>> rose: welcome to the program, tonight from the hit series on television homeland, the one and only claire danes. >> she is very smart, yeah and she doesn't suffer fools and she doesn't apologize for her intelligence, and that is really a lot of fun. and women don't get to be that way. >> rose: yes, yes. >> very often and i think her condition affords her that too and i think actually, you know, when there is a certain point in one's maniac, because there is always an arc, when the mania sets in, and when you are hypo manic, when the mania is starting to build there is like a sweet spot where you are the smartest person in the room,

where your brain is working faster and more efficiently, and you are able to connect dots in an astonishing rate and gain insight, you know, very quickly and to, you know -- amazing worlds and all of that, so she has a lot of experience of being genuinely, you know, the smartest person. but then the curse of the condition is that it necessarily devolves into a kind of, into chaos. >> rose: claire danes for the hour, next. funding for charlie rose was provided by the following. >> additional funding the provided by these funders. >> and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and information services worldwide.

captioning sponsored by rose communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> rose:. >> bomb maker told me an american prisoner of war had been turned. he was coming home to carry out an attack. >> and you believe this? >> he told me minutes before he was executed. >> so? >> so he was my prisoner i interrogated him for months. he was cooperating at the end. there was no reason for him to lie. >> and you think i am that pow? >> there is no one else it could be. >> rose: claire danes is here, the star of show time's drama series homeland and plays the role of carrie matheson a brilliant but psychological troubled cia agent. >> one of the greatest nation's losses on 9/11 is the delusion

of invincibility, here matheson poised between breakthrough and break down personified the country, confusion, the performance has earned her two consecutive emmy and golden globe awards and here is a look at the series. >> the green pen is what i want. >> and blue is what is available. >> green is important. green is necessary. it doesn't make sense, and it is really not an unreasonable request. >> carrie. >> so, thank god. i have asked four, five, six times but there is no understanding. they offer me blue, they offer me black, is green so hard? is blue elusive? my kingdom for a green pen. >> >> she should go to her room. the doctor will be in. >> i am focused on green. there is more, there are many, many more. the avenues here have methods and patterns and priorities, a single sniper.

no. they couldn't do that. he never has. he never will. he goes big. he explodes, he -- >> slow down, slow down. >> we have about a week, maybe less to figure out the real target of a single shot, spy novel. >> that is in theory. >> that is wrong. it is incomplete. this is critical. he is the part of being a pawn, not important. there is bigger pernicious, and we have little time. we have to code it, collide it, clams it, contain it. >> settle down, carrie. >> okay. the important thing is the green pen. >> rose: so i am pleased to have claire danes back at this table. welcome. >> thank you very much for having me. > >> rose: we have done a program recently here, in fact, today with a group of people talking about the third golden age of television. >> uh-huh. >> rose: that this is such a

great time for actors, for directors, and for the audience. >> yes. >> rose: tell me about how homeland fits into that for you as an actor. >> well, i think a lot of it has to do with the nature of cable television, and how many liberties it affords creative people, you know. and, you know, i started getting really excited again by the show the wire, which came out -- >> rose: right. >> yeah, yeah, yeah. because i was just so profoundly kind of impressed by that show and, you know, it got me eager to participate again in that medium and breakthrough the screen and go for number 2, participant. so, yeah, it is just, you know, people are now watching television like they read novels, they can really bureau into a series and they don't have to wait for commercial

break. you know, .. they don't have to be at their couch thursday at eight. >> rose: they can be there saturday morning and watch three hours in a row. >> exactly, they can binge and the quality of the material, it keeps escalating, and it is really very thrilling. >> rose: homeland, obviously is a great success because of good writing, good acting, and a very interesting narrative. but more than that, what is it you think makes homeland such an obsession for so many americans? >> well -- >> rose: they don't like it. they get a little bit angry. >> yeah, well, i mean, it is a sign that they care. >> rose: exactly right. no, it is. we will talk about that. >> yeah. i mean, when i read the pilot, you know, the ending was just so -- it was so, so well

constructed and i was, you know, greedy for next one, and i got the sense that would be the case with every episode, and, you know, it is really provocative subject matter and, you know, it is incredibly relevant to what is happening right now and that made me anxious initially, because, you know, i didn't want to pray on prey on people's vulnerability and, you know, these very heightened, intense feelings that they haven't had time to resolve because it is so current. but when i met with the show -- howard gordon, it became really clear that they were incredibly skilled and they were experienced, skillful and

