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Wilfred

Coverage by Nobuhio Hosoki

Story : The story of Ryan, a depressed man who believes he is getting nowhere in his life and plans to kill himself. In the middle of his attempted suicide, he is asked to watch his neighbor's dog, Wilfred, but Ryan can only see Wilfred as a real person instead of a animal that everyone else sees.

 

Q&A with Elijah Wood

 

(Q) : This premiers tonight on FX at 10, so how are you feeling about it?
 
(Elijah Wood) : I'm excited. I'm very curious for people to see it; I think it's very unique and kind of different. It's not the easiest show to describe. It's essentially about a man who befriends a dog, but he sees the dog as a man in a dog suit. But there are a lot of layers to it and there's a lot more to it than that. So I'm just curious for people to see the show for the first time. It's exciting. We just finished shooting 13 episodes three weeks ago, so the fact that it's airing tonight is wild.
 
(Q) : How did it come to you? How'd you get involved with it?
 
(Elijah Wood) : My manager sent me a copy of the script, said it was the funniest thing she'd ever read. I read it and I completely agreed. It was unlike anything I'd ever seen on television or read before. It really reminded me of "Harvey." I'm a huge fan of Jimmy Stewart's "Harvey," and this is like "Harvey" on acid. A little bit ruder version.

I loved that it was both hilarious but also there was a reality to what the character was going through and that there was almost this regal aspect of the manifestation of Wilfred, that you could almost interpret that as out of this moment of crisis or insanity or loss of sanity my character manifests this as a coping mechanism. And that's one way to look at what Wilfred really is in terms of the progress over the course of the show, and I loved that, I thought it was such a unique, interesting story.
 
(Q) : Tell us a little bit about your character.
 
(Elijah Wood) : I play a guy called Ryan. You find him in the opening episode kind of having hit a wall in his life, and he's ultimately done everything that everyone else wanted him to do as a father, wanted him to be a lawyer, his sister wanted him to take a certain path, and he never ultimately followed his own path.

He went so far down that road of not serving himself that he thought the only way out was suicide, at which he fails miserably, and out of the ashes of that he meets Wilfred. So he's a guy that is desperate to find his own way and never really found the tools within himself to make that happen and to kind of live life freely without some of the confines or sort of his shackles.

(Q) : Can you tell us a little bit about the gentleman who plays Wilfred? Because this did not originate in the States, right?
 
(Elijah Wood) : Correct. Jason Gann created the character that you see, Wilfred, and it was initially a short film. As the story goes, he was stoned with a friend of his and they were talking about how a mutual friend of theirs, this woman, had a dog that would give a lot of trouble to her perspective boyfriends and basically cock block her.

So he created this character, they were sitting on a couch and he started affecting this character of Wilfred, and they both concurred that that was a great idea for a short film. They made a short, it won the Short Film Festival in Australia, and then from there they made a series.
 
(Q) : Had you watched the series before?
 
(Elijah Wood) : When I read the script it was the first time I'd heard of the show, so I looked up clips on YouTube because that was all that I could find. And I still haven't seen the series. I've seen the short, the short's pretty wonderful, but I've not actually seen the series. And it's a little bit different.

The main difference between our show and theirs is that essentially Wilfred is basically the dog of the girlfriend, whereas in this it's a next door neighbor. And then also Ryan, the character in this, he has mental issues and depression, which the character did not have in the original. So it kind of gives a little bit more of a context for why Wilfred might manifest.
 
(Q) : Can you describe the first meeting you had with Jason Gann and talking about this character, talking about the show and how to adapt it.
 
(Elijah Wood) : There are two things I could go with that. The first actual meeting I had in regards to "Wilfred" I sat down with David Zuckerman. David Zuckerman's our head writer and our show running, and he hails from "Family Guy," from animation as a writer there. I read the script and loved it but it was wonderful to meet him because I was able to get a sense of where the show was going to go.

And he talked to me about the character, how he felt there were all these opportunities for comedy but then also for surreality to sort of start to infringe upon the show and for it to become a little bit stranger and more surreal as it goes along, and Ryan's on this journey of trying to essentially keep his feet on the ground and recover in the midst of this relationship with Wilfred. And I just fell in love with it even more, and then from there I went through the audition process and met Jason.

