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LAist had the chance to talk to Academy Award-winning actor Timothy Hutton as he was on promotional tour for his new TV series on TNT, "Leverage", which premieres on Sunday, December 7th, at 10:00pm.
"Leverage" is an action-thriller which stars Hutton as the ringleader/organizer of a team of high-tech former criminals who target powerful exploiters of those who are powerless, Robin Hood-style. This marks Hutton's return to TV after NBC's "Kidnapped" was cut short in 2006. Hutton started his career in television over thirty years ago before taking on the Oscar-winning role of Conrad Jerritt in Ordinary People in 1980, embarking on a career that has included many other excellent films such as Taps, The Falcon and the Snowman, and Kinsey.
In 2001, Hutton became executive producer, director of several episodes, and the protagonist of the A&E series "A Nero Wolfe Mystery", becoming a leader in bringing high production-value, original drama to basic cable. "Leverage" brings Hutton back to basic cable in what appears to be a well-produced series for TNT- what is now an expected phenomenon in a trend Hutton helped start almost a decade ago.
LAist: How has working with TNT on "Leverage" been different from your experience doing the "Nero Wolfe" series on A&E?
Timothy Hutton: "Nero Wolfe" wasn't set up to be a series on A&E, our idea was to do these books by Rex Stout as 2-hour movies because that's what they lent themselves to. We did one and it did really well, so they asked us if we wanted to do more, so we did a few more, and then we discovered some [Rex Stout] books that would work as 1-hour pieces but it was never set up as a series. Each piece was supposed to be a separate work. When I decided to do "Leverage" it was the first "traditional" series for me, I had to agree to be on it for 5-years should the show progress that far and I thought it was a great script was and it was an interesting way to start off with a character who had hit rock bottom and the only way he could pull himself out of it was through the psyche of helping people and going after those who had been ripping off others.
[Interview continues after the jump]
LAist: Your character, Nathan Ford, has some character flaws, how are those going to be explored over the season?
Timothy Hutton: The first season will show a range of Nathan being seemingly stable and ok and having found this new way of getting on with his life to completely falling apart and being pulled back into the tragedy of his life, when he lost his son. The drinking remains a problem for him and he gets confronted about it by the other members of the team.
LAist: You mentioned the team that Nathan assembles. There are other shows out there that have these high tech teams but one thing I noticed about "Leverage" is that there's brevity, these other shows are so damn serious, nobody cracks a smile, but with Nathan's crew there's humor, is this consistent throughout the season?
Timothy Hutton: That continues very much so. Some of that is driven by the characters that the team members have to assume as part of a con. Some of these characters and personalities get further developed, like a loudmouth card-shark that I play, the team also takes over a movie set to con a woman, an aspiring actress, who has been running a corrupt child adoption agency in Serbia and that's very funny. We take over a wedding and Nathan steps in as the priest who was supposed to preside over the wedding.
There is humor, the team has fun in what they're doing, sometimes things fall apart as they are apt to do and they have to resort to plan B. It's what was appealing to me, I didn't want it to be taking itself too seriously, I didn't want to be part of some kind of crusaders sticking it to the man.
LAist: Are you thinking about directing any future episodes of "Leverage"?
Timothy Hutton: I certainly didn't think about doing it for this first season because we had so many great directors lined up. It doesn't mean I don't want to do it maybe down the road, but I think I've done that, where I'm playing the role and I'm directing, and it's a lot to take on. I think if I were to direct again for television, it would be for a series that I wasn't acting in, where I'd be an executive producer, directing every now and then, and developing story lines.
LAist: I think your "Nero Wolfe" series really brought high-quality shows to basic cable, it was one of the first to do so.
Timothy Hutton: I think so, but I sure have never read that anywhere or heard anyone say that. It really feels, and I don't want this to come like I feel that the show was underappreciated, but it really was in its own vacuum. Those shows were very carefully put together, everything from the cinematography which was beautiful to the idea of a repertory cast - I just don't think that many people picked up on that, and I do think it laid some groundwork.
LAist: Certainly many shows followed the series that we are now familiar with, like "The Shield", etc. Where do you see things going from here, will there be more stuff done on the 'net?
Timothy Hutton: I think more things are going to be done on the 'net but I think it's going to be a bit of a rocky road. You need to have high speed gear and a connection to watch a program and it isn't anywhere near the same quality that you have when you watch it on TV even when you go through your TV off of the Internet. I think it's definitely the next frontier, you know, for tuning into serialized shows.
