- 53,484
- 21,063
What's the age difference between the two? Unser looks old enough to be Gemma's dad.
- 10,756
- 9,096
Jackie sitting at Opie's grave might be the saddest **** I've seen in a long time
Then Jackie leaving the homies to go turn himself in ahh man heart wrenching
Oh and I hate Juice
Then Jackie leaving the homies to go turn himself in ahh man heart wrenching
Oh and I hate Juice
Last edited:
- 64,966
- 196,172
Gemma trolls Unser so hard
all the time...
If I was Usner, when she was crying on my lap, I would have whipped it out and put her forehead.
Last edited:
- 40,141
- 11,080
Gemma trolls Unser so hard
all the time...
If I was Usner we she was crying on my lap, I would have whipped it out and put her forehead.
this
- 42,694
- 178,408
The feels when he said this:
- 20,396
- 14,184
One theory I read (comments section on AV Club) is that Unser is actually the father of Thomas Teller. Just basing it off the fact that Thomas' middle name is Wayne. Would be a crazy twist, no? Also, might explain Unser's weird undying love for Gemma....Those two have a real strange relationship.
- 40,141
- 11,080
The feels when he said this:
View media item 691592
the gf chocked up a lil when he said that
... i got punched for laughing because i felt tara was gonna die this ep regardless so him saying that didnt mean much to me...just slapping her with truth
Last edited:
That was just an extremely emotional scene
Interview with Eli.
Interview with Sutter.
Interview with Tara.
Interview with Juice.
Interview with Nero.
Interview with Eli.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: I was just transcribing my chat with Theo Rossi.
Rockmond Dunbar: You talked to that punk? You talked to that punk?! [Laughs] You tell him next time he shoots me, shoot me in the face like a man, not in the back like a little girl. Little *****. [Laughs]
GET MORE EW: Subscribe to the magazine for only 33¢ an issue!
Yes, he said he’s glad you have The Mentalist to fall back on.
[Laughs] Yeah, I think that was the catalyst for it.
At what point did SOA creator Kurt Sutter tell you Eli would be dying?
When Kurt Sutter and I first sat down to talk about the job three seasons ago, I knew I was gonna die. He made it very clear. It was supposed to be a 10-episode arc. He said, “Hey look, 10 episodes. After that, you’re gonna die a horrendous death, and it’s gonna be great.” And I was like, “Yes!” I was excited. And during the read-through of the 10th episode, he said, “Rock, we love you. FX loves you. Fans love you. I love you. We can’t kill you. So see you next season.” Coming around to my third season, it got a little sticky because I booked a David Shore pilot called Doubt for another network [ABC]. We didn’t know if I was gonna end up coming back to Sons because of that, but it didn’t get picked up. I wasn’t in the first couple episodes [of season 6] because of that, and Kurt pulled me back on to the show, and we start going along, and then The Mentalist came after me with an offer, and it was something I couldn’t refuse. I sat down with Bruno and Chris, and they were like, “We love the work you’re doing on Sons of Anarchy. We know they haven’t made you a series regular yet, so we want to step up and make you a series regular on our show. We figure we have a few more seasons under our belt and we hear Sons of Anarchy only has one more.” I was also recurring on The Game, so I was trying to do three shows at the same time. It just became really difficult. I’m sure Kurt woke up one morning after four episodes trying to make it work with me — and me showing up at The Mentalist shooting a scene and me running over to Sons of Anarchy and shooting a scene there on the same day — and he spun the dartboard and threw the dart and hit my picture. [Laughs] Kurt might tell a different story, but I think it was just too much to work out with all the scheduling. (UPDATE: Sutter says that’s half true: In writing the scene, he realized that DA Patterson (CCH Pounder) would not have left Tara alone and would have given her a police escort. So in the end, logic won out. “It happened organically.”)
So when did you learn Eli’s death was happening now, in the finale?
We were on episode 12, and the script for episode 13, the finale, was about to come out. One of the writers called me. It was so funny: I woke up in the morning, and I just felt really queasy in my stomach. I was thinking, Ah man, it’s just sympathy pains. My wife is pregnant. I kinda shook it off, and boom, 10 minutes later I got the call. It was like, “Rock, man, we love you, dawg. It’s just been too hard. Kurt woke up this morning on the wrong side of the bed and tripped and fell in some dogs–t and he’s killin’ ya.” [Laughs] And I was like, “Man, I’ll come over there and clean his feet off from the dog s—t. I like havin’ three jobs.” [Laughs] Kurt and I have a great relationship. You never know, maybe I’ll wake up in the 7th season, put on a Band-Aid, and you’ll see me in the hospital bed sayin’ my last words. You never know with Kurt, man. I’m just happy he killed me that way, and I’m happy Juice got the opportunity to kill me instead of me gettin’ a stiff nine-incher in my butt crack in jail. That would not have been good. [Laughs]
What was it like filming your death scene?
I have to tell you, it sucked balls. The scheduling was kinda crazy. It was the last scene of the last day of the episode. So we were all super tired. Who wants to come to work and die, regardless of what the situation is. It’s a very emotional scene, and at one point, I realized, ohmygod, I haven’t died since I was like 10 or something. You know, when you play fake dead and you fall over. You have the stunt men there and you prepare, and I was like, “Man, I haven’t done stunts in a long time.” And I got all this sympathy weight on for my wife. I gained like 35 pounds. So me falling on the ground with my fat *** after getting shot — it was rough. [Laughs] It was so rough. I remember Eric Norris, our stunt coordinator, saying, “Dude, you’re gonna be f–kin’ sore tomorrow.” And then the executive pulled the plug and said, “Look, too many hours. We’re not going over the hours. Everybody needs to come back and shoot for another day.” So we came back the next day to finish the scene. It was not the greatest situation, man. [Laughs] So I went back, shot the scene, wrapped that show, got back in my car, drove over to Warner Bros. to start shooting another scene for The Mentalist. It was hard… Of course everybody on The Mentalist was happy. They’re like, “That’s great! We don’t have to work around the schedule. Now we only have to work around your wife havin’ the baby.”
Oh, this is the best quote — THE BEST QUOTE — by Maggie Siff. We were walking down the corridor, we’re about to shoot our scene, and Maggie [who's expecting her first child] turns and looks at Kurt and is like, “What the f–k is your problem? You have to kill off the two people who are having babies? Do you dig that?” [Laughs] And I looked at her, and I was like, “Well, yeah. I thought it was because I was black, but I am having a baby.” [Laughs] We all got a kick out of it and a good laugh. Kurt has a great twisted, weird sense of humor and so do I. I really, really enjoy that about him. He’s a tortured soul, man, and it really works and shows in his work. He’s a borderline genius, and I don’t throw around the word “genius” too often. He’s a great guy.
Did you keep anything from the show?
I got to keep my chair. I always get the back of my chair, but I got the whole entire chair. Brandon, who’s one of the prop guys, handed it to me. He’s like, “Dude, you f–kin’ deserve it.” I was like, “Thanks, man.” And we worked together on my very first show [1994-95's] Earth 2, when I was a sophomore in college in Santa Fe, New Mexico. So to come full circle and work with this guy again, it was just great.
What is your prediction for the end of Sons of Anarchy‘s final season?
He’s gonna kill everybody. He’s like, “Dude, I already sold another show and my wife [Katey Sagal] is attached to it. I’m gonna kill all you guys, one by one, real slow. Or I might just throw you on a plane and have it crash, a real Buddy Holly story.” [Laughs] He may not know what it is yet, but one day, he’s gonna wake up, he’s gonna step out of his bed in a big pile of dog s–t, he’s gonna slip and fall, and he’s gonna throw 10 darts and hit everybody on the dart board, and it’s going to be mayhem. And I can’t wait to see it. I really can’t. And I really hope that Unser [Dayton Callie] is the last motherf–ker standing. [Laughs] He hops into his Airstream. He kicks open the door. He takes a puff of a cigarette. He throws his cancer medicine out of the window, and he just says, “Ah, f— it.” Blackout.