decent, and they were not going to, you know, be jerks. >> yeah. >> rose: it has also that element of, it seems to me that you don't really know who is good and bad. >> you don't, no. everybody is -- everybody is flawed, and, you know, everybody is trying their best, you know, but their ideas of what best is are often conflicting. but, yeah, i think that it captured a new -- a new kind of anxiety, and self-doubt and insecurity that we as a nation are coming to terms with. and, you know, i don't think that there has been a representation of that in television. >> rose: does it feel, still surprise you in the third season what carrie does? >> yes. it does. i just -- i just finished filming the finale of the third

season about five days ago, so it is still very raw and -- >> oh, tell us. >> yeah. but -- and actually i haven't seen any of the show beyond the third episode of this season. >> rose: you are watching it yourself? >> yeah. i filmed it but i haven't seen it played back. so and so it is always different when it has gone through the editing process so i am not entire he sure what it is. >> rose: is it any different in terms of watching it there, when you say everything, rather than just your part. >> oh, yes, it is very different, it is very -- what, we filmed it and it is like, oh, yeah, maybe he was working, it turns out. but yeah, no. and it goes through the processing, filtering process and it gets to be what it is destined to be. no, but it is still very fresh and alive and the writers need to make it that way for

themselves, so, you know,. >> rose: you mean for themselves because -- >> because they want to remain engaged and they don't want. >> rose: and interesting to them tofnlt them. >> rose: to create the character in all of the different manifestations of her experience. >> they are always finding ways to reimagine it and reinvent it and i think every season will have a different, a different character, a different nature, a different tone, and a slightly different context so we will get to experience these characters who obviously are becoming, we are becoming increasingly familiar with but in, but in a new environment. >> rose: tell me who carrie is in your mind. >> well, carrie is kind of a super hero, i mean, and she -- she is a true patriot, i mean, as people are in the cia. i mean, they are not kidding about that. >> rose: it is about country. >> it is about country.

and she is -- >> rose: it is almost about anything for country. >> anything for country, and i mean, i think the show explores what that means. >> rose: what it means. >> and, you know, it is a very lonely, deeply lonely, and isolating profession, and, you know, they take incredible risks, personal risks on behalf of the country and they can't tell you -- tell anyone amount those risks and, you know, except for people within that world, which is pretty, you know, tiny. >> rose: in fact, as you obviously know and i have talked to people about, you know, there is that wall of heroes at the cia building in langley, and because they can't tell those public stories of people who did heroic things. >> right. >> rose: and they have been killed in action or otherwise. >> right, right. and, you know, when their failures are well punishable

sized and their successes are not. so -- >> rose: you talked to the character -- is there one person that your character represents in terms of the way the writers write carrie. >> ? >> there is a woman who is very successful, case officer, who got -- who had been kind of the model for carrie. but, you know, she is a little bit less insane. >> rose: so carrie is insane. >> she is, she is. >> rose: you got a bit of that in that clip. >> but this woman, who has served as the model, met -- met for lunch one day just before i did the pilot and offered whatever insights she could, and

she organized a littlefield trip for me to go to langley and asked some of her colleagues to spend a couple of hours in a room with me sharing their experiences, and it was so wild, and so rivetting, it was really one of the most, you know, mind-blowing -- >> rose: some of those things work their way into the -- >> well, they definitely worked their way into my performance, yeah, but i remember when i mentioned that my character was -- would be bipolar they all literally laughed. >> rose: because they knew bipolar among them? >> well, no, because it just seemed to impossible that anybody with a condition hike that would finally go through and, yeah, within the -- >> rose: so what do you think of the bipolar part of carrie? >> well, it is useful in terms of our -- in the telling of our story. >> rose: it gives you a place

to spread every acting wing you have? >> yes. and it also, you know, serves the genre, i mean, she is -- you know, she is an unreliable narrator and she is paranoid, but actually has reason to believe paranoid, and so it is an exciting paradox. >> rose: there is this aspect she says, in almost every maybe the, beginning of every episode, i can't remember that, but frequently says she is torn, she regrets the fact she is haunted by the fact she could have stopped -- >> >> rose: 9/11. >> it is easy for me too, to think, yes, about her condition in relationship to her work, because she never takes her -- her health and safety for granted. you know, she is sort of sitting on this bomb, so to speak, and sh she is not affordd

