Wow! That thought crossed my mind repeatedly over the course of tonight’s Season Finale of Psych. While the episode still served up some great laughs, it was a much more tense, scary, and dramatic episode than what Psych fans are used to.

Personally I loved it, I thought Roday’s direction was great, and I loved the shots he cribbed from Hitchcock, especially Lassie getting chased by the remote control airplane a la North by Northwest. I loved the Mary and McNab red herrings, and of course Gus' "What about my face" line. And I absolutely loved the song that played over the final scenes. ("I Go To The Barn Because I Like The" by Band of Horses) There was so much to love in this episode, and I didn't want it to end.

And, I don’t know about you, but I was honestly worried someone was going to die. First I thought McNab was dead, then when he wasn't I was worried again. I never really feared for Juliet’s life as I think she and Shawn will get together before anything happens to either of them, but I was genuinely worried that Shawn was going to have to watch Abigail die. I also feared for Henry’s life for a few seconds when Shawn chose to save Abigail over catching Mr. Yin, as I was worried Henry would be ambushed by our secret killer.

But lets discuss the thing I’m sure you’re all wondering about: That last moment where we see a picture of Mr. Yang (Ally Sheedy) and young Shawn. What does this mean? Does Shawn know that he knows Yang from when he was a kid? Is he hiding this fact from everyone else? What was their relationship like? And more importantly how long will we have to wait to see Yang again?

Personally I think Yang was someone who worked at his school, or someone he met on a field trip. Someone Shawn has no memory of having met as a kid, but who clearly had an impact on a very crazy woman. (I'll admit for a second I thought it was Yang and her son, Mr. Yin, and thought his resemblance to young Shawn was indicating that Yang and Shawn had a kid together. But I mostly attribute that to having originally watch the episode on a tiny square on my computer monitor)

During my interview with Ally Sheedy and James Roday on Monday several questions were asked about Mr. Yin and Mr. Yang. I didn’t want to spoil any of last night’s episode so I held those questions and answers for today. So keep reading to find out a little bit more about the serial killers that haunt Shawn and Gus at night. (This part of the interview is pretty Roday heavy as most of the questions center on last night's episode and the future of Psych)

I asked Roday and Sheedy when and if we’d be seeing her character again. Sheedy said that “there is a strange secretive sort of story going on here,” and deferred to Roday who said that “it’s fair to say we have not seen the last of her and we’ll leave it at that.”

Of course the questions that everyone wants to know is what is up with that picture that appears to be of young Shawn and Mr. Yang? Of course neither stars wanted to comment to much on that questions. “James can answer it.” Sheedy said, while Roday replied “I don’t even want to talk about that last moment.” So it seems like we’ll have to wait a few months to find the answer to that question.
"You're just amazing...My most admiral foe...That's why I chose you...We're going to be working together again...Shawn I knew you'd come."

Another question we’ll have to wait for a definitive answer to, just who is Mr. Yin. When asked if there had been any clues to that mystery Roday said there was nothing overt. “We’re still sort of working that out ourselves, but we’ll make sure that when we do finally sort of come clean we’ll do our best not to make it one of those things where retrospectively it’s like, well, that couldn’t have been possible. We’ll do our best not to cheat. I don’t think we’ve backed ourselves into any corners so far. We’ve kept it pretty ambiguous. We’ll just come up with something really cool and then lay it out there.”

Roday also said that the idea to make a trilogy out of the Yin/Yang killers came from Andy Berman and himself. “[We thought] that it would be fun to do a trilogy within the landscape of Psych. For a while it was just me and Andy that thought that was cool and then we did the first one and it kind of went over like gangbusters. And Ally was a huge part of our campaign to keep going because I think she did such a marvelous job with that character that it’s like how can you not want more of that?”

Roday also said that credit had to be given to Jimmi Simpson (Mary) who came in and “created this unbelievable sort of character that we didn’t want to see the end of yet either.” Roday said a lot of different things just came together and it was a no-brainer to do another one. “We started thinking about the second Yang, I think a day after the first one aired and everybody was so pumped about it. We have not stopped thinking about it since because we still have more work to do.”

Asked whether or not he thought the dramatic tone of this episode would change the series tone Roday said a hearty no. “I don’t think it’s going to change the tone. I think it’s another sort of feather in the cap of Shawn’s growth. Obviously I’m not getting younger; the character is not getting younger. None of us are getting younger so we have to start addressing that. This is a pretty good jumping off point, I think going into season five of just like wow, everybody sort of needs to check in with themselves and recognize that you can’t be a kid forever and maybe that should start informing our behavior a little bit.”

Roday also said that there while there would still be plenty of laughs in the next season, this episode would serve as a way to push the growth of Shawn’s character. “We’re still going to be plenty silly. This is just a character beat for him more than anything. He’s mortal even though he likes to think sometimes that he isn’t. This is sort of just a wake-up call. It’s good. You’ve got to do that kind of stuff once you get this deep into the series so that you feel like you’re going somewhere.”

Roday was then asked how he thought fans would react to the finale and the choices made by the characters. “I hope they dig it. There is not a lot of build up to it and I think our publicity guys have done a really good job of sort of getting everybody’s anticipation up and like I said I think we’ll get away with it partially because it’s a finale and everybody gets a few months off to sort of process and water cooler talk and you don’t have to sort of adjust yourself to come right back next week and watch us save a sea mammal of some sort.”

Roday continued saying that it’s easier to do these heavy episodes at the end of the season. “[It] buys us a little bit of latitude and the fact that it’s a little darker and a little scarier and the stakes are pretty high is fun I hope for fans. It’s a nice sort of curve ball that we don’t throw very often. Also, I think it’s a treat to watch good actors doing good work on a show that you’re a fan of. I think that’s what Ally and Jimmi and the rest of the cast sort of delivered in spades in this episode. They certainly all made me look good.”

