March 1999, "Rupert Giles - Anthony Stewart Head on his Van Helsing role as teen counselor," by Mitch Persons.

Watching the character of Rupert Giles emerge on WB's Buffy the Vampire Slayer is almost like watching the Cheshire Cat in Disney's animated Alice in Wonderland. Like that fanciful animal, Giles' character magically appears once piece at a time. Giles was first seen as a bookish and mild-mannered mentor/guardian to Buffy. Suddenly, he became a man with a past in the episode "The Dark Age" (11-10-97), then later on, a vengeance-crazed lunatic hell-bent for the blood of the man who murdered his true love in "Passion" (2-24-98).

When Anthony Stewart Head, the very personable man who plays Giles, was asked if there are going to be any more sides to his character in Buffy's third season, he answered wryly, "If there are, they'll lead to conflict. I can guarantee that. Things will not be easy.

"Part of our producer, Joss Whedon's--how can I say it--genius, maybe, or cleverness, is that the manages to tap into the human psyche and come up with all these unexpected twists and turns and character developments that leave everyone breathless. In one episode, "I Only Have Eyes For You," Giles believes that he hears the voice of his dead love, Jenny Calendar, calling to him. It turns out, of course, that he is completely wrong. Now, if Joss just went with, yes, it's the ghost of Jenny, the story wouldn't have gone anywhere. No conflict. Also, it added more pathos to the character of Giles, gave him more depth.

"That depth, the conflict, the human relationships, are what I believe makes Buffy so fascinating. Buffy is not just a horror show, it's not just a comedy show, it's about how we all have these conflicts, and how we deal with them. That's what life is about, is dealing with conflicts, and coming through the other side of that, and learning from your experience. Because Buffy is set in a high school, it's kind of under a microscope. That was the whole thing about high school, one was learning how to deal with people, and how to deal with each other, with your emotions, your sexual feelings; everything is thrown into relief in high school.

"Now being English, I don't think my fellow countrymen have quite gotten that yet. The English see Buffy, and they see it as a teen show, which it's not. The series does appeal to teens because the main protagonists are high school students, and they see a lot of issues being dealt with, but there are also a lot of adult issues that are played out.

"I also think that my compatriots haven't latched onto the fantasy elements of the show. As an actor, that is probably one of the most difficult things for me to bring across--to make people believe the unbelievable. It can be done, but it has to start with a deep conviction that what is happening is real. Now, I don't find it hard to believe in that reality. If I'm called on to be in love with a man, as an actor, I do that. It doesn't mean that I'm necessarily in love with a man, but I take the feelings of love that I do have and I project them on whatever the character is. If I have to be scared by a vampire or a demon, it's not too far to think that there's something dark and sinister out there.

"By the way, despite what I'm saying, I don't really think acting is necessarily a gift. I think anybody could probably do it, given a bit of time and a bit of thought. It's not a special thing. If what is on the printed page appears real, then anybody can make that come to life. The thing that would stop most people from doing that is themselves. They would say, 'I can't do that, I can't do that,' in which case they wouldn't be able to. But if they think to themselves, 'I can do this, I can do this,' then they do it. We should always believe that everything is a possibility.

When I do speak of acting gifts, I think the greatest is being able to make dialogue work. That's very hard. But when you're given as good dialogue as we have been in Buffy, it's not too difficult. Most of my stuff is telling the story, explaining the plot. People say, 'Well, how do you manage to do it?' I just believe in who I am and what I'm saying. It's just like reading a book. When you believe in a book, and you believe in the characters, you get so caught up in it that by the end, you feel you know these characters, and you feel let down, the fact that you're not going to see them again, that you're going to have to say goodbye. The same way, when you're reading a script, or you're playing a role, especially something in a recurring role that has had two years to develop and be nurtured, and has gone through so many emotional ups and downs as Giles has, it becomes part of your life, part of your psyche. Giles has become a real human being. Knowing that, I love it when Joss or David [Greenwalt] or Marti [Noxon, the co-producer] ask, 'What can we do with him now? Where's he going next?'"

As to where Head himself is going next, he has some very definite plans. "I'm producing an animated film called D'Ark Secrets. It's going to be a fantasy/musical along the lines of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. I've always been a big fan of that show, and not too long ago I realized that there hasn't been a musical like that in quite a number of years. I co-wrote the book with another Englishman, Matthew Bell, and I wrote all the 15 songs. It's a strong story, fairly dark, but funny. It also deals with something that I believe has never been touched on before--at least not in a musical.

"My agents tried to sell D'Ark Secrets as a straight live show, but they weren't having too much luck. Then, one day, I was talking to a man I had met in a restaurant called Scott De Las Cassas. I mentioned that I was having some difficulty selling D'Ark Secrets. It turned out that Scott was an animation producer. He showed some interest in the script, said he wanted to see it. After he read it he said, 'You know, this may just work as an animated film.'

"Many might say that my meeting Scott was just happenstance, but I don't think so. I'm a great believer in things occurring for a reason. Whatever life hands us is meant to happen, like my running into Scott, or my being cast as Rupert Giles. I have every conviction that life will give us whatever lessons and/or gifts we need to have at the right place and at the right time."

Page created May 1999. Original material © Betsy Vera (bentley@umich.edu). This website is for information and entertainment purposes only and is not intended to infringe on copyrights held by others.

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