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Blonde Ambition
by  Joe Nazarro

TV Zone February 2001

From dangerous killer to sweet puppy, we talk to James Marsters about his character's change of heart

     There's something that James Marsters wants fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to know, and he doesn't want there to be any doubt about it. "Many people think Spike is impotent," the actor explains, "and we should clear that up right now. We should put it in the first paragraph of your article: he can have sex, but he can't kill humans!"
    Marsters is referring to that now-classic scene in which Spike attempts to partake of a bit of liquid nourishment at the expense of Willow, only to discover that a brain implant devised by the Initiative prevents him from chowing down on human prey. The result is a hilarious 'It's not you, it's me' exchange by the, er, frustrated Spike and a very confused Willow. If a casual viewer had switched on the episode after the commercial break, "It would've sounded like a failed rape scene," claims Marsters. "I went as far with the beginning of the scene, which was the beginning of the 'rape' and I was remembering De Niro in Cape Fear [in which his character violently assaults a woman] and tried to get as much as I could to get to that.
    "That was the scariest scene in the movie, and I still can't get it out of my head. I really can't watch rape scenes, but I thought the scarier the beginning of our scene was, the more people took it seriously and were really freaking out, the funnier it would be when we came back from commercial and I can't get it up."
    That kind of humorous juxtaposition is one of the more enjoyable aspects of working on Buffy as far as this actor is concerned. I liken it to the court jesters of a few hundred years ago, who were the only ones who could be honest with the king, as long as it was joke. You could tell the king he was a fat idiot as long as you're being funny, and I think Joss is able to talk about some issues in a more direct way than other shows that are more realistic.

Tender is the Script

    "For example, Buffy's sexuality has been very honestly dealt with in this past season. she's in college now, she's 18 or 19, she's becoming a woman and having boyfriends. On other shows, they would shy away from that, giving her just one boyfriend. And the thing about Willow having a gay relationship; they're able to talk about that in a way that's very tender and beautiful.
    "When the Columbine shootings happened, we had a kid up in a bell tower, so we were ready with that [in the episode Earshot]. We had him and Buffy talking about loneliness, self-esteem and disenfranchisement, many of the central issues. So you don't have to have the blood to have an episode, and that gives the writers license to really kick butt."
    And what does the Season Five of Buffy have in store for Spike? From what we've seen thus far, series creator Joss Whedon has some very interesting developments in store for the character, but where those storylines will eventually lead is anybody's guess. "Joss usually does go in a new direction, at any given second," agrees Marsters. "You never know what's going to happen, but yes, Spike id definitely at a cross-roads."
    Among some of the recent events in Season Five are Spike's sudden and inexplicable attraction for Sunnydale's favourite Slayer; his continuing love-hate relationship with the annoying Harmony; and a series of flashbacks that reveals Spike's early days as William the Bloody as well as his encounters with the previous two Slayers. This is actually the first time that Marsters has been given an idea of things to come; in seasons past, he pretty much had to wait until the next script came in to find out what was happening Spike-wise. "I'm usually on a need to know basis, and I really don't need to know. Spike doesn't know what's going to happen next, so frankly, it can almost mess you up to know too much. But yes, I'm finally in on the secret of what I'm doing this season in general. I can't really say what it is, except to say that it's my wildest fantasy, it's the best thing I can think of for Spike, and if you think Buffy is fun to watch, just wait because this season is going to rock. Joss has assembled probably the strongest writing team that I've ever worked with."

Shakespearean Spike

    But just how villainous can Spike continue to be when he's still got that chip imbedded in his brain? Well, pretty nasty, as seen in Season Four's The Yoko Factor, where he manages to turn the members of the Scooby Gang against each other simply with some well-chosen words. "It's very Shakespearean, he says it right out in that scene, 'This is what I'm going to do,' and we watch him do it. That's the thing, if Spike can't cause physical pain, at least he can mentally torture people."
    Spike's chip-induced impotence (there's that word again) may have led some viewers to believe that the vampire may have lost some bite, but Marsters says it just ain't so. "I'm evil!" he insists. "That's right in the scripts again.

Bottled Anger

    "I kind of use Malcolm McDowell in Clockwork Orange as a touchstone. When he was deprogrammed, it was pretty much the same thing, except that he was stricken with nausea. Behind his eyes, he was still evil. If anything, he was even angrier and wanting to do more damage when he was kept from doing it, because it was bottled up inside him to some degree, that's what I was going for, but at the same time, they are trying to find a way to make Spike last. If he's evil all the time, any villain can probably try to kill Buffy maybe five times before they become pathetic.
    "That just gets so old, so they have to find a way to keep Spike from trying to kill Buffy, and this was the way they've done it so far. Again, not that I know that much about the new season, but there will probably be other things that bring them together. I suspect that if Spike's needs are parallel with Buffy's then they will be on the same track, but I don't think he'll ever be a good guy. I don't think he was a particularly nice guy before he became a vampire."
    Since his introduction in Buffy's second season, Marsters has seen his vampiric alter ego go from recurring villain status to series regular, which isn't bad considering his character wasn't supposed to make more than a handful of appearances. "Originally he was slated to die after three to five episodes," the actor recalls. "He was Drusilla's boy toy, who was going to be dumped and killed by Angel when he took over with Drusilla. They thankfully decided not to do that, but I don't think they had a lot for me in that season because my being alive wasn't part of the arc, so I was in the wheelchair.

