Moviefone Editorial

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  • ‘The Defenders’ Star Mike Colter on Luke Cage’s Exes, Cast Chemistry

    'Marvel's The Defenders' New York PremiereNow that Luke Cage is out of prison, he’s proving he can work and play well with others — namely, the other four superheroic leads of the Netflix-Marvel series now united in “Marvel’s The Defenders.” And actor Mike Colter’s happy to be a team player, too: after a years-long build-up, he’s taking his place in the ensemble and adding Cage’s bulletproof muscle to the group.

    While Cage initially has no direct connection to the villainous ninja death cult The Hand which the heroes band together from their various New York City boroughs to battle, the backdrop is still particularly provocative for him: Luke suddenly finds his past and current paramours — Jessica Jones, Misty Knight, and Claire Temple, respectively — regularly crossing paths. And, as Colter tells Moviefone, while those awkward ex encounters may not be as violent as the ninja battles, they still leave a mark.

    Moviefone: With all the build up to “The Defenders” and all the anticipation, what was it like when you finally got in the room with everybody to shoot some scenes, and what were the surprises that you didn’t anticipate about the whole thing?

    Mike Colter: From the outside, it always seems like actors, when they’re on a screen together, aren’t familiar with one another. So it’s like a weird thing: for everybody else, it seems like it’s brand new, but for us, we palled around because we’ve seen each other at junkets, we’ve seen each other at press, we’ve done press together.

    Finn [Jones] I’d met a few times, but briefly because he’s coming from the UK, or he was actually not around. I’ve known Krysten [Ritter] for a while now. I’ve come into contact with Charlie [Cox]. We’ve crossed paths quite a few times. It wasn’t as if we were completely unfamiliar with each other, and I think it just felt normal. It didn’t feel like it was unusual in the least, really. But we are characters so I think on screen, it felt like it was for the first time.

    What did you enjoy about the way the characters’ dynamics played out once they started butting up against each other? Was there some fun friction and chemistry that you saw in the new guys you were playing with, like Finn and Charlie?

    I think the best part about it is that we basically have, whether we want to admit it or not, there are four alphas — I wouldn’t say alpha male, but alpha personalities. Even Krysten’s character, everybody has their own thing. Nobody’s eager to be friends. So it’s not an alpha male thing, but it is an alpha ego thing, and I think everybody has their own agenda, and no one’s eager to be friends.

    No one’s looking for a team up. No one’s looking for a buddy or a sidekick. So they’re kind of reluctant to do their thing, but I think that’s the best part about it, trying to ease into the situation where we’re going to fight together one way or the other, and trying to see how that’s going to play itself out.

    In terms of revisiting Luke, what were the fun new sides of him that you were able to explore? What was a new challenge that they threw at you?

    I think Luke is now at a stage where he’s not running from the law anymore. He’s aware that there are things out there that he can’t do as a “man of the people,” as the hero of Harlem, or whatever he wants to kind of call himself. But ultimately, he sort of has freedom now to explore.

    It changes his personality, I think. He’s more open. He’s more jovial. He’s more relaxed. He doesn’t feel like he has to hide things. He’s not an open book, but he does have a lot less to hide now. Everyone knows his power. Everyone knows what his real name is. Probably everybody knows what his old name was. They know that he was in prison. They know that he had a wife. There’s really not that many secrets now.

    So now he’s just enjoying himself and trying to figure out how to function in this world openly as a hero that people are aware of. It’s just a different kind of thing. It’s fun because now you get to see Luke function with a more human side. Him dealing with his own powers out in the public and openly.

    Luke has a colorful romantic history, and some of these women are in the same room together with him here. That must have been fun to figure out how to play the sort of romantic tensions that are in his life right now.

    Yeah, I think for most of the audience, I think people are always eager to see how this is going to play out. But I’ll give Marvel and the writers and Netflix and everybody all credit: I’d say maybe 20 years ago if we were doing this, there would be scenes where girls are dressed a little skimpy, and it’d be a little weird. I think they’re pulling back on this whole thing of, well, he slept with multiple girls, and now these girls are going to have a little catfight over him. It’s not that. They’re all adults here. Things happen.

    Needless to say, the history is there, but I think for the audience, it adds a different color to it, adds a level to the interaction between everyone. Every time they see Misty talking to Claire, they’re thinking about that. There’s that added thing. Every time they see Misty come into contact with Jessica Jones for the first time, it’s like, “Oh, what’s going to happen here?” Or Jessica coming into contact with Claire.

    All this underneath it all, the audience is sort of intrigued to see and to wonder, “Is there something there? Is there something that’s going to come up?” Just makes it more interesting. But I don’t think we’re going to stoop to like, girls have to fight about Luke openly, because ultimately, they’re all adults. They make decisions and things happen. That’s just kind of how it is.

    As good as the writers, directors and producers are, and as deeply they do know all these characters, did you feel a little bit like you were Luke’s custodian, in making sure that he always came off the way that you and Cheo [Hodari Coker] have envisioned him?

