Demetrius Grosse – Fear the Walking Dead

By starrymag | October 25, 2020

By: Kelly Kearney

 

 

Q) “Fear the Walking Dead” just kicked off their new season and you’re playing Emile LaRoux, a bounty hunter sent on a mission by Ginny. What can you tell us about Emile and how he fits into the Fear universe?

A) How Emile fits in is that he’s a loner and Virginia (Colby Minifie) has hired him to be a bounty hunter to get Morgan Jones (Lennie James). In this world in “The Walking Dead” world where people are the real threat…You know, it was explained to me early on in the process that this environment is one where it’s kind of predictable what zombies will do, but it’s unpredictable with what the people who are clinging to survival will do. Emile has constructed a life for himself where not only is he safe, but he has a kind of security system around him to protect himself. He’s basically a character where in some spots he may be looked at as neurotic or crazy, but in this world he’s very sane. He’s someone who’s figured out how to survive in this world at this time with these circumstances and he’s pretty vigilant about how he gets his job done.

Q) Originally, your character was named Josiah, but then the show went with the French name Emile. Why the change?

A) It just changed naturally. The writers are creative and find names that resonate. What’s interesting about Emile is the sound and the way it’s spelled. It’s more of an androgynous name. It almost sounds like…It doesn’t sound as deadly and unassuming and I think that harkens to the humanity of this character; in all of these characters. That’s what is really fascinating about playing him in that you have to love a character that you play. Even if he deals in treachery, you have to find some sort of humanity in the character, to whereas you’re not judging the character that you are playing but instead you are trying to see the world or the imaginary world of the story through their eyes; and why they had to make the choices that they made to survive.

Q) Everyone is talking about how dark this season is and Emile certainly plays a part in that shift. After landing the role, what was your first reaction when you read the script?

A) Yeah, I was really excited to do this. This character isn’t just one dimensional; he wasn’t just a gun for hire. He has a swagger and a kind of je ne sais quoi. There’s a humor to him. He relishes in his power and his ability to have his bearings in a world where everything is upside down and it was great to get a chance to work so closely with Lennie James who is a delightful and a giving actor. The showrunner and director gave us a lot of room to find these moments. It was just cool reading the script because it wasn’t a world that I normally play in. I’m honestly not really into the zombie genre and I thought I was going to be afraid. Maybe that’s not the right word, but I thought it was going to be off putting with all the gore and blood and guts and in the circumstances that I found myself in playing Emile in this world, I kind of binge watched a bunch of zombie movies to prepare. Movies like the old Night of the Living Dead and the new Bill Murray movie The Dead Don’t Die with Adam Driver and just had to desensitize myself to the gore so I could live and walk in the shoes of this guy, of someone who has lived in this world and survived in this world and is a bounty hunter in this world.

Q) The role is definitely a physical one with plenty of action sequences and bloody gore. Did you find it challenging or was all that axe swinging and guts pulling, a fun little release?

A) Yeah, sure. It was testament to the production design and not only swinging the ax like that, but just all of the design elements were fun for me creatively and artistically. Just getting a chance to help with his wardrobe and his hat and his tools and deciding what the axe looked like. To be involved with the creative team, and then seeing the persona we developed, live on beyond what we know of as Emile. That was really spectacular to get a chance to be a part of. The creative process of making those things…But I’m not really a gore guy, ironically. I’m really not. [laughing]. It was about desensitizing myself and really diving all the way into the details so I could kind of wield the axe so to speak.

Q) This is your second role in one of these gore-tastic shows. “Fear the Walking Dead” is not your first foray into the horror world. You also starred in the HBO anthology series, “Lovecraft Country.” What is it about the genre that attracts you to these types of roles?

A) I think so because you know black actors, I feel like we’ve only recently been getting and creating opportunities for playing in the science fiction realm. It’s important in a time like this to see us in this light; in futurism and getting the light shining on it. Like with “Lovecraft Country” and now with “Fear” having Lennie as the lead of the show, one that’s as contextual as “Fear” and coming off of “The Walking Dead” and it’s an important way to show that audiences are ready to see diverse representation in who their protagonists are. Whether that’s with gender diversity, cultural diversity…You know Virginia is kind of a bad ass and having this ostensibly dainty woman who commands that kind of power is important to see. Without being on too much of a soapbox here, I think this show is kind of checking a lot of boxes and resonating a lot of chords with people and especially at a time when our world finds people speaking up in all races saying, “Hey, you know black lives do matter; and when black lives matter, then yes, all lives will matter.”

Q) What kinds of obstacles did you face trying to get this episode finished during the COVID-19 pandemic?

A) Yeah, the pace is a lot more methodical in filmmaking now. There was a smaller crew on set when we were shooting and moving forward I feel like there’s going to be less people around on the set environment and going to be a little more contracted where there will be…You know where it used to take a hundred crew members, now people are finding ways where we can cut some of those numbers in half. I feel like we were able to get a lot of it done before the COVID pandemic, but from what I know during it I know some portions had to be shut down and then we had to come back and finish up the season. The pace is just a little slower, but it also provides an opportunity for greater appreciation for what it is we do and that’s bringing imaginative stories that inspire people and entertain them and give a little more wonder to their everyday lives

Q) A show about a world overrun with the undead really has to come up with new and inventive ways of killing. Emile’ s axe is certainly a unique and brutal addition to the show’s weapons cache. Did you have to do some training with the axe when preparing for this role because you swing that thing like a pro!

