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James Whitmore, Jr.
is an actor, director and a family man who is extremely busy, but
generously gave PQL a telephone interview at the end of April. Our
readers are familiar with his work on fourteen episodes of Quantum
Leap
and two episodes of Enterprise, and nowadays frequently recognize his name
during the credits for Cold Case, Bones and Don Bellisario’s
NCIS.
Sharon:
It’s taken us a month or so to finally arrange this call. Does a director
ever have a hiatus?
Jim:
The last few years have been pretty busy because they have been doing a
lot of cable shows in the off-season. If I wanted to, I could work pretty
much straight through, and I have, up until last year when I took a month
off. This year I’m taking a couple of months off and I’m going to go out
and do a play as an actor with my dad in June and July. Last year we did
Inherit the Wind together at the Peterborough Players, which is a theatre
in New Hampshire where my mother and father met and fell in love in 1947;
I was born a year later.
Jon L. Egging, James Whitmore, and
James Whitmore, Jr. in Inherit the Wind in 2005
Photo courtesy of
Peterborough
Players, New Hampshire
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This year we are going to do Tuesdays With Morrie together. I get a
chance to be with my dad and work with him, hang out in beautiful
surroundings, and it’s going to be cool. It is one of a few really
classical summer stock theaters. It’s an old barn, they’ve fixed it up
[inside] to be very modern, and it’s a wonderful place. The show opens
June 21 and goes thru July 9.
[Editor’s note: According to my contact at
http://peterboroughplayers.org/, single tickets go on sale on May 15
and prices are $33-38 for adults. Student rush is available (but not
recommended for this show).]
Sharon:
It is a great play. My best wishes for a successful and satisfying run.
I hope our readers who live in the area will make an effort to come out
and see you and your dad.
I may as well begin with directing. We know that the average shoot for a
one-hour tv show is about eight working days. How much in advance do you
usually get a script?
Jim:
In a show like Quantum Leap, the scripts were in gestation when I arrived
to prep. If there was a script, it was pretty certain it was going to
change a lot before shooting started. I usually show up about eight days
before filming begins to start prepping: scouting locations, casting and
to work with the art department. With Quantum every week was a different
movie, with a different time period, so there was a lot of work to be
done.
Sharon:
With Quantum you got to know the characters pretty well, but sometimes
you’re asked to do a show—such as Bones—and aren’t familiar with the
show. How much do you rely on the cast members themselves for character
development, or do you go by what is strictly written on the page?
Jim:
What I do with a new show, I ask the [production] guys for some
film—something representative of the show. I look at it, digest it and
take the script they give me. It’s sort of meditative—letting it sink in
and take form within me—from all of the input. I look at the pilot and
the stuff they want me to see.
A lot of time the pilot is one thing but the show becomes something
else. [If] they didn’t quite get it with the pilot, but they’re starting
to get it now that the shows are shooting, they’ll show me the shows they
like and feel are representative. I take that and go on the set.
Sharon:
Directors are usually known for a particular style or genre, whether it be
action, suspense, comedy, drama or a certain time period, but your credits
include just about everything and your work cannot really be categorized.
What do you think producers are looking for when they offer you a script?
Jim:
They want a guy who has some experience and some energy, and a passion
about what he does. I’ve been really lucky.
I was the same as an actor; I’ve had a chance to play a lot of different
kind of parts. In the beginning all I shot was guys crashing cars,
shooting each other with guns, and then all of a sudden—a few years later,
I was working for Warner Bros. doing Dawson’s Creek and some of that
stuff. People started saying “Jim can’t do action.” I like doing action;
it’s a weird town. Everyday there is a new 14-year-old kid who takes over
the business and they don’t remember a lot of stuff, so that’s a bit of a
problem if you’ve been around for a while.
I love doing ALL the different kinds of stuff like Cold Case to
Bones—which are completely different universes, and both of them are fun.
Sharon:
How about your Enterprise episode “Acquisition?” That was hilarious.
Jim:
That was the one with the Ferengi. I thought that was funnier than hell
too. It was so much fun to do. They just hired me and I loved working
with those guys. Comedy is probably the most fun of all. I did a
two-hour movie a few years ago—the first Rockford Files movie [I Love
L.A.]. When I shot that movie, it was the most fun as I’ve ever had in
this business as a director. Every night I was driving home laughing.
There is so much more to our
interview, which lasted a good half-hour. Jim spoke about his work on
shows nowadays, how and why they are taking more than eight days to shoot,
what that term “second unit” means, his work on Quantum and other
series, what he does to relax, and he even answered my burning question,
“Why do directors establish a shooting schedule where actors are thrown
into the love scenes first, sometimes without even having gotten
acquainted first?” The complete interview will be in the next issue of
The Observer.
--- Sharon Major
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