I met Jason actually in an audition reading for the role, and he was wonderful and hilarious. And we ended up doing a test, because they do this for networks, they basically put you in front of a camera. Everybody has to test, and so he actually was in the Wilfred costume for my test. It felt great and we kind of immediately had a great connection and a great sense of chemistry I think and worked really well together. That then transposed into doing the pilot and we've just kind of had a great working relationship ever since and kind of make that dynamic come to life.

(Elijah Wood) : It sets up beautifully their relationship in terms of what Wilfred's going to be for him. And there's something kind of dangerous about that too. The moment kind of follows after that and Ryan looks at him and said "That's not just a ball." There's an immediate sense of distrust because what are Wilfred's intentions, and I think throughout the show that's constantly a question, whether or not Wilfred's genuinely looking out for Ryan's best interest or not.
 
(Q) : A lot of actors who are well known for their film work are gravitating towards series television. Were you looking for that opportunity when this came or was it just a role that you really wanted to play?
 
(Elijah Wood) : I was actually looking at television drama, I wasn't necessarily looking at comedy, mainly because it has opened up so much in the last five years and I'm a huge fan of shows like "Breaking Bad" and "Mad Men" and "The Wire." It's an incredible medium for storytelling to be able to tell stories with character development over the course of multiple seasons. There are incredible actors and directors and writers that have moved to television, so I was interested in it as a medium and just having looked at what was around.

I've never done comedy before so I just thought it would be interesting to take a look at comedy. I read a couple of scripts and this was the last thing that I read. So I was interested in it. Comedy's a little bit harder to find. There's less interesting comedy on television. There are some great things on cable, but comedy dominates network television. And then I just found this and it became specific to the project. I just knew I wanted to be a part of this.
 
(Q) : And I lot of foreign comedies are being adapted for American television, which is kind of a risk. Some of them obviously are the biggest hits we have, like "The Office" for example, but it's still a risk. You're adapting it for a new culture, you don't want to spoil the original, you don't want to step on it. Was that a challenge that you were aware of or anticipated?
 
(Elijah Wood) : Completely. And it was something that I felt relieved just upon reading the first script as well, knowing that Jason was involved. Because it was clear that Jason had created the original show, I recognized that it was based on an Australian show, and the fact that he was involved in this iteration as a writer, producer, and reprising that role, I knew that it would retain the integrity of its origin.

But you're right; there are so many adaptations. Some of it I think is translation issues, where something's not translated properly or it just doesn't translate to an American audience, and sometime's it's taken away and not necessarily adapted in the proper way. And more often than not you don't have the original creator involved, and that gave me great reassurance.

(Elijah Wood) : In the show he tells me that that's the only ball he has, and that ball becomes symbolic of my new life. And he tells me this story about the significance of that ball in his life, and I throw the ball and I say to him after I throw it "Aren't you going to fetch it?" and he says "Don't you know how many balls I have?" So it already a manipulation. So there's always constantly that happening throughout.
 
(Q) : There's also the idea that to the extent that Ryan is emboldened by needing Wilfred and encountering him there is that element of mental illness. This guy's not quite right. How do you strike that balance in this character?
 
(Elijah Wood) : It's something we talk a lot about on the set, I think primarily when we enter scenarios that are particularly bizarre and take ourselves out of the context of the world that we've created to see that if you look at it from a different angle it could be kind of disturbing from a mentally ill standpoint. I'm not playing it that way because essentially the way that it's constructed is that Wilfred comes into his life and Ryan accepts it, and Ryan is really our eyes as an audience.

If he starts to break down in a very real way it also ruins the façade of Wilfred. So we really make it seem like this is reality for him, and we never really break that reality, and he never really questions it. It happens later in the show where he starts to wonder what Wilfred really is, and a few of those questions come about, but I think it would start to deconstruct the construct of the show if the lead character was also breaking that conceit.
 
(Q) : I know you're going to be in an upcoming movie called "Happy Feet 2." What's the story about and what is it like from your personal view?
 
(Elijah Wood) : The story is actually about Mumble being a father a little bit and the relationship between father and son. It's also about identity. It's a similar theme, and there are also environmental themes that take place as well. But it's about finding yourself and your own voice, which has a similar theme to the original film.
 
(Q) : Did you ever get to wear the dog suit?