A) Well, I do have a mediocre golf game. [laughs] And my friend does Wing Chun and he showed me a little bit of stuff in terms of some of their weaponry, but really in the moment it’s the stunt coordinator that they have. He was a great coordinator, so I was just working with a great team and I was able to capitulate that this was a top tier stunt production company putting this together. There’s not a lot of room that they leave for mistakes to be made especially with the kind of level of danger these characters find themselves in, in this world.

Q) In the pre-apocalyptic world, a bounty hunter was typically motived by the bounty. Emile the head-hunting literalist seems to care more about social contracts and collecting heads. What do you think is his motivation because it is not money?

A) Wow, that’s a great question! I feel like Emile’s motivation was the same motivation that would be like a coroner’s or would be like a military contractor almost. Someone like that in the world of “The Walking Dead,” when people die they become undead and so I looked at Emile as being a person who felt like what he does helps to establish a sense of order or finality to people who the government or the powers that be decided were dangerous to society. In the same sense as Osama bin Laden was taken down by Navy seals or like Saddam Hussein; people who are terrorists in this world. Emile is the terrorist of the terrorists and so I looked at him as this kind of final say because if you decapitate person in “The Walking Dead” world, they are most likely going to become a threat to the living. So, his method is the only foolproof method to really make sure that the bad guys, essentially, are really dead because in this world we’re in – a world where the dead are undead – there’s no guarantees that there won’t be any more trouble coming after someone has died.

Q) The themes of this show are always going to be dark, deadly, and disastrous. How did you get into that “head chopping” mindset and what did you do to decompress after a long day on set?

A) Oh, man, well, barbecue and watching cartoons. [laughs] It’s all about that balance.

Q) Why do you think Virginia is determined to kill Morgan? He is one man and she has the power of a community behind her. Why not let him live?

A) Well, we will have to exposit that as the series continues. I didn’t have a really good nice and neat answer why that is. I feel like Morgan should be able to ride off into the sunset, right? He’s a beloved character and he’s already had hell to deal with, so I don’t know. I don’t want to be verbose or speak out of turn about what their motivation is, but I think it’s going to make for some great TV.

Q) I was sad to see Emile did not make it through the season opener. I was all ready for him to be the next big bad! Do you think Emile had to die so that Morgan could be reborn, so to speak?

A) I think so. Philosophically, the idea of the end being the beginning sounds very much like something you would read by Lao Tzu or something, and I do feel like it’s a butterfly effect that’s happening between the characters, Emile and Morgan. One of the things that people are starting to pick up on is that Emile actually mentions that he has a brother. He mentions it at the campfire with Walter during the Tabasco sauce scene. So, there’s a rumor that there is another LaRoux in in this world that we have not met yet. Whether we meet him or not we’ll see, but I think Morgan will definitely be able to carry that mantle wonderfully as a protagonist, and we’ll see what happens with that.

Q) Since he crossed over from “The Walking Dead” to “Fear the Walking Dead,” Morgan has been on an enlightened path. Not only did he spend last season trying to rescue people in need, but he often goes out of his way to avoid killing unless it is the last resort. We saw this again with Emile when he avoided the kill shot for a bullet to the arm. Was the headhunter a test of Morgan’s peaceful ideology?

A) I think he is and I think Morgan passed that test. The humanity of Morgan’s character is one of the things that I know I struggle with. [pause] It’s the idea of black on black crime – even in the zombie apocalypse! [laughs] I think Lennie and I kind of chatted about that lightly and then we went back to work because we’re actors in an imaginary world telling a story, but we couldn’t go on without us acknowledging that these two black men where one is head hunting the other and Morgan is just trying to survive. And this guy is just trying to take off his head. For Morgan to just kind of do a shot to his arm and not kill him when he had the opportunity to is a little bit of that consciousness seeping into our story – where you see Morgan’s humanity and understanding. It’s just that this man is someone who the fans love and that’s someone who is almost an everyman, right? A man of every season. Someone who’s just trying to make it through this world where nothing is normal or that we know as being normal.

Q) Lennie James is brilliant as Morgan Jones. Did the two of you have time to explore the dynamics between these two characters before you filmed?

A) Yeah, you know we worked on it. It’s a lot of hurry up and wait in the movie and TV business and that much hasn’t changed. When you’re there it’s like go time so we definitely worked on fight scenes and the choreography and we did it pretty early that day and shot it the same day. So, we did our choreography and stunt training and then after lunch put it up on its feet. I mean that guy is a pro! He’s been doing it for a while now.

Q) Besides “Fear the Walking Dead,” are you working on any other projects we can keep an eye out for?

A) I did a film called Survival, also starring Elise Neal, and I’m also directing a feature named Godfrey that will hopefully see it’s light in 2021. We started shooting it right before the pandemic and early on we used face masks or face coverings and the early shots that we got we paused a little bit for COVID, but it looks like we’ll be able to get things going with that at the beginning of the year.

Q) What would you like to say to the fans and followers of your work?

A) Thank you for being the great fans that you are and keep up with my career because I think there’s going to be some great things on the horizon.