The TV Chick

As most of you already know, I adore the CW Network. One of their new (fantastic) offerings this fall is The Secret Circle, which will act as a companion piece to The Vampire Diaries (you all know my love of that show!) The Secret Circle is based on the book series by L.J. Smith (same author of The Vampire Diaries series) and centers around Cassie Blake, who comes to a new town to find out she is a witch and has powers she never even knew about. She meets a young group who call themselves The Circle and practice witchcraft without their parents knowing. One of these circle members is Adam (played by Thomas Dekker), who has to take care of his drunk, troubled father, all while going through high school and dealing with his witch powers. I recently had the chance to talk to Thomas Dekker at Comic Con, who talked about what drew him to the role, the possible relationship between Adam and Cassie (even though Adam is currently dating another girl, Diana) and Adam’s father’s past.

For those who haven’t seen the pilot yet, can you tell us a little more about your character’s background?
Adam is a young guy in high school. He’s sort of a pillar of goodness and sanity in this group. He’s trying to control everybody’s ego and everybody’s desire with their power. And I think the biggest thing is — out of all of them — he definitely would not have chosen to be a witch. He would have just been happy to work at his dad’s bar and drive motorbikes or something. But he definitely wants to use it for good, at this point. We find out later, my element is water, and I think that says a lot about him. He’s very interested in nature and how things work. But [it's] unlike Faye or the other characters who really kind of want to fuck around with it.

Can you talk a little bit about what attracted you to the role of Adam?
First of all, when I was younger, I was deeply fascinated by witchcraft, mainly because I was obsessed with the movie “The Craft,” growing up. As an actor, I always, no matter what the job is, I try to find roles that have a unique duality to them. I don’t ever want to play someone that’s just one thought or one chord. From a role like John Connor to a movie like Kaboom — all the stuff I’ve been trying to do. And I like the opportunity with this character that he’s such an all-American good, grounded, sane guy. He doesn’t seem to have much malevolence or manipulative air, but to be dealing with witchcraft and spirituality and outside realms, there’s a kind of natural and necessary grace and attention to nature and a gentleness that I think is usually connected with female roles. So I like the idea of taking the masculine and the feminine and getting to work that into one person. And we get to play with that even a little more as the show progresses. We get more into spell book and candle type stuff as opposed to just looking at things and making them move.

Kevin said the show’s going to be really scary. Is it going to get scary?
[The second episode] is much edgier than the pilot — in terms of sex, in terms of violence. The level of evil that exists in the adult world, which is exciting I think. It’s definitely a scary show and I think even the pilot sets up a mood and a tone that everything’s a bit off in this town. Everything’s a bit kooky.

In the book, Cassie and Adam become a couple and in the pilot there are hints of that. Will we see more of that?
Yes. For sure. The idea of Cassie and Adam being each other’s fate and each other’s destiny which really I’m excited about — were getting into the backstory of Diana and Adam already, which gives a lot of depth as to why they are together as opposed to just, he’s got his girlfriend. And it becomes a big moral struggle for me and also it brings up the question of well, Diana’s a witch and how is she going to react to whatever goes down in this new situation. And we have to remember who her father is, too. So, it’s cool. When I talk about the show I do a lot of eyebrow raising because I can’t really tell you what’s happening but I need to allude. (laughs)

Are we going to be learning more about Adam’s father?
Yes. Originally, I think they were going to kill my father in the pilot. But we realized there was such a great thing between Adam and his dad. That’s another piece of information about my role is that I care for this troubled alcoholic dad that we decided that I don’t resent him. There’s a lot of understanding there and it goes in some really cool places. So I hope they keep him around for a while, because you know Mr. Williamson loves to kill off parents.

Did you read the books?
No, I did not read the books. When I read the role, I had not read the books and I said to Kevin, “Should I?” and we sort of deduced that for the purposes of the show with the directions it’s going to go, it’s more so about him and I and the rest of us finding what we are playing in this. It’s kind of in the same way as on my old Terminator show, we didn’t sit around and really try and be Linda Hamilton and Edward Furlong. We kind of had to come up with our own take so we’re doing that for now. Maybe once I’ve found it and it’s solid, I’ll eventually read the books.

Are we going to see more of Adam teaching Cassie, like in that nice scene in the pilot?
Yes. We actually get a lot of that to do in the one we’re shooting right now. We joke about it. Every actor’s supposed to say this, but that “Oh we all get along so well,” but we actually really do. And there’s a beautiful kind of group — the six of us. We’re all really different people but we all get along. And Brittany and I did a movie together four years ago where I was a witch and I teach a girl about witchcraft and she’s even caught in a burning car at one point, so there’s weird similarities. So that when I got this, when I read it and I said, “Who’s playing Cassie?” and they said Brittany Robertson, I was like oh my God, here we are again. But we have nice chemistry, I think.

What would you say is the best aspect of your character?
I really like his moral center. In a way it reminds me of my last TV role. It’s a character that has a lot to grapple with, but really has a good moral core and he feels a lot of pain and confusion about this whole love triangle he finds himself in. He has a lot of guilt. But my hope is that he will at some point fall to a little bit of darkness for a while, just because as an actor, that would be very exciting. Even if it’s just an episode, I would enjoy it.

Be sure to tune in Thursday night at 9 PM to the CW Network for the series premiere of The Secret Circle!