Finally Roday was asked about the cameo he and girlfriend and Psych co-star Maggie Lawson had in the movie Gamer, and whether or not the mustache he had was his idea. “We’re buddies with the filmmakers. I’ve known [writer/directors] Mark [Neveldine] and Brian [Taylor] for a while and they just called and said, “Hey do you guys want to come to New Mexico for a day and do some silly stuff?” We were on our way across country to visit Maggie’s family anyway so we just made a quick pit stop and did that silly stuff. The mustache is always my idea, man. Any time I can exploit that thing I do because it’s serious and it’s real.”

Labels: Interview, Psych

Tonight brings us the 4th Season Finale of Psych and it's a doozy of an episode, easily one of my favorite of the series. The episode brings back Ally Sheedy's Mr. Yang, the serial killer that wrought much turmoil in Shawn's life in last season's finale. This is part two of what James Roday calls a "trilogy" so expect to see more of Mr. Yang after tonight.

The episode involves a serial killer with a Hitchcock motif, using scenarios from several Hitchcock films to try and divide and conquer our fearless group of police and fake psychics. The episode was co-written and directed by series star James Roday and features many homages to Hitchcock including at least 4 shots taken directly from famous scenes in the auteur's catalogue. Monday I was lucky enough to take part in an interview with Roday and guest star Sheedy. Keep on reading to find out what Sheedy thinks happened to her Breakfast Club character, Allison, the odds of seeing David Bowie on the show, and much, much more. But first a clip from tonight's episode:

Since Roday had both written and directed tonight’s episode, the conversation quickly lead to him discussing those aspects of the show. I asked James if he drew inspiration from any other directors or if he stuck to Hitchcock when directing tonight’s episode. Roday said “You know, I really do try to stay as faithful to Hitchcock as I could both aesthetically and in pacing and I just shamelessly tipped off four or five shots straight out of his films, quite frankly. It was an homage episode and I’m a Hitchcock fan, and Andy Berman who wrote the episode with me is a Hitchcock fan. As much as we could get away with doing Hitchcock in a Psych episode that’s definitely what we set out to do.”

Roday went on saying “I have always been a Psycho fan. I’m a horror buff. I just think Hitchcock sort of revolutionized the idea of the chiller twist that horror films kind of attempted to be predicated on since Psycho came out. That is the original jaw dropping twist that sort of set everything else in motion. I love that movie, and Anthony Perkins is fantastic in it and it’s shot amazingly and yes, that would be my number one.”

Roday continued to reflect on directing the episode when asked, if like Hitchcock, he did most of his directing in preproduction. “No. Hitchcock, God love him, he’s one of the great masters of all time, but he did used to stick to that whole idea that the entire movie was in his head before he stepped on set for the first day and that never once in his entire career did anything ever change. That’s like the most impossible thing in the world for me to believe if for no other reason than something must have fallen over at some point or exploded or something.”

“We’re a TV show on a seven day schedule so it’s like you want to make people laugh, come in with a plan. Ha, ha that’s very funny. You learn very quickly that if you can get two or three or maybe four of the things right or at least close to what you had in your head over the course of a seven day shoot then you’ve succeeded. That’s a lot to be happy about. The same goes for this episode. I sort of chose my battles and I picked the things that I really, really, really wanted to look like the way that they were storyboarded or the way that they were conceived and everything else you’re just rolling with the punches and collaborating like crazy and hoping that other people will step up and make you look good because you simply haven’t had time to think about some stuff as much as others.”

“For this episode the Hitchcock stuff was obviously very important. We wanted to service that as best as we could and it was a lot. It was a very ambitious episode. Andy and I had sort of looked at each other several times and we were like, gosh, why did we think we could do this? It’s a game and you’ve kind of got to be ready for anything at any time and that’s the fun of it also.”

Roday said that there’s a challenge to acting and directing and surprisingly he finds the acting harder when doing both. “The acting part is more challenging because I just don’t want to think about it. This time I think I was a little more aware of it, but truthfully there are so many things that you’re sort of in charge of and there are so many questions that you have to answer after any given take from the director’s perspective that that’s kind of all you’re thinking about, at least me anyway. I’m just lucky that on the acting side I’m playing a character that I’ve played for many, many years, that certainly helps. Staying in the moment as an actor is definitely the biggest challenge while you’re directing.”

Asked whether he gets his inspiration for his character from the script of someone he knows in real life Roday said that Shawn’s “Peter Pan” and that he doesn’t know “real people like him.” Roday said that if you go back to season one and watch through to the present episodes there is an evolution to the character and “you can see a lot of differences.”

When asked about the feel of tonight’s episode, which is more serious and intense, that most episodes Roday said that although he doesn’t “want to pull the rug out from under the fans every week and slap them in the face...this was a season finale and it was the long awaited return of Mr. Yang...we wanted to load our canon with as much stuff as we could. That’s a fun way to end a season.”
The conversation turned to Sheedy and her character Mr. Yang, Sheedy spoke about getting the call to play Mr. Yang, saying that she heard there was a show called Psych and that “they want you to do a character called Mr. Yang, and could you take a look at the script? I read it. I didn’t know how on earth anybody had me in mind for that part either, not a clue. But as soon as I read it, I thought, okay. This is going to be really, really, really fun so absolutely and jump in. That’s how it went.”

Sheedy then talked about playing such a menacing character on such a funny show saying “it’s not hard at all,” everybody is so “whacked out and so extreme” that she doesn’t have to imagine how a serial killer would really behave and she can “sort of swing out there and wing it.” Sheedy said that working with Roday as a director was fun because she “had the feeling like anything [she] could come up with goes. Everything about Mr. Yang is fun for me, everything.”

I asked Sheedy about her character from The Breakfast Club, Allison Reynolds. I conjectured that had she not made friends with the other kids in detention that day, she might have gone crazy, her wheels might have come off, and eventually she might have become Mr. Yang. Sheedy said “Well, I think she has that day with them but I don’t think it means that her wheels don’t come off. I think things sort of go back to the way they were after that. That’s what I think at the end of the Breakfast Club day it’s the way it was before. I have my own ideas in my head about what happens with Allison but I do think the wheels definitely come off at a certain point, yes.”

