‘Hemlock’ is her cup of tea
“THE ODD THING,” says Kandyse McClure, “is that I don’t watch a lot of horror.”
But if the rest of us want to see her these days, we do. She’ll be starring this fall in Sam Raimi’s “The Seventh Son.” More immediately, she plays Dr. Clementine Chasseur in “Hemlock Grove,” a Netflix series being released Friday.
Based on Eli Roth’s suspense novel, “Hemlock” visits a small town with dark secrets. Since Clementine has dark secrets herself, she fits right in when she’s hired to help figure out who or what ripped a high school student to shreds.
“I’ve always been more captivated by nerd stuff, like ‘Star Trek: Next Generation,’” McClure admits.
“But a character like Clementine is interesting to play. She’s fleshed out more in the series than in the book, although fans will still get what they expect from Eli Roth.
“The real question we’re asking is, ‘Who are the monsters?’”
Along the way, “Hemlock Grove” had nice acting perks — like the action scenes.
“It can be so cathartic,” McClure says. “When you’re having a bad day, you channel it into kicking the s— out of somebody.”
McClure also did some of that in her best-known role, as Petty Officer Dee Dualla in “Battlestar Galactica” from 2003 to 2009.
“Fans still come up to me every week,” she says. “The more I talk to, the more I see how deeply the show affected them. So many people tell me they weren’t sci-fi fans, but they loved that show. I think it changed our notion of what a sci-fi show is.”
“Battlestar” also helped define her own life.
“In my 20s, I was an actor,” says the South African-born McClure, who just turned 33. “That was enough. When I wasn’t working, I’d go to my apartment. I had to remind myself to be social.” Now, even though she’s still busy, she’s sharing some of her life.
“The problem with relationships for an actor is your schedule,” she says. “You have to fly off for weeks or months at a time. I’m lucky now, because I’ve found someone who has a similar career. So he understands when sometimes we don’t see each other for three to four months. Thank God for Skype.” McClure laughs. “When we do have time together, one of our favorite things is just to sit and watch movies all day. We can go for hours and the only thing we say is, ‘Lunch?’”
And, yes, the new Netflix world suits McClure well: “The way life is today, it’s great to have shows I like available whenever I want.”