Glenn Howerton as Don Chumph
On May 16, I had the opportunity to participate in a conference call with Glenn Howerton, co-star of the FX series Fargo. The series was developed and written by Noah Hawley and is based on the 1996 Coen Brothers’ film of the same name. Howerton plays Don Chumph, the lovable yet dim-witted personal trainer who ends up blackmailing Stavros Milos (Oliver Platt).
Having just screened Fargo’s upcoming shocking episode, “Buridan’s Ass,” before the conference call, it was difficult to keep the questions spoiler free, especially with Howerton’s involvement in the episode. That said, be advised there are a few spoilers in some of the questions asked by others.
I asked Howerton if he had any input into the writing of his character given that he is one of the writers for his other show, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, another FX series, and was surprised by his answer. While Howerton only answers part of my question, he comes back to it during another question.
I would have liked to ask more questions but unfortunately, this was the shortest conference call I’ve ever participated in.
Here are my questions, followed by the remaining Q&A of the call.
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Moderator Our next question comes from the line of Greg Staffa with Your Entertainment Corner. Please go ahead.
Greg Thanks for taking our calls today.
Glenn My pleasure.
Greg I saw next week’s episode, and all I can say is wow. I’m calling from Minnesota, and it’s hard not to think of Fargo without thinking of the Minnesota accents. My question is how did you find your Minnesota voice. And as a writer/actor on another popular show, did you have any input into the writing with Noah as far as your character, or how hard is it to resist the urge to sit down and start writing stuff?
Glenn It’s not hard for me to resist it because it’s not something that—it’s going to sound weird. I’m not compelled often to be a writer. I would much rather, as an actor, get something that’s so well written that I don’t feel the desire to write it or rewrite it, and that was certainly the case with Noah’s writing.
I think he strove for a certain amount of excellence in his writing where if you said things pretty much word for word that it would convey exactly the message that it needed to convey. So, I really stuck pretty closely to the script on this one, but to Noah’s credit, there were certain sections where my character is sort of [indiscernible] through a moment where he was absolutely open to me changing or altering things in any way that I saw fit, but to be honest, most of the time, I stuck pretty closely to the script.
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Moderator Our next question comes from the line of Jamie.
Jamie Thanks for doing the call.
Glenn Hi, Jamie.
Jamie So, your character in Fargo is really great, and I’ve seen your last episode too. Quite a lot happens. Can you talk about what originally attracted you to the character and why you took the part?
Glenn How do you know I don’t come back as a zombie?
Jamie Well, I guess that’s true. We’ll have to wait and see. That would be fun.
Glenn It could be a Coen brothers’ zombie movie. Who knows? I didn’t know a whole lot about it when I said yes to it if I’m being honest. Television moves at a different pace than film.
I knew that the Coen brothers were involved. I’ve been a big fan of FX dramas for a while, and obviously, I’ve been a part of the family for many, many years, and the president of FX, John Landgraf called me and he’d been speaking about—he knows that my background is not really in comedy and a lot of my background is actually in more dramatic stuff, which is weird. So, he always asks me, he threw it out there, would you ever want to be on one of our dramas, and I said absolutely. So, this came along and even though it’s kind of a comedic role, he felt like it was something that I hadn’t really done comedic-ly before, and it was part of a drama, and he explained the concept to me, who the character was, what the tone of the show was. I’m a big fan of the movie, Fargo, and I basically without ever even seeing a script, I said yes just because of all the people that were involved.
Moderator Our next question comes from the line of Eric. Please go ahead.
Glenn Hey, Eric.
Eric Hi there. How are you?
Glenn Good. Thank you. How are you?
Eric Good, thanks. Was just wondering—Noah Hawley has talked a lot about how he’s put little references to other Coen brothers’ films, not just Fargo. So, I was wondering—you could maybe see a little bit of Brad Pitt’s character from Burn After Reading in your character. Did you notice this, or was this something that was ever brought to your attention, or do you even believe that?
Glenn I assumed the same thing you did when I read the script that it was a pretty clear homage to that character. I don’t remember ever actually having that conversation with Noah, but I know that he definitely wanted to distinguish it enough from that character, which I think is something that happens naturally when you cast two different actors. He and I are always going to have a different take on things. So, I think the homage was clearly there, but I certainly tried to stay away from anything that Brad did in the movie, especially because I actually did re-watch a lot of Coen brothers’ movies including Burn After Reading, and I was like, my God, Brad Pitt’s performance in that is so brilliant, I don’t even want to—I don’t even think I could match it even if I wanted to.
Eric Great, thank you.
Moderator Our next question comes from the line of Rebecca.
Rebecca Good morning. I was wondering—your character is not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed. How difficult is that to play? How easy is it for you to get into that type of thing?
Glenn Well, some of the tools are not meant to be sharp. So, I’ll start with that. You have a lot of blunt instruments in the tool shed. What was your question?
Rebecca How do you get into that? How do you get into a character who just is not very smart?
Glenn It’s a good question. It’s kind of a difficult question to answer only because I know I’m one of those guys that I have to just kind of feel it. Otherwise, it becomes a very intellectual exercise if I start thinking about it too much. I think it’s more, for me, getting into a very open-minded mindset where, for me, I felt like this was the kind of guy who is very easily influenced, especially by someone with such a presence as “Lorne Malvo” has.
