TELEVISION INTERVIEW: Getting Angelic with Misha Collins

Supernatural season 4 has been a wild roller coaster ride for fans and viewers alike as Dean and Sam Winchester (Jensen Ackles & Jared Padalecki) have faced some of the toughest challenges of their ‘hunter’ careers: from Dean being pulled out of hell by an angel to take on a mission from God to Sam becoming addicted to the demon blood from which he gains powers to defeat those very same demons. Along for this ride with the Winchester brothers is the Angel Castiel, played by the charming and very talented Misha Collins who recently received his official notice that his character is going to be regular in the upcoming Supernatural season five.

Yet before fans, viewers and actors cross that bridge, there are two more episodes left in season four and they promise to be the wildest part of the ride yet and Eclipse Magazine had a chance to spend ten minutes talking to Misha Collins about his role so far in season four as the angel Castiel.

“I think Castiel is one of the most interesting roles I’ve taken on,” Misha says when asked about the difficulty of playing a character to which human emotions are an alien thing to him. “Castiel hasn’t been among humans for several thousand years and he is not sure what humanity is about, but he is learning from his association with Dean to tap into emotions and to feel them,” Collins says of Castiel. At he same time though the actor has also been appreciating the challenge of playing a character with little or no emotions.

“I’ve enjoyed playing this character to which emotions and not being human is a vital part of who he is. In stepping outside of humaness and having to play a nonhuman role has given me an opportunity to look at my own humanity and actions as a human being. It’s been an interesting experience.”

Misha says that playing this kind of character that hasn’t interacted with humans or been inside of human form for thousands of years also affects the way that Castiel deals with physical confrontation. “Castiel isn’t used to being human and dealing with the reactions that the human body has to pain. He can put his hand on a hot burner and know that the body he is in is feeling the pain, but Castiel is slow to react to it because he has to take time to process it. That’s why he doesn’t always have the best reactions in a physical fight because he is used to battling on a more supernatural level with different powers and perceptions.”

In the latest episode, ‘The Rapture’, fans and viewers got to see how Castiel came to chose the human form he is possessing and we got to meet the man behind the angel, Jimmy Novak. I asked Misha what it was like to be basically playing three different characters at one time since we not only see him playing Castiel, but both Jimmy in present time and in flashbacks.

“It was challenging,” Misha says with a laugh. “This is the first time I had to actually read a script over three times before I was able to feel comfortable with how I was going to approach this kind of jumping back and forth between Jimmy in the present and how he was in the flashbacks and go back into playing Castiel. Thankfully I have an excellent crew to work with. Jared and Jensen are great guys to be hanging out with and working with. Everyone in the Supernatural family is very supportive. It’s one of the best sets I’ve worked on.”

At the end of ‘The Rapture’, we see that Castiel, who had been summarily yanked from Jimmy’s body and sent back to heaven for what we can only assume was something akin to an ‘attitude adjustment’, was back to being very unemotional and seemed to had lost all the ‘humanizing’ he had undergone from befriending Dean. I asked Misha if this ‘hard reset’ of his character was because of the renewal of ‘Supernatural’ for a fifth season and the possible need to put the brakes on his character’s development so that things could be stretched out more slowly.

“Actually the hard reset was necessary for what is coming up in the final two episodes,” Misha says while being careful not to give out too much of spoiler. “We are going to see Castiel going through changes again before season four is over.”

The one thing that hasn’t changed however is Castiel’s wardrobe. At the end of ‘The Rapture’ Castiel was still wearing the same ‘holy tax account’ outfit he was wearing in the season opener, ‘Lazarus Rising’. Misha was a bit surprised about this as well.

“You would think that the first thing Jimmy would have done when he got home was put on totally different clothes,” Collins says with a laugh. When I mention that despite the constant wear, Castiel’s clothing still looks to be in pretty good shape, Misha lets us in on a little known secret about his character. “Not only can Castiel heal the human body he’s possessing, but he has magical clothes mending abilities as well.”

Good thing too, cause with Misha getting the official nod to regular character status in season five, it looks like Cas is going to be wearing those threads for a little bit longer.

Outside of working on ‘Supernatural’, Misha Collins has been taking part in the adventures of being a convention guest at ‘Supernatural’ related conventions held in the USA by Creation Conventions and most recently the All Hell Breaks Loose convention in Sydney, Australia. “It’s been a wonderful experience and nothing is more humbling or more rewarding than being on stage for a roomful of people who love your work and your character and want to share that love with you,” Misha says of his warm reception by fans attending the conventions.

Besides his first foray into convention attendance, ‘Supernatural’ is also Misha Collin’s first time to be involved in something that has merchandising attached to it and he is looking forward seeing what kind of Castiel merchandizing is on its way.

“My belief is you really haven’t made the big time until your face is on a dinner plate,” he laughs then asks me what kind of things he might have to look forward to seeing himself on. I tell him its pretty much everything from trading cards to calendars to jewelry. I think I left Misha a little overwhelmed by what’s in store for him on that front as the publicist told us our time was up.

And so that was our ten minutes with Misha Collins a.k.a the angel Castiel, but fans and viewers can catch him along with Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki on the CW Network Thursday nights at 9PM EST as ‘Supernatural’ rolls out it’s final two episodes of season four. This coming Thursday, May 7^th at 9PM EST is ‘When the Levee Breaks’.

DEAN AND BOBBY TRAP SAM IN THE PANIC ROOM — Dean (Jensen Ackles) and Bobby (Jim Beaver) lock Sam (Jared Padalecki) in Bobby’s panic room so he can detox from the demon blood. However, as Bobby sees more seals are being broken he tells Dean they should let Sam out to help them fight the impending apocalypse. Dean disagrees and goes to Castiel (Misha Collins) for help. Sam and Dean have a big blowout confrontation. Robert Singer directed the episode written by Sera Gamble.

Check out this sneak peek at the episode.

The tune in on Thursday May the 14^th at 9PM EST as the season finale ‘Lucifer Rising’ airs.

Photos and video courtesy of the CW Network.