the kind of luxury that most of us are afforded. she can't take her health for granted. she can't be complacent or naive, and so it is a kind -- easy for her to extrapolate and maintain that kind of hypervigilance in relationship to her country. and also i think of her kind of as edward scissor hands, he is she is very aware of the kind of .. a strong her condition can wreck in intimate relationships so she doesn't dare allow her elf to become close to anyone. >> rose: they can't become close because of her own -- she has enough knowledge of self. >> yes, so she has already, you know, made a lot of sacrifices, i mean, she doesn't feel that she is cable or deserving of real closeness with another person, so her life is already

kind of emotionally barren, and, therefore, it is easier to give it up in order to do her very risky work. >> rose: her love search the cia. >> yes, her love search the cia, yes. >> rose: so who is brody? >> brody is the antagonist, yes. >> rose: my question has to do with how you see brody. >> right. well, i think she sees, they recognize a lot of themselves in each other, they are both patriots. >> rose: yes. >> and they both have been damaged overtime. she kind of started off damaged, and he, you know -- her -- her condition has forced her to accept her vulnerability and has been very challenging for her and he, you know, has bonn through -- >> rose: hell. >> hell. many times over. >> rose: exactly. >> so they connect on a very

primal level. >> rose: you have to believe to make the show so compelling, you have to accept the fact that he could have -- he couldn't be as bad as he is imagined to be at his worst? >> yes, yes. >> rose: you have to step the fact he may have been -- >> rose: may be -- >> >> rose: and could be -- >> yeah. and he is -- he has made bad choices, even since we have met him and fallen in love with him and, you know, he did kill the vice president. he didn't have to. so, yeah, his morality is in question. >> rose: the question about killing the vice president because he had to protect himself or because he believed -- >> well, yeah. he is still conflicted and i

think that the writers explore that and really, in really spraifg ways, in ways that we will see as the season continues to unfurl. >> rose: the relationship between -- >> well, the relationship with -- i mean, with islam, you know, and -- >> he has become a muslim? >> he has. and i think he doesn't belong anywhere anymore, , you know. t is so heart wrenching in the third episode of this -- of the third season when he takes refuge in the mosque and he puts -- the family in mortal danger, you know, but it was kind of a delusional thinking on his part, magical thinking but, you know, that that -- that that was a false harbor, not really available to him anymore.

>> rose: the manic depression aspect of it, it is said that in order to -- or how could you? i could add how did you get choser to understanding that mind? >> well, it was a really, really fascinating process, and i -- before i did the pilot i just gorged on a lot, any bit of material that i could find on the subject and i met with a woman who i will call julie fast, who is, is bipolar and written a number of books on it the, i talked to some of my friends who are psychologists and have bipolar patients and -- but ultimately the most useful resource was the internet, of course,. >> rose: and youtube. >> and you tube and there are a lot of -- i a lot of bipolar people who have these blogs, they are called, video blogs or video diaries, and so, you know,

it is one thing to read about the condition, it is another to be able to observe -- >> rose: see and observe. >> the behavior of someone who is in a manic state, and, you know, so that was really, really, really very helpful for me to kind of just make sense of their mannerisms and hear the rhythm of their voice and, yeah. >> rose: there is a light side of it too when you accept theatrical woman of the year, harvard a year and joked about working my way through the dsm. >> yes, the dsm 5. i mean, i took -- when i first started going to school, to college, i assumed i would be a psychology major until i realized that there is a lot of lab work involved and that was not as interesting. but, yeah, i always had been interested in psychology and so i am just delighted to have an

excuse to think dewpointly about that still, but in the context of acting. >> rose: how is carrie evolving over the three -- now we are halfway through episode 3. >> this season, i think she is in a pretty bleak place. all the characters are, actually. i mean, the cia did blow up last season so we are -- we are -- we are kind of recovering from the devastation of that. all -- >> rose: and also wanting revenge? >> yes. and wanting revenge. but it is also interesting because one of our key writer on the show died in march just as the writers were starting to design the season, and i think this is always going to be a fairly mournful season, but henry bernal, i think really

