INTERVIEW WITH KALE BROWNE (MICHAEL) PART #1

AWT: Do you remember your initial audition for the role of Michael Hudson?

KB: I was in Brazil doing a movie and just got back to Los Angeles. I didn’t know if I ever wanted to do a soap, not that they were knocking my door down, but all of a sudden my agent called me up and told me that I had a screen test with Deirdre Hall over at Days of Our Lives for the John Black character. So I went in and auditioned and (Deirdre) was great, really wonderful to work with, and then I didn’t hear anything, and I thought, ‘God, I know I did okay.’ I mean, not to hear anything was just odd. And then a week later, I get a phone call asking would I do a soap in New York, and I said okay. So I got on a plane and flew to New York. I tested on the sound stage with Anna Stuart (Donna). I flew in on a Monday, auditioned on that Tuesday, and was shooting on Wednesday. They actually had been shooting the back of Michael’s head while they were looking for an actor. How I got called in was that the casting director remembered me from an audition for As The World Turns about 4 or 5 years back, and so they were looking for me to audition me, but I had been in Brazil. So the first NBC knew I was back was when I came in for the DAYS test. I guess it was meant to be.

AWT: What did they tell you they were looking for in the character?

KB: Just that Michael was kind of the mysterious guy and the father of twins, and that I had been (involved with) Donna. The thing is, something like that, you’re playing the moment, so you do your work as an actor to figure out your history, and you go in and do it. I was just having fun as an actor because I thought that this would probably be thirteen weeks and I could pay off my VISA card and that would be that. So I’d go in thinking: ‘Let’s make him a shell-shocked Vietnam Vet’. I’d go in with that as my subtext and just give it a little bit of that underneath, and they started writing it. The writers were very perceptive and could see what you’re doing and take it and run with it. It was amazing.

AWT: What was it like working at Another World?

KB: The wonderful thing about Another World, bar none, is that it was always about the work, no matter what. It was like you were in a lifeboat together. You don’t choose the people who jump over with you, but now that you’re in this situation, you’re all each other have. No matter what was happening in the dressing rooms – and there was a lot! – it was always about the work. This was after teleprompters, and we’d have 12 to 15 page scenes early on, and sometimes you’d get lost in there and sometimes it became surfing. Because they’re not going to cut the cameras once you’ve got something going. We weren’t going to go back to the beginning. They didn’t call ‘cut’ unless someone came in and parked their car in the middle of the scene. So we’d ad-lib. We’d figure out our way back and it’d be like surfing with somebody else. Tommy Eplin (Jake) was great at it. It’d be like playing a symphony, and then someone would say a word that would spark something and you’d work your way back, and then I’d think ‘My God that was great!’ It really required a lot of attention and was a high adrenaline experience. It was the most fun show I’ve ever worked on, and certainly the best group of people.

Come back on Wednesday, January 27th for Part #2!