Chicon Report: Private Q & A With Jensen

Once again I had the great fortune of being able to attend the private Question and Answer session with the very eloquent Jensen Ackles. 

I have to say, I think this time the seating arrangements were handled much better by Creation than last year.  All participants were alphabetically assigned a seat.  Last year it was it was random and there was contenting when getting in line out side the board room.  Assigned seats negate the need for people to line up to get good seats and negated an additional line in the area.  This is also were fans line up for the photo ops so anyway to keep the people flowing and reduce capacity is a plus.  I commend Creation on it change in procedure.

We all entered the room took our assigned seats and had a few minutes to collect our thoughts.  Many participants were first timers to the Q&A and it can be an overwhelming experience, especially when you get to be so close to once of the most eloquent actors in the entertainment business these days.  Not to mention one half of the hottest brother duo on TV.


Jensen entered with a hello for everyone and a thank you for coming.  He asked a fan where she was from and she was from Chicago.  She said she was just 10 min away and Jensen jokingly teased how that was a long schlep for her to get here then.

As per usual he starts off with a monologue before taking questions.  This time he mentioned how much he had some ties to Chicago.  He said he liked Chicago and that his dad had worked here for a while at WGN as a technician doing promos for the station. He said one day a guy didn’t show up for his spot so the director told his dad to get in there and do the part so he did.  Jensen also said that his older brother Josh had been born here.  His family had move back to Texas right before they had Jensen.  He also mentioned he was heading back to Dallas after the convention.  He has through Wednesday of this week off and he wanted a chance to sit in his house with his family for a few days.  Something he rarely gets to do during the season. And no he wasn’t going to attend the games, but would watch them.

At this point he asked for questions and the first was very original.  The fan stated that we come here from all over to buy photo-ops and autographs and be fangirls to him.  So the fan asks, “Who do you fan over?”

Jensen jokingly, “Nobody.”  (And the fans get a laugh out of that.)  But that wasn’t quite true as he continues with a funny story about one of his fan moments

Jensen says, “I had this conversation with my wife Danneel yesterday. We were walking down the street, and there were a couple of those kinds of reactions, you know, where someone walks by and they do the double take and then they go “Ohhhhh!!!!!” at me and then I’m like, “What??”  (Fans get a chuckle out of this.)

He continues, “But when I do see famous people, like the other day Dustin Hoffmann was right in front of me getting coffee and I was like “oh” and that’s about the biggest reaction I actually have. Danneel actually though is Miss Cool to me. She never gets really excited. But the other day I saw her lose it. I was on a flight from Vancouver back to Los Angeles and Jared was on the same flight.  He didn’t recognize the guy because he was sitting behind him, but I did.  It’s funny; Jared and I fly back and forth so much, that we don’t sit with each other anymore. Because he likes the left side of the plane and I like the right side of the plane. It’s weird; you fly that much it’s like “No, I like 3F, that’s my seat, that’s where I’m going to sit.  And he’s like ‘I like 2A and that’s were he’s going to sit. But we talk anyway.

“So I kind of recognized the guy behind him and I was like “Oh wow” because I’ve been a big fan of his and I kind of geeked out. So as we were walking through the terminal I was like “Hold on Jared, I got to do something” and I turned around and said “Hey man, I just wanted to say I’m a big fan, I hope you do another cowboy movie sometime soon. It was Luke Perry. “8 Seconds” is one of my favorite movies. And he stopped, took his bag off his shoulder, and he was like, ‘It’s so nice to meet you, what’s your name?'”

Jensen relied with his name and Perry continues,” I recognize you, you do that “Supernatural” show. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Congratulations on all your success.”

And I’m like, well seriously you’re amazing in ‘8 Seconds!'”

And Luke Perry continued, “Well I’ll tell you what. If I find a good cowboy script, I might give you a call.” Here the fans gave a lot of whoa!!!  Jensen said this left him a bit spellbound.  

So he turned and rejoined Jared who had gone to go get coffee or something while he waited for Gen.  And he went to meet Danneel was waiting for him just across the street in the parking garage.  And he walked out and noticed that Luke had walked out right next to him, and he was like “Hey, here we are again.” And they continued to have a pleasant conversation as they crossed the street and Danneel had gotten out of the car and as we walked up he could see all the blood drain out of her face. And he says “This is my wife Danneel and he’s like a very very pleasant guy and he’s like nice to meet you and she’s like ‘it’s a pleasure to me you too’ and  he turns away and I just had to asked, ‘Are you OK?’ And she was like “It’s Dylan!” 

Jensen continues,” I don’t think I’ve ever seen her lose her composure like that. And I’ve seen Jared fangirling over Pearl Jam, but it hasn’t happened to me yet, but when it does, I’ll let you know.” 

The next question was asked by a military person just back from Afghanistan. She said that the series was very popular over there and she thought how they handled there weapons was great.  Her question was how did they learn it and who from?

