OHP “Dishes” With TAC! 

Outlander Homepage Originals 

By Janis Hines

Last Friday I had the distinct pleasure of speaking with Marlise Boland and Elyse Ashton,  the hosts  of the wildly popular Outlander recap show, OutlandDish, which can be seen on The Anglophile Channel on YouTube.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with The Anglophile Channel (and I find it hard to believe that there are verra many of ye out there, ye wee gomerels), it is an Anglophile’s paradise “Dedicated Exclusively to British Entertainment, Arts & Culture!”

 

For British television recaps, there is DowntonDish, OutlandDish, and PoldarkDish.  Want celebrity interviews, set visits, and more British culture than you can shake a brolly at?  Check out Backstage with the Anglophiles, On the Red Carpet with the Anglophiles and the Favorite British Artist of the Year Awards (which were snagged by our very own Sam Heughan and Caitriona Balfe this year!).  Interested in British Films?  Why not settle in with a nice wee dram and watch BritFlix?  If you think Britannia Rules (and we KNOW you lassies love those British, Scots and Irish accents!), there’s something for everyone over at The Anglophile Channel! 

Ok, so I admit it, I was a wee bit nervous about controlling my fangurl crush on Marlise and Elyse, but they couldn’t have been nicer, more fun or more generous with their time during our interview.  So here it is; I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

OHP:  “Hi Marlise and Elyse.  Thank you so much for taking the time to speak to me!

MB:  Great to talk to you.  Tell us a bit about yourself and your blog.

OHP:  Well, we’re three women who met on Twitter through the Outlander fandom and just really hit it off together.  We were already fans of the books and the show, and we decided to start a fansite together. Dorianne and I are on the East coast, and D is in California.  I’m really excited to be interviewing both of you…we’re all big fans of your OutlanDish show!

MB:   Thank you! Sorry about all the reschedules.  We’ve been so busy doing Poldark Dish, my daughter’s in a play, and Elyse has been really busy…

OHP:  No problem at all!  Your daughter, Juliette, is the singer, right? 

MB:  Yes, she does musical theater.

OHP: I saw some of her videos online. She has a beautiful voice!

MB: Thank You!

OHP: So do you, for that matter.  Came across and old video from 12 Oaks Entertainment.

MB: (laughing) Thanks.

OHP:  Elyse, do you sing as well?

EA: No, but I’ve done some movies.  Played a lot of naughty girls in films.  I’ve screamed a lot in movies. (laughing). 

OHP:  (laughing).  I saw your IMDB page…quite an impressive list!

EA: Actually, I have an issue with my IMDB listing…it says “Elyse Ashton, Born to Lose” (laughing)

OHP: No!

EA: That’s the most popular listing (laughing).  Or maybe they just use the most embarrassing title first!

OHP: Oh no!  That’s too funny!

So, I saw that you posted on Twitter that you were headed to England and Scotland.  Any word yet from the Outlander people if you’ll be able to visit the set?

MB: I tweeted Tall Ships, Maril, and Terry.

OHP:  I saw that Sam was rooting for you. He tweeted “Hey, can anything be done about this?”

MB:  Sam did?  That’s so nice! He’s such a sweetheart!

I just told them we were heading over, we’ll have all of our equipment and if there’s chance we can do a set visit that would be great.  It would be great fun. I didn’t go through any of the official Starz people.  Sometimes it’s better to just use personal contacts.  I’m sure Starz gets inundated with those kinds of requests.

OHP:  That would be great if you can…it would be so interesting to watch them filming.

EA:  And we’ll come bearing gifts!

OHP:  Well, don’t bring nougat or you’ll have a big fight on your hands!  Sam was “accused” of stealing Maril’s nougat from France.  There seems to be some bitter feelings there (laughing).  The tweets over “nougat-gate”  were really funny.

MB: (laughing) Well he likes to drink…perhaps a wee dram of something would be better!

EA:  We could hide the whisky IN the nougat! (laughing). Scotch dipped nougat!

OHP: Great idea!  Now that’s a money maker!