Rockmond Dunbar: You talked to that punk? You talked to that punk?! [Laughs] You tell him next time he shoots me, shoot me in the face like a man, not in the back like a little girl. Little *****. [Laughs]
GET MORE EW: Subscribe to the magazine for only 33¢ an issue!
Yes, he said he’s glad you have The Mentalist to fall back on.
[Laughs] Yeah, I think that was the catalyst for it.
At what point did SOA creator Kurt Sutter tell you Eli would be dying?
When Kurt Sutter and I first sat down to talk about the job three seasons ago, I knew I was gonna die. He made it very clear. It was supposed to be a 10-episode arc. He said, “Hey look, 10 episodes. After that, you’re gonna die a horrendous death, and it’s gonna be great.” And I was like, “Yes!” I was excited. And during the read-through of the 10th episode, he said, “Rock, we love you. FX loves you. Fans love you. I love you. We can’t kill you. So see you next season.” Coming around to my third season, it got a little sticky because I booked a David Shore pilot called Doubt for another network [ABC]. We didn’t know if I was gonna end up coming back to Sons because of that, but it didn’t get picked up. I wasn’t in the first couple episodes [of season 6] because of that, and Kurt pulled me back on to the show, and we start going along, and then The Mentalist came after me with an offer, and it was something I couldn’t refuse. I sat down with Bruno and Chris, and they were like, “We love the work you’re doing on Sons of Anarchy. We know they haven’t made you a series regular yet, so we want to step up and make you a series regular on our show. We figure we have a few more seasons under our belt and we hear Sons of Anarchy only has one more.” I was also recurring on The Game, so I was trying to do three shows at the same time. It just became really difficult. I’m sure Kurt woke up one morning after four episodes trying to make it work with me — and me showing up at The Mentalist shooting a scene and me running over to Sons of Anarchy and shooting a scene there on the same day — and he spun the dartboard and threw the dart and hit my picture. [Laughs] Kurt might tell a different story, but I think it was just too much to work out with all the scheduling. (UPDATE: Sutter says that’s half true: In writing the scene, he realized that DA Patterson (CCH Pounder) would not have left Tara alone and would have given her a police escort. So in the end, logic won out. “It happened organically.”)
So when did you learn Eli’s death was happening now, in the finale?
We were on episode 12, and the script for episode 13, the finale, was about to come out. One of the writers called me. It was so funny: I woke up in the morning, and I just felt really queasy in my stomach. I was thinking, Ah man, it’s just sympathy pains. My wife is pregnant. I kinda shook it off, and boom, 10 minutes later I got the call. It was like, “Rock, man, we love you, dawg. It’s just been too hard. Kurt woke up this morning on the wrong side of the bed and tripped and fell in some dogs–t and he’s killin’ ya.” [Laughs] And I was like, “Man, I’ll come over there and clean his feet off from the dog s—t. I like havin’ three jobs.” [Laughs] Kurt and I have a great relationship. You never know, maybe I’ll wake up in the 7th season, put on a Band-Aid, and you’ll see me in the hospital bed sayin’ my last words. You never know with Kurt, man. I’m just happy he killed me that way, and I’m happy Juice got the opportunity to kill me instead of me gettin’ a stiff nine-incher in my butt crack in jail. That would not have been good. [Laughs]
What was it like filming your death scene?
I have to tell you, it sucked balls. The scheduling was kinda crazy. It was the last scene of the last day of the episode. So we were all super tired. Who wants to come to work and die, regardless of what the situation is. It’s a very emotional scene, and at one point, I realized, ohmygod, I haven’t died since I was like 10 or something. You know, when you play fake dead and you fall over. You have the stunt men there and you prepare, and I was like, “Man, I haven’t done stunts in a long time.” And I got all this sympathy weight on for my wife. I gained like 35 pounds. So me falling on the ground with my fat *** after getting shot — it was rough. [Laughs] It was so rough. I remember Eric Norris, our stunt coordinator, saying, “Dude, you’re gonna be f–kin’ sore tomorrow.” And then the executive pulled the plug and said, “Look, too many hours. We’re not going over the hours. Everybody needs to come back and shoot for another day.” So we came back the next day to finish the scene. It was not the greatest situation, man. [Laughs] So I went back, shot the scene, wrapped that show, got back in my car, drove over to Warner Bros. to start shooting another scene for The Mentalist. It was hard… Of course everybody on The Mentalist was happy. They’re like, “That’s great! We don’t have to work around the schedule. Now we only have to work around your wife havin’ the baby.”
Oh, this is the best quote — THE BEST QUOTE — by Maggie Siff. We were walking down the corridor, we’re about to shoot our scene, and Maggie [who's expecting her first child] turns and looks at Kurt and is like, “What the f–k is your problem? You have to kill off the two people who are having babies? Do you dig that?” [Laughs] And I looked at her, and I was like, “Well, yeah. I thought it was because I was black, but I am having a baby.” [Laughs] We all got a kick out of it and a good laugh. Kurt has a great twisted, weird sense of humor and so do I. I really, really enjoy that about him. He’s a tortured soul, man, and it really works and shows in his work. He’s a borderline genius, and I don’t throw around the word “genius” too often. He’s a great guy.
Did you keep anything from the show?
I got to keep my chair. I always get the back of my chair, but I got the whole entire chair. Brandon, who’s one of the prop guys, handed it to me. He’s like, “Dude, you f–kin’ deserve it.” I was like, “Thanks, man.” And we worked together on my very first show [1994-95's] Earth 2, when I was a sophomore in college in Santa Fe, New Mexico. So to come full circle and work with this guy again, it was just great.
What is your prediction for the end of Sons of Anarchy‘s final season?
He’s gonna kill everybody. He’s like, “Dude, I already sold another show and my wife [Katey Sagal] is attached to it. I’m gonna kill all you guys, one by one, real slow. Or I might just throw you on a plane and have it crash, a real Buddy Holly story.” [Laughs] He may not know what it is yet, but one day, he’s gonna wake up, he’s gonna step out of his bed in a big pile of dog s–t, he’s gonna slip and fall, and he’s gonna throw 10 darts and hit everybody on the dart board, and it’s going to be mayhem. And I can’t wait to see it. I really can’t. And I really hope that Unser [Dayton Callie] is the last motherf–ker standing. [Laughs] He hops into his Airstream. He kicks open the door. He takes a puff of a cigarette. He throws his cancer medicine out of the window, and he just says, “Ah, f— it.” Blackout.
Interview with Sutter.
The death toll on FX’s Sons of Anarchy has swelled once again, and while that’s to be expected from a season finale of one of the most deadly shows on TV, the shocking murder of Maggie Siff’s Tara Knowles at the hands of Gemma (Katey Sagal) is one that will change Jax Teller forever.
“Obviously, it’s a major shift in the mythology,” executive producer Kurt Sutter said at an intimate screening event Tuesday evening in Los Angeles. “I knew that, ultimately, where I wanted to take Jax in that final season is I wanted to remove his true north for that last season. I feel like there need[ed] to be, for someone like Jax, a major psychic and emotional shift.”
Next season, added Sutter, will explore “what happens to a guy who has lost both of the people who he loved the most and who centered him the most,” referring to both Tara’s death and the death of his best friend Opie last season. “It is Jax untethered and on his own in the final season,” said Sutter, who was joined at the event by Siff and Sagal.
GET MORE EW: Subscribe to the magazine for only 33¢ an issue!
Below, see the trio answer a few more burning questions. For more insight into the finale, read our postmortem interviews with Siff, Theo Rossi, Rockmond Dunbar, and Jimmy Smits.
+ WHEN WAS IT DECIDED TARA WOULD DIE?
“I knew fairly early on that Tara would die before the final season — probably as early as season 2 I had a sense of that happening.,” revealed Sutter. “I didn’t quite know exactly, obviously, how it was going to happen in terms of story. I just knew in terms of a mythology mile marker that that’s when it was going to happen.” Meanwhile, Siff reiterated what she told EW, saying that she learned of Tara’s fate at the beginning of the current season. “I had some time to wrap by head around it and head toward it.”
