Entertainment

‘Anarchy’ drafts McHale

Joel McHale in his role on NBC’s “Community.” (Tyler Golden/NBC)

When “Sons of Anarchy” creator Kurt Sutter approached Joel McHale about playing a con man named Warren for a two-episode stint beginning Tuesday night, McHale’s demands were modest.

“He asked if I wanted to be on,” says McHale, “and I said, ‘Well, make sure the money is the highest you’ve paid anyone, and then I’ll do it.’ I got $6.8 million dollars for my appearance. It was great.”

Whatever McHale was paid, his real prize was getting to play a character so far outside of the snarky-but-charming wheelhouse he’s established as ex-lawyer Jeff Winger on NBC’s “Community,” which returns this Friday at 8:30, and on E!’s “The Soup.”

For Sutter, getting actors to play way sleazier than type has become something of a hobby.

Over five seasons, he has employed novelist Stephen King as a “cleaner” who disposes of dead bodies; Tom Arnold and David Hasselhoff as porn producers; and this season, Disney Channel/”High School Musical” star Ashley Tisdale as a hooker who was beaten to a pulp by club matriarch Gemma Teller, played by Sutter’s wife, Katey Sagal.

Sutter swears he’s out to do more than just give these actors the credibility they’d need to star in their own modern version of a ’70s grindhouse biker film.

“I like the casting to be fresh,” he says. “Sometimes, when you look at audition tapes, you see a lot of the same faces playing a lot of the same characters. Casting can get a bit lazy in television sometimes. So for me, it’s cool to have actors break type.”

This approach goes back to his days as a writer on “The Shield,” when they cast Anthony Anderson as a brutal drug lord.

“Up to that point, Anthony had only played funny, cuddly uncle characters,” says Sutter. “We took our chance on Anthony to play a dark, heavy character, and that turned out to be a really good experience. From that point on, I always had a sense that if people have the opportunity, they’re able to stretch and do different things.”

This kind of casting isn’t limited to the show’s smaller roles. The casting of Harold Perrineau as criminal mastermind Damon Pope — who so far this season has burned a teenage girl alive as her father looked on, and forced Sons president Jax Teller (Charlie Hunnam) to choose a member of his own club to be killed — may surprise those who mainly knew him from his work on “Lost.” And, over the series’ run, Sagal has also stretched her talents beyond what she had done before.

“Harold’s a seasoned actor, but it’s definitely a much more original casting decision [in that role] than a guy who usually plays a heavy,” says Sutter. “And Gemma is a different kind of character for Katey. She’s done drama before, but never really a serialized role like this. So I always like to give people the opportunity to do something different.”

As well as the show is doing, it would be surprising if more actors weren’t lining up to have Sutter knock them down a peg. This season’s September 11 premiere was watched by over five million viewers, making it not just the No. 1 show of the night on cable, but No. 1 over broadcast offerings as well for men 18-34 and 18-49. The season’s third episode, featuring the shocking death of beloved Sons member Opie (Ryan Hurst), finished second in its time slot on broadcast and cable behind only CBS’ “Vegas.”

The seeds for McHale’s appearance were sown last November, when Sutter and Sagal, who are married, participated in a comic bit on “The Soup” that included a fake shootout, and ended with Sutter saying to Sagal, about McHale, “I love the way you kill soft men.”

Sutter and McHale joked then about the actor’s appearing on the show at some point, and when Warren was being cast, McHale seemed right.

“Warren doesn’t live in the same world as [the ‘Sons’], but he’s this con man working a couple different angles, ripping off older women and stuff like that,” says Sutter. “It’s definitely a character that’s darker and slimier than Joel has played before, and he was great. We introduce him in this episode, and do just horrible things to him in the next one.”

Since McHale and Sutter could only give away so much, it will be interesting to see just how much of a dark heart McHale conveys. When asked about the surprising aspect of his snarky persona being inserted into this show, he jokes that “any motorcycle gang would kill me in about 18 seconds.” How true that is of Warren remains to be seen.

“I would just say, Warren is not some sort of badass, mixed-martial-arts fighter. He will get away with what he can,” says McHale. “But he is not afraid to, if given the chance, kill someone.”

SONS OF ANARCHY

Tuesday, 10 p.m., FX