From the mind of Stephen King, Season 2 of the AT&T Audience Network (available on DirecTV) drama series Mr. Mercedes picks up a year after the attempt Brady Hartsfield (Harry Treadaway) made to commit a second mass murder in the community of Bridgton, Ohio, landing him in a vegetative state in the hospital. Retired Detective Bill Hodges (Brendan Gleeson) has done his best to move on from his obsession with the psychopath, by trying to keep himself busy with work, but when unexplainable occurrences begin to happen among the hospital staff, Hodges begins to wonder if there’s some way that Brady could be responsible.

During this 1-on-1 phone interview with Collider, actor Brendan Gleeson talked about what he most enjoys when it comes to playing the very flawed Hodges, why he wanted last season to affect his character this season, the importance of grounding the spookiness, the fascinatingly complex and creepy dynamic between Hodges and Brady, the fun of actually getting to work with Harry Treadaway this season, and that the relationship with Ida (Holland Taylor) keeps Hodges from only spending time with his tortoise. He also talked about working with his family on the short film Psychic, for which he made his directorial debut, and what he’s going to go do next.

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Image via AT&T Audience Network

Collider:  When this TV series first came your way, what was it about the story and this character, in particular, that most appealed to you, and has that changed, at all, as you’ve done two seasons now?

BRENDAN GLEESON:  Well, I think the character is very rich. It’s an older character that has been properly explored, which you don’t always get. It’s a bit like the way women were, for years, just as part of another story. I think older people have been part of other stories for quite a long time, but it’s very seldom that their emotional life is explored. For somebody like me, that’s gold dust. [Hodges] is very flawed. In the book, he was suicidal, in the opening part. We tried to tone that down a small bit, but it’s apparently true that a lot of retired detectives and police officers take their own lives. People who have given themselves over to a particular life, have seen an awful lot of really bad stuff, and have maybe lost their families through over-commitment to it, amongst other things. They feel very alone when their job goes. He was very challenged, and at the heart of him was a stubbornness about holding up certain principles, of what he felt was acceptable, as proper human behavior. There was a very beaten up, flawed nobility about his soul, somewhere hidden amongst all the booze and the desperation. This kind of stuff is what you want to get your teeth into, so it’s been pretty great.

Because the storytelling has shifted a bit this season, does it feel different, as far as the things you liked about Hodges, or do you feel like you’re just getting to explore that in a different way?

GLEESON:  I wanted him to be fairly different this season, in the sense that I couldn’t see the point of going through last season, if he didn’t learn anything from it. So, I wanted him to be more evolved and a little easier in his skin, in the sense that he’s been vindicated. He brought down the bad guy. Everything he’d been saying about the bad guy had been brought into the light of day. I felt like, on that level, he must have had a better sense of himself. He isn’t a persistent self-loather. That’s not just his default position. Fundamentally, he can be at ease with himself, when he’s allowed to get his job done. I also think the fact that his heart has been opened a little bit, in terms of his connection with Janey (Mary-Louise Parker), even though that ended horribly, in the first season, taught him about the possibilities that were still there for him and his life. She fed into some latent optimism that had been lost. So, I was hoping that it would go that way. I was never totally sold on just anything being possible. If you get into the spooky stuff, I wanted it to be chained to a believable reality. It had to be credible, even if it was moving into weird areas. In terms of what we know about the brain, there’s so much that we know we don’t know, at this point. There are a lot of things that are only partially explored with the paranormal, so I wasn’t averse to going into that area, as long as it remained rooted. For example, Hodges can question that. In a way, Hodges almost becomes a voice of incredulity for the audience. He has to believe what’s going on. We didn’t want to just go into spooky-land and lose that great inventiveness that we had in the first season.

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Image via AT&T Audience Network

This show gets so dark, at times, that it is very much a horror story, but you don’t want it to feel campy.

GLEESON:  No, you don’t. You don’t want to turn into bats. We said, from the very beginning, that what we’re trying to maintain is that the worst demons are within, and we’ve never lost sight of that.

What was it like to have to wait until the second season of this show to actually be able to interact with your co-star, Harry Treadaway?

GLEESON:  It was crazy! Myself and Harry were at opposite ends of the story, battling for one world against the other. That was very interesting, in Season 1, but it was great to share things. He’s amazing. He really has made that character completely his own. It’s wonderful.

It’s such an interesting dynamic because they are so intertwined, and yet we spent the first season not actually getting to see them together.

GLEESON:  It was really fascinating. They would see each other, but not interconnect. He’d come zipping by in his little ice cream van, and Hodges wouldn’t throw him a second glance. It was like ships passing in the night. It was a great set up. We’ll see now where we go, in Season 2.

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Image via AT&T Audience Network

As the audience, we’re not sure if Brady can get other people to do his bidding, or whether people are really hearing him, or why they’re acting the way that they are. How much more dangerous do things get, without anybody really knowing who’s going to be acting out now?

GLEESON:  I know! It’s tough to tell.

At least before, Hodges had an idea of what he was looking for, but now, it seems like it could be coming from anywhere.

GLEESON:  I know. The danger, if it can come from absolutely anywhere, would get slightly out of control because, if everybody is the enemy or everybody could be, then nobody is, really. There has to be a certain limitation to that, otherwise it can just float out of anywhere. It’s not allowed to get out of control. It dissipates a little bit and stays in the right zone.