WHAT WAS IT LIKE SHOOTING THE KITCHEN SCENE?
Both Siff and Sagal watched the season finale for the first time at the event, and Siff admitted shortly after that seeing it unfold was more difficult than she’d imagined. “Watching it put into the story and put into the context of the entire series and everything we’ve been through together — that was hard. That was more difficult than I thought,” she said. Meanwhile, Sagal admitted she was nervous about filming the murder scene for a while. (She even joked, “I think I was in denial that we would [do it]. Actually, I thought I could maybe change [Sutter's] mind.”) “I think the biggest struggle for me was to remain truly with Gemma because the truth of that [moment] is that she was not aware of all those things going on behind the scenes,” said Sagal. “I think that’s maybe why it was so hard to watch because it was so clear. But in the moments of Gemma, [she] didn’t know what was going on. All [she] knew is that [Tara] had ratted, she had betrayed me, she had betrayed my son, she was taking my grandkids away — all those things that were Gemma’s center.”
WHY DID TARA’S DEATH HAVE TO BE SO…BRUTAL?
“I knew I wanted it to be sort of simple and pedestrian and of Gemma’s world — not of the club’s world, meaning I knew I didn’t want it to be a gun or a knife,” Sutter explained of Tara’s death by carving fork in the family kitchen. “We see Gemma in that opening montage washing dishes and we have no idea that something as simple of a tub of dirty dish water and a carving fork would ultimately be used as implements of death.” Sutter said it was also important to root the moment in Gemma’s tendency to react first and ask questions later. “There was a moment where Katey looks back at that fork…and it’s almost a moment of like, ‘Oh, where did that come from?’ and of not being aware of what she was doing.”
DOES UNSER KNOW THAT GEMMA MURDERED TARA?
Not according to Sutter, who said that despite the fact that Unser was seen comforting Gemma at the end of the episode, “Unser is not necessarily aware of the details of what happened.” “All that he knows is that she’s upset, and, he thinks, at that point, that it’s because Jax is gone,” he said.
HOW WILL NEXT SEASON BEGIN?
With a time jump — but a small one. “I don’t want to lose the weight of what’s happened,” he said, “so there may be a little bit of a time [jump], like we did this season, which was a few weeks.”
WHAT’S NEXT FOR JUICE?
Sutter admitted that he’s not sure what’s next for Juice’s arc, but said that he will be aware that he’s on thin ice with Jax (“Knowing that he betrayed Jax is not a place you want to be in the outlaw community.”) and possibly use his bold move in helping Gemma as leverage. “Does Juice keep this secret? Does he use it to his advantage? I don’t know the answer to that,” said Sutter. “I just know that we have something really fun to play with when we start the next season.”
DID JAX KNOW AT THE BEGINNING OF THE EPISODE THAT HE WANTED TO TURN HIMSELF IN?
“I think the beginning of that episode and the journal entry is the most honest and revelatory we’ve ever heard Jax,” said Sutter, “and I think that was the beginning of it.” Ultimately, though, “a lot of things along the way cemented that choice — the conversation with Patterson and the conversation with Tara,” he says. “But I think he had to have that idea somewhere in his conscience and his consciousness and, in the moment, it became the only option.”
WHAT WAS IT LIKE FILMING THE PARK SCENE?
“I feel like that was the most important scene for me in the episode because I knew it was the only moment for Jax and Tara to really penetrate each other, in a sense,” said Siff. “It was very tricky because I think coming to the point where I actually believed it was possible Jax could kill me was a scary place to get to and then to sort of turn around and see all those guys approaching and knowing the jig was up — it was scary.” Luckily, Siff said, co-star Charlie Hunnam made the heavy moment a little easier. “Whenever I work with Charlie I feel like we find our way together, and I just hoped for the best.”
WHEN DID SUTTER DECIDE ELI HAD TO GO?
“When he became a series regular on The Mentalist,” joked Sutter. “That’s only half true.” The whole truth is that in writing the scene, Sutter realized that Patterson would not have left Tara alone and would have given her a police escort. So in the end, logic won out. “It happened organically,” he says.
“Obviously, it’s a major shift in the mythology,” executive producer Kurt Sutter said at an intimate screening event Tuesday evening in Los Angeles. “I knew that, ultimately, where I wanted to take Jax in that final season is I wanted to remove his true north for that last season. I feel like there need[ed] to be, for someone like Jax, a major psychic and emotional shift.”
Next season, added Sutter, will explore “what happens to a guy who has lost both of the people who he loved the most and who centered him the most,” referring to both Tara’s death and the death of his best friend Opie last season. “It is Jax untethered and on his own in the final season,” said Sutter, who was joined at the event by Siff and Sagal.
GET MORE EW: Subscribe to the magazine for only 33¢ an issue!
Below, see the trio answer a few more burning questions. For more insight into the finale, read our postmortem interviews with Siff, Theo Rossi, Rockmond Dunbar, and Jimmy Smits.
+ WHEN WAS IT DECIDED TARA WOULD DIE?
“I knew fairly early on that Tara would die before the final season — probably as early as season 2 I had a sense of that happening.,” revealed Sutter. “I didn’t quite know exactly, obviously, how it was going to happen in terms of story. I just knew in terms of a mythology mile marker that that’s when it was going to happen.” Meanwhile, Siff reiterated what she told EW, saying that she learned of Tara’s fate at the beginning of the current season. “I had some time to wrap by head around it and head toward it.”
WHAT WAS IT LIKE SHOOTING THE KITCHEN SCENE?
Both Siff and Sagal watched the season finale for the first time at the event, and Siff admitted shortly after that seeing it unfold was more difficult than she’d imagined. “Watching it put into the story and put into the context of the entire series and everything we’ve been through together — that was hard. That was more difficult than I thought,” she said. Meanwhile, Sagal admitted she was nervous about filming the murder scene for a while. (She even joked, “I think I was in denial that we would [do it]. Actually, I thought I could maybe change [Sutter's] mind.”) “I think the biggest struggle for me was to remain truly with Gemma because the truth of that [moment] is that she was not aware of all those things going on behind the scenes,” said Sagal. “I think that’s maybe why it was so hard to watch because it was so clear. But in the moments of Gemma, [she] didn’t know what was going on. All [she] knew is that [Tara] had ratted, she had betrayed me, she had betrayed my son, she was taking my grandkids away — all those things that were Gemma’s center.”
WHY DID TARA’S DEATH HAVE TO BE SO…BRUTAL?
“I knew I wanted it to be sort of simple and pedestrian and of Gemma’s world — not of the club’s world, meaning I knew I didn’t want it to be a gun or a knife,” Sutter explained of Tara’s death by carving fork in the family kitchen. “We see Gemma in that opening montage washing dishes and we have no idea that something as simple of a tub of dirty dish water and a carving fork would ultimately be used as implements of death.” Sutter said it was also important to root the moment in Gemma’s tendency to react first and ask questions later. “There was a moment where Katey looks back at that fork…and it’s almost a moment of like, ‘Oh, where did that come from?’ and of not being aware of what she was doing.”
DOES UNSER KNOW THAT GEMMA MURDERED TARA?
Not according to Sutter, who said that despite the fact that Unser was seen comforting Gemma at the end of the episode, “Unser is not necessarily aware of the details of what happened.” “All that he knows is that she’s upset, and, he thinks, at that point, that it’s because Jax is gone,” he said.
HOW WILL NEXT SEASON BEGIN?
With a time jump — but a small one. “I don’t want to lose the weight of what’s happened,” he said, “so there may be a little bit of a time [jump], like we did this season, which was a few weeks.”
WHAT’S NEXT FOR JUICE?
Sutter admitted that he’s not sure what’s next for Juice’s arc, but said that he will be aware that he’s on thin ice with Jax (“Knowing that he betrayed Jax is not a place you want to be in the outlaw community.”) and possibly use his bold move in helping Gemma as leverage. “Does Juice keep this secret? Does he use it to his advantage? I don’t know the answer to that,” said Sutter. “I just know that we have something really fun to play with when we start the next season.”
