s a dynamic where she probably started out as a better mom than she’s become, and I think in her liberation from the traditional suburban world and into the drug world, she became selfish. You could say she started out with all the right intentions and then she lost herself along the way. But I can say that in Season 8, we all will return back to where we started and she [does that] in a great way. She definitely discovers that she hasn’t been the best mom and so she starts trying to be a better one.

What was it like to have your teenage years played out on camera, especially all of the risqué moments you’ve had on Weeds?

It’s kind of funny because I lost perspective on that. When I read the pilot for Weeds, we were all like, “Whoa, what is this?” but it’s so normal now and it’s been eight years. At the very beginning, doing a show where I would be naked the entire time and having sex with girls and doing drugs was pretty crazy because I grew up in Texas with a pretty sheltered life. I talked to my parents about it and I was like, “Are you guys okay with this?” And they were like, “Hunter, you know who you are, you know what you believe in, where you stand, you go on this path and see where it takes you, and we’ll be here to remind you of who you are.”

You have an EP coming out. What can you tell us about it?

I started working on music three years ago and the record is sort of like folk-pop. I gravitate towards pop music and music that is easy to listen to but pop doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be Justin Bieber. I’ve always been a Bob Dylan fan and I listen to a lot of Ryan Adams.

Are you nervous at all about the difficulty that crossover artists have had? You’ve been on Broadway and have clearly established yourself as a performer and a singer but with the EP it sounds like it’s really new territory.

That’s the hardest part of this entire thing. I’ve been making music on my own since I was fifteen but shortly after that, I got Weeds so my life and my career became more about TV. Also, I was told early on to break into music first but that didn’t happen for me. So does that mean that you abandon your passion for music? For me, the answer is “no.” Am I scared? Sure. You watch these actors try and make albums and if it doesn’t hit, they sort of die off. I’ve always had the desire for music so my intention is to make music whether people really respond to it or not. Hopefully other people will appreciate it but the truth is, I will always be making music regardless. And that gives me a lot of comfort in going forward.

Do you have any people that you look to as a role model — performers who have been successful at going back-and-forth between music and acting?

To be honest, I don’t look at anyone. I hope that I don’t do it like any of them. J.Lo comes to mind when you think of actors turned singers. She is a great example of someone who has hits on the radio and people don’t hate her in movies. Frank Sinatra, he did movies back in the day but people don’t talk about Frank Sinatra and his movies necessarily — he’s such an iconic music guy. He did acting but he only did them because he was Frank Sinatra the singer. And it’s important to remember that. As far as other people, Johnny Depp has a band but you don’t hear it on the radio. People can ridicule him all they want, but the truth is, he’s making music that he wants to make. It’s that simple.

And what if people ridiculed you?Would you be content even if the public doesn’t respond the way that you might have originally hoped?

I’d like to say that I would. You know, you don’t really know what you’re going to do until that happens. But I would. Some people know me from the show but it’s not like that many people know me so I’m hoping I can surprise people. I think some of the most terrible creativity comes from trying to write what you think people will like and that’s kind of why I’m frustrated with our music industry today. Music is written with the idea that it will be put on the radio and it will become a hit. And that’s so boring to me. Death Cab for Cutie is one of my favorite bands and they write music that they want to write and it’s freaking good. And they have one song that made it on the radio out of all of their records, “I Will Follow You Into the Dark.“ They write music that they care about because they’re real musicians. So I’m trying to go down that path.

And you have other irons in the fire, so you’re in a fortunate position.

Exactly! I already have an acting career so music doesn’t have to be a compromise at all.

[source]

Hunter Parrish Expresses Himself

Posted on: June 28th, 2012 0 comment

When Hunter Parrish first started his role on “Weeds” as a fresh-faced 18-year-old, he likely didn’t expect he’d still be playing the same character at 25! The TV cutie stops by the Studio to chat about the 8th and final season of his hit Showtime series and how he will be scratching his creative itch going forward — music! Branching out with a single, “Sitting At Home”, and marrying his two passions on Broadway in ‘Godspell’, it seems this multi-talented star will be just fine after the Botwins take their final bows! Hosted by Nikki Novak.

[source]

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