(Elijah Wood) : I didn't actually put the suit on, but I did put the head piece on once and showed Jason and he was very freaked out. Jason has worn that suit for so many years now and was quite reluctant actually to reprise the role as Wilfred. He was convinced otherwise and obviously loves the show that we've made. But seeing me in the suit I think it bugged him out because I don't think he'd seen anybody wear it before. Just the head part.
 
(Q) : What was it like working with Frank Miller and Rodriguez in "Sin City"? I know you didn't have lines.
 
(Elijah Wood) : No, but I got to kick ass. It was so much fun. I'm a huge Frank Miller fan and a massive fan of "Sin City," so to get to be a part of that world and to play that character was so mind blowing. And then having Frank on set he was genuinely a secondary director on the film. And he was coming up with new shot ideas so he'd draw new frames and show Rodriguez and they would come up with new shots. Two days of work, literally the whole character was done in two days. Wires, jump kicks all over the place; it was a blast.
 
(Q) : Sequel?
 
(Elijah Wood) : There's been talk of a sequel for a while, and I know that Frank is rumored to have been writing new material for the "Sin City" universe, but I'm not sure. There's no update. I'd love it to happen.

(O) : You've had such a big movie career, big productions like "Lord of the Rings" and all that, and now you're switching to such a small production; television. Which do you actually prefer?
 
(Elijah Wood) : They're so different. The pace on television, especially with comedy is so much faster. We did 13 episodes in 10 weeks; we were doing eight to 10 pages a day, which is a lot. I don't know how to put that in perspective but that's a lot. So it's constantly moving, and for something like this it's great. It felt appropriate, the pace felt really good because it was driving the momentum of the scenes we were doing and there was never a break from it. I don't know if I prefer one over the other.

This is so different for me because it's comedy as well and I've never done comedy before. So regardless of whether it's film or television it's just a different medium to exist in to do comedy and I really enjoy that. Film is a much longer process; I don't know that one's necessarily better than the other.
 
(Q) : Did you find directing yourself difficult? Did it get in the way of your performances or in the way of direction? And also have you been approached by any dog food companies yet?
 
(Elijah Wood) : I didn't direct any. Eventually I'd love to. And I don't know I'd want to direct myself. I'd be very uncomfortable with that notion of calling action on myself and then critiquing my own performance. I don't know if I could do that. But the dog food company thing; no. But we've thought about those things, like if we would end up doing some sort of cross promotion Wilfred Alpo, Wilfred for Petco; it could be interesting.
 
(Q) : Yeah, think of all the product placement opportunities in the show.
 
(Elijah Wood) : Flea bath.
 
(Q) : Exactly. Just set a whole episode on Petco and they pay for the budget of the show. They hook you up. It could happen.
 
(Elijah Wood) : We've thought about it from a comedy angle, what kind of ridiculous "Wilfred" cross promotions that we could do.
 
(Q) : Interesting that Jason's kept the Australian accent. Do you think that's going to go well with Americans?
 
(Elijah Wood) : I think so.

(Q) : And secondly, his language in the Australian version; is that coming through on the American version or is it more suited to…?
 
(Elijah Wood) : It is. There are certain words we can't say unfortunately.
 
(Q) : Which kind of is what Wilfred's about in a way.

(Elijah Wood) : It is. The crudeness of the character and the language, absolutely. Well the language is still crude. There are two words that we can't use unfortunately. It's funny, it is a cable network but they do have their standards. And we have no nudity either. But outside of that it's very similar. I hoped that it would retain the darkness of the original show because I felt like that helped to make it very unique and it was part of its identity.

I knew that the show we were making had integrity, but I was afraid that because of being on FX we might have to lessen some of the darkness. It's funny; midway through the season Jason thinks that our show is actually a little bit darker. And I think the darkness comes in more thematically and less with those kind of overt, crude moments. So it doesn't feel anesthetized, that's for sure.
 
(Q) : Why do you think the American networks prefer to remake television series instead of airing the original versions?
 
(Elijah Wood) : Create their own shows you mean? I was making a joke. Why does the film industry do the same thing? I don't know. Look, there are some great shows from foreign countries. We live in a very small world now though where we have access to some of these shows, but there are some great pioneers in other countries. I don't know really how to answer that question because I'm not the creative forces at these networks that are looking for new material.