influenced the writers and -- as they were writing. >> rose: how so? >> i think they were sad. >> rose: oh. i see. >> i the i think they were reald to lose their friend. >> rose: and sadness permeated the story. >> and sadness permeated the story. it is a very dark season. >> and you know some people weren't happy about this, as you know. >> yes. >> rose: because you have got -- you have brody in venezuela. >> yes. >> rose: we have you sort of under stress. >> right. >> everybody is in great distress and nobody was having very much fun. and then there was this design the con, to the long game they are playing and, you know, yeah. and it was a bold choice on the part of the writers to share that, so many episodes in, and not halfway through season. >> rose: it is almost like they want to see you and brody together, that's what they want? >> yes, they do, but -- they

will. >> rose: let's wait. patience! >> think how good we have been to you. no, i think we are -- they are star crossed lovers. >> rose: and will be again. >> yes. and anyway. it is one of those perfect impossible loves. >> you broke my heart, you know. >> was that easy for you? for fun? because of you i question my own sanity. i had myself committed to a mental institutions. >> i lost my job too. >> i lost my place in the world. i lost everything.

>> the truth? >> bull (bleep). you came this close to blowing him to a million pieces. did you tell him that? >> i didn't wear a bomb. >> did you even think about me when you went there? >> rose: one more time, why are they desperately attracted to each other? because they have -- >> i don't think they can even -- i don't think they can articulate it. i don't think they even though but i think they see they -- they recognize the pain in each other, and the kind of disenfranchisement and the otherness, you know, of the other .. and they have great empathy for each other and compassion. >> rose: and believe in each other? >> yeah i think they believe in each other and also i think that they start working together. they have a working relationship, and. >> rose: and she helps him escape. >> and they have a common goal.

>> yeah, and then ultimately, you know, their lives are, you know, are dependent on each other. so, yeah. >> rose: does that help you play that part of, does your life help you play the story not your life but understanding the sheer impossibility of relationships? >> yeah. well, i think -- i think also, i mean, i -- in some ways it is probably convenient for carrie, because as i said, i think that she -- >> rose: it is good to have a man like brody. >> yeah, a man who she can never have, because it is where she is ultimately safest. i think, you know, we have learned now that she is pregnant. >> rose: yes. >> so. >> rose: but we do not know who the father is. >> we don't know who the father is because we know she is with child, but i think that is interesting. that is going to be interesting, because then she is going to

really have to confront herself and her fear of really committing to someone. and. >> rose: in other words, it is in the interest of the child she bears to deal with that fear? >> well, she is going to be intimate with someone fine i believely, biology has decided that. >> rose: her son. >> or daughter, whatever me is having, yes. this person is going to be dependent on her .. .. in a way she has never allowed anyone to be, including brody. i mean, i think it is easy for her to believe that she, you know, cash and -- and invest in this infatuation so completely because it is never, it is never going to become manifest. >> rose: to hear you talk about this means that it makes it like such a wonderful acting challenge. >> it is a wonderful acting challenge, yes. it is a lot of fun. mistakes are always, you know,

preposterously high. >> rose: she is a risk taker. >> risk taker. >> rose: huge risk taker. >> huge risk taker. >> rose:. >> and always right. >> rose: exactly. >> she just has been delightful to play. >> rose: exactly. >> rose: i told you so, i told you so, i told you so! >> she is always -- she always prevails but they do make her go through the mud. i mean, she has to work for those victories. >> rose: yeah. and live with her pain. >> and live with her pain, yeah. it is -- you know, as i said i just finished filming. i am pretty spent, i am pretty stripped. i am a little -- i am drained. i am tired. and i really need to disengage for a little while and return to my kind of bunny infant and. >> rose: you need quiet time away from anybody with demons, you need some loving. >> i do and i am not a messy actor and, you know, i really am

not but you just -- there is something to kind of -- i have to host a lot of very, very dark feelings and thoughts many hours a day and it does something to one's chemistry and psychology, i think. so -- and it is not -- you know, in about a month's time it will occur to me that i am actually fine. i am actually pretty happy. >> rose: i am not what i -- >> no. >> rose: it is almost like you are saying i had come to live with the idea i amman nick depressive. >> yes. >> rose: and can't love and. >> yeah, yeah, yeah. >> rose: and all of a sudden you have to sort of, you know, it takes you time to get away from that. >> yes. >> rose: in order to find that peace you have in your real life. >> exactly, exactly. and i love her. i mean, i love her and i admire her and so wish i could be her in so many ways.

