IN CONVERSATION WITH JOSHUA JACKSON
interview JANA LETONJA
Joshua Jackson will star in the highly anticipated Ryan Murphy ABC series ‘Doctor Odyssey’, on which he also serves as an Executive producer, and is premiering this September. Joshua is fondly known for his roles in The Mighty Ducks trilogy and his role as Pacey Witter in ‘Dawson’s Creek.’ He most recently starred in Paramount+ series ‘Fatal Attraction’ and Peacock series ‘Dr. Death’.
Joshua, we’ll be seeing you in ABC’s medical procedural series ‘Doctor Odyssey.’ Tell us more about the story of the series and your character.
The story of the show is about a medical team on a luxury cruise ship. I would call it a grounded fantasy. Everything's beautiful, the clothes are perfect, and the people are smart and charming and funny. There is a real life aspect of dealing with personal relationships, and also the crisis of what happens to people when they get sick on a ship and they're a hundred miles off shore. My character, Dr. Max Bankman, is a man who has always been a very high achieving career driven doctor. We learn that he has had a very intense experience with Covid, and decides that he needs to change his life. He wants to go and live a little and experience things. We meet him at the beginning of the show having taken this major career shift of being a high flying doctor who wants to run his own hospital, to being the head of the medical staff on this cruise ship. He gets thrown into this sort of quasi family with his two nurses and the captain, and the hijinks ensue from there.
Besides starring on the show, you also serve as the Executive Producer. What was most challenging about juggling this dual role on the series?
The most challenging piece about being a producer on any show is that there's an additional amount of responsibility and the time that you have to dedicate. But in many ways, being the lead of a show is very similar. If you're doing it right, it's very similar to the responsibilities that you have as a producer, because your responsibility is not just to show up and know your words and be prepared, but it's also a commitment to the work environment, to the overall quality of the material that you're doing, and to the wellbeing of the people that you're working alongside. I’ve always taken each of these things seriously and now I have the title that makes it my job.
The series is the work of the iconic Ryan Murphy, who is behind many internationally successful series we’ve been able to watch over the last years. How was it working with him, and what did you enjoy the most about it?
The thing that made me want to work with him was his style of dialogue and storytelling. He likes to keep things very fast and crisp and moving, and I enjoy that. I find it fun to be in scenes where the characters don't think between the words. They just kind of get it all out and it keeps on moving. It has a snappy pace, a rhythm to it. But also, and I've appreciated this more as I've been working with him on this show, he has a non-cynical love of television. Ryan has that sensibility. I think he writes television shows from the perspective of a person who deeply loves television and that's been fun. There's no cynicism about what it is that we're doing.
I grew up in Canada, but we mostly watched American shows, and so many of these shows that were made were the types of shows that the critics or the intelligentsia would possibly look down on as popular entertainment. But I loved these shows; they really meant something and I couldn't wait for that one hour of the week when they were airing - you’d sit down with your family and watch ‘The X-Files’ or ‘Law & Order’, whatever it was.
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Fans really got to know you back in the 90s in the beloved series ‘Dawson’s Creek’. How did this series and the role of Pacey impact you personally and your career?
It was impactful on so many levels because it was six years of my life. So personally, I think the biggest impact was that it was the job that made me realize that I was a professional actor. Before that, I was a kid who was also acting. And that was the first time I realized that this can be a career; that you could do this for a living into the future. This gave me an opportunity to do it every day, whether I wanted to or not, whether I was excited about the material or not excited about the material. You just have to go every day and commit yourself to this work rhythm, which is quite intense. It’s what I could imagine going to drama school would be like. You have to do it, it's your curriculum.
I worked with five other young actors and we were all going through the same things and every day we showed up and every day we tried to find a way to make it fun, keep it interesting, and do the best that we could. I think that really set me up for the rest of my career and the way that I approach work. On the personal side, it completely financially changed my life; this work gave me a financial freedom that I had never had before.
