Both Jim Beaver and his character Bobby Singer are loved by the majority of fans. Jim was kind enough to take time out from his ever-busy schedule to do an interview with us for the site.

Thanks to Jim for agreeing to this interview.

Feel free to link to this interview, but DO NOT copy it anywhere else on the web without express permission.

General Questions

When did you decide that you wanted to get into acting?

Although I'd done a couple of plays in elementary school, I never really thought much about acting as a career until I got out of the Marines and went to college. I wanted to be a film historian, but it wasn't easy finding a college with courses in film history in those days, so I took theatre classes instead. My roommate asked me to be his scene partner for his audition for the college players, and we did a scene from OF MICE AND MEN. I was hooked and haven't seriously considered any other career since then.

You are currently working on a biography about George Reeves. How did you get involved with that?

As I said, I wanted to be a film historian. I wrote my first book, called JOHN GARFIELD: HIS LIFE AND FILMS, while I was in college, and I continued to write film history, reviews, and a column for FILMS IN REVIEW magazine for about ten years after college. My editor at FILMS IN REVIEW asked me to do an article on TV Superman star George Reeves, knowing I was a fan. I started the article and quickly began to realize that there was a book to be written on the topic. But my acting career was picking up, and although my first book took me two years to write, this one is about 29 and still not finished! But I continue to work on it between (and sometimes during) acting gigs.

You've been involved in writing episodes of two TV shows set during the Vietnam war (including "Tour of Duty", which I have to mention as being my favourite TV show ever!). How did your experiences in Vietnam help you with these?

Writing for the Vietnam shows was an interesting experience. The biggest effect of my having been in Vietnam was in getting me the job. The producers of TOUR OF DUTY and VIETNAM WAR STORY were looking very hard for veterans of the war to write for them. So I got an automatic "in," I guess. Not that I didn't have to show them I could write, but rather that they were quite welcoming to any writer who was a vet. None of the scripts I wrote bore much resemblance, plot-wise, to my own experiences, but what I was able to bring to the shows was my own take on what day-to-day life was like in the Nam. Songs and popular expressions and terminology and how people passed the time when they were bored, all of those, I think, would have been something non-vets would have been unaware of. I also drew on the experiences of other vets and in-country personnel. For my TOUR OF DUTY script "U.S.O. Down," I got some wonderful material about the women who worked for the U.S.O. from my late wife's cousin, whose experiences were dramatic. For a while there, having gone to Vietnam seemed like a wonderful career move, since I was getting both writing and acting jobs based on my having been there. But like I say, credentials can only get you in the door. They don't guarantee the job.

You also wrote several episodes of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents". Is writing for television something you want to continue to do? Perhaps for "Supernatural"?

I really enjoyed writing for television, but I have not tried to land work on a series in many years. It's way harder than acting, and fortunately I get to act quite a bit these days. I don't usually like to try to write for shows I'm acting on, either. It just muddies the water, for me. I don't want to tick someone off and lose my acting job because the producers didn't like something I wrote, you know? Anyway, my writing these days is much more about doing projects I myself thought up and want to do, rather than trying to supply product for someone else's project. I've got a real-life memoir coming up, as well as finishing the Reeves book, and a detective novel also in the works, not to mention a historical mini-series that I'm pitching to HBO. So I don't think Supernatural fans have to worry about me messing with their show anytime soon, not script-wise, at least.

Other Roles

Is there a particular role, in any film or TV show, that you would love to have had?

There are lots of roles I'd have liked to have had. But I'm a realist. There's no way I was going to get most of those roles, because they were always going to be cast with big-name actors. I'd have loved to do just about anything Robert Duvall has done in the last thirty years, but who are we kidding? Most of the roles I would like to have done (or would still like to do) are on stage. I think my Hamlet days are over, but I'm casting my eye toward maybe doing King Lear someday. I love Shakespeare but haven't done any in a long time. I miss it.

You mentioned doing stage performances of Shakespeare. What roles have you done and do you have a favourite?

I did five seasons with the Dallas Shakespeare Festival, as well as college and regional productions of Shakespeare. I was Albany in KING LEAR, Lucentio in THE TAMING OF THE SHREW, Young Siward and Macduff in different productions of the Scottish play, and various drips and drabs in other shows. Macduff was a great part, though I long to play the big fellow himself in the Scottish play. (You know it's bad luck to say the title.) The best stage role I think I ever had came about last year as a result of a failed attempt to get the Scottish play mounted here in L.A. I couldn't pull it off, so we tried for something similar but easier to do and I ended up playing Henry II in THE LION IN WINTER. This was the best stage acting experience of my life.

Which genre do you prefer to work in?

As to genre favorites, well, there's hardly anything more fun to do than a good part in a Western. I love playing cops, detectives, and bad guys. I very much enjoy comedy, but don't get asked to do it all that often. On a technical level, I enjoy fantastical stuff like SUPERNATURAL a little less, but only because it so often involves complicated special effects which can make for long, dreary days. But give me a good meaty straightforward acting scene with Jared and Jensen any old time.

