Terry Crews – Tales of the Walking Dead

By starrymag | August 21, 2022

By: Kelly Kearney

 

 

 

 

Q) What I want to know is, obviously The Walking Dead is this huge franchise and this is a new edition but it’s still part of The Walking Dead. What surprised you the most about the job going in that you didn’t expect? 

 

Terry: Wow! You know, how hard it would be. [laughs] A tremendous amount of effort goes into every episode. We only had ten days to do a full movie. You know what I mean? We went twelve hours every day and it was basically– I mean, it was basically me and Olivia [Munn] in every scene, and thank God we were playing the apocalypse because it felt like it. We were so exhausted and so tired but that’s what you want to be. The way I look at it is, if you know you’re playing in the Super Bowl, you want to get dirty, bloody, messed up. If you come out of the Super Bowl with a clean uniform, did you ever play, you know? And this is what I knew coming in; that this was going to be a challenge because you’re playing the end of the world in the zombie apocalypse and I didn’t want it to be easy, but I was shocked at how hard it would be. 

 

Q) What is the thing you love about Joe?

 

Terry:  The thing I love about Joe is that he’s prepared. You know what I mean? He wants to be ready for everything but that’s absolutely impossible. He’s a realist and he saw this coming, and damn it he was right! The world did end [unintelligible] and he’s got everything about him and everything that justifies all his decisions, and I also love the fact that he has this relationship with Gilligan, his dog, and he’s like– that’s his buddy. There’s something about that relationship that I think is one of the sweetest things about Joe. It says everything about him; it’s his pal, it’s his buddy–they would die for each other, and that’s the one thing I love about Joe because he’s got this heart and everything. 

 

Q) You’re a big fan of The Walking Dead franchise and you even mentioned how Melissa McBride [Carol] sent you a message and you were over the moon. What makes Carol such a great character, and would you like to star alongside her in the future– if that’s a possibility? 

 

Terry: Well, first of all, I gotta straighten this out! This is great and glad you asked that because you know Melissa McBride, I love her! I mean, as Carol she’s been there since the beginning. I got a message on Instagram but I found out that it wasn’t really her and I got catfished just like Joe does in this series! It wasn’t her and I was like, “Oh my God! Like I said this in an interview?” And when I got the chance to meet Melissa and she looked at me like, ‘“Really?” She was so nice, but it wasn’t her! [laughs] I said, “Boy, just like Joe does with Sandra (Kersti Bryan) in this whole thing! He thought the internet – he believed the internet, and Terry Crews believed the internet too and it’s so wild because you find out half of the internet is not real, and it’s a way to…You can live a whole life vicariously through the internet and not touch reality one bit. But it’s a testament to what this world is now. And another thing that’s so wonderful is that Joe does live in this episode – he survives, and now he is open to being in any of the series, from Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) to Daryl’s (Norman Reedus) France series, all the way to the new Rick (Andrew Lincoln) and Michonne (Danai Gurira) series. And I would literally jump at the chance to bring Joe back in any one of those iterations; in any one of those series, because I love this character so much.

 

Q) I just saw your drawing that you made on Instagram of Olivia. It’s absolutely great!

 

Terry: Aw! Thank you! I have all my little art stuff here right now. 

 

Q) It’s amazing. And speaking of Olivia, who do you relate to the most in real life from your two characters, and now that the whole experience is over, who has the best survival skills between you and Olivia?

 

