According to Scottish actor Alan Cumming, working on the US version of The Traitors makes him feel like a “James Bond villain”.
Cumming, who played in the 1995 Bond film GoldenEye, claims the reality show’s producers wanted him to “camp it up” and host as an over-the-top persona.
So he adopts an odd Scottish dialect, quotes Shakespeare, and mocks the participants, yet Cumming insists he remains deeply immersed in the drama, which he monitors on live feeds in his dressing room.
“I see them.” “I feel like a James Bond villain,” he says, smiling and petting an imaginary cat, imitating one of 007’s most famous adversaries, Ernst Blofeld.
In fact, Alan claims that when he accepted the part, he recommended bringing his dog to stroke menacingly instead.
The idea was not pursued for the first series since his dog Lala could not travel to Scotland for filming.
Alan Cumming: I Feel Like Bond Villain In US Traitors
“My dog’s in the second one,” Alan says, smiling.
Season two of the US version of The Traitors is presently airing on BBC One, alongside the UK version, which Claudia Winkleman hosts.
Both are shot at Ardross Castle in Easter Ross and feature “faithful” participants attempting to identify and destroy traitors in their midst.
Cumming hosts the US version in progressively colourful clothes, with accessories added as the series advances.
He tells BBC Scotland’s The Edit that his exaggerated Scottish accent is “me playing Moira Rose from Schitt’s Creek as Alan Cumming”.
According to Cumming, the US version is particularly unique in that all of the contestants are celebrities in some way, usually reality TV personalities.
“It heightens the drama, they understand how to do drama,” he said.
Alan Cumming: I Feel Like Bond Villain In US Traitors
While many celebrities are unfamiliar to UK fans, one stands out.
John Bercow, the former Speaker of the House of Commons, is one of the most unexpected participants in the US competition.
Cumming comments, “It was fascinating to see what the Americans thought of him because they had no idea who he was.
“They thought he talked too much, and he did.”
However, Cumming states, “In the end, he became a team player.”
He says he enjoyed taunting Bercow while recording the episode.
“It’s hilarious; I enjoyed bossing him around,” Alan says.
“Any opportunity to go, ‘order, order, John,’.”
Alan, originally from Aberfeldy in Perthshire, began acting in the 1980s and is best known in Scotland for the comedy series The High Life, which he co-created with Forbes Masson.
In the decades after, he has starred in scores of films, including Spy Kids and X-Men 2, and he has a leading role in the American television series The Good Wife.
Alan, now 58, is thinking more about ageing, and it is the topic of his new solo tour, Alan Cumming is Not Acting His Age, which begins later this month.
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Alan Cumming: I Feel Like Bond Villain In US Traitors
He described the act as a traditional lounge, with music and discussions about sex, death, and drink.
Cumming believes there are some underappreciated benefits to being older.
“You get wiser; you don’t worry so much,” he said. “Wisdom is the realization that life is cyclical, that the same things keep happening.
“It’s the same show with different costumes.”
According to Cumming, realizing this allows for improved decision-making later in life as well as being open to new experiences.
“We worship at the altar of youth,” he said.
“I discuss this on the show: why have we determined that something unavoidable, like ageing, is the worst conceivable thing in the world?
“We need to find beauty in not just youth.”
SOURCE – (BBC)
