Sam Anderson talks about his traveler career, ‘Matlock’ and ‘Lost’

If there was a prize for the best supporting husband, Sam Anderson would earn a place in Fame’s television hall. It is hard to say what you might recognize the traveler actor of the stage and the screen of the first – perhaps if the director in “Forrest Gump” or one of his more than 100+ performances on television in shows of “Perfect Strangers” to the recent limited “PAINKILLER” series. Many viewers first fell in love with him as the loving, devoted Bernard Nadler, Husband of Rose, on the TV phenomenon ‘Lost’. And now the 78-year-old actor is back with a different network hit and he plays the supporting husband of Madeline Kingston of Kathy Bates, also known as “Matty” Matlock on the CBS series “Matlock”.

Een van de weinige kritieke en commerciële hits van het nieuwe seizoen, de reboot van Jennie Snyder Urman geeft een draai aan de Andy Griffith -serie uit de jaren 1980. Bates speelt Matty, een lieve en folksy advocaat die gedwongen wordt om met pensioen te gaan en voor een groot bedrijf te werken nadat ze zegt dat haar man stierf en ze heeft de opdracht om voor haar kleinzoon te zorgen. But towards the end of the first episode, viewers learn the truth when Matty returns to a beautiful country house and the poor of Edwin, her admiring husband of almost 50 years. Matty actually works undercover at the law firm that blames her daughter’s death, because she hid evidence that opioids could have gained from the market – and Edwin is her partner, dragged into a world of deception and spy that marks new territory for the retired professor. Although a lot of comedy comes from looking at the friendly Edwin who is drawn into her schedules, there is also a lot of fun seeing an adult couple who just worship.

Here are a few things to know about actor Sam Anderson, Edwin playing and his legendary career.

Even he is overwhelmed by the enormous success of ‘Matlock’.

Although he is no stranger to large projects with dedicated followers, Anderson admits that the critical and commercial love for “Matlock” has been overwhelming. “I literally shake my head daily and think:” How did I get here? This is great. ”

He mentions the success of the show to his impressive ensemble – although season 1 Edwin did not see communicating with the characters of the law firm played by Beau Bridges, Jason Ritter and Skye P. Marshall – and maker Jennie Snyder Urman, who holds the surprises every week. “I get these scripts and it’s like reading a best -selling novel,” he raves. “More often than not, I crave breath because I can’t believe what Jennie did. It is a pleasure to read and a pleasure to play.”

He and his Oscar-winning CO-star go far back.

The warm and well -known chemistry that he shares with Bates is helped by the fact that they first met 40 years ago in a class given by the Mentor of Anderson, the acclaimed theater director José Quintero. Over the years they would come across each other, even collaborate on another legal drama, 2011s, “Harry’s Law”, and Anderson says he remained “one of her greatest fans”. When the “Matlock” offer came the way from Anderson, he says: “I jumped into it. And I will tell you, it has been such a gift. I say that as someone who is just as interested in the profession and how it works as she is, I just ended up in Co -star Heaven.”

He adds that Bates makes it easy to portray the almost 50 years of marriage between the two. “If you have such a person, you just have to look into her eyes and tell the truth.” Reasonable, because their characters cheat others. He adds: “Even if you lie, you have to tell the truth.”

He put himself on tape for the role of Edwin.

Initially, not much was known about Edwin’s Edwin, but the role continued to grow throughout the season. “I try to go on things and stay open, and it seems to have developed very well,” he notes. It may surprise people to know that Anderson did an audition for the role despite the fact that he had more than 100 credits. He doesn’t mind and notes: “I think all the rules have changed since the pandemic, and I have no attitude towards opportunities to audition.” He admits that when Covid struck for the first time, he was not sure that he would work again: “I thought I would probably have to retire, because we didn’t know when we would come back or what we were doing.”

It appears that one of his first post-Pandemic jobs was ‘Painkiller’, in which he depicted Raymond Sackler, part of the family that was responsible for the spread of the opioid epidemic. He had just packed that shoot when he heard that his ‘Matlock’ character would be a father who lost his daughter of opioid use. “I had just come from the other side of the whole thing, so I was able to bring all that perspective and knowledge to this show.”

Roles for older actors seem to be better than ever.

“It starts to feel as if 75 is the new 50,” Anderson says, before clarifying that he is joking. But he is not wrong – and he likes to see people of a certain age who are depicted as lively and valuable. “For a long time you would see that people of a certain age are unable or disconnected; it used to be a big stereotype,” he says. There also seem to be more roles available for older actors. Anderson remembers an audition from about 30 years ago, when he went up for the role of a son and was linked to older actors. “I was in the waiting room and saw these iconic actors, one after the other, fighting for this part. At one point there were about 15 of them in the room, and this one actor walked in and said:” For God’s sake, does any of you not have the decency to die? ” [that] All these actors still did this and thought to myself: “I hope I can do that too.”

“Lost” was a game changer.

“That changed everything,” Anderson says about the participation of the SCI-Fi phenomenon in his second season as a “tailie”-a rather unseen passenger who had been in the back of the plane when it broke in two, so he divorced his wife Rose (played by L. Scott Caldwell). Caldwell, a black actor, was already founded as a beloved character in season 1, and the unveiling of Anderson as Bernard was best summarized by the character of Jorge Garcia’s Hurley, who was deadpanned: “So, Rose’s Man’s White of Rose. So not that of Rose’s man.

But the show never mentioned it again, and Rose and Bernard were probably the best pair on the island. “One of the things I liked most was that I think many people thought we would do an episode somewhere along the line about race. And they never did that – they normalized it. We were only two people incredibly in love.”

The only drawback of his five seasons on “Lost”? People who dispute him about whether or not the characters were dead-especially because Anderson says that he would be confused himself and his then 14-year-old son (who said no) and had to ask air travel interesting. “Sometimes Scott and I would travel on the same flight and while we walked on, we would see the faces of people as:” Get me off this plane; it’s going to crash. “

Prior to ‘Lost’, Anderson says that he was usually the most recognized for playing the head of cardiology about the medical drama ‘there.’ (It is interesting that Anderson also appeared on the short sitcom “er” with George Clooney. He also worked with the actor in Clooney’s first game, “Vicious” in 1986.) “I remember visiting someone with someone [the hospital] And I got on the elevator with three doctors, and they would look at me and nod, “doctor.” ”

Theater is still a large part of his life and career.

A theater -Major who also obtained master’s degrees in creative writing and American (“Just to be on the safe side”) has been active and directing and directing for the stage since the 1970s. Highlights were playing the titular character in “Edmund” and award-winning turns of David Mamet in “The Bird and Mr. Banks” of 2010 and “Blackbird” of 2011. In 2005 he became a member of the highly regarded Road Theater Company, where he now serves as a board member and co-artist director. Although a non-profit theater with 99 seats, the road has had a major impact since the launch in 1991. One of his favorite productions with the company was “The Play About the Baby” by Edward Albee. “He never spent the rights and he gave us what was great,” Anderson notes, adding that the playwright died on their opening evening. “It was a great show and experience.”