>> rose: i love her, i admire her, i wish i could be her. >> yes. but i am not. and it is a good thing for everyone. >> rose: okay. but you love her because of the counsel she has or the -- >> i love her because she is ultimately a virtuous person she always does the good, right and brave thing, and she is self-sacrificing and she is deeply responsible, you know. she iser the fade of incurring harm or injury on anyone else, and she will give everything to protecting, you know, decent people from evil, you know,. >> rose: yes. >> it is a very extreme, but it is true. >> rose: what we haven't said is she is witheringly smart. >> she is very smart, yeah, and she doesn't suffer fools and she doesn't apologize for her

intelligence and that is -- that is really a lot of fun. and women don't get to be that way. >> rose: yes, yeah. >> very often. and i think her condition affords her that too. and i think actually, you know, when -- there is a certain point in one's mania, because there is always an arc, you know, when the mania sets in and when you are hypo manic and the mania is starting to build there is a sweet spot where you are the smartest american the room and your brain is working faster and more efficientliness and you are able to connect dots in an astonishing rate and gain insight, you know, very quickly and, you know, in, amazing worlds and all of that, so she has a lot of experience in being genuinely, you know, the smartest person, but then the curse of the condition is that it necessarily devolves into a kind of -- into chaos so --

>> rose: does it therefore automatically go to this point that you have been able to take your acting to places you hadn't been and found skills and competencies and things that you hadn't touched? >> >> or not? >> yes. no. well i think i first experienced that i really stretch myself as an actor when i did a role, when i did temple -- >> rose: everybody talks amount that. >> right. so that was a huge undertaking for me because she was such -- they is such an idiosyncratic person. >> rose: autism was the subject. >> yes. autism was the subject and she is brilliant and singular and she is kind of a culture of one. there is absolutely no one like her. and so i had to, you know -- i had to piece her person together and make sense of it for myself, as an actor and that was ambitious and so fun ultimately. i had a great time and i felt really robust after that, and it

was frustrating when i finished, because there wasn't a comparable role out there, you know, there was -- i couldn't just then play the girlfriend, i was like spoiled so this is the first character that i found after that that was -- that rivaled it, you know in its complexity and in its scope. >> is there any danger in playing this character too long so you begin to -- >> maybe. yeah. i think that i -- after a certain point you run the risk of becoming a little lazy, actually, because there is like a shorthand. >> rose: for being -- >> yes. >> rose: the mannerisms that worked. >> exactly. and that is, i think, a danger and i am really keen to play another role now, just so that i

can -- >> rose: while before or after you finish? >> after i finish. i would like the play another part. i would like to just do the opposite of what i have been doing, because that is what every actor wants to do, really. >> rose: yeah. >> but i love her. i -- i look forward to playing her again but i think that we will both benefit, the performance will benefit from my exercising different parts of myself. >> rose: speaking of that, one of the things that people talk about in the performance is the mas advertise city of your body so to speak you know what i mean? plasticity has to do with the brain. it is the notion of you using, i just saw it in the piece there, you were using physicality .. in a really compelling way. >> well, i started. >> rose: dancing. >> i was a dancer, and i loved movement and i am really interested in it and it is true that one of the interesting things about playing somebody

with a mental kind of condition is that it affects the body. >> rose: exactly right, yes. >> and that was true -- >> rose: the muscles and everything else. >> and that is just always a fascinating thing to explore. i mean, damien plays a junkie in the season, he becomes addicted to heroin and it was kind of wonderful to watch him make sense of that physically as an actor, and to see him go through or render the experience of withdrawal withdrawing from the drug so -- >> rose: and then there is mandy. >> i was jealous. it is like i want to get off of drugs. >> rose: is that right? >> yeah, yeah. >> rose: you want to go through withdrawal. >> i wanted to figure that out physically as an actor. what would that be like? yeah. >> rose: so did you question him about that? >> no, write question. well i did ask him like what he was reading, you know, what -- >> rose: how to prepare or -- >> what he was doing to prepare. >> rose: or calling on his own