    Yeah, that, too, but also this being another direction: when he gets out of prison, he does change his path a bit. It’s a new chapter in his life. So this is something that [showrunner] Marco [Ramirez] was going to be a steward in writing and starting to get him on his journey in that direction. Cheo was involved, I think, Melissa [Rosenberg] — all the writers sort of chimed in, I think, to give their opinions about drafts to make sure that it felt right.

    And yes, for sure, I definitely played the custodian of Luke because I wanted to make sure that if something didn’t feel right or if something didn’t make sense, we didn’t spin him in the wrong way. Dialogue, any little thing that sort of didn’t rub right, I felt like I could come to Marco and he would be open to suggestion.

    I think that they things we didn’t want to touch on now and be left to our own show, they left those things alone. There was this thing about making sure every character, made sure everybody knew what they were doing, and if it didn’t feel right, we could talk to Marco, and he was pretty open about helping us.

    Did you and Finn spend a little extra time making sure that the heroes for hire had a dynamic that a lot of fans familiar with the long “Power Man & Iron Fist” partnership are looking forward to seeing, so that it would play just the right way? Did you give a little extra time to the Luke and Danny relationship?

    I don’t think we had to. I think either you have this ability or you don’t. I think as far as working in this business, you have a chemistry that you have in life. Sometimes those things don’t actually line up. You can be with someone you can’t stand, honestly, and that doesn’t mean that it won’t come off on screen well.

    There are so many ways to look at it, even when you have a love affair on screen, you have a romantic relationship on screen, you have a friendship, and it doesn’t mean you actually have it in life. It’s just sometimes things work in a weird way. I think for us, we banter a bit. We have a great rapport. We sort of are alike, but very different, and I think that’s from visualization. We’re very different, same way Jessica and I are different. So our personalities aren’t that far apart, but there’s a lot of things we have in common, and a lot of things that we’re completely off on.

    But we embrace those. The differences sort of make it humorous sometimes. The differences between our characters and between us as people sort of helps to play out this relationship, and we embrace that, because that’s the humor of sort of opposites trying to fit together, trying to work together, and trying to become a “dynamic duo” of sorts. We’re not alike, but that’s part of what makes it work.

    Now that you’ve had this swing again at Luke, and you’ll going to carry what happened to him in “Defenders” over to another season of “Luke Cage,” what’s got you excited about perpetuating the character, staying in him and moving him forward from here?

    The most exciting part about moving him forward from here is trying to figure out really how to actually live a life now. He’s lived a life in secrecy, on the run. Now it’s about living a life with this “impediment.” Because being a superhero as they say, being a person with abilities, it’s not necessarily a good thing. It is an impediment. It does sort of keep you from doing things the way you would like to do them, and there’s a lot of expectation, a lot of responsibility. You have to figure out what you’re going to do for a living — there’s a lot of pressure to figure out what’s the next move for him.

    So what I want to explore, and what’s going to be really interesting for the second season, is seeing how he handles these newfound freedoms. What does it open up for him? How does his life change from now on moving forward? And what is it like to sort of be a person that when you walk down the street, everybody knows who he is?

    It’s a different level. We started to touch on it maybe halfway through the season, of last first season, but there was a lot of other things going on. We’re going to see some other exploration for the character. It’s really great what we’re doing so far, and I’m really happy about the writing. I can’t wait to continue to shoot some more and see where we are by the end of the season, but I’m really happy about the direction so far.

  • Oops: HBO Aired ‘Game of Thrones’ Season 7, Episode 6 Early in Europe

    What in the seven hells is happening at HBO? Sounds like it’s time to Dracarys more employees!

    “Game of Thrones” Season 7 just faced its third known internal leak of the year. Yes, third. The first would be the full Season 7 breakdown that was leaked several months before the season even premiered. That had to be from someone inside. The second was the Star India release of Season 7, Episode 4, “The Spoils of War,” a few days ahead of the scheduled air date. And now, TVLine reports, HBO Spain and HBO Nordic accidentally made Season 7, Episode 6 available On Demand for its subscribers for a full hour, several days ahead of the Aug. 20 premiere date.

    Oops. But lucky subscribers! (But also, very emotional subscribers.)

    HBO Europe said in a statement (via the Associated Press) that it had “learned that the upcoming episode of ‘Game of Thrones’ was accidentally posted for a brief time on the HBO Nordic and HBO Espana platforms. The error appears to have originated with a third party vendor and the episode was removed as soon as it was recognized.”

    That was enough time for the episode to be shared online, with confirmation that it’s legit — and, unlike “The Spoils of War” — in HD. The ep also spread to Reddit and beyond, with all current links being removed. Since it was not a low-quality leak like Episode 4, we now have to see if that changes anything for the overall Sunday night ratings. (It probably won’t.)