On working with an 80s icon like Sheedy, Roday said “I’ve been a huge Ally Sheedy fan for a long time and she’s been on our board of people that absolutely must come on the show since the very beginning. It’s surreal. It really is. You grow up and you have dreams of doing this for a living and you have people that inspired you and then you get lucky enough to do it and one day you’re sitting across from them and it’s crazy, but it’s also – it’s unbelievable. All you can do is – you just kind of want to capture these moments in little time capsules. I haven’t been nervous many times on our show, I have to be honest, but I had the butterflies going with Ally.”

James went on to say that while he’d love to have the entire Breakfast Club appear on the show, he feels he’s “got the top two on the list,” saying “Ally was always sort of...number one and then Judd was number two and then there was like a three-way tie with lots of love for the other ones.” Sheedy said she thought Anthony Michael Hall would do the show, but that Molly currently has a show (ABC Family’s Secret Life of an American Teenager), and Emilio is out of the acting game, and currently directs.

Sheedy was asked which Breakfast Club actor she would like to “take down” as Mr. Yang, to which she replied “Oh, I don’t know that I should be answering this question. I don’t want to get – let’s just say I have an idea but I’m going to be in big trouble if I say it.” The questions was changed to which Breakfast Club actor she’d most like to work with on Psych. “One of my favorite people in the world is Judd, but he already did an episode of Psych. I guess my personal soft spot love is for Judd, so there you go.” Roday chimed in saying “So we can bring Judd back and then she can take him down and there you go.”

Some other quick takes:

- Asked about his quest to get David Bowie on the show, Roday said “There is a less than 30% chance it’s going to happen, but we’re going to keep trying.” And said that the closest they got was when they did “American Duos” because John Landis, who’s friends with Bowie reached out and almost made it happen.

- Asked about preparing for the role of Mr. Yang Sheedy said “I just told myself not to get – just to not plan anything ahead of time. It was so funny and wacky so I decided to completely dispense with the creepy dark, very serious and brooding serial killer thing and just like I thought the whole thing was hysterically funny.”

- On the episode being so dramatic versus the usual comedy “We as the cast dig those. We don’t get to do them very often. As much as we love our show and as lucky as we are to do it and still be doing it, any time we can mix things up it’s fun for us because we get to work different muscles and even if it’s just for a week it’s fun to mix things up. Once or twice a year we know that we’ll have these episodes coming up and everybody gets pumped and everybody gets a little extra sleep. We don’t go out as much and we recognize it as an opportunity to do something that we don’t always get to do. “

- Sheedy on Sunday night’s John Hughed Tribute “Really I haven’t seen most of those people for quite a while. It’s bizarre because every time we see each other it’s sort of like not a lot of time has passed. I share this crazy experience with those four people and nobody else in the world. It’s weird. We just share a lot so there is a lot of unspoken stuff that goes on.”

- On their favorite episodes of Psych Sheedy joked that she “love[s] the episodes that have Yang in them.” While Roday said that he’s “always been really fond of the tele-novella episode where we spoofed a Spanish soap opera...called “Lights, Camera, Homicidio,” and that he likes the first half of season once because they “were sort of flying by the seat of our pants and every week was truly a new adventure.”

That’s all for now, but head back here tomorrow to see Part 2 of my interview in which we get into a little more detail about tonight’s episode. Also don’t forget to check out my Psych Grab Bag Giveaway, which you can enter until midnight tonight.

Labels: Psych, USA

This Wednesday Psych has it's 4th Season finale, and from what I hear you don't want to miss it, especially they last 2 minutes! And based on the picture above, it looks like some serious stuff goes down! (I'm sitting down to watch it as soon as I finish this post.) And once again the people at USA Network have given me a sweet Prize pack for one lucky winner. This contest is open to anyone, anywhere! You can enter once, and the total value is $135! The contest will end at Midnight on March 10th.

To win I want to know how you think the Series will end. Will everyone survive the series? Will Shawn and Gus' friendship survive? Will Shawn be found out? You tell me how you think the series will end however many years from now. (E-mail me your answer at thecinemaniac.com@gmail.com or use the link at the top of the page.) Leaving a comment is not an entry and will not be counted as such. Details on the contest are below. And be sure to come back here Wednesday morning to read my interview with James Roday and guest star Ally Sheedy!

Don’t miss the most shocking PSYCH finale ever as a killer targets Shawn using scenarios from classic Hitchcock films. Ally Sheedy guest-stars in Psych's season finale, directed by James Roday — "Mr. Yin Presents" — premiering Wednesday at 10/9C!

Enter to win a Psych Prize Bag filled with:

– Psych Season 3 DVD Set

– Psych Talking Bobbleheads

– Psych Book: Call of the Mild

– Psych Pineapple T-Shirt

– Psych Pineapple Stress Toy

Labels: Giveaway, Psych, USA, USA. Contest

That's right one of my favorite shows on TV, Psych, returned to USA last night with all new episodes. And last night's episode kicked the Winter Season off in style with guest star John Cena, from the WWE. Cena played Juliet's big brother, who is apparently a kick arse military man. Last week I had the pleasure to sit in on an interview with series star James Roday and John Cena, and although it was supposed to be a joint interview, the two were never able to make it on the phone at the same time. Cena was waiting on a flight to take him to the set of a movie he's filming and Roday couldn't get into the call. Roday finally joined the exact second that Cena had to leave to get on his flight.

Although the duo never got to speak at the same time, it was a great interview and it was a revelation to me how nice of a guy Cena is, and how much he's done besides wrestling. Who knew the guy was not only a wrestler and actor, but also has a gold record for a hip-hop album he released.