Do you have any new TV shows or films in the works?

I'm appearing in HBO's new show JOHN FROM CINCINNATI, which just premiered. It's a strange and magical show from my old DEADWOOD producer, David Milch. I'm also appearing in several episodes of the new season of BIG LOVE, which also just premiered on HBO. And of course, we're getting ready to start the third season of SUPERNATURAL.

Supernatural

How much did you know about the character of Bobby when you first appeared in the show? Were you told back then that the character would have such a large role in Season Two?

I went in to audition for the role of Bobby without ever having seen SUPERNATURAL. I knew nothing about his back-story except what was in that first episode, "Devil's Trap." I didn't even know that my old friend Bob Singer, with whom I'd worked years ago on another series, REASONABLE DOUBTS, was producing. As it turned out, Bob blew off my audition and offered me the role. To this day, though, no one has ever sat down and given me any kind of history about the character. Bobby just seems to develop, script by script. I like the way there's no big exposition scenes about who he is or how he came to know the boys. The writers just let the audience figure it out bit by bit from clues that occasionally show up inadvertently in the dialog. But don't think I know any more than the viewer does!

I certainly had no idea that Bobby would EVER be back after "Devil's Trap," much less that he would be so prominent in season two. I had some hints that I might be back while we were shooting "Devil's Trap," but only because crew members kept saying how wonderful it was to have a guest star who didn't get killed! Even after the brief appearance of Bobby in "In My Time of Dying," I didn't necessarily expect to be back. But by mid-season two, it was clear that the head honchos liked something about having Bobby to turn to when the boys were in a jam or needed their heads screwed back on straight. Now I feel very much like part of the SUPERNATURAL family. That doesn't mean Bobby couldn't get turned into black smoke or French fries, but it does suggest that he is a more integral part of the story now.

If you could have any other role on the show, which would it be?

I can't imagine playing any other role on SUPERNATURAL. I mean, who would it be? I'm a little long in the tooth to be one of the buff-guys-the-vampire-slayers, and I'm not pretty enough to play Ellen. I'm very content playing Bobby, though I wouldn't mind if some of those hot guest-chicks took a liking to an older vintage once in a while. The JJ's get all the breaks.

While many of the new female characters introduced to the show are disliked by the fans, Bobby has been a big hit with everyone. Did you anticipate the fan response to your character? Do you have any idea why he is so popular?

Never in my wildest dreams did I ever expect SUPERNATURAL's fan base to take to Bobby the way they have. I've spent a lot of years being a reliable (I hope) character actor who does his work and very rarely gets noticed for it, which is not a bad way of life. Now, I'm not saying I get chased down the street by screaming fans now that I've done a few SUPERNATURALs, not by a long shot. But it's very rewarding to know that the fans like ol' Bobby. I was not expecting it, especially because it seems like these days you've got to be pretty young to be popular on TV. I'm not old, but the pretty-young ship has long since sailed. I can't quite figure what it is that makes Bobby popular, except that he's pretty no-nonsense, but in an affectionate and respectful way. It's clear he is growing to care deeply for Sam and Dean, but he's going to take care of them in the best way, by bringing them up short when they are in danger of doing something foolish. He's also reliable. Bobby's always there when they need him, and he's there with a good spirit, a good nature. It's pretty easy for a fellow to be popular when he's got qualities like those.

You mentioned Season three of Supernatural before. Have you heard anything definate yet?

Funny you should ask. I just got a call from my agent. He told me they wanted me for episodes one, three and four of season three, to start shooting July 16. So that sounds pretty definite.

What would you like to see happen to Bobby's character in Season Three?

The only thing I'd like to see happen with Bobby's character in season three is that thing I said about the hot guest-chicks. Anything else (aside from slow roasting over the coals of hell) is okay with me.

Do you get involved in the 'pranks' that we hear about on the set of "Supernatural"?

The pranks that take place on the set, the ones you've heard about, are pretty much all Jared and Jensen's doing. We have a lot of fun on the set, more fun than most shows I've ever worked on, because everybody's got a great sense of humor, especially the JJ's. My pranks are more along the lines of pretending to take an adjustment screw out of the camera just as the director's about to call action and saying, "How do you get this screw back in?" The big ones, the ones that involve stink bombs or people getting liquids dumped on them, those are pretty much the arena for the boys or the crew. Remember, technically speaking, I'm just a guest!

Have you been reading the Supernatural comics at all? Are you looking forward to the possibility of seeing yourself as a comic book character?

I think it would be cool to see this old mug of mine in a comic book, but I've never seen a SUPERNATURAL comic. I didn't know about them.

Do you believe in ghosts?

I don't believe in ghosts. That's not to say I don't still talk to my late wife or my dad. But I don't expect them to answer, and the stuff that happens on SUPERNATURAL is completely foreign to my real-life experience. It's just TV. Now, sometimes you get ghosts on TV, but usually if you jiggle the cable line, they go away.

Again, thank you very much to Jim for agreeing to this interview.

Feel free to link to this interview, but DO NOT copy it anywhere else on the web without express permission.

This interview was done in June 2007.