Working: How Actor Blair Underwood Gets Inside His Characters’ Heads

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4.2 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 9 May 2021

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week host Isaac Butler talks to actor Blair Underwood about performing for the stage and screen. In the interview, Blair talks about landing a role on the legal drama L.A. Law when he was still an undergraduate student at Carnegie Mellon. He also explains how he prepares for roles and how he gets in the right mindset to play tormented characters. After the interview, Isaac and co-host Rumaan Alam discuss the mysterious craft of acting. In the exclusive Slate Plus segment, Blair tells the story of the time he found himself sitting next to Sidney Poitier on a flight from New York to L.A. Send your questions about creativity and any other feedback to working@slate.com or give us a call at (304) 933-9675. Podcast production by Cameron Drews. If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence—and you’ll be supporting the work we do here on Working. Sign up now to help support our work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	I always think inside first, inside out.
0:08.9	It really, it's psychology.
0:09.9	It's one of the reasons I become an actor because it's all psychology.
0:13.4	Why does this character do the things he does?
0:16.2	Why does he think these thoughts?
0:17.7	Why does he respond and react the way he does?
0:20.5	Where does that come from?
0:21.8	And then the outside, the physicality, that is important too, but it's just a layer.
0:27.0	It's the icing on the cake.
0:30.4	Welcome back to working.
0:31.8	I'm your host, Ramon Alam.
0:33.7	And I am your other host, Isaac Butler.
0:36.4	I wonder if some of our listeners recognize the voice that we just heard that the actor
0:42.1	Blair Underwood.
0:44.0	Isaac, why don't you tackle the quick recap on Blair Underwood's career?
0:49.0	Oh my God.
0:50.0	Well, I mean, he's done everything, right?
0:52.5	I mean, shortly after leaving Carnegie Mellon when he was an undergraduate,
0:56.5	acting student, he started getting TV work and that led very quickly to a leading role
1:02.1	on L.A. law.
1:04.1	And since then, he's been in TV shows, he's been in movies like Deep Impact and set it
1:10.2	off.
	...

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