Cena mentioned that while he hadn't been a big fan of the show before he had seen bits and peices of the show before, since its on the same network as WWE RAW and that he saw could tell that it was his sense of humor and that he knew he'd fit in with the cast. He went on to discuss Roday and co-star Dule Hill and what he thought would happen when the guest hosted Raw (it aired this past Monday) saying "I’ll tell you what, Dule’s energy is second to none and James, believe it or not, whether you’re going to get him to admit this online on the phone is one of the biggest closet wrestling fans I have ever come across in my life. There are many intricate professional wrestling references in the kick off Psych episode. It was a pleasure to see those guys pay homage to the sport and to the industry fantastically well with their clever way of writing material."

Unfortunately, for those of you who didn't see it, Roday had to have an emergency appendectomy on Monday and was only able to call in briefly to the show, but Dule did a fantastic job of guest hosting, and got a chance to do some comedy with Cena as well.

Cena also noted that he was glad that his character's exit from the show was left a bit open ended as it allows him to come back at some time. He said "I would certainly love to come back if, let’s hope we get some good ratings for the premier episode and if we do then hopefully I’ll be seen again."

While Cena spoke about wrestling, guesting on the show, and his career, the talk didn't really begin to focus on the upcoming season of Psych until Roday joined the call. Roday began by discussing the theme song and who he'd like to have perform it after this past years wonderful rendition by Boyz II Men. Roday's dream covers would be performed by The Chipmunks and David Bowie. (Funny enough within minutes someone on Twitter had poster a link to a Chipmunks version which you can find here.) He went on to explain "For me selfishly I would want it to be Bowie so that I could hang out with Bowie and I would actually request that he come dressed as the character from Labyrinth and I would hang out with him while he did it and then I don’t know, who doesn’t want to hear their theme song sung by the Chipmunks? Am I crazy? Am I wrong on this?"

When asked about being the longest running original series on USA, now that Monk has wrapped Roday said " I feel older and my knees feel older. You know what, it’s a testament I think to, to the sort of little engine that could mentality that we’ve had from the very beginning with the show, that we have sort of stuck around long enough to be anybody’s flagship. USA does such a great job sort of branding and packaging their shows and you know, they move and they sort of you got to keep up, you’ve really got to keep up with the train. And we’ve managed to sort of kind of continuously reinvent ourselves and become this sort of hybrid show that can stick around hopefully no matter what else is going on around it. So it feels good for us, I’m not sure if it makes any difference to anyone else, but it, but it feels good to have lasted, to have lasted this long and still be standing for sure."

One thing that Roday mentioned that I would love to see is a musical episode, which is his dream storyline. "Now that Glee has sort of, you know, captured the countries sort of attention and is in everyone’s subconscious I think it’s probably the best time ever because they do it so well that I think the expectation for us would be to just do it, and I know we can pull that off." Other than that he'd like to see an episode where we get to go into Gus' dreams.

I got to talk to Roday for a second and ask him about the potential for him and Juliet getting together and he said that "Well, I can tell you that our, our dear show creator Mr. Franks has sort of ambiguously informed us that he does have, sort of definitive plans for Shawn and Juliet in season five, which we haven’t started yet. As far as the stretch run here in season four, I think it’s a little more tangled up and there’s lots of different moving pieces and like you said Abigail’s floating around in there and we’re going to, well it’s complicated you know, it’s, it’s complicated for a little while longer."

To end I'll leave you with this bit of conversation between Roday and myself, I had just told him I was rewatching the old episodes on DVD with my 2 year old son and how much he loves Psych:

James Roday: Trav, I love the fact that your two-year-old son watches our show. I challenge anyone on cable at 10:00 to say that their fan base casts that wide of a net.

Travis: Well I have a video from last year when he was one dancing to the theme song so he’s been a fan for awhile now.

James Roday: He’s the star, he’s a rock star and it’s time we put him on a shirt of something.

Travis Tidmore: I agree.

James Roday: Thanks Travis.

Labels: Psych, USA

As you may now USA's Psych returns on January 27th on a new night. (Check out the Sweet new poster above!!) Now that it's on Wednesdays it'll be facing stiffer competition, but I'm pretty sure it will still be the funniest comedy/mystery show about a fake psychic detective on TV. (It's even better than that dramedy/mystery show about the fake psychic detective that airs on CBS!) I just know I'll still be watching it as soon as it airs!

What you may not know is that the folks behind Psych have just launched a contest that will send one grand prize winner to the set of Psych in Vancouver, British Columbia (that's in Canada!!) Now this trip is freaking awesome and it truly is the ultimate, once-in-a-lifetime experience for any true Psych fan. The Grand Prize winner and a Guest will enjoy a day on the set complete with lunch with the cast, a personal tour of the Psych office, autographed scripts and a video diary of their visit!

Yeah not only do you get to visit the set, you get lunch with the cast. That's pretty frakin' amazing if you ask me. I'd not-quite kill for that chance. If you want to enter you can head on over HERE.

Below to help get you in the Psych Mode I've included a couple of new promos for the show as well as a couple of my favorite promos from the past couple of seasons.

Labels: Psych

This afternoon I, along with a few other bloggers, got a chance to talk to Steve Franks, the creator of USA's Psych. He brought along Dule Hill and it was a great time, although Dule got dropped from the call and a few minutes later my phone dropped out as well. But during the excellent interview I got to talk to Franks about the excellent Theme Song. While I'll have more from that interview later this week I wanted to repost the video of my son, Owen, dancing to the theme song when he was about 11 months old. So I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.




Soon I'll try to post a video of Owen saying "Psych" and "I know, I know" which he does whenever he sees the Psych DVDs.

