role play

The Following’s Natalie Zea Shares Ten Random Stories From Her TV Career

THE FOLLOWING: Claire Matthews (Natalie Zea) is Joe Carroll's ex-wife in the new drama THE FOLLOWING premiering Jan. 21 (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX.
THE FOLLOWING: Claire (Natalie Zea) finds out some disturbing news in the new drama THE FOLLOWING premiering Jan. 21 (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. ©2013 Fox Broadcasting Co. CR: Bob Mahoney/FOX Photo: Bob Mahoney/FOX

Natalie Zea is one of those actresses who elicits a Where do I know her from? thought bubble — not because she’s forgettable, but because she’s been on so many shows that it’s hard to quite place her. She has a recurring role on FX’s Justified (her character returns tonight), and she’s starring in Fox’s The Following as a woman caught between her serial-killer ex-husband (James Purefoy) and the former FBI agent (Kevin Bacon) who caught him. “It’s really hard to wrap my brain around it,” Zea laughed when Vulture sat down with her for lunch recently. “How could she not know her husband was a serial killer?” To give herself some perspective, she wrote a history for her character (“All this great dark shit about my absent mother”) only to turn out to be wrong when showrunner Kevin Williamson presented her with a new script. “There was a line ‘If my mother calls, tell her I’m napping,’” she laughed. “That’s the problem when you’re doing a show that incorporates flashbacks.” Not to be daunted, Zea was happy to flash back on her varied career, giving us her favorite stories from ten TV gigs.