 

It seems that Hodges’ work isn’t really turning out the way that he planned or hoped it would. He’s just repossessing people’s cars and upsetting families. How does he feel about that?

GLEESON:  It’s so disappointing, isn’t it? You think you set something up, and one minute you’re rescuing a plane, and then the next thing you know, you’re throwing some poor single mom out of getting a job to bring her children up. He doesn’t really get to rest on his laurels very easily, does he? But, the fact that it bothers him is what his saving grace is. This is not enough for him. He feels slightly dirty, in what he’s doing. It’s part of what you hopefully like about the character. It just doesn’t sit easily with him.

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Image via AT&T Audience Network

That also does really interesting things for the dynamic with Holly (Justine Lupe), as well.

GLEESON:  Yes, absolutely. It’s not too far away from the way a lot of people think. Can you engage in the bigger picture, or do you just put your head down and get on with it and make a living? It’s so easy to just put your head down, but on the other hand, it’s also easy to put your head up and blame everybody for the nastiness of the world and forget that you actually have to exist within it. So, the stuff with Holly actually became more and more interesting, trying to define the new relationship between those two. It wasn’t immediately obvious, what way their relationship would go. It’s interesting that there are differences. They obviously connected in the first [season], but now the practicality of actually having to live and work in the same office is there, and that dynamic gets really interesting, the more it goes on.

One of my favorite parts of the series, and I know a lot of people’s favorite part of the series, is the relationship that you have with Holland Taylor. It’s so great to watch you guys together, and it seems like you’re both just having so much fun working together. Is that a highlight of telling a story like this, that you can have this relationship like that, that doesn’t seem like it would fit in, at all, but actually really works?

GLEESON:  That’s where David E. Kelley is so great. Ida, Holland’s character, wasn’t in the book, or any of the books. David E. Kelley came up with her. To have somebody have Hodges’ back and humanize him is just extraordinary, what he achieved with her. It’s about finding extraordinary things in the everyday. They’re just neighbors, and yet he manages to mine all of this stuff, with the shifting dynamic between the two of them and the obvious affection that’s there between them, and then how far that can be taken. Holland, of course, is a national treasure, really.

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Image via AT&T Audience Network

It seems as if that relationship wasn’t there, Hodges would just spend a lot of time talking to the tortoise in his yard.

GLEESON:  He’d be spending his time trying to get the tortoise to come out of his shell. The lightness of touch in the writing is just amazing. It’s just pure joy with Holland. She just doesn’t suffer fools, especially as Ida.

The biggest voices behind the scenes on Mr. Mercedes are David E. Kelley and Jack Bender. What has your working relationship with them been like? Are they very collaborative with you?

GLEESON:  Yeah, Jack is particularly very collaborative, and he’s a terrific director, too. He’s incredibly efficient, incredibly incisive, and he’s very good with the script, in terms of making sure that we are all trying to make the same thing. I just really enjoy being on set with him. I found him really, really facilitating with whatever is required, whatever we need, and whatever we need to discuss. And David E. Kelley is someone I’ve admired since the time I did Lake Placid. In broad terms, it’s hugely collaborative. It’s a very happy set, all around. I have no wish to direct it and I have no wish to write it, but at the same time, having your ideas being entertained and listened to is great. You become the custodian of the character, in a way. You would know the man, as well as anybody, especially emotionally. There are these constant consultations about how to negotiate whatever the plot points are or whatever the emotional journey is, and I find that hugely satisfying. It’s been a really good experience.

What was it like to also get to work with your sons on Psychic and make it a real family project?

GLEESON:  It was fantastic! We’ve done a few things together, through the years. The three of us did a play, The Walworth Farce, in Dublin, maybe three or four years ago, and that was just a fantastic thing. So, with this, we took it a step further. I had worked on a show that Domhnall made, wrote and directed, about 10 years ago now, where myself and Brian were two inept cops, which was called Noreen. But this is my first time directing, and it’s always a little different when it’s dad. They’ve also grown into fully-fledged actors, at this point. There’s no question that everyone has their convictions now, so it was a great dynamic. I’m so pleased that it came together. I was really happy, looking at the monitor. I acted in it, as well, and I found that a little frustrating, not as an actor, but as a director. You’re not watching a scene unfold because you have to be in it. When I managed to get out and was only directing the two lads, it was just great. I really loved it, I have to say. We had a ball.

Would you like to try directing again, on something that you’re not also acting in?

GLEESON:  Yeah, I think I would. I was intending to direct a film for years. I was trying to get it made, but it never happened. I had been intending to be in it, and I think if I do get there in the end, I might do a cameo, just for the laugh, but I don’t have the assuredness as a director to be able to just wing it. I have to prepare and know what I’m doing, and I’d prefer to give it my full concentration, the next time around. I did the short to see whether I enjoyed it, or whether it drove me nuts, or whether I’d become neurotic. I was sitting in front of the monitor, when it was in full flow, and I remember thinking, “I like this too much.” So, hopefully, something will happen, in the future.

Do you know what you’re going to do next, while you’re waiting to find out about Season 3 of Mr. Mercedes?

GLEESON:  Yeah, I’m going to do a film in Portugal with Ira Sachs and a great cast. We have Isabelle Huppert, Greg Kinnear, Marisa Tomei, and a whole bunch of really great actors. It’s an independent film, called A Family Vacation, that I’ll be doing in October. I’m really looking forward to that.

Mr. Mercedes airs on Wednesday nights on the AT&T Audience Network on DirecTV.

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