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| Photo: Martina Tolot |
As an actor, Griffin Dunne has had an accomplished career, starring in acclaimed feature films including “War Machine,” “Dallas Buyers Club,” “After Hours,” and “An American Werewolf in London.” Little did he know that a television role could introduce him to a whole new audience.
As Nicky Pearson, Jack’s younger brother on NBC’s “This Is Us, Dunne has gained a family and an audience of millions every week. TVMusic Network caught up with the actor to get his thoughts on the show’s success, Nicky and Kevin’s bond, and what he’s doing at Rebecca’s bedside in the flashforward that everyone’s talking about.
Check out our interview below.
TVMusic Network: Congratulations on being on the show and
still being alive.
Griffin Dunne: Thank you. (laughs)
TVMusic Network: It has been great to see Jack and Nicky’s relationship and to get a glimpse of Jack’s life before he met Rebecca and before the kids. We got these wonderful flashbacks.
Little did we know Nicky was still alive. So when that reveal happened, it was even better than we could have imagined.
Griffin Dunne: I know. He’s such a rich and complicated and
touching character. I’m so glad to be able to play him.
TVMusic Network: I like that Nicky’s having this relationship with Kevin now. Kevin needs a father figure the most out of the Big Three than Kate, Randall. It’s great that you guys are able to
like get to know each other.
Griffin Dunne: It’s an interesting dynamic
of, you know. One person wanting to reach out, to help someone and then
uncle Nicky not wanting any help. But in fact, they both need help. And, and
you know, I think Nicky arrives at the thing where is he lets himself be
helped. He admits he needs help. And uh, you know, which is what Kevin struggle
has been too with alcoholism and with alcohol. So, it’s, it’s very complicated
and rich, and I, I only hope, it’s so good. I always kind of
jokingly say, let’s not make Nicky too healthy. I kind of have to have somewhere to go. Yeah. Let me
fall off the wagon.
TVMusic Network: Knowing [show creator and executive producer] Dan [Fogelman], Nicky’s still got some stuff coming
up. With Nicky, I think this has
all caught him off guard. And it caught the audience off guard too. With the ice cream scene, you’ve got
this whole different side to Nicky. When he started cutting the ice cream and telling the story behind it. It got you at the end. You think, wow, he’s opening up.
Griffin Dunne: You know, and I think that’s a personal, experience for Dan. He says,” I, I don’t ever do that.” He said, “I
don’t really ever cry “when I say you’d think I would cry, but this one really got
to me.
TVMusic Network: Now, where do you see, I know you probably
can’t tell too much and plus with that show, be being him that back and forth.
You don’t know what’s up. Yeah, that’s for sure. How far do you see Nicky’s opening up to Kevin? He thinks he’s going to open more. I was it hard to
say.
Griffin Dunne: think it’s very, very hard to say. I there are certain things, where [the writers] just sort of needle drop things that
give you an indication of something. Nothing is wasted here. So, you saw me
sitting around the bed of Rebecca last season. In the distant future, near
future, I’m not sure which. And uh, and then also I seem to be talking about at
one point about a girl named Sally. So, I mean I’m just being an armchair fan.
If I say I have a feeling.
TVMusic Network: Most of Nicky’s scenes have been with Kevin
but there have also been scenes with Cassidy (Jennifer Morrison). The three of
you, will there anything about the relationship and about the three you that
you can touch upon?
Griffin Dunne: I think that they’ll probably, I think it’s going
to resolve itself and then you know, I think he’ll go on to whatever his is, and
then I’ll go onto whatever mine is. I think there’s a certain kind of closure.
TVMusic Network: When you mentioned the scene at the end of
last season, of you sitting at Rebecca’s bedside, many people thought that it was
Miguel.
Griffin Dunne: Yeah? They thought it was Miguel? When they
were doing the makeup, they spent a lot of time getting it right. And I think
they went too far, and they’re looking and said well, wait a minute “Now I can’t
even tell you are.” Ken Olin, who directs a lot of the shows and he directs
that one, I walked into his office, unannounced, the door was open, and I just sort
of walked in, He’s like, “this old guy is in my office and he says “can I help
you?? And I went, “Really? Are you serious?” And he said, “Oh, this is too
much. I did not even know you.” And I was maybe 5 feet from him.
TVMusic Network: Now how do you watch the show? Do you watch
on Tuesdays with the audience? Or do you watch it back later?
Griffin Dunne: I have one of those demand things on my TV and
I’ll go and I’ll watch it. I have a girlfriend and we like to watch it at the
end of the night or something. We’ll have dinner and I don’t watch it live. I
scroll through those commercials.
TVMusic Network: What has the fan reaction been like for
you? Because you’ve done so much, movies, etc. and now you’re doing this tv show.
Griffin Dunne: Yeah, no complaints, but in the past I’ve
always, it’s always been more sort of acknowledgement by film people, who are into film
and like to talk about films and are glued in film, that kind of things. But
this is… I think this is my first audience experience. People who just like the
show and they’re genuine which is great. You know my dry cleaner. For example,
I live in New York and she’s a Korean lady across the street and I’ve been
going to her for 10 years or whatever. And I walked in after…I come back after
the first episode aired and she just lost it. I lost it. She didn’t have any
clue what I did for a living.
TVMusic Network: Well this season I know that Kevin has something
big thing coming up in the Winter Finale? What can we expect for the rest of
the season for Nicky?
Griffin Dunne: Dan and the writers are infinitely patient. [They
say] “we, we, we, we laid it down, we’ll get to it when we’re ready, whatever
it is.” I’ve never been involved with a show where people want to know all
these things either. I can’t tell them because I don’t know, or I can’t tell because
I can’t. I’ve never been involved with something that elicits such curiosity.
TVMusic Network: Is there anything maybe in Nicky’s past that
relates to Jack, they’ve been showing a lot of flashbacks, Jack and like Nicky as
kids. Is there anything in Nicky’s past that he might know about Jack that no
one else does?
Griffin Dunne: I don’t know the answer to that, but as a normal person who watches it, I thought of that. I think, because I was sitting
around Rebecca’s bed, I think that I ended up there for a reason. I think that there’s
something and because I’m the closest thing she has to Jack, I think that will
be something that plays into it. But I’m just guessing. Just don’t worry Dan,
I’m not giving anything away.
TVMusic Network: Today’s
Veteran’s Day. Are you getting a lot of responses from people from veterans
watching the show and the Vietnam storyline? It’s opened a lot of discussion
about it.
Griffin Dunne: The interview I had before was with a woman
from the veterans’ organization and I was grateful to be able to talk to her.
Some of the most real, most gratifying reactions I’ve had had been from Vietnam
veterans and people who have been in battle and are suffering from PTSD.
And I hear this not just from them, but I hear from Tim O’Brian who wrote,
created this character and wrote some of the finest books about Vietnam, which
I happened to read before. That war, I just dodged a bullet. They, they ended
the draft a couple of weeks after I got my draft cards. Then I’m thinking about
it a lot, because my dad was a war hero at the Battle of the Bulge and got the
bronze star. And there’s nothing about them that reads war hero. So many of the
people that came out of that war, they didn’t talk about that war. It wasn’t until
”Saving Private Ryan.” It just unleashed and people said “I got to tell you
some stuff.
TVMusic Network: A friend whose Dad fought in the war would
never talk about Vietnam, he just couldn’t do it but after the episodes with
Jack and Nicky aired, it opened a dialogue for them to talk about it.
Griffin Dunne: Oh, great That’s so good to hear. The power
of television.
“This Is Us” airs Tuesdays on NBC.
_Additional reporting by Belinda Thomas
