We spoke on the phone for a little over fifteen minutes. With his permission, here is a transcript of that conversation:
(By all means, feel free to link to this thread, if you like, but please do not copy this interview – in whole or in part – elsewhere.)
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Lilly: OK – here we go…
Jason: OK - How are you?
Lilly: I’m good. My first question for you is – did you have a good time?
Jason: Of course.
Lilly: You have some very dedicated fans who were hoping to get a glimpse of you on the Golf Channel when you played at the BMW Charity Pro-Am over the past few days. If I’m not mistaken, you had an impressive third place finish last year. Can you tell us how you got involved with the event?
Jason: Well, actually, Catherine Bell – she’s on Army Wives now, she was in the Bruce Almighty movies – she invited me and my buddy Michael Pena to come out because she knew we were both golfers – and she put in a request that we could come out there and we said “yes.” So we got a chance to go out there and play. Mike and I go and play golf every month or so, and were ready to get out there and play with the professionals. It’s something I try so hard to be good at, but it’s so hard, in general – just golf. So, it’s cool to see these guys who are just amazing, because it gives you the idea of what, I guess, you could aspire to be too, in that field.
Lilly: That was going to be one of my questions: when you play along side these guys, do you pick anything up? Do you get any tips? Do you get any inspiration?
Jason: Absolutely! Yeah, you realize that everything you’re doing is totally, like, wrong.
Lilly: (laughs)
Jason: And like, they’re just so smooth, you know? And, I don’t know – it’s very easy, the way that they do it all. And, yeah, they’ll give you little tips, too, here and there. And we’ll definitely pick those up and it makes our home game a lot more fun.
Lilly: You were paired with Justin Bolli…
Jason: Yeah, that was my guy!
Lilly: Unfortunately, the two of you didn’t make the cut in team play, but he made the cut as a pro. He finished 50th yesterday. We kind of watched him because the PGA website and the Golf Channel were not forthcoming with information about you. So, we kind of kept our eye on him to see how he was doing.
Jason: Aw, that’s cool. Yeah, he was a great guy, man. He was really good. I guess it’s cool to even make the cut for these guys. They try to halve the field, or something like that, so to make the cut is good. I think that’s when you make your money – when you make the cut – so that was good for him.
Lilly: That’s great. Did you complement each other at all? And by that I mean, not like “Hey, dude, you’re looking good.” I mean, were there things that you brought to the course either in terms of your attitude or your temperament that may have helped him out?
Jason: I don’t know, man. I don’t know if I could take credit for that. But, yeah, you try to keep it light and not be too serious, you know what I mean?
Lilly: Yeah. (so profound
)Jason: Otherwise, it gets a little bit like – I don’t know – it’s not as fun and I don’t think you do well, in general. And I think that’s true of anything. You know, you’ve got to kind of have an “un-serious” nature about what you do. But, I try to do that; try to inspire that where I go.
Lilly: Did you find that playing in public with the pros – did that affect your game at all?
Jason: Dude, it makes my game sharper, man! ‘Cuz you have people watching, so you don’t want to embarrass yourself. (laughs) You know, like the first shot is sort of the toughest one – or if you have a little putt to make or something like that – if you miss it and everybody groans, you feel like you let down the whole world.
Lilly: (laughs) I’m thinking you’re used to being in the limelight – I guess that golf is a little different than acting in that respect. But, maybe not.
Jason: I’m definitely more certain about acting, you know, than I am about golf.
Lilly: (laughs again) I want to talk a little about how the tournament worked. I know it’s a “better ball” tournament and that meant when you’re working as a team, whoever did better on any given hole – that was the score that was going to count.
Jason: That’s right.
Lilly: So if Justin made par and you got a birdie, then your score is the one that’s going to go on the scorecard, right?
Jason: That’s exactly correct.
Lilly: I see that Justin had a 69, a 69 and a 67 over the first three days, but your team scores were, like, 63, 63 and 65, so – to me – that says you made a contribution.
Jason: Yeah! I did OK, you know? I mean I didn’t play badly, that’s for sure. You know, I think we did a little bit better than average, for the teams, so I was happy. I actually had work stuff that I was working on before the tournament, so I didn’t get as much chance to practice – going out – before we did it. So, it was different then, say, last year, when I kind of was working on my golf game a little more before we got there, but hopefully if we do it next year, uh, I’ll get in there more.
