Chris Colfer talks about Kurt Hummel for the Home Entertainment release of Glee: Season 4 | The Fan Carpet Ltd • The Fan Carpet: The RED Carpet for FANS • The Fan Carpet: Fansites Network • The Fan Carpet: Slate • The Fan Carpet: Theatre Spotlight • The Fan Carpet: Arena • The Fan Carpet: International

Chris Colfer talks about Kurt Hummel for the Home Entertainment release of Glee: Season 4


The Fan Carpet Chats To...
11 October 2013

With many of the former Glee Club members now graduates, the hunt is on at William McKinley High School to find talented singers to rebuild the New Directions. It’s not goodbye to the graduates however as beloved characters Rachel and Kurt move to New York to continue their education at the New York Academy of the Dramatic Arts (NYADA), struggling to adjust to life after high school. So Glee: Season 4 still features all of your favourite characters, but also introduces great new additions to all the laughs, tears and fun-filled antics in a season that features numerous episodes that will leave you desperate for more.

Like the memorable seasons before it, Glee continues to attract big names, with starring roles from Kate Hudson as a nasty NYADA dance teacher, to Sarah Jessica Parker and Whoopi Goldberg (reprising her role as NYADA Dean Carmen Tibideaux). As well as this, the popular show’s trademark tribute episodes entertain more than ever, with this season featuring episodes dedicated to the music of Britney Spears, Grease and Stevie Wonder.

Glee Season 4 also sees the introduction of latest Glee Project winner Blake Jenner who joins the cast as Ryder Lynn, a football-playing sophomore who Finn encourages to audition for the upcoming school production of Grease.

 

 

Last year we were saying that the third time’s the charm and it becomes what it is.  But Glee has transitioned to something totally different now.  What is your idea of transitioning?

Well I think in season four you see these characters that in many respects you got to see grow up, go out and live their lives.  And very much like real life, these characters move on and they move away so you get to do that with them in this season.

 

What is the hardest part about moving on?

There’s lots of attention on that first love that everyone has.  And I think right now that the characters are getting used to the whole, what it is to have a long-distance relationship and their kind of understanding that with distance comes emotional distance as well.  So they’re working through that.

 

I don’t think we’ve seen the music chosen as well as we have in the breakup episode.  How hard is it to balance the emotional tonality with the music and the acting?

Well, for me all the emotional stuff is really what I live for because that’s kind of my favorite thing about being an actor. When you get to dive into those emotional scenes and just let it all come out and all hang out.  And it’s such a relief.  It’s very therapeutic.  But I don’t know, it’s very helpful when you have a great song under you to really get that emotion out.  And there’s nothing like singing a big powerful ballad and emotional ballad and just having tears to your eyes and a stage or soundstage behind you.  It’s a great, great feeling and it really helps.  Music is a great tool for an actor to get the emotion across, I feel.

 

 

Kurt and Blaine have become this TV couple that people want to embrace because we want them to work.  What is the pressure to make that work?

It’s interesting because I never once ever imagined that I would ever be half of a power couple ever.  That was not one thing that never crossed my mind.  So I have issues with it.  I don’t know if I’m the best person for the job.  Because I’ve always been a very, very independent person and I still, which people get so mad at me for, always still think of Kurt as an individual.  I don’t think of him as half of the character.  I think of him as an individual.  So my loyalty is always going to lie with Kurt and what’s best for Kurt.  So a lot of fans get mad at me for that because they love them as a thing.  But I mean for me they can be a thing for as long as they want but I feel like it’s a television show so our job is to entertain an audience and they should have ups and downs just like every couple.   The more it’s made out to be, it’s such a wonderful couple and the fact that it’s a little fictional just how wonderful it is, I think it almost discredits them. So I like it when there’s the emotional roller coaster for them like there is for every other couple.  Because an actor, it’s not fun to say I love you everything.  I mean we’re going to have to start doing it in other languages if we want to spice it up.  But no, so I think we both enjoyed this separation a lot because we’ve been able to stretch those muscles that have been waiting to be stretched.

 

What is Ryan working through?

They’ll come up to me and they’ll say oh so next episode you guys are going to lose your virginity to each other.  I thought like what?  Are you kidding me?  Like I thought for sure they had lost their minds and that that was way too much and I couldn’t believe they’d want to go there.  But then you see the episode and you get a script and it’s great, great, really touching things.  So they surprised me with that.

 

Looking ahead, is there a theme to this year’s season?  It seems like there is on one hand rebirth but the older characters are still tackling the world and it’s not always easy.

I mean, I don’t know.  It’s a representation of that struggle, you have the dream for so long and then when you get out there you realize it takes a little while for you to realize you’re actually living the dream because there is so much, there’s so much work you have to put into it.

 

Do you have faith that Kurt will realize who he should be?

Well, I would certainly hope so.  I certainly hope that Kurt makes it because it would be much more entertaining for me and to play a character who gets to go on and do other things.  Rather than just being another voice in the lost crowd.  But we’ll see.  I think he’s a really, really tough guy and I think he’s got what it takes.

 

 

GLEE: SEASON 4 IS OUT NOW ON BLU-RAY AND DVD