Post by Betsy on Oct 18, 2003 21:58:40 GMT -5
Wyndam of Change
By Darryl Curtis
Following the conclusion of the fourth season, "Angel Magazine" caught up with actor Alexis Denisof for a chat about the latest developments in "Angel," and to find out what he thinks the future holds for Mr. Wesley Wyndam-Price.
He may have started out as a bumbling idiot on Buffy the Vampire Slayer when he entered the fray as Buffy's new Watcher in Season Three, but Wesley Wyndam-Pryce has since proved himself to be one of the most dangerous men in California. When he first arrived in Joss Whedon's universe, the prissy Watcher barely knew how to hold a stake, let alone face up to a posse of blood-hungry vamps. But Wesley has since stood along-side the Angel Investigations team and faced an endless slew of demons and monsters, even leading his colleagues headfirst into danger while Angel was otherwise engaged in wreaking his revenge on Wolfram & Hart in the show's second season.
Alexis Denisof is one of the first to admit that the character of Wesley has undergon some significant changes over the years, and reveals that in the early days, he was always trying to persuade Joss Whedon to make his character less of the uptight coward that we all knew him to be. "I always said to Joss that I wanted Wesley to be cool when he was on Buffy," he recalls.
"But I like the old Wesley and the new Wesley," Alexis admits, revealing that he as, ironically, particularly enjoyed revisiting the more nerdy aspects of the character in recent years. "I loved it when Wesley got to be a clown," he says, referring specifically to the Angel Season Four episode "Spin the Bottle", in which a spell caused the characters to revert to the personalities of their youth, allowing Alexis to get back into character as he was in Buffy.
Another Angel episode which allowed Alexis to act the buffoon was Season One's "She", in which Cordelia celebrates moving into her new pad (with Dennis the ghost) by hosting a small soiree for her close friends. As Alexis explains, the script called for Wesley and Angel to dance very badly and fall into people. However, the extras in the episode hadn't been told what was going to happen in the scene, and most of them didn't know who Alexis Denisof was or what his character was like. "People were looking at me, like, 'Who the hell is this guy?!'" he recalls. "They didn't know what was going on."
So what does Alexis put Wesley's previously uptight behaviour down to? "He needed to get laid!" he laughs. Well, in recent years, Wesley's certainly had his fair share of female attention. He dated Virginia in Angel's second season, had a brief liaison with a 'bleached blonde' in "Dear Boy", fell head over heels in love with Fred in the third season (although, sadly, as we all know, the feelings were not reciprocated), and had a steamy affair with Lilah in the fourth season. "I've been very lucky with the leading ladies I've had picked for me," Alexis admits gallantly, adding that he didn't expect to be paired with Wolfram & Hart's sexy but dangerous executive following Wesley's alienation from the gang at the end of Season Three. "I was surprised by Wesley and Lilah, but Stephanie's a knockout, so I'm glad he got laid."
Talking of knockouts, Alexis fondly recalls the climatic fight scene in the Buffy episode "Graduation Day", which saw the students taking up arms to join Buffy and the Scooby Gang and helping them bring down the Mayor. Joss Whedon gave Alexis the coice of getting to join in the fray and prove his mettle, or getting knocked out with just one punch. "I chose getting knocked out in one punch for comedic value!" he says.
"Graduation Day" is just one of the episodes of Buffy and Angel which has seen Wesley take a pounding, and surely one of the character's biggest claims to fame is his ability to have stayed alive against all odds. He's been shot (in "the Thin Dead Line"), had his throat sliced open (in "Sleep Tight"), been almost suffocated by his former boss (in "Forgiving") and tortured nearly to the point of death by Faith (in "Five by Five"). But somehow he's always managed to pull through.
See Next Post for Article Continuation
By Darryl Curtis
Following the conclusion of the fourth season, "Angel Magazine" caught up with actor Alexis Denisof for a chat about the latest developments in "Angel," and to find out what he thinks the future holds for Mr. Wesley Wyndam-Price.
He may have started out as a bumbling idiot on Buffy the Vampire Slayer when he entered the fray as Buffy's new Watcher in Season Three, but Wesley Wyndam-Pryce has since proved himself to be one of the most dangerous men in California. When he first arrived in Joss Whedon's universe, the prissy Watcher barely knew how to hold a stake, let alone face up to a posse of blood-hungry vamps. But Wesley has since stood along-side the Angel Investigations team and faced an endless slew of demons and monsters, even leading his colleagues headfirst into danger while Angel was otherwise engaged in wreaking his revenge on Wolfram & Hart in the show's second season.
Alexis Denisof is one of the first to admit that the character of Wesley has undergon some significant changes over the years, and reveals that in the early days, he was always trying to persuade Joss Whedon to make his character less of the uptight coward that we all knew him to be. "I always said to Joss that I wanted Wesley to be cool when he was on Buffy," he recalls.
"But I like the old Wesley and the new Wesley," Alexis admits, revealing that he as, ironically, particularly enjoyed revisiting the more nerdy aspects of the character in recent years. "I loved it when Wesley got to be a clown," he says, referring specifically to the Angel Season Four episode "Spin the Bottle", in which a spell caused the characters to revert to the personalities of their youth, allowing Alexis to get back into character as he was in Buffy.
Another Angel episode which allowed Alexis to act the buffoon was Season One's "She", in which Cordelia celebrates moving into her new pad (with Dennis the ghost) by hosting a small soiree for her close friends. As Alexis explains, the script called for Wesley and Angel to dance very badly and fall into people. However, the extras in the episode hadn't been told what was going to happen in the scene, and most of them didn't know who Alexis Denisof was or what his character was like. "People were looking at me, like, 'Who the hell is this guy?!'" he recalls. "They didn't know what was going on."
So what does Alexis put Wesley's previously uptight behaviour down to? "He needed to get laid!" he laughs. Well, in recent years, Wesley's certainly had his fair share of female attention. He dated Virginia in Angel's second season, had a brief liaison with a 'bleached blonde' in "Dear Boy", fell head over heels in love with Fred in the third season (although, sadly, as we all know, the feelings were not reciprocated), and had a steamy affair with Lilah in the fourth season. "I've been very lucky with the leading ladies I've had picked for me," Alexis admits gallantly, adding that he didn't expect to be paired with Wolfram & Hart's sexy but dangerous executive following Wesley's alienation from the gang at the end of Season Three. "I was surprised by Wesley and Lilah, but Stephanie's a knockout, so I'm glad he got laid."
Talking of knockouts, Alexis fondly recalls the climatic fight scene in the Buffy episode "Graduation Day", which saw the students taking up arms to join Buffy and the Scooby Gang and helping them bring down the Mayor. Joss Whedon gave Alexis the coice of getting to join in the fray and prove his mettle, or getting knocked out with just one punch. "I chose getting knocked out in one punch for comedic value!" he says.
"Graduation Day" is just one of the episodes of Buffy and Angel which has seen Wesley take a pounding, and surely one of the character's biggest claims to fame is his ability to have stayed alive against all odds. He's been shot (in "the Thin Dead Line"), had his throat sliced open (in "Sleep Tight"), been almost suffocated by his former boss (in "Forgiving") and tortured nearly to the point of death by Faith (in "Five by Five"). But somehow he's always managed to pull through.
See Next Post for Article Continuation