Lilly: I was going to ask you, if they invite you back and work permits, you’ll do it again next year?
Jason: I think I would. I like it – it’s fun. And you get to see – there’s some great artists there, man, and they perform. They had a great concert in the park and it was beautiful, man. Josh Kelly and Joe Don from Rascal Flatts – it was just awesome. The guys are just great artists. It was beautiful to be out there and watch them – kind of like a vacation with a bunch of friends.
Lilly: That’s wonderful.
Jason: Yeah.
Lilly: One thing I noticed watching the Golf Channel coverage – I can probably tell you the handicap of about 6 different celebrities, but unfortunately –or fortunately, depending on how you look at it – they didn’t mention yours. Are you willing to share with us what your handicap is?
Jason: Oh, yeah. I was an 8 for this tournament.
Lilly: Wow! You’re right in the middle of the pack – that’s great. They were focusing on some celebrities, some didn’t get mentioned – and of course your fans were disappointed not to see you out there. We’re glad that you had a good time and did pretty well.
What charity were you playing for?
Jason: Oh, well, they have certain charities set up and there’s a list of like three pages of different charities that they had.
Lilly: They’re all regional – South Carolina?
Jason: There’s Girls’ Club, Boys’ Scouts of America, you know different things like that and so it’s just all good, you know? … There are different charities and there are certain – the volunteers that come out to help with the tournament are people that work with those charities, so, you know, they come out and support it – the tournament – and, not in return, but they give them money as well for the different activities that they’re involved with.
Lilly: Gotcha. (another brilliant response on my part - oy
)How long have you been playing golf? Is this something you started when you were real young? Or is this something you picked up recently?
Jason: Yeah, like my dad would take me out to the driving range when I was a kid, you know, like eight years old or whatever. He used to be very good. I mean, we have pictures of me in a car seat in a golf cart and those were, like, some of the first pictures of me when my dad would take me out and play golf.
Lilly: Oh, my gosh! (suppresses inner squeal)
Jason: (He’d put me in the)… car seat – just, you know, hang out. (laughs)
Lilly: Uh, any chance of putting that up on your new website? That’s something that I imagine a lot of people would get a kick out of seeing. (laughs)
Jason: OK. I’ll definitely put in a request for that.
Lilly: OK. (still giggling) You have a reputation, at least in the public eye, as being a really well-centered, kind of easy going guy. When you get out on the golf course, does a competitive streak come out? Do you get real serious, like you really want to win, or is it more about competing with yourself?
Jason: No, I like to win at what I do, but it’s not like I want to wipe someone else out so that I can get into the first-place slot. You know what I mean?
Lilly: Not cut-throat.
Jason: Yeah, not like serious or evil with it, you know what I mean?
Lilly: You’re determined?
Jason: Yeah! You like to do well and I think that’s a cool quality in people. You have to have that, I guess, even as an actor, you know, because you gotta beat out 200 other people, you know? So it’s like, what have you got to do to do that? And you look at that’s how good you have to be.
Lilly: Right.
Personally, what do you get from playing golf that you don’t get from acting?
Jason: Oh my gosh. (laughs) I don’t know – you’re making all the questions so serious. I don’t know if I treat it that way. I just kind of go out there and just do it. But I guess it’s relaxing, you know, and, I like that you can never really beat the game. There’s always, like, one or two other things you could have done a little bit better or whatever. It’s just kind of a life-long game. You can play until you’re old.
Lilly: Well, that might be said of acting too, though. So, maybe there’re more similarities than differences.
Jason: Absolutely. There are similarities in that way, I guess.
Lilly: Um, I’ve got to ask you – there was a scene in episode 3 of Moonlight where Josef is taking some putting practice in his office. Did the writers know that you were a golfer, or was that just a happy coincidence?
Jason: It was a happy coincidence – and originally we had it scheduled on the driving range, so it was going to be like, you could take full swings. And then they moved it inside and we had the little putting machine. But I made it! I made it, you know. I don’t know if anybody caught it…
Lilly: Well, we saw that – but we didn’t know how many takes that took…
Jason: One, baby, one!
Lilly: (laughing) All right! (still laughing) And I love the little holstering the putter action at the end of that too – that was nice.