DID JAX KNOW AT THE BEGINNING OF THE EPISODE THAT HE WANTED TO TURN HIMSELF IN?
“I think the beginning of that episode and the journal entry is the most honest and revelatory we’ve ever heard Jax,” said Sutter, “and I think that was the beginning of it.” Ultimately, though, “a lot of things along the way cemented that choice — the conversation with Patterson and the conversation with Tara,” he says. “But I think he had to have that idea somewhere in his conscience and his consciousness and, in the moment, it became the only option.”
WHAT WAS IT LIKE FILMING THE PARK SCENE?
“I feel like that was the most important scene for me in the episode because I knew it was the only moment for Jax and Tara to really penetrate each other, in a sense,” said Siff. “It was very tricky because I think coming to the point where I actually believed it was possible Jax could kill me was a scary place to get to and then to sort of turn around and see all those guys approaching and knowing the jig was up — it was scary.” Luckily, Siff said, co-star Charlie Hunnam made the heavy moment a little easier. “Whenever I work with Charlie I feel like we find our way together, and I just hoped for the best.”
WHEN DID SUTTER DECIDE ELI HAD TO GO?
“When he became a series regular on The Mentalist,” joked Sutter. “That’s only half true.” The whole truth is that in writing the scene, Sutter realized that Patterson would not have left Tara alone and would have given her a police escort. So in the end, logic won out. “It happened organically,” he says.
Interview with Tara.
But first, a spoiler alert! Don’t read beyond the jump if you haven’t watched the heartbreaking episode.Tara thought she was home clean, quite literally, after Jax decided to turn himself into the Feds — but that was before she found a very high Gemma waiting for her in the kitchen. In one of the more brutal deaths this season, the soulless Gemma stabbed Tara to death — making Siff the latest casualty in Kurt Sutter’s violent psychodrama. EW met up with Siff to talk about her character’s passing, and what’s next for her career.
Were you told at the beginning of the season that Tara would die?
Kurt Sutter and I sat down and I made a half‑joke because I thought I might be getting killed off. He didn’t respond right away. I was like ‘Oh my God! You’re killing me off!’ He was sort of like well, no. He wasn’t entirely sure yet. There were some things that happened early on in the season with Donal Logue [Editor's note: Logue had to leave early during to scheduling conflict with the History Channel series Vikings] that made life sort of confusing for how this season was going to map out. That was a big plot point that just got lost because he was going to be the main antagonist for the club for the whole season. And so, at least how he explained it to me, he was trying to figure out how to map out the rest of the season. Tara’s death could potentially happen. I knew that Donal going away meant the odds of me dying were greater.
Did you cry?
I maybe did cry a little bit. I think when I sat down with Kurt the second time and he told me yes, this is what we’re doing, I think I actually did cry a little bit. But it was almost more in gratitude than in anything else. It’s been such a long, wonderful journey and I’m very grateful for it. But as an actor, six years of anything is sort of insane. I think that we all are curious and interested in what the rest of our life is. I think all of us have felt the end of the series kind of sneaking up on us over the last year‑and‑a‑half. I think actually when Opie died. It’s sort of like oh, this is really the beginning of the end of our journey singularly, and collectively.
GET EW ON YOUR TABLET: Subscribe today and get instant access!
Could you imagine a scenario where Tara wouldn’t die this year?
I think I’ve always felt like it could go one of two ways for Tara. You know, there’s the Ophelia model and then there’s the Tara morphing into Gemma and taking her place and sort of ascending her throne.
What’s it like around here when a character dies?
It’s really surreal. It’s very hard. It’s very hard to imagine it. You know, Ryan Hurst has this whole thing that he’s been talking with Charlie about how you spend all this time trying to embody a character, but nobody ever teaches you how to kill a character.
Talk about Tara’s arc this season.
I think she started the season on a really kind of dark, but strong note, in that once she finds herself in prison, she realizes that she’s going to have to change her reality and that it’s going to take a tremendous effort of will and wiliness, and plotting. She doesn’t have any allies that she can think of and that includes Jax and Gemma. The end of Season 5 was really a rough moment. I think on some deep level, she fundamentally feels like Jax has chosen the club over her and the family.And so, she realizes she’s going to deliver her children to safety. It’s really sad. I mean partly because she’s somebody who did get out at another point in her life, you know, but has slowly found herself, found her way back in and then found that the walls of this prison just sort get higher and thicker. Part of it is her love for this person and for these people and the fact that they’re the only family she knows and the only family she has. In the third or fourth episode she says to Unser, ‘It’s not about me anymore.’ And I’ve been holding onto that throughout the season.
Has Tara been the moral center?
I don’t know. I think it’s interesting the way it’s developed because she definitely was the moral center of the show for a while. I think Kurt used her as a window, through which the audience could experience the club and the life of the club. You could see her loving these people in spite of herself, in spite of knowing better. I think she remained a moral center in that she continues to be one of the only in the world who experiences real emotional conflict around the violence and the difficulty and the pain of the life and wanting something better for her children.
It’s been pretty dark this year.
Every year I feel like I said oh, it’s just getting worse and worse. But it does. Kurt Sutter sort of escalates the violence. Every episode people die. But, you know, as the seasons have progressed there have been like these heart‑wrenching losses that have to do with the people that we lose within the club or within the family — the things that happen within that family that we’re following. Every season has been more horrible than the one that’s preceded it and this one is no exception.
What has this role meant to your career?
I really was a theater rat — and I say that in the most affectionate sense — for most of my career until I came out here to do the first season of Mad Men. Then I went straight into this. So, my whole life just kind of changed. Having a job that lasts this long provides an incredible amount of stability for an actor especially if you’re coming from the theater where stability is not really part of your vocabulary. This show and like the world of this show is so far removed from what I could ever have really imagined for myself for a whole host of reasons. During our first read‑through, I walked in and I was like what am I doing here? Like I was looking around like at Boone and Kim and, you know, all these like big, scary, burly‑looking character dudes. And I was like what the hell? It’s been a really interesting journey for me. And I’ve never entirely felt like I fit into the world or familial. And that’s been the tension of my life on the show. Although I, Maggie, felt incredibly loved and embraced by everybody.
What’s next for you?
Theater’s a huge part of my life and I’ll never stop doing that. I’ll probably take a little time. I’d love to do some more independent film projects for a little while. And I would love to find another great cable show because I feel like that’s the kind of thing that the gift of being on a show that is — has such high quality of writing and acting and directing.
Were you told at the beginning of the season that Tara would die?
Kurt Sutter and I sat down and I made a half‑joke because I thought I might be getting killed off. He didn’t respond right away. I was like ‘Oh my God! You’re killing me off!’ He was sort of like well, no. He wasn’t entirely sure yet. There were some things that happened early on in the season with Donal Logue [Editor's note: Logue had to leave early during to scheduling conflict with the History Channel series Vikings] that made life sort of confusing for how this season was going to map out. That was a big plot point that just got lost because he was going to be the main antagonist for the club for the whole season. And so, at least how he explained it to me, he was trying to figure out how to map out the rest of the season. Tara’s death could potentially happen. I knew that Donal going away meant the odds of me dying were greater.
Did you cry?
I maybe did cry a little bit. I think when I sat down with Kurt the second time and he told me yes, this is what we’re doing, I think I actually did cry a little bit. But it was almost more in gratitude than in anything else. It’s been such a long, wonderful journey and I’m very grateful for it. But as an actor, six years of anything is sort of insane. I think that we all are curious and interested in what the rest of our life is. I think all of us have felt the end of the series kind of sneaking up on us over the last year‑and‑a‑half. I think actually when Opie died. It’s sort of like oh, this is really the beginning of the end of our journey singularly, and collectively.
GET EW ON YOUR TABLET: Subscribe today and get instant access!
Could you imagine a scenario where Tara wouldn’t die this year?
I think I’ve always felt like it could go one of two ways for Tara. You know, there’s the Ophelia model and then there’s the Tara morphing into Gemma and taking her place and sort of ascending her throne.
What’s it like around here when a character dies?
