-edit-
Okay, here's the transcript. I believe the interview was conducted during Aly's most recent trip to the UK, which was last year, to promote AP2. Be warned that it is a bit tacky and tabloid-y, cause that's what the magazine is like.
Minor spoilery bit about Aly's contract towards the end of the interview. I'll leave space so you can look away now if necessary.....
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'Buffy' star Alyson Hannigan explains why she thinks she’s vastly underpaid compared to the casts of shows such as ‘Friends’
Alyson Hannigan weaves magic as Willow, the right-hand girl to vampire slayer Buffy. And she cast a spell of her own to get actor boyfriend Alexis Denisof to fall in love with her.
Alyson, 27, who stars in the hit Sky One series, first met the 35-year-old Alexis - a former love of ‘The Royle Family’ star Caroline Aherne - in 1999 when he played Wesley Wyndham-Pryce in the show. ‘It was flirtation at first sight’, she recalls. ‘I was trying to pursue him, but he didn’t want to date someone he was working with. So we just developed a great friendship, with me hoping it would lead to something else.
‘After a while, I got bored with him not wanting to date me. I started seeing someone else and, suddenly, Alexis didn’t like that. But I kept on seeing this other guy and told Alexis “Let’s just be friends.”
‘That seemed to make him more enthusiastic than ever. When my other relationship ended, I noticed that Alexis had changed towards me. Flirtation had developed into truly caring about each other. It took me at least a year to get him that interested. Since then, it’s been great.’
Alexis, also co-starring in the Sky One series ‘Angel’, was entranced. But Alyson, who uses her onscreen powers to try to bring Sarah Michelle Gellar’s Buffy back from the dead in the new series, took it in her stride.
‘He’d also just got out of a bad relationship and perhaps he needed time,’ she says. ‘After all that’s gone on, the relationship is now much stronger and better.’
Alyson, who grew up in Atlanta, Georgia, obviously has that old-fashioned Deep South charm when it comes to dealing with boyfriends. She’s loved and left them, but still remains friends.
‘I was proposed to by my very first long-term boyfriend’, she says. ‘It was quite early in our three-year relationship, so I didn’t take it too seriously. It wasn’t as if he’d gone out and bought a ring.
‘I remember asking him: “Why have you got down on one knee?” It was very sweet and it’s always nice to be asked, but it wasn’t right. I had too much to do in my working life to marry at that point. We’ve remained great friends. In fact, he’s housesitting for me back in Los Angeles.’
Alyson, speaking to ‘Now’ in London, believes that after a loving relationship stops, it’s always best to have a break from each other. But once those passionate feelings are history, you can decide whether it’s worth staying friends.
‘I know many people who can’t carry on seeing the person they were once in love with. So far, I’ve been able to. I don’t want to stop seeing someone I’ve had strong feelings about.’
Alyson and Alexis have since become a celebrity couple in Hollywood. ‘I understand both the good and bad of being well known’, she says. ‘At its most extreme, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman were photographed and scrutinised everywhere they went. That must have added pressure to the relationship. Although we can’t compare to them, I appreciate the difficulties.
‘It would also be difficult for me to date someone who isn’t an actor. It’s so helpful to come home to Alexis and have him relate to what I’m talking about. He’s given me great advice and, hopefully, I’ve given him good advice too.
‘People break up every single day and it never makes the news. If Tom and Nicole hadn’t been in this industry, no-one would have given them a second thought. In our case, who knows what will happen.’
Alyson, who once dated Ginger Fish, the drummer from Marilyn Manson’s band, has played Willow Rosenberg in ‘Buffy’ for the last five years.
‘It’ll be at least two more’, she says. ‘It’s a great show, with a huge following, but we don’t earn the fortunes paid to stars of other hit television series.
‘Don’t get me wrong, we’re still doing much better than most. But, compared to our peers in shows such as ‘Friends’, we’re vastly underpaid apart from Sarah. And, after all, Sarah is Buffy. They don’t care quite the same about supporting players.’
Alyson, whose first acting job was at the age of four in a McDonald’s ad, moved to Los Angeles as a teenager to try for bigger roles. It paid off handsomely, with ‘Buffy’, the film ‘Boys and Girls’, and a starring role in box-office hits ‘American Pie’ and ‘American Pie 2'.
‘I’ve been lucky’, she says, ‘but Hollywood is an insane place and you have to be sort of insane to live there. I find that it’s best to keep friends close and try not to take acting too seriously’.
Interview by Garth Pearce
Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's hard to read. - Groucho Marx
Edited by: tyche at: 4/4/02 11:16:06 am
at: 4/4/02 4:34:10 pm
at: 4/4/02 9:40:02 pm