Jason: Yeah. There’s a great golfer that’s famous for doing that. You know about him?
Lilly: I don’t.
Jason: Yeah, his name is Chi Chi Rodriguez…
Lilly: OK – I’ve heard the name … (at this point, I want to slap myself, because of course I’ve heard of Chi Chi Rodriguez…
)Jason: Whenever he would make a long putt, he’d do this, like, swordsman thing and then holster it. It was sort of an homage to him, I guess.
Lilly: That’s wonderful.
I just want to tell you that so many people were watching in hopes to get a glimpse of you. You have been so missed on the small screen and, uh, the Golf Channel just didn’t come through for us. We were starting to wonder if maybe you did something to seriously piss them off that they weren’t going to show you on television.
Jason: No, I think they just kind of follow the guys who were in contention for the win, you know what I mean….
Lilly: Well, that’s debatable...
Jason: I think they also had cameras at one of the courses? I’m not certain of that.
Lilly: Yeah, they followed Thornblade most of the time, but they did cut to Bright’s Creek and Carolina Country Club for highlights of, you know, either some of the leaders or some of the celebrities when they weren’t at Thornblade.
Jason: Gotta get ‘em to give me some highlights next year, huh?
Lilly: I would hope so. We have to talk to somebody about that.
Jason: Well, I’ll try to do that for you then.
Lilly: (laughs) All right.
Now, I have one non-golf question for you if you have a couple more minutes.
Jason: Yeah, sure – go ahead.
Lilly: It’s with regards to the “Sleeping Beauty” episode of Moonlight. I got my hands on a script last year right before the Moonlight Gala in November. And I brought it and I had you sign it and I never read it until, like, a month later. And I found at the end, this really great, very small scene where Josef goes to John Whitley’s penthouse for one last confrontation. It would have been so powerful, but it never showed up in the final edit. I asked Trevor Munson about it – he didn’t even know if they ever shot it because, I guess, the writer’s strike happened right in the middle of that episode. Did they ever shoot that?
Jason: You know, yeah, we did shoot it. And, I don’t know if our episode was running long, or something – I think that’s what I remember, because it was just an awesome scene. Very well lit, beautiful – the guy did such a great job.
Lilly: I can imagine, because just reading it, I could hear your voice saying those lines and I think it would have been awesome. On our forum, right now, we were having a discussion of what that scene would have meant in terms of dramatic impact and in terms of closure. Any thoughts of yours, if you have been able to make the decision to include it? Anything you want to share with us?
Jason: Yeah, I just worked on that scene a lot and I remember that monologue, or whatever, and the director gave me some really great notes on it, as well. It was just so beautiful in the way it was lit with this soft, warm light – and he was kind of in poor health – it was just awesome the way it was shot. So, I don’t know…
Lilly: Now, why couldn’t they have given us something like that on the DVD’s?
Jason: I don’t know. Wouldn’t that have been great?
Lilly: That’s the kind of thing we would love to have seen.
I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to do this. You must be exhausted after traveling and all that, and I really, really appreciate it.
Jason: Aw, … no problem at all.
Lilly: Oh, one other thing – your website just came up a week ago.
Jason: Yeah!
Lilly: After all that time – like a year after that marathon survey – and it looks great. I don’t know if you’ve had a lot of feedback on it, but what I’m seeing and hearing from people is that they think it’s awesome.
Jason: OK. That’s cool. Thanks for that. And I appreciate all the surveys – that was really kind of people to do that and help me out with that.
Lilly: Thank you very much. And, good luck. We’re kind of hoping and crossing our fingers – I know the upfronts are on Wednesday. We haven’t heard a lot about your pilot, so I don’t know what’s going to happen there, but whatever – whatever happens there, we wish you all the best.
Jason: Cool. Well, thank you very much. And we were really happy with the show, so whatever happens, we’re pleased with the product anyway, so that’s cool.
Lilly: Well, that’s great, but we want to see you back on the small screen – or the big screen –any screen!
Jason: (laughs) OK. You’re the best. Thank you so much.
Lilly: Thanks, Jason. Take care.
Jason: OK. Buh-bye.
Lilly: Buh-bye.
listening to his voice on the phone!
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to lilly. Plus it was very obvious that you watched the tournment. That had to have made him happy. 