Jensen reply, “Actually we have a friend of ours, he’s Special Forces and has done seven tours in Iraq, who lives in Washington State in a town just across the border. And we got in contact with him, actually Clif did locate him for us, and he does orientation and trains with weapons.  And we go down there on his giant three acre gun range in his front yard.”

Jensen said he actually was there just two weeks ago with others, one was the Seattle Swat team and were shooting all kinds of 1911’s, Glocks, fully automatic, teaching us how to clean and load the weapons. He says they are definitely not nearly as much of a pro as they’d like to be, but for what we do on the show…for the movie magic…it works.  He went on to say he can take apart his double barrel side by side shotgun and also Sam’s Beretta. He can take can take the whole thing apart and but it back together without looking at them, while saying my lines. For him, that was the biggest challenge he’s had. He then said he can show us a little video that Clif took of him on his IPhone just recently doing a stance and shooting off a number of rounds using a semi-automatic. And yes, we all got to see it, and yes it was amazing and yes, he looked like sniper Dean…so cool!  Hope he releases that for YouTube some day

A fan asked if Dean would ever have to use something like that to which Jensen answered smirking he wouldn’t, but Jensen likes to play around once in a while.  He added he goes done there to practice whenever he can.

Next fan asked if Jensen had ever had anyone name a baby after him.  Jensen said he had heard some had but never knew any directly.  Well this woman was a nurse who had just been present at the birth of a baby and the parents did indeed name it after him.  She said the parents had heard she was coming down to the con and asked her to show Jensen photos of their boy.  The baby had a full head of hair and that prompted Jensen to tell us all little about his birth.

“You know what’s funny?” he said. “I had about as much if not more hair than this. I actually popped out with a full ‘fro’ and my dad was like “hummmmmm??” It was a black ‘fro’ but than after about six months it turned platinum blonde and blond blond stayed that way until he was about twelve. This got a lot of awwwwwws from the crowd.  Jensen said he felt bless that they named the baby after him.

The next question was about promoting stars in a show to the status of executive producer and was wondering if that would happen to him at some point.  Jensen explained that a lot of times that was a way of the studio giving stars a raise while staying with in the rules the industry had.  He said most of the time that doesn’t mean the actors do any executive producing, although in some cases it may, but most of the time is doesn’t.  As for him doing any producing, he doesn’t feel that he would as he likes more the creative side of the job and not so much the organization of it, so he probably not do any producing.

Next question was on Jensen’s directing.  The fan told him,”you are a fantastic director from what we can see.’  Jensen replied that he was still learning. The fan continued: “My favorite line from the episode you directed was the one about the wildebeest.”  Jensen laughed and said the guy who did the voice over for that part was the real Bob Singer. This got an “Awesome” from the crowd! 

The fan continued and asked who makes decisions about things like music in the episode since she was very happy to hear the Goo Goo Dolls in that episode. Jensen explained that’s done post production. As director he throws his suggestions out there, and then editor will give him some options. He explained that on the first cut they originally had an old Belle and Sebastian song and when they couldn’t get clearance, they had to go down the line with different songs and eventually got to the Goo Goo Dolls.

Another fan asked if he would try anything different the next time he directed.

Jensen said,” You know, I really enjoy the action sequences. In “Weekend at Bobby’s” the wood chipper scene, which is basically a fight scene, I got a real rush out of directing the fight scene. I’ve always been attracted to, as far as an actor, when we get fight scenes. It’s almost like choreographing a dance. It’s like three rights, then swing left, block, parry, and shove. So it’s really this unique choreography that I like to do and also I like the different camera movements you get.   I really didn’t get a good fight scene in “The Girl Next Door.” I had the kids, young Sam who had a little tussle with the boys outside the library. But those kids were not trained to fight; they had no experience with stage fighting or anything like that. So I just had to hide the fact that they really didn’t know how to throw a punch. I’m not sure I knew how to throw a punch at that age either.”  He continued that next time he hopes to get a bigger action sequence to direct, like a car chase would be fun. Those things are a lot more exciting to direct because there’s so much going on, whereas just a scene with two people talking, you have to get really creative because you don’t want the audience to fall asleep while they’re listening. Where as a car chase of a fight scene has much more going on.  So he’d like to do more of that

Next question was mine and one I have always been curious about.  My question: What is you favorite season of “Supernatural? Do you have a special one you like more than others or do you like them all about the same?

After a bit of hesitation he replied, “I know my least favorite.” Which I said was a start.  He said it was last season.”  And that would be personal issues with workload and storyline and the character. In the beginning I guess I felt a little lost. Sam was soulless, so I didn’t have my partner in crime. Dean was trying to be so domestic. And he was also trying to pick up the pieces of Sam’s soul. It seemed to be all about Sam but I was doing all the work. So my character wasn’t actually progressing, so selfishly I was like, come on, I understand the story was about Sam; it’s Sam’s storyline, but it was Dean-centric, so that was kind of throwing me off. We got through it and Jared did a great job, but I was glad to be done with that storyline. As far as my favorite, I still love Season One, just because of the formula. It was simple, it was tight, we were still getting to know each other, the characters were starting to develop and I liked the fun nuances between the brothers. And I liked that simple formula that we had; the monster of the week episodes. I understand that the show to get to season 7 needs to have longer storylines and I applaud Kripke for how he did that but I always just liked like the monster of the week episodes.”  Love that answer.  Season one has always been my favorite.