Labels: Psych

With Psych's new season premiering tonight the fine folks at USA have also hooked me up with some goodies to send to two lucky winners. So in honor of the new season in order to win you must e-mail me and tell me how you would use Psychic powers if you had them. Would you use them for good, evil, solving mysteries, winning the lottery, etc. Be as creative as you can and feel free to make it a story. The contest ends on September 4th @ Midnight. My favorite answer will be the winner, and might be published on the site. Here's what you can win:

Grand Prize Winner will receive:

Psych Season 3 DVD

Psych T-shirt

Psych Pineapple Stress Toy

Psych Novel

1^st Prize Winner will receive:

Psych Novel

Don’t miss the season 4 premiere of PSYCH on USA NETWORK, Friday at 10/9c. While vacationing in Canada, Shawn and Gus track Despereux, an elusive international art thief who has alluded Lassiter for years. Cary Elwes (The Princess Bride) guest-stars in "Extradition: British Columbia.” Become a fan on Facebook, Follow Psych on Twitter, and play Psych games on USA’s Character Arcade.

For those of you who inevitably won't be able to find where to send me an e-mail, there's a button just below the Banner that says "Contact Me" in between "Home" & "Subscribe".

Labels: Giveaway, Psych

Two days after participating in the Tony Shaloub inteview, I got the privilege to take part in an interview with the two of the stars of USA's Psych. As much as I love Monk, Psych is quite possibly my favorite show on TV. It's a perfect blend of hilarious comedy and clever mystery. For the next few weeks I'll be looking forward to 10/9c on Fridays so I can sit down and enjoy some of the hilarity that is James Roday and Dule Hill. And so being able to ask these guys a question and listen to them answer several others was a real treat. Hopefully you'll enjoy it as much as I did.

Q: I know that you’ve both played very different characters in other things. I know that Mr. Roday had actually played alongside to Maggie Lawson in Fear Itself and Mr. Dulé you had a wonderful part on West Wing for a while. So how do you feel now about playing comedy? Do you enjoy it better; do you like doing horror or drama more? How does it feel?

D. Hill I actually enjoy comedy; it’s a lot of fun. After doing seven years of drama on West Wing to be able to come and work with Roday and the rest of the cast has been a blast. It’s something different, especially working with Roday where he likes to improv a lot it challenges me to work on different muscles that I haven’t used before.

J. Roday Well, first of all I just want to thank you for reminding me that I did in fact appear in Fear Itself; I often forget that. Secondly, I would say I’ve actually done a lot more comedy than I’ve done drama. It’s weird the way that worked out, because when I came out of theater school I took myself way too seriously, so it’s kind of ironic that I ended up sort of going down the comedy path.

But I think what makes this role special compared to some of the other stuff that I’ve done is just the fact that I’ve had the opportunity to live with it so long and sort of watch it sort of grow and nurture it, not unlike you nurture a plant. And working with a great group and an unbelievable cast and sort of having the freedom to do what we do on the show sort of sets it apart from any role that I’ve played, comedy or drama. It’s just been a special ride. It’s been a special ride.

Q: The show is known a lot for its kind of fast-paced banter between your characters Shawn and Gus. And so what I want to know is how much sort of say do you guys get in what goes on in the dialog, particularly between the humorous segments and something like the nicknames that Shawn makes up for Gus? What goes on with those types of moments?

J. Roday Unlike, I think, the majority of shows on television right now we actually have a frighteningly high amount of say in what we do with the dialog. A lot of times it comes in great and all we have to do is say it, but any time we sort of recognize an opportunity to throw something in or add something or if we have a better name for Gus than the one that came in we just pull the trigger.

We’re pretty good at monitoring ourselves so that we only do it if we’re making it better, and it’s very rare that we find out later that the people down in LA were disappointed because we changed something. They’re usually pretty pleased.

D. Hill Yes. And the names that we come up with most of the time it has to do with somebody that we know, somebody in the cast knows or somebody that one of the writers knows or a producer, something like that. I would say pretty much eight times to of ten there is some relation to the crazy name that Gus is being called.

Q; How many of the pop culture references come from you, including the Chad Michael Murray reference?

D. Hill I would say about 99.9% of them do not come from me. Maybe if there’s something in the ‘70s that might be something that I came with, but most of the ‘80s references I have no idea what I’m talking about. It’s not until after I film it that I turn around and say, “Okay, now what was that about?”

J. Roday Who were the twins that you knew that I had never heard of in Tuesday the 17^th?

D. Hill The twins? Oh, the Mowli Twins.

J. Roday The Mowli twins. That was your 0.01% man.

D. Hill That and what’s the other one? I don’t even know if it made it to air, the Gill Scott Heron.

J. Roday Oh, that was. That made it two. That made it two.

D. Hill Gill Scott Heron. That’s my two for the year.

J. Roday Yes. Most of them come from the writers and then I throw in my fair share as well. Chad Michael Murray became the target of some early jabbing for us after I saw some interview where it was like a behind the scenes of House of Wax and he was wearing a wife beater. It was just a real serious interview, and I got such a kick out of it that we had to have some fun at his expense. Hopefully he’s a good-natured guy with a sense of humor.

Q: What detectives, in real life or in fiction, have been an influence for the characters?

J. Roday You know what, I go to this movie called Without a Clue that not a lot of people saw. It was Michael Caine and Ben Kingsley, and the idea behind the movie was that Watson was the brains of the operation and Holmes was just this very theatrical sort of charlatan that diverted people’s attention and got all the ladies. It’s a very, very funny movie that not a lot of people have seen.

But I love the fact that it was sort of rooted in the idea that these two guys absolutely, positively were dependent on one another to solve a crime, because Holmes was sort of the face of the franchise but Watson was the guy that sort of kept their feet on the ground and did a lot of the thinking. That’s not exactly what the dynamic is on Psych, but the sort of ying yang element of it of there’s no way that either of these guys could work on their own and there’s no way that they could accomplish what they were doing without the other one is definitely sort of a big element of what we do on Psych.

So that’s my answer. I feel decent about it. I’m passing it off to Dulé.

