Interview with Nadine Velasquez - October 2nd, 2008

Promoting: My Name Is Earl
Venue: The Soho Hotel
Interview type: One-on-one



View (V): What do the writers have in store for you this season?

Nadine Velazquez (NV): They haven't said, exactly, but we are going to meet my extended family. So next week we're shooting, I have a little nephew that's coming, who does voodoo and scares everybody. So anytime I'm interacting with my family, I think it's hilarious, like when they came and rescued me in Guadalatucke, so that I could marry Earl, at the time, that was funny. Whenever you put Randy and Earl in a foreign place, it's hysterical, so in that regard, I feel like I serve a pretty good purpose in the show. So you're probably going to see more of that.

V: It seemed, in seasons 1 and 2 that there was a hint of a romance between Catalina and Earl, only he was completely oblivious to it. They seem to have dropped that for season 3 – was there any reason for that? Were you annoyed?

NV: No! I mean, I think they just come up with ideas and whatever the writers think is going to work or not work, they just go with. They experiment a lot on the show, obviously – I mean, in the third season, Earl's in jail, he's in a coma. So they're not afraid to try things and drop things and I think they just thought that if Earl, the main character, gets involved romantically, it's kind of a new twist to the show, so it's better to keep him focussed on the list. And same with Randy, it's best to keep him focussed on the list as well, because that's the point of the show.

V: How many more seasons has the show got in it, do you think? Have they said if it's going on indefinitely?

NV: No, I mean, I guess you never know. I would love it to go at least two or three more seasons. I did ask Jason and he said five seasons he wants to put into it, so that would be next year and that's it. That would make me really sad, because I can't believe we're already in the fourth season. But I have a feeling that there's at least one or two more left.

V: The Spanish segments in the show are very funny, with you acting like you're saying something that's relevant to the scene but actually addressing the Spanish-speaking audience. Was that something the writers came up with for you or was it your idea?

NV: No, they just did that. Actually, we have to do that this season, I haven't seen that yet. Normally, it's when I'm going off on someone, I'm actually giving a shout-out to the Spanish-speaking audience.

V: The show has a huge supporting cast. All the secondary characters seem to come back and hang out in the bar. It all seems very friendly, so is there a lot of socialising off-set?

NV: Sexualising?

V: Socialising! Hanging out together.

NV: Darnell, Eddie Steeples and I hang out together a lot, off-set. Sometimes Jamie and I will as well. We get invited to a lot of things that people are up to, so yeah, there is socialising.

V: Do you have a favourite episode?

NV: I love the one where I get smelly and stinky. It's called Foreign Exchange Student. It's the one where I have sex with Randy that night and that was, I think, one of the funniest moments for Catalina. There's that whole montage of her preparing herself for the big disgusting moment. I also liked the telenovela thing that I did, the flashback.

V: Who's been your favourite guest star, so far?

NV: Well, I didn't get to actually work with him, but Christian Slater, because I think he's hot.

V: What was your reaction when you realised your character was going to be based in the strip club for the rest of the season?

NV: I didn't know where they were going to go with that, I mean I didn't know how that was going to work at the time, but they've managed to put me in that outfit at the hospital, in the forest and in the car, so if the motivation for it was just to get me in less clothes, then they succeeded.

V: Do you enjoy doing the bouncy dance?

NV: I just did it again, in the fourth season. Jump, jump. It's a hilarious scene.

V: What have you got coming up?

NV: I'm shooting a film in Michigan right now, called All's Fair in Love, set in a Renaissance Fair. So I'm doing that and I just shot my 2009 Nadine Velazquez calendar, so I'm very excited about that. And I'm also shooting an independent comedy in January, called Lucky.