DEAD FUNNY
“What We Do in the Shadows” star on Season 3
HE’S having a bloody good time. British actor Kayvan Novak, who stars as Nandor The Relentless on FX’s vampire comedy “What We Do in the Shadows,” said that showcasing Nandor’s love life more in Season 3 was his idea.
“It was something that I had expressed when asked, ‘Where would you like Nandor to go?’ I thought it would be exciting for him to explore his relationships and finding love,” Novak, 42, told The
Post on a call from his home in London.
“The writers decided to run with that concept and they’ve just given me everything. All my Christmases came at once, I had so much fun stuff to do this season. We laugh a lot on set. It can be a cliche that a comedy ensemble goes on about how much fun they have on set — but we genuinely do.”
Season 3 of the Emmy nominated vampire mockumentary series (premiering Thursday at 10 p.m. on FX and Friday on Hulu) that’s based off the 2014 film of the same name from Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi continues the adventures of Nandor, a neurotic former Ottoman Empire warrior, and his fellow vampire roommates in Staten Island: lothario Laszlo (Matt Berry) and sarcastic Nadja (Natasia Demetriou). There’s also Nandor’s human familiar Guillermo (Harvey Guillen), who takes care of household chores in hopes of one day getting turned into a vampire himself, and energy vampire Colin (Mark Proksch).
Season 3 kicks off with the central trio assuming new positions as leaders of the local vampire council, while Nandor, who has had 37 wives (and loved 35 of them), also finds himself wondering if there is more to life than “killing and bloodlust.” While he ponders this, he engages in a flirtation with a woman at his gym and the show introduces his on-again off-again paramour, Gail (Aida Turturro,
“The Sopranos”).
“Nandor having another dysfunctional relationship to go with his dysfunctional relationship with Guillermo felt like a natural progression,” said Novak. “Aida Turturro playing the incredible Gail was just a riot.”
Novak teased another character later in the season who, “I fall for in quite a serious way — and then Guillermo has to do something about that.”
Season 3 also has a kickball game scene as an homage to the infamous vampire baseball in the first “Twilight” film.
“That was great fun,” said Novak. “All that snow [in the scene] was real snow. We’re like kids, I think we had one too many snowball fights that night. I did like a belly flop into the snow as a joke, and costume [department people] were like, ‘No, the coat!’ I gave them a worry.”
Nandor’s new love-focused plotlines also gave Novak, who dons an elaborate costume to play the bloodsucker, a new element to his look.
“I do love wearing the clothes,” he said. “It’s all the different layers, it’s the capes, it’s the leather doublet, it’s the buckles, the big boots. That all helps immensely with feeling like Nandor and feeling like a vampire. Having said that, this season I was asked to do some nudity. And that was a whole new experience, being Nandor in [just] a T-shirt and boots!”
“I love playing Nandor, and I think that’s important for a performer to really own their character and feel like when they play their character, they’re on a kind of groove. If you’re not on that, you’ve got to make some changes. But, I feel pretty groovy as Nandor.”