    This is all separate from the hackers leaking information. That’s its own trouble. Plus the whole “Confederate” controversy. You’d think this was an awful time for HBO, but “The Spoils of War” was the most-watched episode ever, to that point, despite the leak. Episode 5 “Eastwatch” just upped the ante to claim the throne as the most-watched episode to this point. So despite this new leak, there’s every chance “Death Is the Enemy” (the supposed title of Episode 6) will have record ratings too.

    Still. What is going on? If you want to go full conspiracy theory, maybe it’s a way to get the rest of the viewers around the world obsessively watching their own HBO On Demand set-ups to see if Episode 6 magically pops up. It’ll premiere this Sunday, Aug. 20 at 9 p.m. on HBO (unless you see it sooner).

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  • Shiri Appleby Promises That ‘UnREAL’ Season 3 Has Course Corrected

    SAG-AFTRA Foundation's Conversations With UnREAL“UnREAL” star Shiri Appleby was ready to sample a new flavor in her acting career, and “Lemon” was the combination of tart and sweet she was looking for.

    Directed by Sundance favorite Janicza Bravo, who co-wrote the screenplay with her husband and the film’s star, Brett Gelman, “Lemon” mixes quirky family dysfunction with a haunting underbelly of despair and longing (think Wes Anderson meets Paul Thomas Anderson), casting Appleby as Ruthie, the well-meaning (if often annoyingly demanding in customer service calls), very pregnant sister of Gelman’s falling-apart lead, Isaac.

    As Appleby explains to Moviefone, the role provided a fun departure from her hit series “UnREAL” — which she assures us has regained its creative footing in its upcoming third season — her burgeoning producing and directing career, and her very real home life with the Hollywood crowd’s reigning restaurateur Jon Shook (Jon & Vinny’s, Animal, Son of a Gun) and their children.

    Moviefone: You look like you had a lot of fun with this one.

    Shiri Appleby: A lot of fun. That’s why I wanted to do it. It felt so different from some of the stuff I’ve been doing lately.

    A very different role for you, and just a very different kind of movie. What did you respond to in the very specific voice of Janicza Bravo that you saw here?

    I mean, when I saw the movie I had no idea that that was the movie that I was making that I felt like what was on the page was a really strong female character … Janicza, when I spoke to her on the phone was really like, “Ruthie is the light of this family.” It’s obviously a very dark, heavy family, and the fact that she’s sort of the sparkly energy within this group, I really respond to that.

    And I really liked the idea that I was in the handful of beats that I’m in the movie, I was emotionally going all over the place. So I just felt like it was a great, well-written role, and it was a well-written script, and then I watched Janicza’s shorts and I was incredibly impressed with her, and I just knew that she would make an outstanding first feature, and I wanted to be a part of it.

    The voice of the character itself, especially when she’s on her cell phone — I feel like I’ve been next to this woman in the grocery store or the movie theater.

    She’s not aware of how loud she’s screaming on the phone demanding what it is she wants.

    How fun was that for you, to kind of catch that vibe and to act out those half-heard conversations?

    It was really fun, but at the same time I’m talking to no one! “Does this feel believable? I’m kind of coming off sort of bitchy. How’s this gonna play?” But at the same time she pushed me to go farther and go really mean and really dark, and so just being able to stretch in that way was something that I was really attracted to.

    Did you pick up from anybody that you’d run into in public that was sort of that person?

    Myself, maybe, at times! It’s just life. We’ve all encountered those moments, and especially when she’s a young mother, life is stressful, she’s pregnant again. The weight of the world is constantly on you physically when you’re pregnant, and so if things aren’t going your way, it’s cause for anxiety.

    How nice that with all of the great actors that were recruited for this that you guys did get one big scene where most of you were together. What was that experience like?

    Well, all the actors in the movie were people that I would hope to work with. I became really close with Roswell,” so it was nice to spend some time together, and it was a group of people that you really respected.

    Anybody that you had any downtime with, I felt like “I’m gonna take advantage of this and have some kind of meaningful conversation.” There’s always something to pick up and learn from people, so it was one of those moments when you’re like I feel really grateful that they thought of me for this role. People don’t normally think of me for a comedy, so it was really great to be given this opportunity, and to be surrounded by people that you really respect and admire.

    It’s been cool to see the second act that you’ve been having. You’ve been doing some really adventurous stuff, and now you’ve got a production shingle going. What are you thinking about for the future?

    I’ve been working since I was a kid in this business, and I feel like I’m starting my career over again. I go to work every day at Appletree. We’re busy trying to sell shows and option books and articles, so it’s been really exciting cause I’m learning a totally different side of the business and now I’ve got a handle on it and putting things together and it’s really finding my voice.

    The role of the actor is somewhat limited in the sense that your job is to perform what somebody else has in mind, it’s sort of kind of stay out of the way, and so now to have a strong voice and put shows together … These are the themes and the conversations I’d like to be having that feels really great and to now be on the set as a director and say, “This is the way I imagine it,” and being able to make my days and keep things moving.