whatever. >> no, i asked him how he prepared, it is like oh, wow, like he was eating a big steak, mmm, mmm, mmm. >> rose: oh. it is about the roles, isn't it? >> well, yes yeah, it is fun. >> rose: is that what it is in the end that makes acting so great? you can inhabit the most remarkable kinds of behavior? >> yes, it is. >> rose: and make it authentic? >> it is. and, you know, and it is always interesting when i come in certainly lake meeting carrie when i first meet them on the page, it is like, oh, my god, they couldn't seem more, more antithetical to who i am and then you find -- you meet in the middle, you find them, they finned you, and to experience that kind of meshing and that empathy is, there is nothing more thrilling, because you experience a kind of oneness, i

feel very hokey saying this. >> rose: with you do it with the character. >> with the character, with your imagination. it is all, you know -- >> rose: right, right. >> it is all active imagination, but, you know, you are forced to consider that maybe somebody out there in the world who you don't recognize is somebody you share a lot more in common with than you think. >> rose: and does it -- i mean, it is not a question of taking it home, but, you know, when you inhabit a character and let's assume it is carrie or let's assume it is any of the other characters, that somehow you find something that -- inextricable way becomes who you are that you don't let go because it is something you like and it is something that you master so it incorporated i mean i know men and women who have seen themselves, not actors but have seen themselves in a certain way, wanted to be in a certain way and so they became in a certain way. >> right, right. >> rose: they became what they wanted to be in their manifestations of living. >> yes, i think that is probably

true and, you know, there will be a character i played a character in the movie called broke down palace who was kind of a bad girl who was trance gressive and aping friday and i never allowed myself to consider i could be any of those things and like oh god this is going to be a real reach and really awkward it might not happen and i was startled to discover how quickly i could muster feelings of anger or, you know, subversiveness, it is like, okay, there is a naughty girl in there. i let her out. it was great! >> rose: is that right? >> sure. i mean,. >> rose: there. >> it was my job. >> rose: but it felt good, so why not? >> it felt academy and i think i probably benefitted from that and i probably, overtime, you know, allowing different parts of myself to breathe and be, and maybe a more integrated person. >> rose: i would say it is there and you are letting it out

other than you discover it and found i it was fun. >> i don't want to admit to that but we don't realize how many, you know, rules, social rules we are observing and we have -- >> rose: exactly. >> we have a very set idea of who we are and who we should be and it is often prescribed or it is often, you know,, you know, just a design, and it is a series of choices or whatever it is, but it is a construct, and when you kind of take that apart as an actor, it is really kind of cool to see what else is lurking. >> rose: you wonderful. and so how does this affect -- what does your husband say about all of this? >> well, my husband is an actor too. >> rose: i know he is. a very good one. >> and he currently is playing an fbi agent who has a mental -- you know. >> rose: it is not pun to be a -- >> and we really don't talk

about work all that often. but, no, he also played not just a character about six months before i took on temple, h he hd done all the required reading for me. >> rose: so he said try this, try this, try this. >> and i remember when i was filming, you know, about ought ic people they have sdims, they self stimulate and every, every person has a different set, and they are pretty specific, and but i was asking him what were your stims? >> how did you do the panic attack? it was kind of fun to be able to trade notes like that. >> when you went to yale, you were in pursuit of what? >> of not acting. >> rose: it was really to get away? >> yeah. well i started acting from, i mean, i got an agent when i was 12 and i worked pretty consistently in that point on, and really didn't go to high

school, and, you know, in a convention malsense, i was mostly tutored onsets, and i was lonely. i really needed to have more experience, socializing with kids my own age. >> rose: because you had been working all the time. >> because i had been working all the time, i was in a very adult world and i don't know. i think i needed to go back a few steps and actually i really needed to learn how to hang out, how to just sort of be, and actually the last time i was in school was in junior high, and i, you know, when girls start becoming really scary, you know, and actually i had developed a real fear of girls and, therefore, women and i had to go back to college to learn that we grow out of that, you know, we don't remain that kind of -- those terrifying, you know,

