There aren't too many male actors on Showtime's hit drama
The L Word, but this doesn't bother industry veteran Wallace Shawn, who has landed a multi-episode guest-starring arc on the series.
“I already had seen the show, so I wasn't looking around thinking, 'Where are the men?'” Shawn told
TV Guide. “And of course for me, I'm more comfortable with the company of women than the company of men, so it was the world that I think every show or play or film should be — I'm the man, and everyone else is a woman. It's very agreeable.”
Since
The L Word is a show that follows the lives and loves of a group of lesbians and bisexuals, it's only logical that it has a female-dominated cast, for whom Wallace Shawn said he has great admiration.
“Secretly I idolized them,” he told
TV Guide, “and most of them had never heard of me and didn't really necessarily find me that interesting. My job was to curb my enthusiasm, I suppose. I was trying not to fawn over people.”
He also has much praise for the show itself.
“I think it is incredibly smartly written and directed and I worship the actresses, so my goal was to just pretend that I didn't care and I was just doing my job,” he said.
On
The L Word, Wallace Shawn plays William Halsey, the investor of Jenny's (
Mia Kirshner) fictional movie. The character only appears in four episodes, in accordance with the duration of Shawn's brief guest-starring stint.
“I'm sorry to say that for whatever reason, my fantasy that my character would grow and grow was not realized,” he said. “Perhaps they would have liked nothing more than to develop my storyline, but it just didn't happen this year.”
Still, Shawn is hopeful for a return, considering death is not in the horizon for his character.
“He's very much alive at the end,” he said. “I think that their general belief is that every other show tends to be about the men, and even though I, as the actor, dreamed that my character would develop in so many directions, I think they just had other priorities. Who knows? The public might respond to my character, they might beg to [bring] me back.”
-Lisa Claustro, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: TV Guide
(Image Courtesy of New York Times)