It’s really surreal. It’s very hard. It’s very hard to imagine it. You know, Ryan Hurst has this whole thing that he’s been talking with Charlie about how you spend all this time trying to embody a character, but nobody ever teaches you how to kill a character.
Talk about Tara’s arc this season.
I think she started the season on a really kind of dark, but strong note, in that once she finds herself in prison, she realizes that she’s going to have to change her reality and that it’s going to take a tremendous effort of will and wiliness, and plotting. She doesn’t have any allies that she can think of and that includes Jax and Gemma. The end of Season 5 was really a rough moment. I think on some deep level, she fundamentally feels like Jax has chosen the club over her and the family.And so, she realizes she’s going to deliver her children to safety. It’s really sad. I mean partly because she’s somebody who did get out at another point in her life, you know, but has slowly found herself, found her way back in and then found that the walls of this prison just sort get higher and thicker. Part of it is her love for this person and for these people and the fact that they’re the only family she knows and the only family she has. In the third or fourth episode she says to Unser, ‘It’s not about me anymore.’ And I’ve been holding onto that throughout the season.
Has Tara been the moral center?
I don’t know. I think it’s interesting the way it’s developed because she definitely was the moral center of the show for a while. I think Kurt used her as a window, through which the audience could experience the club and the life of the club. You could see her loving these people in spite of herself, in spite of knowing better. I think she remained a moral center in that she continues to be one of the only in the world who experiences real emotional conflict around the violence and the difficulty and the pain of the life and wanting something better for her children.
It’s been pretty dark this year.
Every year I feel like I said oh, it’s just getting worse and worse. But it does. Kurt Sutter sort of escalates the violence. Every episode people die. But, you know, as the seasons have progressed there have been like these heart‑wrenching losses that have to do with the people that we lose within the club or within the family — the things that happen within that family that we’re following. Every season has been more horrible than the one that’s preceded it and this one is no exception.
What has this role meant to your career?
I really was a theater rat — and I say that in the most affectionate sense — for most of my career until I came out here to do the first season of Mad Men. Then I went straight into this. So, my whole life just kind of changed. Having a job that lasts this long provides an incredible amount of stability for an actor especially if you’re coming from the theater where stability is not really part of your vocabulary. This show and like the world of this show is so far removed from what I could ever have really imagined for myself for a whole host of reasons. During our first read‑through, I walked in and I was like what am I doing here? Like I was looking around like at Boone and Kim and, you know, all these like big, scary, burly‑looking character dudes. And I was like what the hell? It’s been a really interesting journey for me. And I’ve never entirely felt like I fit into the world or familial. And that’s been the tension of my life on the show. Although I, Maggie, felt incredibly loved and embraced by everybody.
What’s next for you?
Theater’s a huge part of my life and I’ll never stop doing that. I’ll probably take a little time. I’d love to do some more independent film projects for a little while. And I would love to find another great cable show because I feel like that’s the kind of thing that the gift of being on a show that is — has such high quality of writing and acting and directing.
Interview with Juice.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Holy s—.
THEO ROSSI: [Laughs] Holy s—, right?
GET MORE EW: Subscribe to the magazine for only 33¢ an issue!
Before we get to the end, let’s start with the scene in which Jax (Charlie Hunnam) hugs Juice and tells him, “You betrayed me.” The look on Charlie’s face scared me through the TV. How did it feel filming that moment?
Listen, Chuck and I have been down so many different roads. We love working together so much. Jax is so broken by everything, he accepts his fate of going away and taking the rap, and he finds that out about Juice and it’s his one loose end. You could see how devastated he is, but also, I think he funnels all his anger of every single moment over this year into that one single second and it all came right at me. How it felt for me was like, “Okay, well, here we go. Let’s do this,” and then, “Holy s–. I’m basically, for lack of a better word, screwed.” [Laughs] Juice just wants to get of there. He wants Jax to go away and to get out of there at that point. It was one of those days where there was a lot of people on the street watching us film, and they didn’t even realize that what looked like an intimate moment was actually so unbelievably intense.
Juice goes to find Gemma (Katey Sagal), who’s drunk and high after breaking up with Nero (Jimmy Smits) and thinks Tara ratted on Jax. He follows Eli (Rockmond Dunbar) into Jax’s house, where Gemma has just brutally killed Tara. As Eli’s about to call in the murder, Juice shoots him twice in the back. In your mind, what’s Juice’s motivation: Is it revenge against the man who started him down this path of betrayal in season 4, or just Juice wanting to help Gemma in that moment?
In my mind, there were three different schools of thought going on: At this point, I feel like Juice has completely snapped. He’s tried everything: He was trying to be the good guy and right all the wrongs after that spiral in season 4 that started with the stealing of the coke, the killing of Miles, and trying to kill himself. And then he found this loyalty in Clay in season 5, and he tried that and was forced to turn on him. And then in season 6, he becomes this aggressive animal and he’s killing people with pillows, beating up cops, running people over. I think in that moment, yes, there’s a part of him thinking that this guy [Eli] is the genesis of all of this. This guy’s words in that office started this whole thing. And at the same time, he recognizes Gemma’s pain so much. He sees exactly what she just did — he saw it with Miles, he saw it with Darvany. He knows the feeling, and he knew that he had to do something. It’s like, “I gotta protect myself. I gotta take out anything and anyone that’s in my way.” I think it makes Juice really dangerous right now. One of my favorite shows ever is The Shield, and it’s kinda like the Shane Vendrell thing — you’re just protecting yourself and everything that occurs is chaos out of it because you don’t know what’s right and wrong anymore. This guy [Eli] didn’t do anything wrong at that moment, but he did a lot wrong to me before it. He used me like a pawn. I’ll just say I’m glad that Rock’s on The Mentalist right now. [Laughs] (Update: Read our postmortem with Rockmond Dunbar.)
I loved the moment when, after Juice reaches out his hand and helps Gemma up, Katey stands close to you but doesn’t actually touch you. It’s like she knows Juice is too dead inside to be of any comfort at that moment, or that she doesn’t have the right to ask for any since she told him vulnerability is a weakness. Was that something you guys talked about?
No, that just happened. None of that was intentional. Not even the picking her up. We just sat there and then Kurt [Sutter, the show's creator who directed the episode] came up in the middle of this take, and he’s like, “Reach out your hand.” It was so unbelievably powerful. And then when he said that, I was like, “Wow, let’s not put the gun down right away.” Let’s move methodically and kind of slow, almost like a predator. There’s that moment where, for a second, you think, is he gonna turn the gun on her? Is he gonna turn the gun on himself? She’s so distraught and broken at that moment, and to see this guy [Juice] who’s always distraught and broken — and who’s been distraught and broken for so long — be the guy standing there. Wow. [Laughs] And then, God, Jax comin’ in later…
That’s my next question: We see Juice dispose of the evidence in dumpsters. Is he thinking about framing Jax when he does that?
That would be a question for the boss. I don’t know. I just know Kurt’s 10 steps ahead of everybody. I don’t know how methodical that is, but I’ve done things two seasons before that he references and brings up. He never forgets anything and everything has a point. That’s really interesting. I love how you’re making me think about things right now. [Laughs] It was really interesting not having the cut on, being kinda covert, trying to get rid of everything — the clothes, and the iron, and the [grill fork], and the gun, and all this stuff. At the same time, I’m not putting them in water or anything, I’m putting them in different parts of dumpsters.
And where are those dumpsters: Close to the house? Far away? So many unanswered questions.
So many unanswered questions. [Laughs] That’s the whole point.
It crossed my mind, for a second after Juice shot Eli, that he might take the fall for Gemma: He’d say he shot Eli for what he’d done to him and Tara to get back at Jax.
[Laughs] I’m glad it wasn’t that. Then I can’t last more than 10 minutes in the new season. I was so amazed by everything that happens. Going back earlier in the episode when we go to the park and Jax talks to Tara, I was so amazed by all that because it was so against what was set up earlier in the year, which is what I think is so beautiful about the whole story. And truly, the love story aspect of Sons of Anarchy — the Jax and Tara love story — came to the forefront at that moment, where he said, “I’m gonna throw myself on the sword. I’m the one that’s gonna take responsibility for all of this.” It was so valiant — and terrifying at the same time, when we show up at the park.
