Graham Rogers and Giancarlo Esposito live in a world without electricity. (Brownie Harris/NBC)
When fans spot actor Giancarlo Esposito on the street, they give him a wide berth. Thanks to “Breaking Bad” and now, NBC’s “Revolution,” he has a reputation for playing cold-blooded killers who’d gut and fillet you as soon as look at you.
“People see me and don’t call me Giancarlo or Mr. Esposito. It’s either ‘Sir,’ and they step aside, or it’s” — he whispers — “ ‘Oh my God. It’s Gus.’ ”
Gus is, of course, Gus Fring, Esposito’s Emmy-nominated role as a drug lord on “Breaking Bad.” Esposito’s exit from the show left an indelible impression — half of his head was blown off in an explosion. Absence made television producers’ hearts grow fonder and Esposito, 54, was offered the role of militia leader Captain Tom Neville on the hit apocalypse drama “Revolution.” In just a few short years, he has become TV’s go-to embodiment of cold, calculating cruelty and power.
Esposito’s fans will probably be disappointed to learn that in real life, the actor relishes moments like taking his girls — he has four daughters — for ice cream, or letting his youngest ride on his back like a horse while he neighs and whinnies like a real horse would.
“Sometimes, my nine-year-old will hop on me and say, ‘can I ride Flash?’ That’s the horse I ride in ‘Revolution,’” says Esposito, 54. “And I’ll get on my hands and knees and do the whole thing, all the sounds and everything. I have a soft spot. I have four sensitive daughters who oftentimes teach me more than I bargained for.”
Esposito feels that the difference between the characters he plays and his true nature ironically helps explain the success of these portrayals.
“You have to touch upon something that people like about them. You need a glimpse of hope that they aren’t really that evil,” says Esposito, whose voice in conversation contains an open, sing-songy quality that immediately contrasts with the psychopathic cool of his TV persona.
“I used to think that if I showed a little smile, or said something in a caring way, then you wouldn’t think this guy’s a badass anymore,” he says. “But it’s exactly the opposite. You wouldn’t be able to read that person, and you’d have your doubts about whether that person is completely good or bad. I like to make a complete human being out of even the lowliest villain.”
Show creator Eric Kripke notes that the dichotomy between his personas on the show and in real life help to define this pivotal character.
“In less skilled hands, Neville would be a very predictable bad guy,” says Kripke. “But Giancarlo makes that character so compelling to watch, because there’s aspects of gentleness, belief, and faith, and then there are aspects of cruelty.”
Born in Copenhagen to an African-American, opera singer mother, and a white Italian father who spoke three languages, Esposito moved to America at age five.
“Culturally, I had a lot to draw from as a child, and I’m happy for it, because coming to America could have been limiting,” he says. “I love foreign films, I love music of all countries, but more than anything, I feel I had the ability as an actor to transcend the race consciousness that exists here. I believe I can play anyone I want to play if I believe the audience will believe it.”
Esposito, who notes that Neville was not written as an African-American, says that being a dark-skinned man with an Italian name has given him a unique perspective on that race consciousness both in life in general, and in casting.
“That was always very oddly received,” he says. “People wanted to label me Spanish, because they never knew a chocolate- or cocoa-skinned Italian black person. When I went to auditions, they would hear ‘Giancarlo Esposito,’ and they would never label that a black name. So they would call me in. There’d be a room full of white guys, and they’d go, ‘We’re so sorry. We’re not really looking for you. We thought you were somebody else.”
When he’s not filming “Revolution” in Wilmington, NC, Esposito lives in Ridgefield, Conn., not far from his daughters’ upstate home in Red Hook, NY. He jokes that he’s “in between being married right now,” saying that he and his wife, Joy, have “been married about 15 years, but have been divorcing for the last seven.”
“We’re friends. We’re close,” he says. “We care for our children, and I admire her greatly. After seven years of moving away from each other on a romantic level, we found a new friendship, which is really quite wonderful.”
This is exactly the sort of sentiment one could have trouble imagining from Gus Fring or Tom Neville — and the reason he’s able to be a loving, caring dad while embodying evil on network television’s newest prime-time hit.
“I like to play villains who have a glimpse of goodness about them, just to show that you can’t judge a book by its cover,” he says. “We’re not all black and white.”