D. Hill I guess for myself it’s not any real I guess template that I came in to with a preconceived notion about like in terms of a previous detective team. I guess if I had to choose one I would say Cosby and Poitier in Uptown Saturday Night. I want to say that would be the equivalence that I could think of, but besides that there’s not really anything that I’ve thought about before to say yes, this is what the template is.

Q: I just wanted to know what was behind the decision to actually feature Vancouver in the premiere episode?

D. Hill I think it’s that we work in Vancouver. We’ve been working—

J. Roday Yes, it was an opportunity to finally not worry about everything that was in the background of all of our shots. We actually could play the locations for the actual locations, and make believe stickers and Canadian flags all those things were good. And it was actually a lot of fun; I’m glad we’ve lasted long enough to do one to do that. It was fun.

D. Hill And we finally didn’t have to move our palm trees with this; we could leave the palm trees—

J. Roday That’s right, our three movable palm trees got an episode off.

D. Hill Right. They were tired, you know what I mean; the palm trees were tired. With every episode they were...

J. Roday We gave them a much-deserved break.

Q: I really enjoy the pop culture references that you make in the series, and I just wondered if you could be in any television show of the past which would it be? Or if you could spoof a show as an episode what would it be?

J. Roday Well, my answer is one in the same. I would have given anything to be on Twin Peaks, and if we last another season we will be doing a Twin Peaks episode. So there you go.

Q: Really. That would be interesting to see. Dulé?

D. Hill I guess for myself if I could have been a Cosby kid.

Q: Cosby kid.

D. Hill Yes, of course. If I could have been on Cosby that would have been great for me. And I guess if we could spoof any show I would say maybe Fame; I could be Leroy.

Q: Fame. Oh, you really have to do that I think. I’m going to petition for it.

D. Hill Sounds good.

Q: At Comic Con you kind of teased that Twin Peaks would be this season. Is that not true?

J. Roday That is not true, unfortunately. I think that something got lost in the translation there. This season has sort of been locked for a while; there are no unaccounted for episodes. That was us teasing with the hoax that if some of our executives were in the audience it was like a hint, hint listen to how bad everybody wants this. You have to keep us on the air. It’s a promise; it’s definitely a promise that if there’s a season five Twin Peaks will definitely happen.

D. Hill I guess a little teaser too Twin Peaks would be Ray Wise doing our show this year. A little prelude.

J. Roday That’s true. It’s a Twin Peaks prelude.

Q: If you could investigate anybody who would it be?

D. Hill If I could investigate anybody who would it be?

J. Roday I think I might have to just really roll up my sleeves and investigate Monica Bellucci and just make sure that she’s living her life along the straight and narrow, she’s not cutting any corners in life, in her work; just really get in there and make sure that she’s on the up and up.

D. Hill And from my side I would investigate (Does a goofy voice) Halle Bear, who is also Halle Berry.

J. Roday That’s it; this is classy stuff you’re getting from us today.

Q: It just seems like you have a blast; the show is so fun to watch. And I was wondering if the show is as much fun to shoot as it is to watch?

D. Hill Yes.

J. Roday Absolutely.

D. Hill We have so much fun up there. The cast is great, the crew is even greater, and we just have a lot of fun. No one takes themselves too seriously; we all come to work and we are pretty much getting paid to laugh all day. We sing songs; we have the best singing crew in Vancouver. One day if you get a chance you come up there and we’ll have them sing you Happy Birthday just for no reason in particular. We sing Happy Birthday about three or four times a day just because. There’s a really great bunch of people up there.

J. Roday And we don’t pay royalties for it. It’s free; we can sing Happy Birthday for free.

Q: I wanted to talk about some of the telltale references. I actually thought it was really funny the jokes that you made about The Mentalist in the premiere. When that show started were you guys like going, “Hmm, that sounds familiar,” and was it sort of fun to sort of point that out on screen?

J. Roday It was. No one is off limits when it comes to us, including ourselves. We’ve made fun of our own sort of resumes on this show. As long as they have a sense of humor over there I would think that they would be sort of flattered and get a kick out of it.

Obviously, it’s not malicious in any, but it’s what we do on our show and if you’re going to go make a bigger show that’s kind of like our show and get four times as many viewers and Emmy nominations then you should expect to hear about it when our show airs.

T. Tidmore Hey, guys, thank you for talking with us today.

J. Roday Hey. No problem.

T. Tidmore I’m a big fan of the show and my son is a one-year old and loves your theme song. I have a video online of him dancing to the theme song.

J. Roday Nice.

T. Tidmore Do you guys have a favorite episode to film or that you think is the best episode you guys have done so far?

J Roday I like different ones for so many different reasons, but I can say that for me personally, just as an actor, I think the most fun I’ve ever had on our show was an episode called Life’s Camera Homicidio when my character got thrust into the world of a Spanish telenovela and I got to improvise in both English and Spanish. That was a blast.

D. Hill Well I guess for that episode I guess Roday to be able to improvise in Spanish he was getting in touch with his roots so he was really excited about that.

But for myself it would still have to go back to American Duos. I just can’t help it, I just loved dressing up as Michael Jackson and being able to do a moonwalk, have John Landis direct me while I’m dressed up as Michael Jackson in Thriller. And there was a crowd there, too, so you can’t really beat that. You can’t really beat that. That’s one of my all time favorite experiences on Psych.


Q:Could tell us about this upcoming season, whatever you feel free to share either overall or specifics about what we can expect this season.

J. Roday In terms of sort of themes for episodes you saw that we’re doing sort of an expedition Canada, catch a jewel/art thief episode, and we’re doing sort of a Shawn and Gus save an old western town and everything that comes along with that that you could imagine, including a grizzled, gray bearded James Brolin.

D. Hill Exorcism episode.

J. Roday Yes, we’re paying tribute to the Exorcist with our exorcism episode featuring the aforementioned Ray Wise, who is just fantastic in the episode I have to say. Just really came in and knocked it out of the park.