I think that reality TV will continue to be a big part of programming on the Big Three. I hope it's not the case, but the economics, the business model for those kinds of shows is that they are such low risk, and it's such high risk for a show like Christian Slater's show, which is a really terrific show, but the network looks at it and thinks it's a really expensive show that has an effect on other things they have in development. But if a reality show doesn't work it doesn't have an impact on the next guy who comes in to pitch another reality show.
Timothy Hutton plays Nathan Ford in "Leverage", premiering on TNT, Sunday, December 7th at 10:00pm.
Photo by Tom Lewis
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Enjoyed the interview and am looking forward to the show!
I am now going to check your freezer for human heads
Tim Hutton is a treasure : )
Very nice interview, Tom.
Timothy Hutton rocks! Great interview!
whenever i see him, i still think of "taps" ...
and the fact that his face looks permanently young.
very laid-back guy, totally professional and pleasant, and very web-literate to boot. I'll post the sound file of the interview later
Nice work, Tom, but I was totally taken aback by Timothy Hutton’s apparent ignorance of the adulation that “Nero Wolfe” won from professional critics and viewers alike. It was underpromoted and cancelled because the network of “Pride and Prejudice,” “Nero Wolfe,” “Horatio Hornblower,” and the like, decided to reinvent itself as the network of “Dog the Bounty Hunter” and the like, but by no criteria could it be considered “underappreciated” by those who managed to find it on the air and the many others who have joined them reveling in “Nero Wolfe” on DVD.
The whole show, as well Tim’s major contributions in particular, earned rave reviews at the time, and new waves appeared as the DVDs were released. Here’s just a tiny sampling of what that makes Tim response, “I sure have never read that anywhere or heard anyone say that,” to your noting the high quality of “Nero Wolfe” so bizarre:
New York Magazine’s Top Ten TV Shows of 2001; Multichannel News’ Top Ten Cable Shows of 2002; “Hutton has found a series of which he can be proud. Most actors would kill to be a part of such a witty and classy production” (Pittsburgh Tribune); “Timothy Hutton, Maury Chaykin and a stellar ensemble deliver one juicy moment after another. Chaykin is wonderfully petulant as Wolfe, and Hutton shows a surprising comedic charm that reveals an as-yet undiscovered range” (Variety); “In addition to co-producing the series and directing several episodes, Timothy Hutton plays Archie Goodwin, and I can't see how anyone could do a better job” (Terry Teachout, WS Journal theater critic, writing in the National Review); “Chaykin is wonderfully petulant as Wolfe, and Hutton shows a surprising comedic charm that reveals an as-yet undiscovered range.” (NY Times); “A witty, beguiling, colorful, pulse-pounding hoot of a weekly series.” (LA Times); “Network television has rarely seen such a combination of eye candy and brain food. On all counts, Nero Wolfe is a class act” (Richmond Times-Dispatch).
“’Nero Wolfe’ is incredible. Every facet of the series -- its writing, the acting, the music, the cinematography, the set design -- is flawless, to the point where I had a tough time pinning down a starting point for this review” (DVD Talk); “Nero Wolfe is a rare television series that will enthrall almost any audience” (DVD Verdict); “The production values for these shows are beyond reproach. ‘Nero Wolfe’ is about as close to perfection as any fan could wish -- and will undoubtedly serve as a superb introduction to a new generation of fans as well” (Home Theater Sound); “Once upon a time there was an extraordinary group of people who made extraordinary television for the A&E network. ‘Nero Wolfe’ was absolutely riveting, from the dialogue to the storyline to the photography to the vintage sets. I, myself, didn't know about it until it was too late to save it. The DVDs have been my chance to see what I missed” (Cosmic Debris).
Such accolades are prominently available on the internet, e.g., the Wikipedia entry, and Imdb External Reviews and Wolfe Pack sections for “A Nero Wolfe Mystery,” the Customer Reviews for the DVD sets on Amazon, etc. Icons from screenshots featuring Tim Hutton-Archie Goodwin, Maury Chaykin-Nero Wolfe, Conrad Dunn-Saul Panzer, and other cast favorites pop up all over the place. And since ‘Tis the Season, how about this glorious fan-made video:
http://www.iment.com/maida/keepthissecret/songvids/xmassong.htm
So, the “web-literate” Timothy Hutton – lookin’ for love in all the wrong places? I wish him success with “Leverage,” which seems to be a fun series, but he’ll always be Archie Goodwin to me and a lot of other people. There would be still more of us if “Nero Wolfe” had been treated to even a fraction of the promotion that TNT is giving “Leverage” or, for that matter, that A&E bestows on its “Dog” and other crap.