Next question? What do you think about Dean’s story arc in Season Seven so far?

Jensen: It’s been a bit of a relaxed season so far, as far as my character goes. There’s a lot happening with the leviathans, and Castiel is now gone.  And there is a lot happening around us and that has caused the brothers to get back together and rely on each other. So it seems a bit like going back to Season One. The two brothers against the world, and I do like that. “

The fan continued, “In the last episode, I was literally screaming at the screen “Just tell him!”   This got some laughs from the other fans.  Jensen’s reply (smiling), “Ah…yeah, it will happen soon enough.”

Next question: “You seem horrified by the idea of doing Supernatural the Musical. Were you traumatized as a child by a musical?

Jensen: Actually, I did a musical in high school. In fact, I’d never sung before anybody in my life, and the drama teacher said, I really want you to try out. Somehow she convinced me to do it my senior year. I was like, “It’s my senior year in high school, what do I have to lose, why not?” And she ended up giving me the lead in West Side Story. I played Tony.” From the fans, ‘WOW. Not exactly a small part!”

 

Jensen laughing, “Yeah, for someone who’s never sung before in front of people!  So baseball season had ended, we didn’t get picked to go to the playoffs, so I asked my coach.  We’re not in the playoffs and rehearsals start next week so what do I do, and much to my surprise, the coach was like “You’ve given me three years of your life (Cause that’s all I did through high school was play baseball.) Go get as much out of your high school experience as you can, I’ll support you.” And I was like, okay. And of course, the girl that got Maria was like this all state choir phenom but had never done any acting, and I’d had a drama class, you know just like an elective, cause you know you have to take an art class. And I thought, I can’t draw, but I can act like an idiot, so did that. So I had experience there and she had only done choir and no acting. So she helped me with singing and I helped her with acting and we made it happen. But it wasn’t traumatizing, it’s just I think the whole Supernatural musical thing is I’ve just always played Dean who is someone who can’t sing very well. But if somebody could figure out a way to do intelligently and kept it true to the characters, I’m sure that there could be a hard look at it. I don’t think anyone is against it.”

Next question: Is there ever a time when you read a script and you say to your character, “Dean! What are you thinking?”

Jensen: “All the time. Seriously, I would say more specifically usually it’s just certain lines. We get new writers. I’m not quite sure what the number is, but I know that every year they have to take at least one outside submission, so basically it’s someone who has never written for the show. I mean obviously they understand the show because their script got picked, and it’s a good script, but it’s just that sometimes the dialog isn’t really true to character. So I’ll either sit down and rewrite the lines to fit it to Dean or just call Sera or Bob and say “Hey, this particular scene doesn’t sound like Dean at all. What do you think of this? That’s happened maybe twice this year. One of the scenes was between Jared and I, Sam and Dean, in fact I think it’s the next episode, it’s the end scene. We have like this falling out.  We have an argument. And I kid you not; the scene was like straight out of a romantic comedy. It was like a break-up between a woman and a man. Right out of a romantic comedy.  (Laughs from the fans) And Jared and I were in the make-up trailer that morning and I hadn’t really read the scene before then, and I was like “Dude, we gotta change this! This whole thing” So he and I sat there and rewrote the scene to make fit it, to make it closer to our characters. And we didn’t even tell the producer. And then it happened again two episodes later, there was another scene and we were like, “What is happening??” And that time we finally called Sera and said we’re changing the scene. Actually we’re changing the entire scene but it all says the same stuff. It’s just a different way of saying it. I think one of Jared’s lines was when I go to move toward Sam and he goes “Don’t! Just don’t! I can’t even look at you right now!”

(Laughs from fans)

Jensen: continues,” And we were like “No way! I’m not saying that!” So we switched it up and made it a little more manly. So yes, there are times when we look at the script and change lines. But the writers trust us enough to know, that we love these characters. So when we do this it’s to protect them and would never do anything to make them look worse.”

Last question: After seven seasons, how can you keep things fresh and exciting for your characters and the series?

Jensen: Sometimes it feels like I’m tired, or I’m grumpy or I’m sick.  You know we can’t say, I can’t count how many days I’ve had to work while being sick…having had over a 100 degree temperature and still worked a thirteen hour day, but like you also said, we’ve been doing it for so long, that the immediate connection that we have with those characters is there. The director says “Action” and I feel like I know this character so well I know I can just go right into being Dean.”  Jensen also said that both him and Jared also prompt each other.  The will tell each other if they are missing a line.  They are constantly watching each others’ backs. So quality control goes on between the two. He admits some days it’s tough, but they hope that we don’t see that.

At this point we gave him a round of applause and thanked him for taking the time to talk to us.