The look Juice shot Tara when Jax hands Juice the baby was pretty scary.
Juice is still furious with her. At this point, the only thing he knows is that she is the problem for us all, that she flipped on us, that we have a chance to go to prison. A couple episodes ago she and Juice had their little dance where she ran over his bike — so he’s completely finished with her. Again, at this point, Juice is just killing anybody and really not even caring. So he’s waiting for Jax to just say, “Kill her,” and he’ll do it. He’s ready to do whatever he’s told as the guy who’s, at this point, saying, “Whatever you need, boss.” Juice thinks that’s what’s hopefully gonna bring him happiness. That’s all he wanted from Clay: He just wanted that father figure. He just wanted to be told what to do. If Clay’s gonna be gone, is it gonna be Jax? Is he gonna be the one to tell me what to do, because somebody’s gotta tell me what to do, because I obviously can’t make decisions on my own, because every time I’ve tried to it’s been a disaster. [Laughs]
We’ve talked before about how fans are constantly convinced Juice is about to die. Now that Jax has told Chibs (Tommy Flanagan) and Bobby (Mark Boone Junior), who’s been handed the gavel, that Juice can’t be trusted, I imagine that will not stop.
[Before the finale aired] I was getting “RIP”s every 14 seconds on Twitter. It’s this beautiful poetic thing Kurt has created with this character: Juice has done so much wrong, but he’s never done wrong intentionally. Anything he’s done has been basically by mistake, even the confession to Nero [about Jax ordering Darvany's death] he’s under the influence. He wasn’t in his right mind. I see it everyday — even just now, I’m shopping for my nephew in Toys ‘R Us — how fans react: They love the character because they feel for him. Same thing with Gemma and most of the people who run around Charming: They’re humanized because of their flaws. That’s why I think it’s a really interesting relationship with Gemma and Juice. I’m really interested to see how that goes.
We have to talk about the scene in the penultimate episode when Gemma and Nero save Juice from the overdose. How did you film those vomiting scenes?
With Katey, I don’t even have to say it: We’ve been together since Day 1, and I absolutely adore Katey. If I ever write a memoir, it will say Katey has changed my life. But Jimmy Smits is truly one of the greatest human beings alive. To work with them and to do all that… The props department came up with, like, cream of mushroom. [Laughs] I’m so crazy, so it’s, like, low sodium organic cream of mushroom. They mixed it with something else, another kind of soup, and I just kinda held it in my mouth. There were two funny things: One, Katey completely jammed her fingers down my throat at one point, so I did almost really vomit. [Laughs] And at one point, I wasn’t expecting her [fingers], she was just gonna do knuckles, and I think I bit her fingers. But [the scene] looked really good. There was a lot of trajectory on that cream of mushroom.
Has Kurt told you where Juice is headed in season 7?
I’m completely unaware, but [Laughs] I know it can’t be anywhere good. I’m sure it involves a high, high stress level. Let me tell you this, I know it’s not to a pool party or a barbecue anytime soon. It’s going to be filled with chaos. This last season — I’m gonna have anxiety forever. It’s gonna take me 10 years to decompress from this show. (UPDATE: Sutter says he’s not sure what’s next for Juice’s arc but that Juice will know he’s on thin ice having betrayed Jax and might possibly use his bold move in helping Gemma as leverage. “Does Juice keep this secret? Does he use it to his advantage? I don’t know the answer to that. I just know that we have something really fun to play with when we start the next season.”)
I love how the series is coming full circle with SAMCRO being in a beef between the Mayans and the Niners. I’m excited to see more of Alvarez, because that actor, Emilio Rivera, has always been so great on the show.
I’m hoping the Mayans are recruiting because I might need a club. [Laughs]
Can you imagine?
No, no. I think everybody’s just gonna say, “We forgive him. He’s such a nice guy.”
“Let’s not make Juicey cry again.”
Well, if you see him at the end, it seems like he’s just gone stone-cold. I don’t know what’s gonna happen.
THEO ROSSI: [Laughs] Holy s—, right?
GET MORE EW: Subscribe to the magazine for only 33¢ an issue!
Before we get to the end, let’s start with the scene in which Jax (Charlie Hunnam) hugs Juice and tells him, “You betrayed me.” The look on Charlie’s face scared me through the TV. How did it feel filming that moment?
Listen, Chuck and I have been down so many different roads. We love working together so much. Jax is so broken by everything, he accepts his fate of going away and taking the rap, and he finds that out about Juice and it’s his one loose end. You could see how devastated he is, but also, I think he funnels all his anger of every single moment over this year into that one single second and it all came right at me. How it felt for me was like, “Okay, well, here we go. Let’s do this,” and then, “Holy s–. I’m basically, for lack of a better word, screwed.” [Laughs] Juice just wants to get of there. He wants Jax to go away and to get out of there at that point. It was one of those days where there was a lot of people on the street watching us film, and they didn’t even realize that what looked like an intimate moment was actually so unbelievably intense.
Juice goes to find Gemma (Katey Sagal), who’s drunk and high after breaking up with Nero (Jimmy Smits) and thinks Tara ratted on Jax. He follows Eli (Rockmond Dunbar) into Jax’s house, where Gemma has just brutally killed Tara. As Eli’s about to call in the murder, Juice shoots him twice in the back. In your mind, what’s Juice’s motivation: Is it revenge against the man who started him down this path of betrayal in season 4, or just Juice wanting to help Gemma in that moment?
In my mind, there were three different schools of thought going on: At this point, I feel like Juice has completely snapped. He’s tried everything: He was trying to be the good guy and right all the wrongs after that spiral in season 4 that started with the stealing of the coke, the killing of Miles, and trying to kill himself. And then he found this loyalty in Clay in season 5, and he tried that and was forced to turn on him. And then in season 6, he becomes this aggressive animal and he’s killing people with pillows, beating up cops, running people over. I think in that moment, yes, there’s a part of him thinking that this guy [Eli] is the genesis of all of this. This guy’s words in that office started this whole thing. And at the same time, he recognizes Gemma’s pain so much. He sees exactly what she just did — he saw it with Miles, he saw it with Darvany. He knows the feeling, and he knew that he had to do something. It’s like, “I gotta protect myself. I gotta take out anything and anyone that’s in my way.” I think it makes Juice really dangerous right now. One of my favorite shows ever is The Shield, and it’s kinda like the Shane Vendrell thing — you’re just protecting yourself and everything that occurs is chaos out of it because you don’t know what’s right and wrong anymore. This guy [Eli] didn’t do anything wrong at that moment, but he did a lot wrong to me before it. He used me like a pawn. I’ll just say I’m glad that Rock’s on The Mentalist right now. [Laughs] (Update: Read our postmortem with Rockmond Dunbar.)
I loved the moment when, after Juice reaches out his hand and helps Gemma up, Katey stands close to you but doesn’t actually touch you. It’s like she knows Juice is too dead inside to be of any comfort at that moment, or that she doesn’t have the right to ask for any since she told him vulnerability is a weakness. Was that something you guys talked about?
No, that just happened. None of that was intentional. Not even the picking her up. We just sat there and then Kurt [Sutter, the show's creator who directed the episode] came up in the middle of this take, and he’s like, “Reach out your hand.” It was so unbelievably powerful. And then when he said that, I was like, “Wow, let’s not put the gun down right away.” Let’s move methodically and kind of slow, almost like a predator. There’s that moment where, for a second, you think, is he gonna turn the gun on her? Is he gonna turn the gun on himself? She’s so distraught and broken at that moment, and to see this guy [Juice] who’s always distraught and broken — and who’s been distraught and broken for so long — be the guy standing there. Wow. [Laughs] And then, God, Jax comin’ in later…
That’s my next question: We see Juice dispose of the evidence in dumpsters. Is he thinking about framing Jax when he does that?