MB: (laughing)

OHP:  Speaking of Scotland…will you both be heading back there for the Season 2 Premier in the spring?  We’ve heard some things that they may be holding the premier there next spring…but I don’t know if those rumors are true.

MB:  Really?  I don’t know.   I haven’t heard that.   If there’s a Premier there and we’re included, we would be there with bells on!  We’ve been a little out of the OL loop lately since we been so busy with PoldarkDish, just coming off of Comi-con, and prepping for England.  But Elyse stays in pretty close touch with the actors and with casting news, though.

EA:  I try.  And don’t let this get around, but I’m really a Francophile, too (laughing).

MB:  Yes, Elyse speaks beautiful French!

EA:  I love France, French films, French TV, I’ve got my tidbits from Cinq Mondes (laughing)… so I’m really excited about the next season and the new casting! There’s a lot of interesting history between France and Scotland, so I’m really just doing back flips over this next season.  And even when they go back to Scotland….that’s hardly a punishment!

OHP:  I cannot wait to see all of Terry’s costuming, I’m so excited I can’t stand it! From the little we’ve seen, the costumes for the French Court will be amazing!

MB:  Oh, I know.  And we both think Terry was cheated out an Emmy nomination.

OHP (interrupting):  They all were!

MB:  They were, but especially Terry.  Her creations- from the wedding gown, to the kilts and all those beautiful pieces, the tartans…all so beautiful.

EA:  We got to see them up close at the Exhibit they had in LA. You could really see all the detail; it was so subtle and beautiful…the closer you got the more you appreciated them.

OHP:  Yes, they had a display of some of the costumes in NY at the mid-season premier…really magnificent.

MB:   They were gorgeous!  And knowing her work we can’t wait to see what she comes up with for next season.

EA:  And maybe they’ll have a garage sale of the first season’s costumes! (laughing).

OHP: Yes! You guys need those for OutlandDish! 

MB:  Ooh, are we going to get new costumes for season 2?

EA: I don’t know…we already have pretty big hair for Poldark!  It’s a little earlier than Marie Antoinette, but it’s still pretty close. 

OHP:  And they put lots of interesting stuff in that hair!

EA: Yeah…and some of the stuff that got in wasn’t meant to be there! (laughing)

OHP:  That would be great to see you guys in those French Court costumes!

MP: (Laughing) We’d love that!  And if Terry would like to design two costumes for the OutlandDish girls, they couldn’t possibly be more uncomfortable than the ones we designed for ourselves!

OHP:  The 3 of us love your OutLander recaps, and I’ve been following you since you started doing DowntonDish.  I loved Stories from the Anglo-Files, too, because I thought would fit right in.  Just throw me a man with a British accent and stick a fork in me, ‘cuz I’m DONE!

MB: Really?  Fantastic!  You should send us your story! (laughing)

EA:  The DowntonDish  ladies kind of roughed it up when we started OutlandDish.  Our director, Paul, Marlise’s husband, said “you go through DowntonDish and never say a bad word (MB laughing in background), and then you got to OutlandDish and started going crazy!”  Every time we screwed something up the f-bombs would fly… (laughing) so when we go back to DowntonDish, we have to wash our mouths out…!

MB:  Yes…pinkies up during DowntonDish!

OHP:  When you do your recaps, you do kind of a “speed recap” and I always wondered how many takes you need to do that without laughing!  It must be a lot harder than you make it look.

MB:   We do laugh!  It’s thanks to the talent of our editor that it looks easy!  We each watch the episodes independently, then get together at our Anglophile studios and sort of compare notes, but really we just sit down in front of the cameras and start going through the notes and memorizing on the spot.  And then we start one chunk at a time.  We just edit as we go, and the jokes just happen naturally, depending on the mood we’re in and how funny we are that day. Then the three of us collaborate on the silly bits that we do, made up on spot, like the Boogie Woogie Scottish Boy.

 

OHP:  I loved that bit!

EA: Like on Poldark, the Cornwall Cougers just came from a random comment I made (MB laughing).  We added pompoms and away we went.  We both have a lot of random props!

OHP:  (laughing) It would be interesting  to raid your garages…

MB:  There are never any cue cards. We just memorize it and we shoot as we go.