Terry: Well, first of all, Olivia and I worked together on The Newsroom with Aaron Sorkin on HBO, so we’ve been friends for years and I actually showed her the drawing before–  I asked her permission to post it (because I wanted to make sure she approved) and she gave me permission and I was like, “Ah! Thank You!” But when I found out I was going to be in the show, I got a text from her – because we’ve been friends for years. So I get a text and she says, ‘“Hey, Joe” and I go, “How do you know about this?” And she goes, ‘“I’m Evie!” and I went, “Oh my God! It’s a reunion!” It’s amazing to be working with her again and I tell you I love these characters. Let me tell you, this is another thing I love, the fact that they established us in the right pace. It’s very…you get to spend time with us as we get to know each other. We’re actually friends, we’re actually fighting, we break up, we get back together and it’s so great because it’s a real friendship; that’s how real friends act. When you talk about who would survive? I have to tell you, to be honest, it would be Evie because listen…Joe was out of his bunker not even twenty-four hours and he’s caught in a net. You don’t even know how long Evie’s been out doing her thing. You know what I mean? Evie wasn’t bunkerized, she wasn’t…but Joe jumped out of the bunker, and BAM! He’s in a net in less than a day, and then in the end she ends up saving his life because he’s trapped again; he got catfished. So you look at this man, he thought he had it all together but I thought what’s so beautiful was the hope that Evie brings and what he called, “unrealistic expectations” and it’s the thing we all need to survive. You know what I mean? Because you look at what faith is–you can’t see it, you can’t hold it and, in fact, it’s something you can never see, but faith is what keeps you going from here to there, and being realistic– you pretty much will just go down instantly. So, I think Evie is definitely a survivor and I need to stick with her. [laughs]

 

Q) This series, or should I say The Walking Dead franchise, certainly plays up a lot of fears that people have about the end of days and the zombie apocalypse. And I always think about the height of COVID when the CDC listed how to survive the zombie apocalypse. And then I think about a friend of mine who went into some tool shop and purchased a zombie survival kit. So, with all that said, does this franchise play on any fears that you have about the end of the world and the zombie apocalypse; and part two of my question: if we were currently living in a zombie apocalypse, what three things would you have in your zombie survival kit? 

 

Terry: Ok! That’s great…this is awesome! First of all, you gotta understand I’m old enough because I lived through 9/11, and that was the end of the world. I’ll never forget…no planes flying and all of a sudden you knew your world was going to be different from here on out–and what I mean is the fear; it was abject fear. We had no idea what was happening. We said, “Oh my God! The Twin Towers are gone! They hit the Pentagon!” We didn’t know what was happening. It felt like the zombie apocalypse. Then, flash-forward to the pandemic, and I remember I was hosting “AGT (America’s Got Talent)” and slowly but surely the audience kept [sic] away and no one was coming. All of a sudden we had a full-packed stadium and then ten people in there before the whole thing got shut down. I was like, “This is the end of the world!” They were like, “Just go home, and maybe this will be over in a week, or maybe in three weeks,” and then two months later I’m still in my house and was like, “This is frightening!” By that time I had been into The Walking Dead and was like, “That’s what this is!” Now, the things I would have? Okay. What I would definitely do is, I’d go to Costco and I would definitely load up on all the groceries I could get. I would have the biggest freezer – you got to get the groceries and the freezer, okay? And then the third thing would be the gun. I would have the gun and the ammo; and those three things: gun/ammo, food, freezer – those are the three things [sic] because this is the deal; the dead I can deal with, it’s the living you got to look out for. You know what I mean? That’s where the betrayal will happen. It will be people like, “Oh, come over here trust me,” and they will try to take everything you have. If the dead guy comes over – I got him, but man, you do not know what to do with your neighbor who wants everything you have. It’s crazy.

 

Q) You mentioned the all-powerful Rick and Michonne a while ago, but can you talk about getting your own epic and insane love story before they even got to come back to TV?

 