That would be a question for the boss. I don’t know. I just know Kurt’s 10 steps ahead of everybody. I don’t know how methodical that is, but I’ve done things two seasons before that he references and brings up. He never forgets anything and everything has a point. That’s really interesting. I love how you’re making me think about things right now. [Laughs] It was really interesting not having the cut on, being kinda covert, trying to get rid of everything — the clothes, and the iron, and the [grill fork], and the gun, and all this stuff. At the same time, I’m not putting them in water or anything, I’m putting them in different parts of dumpsters.
And where are those dumpsters: Close to the house? Far away? So many unanswered questions.
So many unanswered questions. [Laughs] That’s the whole point.
It crossed my mind, for a second after Juice shot Eli, that he might take the fall for Gemma: He’d say he shot Eli for what he’d done to him and Tara to get back at Jax.
[Laughs] I’m glad it wasn’t that. Then I can’t last more than 10 minutes in the new season. I was so amazed by everything that happens. Going back earlier in the episode when we go to the park and Jax talks to Tara, I was so amazed by all that because it was so against what was set up earlier in the year, which is what I think is so beautiful about the whole story. And truly, the love story aspect of Sons of Anarchy — the Jax and Tara love story — came to the forefront at that moment, where he said, “I’m gonna throw myself on the sword. I’m the one that’s gonna take responsibility for all of this.” It was so valiant — and terrifying at the same time, when we show up at the park.
The look Juice shot Tara when Jax hands Juice the baby was pretty scary.
Juice is still furious with her. At this point, the only thing he knows is that she is the problem for us all, that she flipped on us, that we have a chance to go to prison. A couple episodes ago she and Juice had their little dance where she ran over his bike — so he’s completely finished with her. Again, at this point, Juice is just killing anybody and really not even caring. So he’s waiting for Jax to just say, “Kill her,” and he’ll do it. He’s ready to do whatever he’s told as the guy who’s, at this point, saying, “Whatever you need, boss.” Juice thinks that’s what’s hopefully gonna bring him happiness. That’s all he wanted from Clay: He just wanted that father figure. He just wanted to be told what to do. If Clay’s gonna be gone, is it gonna be Jax? Is he gonna be the one to tell me what to do, because somebody’s gotta tell me what to do, because I obviously can’t make decisions on my own, because every time I’ve tried to it’s been a disaster. [Laughs]
We’ve talked before about how fans are constantly convinced Juice is about to die. Now that Jax has told Chibs (Tommy Flanagan) and Bobby (Mark Boone Junior), who’s been handed the gavel, that Juice can’t be trusted, I imagine that will not stop.
[Before the finale aired] I was getting “RIP”s every 14 seconds on Twitter. It’s this beautiful poetic thing Kurt has created with this character: Juice has done so much wrong, but he’s never done wrong intentionally. Anything he’s done has been basically by mistake, even the confession to Nero [about Jax ordering Darvany's death] he’s under the influence. He wasn’t in his right mind. I see it everyday — even just now, I’m shopping for my nephew in Toys ‘R Us — how fans react: They love the character because they feel for him. Same thing with Gemma and most of the people who run around Charming: They’re humanized because of their flaws. That’s why I think it’s a really interesting relationship with Gemma and Juice. I’m really interested to see how that goes.
We have to talk about the scene in the penultimate episode when Gemma and Nero save Juice from the overdose. How did you film those vomiting scenes?
With Katey, I don’t even have to say it: We’ve been together since Day 1, and I absolutely adore Katey. If I ever write a memoir, it will say Katey has changed my life. But Jimmy Smits is truly one of the greatest human beings alive. To work with them and to do all that… The props department came up with, like, cream of mushroom. [Laughs] I’m so crazy, so it’s, like, low sodium organic cream of mushroom. They mixed it with something else, another kind of soup, and I just kinda held it in my mouth. There were two funny things: One, Katey completely jammed her fingers down my throat at one point, so I did almost really vomit. [Laughs] And at one point, I wasn’t expecting her [fingers], she was just gonna do knuckles, and I think I bit her fingers. But [the scene] looked really good. There was a lot of trajectory on that cream of mushroom.
Has Kurt told you where Juice is headed in season 7?
I’m completely unaware, but [Laughs] I know it can’t be anywhere good. I’m sure it involves a high, high stress level. Let me tell you this, I know it’s not to a pool party or a barbecue anytime soon. It’s going to be filled with chaos. This last season — I’m gonna have anxiety forever. It’s gonna take me 10 years to decompress from this show. (UPDATE: Sutter says he’s not sure what’s next for Juice’s arc but that Juice will know he’s on thin ice having betrayed Jax and might possibly use his bold move in helping Gemma as leverage. “Does Juice keep this secret? Does he use it to his advantage? I don’t know the answer to that. I just know that we have something really fun to play with when we start the next season.”)
I love how the series is coming full circle with SAMCRO being in a beef between the Mayans and the Niners. I’m excited to see more of Alvarez, because that actor, Emilio Rivera, has always been so great on the show.
I’m hoping the Mayans are recruiting because I might need a club. [Laughs]
Can you imagine?
No, no. I think everybody’s just gonna say, “We forgive him. He’s such a nice guy.”
“Let’s not make Juicey cry again.”
Well, if you see him at the end, it seems like he’s just gone stone-cold. I don’t know what’s gonna happen.
Interview with Nero.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: When Nero asked Gemma if she’d leave everything behind but him, he already knew the answer?
JIMMY SMITS: I think he knew the answer to that. He understands that the pull from his past and the pull that she has being the lioness of that particular den are very strong.
What I liked about Gemma and Nero’s relationship is that it was the healthiest one on the show this season because they were honest with each other about everything — and then the second they started holding things back, it all went to hell.
It’s been a kind of awkward courtship. Like when I read the whole thing about him accepting the conjugal [visit Gemma had with Clay], Jimmy was like, “What? WTF?” [Laughs] But then I had to reset and say, “Wait a minute, Nero is the companionator. He understands relationships and how you deal with women in a totally different kind of way than I do.” When I put that kind of thinking cap on, it’s like, “Okay, there’s something different going on there in terms of their relationship, and what they’ve been through, and acceptance and tolerance.” Like Unser will ask her, “So where’s your pimp?” “He’s with the ******.”
GET EW ON YOUR TABLET: Subscribe today and get instant access!
Tell me about filming the break-up scene. It seems like at one point, when Gemma realizes Nero is dumping her, that she’s actually unsteady on her feet before she recovers and calls him an a–hole.
I’m glad you picked that up, because there was something that made her unsteady. Because again this world that Kurt [Sutter] creates, the characters have these major tugs. It’s no accident that both of these characters have little cuts on their heart. They complete each other, in a way. There’s something genuine there, so the potential of having that end — when I saw visually what Katey decided to do as Gemma, it made a lot of sense. But she recouped and went to go do her business, like, right after that.
Jax and Nero still have Diosa together. I’m just trying to imagine how things will be between them.
It’s gonna be very tenuous. I can’t imagine. They’ll come up with stuff, and then we’re gonna have to sit down and reset. There again lies, not the conundrum but the beauty of painting on a larger scale when you’re doing a television show — especially a cable show like this. You have to be able to be fluid. It’s not the beginning, the middle, and the end that you have when it’s a closed [movie]. You have to be able to accommodate little curveballs. Who knows. That bullet might have my guy’s name on it.
Noooo!
Yeeeeah. [Laughs] I thought I was gonna be there for only 10 episodes. So the guy’s on borrowed time as far as I’m concerned. As long as I get to rock those cardigans, put my tattoos on.
You manage to make a cardigan look badass. Were you originally like, “Yay, a cardigan,” or “Dude, I can’t wear a cardigan”?
When we started talking about it in the beginning, it was like, “Come on, cardigans? Mr. Padilla’s Neighborhood. ‘Welcome to Mr. Nero’s Neighborhood.’ But [costume designer] Kelli Jones and I had a dialogue about this guy from the streets who’s trying to be a businessman, but he can’t do suits. So it kinda morphed into this cardigan thing, and he’s trying to do something businessy [Laughs] and he’s got this wifebeater on underneath it. It’s like the tattoos. Tracey Anderson, who’s our head makeup person, came up with a lot of tattoos that — depending on how much you see — it’s a couple of hours to put on. Each one of them tells a story. Most of the guys that have been in the joint, tattoos tell a part of their story. It’s putting my son’s name on my neck and what that means. It really helps me get into character because it takes a long time to put stuff on. And the cardigan adds to that. [Laughs]
Nero did show up with Fiasco for Alvarez’s meeting with Lin. So he’s in this now?
