Matthew Rhys has always been drawn to playing men on the fringes of society.
In the past year, he’s given two different performances that show just how smoothly he can slip into a stranger’s skin. On Netflix The monster inside me, He brings equal parts charm and menace to Niall Jarvis, the real estate mogul accused of murdering his first wife and who takes a malicious interest in his grieving writer neighbor Aggie Wiggs (Claire Danes). And on Apple TV Widow’s BayReese happily toes the line between horror and comedy as Tom Loftis, a beleaguered mayor desperately trying to boost tourism on the New England island—despite residents’ long-time belief that the land is cursed.
Although his acting style has not changed, Rhys admits that the way he chooses his roles has changed over time. “You spend your 20s saying, ‘Oh my God, what are people going to think?’” “And then in your 30s and 40s, you say, ‘Oh, actually, no one cares what you do or think,’” says Reiss, 51. “So I say, ‘Learn more.’ Try an accent. Make a fool of yourself. Great performances by Al Pacino and Dustin Hoffman, it’s that.” particle He swings – and I say, “I have to start doing this because I’m running out of time.” “
Reese plays a particularly large role The monster inside metapping into the dark side of himself that he rarely shows on screen. Danes, who helped develop the limited series with her Homeland Showrunner Howard Gordon says Niall was always the most difficult character to understand. “The actor needed to have that sense of threat while still being magnetic and charming; you want to feel drawn to him and repulsed by him and slightly afraid of him,” says Danes. THR. “There are a lot of competing forces, and not many people can handle that as brilliantly as Matthew did.”
For Rhys, the cat-and-mouse dynamic between Aggie and Nile is established “very concretely” in the pilot, when they are forced to confront their preconceived notions of each other during a public luncheon. “This unlikely friendship forms between the two as they’ve been exposed a little bit by society and they’re both isolated. They look like each other, but they’re also deeply infatuated with each other,” Rees says. Niall personally enjoys teasing Aggie: “He loves how reactionary she is to him. He enjoys it a little perversely because she’s trying to present her as something, and he’s like, ‘I see you, and that’s not you.’”
Over the course of eight episodes, Rhys paints a compelling psychological portrait of a man whose “original wound” was being blamed by his tyrannical father (Jonathan Banks) for his mother’s death in childbirth. Carrying this guilt for decades has manifested itself in a quiet rage that comes out in crimes of passion, including the murder of his wife. “It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy, which is that the way anger is created makes them do something that amplifies that anger again,” Rees points out.
Reese wanted Nile’s tendency to maintain an unsettling sense of calm — even as his world is collapsing around him amid Aggie’s investigation into his troubled past — to resemble Anthony Hopkins’ Hannibal Lecter. The actor, along with the writers, only finds a few special moments to reveal Nile’s true nature. For example, in the memorable chicken-eating scene in episode two, “There’s that moment where the impulse takes over, where he’s enjoying something so much, where he can’t help himself — which I think happens to Niall a lot,” says Rhys. What Niall does always “gets a little out of control”.
Nile definitely gets his comeuppance when his second wife Nina (Brittany Snow) records him confessing to his murderous tendencies. But even as tension rose between the two, Snow marveled at Reese’s ability to slip in and out of character at any moment. “Before we got into the bedroom scene where he had to yell at me, or fight, or slap each other, we were laughing so hard I was crying,” Snow says.
Reese’s natural intelligence is readily apparent Widow’s Baywhich he praises JawsStephen King and John Carpenter. Rhys had never read anything quite like creator Katie Dippold’s pilot, and like the audience, he “wanted to know what happened to these people.”
Due to his lack of formal comedy training, Rhys was initially apprehensive about the tone of the show, but was relieved when Diebold and producing director Hiro Murai asked him to “play the truth” of each situation. “They said, ‘Horror comedy should be driven by characters and situations, and if we play it real, it should evolve from that,’” he recalls. “It was very liberating, and then I said to myself: ‘I’ll do this as a drama, and I’ll be fine.’ “
Much of the comedy in the first season derives from Tom living in constant denial that the town where he was going to spend the summer with his divorced fisherman father is haunted by ghosts. Tom’s insistence on finding semi-plausible scientific explanations for the island’s paranormal activity—particularly the infamous Sea Hag in episode three—ultimately comes from a place of good faith, if misguided. “He’s trying to raise his son as a single parent, and he says, ‘Okay, I’m going to make the best of this situation. I’m going to turn this city into something prosperous where my son can thrive,'” Reese says. But naturally, he cannot keep his eyes closed for long.
While waiting for the green light for a potential second season Widow’s BayReese recently wrapped production on the new season of the legal anthology for Apple TV Presumed innocentand he’s already busy preparing for the new BBC drama Dragon slayersIn which he will play the role of legendary investigative journalist Harry Evans. Rees also hopes to bring his one-man show by Richard Burton to New York City next year.
But the actor will always hold out hope for continuity Brothers and sistersin which he and Luke MacFarlane played one of the first gay couples on network television. Reese even confirms that Tom looks similar to him but Kevin’s character was by design: “I wanted a little bit more level [vocal] Sign up because Kevin was always a bit upset and begging people in the same way as Tom.
After ABC abruptly canceled the drama in 2011 following a leadership change, Reese revealed that he, co-star Dave Annable, and producing director Ken Olin unsuccessfully offered the new brass a two-hour holiday special to finish the story. But with Disney recently reviving both Scrubs and Malcolm in the middleRees sees no reason why this conversation can’t be revisited, especially with Oscar and Emmy Award winner Sally Field at the helm. “One of the reasons we do it is because people still come in and say: ‘I really like it Brothers and sisters“That’s why we said, ‘People will still watch it!'” he says.
This story first appeared in the June standalone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To obtain the magazine, click here to subscribe.
