Haven: Chat with Laura Mennel Matthew Mcguiness & Gabrielle Stanton

Syfy’s original series Haven is adding Laura Mennell to the fold and we had the supreme pleasure of chatting with her as well as with show-runners Matt McGuinness and Gabrielle Stanton.

See what she had to say below and be sure to tune into Haven tonight for an all new episode.

Is she a threat to Haven? Can they trust her?
Laura Mennell: Well I think that’s part of the fun of this new introduction of Charlotte being this CDC — epidemiologist working for the CDC because I mean, yes, generally speaking she does pose a bit of a threat which is kind of interesting coming into town, coming into Haven, not only as an outsider but as this women working for the CDC where Haven’s secrets could be exposed to possibly the worst person possible. But yes, I mean throughout this season you’ll get to see whether she is a threat, whether she’s not a threat, whether she possibly could help. I think that’s part of the fun of it all.

Matt McGuinness: ‘Cause if the question specifically is about can people trust her, I think it’s an excellent question and I think the answer is some will and some won’t and that’ll create really good conflict I think. Some people will recognize Charlotte for the potential threat that she either is or could be, and other people will begin to see her as someone who may actually be a big benefit to the town. And those people will have obviously completely different viewpoints and find themselves in conflict about what to do about this CDC agent.

Working with Adam Copeland
Laura Mennell: Oh Adam is just a sweetheart. He’s really lovely. He has a heart of gold. I think it’s so funny you know coming into a new job when you know you’re going to be working with new people. You always get curious and you do a little bit of research and I knew that he was like this pro-wrestler guy and you know, you see the pictures of him all muscled up and all tough but he’s honestly just such a sweetheart and so lovely to work with as an actor and as a person. And you know you’d come to set every day and he’d talk about his lovely girlfriend and his super, super sweet lovely little baby called (Lyric) and yes, we had a lot of fun, we’d joke around and we’d work really well together so hopefully that comes across. I think it will throughout the season. He’s been great. He’s so lovely and wonderful.

Matt McGuinness: And his dogs? Did he talk about his dogs?

Laura Mennel: Oh my god I saw the tiniest of dogs but I can’t remember its name right now, but his tiniest little old one who was super cute and lovely. It’s just so nice to see this big hulky guy with a heart.

Matt McGuinness: I’m not, if I’m not mistaken, Adam has among other things, a teacup poodle.

Gabrielle Stanton: Yes, that’s it.

Laura Mennell: Yes, yes, that’s the one. Which I love, I love that.

Being directed by Lucas Bryant
Laura Mennell: He’s a great actor and so I was curious to see what he’d be like as a director and he’s a lot of fun. He’s really, really supportive to his actors and his crew and he was really great.
I think what I loved the most about being directed by him was he really encouraged getting to play around with different things and would really give you the time as an actor to be creative and try new things and just to see where it would go. To see what would work, to just try it which was really great. And, I gained a lot of respect for him because that’s a tough job to do and I think he did a great job and I think his episode will honestly be a lot of fun and super weird.

Matt McGuinness: We’re going to chime in here and say that Lucas by all accounts was a fantastic director. And it’s always fun for us to watch and see what directors sort of you know, where their strengths and/or perhaps weaknesses are and actors are always really interesting to me because I think they work from a place of actors. So they work with the actors and they like to work on performance and things like that and that frankly is what I tend to like as well.
So, by all accounts he was a terrific director. And then it was also fun to see the crew really rallying around him. You know I think it was indicative of how fond people are of him up there and these are people that have been working with him for five years in the rain and snow and sleet and whatever else. And you know, there was an opportunity to really ride to the rescue for Lucas and help him as he directed and I think people really did. I was happy to see that, I thought that was a real indication of closeness of people up there.

Ratings
Matt McGuinness: Well you know it’s interesting. Television is sort of a real moving morphing landscape these days. Oura like a lot of television shows, our DVR numbers are virtually the same as our live numbers. And more and more and more and more people, I mean, when I say the same, I mean almost 100 percent of our audience is almost split between live audience and DVR audiences at this time. And I think you know we’re kind of a harvinger of people realizing that people watch television when they want to. I certainly do, a lot of people do. And you know to be honest when I first heard it I wasn’t thrilled. But I think pairing us with wrestling was probably a good thing because Adam has a lot of fans there and I’ve been pleasantly surprised actually at how well it works.