    And on “UnREAL” it’s really wonderful – being an actor on a show and directing, you’re like, “There’s a lot of things that have been untapped here.” How do we show the vulnerable sides of Constance [Zimmer‘s] character, and how do we show tougher moments of Rachel, and how do we get inside of her psyche? And it’s been really exciting for me, again, to just have a voice.

    So in terms of moving forward, I’m really grateful that “UnREAL” is getting another season, but I’m really looking to the future of like how do I really create this production shingle to be a really strong voice and a real provider of female stories? That’s something I’m really, really inspired and passionate, working really hard towards. And I really want to continue to direct and helm those things, and find young writers that I really believe in and start to champion them.

    Had that always been a burning desire in your earliest acting days?

    Absolutely. Absolutely.

    So you didn’t turn a corner and say, “I’ve gotta make shows for me to act in”?

    No, and it’s really not even about that. People are like, “Do you want to be in these,” I’m like “Right now I just want to get these shows on the air!” I just really want to have success in this.

    Yes, I always sort of admired a lot of directors. I dated a lot of directors, and I had a wonderful female director I worked with, Liz Allan, and she really gave me the push. I produced for the first time this web series for Alloway called “Dating Rules for my Future Self” and I was really committed from day one of prep to the last day of edit, and when they asked me to star in the second season, she said “Tell them you’ll only do it if you can direct.” And so, she really gave me the push to stand up and say “I’m ready to do this.” I really learned that it’s constantly using your voice and saying “I’m ready for more.” Right now, I’m pushing and asking for two episodes in the second season.

    And what’s been wonderful is that I do have this vast amount of experience and I’ve worked with really wonderful directors from Mike Nichols to David Gordon Green to J.J. Abrams. I’m saying like, I know how they all did it, from being on this side of things, so how do I take what I’ve learned from them and create my own style. I’ve been taught by some of the greatest people at it, so I’m really excited about having my shot.

    And there’s the day job, of course, on “UnREAL.”

    I love acting. Yeah, we start shooting the fourth season October 17th. We’ll probably finish shooting the fourth season before the third season airs. So that will be interesting, and then we will see how the third season does.

    I know some people thought that there were things a bit off about Season 2. Did you feel like it needed a course correction for Season 3?

    Yeah, it needed a course correction. Season 2 was not us at our best, by any means. I think that there was a lot of problems behind the scenes. And so, I think we’ve corrected a lot of those problems, and Stacy Rukeyser ran a really solid third season. She really came in and stabilized the show, and the show got back to what the show is about, which is feminism.

    Really, we don’t need to attack any other conversations. I think the show should stick with what it’s been really set up to achieve, and the third season is really about “Can a successful woman find love with a man without having to put herself down?” And we really explore that conversation, and then Rachel really sort of does a feminist thing, which is she attacks her past and says “How am I going to fix my past, so I can be a better version of myself today and move forward and create a better life for myself?”

    So, it gets really deep and quite dark, which tends to happen in “UnREAL,” and we end up in a really good place. And, I feel like the show creatively will feel much stronger than it was in the second season.

    Because it is all about feminism, how did the show affect or change you?

    Oh my goodness. Well, it’s given my whole career a whole other boost again, so that’s been wonderful. But you’re at the forefront of having a conversation of what is life like for women, so women are connecting to the show and to you in different ways. A lot of women feel like there are such expectations on them that they can’t be certain ways, and this character really discusses that.

    And also, who she is and what she believes, she believes she is a feminist but yet her job is telling her to tear women down. And so women are constantly feeling at odds about those things, and I don’t know if those were conversations that I was completely aware of until I became part of the show and started having the dialogue and hearing other women speak. That’s been really enjoyable. Being able to actually connect with the people that are watching the show in that deeper way has been great.

    And the show’s also allowed me to produce, and has allowed me to direct, so it’s given me a platform. I’ve always felt like I’ve had this potential inside, but they’re allowing me to actually make it happen.

    Are you keeping an eye on the actual reality series world? Because this has been a wild year for news coming out of shows like the ones “UnREAL” satirizes.

    Yes — “Bachelor in Paradise.” I really sure hope that that’s what our show is about in the fourth season because it’s ripe for conversation. One of the successes of the second season, for as shaky as the story telling was, is we did have the first black bachelor, and they just had the first black bachelorette. And so to think that we did pave a way, there is success in that.

    Have you had conversations since “UnREAL” came out with people who have actually participated in shows like “The Bachelor”?

    Endlessly, and they all want to say “Oh the show’s based on me. The show’s based on me, right?”

    That’s why they’re on shows like that.

    Yeah, and producers on the show are saying it, too, and I’m like “I’m pretty sure I know exactly who this character is written about and it’s not you,” but it’s wild that so many people relate to it. So it’s interesting that so many people have stories or personal connections to it. I mean, also, reality TV is a big part of our world today. The man running the world is a reality star.

    What’s been fun and/or weird about being part of a Hollywood power couple?

    Oh, with Jon? The great part is that we definitely have our own careers, and that’s really wonderful for us as a family, for both people to feel like individuals and to have our own successes, and so that’s really great.