But you know there are plenty of amazing shows that are created every year and original material that's generated here. But we've always looked to Britain particularly. A lot of shows from Britain have been attempted and most of them have failed. "The Office" is the only one I can think of that has been truly successful for a long standing period of time. I think "In Treatment" is an adaptation of an Israeli show, I believe.
 
(Q) : The idea that this is a show that started in Australia and there is a previous incarnation, does that increase the pressure? People know of another "Wilfred"; does that make you more apprehensive about how it might come off and just the pressure to improve on it? Or is it always going to be its own thing and you just want to keep it that?
 
(Elijah Wood) : It feels decidedly like its own thing, but at the same time when you know that there's a core fan base for the original show you want that core fan base to be pleased with the direction that the show has gone. I think it would be a shame to ignore or to not care about the fans that have lived with "Wilfred" for two years, or two seasons there.

So I think it's a concern, and I definitely think it was a concern of Jason's. But it's a concern of Jason's just primarily to make a great show that has the essence of what he had established and to carry that character on. And I think in doing that in a very organic way it will please the original audience. Because he's not trying to Americanize the show, he's just trying to make something that has what he did and is taking it in a slightly different direction.
 
(Q) : Since there are a lot of shows that are adapted to the US they bring over the storylines and they even copy some episodes almost word for word. Is that happening here or is this just taking the characters and the story idea and creating all new episodes?

(Elijah Wood) : It's mainly taking the character, creating the character of Ryan, which is a different character, and creating a new story and a new series of stories. There are certain jokes that have come back, there are certain moments that are directly from the original show, but for the most part it's not like an episodic remake at all.

It's an entirely different story and I think there will probably still be jokes that will find their way in that were successful that Jason loved that were specific character elements. I think it's mainly anything that is in direct reference to Wilfred and his character and things that he may have said or done, they'll find their way back into the show I'm sure. But outside of that that's it.
 
(Q) : When the show is only two seasons in one country, in its original iteration, and you know you have at least two seasons, I mean hopefully it gets picked up for a second season, but after that then it's wide open, you can do anything you want. Is that something that Jason thought of as a writer? Do I really want this to go into a third season? Do I want this to be a hit?
 
(Elijah Wood) : I don't know. I'm very curious about that myself. I'm not sure. I also think we're just about to start the season so it's silly to talk this way. It's a bit premature. I also don't know how long it can last regardless of its success, because I think at a certain point if we're going on the conceit that Ryan is recovering and through his recovery is why Wilfred exists and he's helping him along that can only last for so long.

And I love things, like the British "Office" was two seasons, I love things that try and have a concise story to tell and know when to stop telling that story. And it's a bummer when things get milked into nothingness when they're just grasping at straws for story lines. And I think audiences are intelligent and smart. If they love the show they'll be on to that. I mean ultimately that's up to David Zuckerman and to Jason to see where it ultimately goes, but I think David feels the same. I think it has a certain shelf life.
 
(Q) : How difficult is it when you work on an extremely big project like "Lord of the Rings" where you play such a defining character that the whole film centers around, how difficult it is to leave that character and move into the next project?
 
(Elijah Wood) : Well "Lord of the Rings" is a special one in that there are a lot of factors that I would consider in terms of leaving the project. Not only was I leaving the character but I was also leaving family and friends essentially that I'd lived with for 16 months of principle photography there over the course of ultimately four years. That experience becomes so defining. The thing about any project, "Wilfred" too, small films, big films, is that for that period of time you're in the bubble of that world and that film. "Lord of the Rings" is an even better example because we were in the bubble of New Zealand. We were all so far away from our homes.

Coming off of something like that it was difficult to understand what my life meant. It was a really hard adjustment because our life was defined by that country and those people and that time and place. So coming home I didn't know what to do with myself, like I didn't know where to go next or what my daily life meant. So that transition is I think more difficult. Leaving your character, sure, but I always feel like I leave the character at set every night anyway; I don't feel like I take so much of the character with me all the time. So it's more about how that experience defines your life and how difficult it is to transition out of those experiences.
 
(Q) : Your character on the Australian version of the show, did you study it or did you try and make it your own?

(Elijah Wood) : They're pretty different. I didn't watch the Australian, not intentionally I didn't, I wanted to see it, but I didn't study the character because I knew that the character was so different. This was a character that was written specifically for this version so I didn't feel like I had to do any homework. But we're hoping that Adam, the character from the original, will somehow weave its way into this. It would be very cool.

 

End.