EA:  We dream of having a teleprompter… someday (laughing)

MB: Nah..they probably wouldn’t like it, then!  So it’s all done on the spot, and by take 30 or so, there’s a lot of profanity that happens in between takes (laughs), and then we get our most excellent editor, who happens to be my husband..

EA: Bless him!

MB: Yes, bless him…to go through all the footage and edit out the best bits and put them all together to make us look like we know what we’re doing (laughs).

OHP:  How did you two meet?

MB:  Wow that goes way back…Pride and Prejudice.

EA:  Yes, Pride and Prejudice.

MB:  I had started a theatrical tea catering company.  I wanted to do Afternoon Teas and then in between each course, actors would come out and act out Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.  So I wrote a ninety page script from the book and then held auditions for the cast.  Elyse came out and was the PERFECT Elizabeth Bennet.

EA:  Because I had it almost memorized!

MB:  So she was cast as Elizabeth Bennet in our theatrical teas, and we kept in touch after that.  And then came Stories from the Anglo-Files, and she was perfect for that. And we just became friends…we had so much in common.  Then doing the Dish Shows and everything, and we traveled together…So that was really the beginnings of Anglophile…I mean we had already been “anglophiles”, but it was the beginning of our mania with wanting to do something with it!

OHP:  Ok….quick question, putting you both on the spot:  Jennifer Ehle or Keira Knightly?

Both:  Jennifer Ehle!

OHP:  laughs…ding, ding, ding…correct!

MB: (laughs) You already knew the right answer to that!

OHP:  And there’s nothing like Colin Firth in a wet shirt!

EA:  Yes!

OHP:  Except for maybe, Sam, in a wet shirt!

MB:  I mean I love Matthew Macfadyen and Keira Knightly, but that (with Colin Firth/Jennifer Ehle) was such a beautiful version (of Pride and Prejudice).

OHP:   That’s actually how I came to Downton Abbey.  This is really a little sad (laughing)… I saw Downton Abbey before it ever aired in the US because the “Amazon.com gods” determined that “based on my previous purchases, I would like Downton Abbey”…and they were right! I had never heard of it, but saw who was in it, knew I would love it, and ordered the whole first season.

MB:  Wow.  (laughs).

EA:  It was like at Comi-com….we’d see a really tall guy and be like “Mr. Palmer, do you see anyone we know? (in an English accent).

MB: Right! It’s funny the lines we know…(laughing).

OHP:  Glad I’m not the only one who does that!

So when you go to those events, how long do you have to wait before all the celebs come by?  Is it an all-day thing?

MB:  At a typical red carpet, they generally have press and media check-in about an hour before the Red Carpet opens and the then the celebrities start arriving.  They give you about an hour to do a Red Carpet to do interviews with the celebrities.  But usually the A-list celebrities, like Benedict Cumberbatch, are at the end, so by the time they get to you they have, like, 30 seconds for you.

OHP:  I saw you grab him, though!  I was taking notes on how you did it!

MB:  laughing…You saw that?  It’s funny because no one was really getting to Benedict at that one.  And it was one of our first really big Red Carpets, and we were interviewing Ralph Fiennes at the time, who I absolutely love, and I just kept talking to him.  Meanwhile my husband was tapping me on the shoulder and whispering “You’re gonna lose Benedict.  You’re gonna lose Benedict.  He’s walking away.”  And out of the corner of my eye I see him walk past, and I’m like “Oh no!”  So I had to cut Ralph Fiennes off!  I was like “Thank you so much for talking to us.  Oh, by the way, this is my daughter and she’s huge Harry Potter fan…can you please talk to her?”  So as he starts talking to her, I turned and reached out to grab Benedict and bring him back (laughing).  I’m thinking, oh my God, I just blew off Voldemort!

OHP:  A dangerous thing to do!

MB:  (laughing)

EA:  And  then at Comi-con, everyone was in rooms, so we’d  get there early and get set up and try to relax beforehand and then the PR people would come rushing though in a panic and say “you need to NOT be here!” and so we’d get to go wait out the hall and then come back!