    Our jobs sometimes [converge]: he’s catering the Emmy party, but he’s catering the Emmy party. And I’m like, “You have to come with me,” and he’s like, “Oh my God, please don’t make me go to any of those award shows.”

    So there’s a normalcy to it and I think we are both championing for the other person to be more successful. Like, we are both ready to retire if the other person can figure it out, so that’s a big thing. I mean, I’m just endlessly proud of him, and he’s really passionate, and really inspiring, and he’s a really great person to wake up next to.

    It’s great that as things are happening for both of you, you’re career-adjacent. You’re not deep in the exact same thing.

    No, no, no. And again, he can be totally be much more successful and it’s totally fine.

    Do you cook for him?

    All the time. People are like, “Does he cook?” He doesn’t really cook at home that much because by the time he comes home he’s like, “Don’t make me look at a knife.” It’s a lot of Thai food. It’s a lot of Thai food delivery, and I make food for the kids and for the family, but he usually fixes it.

    What else has been on your mind, away from work?

    I’m really focused on my kids. My whole life, when I’m not at work, is really on “How do you raise good people and what does that really mean?” Now we are looking at schools, and it’s like, what am I trying to achieve by sending my kids to school. Do I need my kids to go to Harvard? Do I need my kids to go to Stanford? Or do I just need them to find something that they’re passionate about, that makes them excited? And, how do you give that to your kids? It’s not a huge cause, but that’s a huge cause to me because these are the two little people that I’m responsible for.

    It is very hard to be a working woman because you take time away from your children but you have to keep reminding yourself, “I’m a role model.” My daughter sees what it means to go on set and her mommy works, her mommy can be the boss and women can achieve that. And for my young son to see a woman also have full careers and full lives, and hopefully both kids will see that their parents work really hard for the life that they’re living. It’s really important to me.

  • Ben Affleck: ‘Justice League’ Is ‘Interesting Product of Two Directors’

    The more the merrier, it seems, when it comes to directing “Justice League.”

    The superhero team-up movie started off with Zack Snyder in the director’s chair, but he left the project in May due to a family tragedy. Joss Whedon (“Avengers”) took over reshoots and star Ben Affleck, who plays Batman, calls the directorial team-up fortuitous.

    “The best person we could’ve possibly found was Joss. We got really lucky that he stepped in,” he told Entertainment Weekly.

    It’s unusual for movies to have two different directors (see: the furor over the directorial change-up on the Han Solo “Star Wars” movie). But Affleck believes the Snyder/Whedon mash-up will work.

    It’s “an interesting product of two directors, both with kind of unique visions, both with really strong takes,” he said. “I’ve never had that experience before making a movie. I have to say, I really love working with Zack, and I really love the stuff we’ve done with Joss.”

    Affleck also waved off rumors that the extensive reshoots indicated trouble with the project.

    “I’ve never worked on a movie that didn’t do reshoots,” he said, noting, “‘Argo,’ we did reshoots for a week and a half! Four days on ‘Gone Baby Gone!’”

    “Justice League” opens in theaters November 17.

  • ‘Will and Grace’ Revival Ignoring Series Finale

    It was all a dream?

    When “Will and Grace” returns to NBC this fall over a decade after its series finale, it’s got some ‘splaining to do. After all, the series finale ended with Grace (Debra Messing) having a daughter with husband Leo and Will (Eric McCormack) adopting a son with partner Vincent.

    So, how will the revival address those events? It’s just going to ignore them!

    “We spent most of our time trying to figure out what would be the way to make the show the best version of itself coming back after 11 years,” creator Max Mutchnick told Entertainment Weekly. “That finale really caused us a lot of grief. You write a finale because a show is over. You never think that it’s coming back again.”

    Mutchnick and fellow creator David Kohan debated keeping Will and Grace’s kids. But as Kohan explained, “If they have children, then it has to be about them being parents, ’cause presumably it would be a priority in their lives. And if it wasn’t a priority in their lives, then they’re still parents, they’re just bad parents, right? We frankly did not want to see them being either good parents or bad parents. We wanted them to be Will and Grace.”

    So, everything is getting retconned, including Jack and Karen’s endings. Jack (Sean Hayes) will still be living next door and teaching the craft of “Jackting,” while Karen (Megan Mullally) still drinks and knows things in her mansion.

  • Rob Lowe & Sons Recall the Early Trauma That Led to ‘The Lowe Files’

    2017 Summer TCA - PortraitsWhen a father is an absolute enthusiast for the weird, the out-there, and the paranormal, and his two sons have a decidedly more skeptical view, throwing them into sites rumored to be haunted, visited by aliens, or home to a Sasquatch promises intrigue — and a bit of infighting.

    And when the family in question is headed by actor Rob Lowe, and his two sons Matthew and John Owen have no qualms about telling him when they think he’s full of it — and quake in their boots a little when it occasionally appears that he’s not — it’s also downright hilarious.

