Stephen Moyer

The True Blood star reveals all about the second series... Discuss this article

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How has Bill changed since season one?
He’s met [Anna Paquin’s psychic waitress character] Sookie, a girl that has rekindled a fire inside him that he thought was gone forever. At the start of this season he’s also dealing with the fact he now has a ‘daughter’, Jessica, a teenager he had to turn [into a vampire] and raise, which is another thing he hasn’t had for almost 140 years and which is an echo of his previous life. So it’s like he’s almost been made human again and he’s getting closer to humanity.’

So what can we expect for Bill this season?
Just as he’s starting to feel these things and his relationship is getting back on track with Sookie, [head vampire] Eric comes in and tries to use her abilities for his own means. Bill is a vampire who kills, but he is kind of the moral centre on the show, which is quite interesting. And then there’s Eric, who is the antithesis, which is great because there’s a percentage of the audience that loves Eric and there’s a large percentage of the audience that loves Bill and they’re kind of tussling.

Why is the show so successful?
I think the reason the show works – apart from being funny and sexy and dark and twisted and odd – is because [showrunner] Alan Ball is holding a mirror up to society. It’s not just bubblegum; it’s really clever, intellectual bubblegum. And the series’ scope now is much bigger. We have many characters who started out with a few lines per episode, like [Iraq war veteran] Terry Bellefleur, who are now rounded characters. Just to give you some idea, shows like Mad Men, 24 and House all shoot seven days for one episode. In the first season, we were shooting 10 days for an hour of TV and some of the episodes this season are 18 days long! It’s so big, it’s become like Ben Hur. The show is like this great big snowball with arms and legs hanging out of it, growing as its world gets richer and richer.

How hard is it to film at night?
It’s not quite as simple as that. What tends to happen is we do days during the week, and by Friday we’re doing nights. And then you go back to normal time on a Monday, so there’s this kind of flowing weird chart. We’ve now got a dark room in our house so we can sleep through the day.

You’ve gone from being an unknown to the star of a hit show. How are you handling that?
I hesitate to say that I’m rather enjoying it… but I’m rather enjoying it! I love our show. I’m really proud and grateful to say that I’m being able to publicise something that I think is really good. And it is opening doors. There are other offers coming in. There were before, but they are certainly more interesting now. I’m in a really privileged spot and it’s been a great year for me; I’ve loved it.

What’s your audience like?
It’s wide. There are octogenarians who get together and watch it in old people’s homes. When we were shooting in New Orleans, we were in a restaurant and this lovely guy came up and he was about 55 with this great big hair and he said, ‘I’m so excited to see you. I didn’t know about your show, but my friend Michael calls me every Monday from prison and he got me into it.’ So every Sunday night all the prisoners go congregate to watch True Blood.

True Blood season two begins on Friday November 6 on America Plus at midnight.