MB:  But this Comi-con was a lot nicer than other Red Carpets that we did because it wasn’t as crowded as usual.  I guess there were a lot fewer of us that got accepted, so it wasn’t as rushed and crazy, and it allowed us to have more time with the artists.  For example, we had more time with Caitriona and we didn’t have to rush too much.  I mean, we were given a limit on questions…

EA:  And we were the only ones who were able to work in the song!

OHP:  Yes…the Happy Anniversary song!

EA:  (laughs)

OHP:  AND…I have to tell you that I was very impressed that you two were the only reporters to get Sam Heughan to say “Honeypot”!

Both:  (laughing)

EA:  And we got the dance, too!

MP:  When we brought it up we thought he just wasn’t going to go there.  I’m sure everyone was trying to get him to say it.  And then Caitriona said “Well, you’re just going to have to wait and see” and I thought “Oh, we’re not going to get it” and then I look over (at Sam) and those little horns came out and he gets this mischievous little grin on his face and he just started to riff on the honeypot and all the various ways you could eat it!

OHP:  I was on the floor when I saw it…so hilarious.  Is he as nice as he appears to be?  He seems like he is just a riot.  And Caitriona too…she seems like she’d be a great person to go on a Pub Crawl with!

MB:  She is really sweet…they both are.  He is a sweetheart and so full of personality.

EA:  He’s kind of like Tigger!

MB:  (Laughs)

EA:  Remember when you were giving him the Anglophile Award?  He was trying to take hers (Cait’s) too! He’s like “Oh and what’s this?  I’ll take that one and that one…”

MB:  Yes. (laughing)

EA:  He’s so fun…really even sweeter than you’d expect.

MB:  I know…I mean you see him on screen as Jamie and he’s this big, rugged, strapping Highlander, and then you meet him in person and he’s just so sweet and fun and funny and he’s  got this personality that we just really enjoy interacting with.

EA:  And Caitriona too.  She couldn’t be any nicer about answering questions.  Such a sweetheart.

MB:  I love her because she’s always so gracious and elegant, but fun. And Sam’s just kind of goofy! (laughs)

OHP:  They’re really adorable together.  I know people want them to be a real couple, and I don’t think they are, but they’re just so darned cute together!

EA:  They get on really well.  They have a really good working relationship and have fun together.

MB:  They have such great chemistry.  That’s really a testament to their talent and artistry that we believe them to be a couple, you know.  Because they really do have that great chemistry.

OHP:  They really do.  How about the other cast members?  And Ron Moore?  I actually spoke to Ron in NY, totally by accident, and he was so nice and gracious to everyone.  NY was just crazy!

EA:  We saw him at the Costume Exhibit in LA and he did take the time to sit down and talk to us there.  He had some really interesting things to say about the atmosphere in Scotland at such a historic time and he was really forthcoming.

MB:  Yeah…he really gave us some great insight into his process and what the climate is like on the set. He really painted a picture for us, which was great fun for us to hear.

OHP:  They all seem to be such nice people.  Even Tobias, who we now all love to hate, especially thanks to the last two episodes! (laughs)

MB:  We talked to Tobias way before the airing of the Wentworth episodes and his character got really bad (laughs)…

EA:  I remember that you were talking to someone else and I asked if he could wait for a moment so we could speak to him.  And he’s really tall, so he was looking down at me and smirking (and I was wondering why).  He just had this very knowing smirk on his face, probably thinking “If you only knew what was coming in the last episodes.”

MB:  (laughing)

EA:  He was standing so close to me then.  I think if I interviewed him now, after those episodes, I wouldn’t know where to look! (laughs).  Marlise has also interviewed Graham McTavish.  I was behind the camera that day, and he was wearing this kind of modern kilty-thing, and I kept trying to get Marlise to look down at this really cool kilt.  And she said later that she couldn’t see it because she couldn’t take her eyes off his tight, black sweater!

MB:  (laughing) Well, the man is so incredibly fit, he must spend his life at the gym, and had this really tight shirt on!  I just never imagined Dwalin from the Hobbit being so…fit!

OHP:  And tall!

MB:  Yes, much taller.

OHP:  Actually, we were really excited because Graham was our very first celebrity follow on Twitter!

