Okay, hi everyone, It's Nat Mundell, the founder of Voyage. I
am super excited and honored and thrilled to be connecting with Catherine Bell, acclaimed
actor. She's recently performed in our very normni series Red Meat Village. You
probably know Catherine from her roles in Jag and more recently The Good Witch,
which is having a really great run among a bunch of other things. And
Catherine, I'm just so excited to meet you and con back with you,
and thank you so much for joining us my pleasure. Thank you so much
for having me. I really had a blast doing this with you guys.
It's been it's been really fun. Is it your first podcast? Have you
done an audio drama before? I've never done one before, and I was
so excited when this came up. I've always wanted to and it was just
so much fun to just sit and like just let your voice do all the
work, you know, I mean it's very similar, you still do the
same work as an actor, but um, it was just it was just
different and fun. Me in a dark room with a cool microphone, noir
vibe. Yeah, that's awesome. And so the prep work was similar and
the experience was similar or what? Did you find some pretty significant differences in
doing just an audio only performance? You know? Interesting? The prep work
was the same, you know, you still want to work on the character
the same and kind of break down the scenes and what's going on and what
you know, what am I trying to do or say? There's like always
the underlying meaning beyond just the words, of course, so that part was
the same. But then I found, um, you know, because I
wasn't reading it with the other you know, the other actors, so you
kind of just skip their parts and then you say your own. So I
had to actually read it to myself, read their lines and then do the
read liric. And that's kind of actually how I That's how I rehearse,
That's how I work on a project. Got it, And kind of yeah,
I've learned a new technique that's kind of really fun. You just you
say their lines and what does that mean? Oh why did you say that?
Oh wow? And then you say your line and you know there's all
these different exercises you can do. So it's kind of like doing that right
on, right on now? Now, why Red Meat Village. Are you
a Noir fan or just you oh my god, so much. I'm such
a noir fan. I think one of my first really fun like you know,
sink my teeth into kind of roles in my acting class that started everything
ages ago that then led to JAG was there were some noir scenes that I
did, just some cool like fatwel just you know that whole And I love
the genre, the era to where where it all start at the forties and
um, so yeah, it was absolutely right at my alley. I love
yeah, and it's it's fun to take that era but bring it into a
contemporary setting right exactly and tell us about your character, like, um,
you know, she takes quite a turn in the show. Were you surprised
by that turn? Definitely? I loved reading the first time I read through
the script, I was like, it's going to happen because you could tell
she has secrets and you could tell that she was not being totally straightforward and
who is she? Is she good? Is she bad? Where? You
know, what is her motivation? And in trying to find her sister and
you know, the whole thing was just so intriguing and a total page turner
for sure. Right on. Yeah, and do you when you prep for
that knowing that there's a big turn, do you have to sort of throttle
performance, you know, when you're in the earlier phases to knowing that that
turn is coming, is there? What do you do for that? Yeah?
I think, I mean that's that's the stuff that's the most fun to
play because there's there's such a great arc in the story, and any great
story always has that. So where does this person start and where do they
go? What's the climax and where do they end up? And um,
you know again, as an actor, you kind of map all that out
before you start recording or filming or whatever. So that was that was really
fun because she starts a certain way, like, you know, for me,
help me, and then you're like, wait a minute, what's what's
going on under that? And then how much do you play? How much
you hide? How much do you showed? And again harder with voice only,
right, I can't do a little look that shows that you're you've got
a secret. You have to deal with your voice. So that was a
bit more challenge in a good way. Wow, very cool. Now inquiring
minds want to know you have had such a range of characters and genres that
you played in over the years. Personally, do you have a preference for
the lighter or the darker? Oh, the darker, no question. I
mean good which is a blast to play. And she's this, you know,
amazing character that has just you know, made a lot of people very
happy, including myself, my family, whatever. But like, to me,
it's just so much more fun as an actor to just sink your teeth
in and be be bad or maybe be bad or I love the action stuff
too. That's like I'm such a tomboy that I love playing that stuff.
Yeah, I you right there with you in terms of preferences of what I
what I watch. Well, what's next for you? What do you want
your fans and our listeners to know, What's what's what's coming down the pike.
Oh my goodness. I have a few things that are that are brewing
for this year. At the end of last year, I did a lifetime
movie that the name is going to change. It hasn't been totally announced yet,
but I'm super excited about because it's based on a true story and I
get to play a character very different than anything I've ever played before. So
that's going to be exciting. And yeah, we'll see what else is on
the horizon. We're wonderful. Well, we can't wait. And and thanks
so much for sharing your perspective and some of your inner working with our listeners.
I think they find it fascinating and from you guys out there. Red
Meat Village is available. Will be available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or anywhere
you listen to podcasts. And Catherine, thank you so much again for joining
us my pleasure, thanks for having me absolutely. This is Nat Mundell signing off everyone