The Walking Dead has brought us incredible characters that fans around the globe have truly connected with on so many levels. Over the years, the show has connected a global fandom not only to unforgettable characters but also to the talented actors who bring their imaginings to life. For so many fans, their time with The Walking Dead has opened metaphorical doors to a wealth of other TV, film, and theatre projects featuring some of these actors. Bringing so many fans to different places through the common source is truly special.
The actor behind our favorite mullet-and-braid-wearing scientist Eugene Porter, Josh McDermitt, is no exception. McDermitt has had an impressively varied career spanning decades, leading him into numerous paths of success. McDermitt is one of the most versatile actors of our time, whose body of work continues to demonstrate an extreme and impressive range.
I was lucky enough to sit down with McDermitt and discuss many of the instrumental choices and performances of his early career, right through to some of his recent roles. The interview was phenomenally genuine, with McDermitt opening up about his formative years in radio and how he was allowed to be expressive in the arts. He also opened up about his love of comedy, behind-the-scenes memories from sets, conventions, and countless laughs throughout, all with his joyous energy. Below are a handful of questions from this huge interview; you can watch the full interview below.
RICHARDSON: Way back when, you were calling into a local radio show, Tim and Willie, doing impersonations to request songs. What was the initial moment for you when you thought, “Hey, let's explore this and see what my voice can do?”
MCDERMITT: You know, I was, like, 14 years old, and I was just bored waiting for the school bus to take me to school. It was a country music radio show. At the time, country music was exploding. There was an artist named Garth Brooks who was one of the hot young artists amongst others, too, but it was just, like, ushering in this new era of country music that wasn't like your grandfather's country music. Not to knock that! I actually love that stuff, too, but it brought me into listening to that, and then I listened to this show.
There was a show in the States; it was a late-night talk show, Late Night with David Letterman. He's got a weird, quirky sense of humor; it's irreverent, and there are a lot of inside jokes. If you watch just one episode, you won't get half of it, but if you watch a week's worth, you'll understand the callbacks, and it ends up being funny.
So these guys were playing country music, and they had a show that was similar in style to the David Letterman program. And I was like, “Oh, this would be great.” So I would listen to that. I was just bored, and I would call up. I'm not Ross Marquand, you know, who played Aaron in The Walking Dead. He can do voices; all I was good at was doing some weird character—but just committing to it. To the point that they're like, “Oh, okay, you can stop! We know this is a bit; you could, like, drop the act now.” I never did.
It was all to entertain myself. It was never, “Oh, I want to work in radio.” I think at one point, there was a moment my mom had said to me, when I was much younger, we were driving around, running errands, and we were listening to the radio, and I was laughing, and she was like, “You know, you could do that for a living.”
We then continued to McDermitt’s time on the comedy circuit, his role in the 2015 comedy-drama Life in Color, a wild pilot with Christopher Lloyd, and guest appearances before going back to another of his guest spots.
RICHARDSON: You also appeared on Escape! where you were in the escape room playing a ‘policeman Josh,’ trying to break out. Have you dabbled in more escape rooms since then?
McDermitt laughs whilst trying to pinpoint the appearance.
MCDERMITT: I've done several escape rooms. Christian Serratos, my co-star on The Walking Dead, who played Rosita, is a big escape room aficionado. And she loves doing them, and I've done them with her, and she's incredible. I love puzzles. I love trying to figure stuff out. That's why I'm drawn to being an actor. It's like, okay, let's get into the nuts and bolts of this person. Let's figure out what makes them tick, right?
She works at such a high level, so quickly, where I'm sitting there, like, “Okay, let's take this piece,” and she's like, “No!” Boom, boom, boom, we're out the door. Like, she breaks records at these escape rooms, where she's, you know, you have an hour to get out, and it's like, the fastest someone gets out is, like, 20 minutes, and she's out in, like, seconds. She's insane. I like doing that with her; it's fun, but also I like to take my time a little bit and do the puzzle. But I have done several since. Escape rooms are fun. They're real fun.
RICHARDSON: They are, if you can get out of them!
MCDERMITT: Yeah, it's humiliating if you don't.
RICHARDSON: All of these little guest appearances in your whole career so far were obviously leading to a show that's touched the lives of millions across the globe. The Walking Dead, of course. There's so much that can be said about Eugene Portal, but one thing in particular is that he never really seems to get credit for lots of pivotal moments in the show that he was actually responsible for. From leading the group to Alexandria at the start to finding Maggie in the tunnel, helping bring down Negan, and ultimately discovering the Commonwealth, Eugene unknowingly guided the characters to their next home. In many ways, he became a quiet compass for the show. How important are those key moments to you as an actor? Realizing that, actually, Eugene, a lot of people put him off, but he really got people places throughout the whole time he was on the show?
MCDERMITT: Yeah, for sure. That was very important for me. The thing you realize right away with a show like The Walking Dead, when it's written so well, is that there's nothing really that's wasted. I mean, there are some things that they've set up that they weren't able to pay off for this reason or that. You know, I don't want to jump into those reasons, but basically, if you're doing something, even if it doesn't make sense, you know that there's going to be a payoff down the road. And some things didn't make sense to me.
Why is he doing this? Why am I saying that? Or whatever. I just learned to embrace it and not really know the outcome, which is, you know, how life is. We don't really know what's coming in the next 10 minutes, or tomorrow, or next week, or next year, right? So you just have to live in the moment, embrace the decisions you make now, and trust that it's going to lead to some good things.
