GRIMM: Bitsie Tulloch Discusses This Week’s Juliette-centric Episode

This Friday’s new episode of Grimm, Juliette (Bitsie Tulloch) is literally thrown right into Nick’s ‘other world’ when she is kidnapped by a fire-breathing dragon. You heard me! I was able to find out a little more of what we can expect this season from Juliette’s story and involvement with the creatures of Grimm, in a conference call which took place yesterday with Bitsie Tulloch.

Moderator: I wanted to ask you first off about the upcoming episode. I know you can only speak I’m sure in very general terms but it’s a big one for you character which I’m thrilled about and I wanted if maybe you could tell us what you thought when you first read the script and maybe just your general experiences shooting the episode.

Bitsie Tulloch: Well this scripts was one of the first times that I actually get really like drawn into all of the madness and what I can say because it’s always been on a preview is that my character gets kidnapped and it was very grand in scope actually with the fire-breathing dragon and everything. But it was really cool to shoot; it was a great director that we hadn’t worked with yet.

And I can also say in this episode is the first time I meet Monroe so they’ve been kind of hiding the relationship from me and this is the first time that I meet him. So it’s kind of a great episode in that this one sort of opens up a lot more to happen down the road.

Moderator: That’s great, that’s great. And I also wanted to ask you is maybe how would you perhaps describe your character Juliette and what maybe have been some of the acting challenges you found as well with the role would you say?

Bitsie Tulloch: I think Juliette is very interesting to me because she’s the only one of the six series regulars, she’s the only who, you know, as we all know or think, she’s the only one who’s not a cop and not a monster. So I was really looking forward to being able to sort of project what it would be like for any normal person to be thrown into that situation and to try to deduce what’s going on with the little information that she’s given off of much of which is skewed because Nick is trying to hide all this stuff from me.

I think one of the difficulties that I’ve had is because they’ve been prolonging my getting drawn into and it and my finding out any information was sort of like what kinds of choices can I make with this sort of pattern of thinking he’s lying but not confronting him and it just felt like there were quite a few…So I was having to get a little bit creative with any choices I could make because, which by the way is why I am so excited about 14 airing because it does open up so many more doors for my character.

Moderator: You had mentioned that this was the first time that you’re introduced to Monroe on the series. Can you talk a little bit about the interaction? How does that to come to pass? What are you told about him?

Bitsie Tulloch: I don’t know that I can answer that question actually. I was given pretty strict instructions on what I can and can’t say. You’ll have to watch on Friday. But all I can say is that I meet him.

Moderator: How well is your character responding to sort of these weird secrets in general and do we foresee a future where she’ll be let in in any way to what Nick is experiencing?

Bitsie Tulloch: I would imagine, you know, we don’t find out exactly what’s going on with our characters throughout the course of the season, assuming there’s a next season but every so often I’ll call Greenwalt and Jim and I’ll just ask I wanted to play this scene this way, is that correct because I’m assuming this is going to happen to me. And they have sort of just instructed me — because I don’t know where I’m going, I’m not even sure if they’ve decided yet — they’ve instructed me to play it so that it is a little bit mysterious, so that some fans on Twitter think that I’m definitely a monster and some fans think the opposite is true. And I think that’s kind of great that there’s this constant guessing game going on.

It’s definitely true that a certain points I’ve thought maybe he’s (Nick) having an affair or I’m just – my mind is going is over why he’s lying to me and, you know, the obvious conclusion that I would make is he’s cheating on me or something because why else would he be acting so strangely. I think, you know, as I said this episode opens a lot of doors. And there’s another episode, episode 16, where I very much get drawn into this and it’s sort of starting to come to a boiling point in which I really need to know and he needs to tell me but it’s going to happen sooner or later, I can’t say when, but obviously he’s going to have to tell me.

Moderator: I’m wondering, do Nick and Juliette have a back story as far as how they met, what they’ve been through. Do you know anything about them?