You basically already kind of answered my next question, but is there any moment in your life that defined the beginning of your passion and interest in acting prior to being on set of ‘Dawson’s Creek’?
There's a lot of them, but the first one that jumps to my mind right now is when I was 15 years old and I was shooting the second ‘The Mighty Ducks’ movie. We were in the Anaheim Pond and for a couple of days that we were there, we had literally 10,000 or 15,000 extras and they were looking for autographs. On one of these days, I just walked out through the tunnel and went straight back to the locker room and didn't stop. I remember Emilio pulling me aside and saying “Don't ever do that again. These are the people who give you the opportunity to be able to do this, you always need to remember that.” I think that was one of the many important things that I was taught by watching and listening and asking questions of the adults that I was working with.
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Besides your on screen work, you’ve also performed on Broadway, on London’s West End, and other stages. What thrill does performing on stage present to you, and what do you enjoy most about being on stage?
It's the immediacy and the ownership. In the job that I'm doing right now, my normal job, an onscreen job, there can be weeks or months before the performance translates into the final product. Whereas when you're on stage, after you have done your rehearsal or show every night, that is the final product. Every performance is its own thing, every audience interacts with the performance differently, and every performance itself is different. So there is an immediacy that you get from that. There's also the adrenaline rush that things can go wrong and how you can right them when they do. This provides an ownership as an actor that you just don't have in any film medium. I give my performance to the director, to the editor and to the producer; they then go through the process. I have some say, but ultimately it's not mine. It's a collection of people who make that performance. And when I’m on stage, that's all mine.
Being a dad, what example and values would you like to set for your daughter growing up?
Curiosity and integrity. I hope to set an example for her of the willingness to suffer through noble pain. There will be things in your life that are difficult and worth it, that maybe people around you will not understand the value of, but if it's worth it to you, it's worth sticking through. I feel like it's so easy to get pushed off. And I think also for young women, it's getting better, but so often young women are told to be quieter and smaller and not take up space. I just know she has natural curiosity, this beautiful ever expanding mind, but also she's fiercely self-possessed. She knows what she likes, she knows what she doesn't like, and she's not afraid to tell you the difference between the two. I hope to cultivate that in her and with her throughout her life.
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With your very busy schedule, what activities do you enjoy the most on your days off? And is there perhaps any new one that you would like to take on in the near future?
I will not be taking on anything new in the near future. Between my job and being a dad, I have my hands full. But truly, and this probably sounds trite, but I just really enjoy spending time with my daughter. She's at a beautiful age. It is magical to be able to experience the world fresh through her eyes, and it is a constant source of joy to watch her spread her wings. She just started school and just seeing a big girl, as she likes to be called now, blossom and spread her wings as she steps out into the world is a wonder. There's a part of my heart that breaks because she's not just my baby anymore because now she has started her independent life. To see the bravery with which she stepped into and the tenacity with which she is leaning into, how much she wants to have this space that's just hers, even at four years old, is tremendously moving and gratifying as her father to see what a wonderful young girl she is.
You have wrapped the Sony Pictures feature film ‘Karate Kid’. What can you tell us about this film and role.
I cannot tease very much, honestly. I can tell you that there will be fresh faces and familiar faces, and Ben Wang, the young man who plays the Karate Kid, put himself through an unbelievable amount of work to be able to pull off the stunts. In a way, that is kind of unique now. The fight sequences are actual bodies in actual motion, not CGI. It’s truly this young man doing his thing and it's really impressive.
TEAM CREDITS
talent JOSHUA JACKSON
photographer DENNIS LEUPOLD
stylist ADAM BALHEIM at THE ONLY AGENCY
groomer DIANA SCHMIDTKE
digital tech GRACIE NEWTON
1st assistant TOMMY BLANCO
styling assistant JOHN CELAYA
producer SADIE E.SCOTT
set designer ALI GALLAGHER
art department assistant ZORAN RADANOVICH
editor TIMI LETONJA
editorial director JANA LETONJA
cover design ARTHUR ROELOFFZEN