EA:  He’s so cool.  He’s just one of those real “manly men” that does manly things, you know, like tossing cabers.  He just has an air about him.  When he walked in the room, everybody looked!

OHP:  I could see that.  He’s got a very commanding presence.

MB:  Yes.

OHP:  So, when you’re out there on the Red Carpet, and this doesn’t necessarily have to be Outlander related, have there ever been any really funny or strange incidents or interviews that you can tell us about?

MB:  I was talking to Ben Kingsley, and you know, you do your homework to prepare for meeting the artists.  You’re ready to tell them all these wonderful things about themselves (like they don’t already know) like “you’ve been nominated for…” and “you’ve won an Academy Award and a Tony Award for…” and I was going on about all these fabulous accolades, and then he just stopped me in the middle of it, and pointed to my daughter and said, “Do you want to talk to me? “ So I introduced her and he says “Is she an actress?”  And I said yes, and he says “I could tell by the way she carries herself.”  So he stopped the interview, and asked her “Do you want to take a picture with me?” And it was great because it was unexpected and funny and just put us at ease.  Those are some the best interviews you get, when you get off script and everybody’s relaxed and you’re completely yourself.”

OHP:  I can imagine.  It must be nice for the celebrities, too, because they hear the same questions over and over, and they have to be gracious, but that’s got to be tough to do.

MB:  It is...but you kind of vacillate between having to ask the same questions over and over because that’s what your viewers or readers want to know and they may not have already heard it, so you’re doing it for your particular viewership.  At the same time, you know they get bored, like “What was it like shooting the wedding scene completely naked?” when you know they’ve been asked that a hundred thousand times, so you try to come up with something different and refreshing.

OHP:  Well, I know that that’s why the three of us enjoy your interviews so much, because you are refreshing…like singing Happy Anniversary to Sam.  It was totally off the cuff; not the same boring thing, you know?  You get celebrities to relax, and that makes people want to watch your interviews more than someone else’s.

MB:  Aw, thanks!  Again, those are all completely impromptu moments.  You’re already under pressure at those events, and you know your time with the celebrities is going to be very short, so you’ve got to know the questions you’re going to ask.  When you find those golden moments, you take them because that’s what makes it fun.

OHP:  I’m sure they appreciate it, too, because it’s different for them and then they can relax a little bit.

MB:  It’s like Richard Armitage and the chair races (laughing)…I don’t know if you’ve ever seen that.

OHP:  That was great!

MB:  He started it!  We were at an interview where I’d done my homework; we were completely prepared for it.  I had these questions…but then he did something silly, and we all followed suit, and that was it.  It broke the ice and it made for a much better interview.

*Here’s some out-take silliness with for Richard Armitage and Hannibal fans:

OHP:  Speaking of Richard Armitage, there is huge online push to keep Hannibal on the air.  Have you heard anything about that, if another network has picked it up?

MB:  I’ve heard there’s some interest, but at this point it might come down to scheduling. You know, you have all these really incredible artists working on that show, and once a show like that is cancelled, these people aren’t going to be unemployed for long.  So the challenge is, not only getting the network to sign on, but getting the actors freed up at the same time, when they may have been offered new roles.

OHP:  Are you sad that Downton is coming to an end?

MB:  Oh yes!  We had an episode of DowntonDish where Elyse was in full mourning.  That was announced right before our final recap, or just after.  We’ve loved that show from the beginning…we feel like those characters are our friends, and to say goodbye to them is…awful!

EA:  It is! 

OHP:  I’m going to miss it, too.  I hope Lady Edith will finally find some happiness.

MB:  I think Julian Fellowes will wrap it all up nicely for us.

EA:  He knows how crazy we all are! (laughs)

OHP:  Well, that was another reason I decided to purchase the first season, sight unseen, because I saw that Julian Fellowes was involved with it.  I LOVE Gosford Park…it’s one of my favorite films.

EA:  He did two fun novels, too, which would be nice movies.  You don’t really hear talk of it.  One of them is several years old, but the other is a bit newer, but it pre-dates most of Downton Abbey.

