The Walking Dead’s Andrew Lincoln

PREMIUM: Andrew Lincoln, the star of The Walking Dead, talks about being number one on the call sheet, setting an example for the numerous cast members, and extras, on the sprawling set in Georgia.

WS: The last time we spoke, you had just lost your TV wife.
LINCOLN: That’s an occupational hazard in the apocalypse, I’m afraid. I’ve lost a lot more people since my TV wife. You know, we still correspond, Sarah [Wayne Callies] and I. She signs off [her e-mails] with DTVW—deceased TV wife.

WS: I’ve heard about the tradition of “death dinners” every time you lose a cast member to the apocalypse. I imagine you’ve had a lot of those in the last couple of years!
LINCOLN: Yes. [Laughs] It’s something I never really thought through when I agreed to do the job. I just thought zombies, apocalypse—not realizing that you make these incredibly intimate and tender and trusting relationships with brilliant actors and friends, and then you have to say goodbye to them. The bonus is I get to work with most of the Screen Actors Guild, in one job!

WS: And a whole lot of extras.
LINCOLN: They’re incredible. The people that play the zombies—the walkers—are hard core. This season in particular, it’s been very, very hot, and wet. It’s probably the same temperature as it was when we first started the show, which was brutal. When you’re feeling sorry for yourself and sweating in your cowboy boots, all you have to do is look across and see somebody with prosthetics on and then you shut up and get on with your day.

WS: What’s in store for season six? The survivors are in a different stage now, having taken up residence at the seemingly secure community in Alexandria. Where is Rick Grimes in this journey?
LINCOLN: We left season five with quite a tumultuous final episode. You have a community in disarray, and the arrival of a long-lost friend, Morgan. You find Rick in a very decisive position. He’s a man who was almost restraining himself toward the end of last season, giving the Alexandrians a chance to get up to speed, as it were, with the realities of the world. You need Rick in a place of no nonsense. I do think that very much the story of this season, in particular what we’ve shot so far, has been about us and them: whether or not [Rick’s group of survivors] can integrate [with the Alexandrians]. But there are two other enormous threats lurking in the wings. All I will say is that this season there have been more zombies per capita than any season to date. It’s a thrill ride, to say the least. It’s been brutal, it’s been brilliant, it’s been incredibly ambitious and also, a nod has to go to [showrunner] Scott Gimple and his brilliant writers’ room. They keep changing up the story, and the way they tell the story. This season, more than any other, they are playing with time and threading some very intricate story plots together. It’s a really bold season in regards to storytelling. That shows some great courage and conviction from the writers’ room, and from AMC for supporting that and allowing them to change up the style and the format of the show. The fans deserve it because they are smart and attentive.

WS: Is the AMC scheduling strategy of having a gap between two sets of eight episodes helpful in terms of allowing you to digest what’s happened in the first half of the season?
LINCOLN: It’s become not just important but absolutely vital. Not necessarily so much for the actors, but for the crew. The crew are magnificent and most of them have been on this show since the beginning. Anybody that’s been to Atlanta, Georgia, in mid-summer knows how brutal the weather can be. We shoot an episode in eight days, which is impossible, actually. Because the bar keeps getting set higher and higher each season, 16 episodes of story is the maximum for the writers’ room. I would hate to speak on Scott’s behalf, but I know how much of a perfectionist he is and how much he cares about this show. He says he never wants a stagnant episode. You don’t want a filler episode, ever, in this show. AMC deciding to do eight and eight not only gives breathing space for the crew to stand down, but it gives the writers an opportunity to do two arcs within one overarching season. You have a season premiere, a midseason finale, and then you have a midseason premiere and an overall finale. You can shape, within one season, more story, more compelling story arcs—and maybe more ambitious story arcs—because of that.

WS: You’ve had five years now with this character. What is it about Rick Grimes that has allowed him to be a leader and survive in these difficult conditions?
LINCOLN: One of his great strengths is the fact that he is very fluid in his leadership. He also doubts himself and he listens to others. If somebody is more qualified than him in a certain area, or has more experience, he will listen to them. Ultimately, one of the things I love about playing him is that when he makes his mind up, he rarely goes back on it. Sometimes you can be fundamentally wrong or corrupt in a decision, but one of the great things about a leader is certainty. Once a decision has been made, he stands behind his decision. That takes great courage and great fortitude. And that’s also why people want to stand behind him.