I think that's really—it was a great thing to remind myself when doing Eugene; there were… There were definitely moments. I was like, what? And it all worked out great, you know, for him. And it all worked out for the betterment of the community. He was on a growth journey that I'm really proud of, and I think they did a good job kind of crafting that for him. I loved that. I loved that he was planted firmly in the middle of all these, like, huge set-piece moments within the show. It pissed a lot of people off. But things worked out, you know, for the betterment of the group, I think.
RICHARDSON: I want to skip on to the next chapter now for you, which was starring in the horror classic Creepshow, the reboot on Shudder. I have to admit, I have arachnophobia. So whilst I loved the episode, that giant animatronic spider was definitely a challenge to watch. I could tell from watching it that it gave John Goodman vibes from Arachnophobia, which is what kickstarted my fear! Were there any moments filming with the creatures, the bugs, the rat, or that hideous arachnid that felt wild or bizarre at times?
MCDERMITT: Greg Nicotero, that was his show, and, you know, he's obviously the big special effects guru that he is, and it was the same thing with The Walking Dead. The special effects, the makeup, the puppetry, and anything that we use look so real that it actually makes your job as the actor easier than having to create this thing in your head, because you're just looking at a tennis ball. That's just difficult. That's a different skill set. I think some people have managed to figure out, like, the Marvel people, they shoot in front of these big green screens, and there's nothing around them, and they have to visualize this world, and maybe they have some artwork of what they're supposed to be picturing, but they're just, like, they're able to do that. I can't do that! I could if I worked at it, but it's a skill that you have to build up, a muscle that you have to build up.
When you have a life-size spider sitting behind you. About to attack you with its, you know, mouth. Chomping at you. It makes it easy to react to that, you know? We had a giant rat. They had this big puppet mouse head, and, you know, my guy was, like, reaching for something off the bed. Then this giant mouse comes and bites my arm off, and then we had this whole rig with this blood, these tubes that went up through my arm, and then all of a sudden it was, like, squirting blood, and I'm, like, holding onto my arm, and you don't see my hand anymore; it was cool!
Then Carrie Jones is this awesome special-effects puppet master who works with Greg. He's a big guy, and he was manning this enormous mouse head, and he wasn't just, like, barely getting it; I mean, he was, like, really (being hard). So it's just like, "Oh, I didn't expect it to be that hard," and you're pushing on me, and I get, and I'm trying to get it out, and it was just this nice collaboration between different departments of just making this thing feel real. And what's really great is, like, when you walk onto a set like that, and you see everything, but then the people behind it are doing such a good job at their jobs, too. It just makes everything so much easier.
This huge interview also covered more of McDermitt’s other work, behind-the-scenes moments, and convention experiences. All of which you can view above.
RICHARDSON: Do you think little Josh, who was calling into the radio at 14 would believe where curiosity took him?
MCDERMITT: He would look at where I'm sitting now and be like, "Whoa, that's awesome, you know?" It's interesting with kids. I'm not an expert on, you know, child development or anything. I know that comes as a shock!
RICHARDSON: Yeah!
MCDERMITT: But it feels like we push kids to make decisions about the rest of their lives when they're at such a young age. Where it's like, just let them be a kid, you know? I didn't have any idea of what I wanted to do; I just wanted to entertain myself, as I said. I just wanted to make people laugh and do things like that. I wasn't like, "I gotta set up my retirement account," and I need to make sure I'm making smart financial decisions in my life so that when I retire, I don't think, you know, I don't know. Not to say that stuff's not important, you know; I was pushed, in a way, by some academic advisors who didn't recognize the creativity in my life that was fueling me; that was my engine. They should have been pushing me in a certain direction, creatively. Instead, they were trying to put me into a mold that wasn't gonna work for me. Thankfully, I figured that out for myself.
A lot of people don't figure that out, you know? I was told, "These are your choices." You get A, B, or C, and I'm like, there's no D? Because none of these appeal to me, and I chose D of my own accord, instead of just, like, going along with it, you know? And going, 'I'll pick B. I feel very fortunate that, in my mind, I stuck to pursuing something creatively in my life. Even if I didn't know it was supposed to be a career. You know, I have been working in radio since age 14, 15 years old. That's a long time, and I'm just like, wow, I'm really, like, fortunate that I was able to do that, and I didn't get pushed into this other thing; I still found my way. So if people want to pursue the arts as a career, even if it's just a hobby, it's okay; it can be a hobby. Like, do it, because I think that's really important. And do it.
If it's not working for you, change course and do something else. That's also okay. You know? So I think my 14-year-old self would be really excited about the choices I made and where I ended up, even though I wasn't necessarily thinking, "This is the direction I want to head." I didn't really know what I was doing.
I wrapped up the interview by thanking McDermitt for his energy and time and for always being a pleasure to talk to. You can view the full hour-and-fifteen-minute interview above, with plenty of extra stories and laughs throughout. It was an honor to conduct this interview and I cannot wait to see where his career takes him next.
Josh McDermitt’s latest appearances in Fire Country are out on CBS (USA) and Sky (UK) now, or you can catch him throughout eight seasons of AMC’s The Walking Dead on AMC and AMC Plus (USA) and Sky Max/NOWTV (UK) now.
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