    That’s the setup for A&E’s “The Lowe Files,” a new series in which Lowe — whose open-mindedness toward the uncanny has long been an element of the clan’s private adventures since his children were young — embarks on some father-son bonding with his offspring, road-tripping to join experts in the paranormal in investigation phenomena that alternately prove eerie or absurd — and highly amusing, Moviefone learned while chatting with the Lowe men, as the skeptical sons constantly attempt to deflate their dad’s burning desire to believe.

    Moviefone: Where did it start with you, your interest in the paranormal? What sparked your interest and then made you want to share it with your sons?

    Rob Lowe: One of the first books I read myself as a boy was “Dracula.” One of the first movies that made an impact on me was a stupid little Scooby-Doo.”

    So I’ve always just liked that stuff, and when these kids were babies, when you see in the opening of the show, that’s real footage of me taking them on hikes and saying, “I wonder if there’s a Bigfoot …” Just to get a rise out of them and just have fun with it. And one thing sort of led to another. This is a real, authentic extension of what we’re into.

    Tell me about the early exposure to this kind of stuff, and sharing that with your dad.

    Matthew Lowe: It starts at that camping trip that we went on in the opening of the show, where he dressed up as a Bigfoot and tried to scare the sh*t out of us.

    John Owen Lowe: And Matthew, being the fearless one, actually ran up to my dad in a Sasquatch costume and kicked him in the nether regions.

    Rob: Sasquatches don’t have nuts.

    John Owen: Yeah, and, meanwhile, I was hiding in a trailer crying with my cousin, who was so scarred by the event, he literally never went back into the woods — never again! We were maybe seven or eight years old.

    Were you kids scarred?

    Rob: I was scarred. It taught me to always try on your costume before you need to use it. I rented it from Western Costume, but I hadn’t tried it on until I was in the woods, in the campsite, in the dark, and the head was too big for me, so the eye holes were way up here, and I couldn’t see. So I was, like, staggering around blind.

    John Owen: So messed up!

    The vibe that comes off in the beginning of the series is that this was a special time for you. It wasn’t just for the show, but just spending the time together. Tell me what that meant to you, to be able to reconnect and go on your journey together.

    John Owen: I think what it was, he was in Loyola Law School. Our dad’s shooting “Code Black.” I was finishing my junior year at Stanford. So we were all completely doing our own things and so busy, that to be able to come together every weekend on go on silly adventures together that we love was like…

    Rob: The best father/son bonding. Really, at the end of the day, that’s what the show is.

    The first show is a rousing success as far as what you discovered, in paranormal terms. But there’s also some failures along the way.

    Matthew: Oh yeah. There were just some ones we were like, “You know what? Better luck next week.”

    John Owen: Arguably those are some of the most fun episodes.

    Did the duds make better shows, in some ways?

    John Owen: Arguably, yes. You get more of us just being idiots and more of us just goofing off.

    Matthew: I think the experts are more sad that nothing happens.

    John Owen: Yeah, you could see the experts we bring on, they’re maybe a little disappointed, and we’re just like, “This was great! We got to ride ATVs in the desert! Cheers!” And then we’re off.

    There are those dicey moments in the pilot, where we can tell you guys are genuinely freaked out. In the rest of the show, does it go further?

    Matthew: It does, but that pilot was such, like, the gnarliest initiation into what this was going to be.

    Rob: I thought, If every week is going to be like this, we’re not going to survive it.

    John Owen: It was real fear. Genuine, real fear. I’ll never forget shooting the pilot. Our last day of filming, we were really late into the castle. We wrapped, and I booked it out. I was like, “I am out of here. I’m never going back to this spot on Earth ever again.”

    Rob: And we stayed.

    Matthew: Meanwhile, we wrapped, and I stayed the night in the castle with the docents, because I was so into it.

    John Owen: Crazy people!

    I love, too, that you guys all have varying levels of wanting to believe or wanting to doubt. So did the experience change you? Did you walk away with a more open mind or a less open mind in your case?

    John Owen: The less open mind, I would love to hear about that.

    Rob: Yeah, less open mind on UFOs. I think that anything that people see is ours. That’s what I’ve come up with.

    Matthew: You said a less open mind on UFOs. You just said you changed what you think they are.

    Rob: They’re not UFOs.

    Matthew: It’s still, technically, an “unidentified flying object.” You just think that they’re ours.

    Rob: Yes. Most people, when they say UFOs, immediately think from other planets or other beings. I don’t believe that. I believe they’re ours. Did you see, yesterday, that NASA released that their new plane will be able to fly from, I don’t know, California to London in 35 minutes? Well, no sh*t. They’ve had that technology for 50 years.

    John Owen: This is where you’re starting to approach borderline conspiracy theorist in Rob Lowe.

    But you’re not at your friend Charlie Sheen‘s level.

    Rob: I’m not, no. Thank God.

    How deep do you go, though, when you’ve gotten into it with Charlie?