Terry: Well, this is the thing with Evie and Joe – it’s such a beautiful story because of where it takes place and at what time. You know, one thing I love about the whole Walking Dead universe is it’s filmed nonlinear; you can jump back in at any time. I’ll never forget the time I saw Michonne in the kitchen with her friends and she’s making food and you’re like, “What world is this?” and you start to realize you can be anywhere. My story takes place 402 days after the apocalypse and that’s when I leave my bunker, which is pretty early in the whole series. I mean, in Season 9 it’s a six-year jump. So, when I look at where we could be and who we could meet, the story can keep going. I mean, I could be hanging with Tyrese (Chad L.Coleman) and Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green); I could be a part of Abraham (Michael Cudlitz) and Eugene’s (Josh McDermitt) crew. I could be back in the day…it’s all these connections that could really happen or it’s one of those things where you can even go back before he [Joe] was in the bunker, you know what I mean? This is one of the beautiful things about this world, and when Rick and Michonne was announced that they were coming back, I think it reinvigorated the whole franchise. I had no clue. I just got off the Comic-Con stage and I was walking off and we were doing other interviews and I heard the yells and screams and I was like, “What’s going on?” and BOOM! There was Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira right there on the stage announcing the six episodes that they’re going to do, and I said, “Holy cow! That would be a dream if I could be in it. I could be in Negan and Maggie’s, I could be in Daryl’s one in France, or I could be in Rick and Michonne’s” and I’m welcome to all of that. I am open. I want to leave it open and I am willing to do any of that. I want to come back in this world.

 

Q) I’m pretty sure you taught Negan how to drop an F-bomb in this universe.

 

Terry: [laughing] You know what’s funny? What if I knew Negan early on and we had some kind of relationship early on before he became a part of The Saviors? I could be a really…you know, my mind just keeps going on about how this thing could go. But listen, there’s one thing I do know, the ending is as hopeful as you ever, ever, see in The Walking Dead world, and that means whatever you see next is going to be brutal.

 

Q) We have to talk about all fight scenes and weapons training. The show is so action-packed and you’re quite familiar with action sequences in film and television. So did you have to do any training for this? Any weapons training, fight training? Were you able to do any of your own stunts?

 

Terry: You know, motorcycle training. Motorcycle training. This is the thing, I don’t ride motorcycles in L.A. because it’s so dangerous. I mean, the thing is, you can do everything right and still get hit in L.A. That’s what’s so crazy. But every year for the last five years I’ve taken a motorcycle recertification course – simply for projects like this. So, right before I went to Atlanta, I re-upped on all my motorcycle skills and I made sure I passed all those things just so you can get comfortable on a bike again. Like I knew what I was doing but the thing is, this thing was a trike – it had a sidecar, which handles totally different than a regular motorcycle, so I wanted to be careful I didn’t hurt my co-star. So, that was the extent of that kind of training. I’ve done the gun training before and I’ve done stunts and stuff, but I remember just being up in the net with one of those moments where you’re like, “Oh! I’m a lot older than I used to be!” [laughs] But that’s the fun part. I’m looking forward to doing more in this world. I really want to get more physical and do more zombie killings, or whatever–people killing, if I have to.

 

Q) So, one of the things I noticed about the episode – it happened In the beginning, when Joe is watching TV he’s watching Ohio State and you see the Ohio State helmet and Ohio State logo. Now, you playing football for Western Michigan, was it difficult for you to wear that Ohio State helmet?

 

Terry: Oh, not at all! [laughs] Not at all; I don’t care. Hey, listen, you ‘gotta understand, the NCAA exploited us, so it’s time to get ‘em back! [laughs] Listen, I came up in the day when there was no name image like this; they used you, they exploited you, so, I have no loyalties whatsoever. [laughs] But what I thought was cool was that they did set it in my Midwestern upbringing, and the fact that I circled the city of Flint, when I went to go look out was just a nod to my upbringing and to where I’m from. You have to understand, Flint, Michigan, was a deep…it went through its own apocalypse. It’s the American city-Flint Michigan and Gary Indiana, which are the two cities – my wife is from Gary and I’m from Flint. It went through its own apocalypse. I have to tell you, everything I remember as a kid, from my high school to the movie theater to the malls, to places I used to go to the restaurant that I used to eat at, has all been knocked down – it’s all fields. When I drive back to Flint, Michigan, it’s like when Joe comes out of that bunker and he’s looking around; he’s driving around and he notices everything is gone. That is my experience when I go to Flint, Michigan and that prepared me. I mean that’s what I was like and this is what Joe is going through, you know? Things he used to see, it’s all gone and he says it to himself, “Hey, they should’ve went underground,” and I felt that way even as a youngster– as a kid growing up in the ‘80s, I was like, “I gotta get out of here or I’m not going to survive.”