caddy queen bees, you know, we develop into generous, mature, fun people, so, yeah, that was -- i really needed to do social work. >> rose: and did you find that when you went there? >> very much. >> rose: did you find what you were in search of? >> i did and more. i had a great experience. >> rose: and more? >> yeah. >> rose: but then you decided i have had enough? >> well when i started going to college, i assumed that i would make a movie a year and that would state my, sate my creative desire but i paid to desire how much work goes into getting work and i was just not available to read scripts or go on auditions and the movie business is not very even and have a film july 10th and invariably be pushed to october 26th and i uh would have to take a semester off and so it just became really unruly and untenable, basically and, you know, yale is not a commuter college, it requires, you know, your full attention

and involvement. >> rose: that's right. >> yeah. and i think i probably went -- that they don't give everybody an a there. >> no, no. and i think after two years i kind of got it, i really understood what it was i was so enriched by it, so ed tied by it. >> rose: both education and the collegial process. >> very much so. >> and, you know, i kind of learned how to read and write and how to think analytically. >> rose: which is pretty good. >> enough. and i had the tools that i thought i needed. >> rose: and confidence, did it give you confidence because -- >> it did. it gave me a lot of confidence, and also, i was starting to feel like a real weirdo, like i was a child actor and i kind of imitated grownups, but hadn't really earned that maturity so i had funny affectations and i don't know i just wanted to have -- i wanted to have a conventional experience and know what that was like from the inside out, and i got it, and,

yeah, and i don't know. to have -- i don't know. to have my smarts central dated by, you know -- >> rose: that's exactly right. exactly -- >> unending professors it was meaningful. >> rose: and the other thing it does, you don't have to have it, boys and girls, but what it can do for you is it can open up the idea of both, it could open up your curiosity because you see the richness of things to learn. >> oh, yes. >> rose: and you see connections and you appreciate, you know, the artistic and creative expression and you appreciate the role of science and you appreciate how these things bump up against each other. >> absolutely. >> rose: and therefore it sets the stage for a lifetime of learning. >> absolutely i don't. >> rose: you don't have to have it but it contributes to it, you know, and that is a great thing. >> it is. >> rose: and especially to do what you do in a sense to give you, you know, the wherewithal to be able to explore and

understand what manic depression means. >> right. yes, i know how to go looking for material on the subject, you know,. >> rose: i was stunned and i wasn't that familiar with everything about you, and am still not, but i am learning. >> really? you don't know everything about me? >> rose: but i am trying. >> rude! >> rose: no. but there was a point in which you had -- you weren't getting evaluate roles, great roles and you thought maybe this is not going to be as food as i believed it was. >> i mean you never know. i have been so, so lucky, to have done two projects .. in the last six years that have worked. >> rose: yes. >> i mean, and one has been homeland and, you know, that has been a three-year gig. but, yeah, no, it is always -- it is always impossible to know if you are -- if your intentions are going to be realized. >> rose: but was there a point

in when you had a series of things this which you weren't getting the good roles and everybody is thinking about you first when they thought about -- >> no, not at all. >> rose: roles like carrie matheson? >> right, right. no. there was -- and i think there was a transitional period too, i mean, i didn't work for three years when i went to school and that was damaging. >> rose: out of sight, out of mind. >> absolutely. so i lost a lot of momentum, yu know, and that is okay, but it took me a while to recover it, and, you know, also i had to remember what acting was. i mean, i had to -- i had done it for so long i just thought it was like forever internalized and i don't know, i was a little rusty, i think. >> rose: what is acting? >> well, it is pretty intuitive,

and -- it is visceral and it is physical, mostly, there is analysis involved because you have to make sense of the character and you have to kind of try out their trajectory. >> rose: right. and be inside their head. >> and be inside their head and kind of recognize what the head is and if you have the stuff to make sense of the head, then fair enough, but if you don't, then you have to go to outside sources and import, you know, that knowledge. >> rose: i think this may have been lawrence olivier, but he said he didn't really feel a part until he put on the costume, until he put on the clothes. >> right. >> rose: really felt the character he was going to inhabit. >> yes. >> rose: was there something that served as a hook for you, for carrie? >> >> well, hmm. i don't know. it was definitely not like a