He’s in it, with reservation.
Is that where you thought the character would end up?
The character is gonna end up on the floor. [Laughs] Where all of these characters end up. That’s part of the schematic of the show. There’s not gonna be too many last people standing, I don’t think.
Last question: If you could have one wish for SOA‘s final season, what would it be? I know you got your motorcycle license for the show.
You know what it is. It’s ride a motorcycle. When am I gonna get on a f–kin’ cycle here? Am I gonna get on a hog or what? I don’t think so. When I got the job, I didn’t know what was gonna happen. I was like, the show’s about dudes with motorcycles, you better be proficient in riding. Because actors will do that all the time: “Oh yeah, I know how to ride a horse. Sure, I can ski downhill.” So I went and made sure I was at least semi-proficient.
I feel like if the Byz-Lats hook up with the Mayans, there’s gonna be more motorcycles around Nero. He might need to hop on one for a quick getaway.
Give me a Vespa or something.
JIMMY SMITS: I think he knew the answer to that. He understands that the pull from his past and the pull that she has being the lioness of that particular den are very strong.
What I liked about Gemma and Nero’s relationship is that it was the healthiest one on the show this season because they were honest with each other about everything — and then the second they started holding things back, it all went to hell.
It’s been a kind of awkward courtship. Like when I read the whole thing about him accepting the conjugal [visit Gemma had with Clay], Jimmy was like, “What? WTF?” [Laughs] But then I had to reset and say, “Wait a minute, Nero is the companionator. He understands relationships and how you deal with women in a totally different kind of way than I do.” When I put that kind of thinking cap on, it’s like, “Okay, there’s something different going on there in terms of their relationship, and what they’ve been through, and acceptance and tolerance.” Like Unser will ask her, “So where’s your pimp?” “He’s with the ******.”
GET EW ON YOUR TABLET: Subscribe today and get instant access!
Tell me about filming the break-up scene. It seems like at one point, when Gemma realizes Nero is dumping her, that she’s actually unsteady on her feet before she recovers and calls him an a–hole.
I’m glad you picked that up, because there was something that made her unsteady. Because again this world that Kurt [Sutter] creates, the characters have these major tugs. It’s no accident that both of these characters have little cuts on their heart. They complete each other, in a way. There’s something genuine there, so the potential of having that end — when I saw visually what Katey decided to do as Gemma, it made a lot of sense. But she recouped and went to go do her business, like, right after that.
Jax and Nero still have Diosa together. I’m just trying to imagine how things will be between them.
It’s gonna be very tenuous. I can’t imagine. They’ll come up with stuff, and then we’re gonna have to sit down and reset. There again lies, not the conundrum but the beauty of painting on a larger scale when you’re doing a television show — especially a cable show like this. You have to be able to be fluid. It’s not the beginning, the middle, and the end that you have when it’s a closed [movie]. You have to be able to accommodate little curveballs. Who knows. That bullet might have my guy’s name on it.
Noooo!
Yeeeeah. [Laughs] I thought I was gonna be there for only 10 episodes. So the guy’s on borrowed time as far as I’m concerned. As long as I get to rock those cardigans, put my tattoos on.
You manage to make a cardigan look badass. Were you originally like, “Yay, a cardigan,” or “Dude, I can’t wear a cardigan”?
When we started talking about it in the beginning, it was like, “Come on, cardigans? Mr. Padilla’s Neighborhood. ‘Welcome to Mr. Nero’s Neighborhood.’ But [costume designer] Kelli Jones and I had a dialogue about this guy from the streets who’s trying to be a businessman, but he can’t do suits. So it kinda morphed into this cardigan thing, and he’s trying to do something businessy [Laughs] and he’s got this wifebeater on underneath it. It’s like the tattoos. Tracey Anderson, who’s our head makeup person, came up with a lot of tattoos that — depending on how much you see — it’s a couple of hours to put on. Each one of them tells a story. Most of the guys that have been in the joint, tattoos tell a part of their story. It’s putting my son’s name on my neck and what that means. It really helps me get into character because it takes a long time to put stuff on. And the cardigan adds to that. [Laughs]
Nero did show up with Fiasco for Alvarez’s meeting with Lin. So he’s in this now?
He’s in it, with reservation.
Is that where you thought the character would end up?
The character is gonna end up on the floor. [Laughs] Where all of these characters end up. That’s part of the schematic of the show. There’s not gonna be too many last people standing, I don’t think.
Last question: If you could have one wish for SOA‘s final season, what would it be? I know you got your motorcycle license for the show.
You know what it is. It’s ride a motorcycle. When am I gonna get on a f–kin’ cycle here? Am I gonna get on a hog or what? I don’t think so. When I got the job, I didn’t know what was gonna happen. I was like, the show’s about dudes with motorcycles, you better be proficient in riding. Because actors will do that all the time: “Oh yeah, I know how to ride a horse. Sure, I can ski downhill.” So I went and made sure I was at least semi-proficient.
I feel like if the Byz-Lats hook up with the Mayans, there’s gonna be more motorcycles around Nero. He might need to hop on one for a quick getaway.
Give me a Vespa or something.
- 42,694
- 178,408
Good reads.
On a side note, Nero's cardigan game is untouchable.
On a side note, Nero's cardigan game is untouchable.
- 40,141
- 11,080
last night i literally said Nero has got to be the most gangster $%^&*() rocking cardigan's faithfully ever
Eli
Last edited:
- 42,694
- 178,408
- 40,141
- 11,080
both look old as $%^&* now
- 25
- 21
I had to download this episode cause i fell asleep smh.
I can't watch this **** again, b. This episode and Opie catching the fade are the two episodes i can't re-watch.
I can't watch this **** again, b. This episode and Opie catching the fade are the two episodes i can't re-watch.
- 8,930
- 3,507
i wanted tara to catch that just as much as everyone, but after seeing her and jackson make up.
i was sitting there like
all types of feels.
i wonder if juice is gonna have a seat at the table next season. jackson already told chibbs and bobby he couldn't be trusted.
i was sitting there like
all types of feels.
i wonder if juice is gonna have a seat at the table next season. jackson already told chibbs and bobby he couldn't be trusted.
Last edited:
- 5,161
- 490
Opie death hands down was the worst. **** was tragic especially since his wife got popped too. Kids growing up without parents always sucks.
When is someone gonna smash Gemma's head in? She is like a cockroach.
When is someone gonna smash Gemma's head in? She is like a cockroach.
- 42,694
- 178,408
^Yeah, that was beautifully and tragically done. The whole sequence and final scene had me feeling 
.
[
Jax watched all to the very end....damn.
.[
Jax watched all to the very end....damn.
Last edited:
- 30,078
- 25,522
Watched season one last night..Jax and Tara and Chibbs looked so damn young..Maggie Siff aged really bad over the last 5 years..
- 24,017
- 3,124
I stopped watching after season 2. Might have to play catchup.
- 22,390
- 14,579
part of the character. It wouldn't make sense for her to look all fresh-faced after being worn down by all the madness surrounding her all this time (hideous haircut excluded)
Last edited:
- 15,448
- 16,780
Just watched the finale. It hurt.
- 1,104
- 280
you guys gotta remember Eli ruined Juice's life... its been all down hill for him since he black mailed him with the information on his father.
- 64,966
- 196,172
Juice hates Eli I understand.
But Juice ruined Juice's life. The worst he had to have thought the crew would have done was kick him out, they won't have made him meet Mr. Mayhen because he was he didn't lie bout his dad, he was just ignorant of the fact he was black. And because he feared that so much he commits the ultimate sin of snitching.
- 1,104
- 280
all im sayin is at the end of the day Eli started the snowball.