Vamp Cordy

    "As far as this last season, the word was that I was to be the new Cordelia; I was going to be the one standing in the corner saying, 'We're stupid, we're all going to die!' and that saves the show from getting too Scooby Doo. I think Emma Caulfield [who plays Anya] fulfilled that place much better and much cleaner and it was very good for them to go to her for that purpose.
    "So in this last season, Spike is not really a narrative character. He doesn't drive stories; he's a bit of colour over to the side just to give it a little edge. But again, noting ever stays the same in Joss's universe, and from what I know, we might find him a bit more in the mix this season, although I would perfectly happy to do what I did last season."
    That's because Spike would basically make a great entrance, get all the best lines, and make a dramatic exit. "And I really didn't have to work. That's the other thing, is that everyone else on the show was working like dogs and I'd come in, shoot a day out of an episode and leave, and I still got wonderful writing."

Love, Demon-Style

    Regrets? Marsters has a few, notably the absence of former co-star Juliet Landau as Spike's great love Drusilla in recent seasons. "The thing is, I felt that what lifted Spike out of the ordinary villain was the fact that he was truly in love with Drusilla, which was strange, because demons are supposedly soul-less, and yet these two people have obviously been in real love for 120 years, so that component of the character was completely gone last season, and I was trying to find Spike without that. I'd like to see Drusilla come back, because I'd like to get back to that side of his character again."
    By now, it's probably old news to Buffy fans that Dru will indeed be returning, first in a two-part Angel/Buffy flashback cross over and then making a major impact in Angel. It wasn't an easy task, bringing Landau back because of her burgeoning film career, and at least one Buffy script had actually been written for the character only to be re-jigged when the actress was unavailable. "That's the problem, this has happened a number of times. I think they're interested in working together, but every time they call, I think it's been two or three times now, she's been busy doing films, which is great for her, but it leaves us without our Dru."
    That gap has been filled to some degree in the past two seasons by Mercedes McNab, who plays Harmony, perhaps the most annoying vampire of all time. "She's the antithesis of Dru - 'I hate you, Harmony, I love syphilis more than you!' Harmony is Spike's revenge on all women for what was done to him. He's an immature vampire; he's just a boy. He's 120 years old and has only had one girlfriend in all that time, so he's pretty much like a 17-year-old as far as love is concerned. So having been dumped for a mucus demon, it was all about hurting Harmony and taking advantage of her, so he'll never be hurt again. It's in the script, because she asks him, 'Why are you so mean to me?' and he says, 'Love hurts, baby!' and you know what he's talking about.
    "That's what I love about the show, is that you can pretty much take the fangs and the blood away from it and the narrative still holds. There's always the wonderful make-up of the show and wonderful fights, but when you really strip it down, the narrative, the build and the climax are all character driven. It's all about the relationships in the show. You could have a really successful episode with no vampires, no fighting, no special FX; just people talking to each other and I think it would be brilliant."

Hollywood Vampire

    In addition to his work on Buffy, Marsters has also made a couple of appearances on the spin-off series Angel, an interesting change of pace albeit with some familiar faces. "As far as the kind of crew they picked, David Greenwalt was one of the executive producers on Buffy before he went over to Angel, so the kind of people surrounding it were very much the same, that is to say, good social skills. On either crew, there's not the division between actors and crew that you usually find on a TV show; it's just one group, which makes everything easier.
    "There are more fights on Angel, which makes me a happier guy, but really, neither Sarah [Michelle Gellar] or David [Boreanaz] play queen for a day. They want to get the work done, they want the show to be good and they don't want to be treated with deference. They just want you to do your job correctly, and if you do that, it's great. No one is quicker with their lines than Sarah. She seems incapable of blowing a take, either because she's not on her mark or whatever reason. She's a machine, and everyone else steps up to that. I'm not going to ruin Sarah's take by blowing my line - how embarrassing would that be? Whenever I do a play, if I'm in the lead, I try to get off-book as quickly as possible and embarrass the rest of the cast be memorising their lines."

Star Leads

    Looking back over the past couple of seasons, some of the highlights for Marsters have been somewhat personal highlights rather than the occasional Spike-heavy episode. "I remember sitting on a police car, talking to Sarah last season, and I finally just got to sit and talk to her. We had a simple scene, which actors love - if we have too many props and have to move from A to B, it becomes very logistical to do the scene. If you just sit down and talk to someone, you can really be an actor with some give and take, and I'm finally getting to do that with Sarah and speak lines, so that's been really great.
    "Seeing David Boreanaz break a two-by-four with his skull accidentally and get up and not complain; that was a good day. I thought, 'This is a good cast; that guy could have whined all day,' but he just said, 'Let's do it!'"

Craving Title Sequences!

    For the time being, it appears that Buffy will be the number one gig for James Marsters, but that's just fine with the actor who's enjoying his increased visibility in the series. "We work 12 to 20 hours a day, five days a week, and because the schedule is erratic, it's very hard to schedule auditions. Because I have plenty of work coming up, I'm not that hungry anymore! Ninety-five percent of your auditions, you're not going to get, so more than nine times out of ten, when you enter a room, it ends in rejection, which is polite, but is still, 'No thank you.' You get more attention; everyone sits up and notices when you're in the title sequence, so this is much better!"