MB:  Another interesting thing that he’s doing now is writing books for Broadway musicals.  It’s such a departure for him. He did the book for School of Rock, and for Mary Poppins.  You just don’t think of him as being involved with Broadway theater, but that’s what he’s doing.

OHP:  So have you both always been lovers of English culture and films? 

MB:  My love for England and all things Britannia goes way back to investigating my own roots and relatives from Britain.  I’ve always just been in love with the traditions and the history, the literature; the artists that come out of there.  The traditions like Afternoon Tea…all those aspects of British culture that makes us fantasize about giving it all up and running away.  That’s what the Anglophile Channel is all about; us having these secret obsessions and wanting to chuck it all and run away to England and immerse ourselves in our Anglophile fantasies.

OHP:  Have either of you ever seen that series of PBS programs where they took 20^th century people in Britain and had them “live” in a different time: The 1900 House, Manor House (which was like an Upstairs/Downstairs kind of thing)?

EA:  Yes! And Regency House Party!  I think I wore out my VHS tape of that!  1900 House was fun…and Manor House was a really fun study in character.

OHP:  I also really liked the 1940’s House, WWII is not my favorite time period, but the people they chose were perfect…they just immersed themselves in it.  It was fascinating to watch.

EA:  Yes…I felt so bad for that one lady whose roots were growing out….I don’t think I could do it!

MB:  I’d like to do one like Manor House…like Downton Abbey estate house, or an Outlander version (laughing)

OHP:  Yes…like upstairs/downstairs at Castle Leoch!

EA:  (laughing)

MB:  Yeah, we already know from DowntonDish that Elyse would make a great downstairs maid! (both laughing).

OHP:  So once you finish with your last PoldarkDish tonight, and all of the shows are on hiatus or filming their next seasons, what do you do on the Anglophile Channel?  Any exciting, new upcoming projects?

MB:  Well, when a show is on hiatus, and therefore there’s not any “Dishes” to do, that’s when we try to reach out to do set visits, or some sort of content that is, for example, Outlander-centric.  For instance, we’re going to focus more on merchandise, like Outlander t-shirts, or Cornwall Cougars shirts, you know…”Dish” merchandise.  Because, let’s face it, we’re going to need a bigger costume budget for Season 2 of Outlander! (laughing).  We also use this time to do more interviews, with Sam and Caitriona, other celebrities.

EA:  There’s always plenty to do in between.

MB:  We’ve also been contacted by Outlandish Tours. He invited us to come out and do something with them.  They do Outlander-themed tours to film the locations from Season 1 in Scotland.

OHP:  The three of us have been considering putting together a small group to do something like that…especially if the Season 2 premier’s going to be in Scotland in the spring.   If we can time it around that, it would be perfect because we really want to go and get in the media blog section and work our way in…but we’re starting at the bottom. (laughs)

MB:  Well, that’s how it starts.  In the very beginning we had very few followers, very few subscribers to our channel, but we built it up little by little and it just happens.  And Outlander has a huge fan following.

OHP:  That’s true!  What is your take on the Outlander fan base as opposed to other fan bases?

EA:  They’re incredible!  So encouraging.

MB:  I have to tell you, the Outlander fans have been so incredible to us: really friendly, really supportive, welcoming…like open-arms welcoming, like no other fan base.  And we haven’t seen a lot of craziness and drama…just fun. We’ve met so many nice people, like the SoCal group, who supported us during Brit Week.  We’ve run into that whole group several times.

EA:  They’re really fun ladies!  What’s not to love?  And they’re all so encouraging.  I mean, I’m coming late to the books.  And Marlise kept telling me “You have to read the books!” and I thought “Well, the series is coming up, I’ll just wait for that”, but then the mid-season break came up and I couldn’t take it! I went straight to Amazon and got Outlander, and then I went on to Dragonfly in Amber.  And when I saw it was set in France, I was doing a little happy dance in my chair (laughs). Now I’m on Voyager.  And even though these ladies know the books inside and out, they’re like “Oh, you’re on Voyager? That’s sweet…but you’re going to just keep going with them, you know!”

MB:  I know a teacher who re-reads them all every summer…she just spends her summers with Claire and Jamie.