Obviously, there’s the threat of violence behind it all, but I think this guy is not so much afraid of any kind of violence against him as he is just sort of getting caught. I don’t know. It’s just sort of getting a feeling of being innocent again. It is a very different character than the character I play certainly on Sunny who thinks he knows everything. I think this guy thinks he doesn’t really know as much as he needs to know, but I don’t know. I don’t know quite how to answer that. I guess it’s just bringing a real openness to the role, more listening than demanding or saying. I don’t know.
Moderator Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Preston.
Preston Hey, Glenn. How are you doing?
Glenn Great. How are you?
Preston Pretty good. I’m curious how you think “Dennis” and the Sunny gang would have handled this situation that “Don” found himself in. Do you think that “Dennis” would have been manipulated by “Malvo” to the point where he would have executed his plan?
Glenn That’s a difficult question to answer simply because we don’t—most of the guest star roles we have on Sunny are sort of so mowed over by our extremely energetic, forceful characters. In season seven, we actually did have a similar situation of being trapped in a closet and the trapped in a closet situation. So, I think rather than—I think the difference between “Don” and “Dennis” is “Dennis” would have spent the entire time trying to figure out how to get out of that closet whereas “Don” just spent the night eating whatever he had in the cabinet and peeing into his shoe or whatever the hell he did, I don’t know. I think he’s just a much more docile, trusting character, “Don,” whereas “Dennis” is much more cynical and untrusting.
Moderator Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Lauren.
Laruen Hi, Glenn.
Glenn Hi.
Lauren So, my questions kind of touch on Fargo. I wanted to get a comment though from someone in the Sunny gang about the recent announcement that they might remake Lethal Weapon and how they would react to that news.
Glenn My God, I didn’t hear that. So, they’re talking about remaking Lethal Weapon?
Lauren Yes. With Chris Hemsworth.
Glenn Wow. Well, I think in true Sunny fashion, I think there would be some characters who would be excited about it, and I think there would be some characters who’d be adamantly against it, and then, the characters would probably battle it out in some way, but personally, me, sure. Why not? I thought the RoboCop remake was good, I’ll say that.
Lauren Congrats on being renewed.
Glenn Thank you.
Moderator Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Kelly.
Kelly Hi, Glenn. Thanks so much for talking with us today.
Glenn Pleasure.
Kelly I love the dynamic between “Don” and “Malvo.” Can you tell me what it was like, though, working so closely with Billy Bob Thornton?
Glenn Yes. Billy is great. I’m always a little bit concerned anytime I get into a scene with somebody who I have as much respect for as an actor as I do with Billy just because they say never meet your idols, and so, I’m like I don’t want to meet this guy and have him be a son of a … or something, but he could not be a nicer, easier to work with person. He is just terrific. He’s extremely open to suggestion, he’s very, very easy to work with, very professional, came to the set knowing all of his lines and clearly is—I’m a big fan of people who I feel like when I’m talking to them in a scene, they’re actually listening to what I’m saying. So, even if I did flub a line, he was listening to me and he’d pick up on it.
So, it was a lot of fun. It kind of became like a really weird sort of Abbot and Costello-ey kind of relationship where I kind of end up becoming his lackey. It was a lot of fun. I’m not accustomed usually to playing sort of, for lack of a better word, the dumb one in the comedic relationship. I’m usually the straight man. So, it was a lot of fun not playing the straight man.
Moderator Thank you. We have a follow-up question from the line of Jamie. Please go ahead.
Jamie Hi, again.
Glenn Hey.
Jamie So, do you have a favorite scene you can talk about?
Glenn From Fargo?
Jamie I’d say that the scene I did in the closet with him was a lot of fun, which in the script, it was actually a little bit of a longer scene. There was more in there, but as I’m well versed on with Sunny, you only have so much time to tell a story, so you have to cut out anything that’s not absolutely essential, but I had a really good time shooting that scene. It was really funny. It’s so awkward to be literally inches away from someone’s face doing a scene, but I think that’s part of why it was so awkward and funny to shoot.
Moderator Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Krista. Please go ahead.
Krista Hi, Glenn. How are you?
Glenn I’m great. How are you? Where are you from?
Krista Alabama.
Glenn Hey, me too.
Krista Okay. Great.
Glenn Where in Alabama?
Krista I live close to Tuscaloosa.
Glenn I’m from Montgomery.
Krista Great. Wonderful. My question was what was the biggest challenge in playing your character.
Glenn I think the biggest challenge really is sort of getting into the mindset of someone who is, as one of the other people put it, not the sharpest tool in the shed just because I tend to get cast more often as the smart guy, some characters who might not be the sharpest tool in the shed but they think they are. So, I was not in my comfort zone playing sort of the dumb guy, the non-straight man character in the scene.
So, I’d say that was a little bit of a challenge for me, but it was also what made it so fun, and then also of course, feeling free and loose in a scene but not having to worry about screwing up the accents I think was a little bit of a challenge too. You don’t want to do, as somebody from Alabama, you know how frustrating it can be to watch someone do a southern accent and absolutely just mangle it and make a joke out of it, and I didn’t want to make too much of a joke out of it. So, it was a little bit of a challenge just feeling like I had it in me and I wasn’t struggling with the accent while I was trying to play the scene.
Krista Great. Well, I look forward to the second season.
Glenn Thank you.
Adrianna Thanks so much to everyone for joining us today, especially Glenn. We really appreciate your time. As a reminder, Fargo airs Tuesday nights at 10 p.m. only on FX. Thank you.
Glenn Thank you.
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Greg Staffa
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