‘In Our Society We Only Promote Success’

Kristoffer Polaha has been a staple on the small screen since 2001, starring in such series as “Life Unexpected,” “Backstrom” and “Condor.” More recently he joined the Hallmark family with holiday movies (“Rocky Mountain Christmas”) and mysteries (“Pearl in Paradise”) and going forward will add even more of films to his plate. This month he can be seen in the Tim Tebow-produced “Run the Race” and next year he will boast being a part of Patty Jenkins’ “Wonder Woman 1984.”

What new shades of a character did playing Michael Truett in “Run the Race” allow you?

This guy’s a mean son of a bitch; he's just a mean drunk. He’s the kind of guy who just failed, and his kids are doing well, and he just hates them for it. [But] it’s about second chances and what happens when you fail. In our society that's interesting, because we only promote success and what it’s like to be winning all of the time. guy is. ... And with Chris, because I trust him and he trusts me, I can show up and I can put something out there, and then I know I’m on the right track and it’s just a matter of connecting. And that’s what we love when we go to movies: seeing two people connect and listening to one another.

How did you establish similar trust with Patty Jenkins on “Wonder Woman 1984”?

Patty Jenkins is somebody who, in my experience, was able to create trust almost instantaneously. I met [her] five years ago when I tested for a pilot called “Betrayal.” She was upset because I was her choice, and ABC, for whatever reason, said no. ... And she wrote me the most beautiful letter I had ever gotten from anybody, let alone a director. ... She was like, “I can’t wait to work with you at some point in the future.”... Cut to “Wonder Woman” [in] theaters … and I loved it … so I just shot her a quick email that said congratulations and six months later I had an audition.

What are the new kinds of challenges that come from such a big-scale project?

There was one day where we shot from 6 o’clock in the morning until 8 p.m. It took an entire day to shoot basically a page, and the luxury of that — that’s the kind of thing you can only experience on a film like that. At one point we were just waiting for the sun to move off a building. ... Doing that is harder than trying to get through nine pages of a crazy television show where you’re just jamming through stuff — because you do it once and you feel really connected and good, but then you do it again and you’re still connected, and then you do it again, and you’re like, “Do you want me to do something different?” Eight hours later, you’re like, “I think it’s good?”