EA:  In the beginning I was a little biased against them because I generally read classics, and I was like “But I haven’t finished all of Walter Scott yet!”

MB:  I loved the history and time travel aspects of them…that’s what pulled me in.  I love the idea of time travel…you know, touching the stone and being back in another time….but I’d miss my stuff!  I think I’d need a Tardis!

OHP:  Maybe they can make a combination Dr.Who/Outlander series (laughing).

EA:   Yeah…here I am in 1743…I need some nachos!

MB:  I think Diana Gabaldon said she got her original inspiration for Jamie from a Dr. Who episode that featured a highlander named Jamie.

OHP:  That’s right.  And the actor who played the warden at Wentworth Prison, Fraser Hines, was the same actor who was the highlander in that Dr. Who episode that she saw, which was pretty cool!

EA:  I love when they bring people back like that.  They did it in Poldark too.

OHP:  I really love Poldark.  I was also getting hooked on Crimson Fields, but they didn’t renew it for another season.  But, there have been rumors that Rik Rankin might be a candidate to play Roger Mackenzie, which would be great.

EA:  And I wonder when they’re going to announce who will be playing Brianna?

MB:  Yeah…the casting letters went out, I think, last fall…so it’s been a year.

EA:  Pretty soon Juliette (Marlise’s daughter) can go get a henna rinse and go in!

MB: (laughing) Exactly!  But, yeah, they’re keeping a tight lid on those major characters.

OHP:  I know. ..so tight-lipped on Roger and Brianna.  I don’t know if they’re just not saying or if they really haven’t cast anyone yet.  I was hoping they would announce it at Comi-con.

MB:  They told us then “We’re not announcing anything, so don’t even ask.”  It’d be interesting to see an unknown…

OHP:  There have been some names bandied about:  Bonnie Wright, Ginny Weasley from the Harry Potter series, Rose Leslie from Downton Abbey & then Game of Thrones, Amber Skye Noyes, Deborah Ann Woll from True Blood …

EA:  Oh…I think I petered out on True Blood after the third season…it just got too odd. Like, remember what happened to General Hospital and we were all like “Oh, come on! Really?” (laughing)

OHP:  laughs..yeah, it did get weird, but I stuck with it.  I’m a closet Twihard, so I felt like I needed to stick with the adult version of Twilight.

So, I don’t want to hold you up much longer.  One last question:  Any advice for newbies?  Words of wisdom?

EA:  Don’t get frustrated when they put you in the shrubbery. (MB laughs).

OHP:  Well we kind of expect to be in the shrubbery at first! (laughing)

MB:  We had some great experiences on the red carpet that started in the shrubbery.

 

OHP:  Everyone has to start somewhere!

EA:  Yeah, I think that was the first time we interviewed Julian Fellowes, when we were sort of under a bush.

MB:  Right, we got a lot of Downton Abbey interviews then.  I mean, we saw Tom Hanks go by, and then someone came up and asked “Anyone here for Downton Abbey?” and we were like, “YES! Over here!”

EA:  (laughs) I just left my dignity in the dust.  I was waving my arms and wearing a really silly hat, and it made him (Julian Fellowes) laugh, and he came right over to us, and he was just so kind.

MB:  Elyse is willing to throw herself in the path of these artists to score an interview on the Red Carpet (laughing).

OHP:  Our Dorianne would do that! 

                                                                                                  

EA:  Remember, there’s no such thing as bad publicity! (laughs)

OHP:  Ok, well, if you do get to go on the Outlander set when you go over, we would love to get a comment from you when you get back, if you would do that.  And have a great trip!

Finally, I just want to thank you so much for doing this. I’m fan-gurling a little bit because I just love you two, and I’m thrilled that you said yes.  I really appreciate your taking time on a Friday night, especially when you still have to film your last PoldarkDish.  It’s been so lovely speaking with you, and you’re both just a nice as I thought you would be.  I hope we’ll get to meet you in person at one of these events!

MB:  Thank you for requesting the interview, and you’re welcome!

Both:  So, Janis, “I’m Marlise, and I’m Elyse, and we’re OutlandDish!”