Season 5 of ‘The Walking Dead’ maybe over but, Steven Yeun still has a lot to say about the hit TV series that launched his career. In a recent interview with Variety, Yeun explained how he defines his character and what it is like working with talented actors.
Yeun points out that his acting has changed over the years and he has learned a lot from his cast especially Norman Reedus and Andrew Lincoln.
You’ve talked a lot about how much you’ve grown as an actor on this show, and when I talked to Tovah Feldshuh about her first episode with Deanna’s video interviews, shesingled out your performance for praise. How does it feel when someone who’s been a working actor as long as Tovah says something like that about you?
I can’t say that I don’t have that laminated, highlighted and blown up billboard size and just plastered on my wall in the office. I can’t say that. She’s incredible, Tovah is incredible. It’s hard to jack-in to the tone of our show — it can go to really grounded and real or it can go slightly surreal. You have all these places it can go. Tovah came in and literally crushed it. For me to even be acknowledged by someone like Tovah is incredibly generous on her part and absolutely awesome.I’ve been very fortunate to be surrounded by actors such as Tovah or Andy (Lincoln) or Norman (Reedus) or Jon (Bernthal) or Scott Wilson. I can name every single person. It’s been great because they’ve pushed me a lot and been great examples of doing things for the art of it. We’re doing what we’re doing because on a selfish level we want to experience these moments. The reason I love being an actor is because I get to do stuff I’d never get to do in real life. I get to be a forever student. To say I get to pretend I live in a post-apocalyptic world and I see someone ripped to shreds in front of me or say I’m a rabid animal and maybe I was away from civilization for too long — these small moments are what we live for and have so much fun doing.
Yeun even addresses the persistent rumors that his character, Glenn will be the next character killed off in the series.
I did have a lot of people say, “Hey, stop holding bats.” [laughs] At the same time I struggle with that. I always struggle with the fact that sometimes people can let the death part of our show overtake what we’re actually trying to do. The bat reference comes from the comicbooks, but we’re not the comicbooks, we’re making a show. That’s not to say that we’re not holding true or heavily influenced by the source material, which is fantastic, and Scott Gimple definitely holds firm to as much as he can, but at the same time we are making something different in a different medium. You know what it is? I wish people could binge watch our show, as opposed to waiting week by week. I often feel that’s the reason people are pulled into this weird vortex of “Who’s gonna die next?” As opposed to just, “Let me watch this story for what it’s trying to say.”
Steven Yeun has come a long way from aspiring to become a physician to a zombie killing husband. But, it is interesting to see his perspective of the show and the future of ‘The Walking Dead’. When asked about the new spinoff, ‘Fear The Walking Dead‘, he revealed “my focus is less on that whole big picture and more on how do we make our show better every single year?”
To read the full interview visit Variety.
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