Gabrielle Stanton: I think, I mean I think as Matt said, it’s funny because it’s almost not as important now when you’re on because no-one or very few people, and I think it’s going to become more so this way are watching real time. I mean I have shows that I love that I watch every week but if you ask me oh what night’s it on. I actually don’t know I just know it’s on my DVR when I get home. So, I think, although like Matt said we were a little you know weirded out by the time at first, we’ve come to realize with the ratings and stuff that it’s not making a huge difference in terms of numbers and our audience is absolutely finding us.

Showing up in Haven
Laura Mennell: Yes, gosh, it’s so weird to go back to like the earliest, earliest thing but yes, originally it sort of comes to Charlotte’s radar through Dave right. Dave has this room that has — how would I explain that?

Matthew McGuinness: Dave has a – Dave basically is on a road trip and in 506 and has a car accident where he gets taken to a hospital. The hospital in North Carolina and as part of the, his regular exam, they discover this odd wound on Dave and what we know, but they don’t know, is that that wound is actually a trouble related wound. And the pathology of that wound I’m sure, made Charlotte’s eyes pop out of her head when she saw under the microscope.

Laura Mennell: Exactly

Gabrielle Stanton: In 507 I mean Vince and Dave were very concerned about these test results being out there and Vince tried to get the sample back from the laboratory and he thought he had succeeded but then we discover no. He did not.

Matthew McGuinness: Oh yes, that’s right, yes we did a whole thing about that.

Laura Mennell: Oh that’s right.

Matthew McGuinness: So that’s how it came across, they did everything they could to keep this sample from getting out into the world but it got out.

Gabrielle Stanton: And we thought that that was sort of interesting and ironic because Vince and Dave worked so hard to keep Haven’s secret from the outside world and …

Laura Mennell: They tried to so hard to keep it secret from some of the residents in Haven.

Gabrielle Stanton: The residents too. It’s kind of interesting that Dave would be the one that kind of ended up leaking you know, this vision.

Laura Mennell: And on a side note, I love them. I just love them, they’re so quirky and so great but anyways sorry.

The character’s description
Laura Mennell: How was she originally described? Let’s see. She was originally supposed to be — well I don’t know if she’s really changed that — well she changes throughout the season but, she was originally described to me as this very intelligent, inquisitive, worldly women and I don’t think that’s really changed. I mean she starts off in the beginning as being this very passionate and dedicated women to her job and I love that she’s just so focused on her job in the beginning as the CDC doctor, epidemiologist. And she’s just — I don’t know I think I had a lot of fun with her specifically because she’s not just that women. She’s also very engaging and sweet and warm particularly with Dwight and you’ll get to see multiple sides with her.
But I mean the fun part is, and this was part of — this was a bit of a surprise to me I guess, is that she has a little bit of a mystery to her which I didn’t necessarily know about coming into it all and it’ll take a little while to sort of discover what her true motives are you know as they unravel which is the fun part. I mean that’s what I really love. There’s definitely some really great reveals with her and that was something I didn’t necessarily expect coming into the show.

Matthew McGuinness: Laura, that’s really fun for Gab and I here because I forget

Laura Mennell: Good …

Matthew McGuinness: No but it’s really fun for us to hear because I forget that you know, now there’s been a fair amount of water over the bridge or under the dam or whatever the saying is and we all know so much but I forget when we first talked to you about this character, we did not reveal everything …

Laura Mennell: No, you did not …

Matthew McGuinness: … Because we did not want you to know. That’s really funny I had fun about that.

Gabrielle Stanton: I actually remember the call when we talked to Laura

Laura Mennell: Yes. We had a specific call. Actually, there were two. There was one where you were not going to tell me anything and you had like a secret little oh, we’re going to go on mute for you for just a little bit we’re just going to go away and then you wouldn’t reveal whatever it was. And then it was like the week later when you revealed something to me which we won’t talk about and it kind of blew my mind. That’s all I’ll say.

