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| Kreuk and Ryan; he’s looking less beastly this season |
I’m not anywhere near The CW’s target demo and have to admit Beauty and the Beast is not normally on my radar. I think if you’re old enough to remember the first one you’re probably disqualified from the current one.
I am, however, a fan of Kristin Kreuk, who returns with co-star Jay Ryan for a second season of the fantasy hour (Sunday at 8 p.m. on Showcase and Monday at 9 on The CW).
Kreuk, Ryan and co-stars Nina Lisandello and Sendhil Ramamurthy made time for interviews earlier this week when I popped down to their studio in Etobicoke. The gigantic former glass factory that is Cinespace is home to several TV shows these days, including the upcoming FX series The Strain and another CW production, Reign.
The cast was working on the sixth episode of the season. Kruek looks so young you forget she has a decade of U.S. network TV stardom under her (brown, as in karate) belt, including seven seasons on Smallville. Despite being named one of Hello! magazine’s most beautiful Canadians last May, the 30-year-old actress has stayed very down to earth, self-effacing and spontaneous despite all those years in the spotlight.
She says her series has been re-booted, with Ryan’s Beast getting a pretty thorough makeover. Gone is the scar, for one thing. His Beast makeup has also been altered to look more realistic in Hi-Def. His Vincent character has also been re-programmed and has had his memory erased–a problem for Kreuk’s cop character as the series resumes.
With a new showrunner, the whole series is more of a romantic fantasy, less of a procedural cop show–which should please fans of the first series.
Vancouver-native Kreuk seems to be really digging T.O. which she says is beginning to feel like home after a season of Beast. “I guess that’s part of the actor’s life, you know, you adjust to places,” she says. “Vancouver is vastly different from Toronto, but, I don’t know, I like the energy here, I like how hard people work, I like that the business is centred here and that people are making things and really strive to get stuff done. I appreciate that.”
Ryan, who hails from New Zealand, describes Kreuk as “a really hard worker. She never complains, which is amazing, ‘cause I complain all the time.” Kreuk is an open book, he adds, “very down to earth, very Zen and she’s really a nice balance to me, I guess.”
