Interview

Jared Padalecki & Jensen Ackles

Dutch Yes magazine
December 15, 2006

JENSEN: "I get to shoot with the coolest guns and at the end, I always get the girl."
JARED: "Actually, we get to be action heroes each week!"
JENSEN: "It took me a couple of weeks before I had it under control, but now I can load guns with my eyes closed. You don't learn that kind of stuff at a 'normal' job."

Q: Have you become friends?

JARED: "Actually I don't wanna say this in front of Jensen, but I really enjoy working with him. A working day with Jensen is never boring."
JENSEN: "We're very much alike and so we get along really well. And we both know damn well that that happens rarely in the world of showbizz."
JARED: "Thankfully, because we spend - we have no choice - a lot of time with each other."
JENSEN: "And then we meet up often after work as well."

Q: In which areas are you alike?

JARED: "In which are we not?"
JENSEN: "We were both born and raised in Texas and we btoh have an older brother and a younger sister. Another remarkable resemeblance: de names of the children in our family start with J, J and M. With Jared: Jeff, Jared and Megan and with me Josh, Jensen and Mackenzie."

Q: Are there any differences as well?

JARED: "I think we're more alike than we're willing to admit. We're both relaxed, love music, movies and having a beer at the end of the day."
JENSEN: "Come to think of it, there are no differences."
JARED: "Oh really? I'm taller."
JENSEN: "And I'm smarter."
JARED: "But I'm just a better person."
JENSEN: "Yeah, and I'm a jerk."
JARED: "And I'm exactly the opposite: considerate and symphatetic."

Q: Is your relationship in the series realistic?

JARED: "Sometimes you gotta use your own experiences for acting. But Dean and Sam see each other much more ofen than I see my own brother."
JENSEN: "And that's clearly visible. They're at each other's throats all the time, they're constantly in a fight. I think that's also because of how we deal with our own brothers."

Q: Do you dare watching horror yourselves?

JARED: "I in fact love watching horror. Just laid back on the couch, with a bag of crisps and a diet coke. Even when I'm alone, I always think out loud: that was cool, that was funny, that was gross and that... was really not necessary."
JENSEN: "I can really enjoy those exciting moments. I love it, when they look in the mirror and spot someone standing behind them."
JARED: "But still I don't really like those kind of movies in which people get crushed or whatever kind of gross thing they come up with. A horror movie is perfect when you don't see what happens and when everything is left to your imagination."
JENSEN: "Now I play in a horror series myself, I've become more critical towards horror movies."

Q: Do you believe in supernatural phenomenons?

JARED: "I do not not believe in them. I don't have any experience with it myself, but we live in a big world and within an even bigger universe. There's gotta be something, it's arrogant to believe that there is nothing more, that you've seen everything. During the filming of an episode in a house in Vancouver a clock suddenly fell down from a wall. We all got kinda scared then."
JENSEN "Oh that's nothing. We were filming in an abandoned psychiatric asylum. I spotted a door which said 'staircase' and I thought I could get to lunch faster that way. Well, not. I ended up in a endless, pitch-dark abandoned hallway with a small light at the end of it. So I started walking and I heard water dripping in a room. I walked a little faster, even faster. Until at one point my hairs stood up in my neck and I sprinted out."

Q: You've played in other series as well. Is Supernatural any different?

JARED: "Supernatural was a big change for my, especially when you compare it to Gilmore Girls. Then I had large group of female fans. But the other day I come across my first male fan. In the gym. A large bloke who practices weightlifting and drinks proteine drinks!"
JENSEN: "In the other shows, we weren't so much background but - according to the official term - window dressing. Supernatural is all about us; we carry these series on our shoulders. Of course, that means a lot more responsibility and..."
JARED: "Passion! It was a whole new thing for me when I started playing in Supernatural. In Supernatural I do the craziest stunts and in Gilmore Girls I learned to memorise long pieces of text to say them on screen afterwards, in a rapid speed."

Q: Jared, in Gilmore Girls you played Dean and now you have to call Jensen Dean. Difficult?

JARED: "In the beginning, yes. If the director said: Dean you stand over there, then I was already standing there. Not until everyone was looking at me again with an odd look, I thought: wait, he didn't mean me."

Q: What's your ambition?

JARED: "Simply become ridiculously rich."
JENSEN: "And retire when I'm thirty."
JARED: "No, seriously: it might sound cliché, but I wanna play all kinds of roles. An actor doesn't specifically want this role, or that one, he wants every role. I wanna do all types of roles."
JENSEN: "I totally agree! That's why we love this job so much. We get to be so many different personalities and we get into special situations. It's like escaping reality."
JARED: "There isn't a specific role on my wanted list. I just wait till I come across a script that smacks me right in a face."

Q: Are you in a relationship?

JARED: "Yeah, both of us. And that's really good."
JENSEN: "It's nice to hear a familiar voice at the end of the day. I'm a little too old to call my mom each day."

Q: Do they act as well?

JENSEN: "Yes."
JARED: "Jensens girlfriend even had a small role in Supernatural."
JENSEN: "We met on the set."

Q: Sounds mysterious. Aren't you giving away names?

JENSEN: "Sandy and Tanya."

Q: Have you always wanted to become an actor?

JENSEN: "Both of us sort of rolled into it. I liked acting, but the idea to make it my carreer didn't cross my mind. I just did it for fun. A talent scout spotted me and sent me to Los Angeles. You're kidding me, I thought, but I went anyway."
JARED: "I was discovered pretty much the same way. I was said to have talent, but I wanted to finish my school. After that, I tried anyway. With my role in Gilmore Girls as the result. College? There's always a chance to do that later, if I want."
JENSEN: "I'm often asked how you can become an actor, but there aren't guidelines for that. Friends of me went to the best theaterschool in America and they still have trouble finding a job. You gotta have talent, but mostly you just gotta be in the right place at the right time."

Q: How do you feel about the world of showbizz?

JARED: "I haven't quite adapted to it yet, I rather stay far from it."
JENSEN: "It took me year to gather a group of friends around me. In Los Angeles, it's really easy to fall into the wrong crowd. But we got a steady homebase, a great family. If I end up at the wrong side of the tracks, my dad gets on the first flight possibly to come over and personally break both my legs."

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