Zea’s first job in television was as a guest star on a short-lived series on the WB (appearing on the fourth and last-aired episode); she reunited with its star Mark-Paul Gosselaar eleven years later to guest on his then-new show on TNT.   “We made out on D.C., and Mark-Paul did not remember me! I felt really bad. And he felt really bad. I only shot one day on D.C., in Toronto, and Mark-Paul, Scott Paulin [the director], and I went out afterward to this barn where they serve beer and disgusting BBQ, and we stayed out all night until 5 a.m. until I had to get on a plane and go — so I don’t know how he didn’t remember. But I’m so terrible with names myself, and I’ve been in some embarrassing situations. I used to tend bar here in New York, and my regulars would come in, and I would have no idea. “You have to be kidding! You serve me here every night!” My friends call me the mind eraser. So I realized, Okay, I’ll give him a second to remember. But I do feel bad for calling him out for it in front of someone else. Perhaps that was rude.”
Zea’s first major television role was on the NBC daytime soap opera as one of the actresses playing socialite Gwen Hotchkiss Winthrop, love interest of Ethan Crane, played by her long-term boyfriend, Travis Schuldt.   “The shenanigans that were going on behind the scenes would shock and amaze anyone who watched it — all the hookups, odd couplings, and the strange, strange matchups you never would have thought. I met Travis on Passions, and once I talked shit about him, something about how it felt uncomfortable to do intimate scenes with him because he’s like my brother, and he found it, and quoted it back to me. It’s now on our refrigerator. We worked together for two years, and getting together was a slow process, but after three years of friendship, it seemed really silly not to make out! And now we’re basically married and we own a home. We’ve been together for about a decade, and we’re in it to win it.”
For five episodes in season three, Zea had a recurring role as Michael Chiklis’s love interest Lauren Riley.   “So I’m sitting there in makeup with bloodshot eyes, looking at the schedule, and there’s a list of directors, and I go, ‘Oh my God! There’s a television director named David Mamet.’ And the makeup lady goes, ‘No, no, I’m pretty sure that’s the David Mamet.’ It must have been a special thing, because he doesn’t usually direct television episodes. And I don’t usually get starstruck or nervous, but I’m enamored with him. I know he’s got a reputation through his text — but his text is not him, and he adores women. He sat with me and talked to me about the character for half an hour, while Michael patiently sat and waited and listened. It was pretty marvelous. He was just talking about the character and how superior women are to men, and he looked at Michael and said, ‘This scene is not about you.’ By the way, David Mamet’s daughter Zosia has the best name ever. I might steal it for a pet or a doll. I tend to gravitate towards the Zs.”
The Darling family had its fair share of screw-ups, including Zea’s professional divorcee Karen Darling, during its two-season run on ABC.   “You got to be careful around Donald Sutherland [who played patriarch Tripp Darling] — he’s a feisty one. That dude is sharper than most half his age or younger. And I was a little nervous meeting him at the time, because I was a smoker. I don’t know if you know about him and smoking, but you may not even smell of cigarettes in his presence. I was very aware of that and paranoid about that. And I quit smoking because of him. There were other factors involved, too, but it was too hard to sneak around, and it felt too silly. I was gobbling up the breath mints, and then going home and smoking half a pack at night. And I thought, At some point, I’m going to get caught. One night, he came up to me, and I’d had a cigarette earlier, and he gave me a hug, and then he said, ‘Have you been smoking?’ I felt like I had been insubordinate to my dad!” Photo: VIVIAN ZINK/? 2008 American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. NO ARCHIVE. NO RESALE.
Zea went topless for the first time for her portrayal of a client who Ray wants to actually date for real — but she just wants to hurt him — in four episodes of the first season of the since-canceled HBO program.    “You like to think you’re fine with the nudity, very free with all that, but on the day, it doesn’t matter how relaxed and groovy you are — it’s still a mind-fuck. I don’t feel as weird about it as much now. This was early on, and the nudity waiver for me was like a dictionary. It was so thick and detailed. This one took two weeks to negotiate, and we have a couple on file now. For instance, I would never do a body double. The waiver is really detailed in terms of language: side breast, nipple, crack. I will not do crack. I don’t love privacy patches, because they don’t cover up cracks, so they made me a special one. I said, ‘Make me a G-string without the string.’ It’s less about what’s making it to air, and more about what they’ll see on set. On Justified, I’ve done scenes completely topless, because I’ve been there long enough.”
Raylan Givens is expecting a baby with his ex-wife Winona Hawkins, which explains his recent moonlighting from the federal marshal service on the new season of the FX program.   “Joelle Carter and I hang out a lot off set, but I only work with Timothy [Olyphant], so it’s all Tim, all the time — not that I’m complaining about that! Sometimes we’re like an old married couple. I love working with him. One time, I said that I didn’t, and please let me explain that one. I never know when you’re on those press lines if the interview will ever see the light of day, and I have a really big issue with repetition, which I’m sure will be my cross to bear as an old lady, so I’m going down the line, and everyone’s asking, ‘What’s it like to work with Timothy?’ And I’m going, ‘Great.’ ‘Great.’ ‘Great.’ And so when I got to the very end, I thought, ‘No one’s going to see this!’ I thought I could have more fun, be less guarded, because I was about to go, and I have no filter, so I was being funny: ‘He’s a dick.’ But he doesn’t care. He knows where I’m coming from.” Photo: PRASHANT GUPTA
In the pilot, Zea played a corrupt assistant district attorney.   “This came up toward the end of Justified. My contract was up, and I was toying with going out for pilots, but most of the stuff out there didn’t feel right. I was in limbo. And then on my birthday, I got a call from my agent: ‘You’ve just been offered the guest lead in a J.J. Abrams pilot! Do you want to read it? Can you read it today?’ And I was like, ‘But it’s my birthday. I’m getting a massage!’ But really, that didn’t matter. You just do it — it’s J.J. Abrams! I don’t know what I did in a past life to deserve that one. So I got on a plane I think the very next day, and came out to New York for a month. The weather was horrendous and a lot of the scenes were outside, so the weather overshadowed the project, which was a bummer, because then it became all about the problem-solving. But they made it happen, and it was beautiful and compelling.” Photo: JEFFREY R STAAB/?2011 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved
In the season three opener, Zea gets treated for a rash by HankMed in the Hamptons.   “I got an offer to do Royal Pains two days after I wrapped on Person of Interest and I was like, ‘Why not? I’m already here.’ But the older I get, the more attached I am to Travis, so the distance was a little bit of a bummer. I was really homesick and biding my time to go back, but then I got this offer. And the character was a good girl. Inoffensive. And that’s really rare for me. I get a lot of bitchy DAs, and I can’t do any more of those. So even though it was another week of not being with my beloved, I got to hang with Mark Feuerstein. And he’s really funny. Gut-splitting funny. I never would have thought. He was just so dark and so absurdist, and we got punch drunk at one in the morning after working all day. And I got to pass out, as my character — go from standing to face-plant at two in the morning on a Friday night when we’re all punch drunk, so he can shake me to wake me up. I’m pretty good at passing out now.” Photo: Barbara Nitke/? USA Network
Zea started her four-episode run as just another of Hank Moody’s exes and then became one of the more significant ones by drugging him in the season five finale.   “I had been dying to get on Californication for years. It’s one of my favorite shows, and I’m friends with the casting director, Felicia Fasano, so every time I would see her, I’d say, ‘Let’s make this happen,’ but there was always a conflict with whatever show I was working on at the time. I was shooting the Person of Interest pilot in New York, I got the Royal Pains offer for two days after that, and then I got a call from my manager about Californication. ‘Felicia called. I told her you’re shooting two things in New York at the moment … ’ This is on a Thursday, but I don’t even have to look — of course I’ll do it! This is the only show I’ve ever done that I’ve been a big fan of, and that will fuck with you. We do the scene, and then I went up to Tom Kapinos, the creator — and I never do this — but I begged for him to write more. ‘Well, you know, you burned down his apartment.’ ‘Figure it out! I want to keep doing this!’ Like he’s my own personal Make-A-Wish Foundation. I guess I was empathetic enough, because they were like, ‘All right, you’re coming back!’” Photo: Copyright: 2012 Showtime
As Claire Matthews, Natalie Zea is the ex-wife of a serial killer and the mother of a kidnapped son.   “We were shooting in one person’s house, and the owners were being particularly particular — anyone who walked in had to wear surgical booties. I shake my head and I say no, and I walk in anyway. Kevin Bacon walks in with the booties and I say, ‘What are you doing? Why are you wearing those?’ ‘They wanted us to put these on.’ ‘I’m going to stop you. You’re Kevin Bacon!’ And he laughed, and he yelled out, ‘You people need to figure it out!’ I was like, ‘Listen to me, kid. I’ll teach you how to be Kevin Bacon.’ He just has so much purity to him, which is so surprising considering who he is. It’s what makes him great.”
Natalie Zea Shares Ten Random Set Stories