    Rob: Nobody can go as deep as The Machine! I think, pretty much, as a society, we’ve come to a conclusion. Nobody goes deeper than Charlie.

    What do you guys believe in now, at least a little bit?

    John Owen: It’s not a role I enjoy, being the skeptic, but it’s the truth. This show is all about authenticity, and, genuinely, I go into these situations and I’m like, “B.S. — I don’t believe it.”

    And there are plenty of things in this season that I’m happy to admit, “I don’t have an explanation for that.” I can’t tell you what that was, what that noise, sound, image was. But I don’t think it’s a ghost. I don’t think it’s Sasquatch. I don’t think it’s a lizard person, whatever they might tell you.

    Rob: In all fairness, neither do I, necessarily. But if it’s jump ball, I’d so much rather it be Sasquatch.

    John Owen: The slogan on the billboard is his line.

    Rob: That’s my line: “It’s more fun to believe.”

    Did you ever have an experience that tested you before this whole thing?

    Rob: Absolutely. I’ve had mediums, psychics, or whatever, say things … Now granted, I know that I’m really, really well-known, so I guess they could do their research and all of that stuff. But I’ve had them come up with things that there’s no way anybody ever…

    Matthew: What about your driving home and seeing the lights in the sky?

    Rob: Yeah, I did have that. The thing that’s amazing is that your logical mind always kicks in and goes, “Ah, that’s bullsh*t. That was a transformer blowing up. That’s the reason the sky lit up. And that voice you heard, there was something coming through the pipe.” Our logical minds discount stuff every day, and I’ve certainly had my share of that.

    One quick example: I had a medium tell me, “Robert’s here.” Okay, I had a grandfather named Robert. “He’s holding … a pie? He’s holding a bunch of pies. Does that make sense?” And my grandpa, when I would go home for the summers to Ohio, would meet me at the airport every single time holding pies. Look, I don’t know what that is. It’s never been in print. It’s never been on Google. It could be anything. He could be holding a candle, he could be holding a sign. He’s holding pie. Who knows? And on and on.

    John Owen: It’s tough for the skeptic to battle you on that one.

    There’s a moment in the first episode where, Rob, you cause quite a commotion when you show up at a small town donut shop. Are you excited for the day you walk into the donut shop and they get all the attention because everybody loves this show so much?

    John Owen: I can answer it for you. He’s not excited for that.

    Rob: Look, the torch has to be passed at some point. If the new young bucks are going to come and push me out, it might as well be my own kids.

    Are you sure you want them telling everybody you’re full of sh*t on TV though?

    John Owen: If I’m going to tell it to anybody, it might as well be on national television.

    Rob: I always look through things, honestly, through a little bit of a prism of: If somebody who I admired or liked or considered one of my peers, or somebody I was a fan of, did this thing I’m thinking about doing, would I be jealous? And this was a resounding “yes.” This was like, You have to be flipping kidding me if I turned on this show and it was one of my peers doing it! I’d be like, “Why didn’t I think of that?”

    Listen, there’s so much more stuff I want to check out: the Bermuda Triangle.

    John Owen: Loch Ness Monster.

    Rob: The Menehune and Night Marchers in Hawaii.

    That’s a deep dive!

    Rob Lowe: That’s a deep dive, but it’s fascinating. It’s sort of the perfect thing. Most people have never heard of it, and it’s so frightening. The Night Marchers are the people that march every night, from the top of the volcanos to the sea, on the Big Island of Hawaii. If you see them, if you look in their face — you’re dead! The Hawaiians, the 100% Hawaiians, to a man to a woman, will tell you they’re real.

    If nothing else, you get to have some great interactions and conversations with people who specialize in these areas, and that’s got to be fascinating.

    Rob: Fascinating! When you’re talking to these tribal members, who will talk about hundreds of years of their people, living with Sasquatch, and they all have had an encounter — when a guy says, “I was touched, one put his hand through my window when I was eight, touched my heart. I screamed, and my dad got a gun, and ran out to the porch, and was ready to kill it, until they looked in each other’s eyes, and it looked like a man.”

    When they’re telling you those stories, you’re like, “I guess you could be lying. Sure. You could absolutely be pulling my chain. But why?” And if he is, he should be acting.

    “The Lowe Files” premieres tonight (Aug. 2nd) on A&E.

  • Exclusive: ‘Shazam’ Director David Sandberg on ‘Getting to Know the Character’

    Earlier today, we talked to David Sandberg, the super talented Swedish filmmaker behind last year’s sleeper hit “Lights Out” and next week’s “Conjuring” spin-off, “Annabelle: Creation.” It was a lively chat that we’ll have up next week, but, while we were on the phone with Sandberg, we couldn’t help but ask about his next project, an adaptation of the DC comic book “Shazam.”

    We first asked if there was a specific tone that he was going for with the adaptation. (The character was created by writer Bill Parker and artist C.C. Beck way back in 1939.)