D. Hill American Werewolf in London homage.

J. Roday That’s right, a little love letter to American Werewolf in London and werewolf movies in general featuring David Naughton, obviously, and Josh Malina. And lots of other fun stuff.

I have to say I think we’re kind of storming out of our gates this year with some really good stuff. I think last year we stormed in our heads, but we were actually like trotting at a casual pace, and this year I actually think we’re storming out of the gates for real.

Q: I was wondering if at this point there are any may or may not things you would tell us about what’s going to happen.

J. Roday Well there may or may not be a continuation of the story that capped off our season last year, An Evening With Mr. Yang.

D. Hill And there may or may not be something big coming.

J. Roday There may or may be our biggest guest star ever appearing on the show down the stretch. And we may or may not be getting another dose of what Gus’ hair looked like in the ‘90s. How’s that?

Q: My question is just this year they released two books for Psych and your characters and everything, and I was wondering if you were to ever read those yourselves and you could come up with your own kind of merchandise what would you like to see?

D. Hill Well I would read it if I had one and if I knew there was one that was out.

J. Roday I was going to say it’s good to know that there are books out. I didn’t know that.

D. Hill Maybe I’ll try to read it one day on the set.

J. Roday Merchandise.

D. Hill I would have to say a video game. I love video games anyway, so a Psych video game somehow that I could play on Xbox or Wii would be great.

J. Roday I have to say I think the idea of a talking bobblehead was pretty solid, and someone actually came up with already and did it. I love the idea of little Shawn and Gus bobbleheads.

D. Hill Which, by the way, I have my President Obama bobblehead also. So when I get my Psych bobbleheads it will be Shaun, Gus, and President Barack Obama bobbleheads sitting on my counter.

J. Roday I might give you Ichiro Suzuki bobblehead just so that you can add it and it would be a quartet.

D. Hill Sounds good.

Q: For the record, Without a Clue is one of my favorite movies of all time.

J. Roday Good man. Good man.

Q: Now look I was wondering if you, James, had visited any actual psychics in order to watch and observe them in action? And if you, Dulé, being an encyclopedia of useless knowledge that oddly becomes useful every week, is it anything like the way your brain works in real life?

D. Hill Well from my side no; I try not to fill up my brain cells with useless information. So most of the time I’m pretty much just learning it as it comes in the scripts.

J. Roday And for me I visited a couple psychics back before we shot the pilot just because I was sort of interested to hear their back stories and sort of how the power manifests itself.

And of course you never know if they’re legit or not, but there were some interesting stories in terms of like physicalizing the gift. I was interested to hear like does it ever take over your body, does your body heat rise, stuff like that; anything that I could steal. Of course I did not tell them while visiting that I was going to be playing a fake psychic nor did they figure it out on their own, so maybe that tells you everything you need to know about the people that I met with.

And I have to say, for the record, my favorite line from Without A Clue is after Michael Caine pokes a dead body with a stick and announces to everyone, “It is my opinion that this man is dead.” So there you go.


Q: I’m going to go back to the American Werewolf episode. You wrote that, James. Right?

J. Roday Yes. I co-wrote that with my best friend Todd Harthan.

Q: Can you talk more about it? It was my favorite movie of all time. And is John Landis directing?

J. Roday Wow. I’m right there with you; it’s definitely one of my favorite movies of all time. The original plan was to have Landis direct it for obvious reasons. He is off directing a feature in England right now. So we got the incomparable Andrew Bernstein to step in in his place, who did a fantastic job, who Dulé has known since his West Wing days.

It’s not unlike Tuesday the 17^th; it’s an episode that needs to sort of stand on its own feet, but will definitely have moments where we’re winking and nodding and proclaiming our love for the original. But it has its own little story and its own little twists and turns.

Just having David Naughton on set was enough for me, because I got to pick his brain for the better part of a week and ended up getting a signed picture of him mid-transformation with the elongated torso reaching up at me. That’s getting framed and going on a wall.

Q: Who would you like to see on the show and who do you think they would play?

J. Roday My answer is going to stay the same until we get him on. The answer is David Bowie, and anybody he wants is whom he will play.

D. Hill And for myself I would like to get someone like Chris Tucker on the show. It would be great if he could play some kind of, I mean he could play anybody he wanted to also, but he could play some kind of relative of mine or something. It would be a lot of fun.

J. Roday I think David Bowie could also play David Bowie if he wanted to, and Shawn and Gus could just have an episode where they hung out with David Bowie.

D. Hill I think David Bowie could play Mr. Guster in season five.

J. Roday He could.

D. Hill There you go—because we change my dad all the time. Like dude, your daddy is David Bowie. … is not showing.

J. Roday That would be fantastic.

Psych airs Friday Nights on USA at 10/9c starting TONIGHT!

Labels: Interview, Psych

Tonight brings us the season finale of both Psych & Monk and I have to admit I'm having mixed emotions about it. Mainly because I love these shows so much I really want more of them, but I'm excited as both episodes sound extremely entertaining.

First up tonight we have the season finale of the penultimate season of Monk. For those of you who weren't aware USA has announced that next season of Monk will be it's last, which means we should be getting close to finding out who killed Monk's wife, Trudy. Which brings us to tonight's episode:
"Mr. Monk Fights City Hall"
In which Monk takes on the City Council when the parking garage where Trudy was killed is slated for demolition in order to build a park, but after Monk intervenes he finds himself investigating the disappearance of a city official key to preserving the site.
Presumably Monk will solve the case before the hour ends, but with it being a season finale, maybe we'll get a cliffhanger. I guess we'll have to watch to find out.
Here's a Clip & Promo from tonight's episodes:

And on Psych we have an episode which looks to be a bit darker than what is the norm for the series. In "An Evening With Mr. Yang" Shawn is taunted by The Ying-Yang killer, a serial killer who haunted Santa Barbara before and has returned to make Shawn his next victim. I don't know much about the episode except that Shawn has to save his mom (Cybil Sheppard) when the killer takes her. Also the episode features the return of Rachel Leigh Cook, who plays the girl Shawn pined over in high school but let get away.
Here's a clip and promo for that episode as well:

Labels: Monk, Psych, USA

The 3rd season of Psych returns tonight with Shawn (James Roday) and Gus (Dule Hill) taking on their most "inhuman case" of all time. Inhuman in that the victim is a Sea Lion! But not just any Sea Lion, no it's Santa Barbara's beloved Shabby the Sea Lion. When Gus drags Shawn along to the funeral he quickly comes to fear that foul play is involved and in a flash the two are on the case, which leads them into something far more dangerous than a dead animal! The episodes even features a guest appearance from "the show killer" himself Ted McGinley, lets hope he doesn't kill this one!

