Hell on Wheels - Colm Meaney Interview

How did you come to Hell on Wheels? What interested you in this type of story and character?
COLM MEANEY: This pilot was being circulated last summer, and the word in town from everybody was that it was a great pilot. They asked me to have a look at it and I did, and I thought it was one of the best things I’d read, possibly ever. It reinforced my belief that the best writing today is in cable television. It really is, from a character’s perspective. The film scripts you read are schlock, compared to cable. It was very exciting. They wanted to meet with me, so we did and we both said, “Fantastic.” They wanted to make sure I wasn’t impossible to work with. I just said, “I’d love to do it,” and they said, “We’d love to have you,” so away we went. I usually read a script from an audience perspective first, and then look more closely at the character. With this, it was a complete page-turner. It was fantastically entertaining. And then, specifically looking at the character that they wanted me to play, it really got my juices going. You don’t see writing like this, nowadays. The vocabulary he uses is just fantastic. There was no hesitation.

How challenging is it for you to give the story with these monologues that your character has, but not having it sound too much like straight exposition?
MEANEY: That’s Tony and Joe’s great writing. You never feel like it’s exposition. It doesn’t feel that way reading it, it doesn’t feel that way playing it, and hopefully it won’t feel that way for an audience either. There are so many burning issues to be dealt with that it’s completely understandable and natural that a character is struggling with these issues themselves. In that struggle, you inform the audience. The thing about this writing is that it’s very easy to learn. Good writing always is.

Source: Full interview @ Collider