Bitsie Tulloch: Well not that we have sort of seen written down on paper. We know they’ve been dating for three years and Giuntoli and I, you know, David Giuntoli and I — this is sort of an interesting tidbit — we have actually done a move together about six months before we booked the pilot. It’s an independent drama about two sisters and he played my boyfriend in the film. It’s actually premiering at Tribeca this April.

It’s a really great film called Caroline and Jackie. So because he and I had already worked together and most of that film was improv, it was an improv drama, he and I had worked together very easily and seamlessly because we knew each other, the chemistry was there and we also tend to, you know, we like to do a little bit of improv and then launch into the scene, 10 seconds of improv and then whoever says the first line. We like to play a lot.

So he and I got together and had dinner and talked about how we met, what our relationship was like and we’ve sort of come to the conclusion based on the script is that we are – it’s actually generally very peaceful and there’s not a tremendous amount of tension and it’s easy, it’s an easy relationship until Nick has this massive crazy secret that he has to start hiding from me. And that adds a lot of tension.

Moderator: Where do you think Juliette is right now emotionally? 

Bitsie Tulloch: I think she is confused, extremely confused, she’s worried, her mind is just constantly racing, trying to figure out what is going on with him and part of her being suspicious and another part really wanting to get involved and be proactive, and if this is some work issue let him know that I’m there for him and I can help in any way possible. So there’s a little bit of that dilemma going on where I think one part of her is like I can’t take it anymore and the other part of her really wants to get involved and just be there for him and it seems to flip flop a little bit.

Moderator: Obviously you seem very pleased with the overall evolution of the show thus far. Are you excited for any upcoming storylines that we have to look forward to?

Bitsie Tulloch: I’m clearly most excited about the episodes in which I get to be a lot more involved in the drama and everything so I really like 14. As I mentioned before, episode 16 is really, really fascinating. It’s an episode coming up that really breaks away from the mold in a way that I think some fans have really been craving which is there’s a lot less of the procedural and a lot more of sort of character building and the relationship and that stuff in the episode.

And you have the great subplot of — or main plot rather — of the monster and Nick having to solve it but it’s not sort of in the mold of the procedural and everything. It even takes place somewhere a little bit far away from that. And I think – I’m very excited to see how the fans react to that episode and hopefully they’ll like it and it sells and I think that that will probably give the writers a little bit more freedom to write a little bit more of that kind of stuff. So I’m looking forward to that.

And the reality that we’re shooting episode 19 starting today and it is definitely coming to a little bit of a – it’s coming to a head as far as him being able to keep the secret from me for much longer.

Moderator: As a woman did you kind of get any feeling like you’ve got to sit down and talk to Nick about what it is he’s hiding? Do you look at the script and go, “Come on, she’s got to know something’s going on by now.” You know, have you ever had that sense that you’re having to play it too naïve?

Bitsie Tulloch: Yes I think so because there is this sort of dichotomy between her not knowing and then the fact that they’ve written the character as she’s pretty bright so you wonder — and this is something I wouldn’t be really be able to talk about — but you wonder how much she actually knows about what’s going on or…But I think that in the earlier episodes that the sort of first conclusion I think that a woman would reach with him being gone at strange hours and being cagey and secretive was that he might be seeing someone else and then it sort of becomes no it’s so much about work so what’s going on with work and what do I not know.

And there’s a character who I think is awesome, he’s actually a Portland based actor, he plays the beaver, the beaver with the – the butt crack beaver guy and his name is Bud, when he was fixing the refrigerator and I’m so thrilled for him because he’s really getting to do a lot more on the show and so he ends up being sort of around me a lot and so that sort of opens doors to what’s going on with Nick at work and all these people that are new that are coming into my life, all of sudden having all these new sort of characters into my life and breaking the routine and everything.

Watch Bitsie Tulloch in Plumed Serpent Friday, March 9, at 9/8c, on NBC.