I got a chance to see the episode early and I can tell you it's classic Shawn and Gus. The episode is of course an intriguing mystery but also combines the humor that we've come to love from these two goofy detectives. Plus the episode once again gives us hope that there might be more than friendship in the future for Shawn and the beautiful Juliet (Maggie Lawson).

The rest of season three will bring us some big names guest stars T including Cybill Shepherd ("Cybill," "The L Word") returning as Shawn's mom, Rachael Leigh Cook ("She's All That," "The Babysitter's Club") reprising her role as the one that got away from earlier in the season, Mykelti Williamson ("August Rush," "Lucky Number Slevin") and Jonathan Silverman ("The Single Guy," "Weekend At Bernies"). And the third season ends with a serial killer and a shocking twist!!!! I don't know about you but I can't wait to see what happens next for these two.

And if all that's not enough for you you can head on over to the Official Site. There you can play along with "Shawn’s Nickname Generator" and even check out the cast’s yearbook photos in PSYCH Yearbook Superlatives." As always, PSYCH fans can watch new "Psych-Outs," view full episodes, read writer commentary on each episode and play fun games featuring their favorite fake psychic detective.

And immediately preceding Psych at 9/8c you can catch an all new episode of Monk as it's penultimate season returns with Tony Shaloub's award winning portrayal of OCD detective Adrian Monk. Tonight's episode, which I can't wait to see tonight, introduces us to Monk's delinquent half-brother, Jack Jr. (Steve Zahn) who escapes from prison and breaks into Monk's apartment where he manipulates Monk into helping him find the person he claims framed him for murder.
Also this season Monk gets involved with a case straight out of "Encyclopedia Brown," Monk must solve a disappearance while trying to keep the parking garage where his wife was killed from being demolished, Monk matches wits with a magician (Steve Valentine) who has the ability to make evidence disappear; and when a childhood bully (Noah Emmerich) who terrorized Monk hires the detective to trail his wife, whom he suspects of infidelity, Monk relishes the opportunity to prove him right -- and things get even sweeter when the bully is accused of murder. And this all leads up to Monk's 8th and final season which is coming this summer.

And over at Monk's official site you can check out the all-new “OCD Video Trivia” game, which allows users to view screengrabs from the show and try to guess what isn’t quite right. Fans can get involved with the “Monk Lookalike Contest” by sending in their best Monk lookalikes and vote on the uncanniest resemblance. Full episodes are always available to watch online, including both classic and new episodes, along with weekly podcasts with cast, writer commentary and new quizzes.

So tune in tonight then head back here to tell me what you think of the episodes.

Labels: Monk, Psych, TV, TV Reviews

I'm happy to say that all my favorite (And they should be yours as well) USA shows are returning next month, and I couldn't be more excited. And while we sit around and wait for the holidays to pass us by so these brilliant shows can return Santa has brought us an early present: Promo videos for each of the shows! So scroll on down and check them out.

Also in case you haven't heard this is Monk's next to last season. USA confirmed that it has picked up Monk for a final season which will kick off this summer, presumably to wrap up after another January run in 2010.

Monk Returns January 9th at 9.8c.



Psych Returns January 9th at 10/9c.



Burn Notice Returns January 22nd at 10/9c. (I believe)

Labels: Burn Notice, Monk, Psych

With the weekend upon us and my Bar Exam in a little over a week, I don't have enough time for several large posts so here's all that info in one Mini-Splotion, Digestible Form.

Both premiers are great, you can check out my Psych Review Here. As for Monk, I didn't get a chance to post a review, but I watched it last night and it was very good, although it was a bit sad. The episode centers on a murder mystery, as usual, but really it centers on Monk dealing with the loss of his good friend, and psychiatrist, Charles Kroger (Stanley Kamel, who sadly passed away unexpectedly just before cameras rolled this season). It was touching to see the episode deal with the loss of Kamel in such a way (because it is clear that it's really about him more than the character) The episode ends in such a poignant way, I was really touched. And that doesn't even touch on guest star Brad Garrett or new cast member Hector Elizondo as Monk's new psychiatrist.

It's finaly here and if everything goes well I'll get to see it tomorrow afternoon! Fingers Crossed. Come back here to tell us how you felt, just please keep Spoilers to a minimum! And when you do see it, maybe give a moment of silence for Heath Ledger as the film ends. We truely lost one of the best actors of a generation in January and I look forward to seeing his penultimate performance tomorrow.

Yes I know I've posted numerous times this week about this wonderfully, hilarious and catchy web series, but it's just to good not to continualy mention. So swing on over Here (or just pick it up on iTunes) and see what the whole internet (and much of the real world) is talking about.
And just to show how much I love it, I went out and got my own Ph.D in Horribleness:


And of course this Saturday, July 19th is my wife and I's 5th Anniversary. So I'd like to say to Jeri, I love you and thank God that I have you every day. You are the 2nd best thing to ever happen to me, and thanks to you we made the 1st best thing together. I love you and thank you for giving me such a beautiful little boy. Here's to 75 more years!

Have A Wonderful Weekend!!!

Labels: Anniversary, Dr. Horrible, Jeri, Monk, Psych, The Dark Knight, TV Reviews