    “This will be very different than what I’ve done in the feature space, because it’s not a horror movie and it’s a much lighter tone. But it’s something that I look forward to trying out, even though I plan to return to horror in some fashion,” Sandberg explained. “My background, back in Sweden, before I started doing horror shorts, I was doing animated comedy shorts. It’s not totally alien to me to have more of a comedy approach. I look forward to taking that on in a feature.”

    We also asked if there was a particular run of the comics that he was drawing inspiration from. When we said how much we loved the miniseries from “Bone” creator Jeff Smith, Sandberg said he hadn’t read that one … yet. In fact, the character (and his rich background) is largely new to him.

    “It wasn’t a character I grew up with. It was published in Sweden, where I’m from, in the ’70s, so it’s a little before my time. So I only knew him from the Justice League,” Sandberg admitted. “It’s not until now that I’m getting into the comics and reading a lot of the old ones, the Geoff Johns ones, ‘The Power of Shazam,’ and looking at a bunch of animation. So I’m really getting to know the character.”

    Another item Sandberg confirmed: that this will be a New Line movie, not a Warner Bros. film. This suits the filmmaker just fine considering that both “Lights Out” and “Annabelle: Creation” were made for the studio. About New Line, the director said: “They’ve been awesome. I will keep making movies with them as long as they want me.”

    We’ll have more from our interview with Sandberg next week, ahead of the release of “Annabelle: Creation” on August 11th.

  • ‘The Middle’ Ending on ABC After Season 9

    “The Middle” is coming to its end.

    The ABC family comedy will wrap up in 2018 following Season 9. As executive producer Eileen Heisler told Entertainment Weekly, “We sat down with the cast at the end of last year. It was important to have a year to say goodbye. We want to be able to tell all the stories.”

    The series premiered in 2009 and stars Patricia Heaton and Neil Flynn as working-class parents to three kids: Axl (Charlie McDermott), Sue (Eden Sher), and Brick (Atticus Shaffer). The show received modest ratings, but was nowhere close to the success of network sibling “Modern Family,” which debuted at the same time.

    “Some know about us, some don’t. We are at heart a midwestern show,” said executive producer DeAnn Heline. “If we can be underappreciated for nine years and be on the air, we’re lucky.”

    The writers already know how they want the show to end; they’ve been working toward it for several seasons.

    “It will be true to our show,” Heisler promised. “It’s an end that fans will like.”

  • The CW Reveals Two-Night Dates for 2017 Superhero Series Crossover

    Mark your calendars now! The CW’s 2017 four-way superhero crossover will air across two nights this November, as opposed to four last year.

    The CW is at the TCAs today, and they announced the first night of the crossover will be Monday, November 27, with “Supergirl” paired with “Arrow” — which means “Arrow” will move to Monday just for the special event. The crossover ends the next night with “The Flash” and “DC’s Legends of Tomorrow.”

    Here’s a mini cheat sheet:

    • Monday, Nov. 27 (“Supergirl” and “Arrow”)
    • Tuesday, Nov. 28 (“The Flash” and “Legends of Tomorrow”)

    Last year, the four shows crossed paths to battle the Dominators, across four nights. However, some fans complained that it wasn’t really a four-way crossover because the storytelling didn’t actually take place across all four shows. The action mostly focused on “The Flash,” “Arrow,” and “Legends,” with one epilogue scene for “Supergirl.” Back in Feburary, executive producer Andrew Kreisberg said they were “hoping to do a true four-way crossover” this time.

    This week, when addressing the change to two nights, The CW president Mark Pedowitz said (via Deadline), “Last year’s (crossover) was the most successful week in CW history in terms of ratings and everything. We felt in this particular case we had Flash on Legends paired, so it was better to make it two two-hour movies — a miniseries. We thought this was the best way to go. We had a lot of conversations with producers and marketing people. Next year, we might go back to four nights.”

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  • ‘Kevin Can Wait’ Is Killing Off Erinn Hayes’s Character

    In early June, “Kevin Can Wait” fans learned the shocking news that leading lady Erinn Hayes had been let go from the CBS comedy, with Leah Remini taking her place opposite her former “King of Queens” co-star Kevin James.

    Now comes another shocker: Hayes’ character, Donna, will be killed off! CBS executives revealed that info at the Television Critics Association’s summer press tour.

    “The character will have passed away and we will be moving forward in time catching up at a later date,” CBS exec Thom Sherman said.

    Remini guest starred in May’s Season 1 finale as an undercover cop and former partner of James’ retired officer. She and James acted side by side for nine years on “King of Queens,” also a CBS comedy.

    Nine or 10 months will have passed when Season 2 premieres, giving James’ character and their on-screen children time to grieve and move on.

    When asked if the sitcom would make Donna’s death funny, CBS Entertainment president Kelly Kahl said there were no plans to do that.

    “I’m not sure we can make that hilarious,” he said. It will be treated with dignity and respect and the show will move forward. It’s something that will have taken place in the past. I don’t want to address it until we see eventually what’s on tape in the first episode.”