Gabrielle Stanton: Which makes us super happy because if even the actors don’t see it coming then we are doing our job.

Laura Mennell: Yes, I think the audience will be in for a bit of a shocker and a lot of fun so.

Memorable filming moments
Laura Mennell: Most memorable moments. I think just working with absolutely everyone. And everyone is super sweet and there would be a lot of fun to be had on the weekends with everyone and also working with Adam which was really great. Just like fun quirky little moments. Like, just little things, like I remember being in this one scene with Emily and Richard and it’s supposed of us and it was this cute little scene and Richard had something to say, I can’t remember what it was but, it was like this specific word and it was a difficult word for him to say and it was a difficult word for him to remember and he came in like at the end of the scene and at first it was just me and Emily and I know it was — I probably even shouldn’t be saying this but it was just so cute. And I mean this in he was so endearing in that moment. But, I didn’t know what it was and Emily and I were doing the scene and it was super serious and then she was just starting to giggle just a little bit. And it was like what is she doing? And this is my coverage, why is she giggling on my coverage? And then I started to giggle because I realized what it was and it was cute little Richard in like the corner, like he didn’t even know he was doing it, but he was repeating this one little word like just under his breath, and I don’t think he knew he was saying it and it was just so freaking cute. Just stuff like that and then we just all kind of laughed about it.

I don’t know if he knew that we knew what he was doing but it was just so cute ‘cause he is just such a wonderful man.

Matthew McGuinness: Do you remember the word – do you remember the word?

Laura Mennell: I can’t even remember the word and if Emily was here, she would probably remember the word because she couldn’t stop saying it to me later on after that. It was just, it was really cute. But it was something you know, tricky little word, that was tricky to get off the tongue and he had no idea what he was doing, he had no idea it was coming out of his mouth and it was just, it was kind of priceless.

Matthew McGuinness: If it was a difficult word to say, Gabrielle wrote it.

Laura Mennell: Yes, probably. I had a few though as the epidemiologist in town. Oh my god do you know how many like Google searches I had to do to figure out what the heck I was talking about with all my science talk and little Google tutorials to do how do you take blood? And how do you do this?

Gabrielle Stanton: Oh in the medical – the medical thing is always, always, bad. It’s almost as bad as the sci fi spaceship jargon.

Laura Mennell: It was educational. I’ll say that much. I learned all sorts of weird facts which was great.

Stunt doubles
Laura Mennell: Have I ever gotten a stunt double. Yes, there was a day where I definitely had a stunt double which is bitter sweet for me because I love to watch what they do and I get really excited about it. But I get really excited about it and I want to do it but I know that you know, producers might not want me to get bruises and maybe get in trouble and maybe accidently do bad things to myself. So I get it. But I love stunt days, I think they’re super fun and super exciting and yes, I mean Charlotte will definitely get in there a little at some length but yes.

Researching the role
Laura Mennell: You know with this role specifically I would constantly be doing research yes as I said. Specifically for all the scientific medical jargon and there was quite a bit of it which I enjoy, I find it a lot of fun. I mean I have a lot of weird facts from all sorts of jobs that just kind of are random and in my head and I know I’ll definitely save some of the ones I gained from this job. So yes, I would constantly be you know doing Google tutorials to learn about how to do weird things like you know, just as simple as taking a blood sample or giving a B12 shot, or just weird little things like that which there’s all these little details in it all. And you know doctors and nurses are watching, you kind of want to get it is as best as you can.
I think the main thing for this role specifically wasn’t necessarily to do other types of research to help inform me of the character but more, I think, I had lots and lots of talks specifically with (Gab) and Matt about sort of her back story and how it all ties into all these little intricate pieces of the storyline which he’ll understand as you watch the episodes, it gets very, very complicated. But very, very interesting. So for me, it was more about sort of getting my story straight ‘cause she has a lot going on as character, Charlotte, she definitely does.

Haven airs Friday 7/6c on Syfy