WS: I heard there’s a “Rick Grimes for President” campaign from some of your fans.
LINCOLN: Maybe about four years ago they wanted Rick Grimes for mayor. Now there is a campaign for the presidency. You know, I’m very concerned about that, I don’t think we need Rick Grimes just yet! [Laughs] He’s a little extremist, or at least he is at this point in the story.

WS: In season five, you put on a security guard uniform at Alexandria—and lost the facial hair. How important were those things for Rick Grimes’s sense of identity after all this time he’s spent looking for something resembling a normal life?
LINCOLN: It was something that had been planned. Two years before we played it out, Scott said to me, I really want to visually see this nadir in all of the survivors’ lives, and just at that point, there is hope again. It made much more sense when I got into the uniform. It was incredibly revealing. Rick has been fervent, wild and tenacious—he had to push the survivors because they were at their lowest ebb. Then they got to [Alexandria]. When Alex [Breckenridge], who plays Jessie in the show, tenderly touches the nape of my neck and the small of my back—no one has been tender or kind to him or any of the survivors for years. That sort of unlocked him in a way, but also made him incredibly vulnerable. As soon as he gets asked to become a constable—which made me laugh; I love the use of the word “constable”—he realizes that this presents an incredible strategy for him. That uniform is like another mask. That scene when he’s speaking to his closest confidantes, Carol and Daryl, on the porch, you realize there is some Machiavellian strategy in all of this. When I played that scene out, it all made sense. I just went, Oh, I get it now! I was channeling the T-1000 [the shape-shifting robot] in the Terminator movies. [Laughs]

WS: What’s fascinating about Alexandria is that while it looks welcoming and pristine, so many of the scenes set there are filled with suspicion and mistrust between your group of survivors and the existing residents.
LINCOLN: There was an opening scene, when we first arrive there, and we walk in and I’m holding [my baby daughter] Judith. We look like a feral pack of wolves. Sasha, under my command, shoots a walker, and I say, “It’s lucky we’re here.” That says it all. Perhaps we’re the virus—the patients overtaking the ward. That for me was a very interesting thing to do. And we’re still in that phase. If this were to happen, how would you redefine civilization and society? How would you build it again in this hell, in this apocalypse? That’s the clash we’re involved in. We left the story [at the end of season five] with lots of things bubbling, with lots of different characters. How are they trying to integrate? Can they integrate? Is it worth integrating? Is there a viable future? And also thrown into the mix are some serious threats just outside the walls.

WS: As the number one name on the call sheet, do you feel a responsibility to set a tone on set, especially when there are all these new characters coming into the show?
LINCOLN: I never want to be one of these benevolent dictators that goes, “We’re so friendly and we’re such a great family!” What I do like to do is welcome people and hopefully lead by example. I care so much about this story, that’s the bottom line. But so do the 350 other people working on it. I don’t think you have to rule with an iron fist. Actors arrive, suitably up for it and excited, and we’ve been so blessed. The biggest compliment we can get is the quality of the actors that have joined our show in season six. They’ve all been absolutely magnificent. And we’ve had that every single year. They very quickly realize that the crew are far more passionate than any other crew they’ve experienced, and everybody wishes them well. You just have to look anywhere on this shoot and everybody is rooting for you. You can’t fake that.

As number one on the call sheet, with the most lines to learn, I’m fortunate that I get to watch all of these brilliant actors joining us and I get to marvel that I’m still around—hopefully!—to work with this brilliant crew and cast. When we started this show, the original DNA of this cast and crew was extraordinary. Everybody came from a theatrical background. We all, like lemmings, jumped off this cliff together and hoped the parachutes would open. And they did. All I care about is honoring those people who created the ethos on this show and are continuing that ethos. And we are still very blessed that there are original members [still on the show]—Melissa McBride, Steven Yeun, Norman Reedus, Chandler Riggs. One of the great privileges has been watching Chandler [who plays Rick’s son] turn into this extraordinary young man. I’m very excited to see what the fans think about his journey this season.