trench coat. >> >> rose: clothes are not the most distinctive thing -- >> learning about her condition. >> rose: yeah. >> and also people -- learning -- people with this condition have a lot of problems with boundaries and are actually pretty porous and they receive a lot of emotional information and that was exciting to think about in terms of her being a case officer and, you know, reading people because i just decided that she could have this kind of x-ray vision into people and gave her a real power and real edge, a real advantage so i started thinking about her in those terms. >> rose: i love this, you see this in certain spy movies, i remember the spy with robert redford and i think brad pitt in which they always will tell you, the power of observation is so acute -- >> right. >> rose: -- wherever you are, you see everything, and you

notice changes in the environment. >> absolutely. like the woman who, again, has been my cia big sister. >> rose: right. >> rifted the set while we were filming the pilot and a bunch of us went out one night after work and a crew member, friend was in the band so we saw the band play and we were there in the club and just as kind of a still litigate game she said. who is -- who is the singer's girlfriend in this crowd? who is the girlfriend, find the girlfriend, she is leaving the room. and i don't know. and she spotted her immediately. and of course it was the girl with the camera taking photos, you know, so it wasn't -- you know,. >> rose: it is connections? >> yes. >> it is connecting the dots. >> yes but he walk into the room. >> rose: who has the most interest in the singer? >> she was assessing the room, and i thought, okay, well that is very telling. yeah. >> rose: mandy. >> mandy.

>> rose: that role that he plays and the relationship there, tell me about that. >> well, he is a virtuous itic performer and a musician and a brilliant one and i think he brings his musicality to the role. >> rose: in terms of voice? >> yes, in terms of voice. >> rose: and that is what i love about him. there is something about his voice that is knowing and experienced. >> yes. >> rose: and wise and deep. >> oh, very much so. >> rose: and the voice says it is just -- the way he says your name. >> oh, yes. he kind of -- he sings the performance. >> rose: yes, exactly right. >> and he is such a good person and he is a very kind of deeply thoughtful, deeply feeling person, and he brings that to saul. but, you know,, i remember when we did the first read through of the pilot, it was electric, i

mean, there was just a kind of chemistry that we had, yeah, that i had no -- i was not prepared for at all, but carrie is so -- i mean he is manic so as a very staccato style of speaking and he is a little iconic,. >> rose: yeah. >> and to the contrast is really groovy. >> have you seen it? >> carrie. of course you have. we all know how we hate things getting out into the press unless we put them out ourselves. >> you don't think i know what you are doing? no. i know exactly what you are doing. >> you are wrong. >> am i? why don't you ask him, your little lapdog except he is trained to kill. >> breathe, carrie. >> are you trying to disbim date my ass. >> there is nothing to talk about. >> contain it. >> contain it? you are containing it! (bleep) off me. >> and sit on it until she copies down.

>> with your operation, saul, remember that. you proposed it, you sanctioned it, you ran it. >> rose: when you think about the two characters, where do they meet? >> do they meet if a sense of one, patriotism, we think. >> yes. >> rose: we think. >> yes. >> rose: we think. >> yes. >> rose: i mean, that is what makes it so interesting, we don't know so, therefore you can speculate. and you have to walk it through your own mind as to who may be what. >> uh-huh. >> rose: as much as you can. >> you get a sense and you pull back. >> right. >> rose: that is what those awful writers do to us, you know,. >> uh-huh. >> rose: so they keep us on the edge as to where it might be. but there is also -- i mean he seems to he, i don't know who he talked to, what he made his role -- or who gave him instielght, insight hike your cia person, but it seems you can be what i think a smart cia person would be. >> yes. i remember too in the first season when i was make sense of what it was too, to interrogate

someone. >> rose: exactly. >> how do you run an interrogation? and so i was kind of -- talking to mandy about that, hike how are you doing it? how are you doing this? and he says, well, i listen to the subject and i often will close my eyes and just hear the -- hear the is a peel, you know, the shah peel and find the truth .. in the sound of the voice, so, i mean, that was a musician's take on it. >> rose: what interests me too is that there is a comradeship between people who are spies. >> uh-huh. >> rose: and who are engaged in every aspect of their life in gathering intelligence between them and those on the other side. there is kind of that, you know -- and it came out

actually in john lecarre's book because you remembered that, in fact, i don't remember write one it was but there was a notion of carla and george smiley, they had only met once and they were, and i think about the most recent episodes here, iranian spy. >> right, right, right. >> rose: and mandy's -- and saul. >> uh-huh. >> rose: there is that sense of respect for spy craft for how you do it and what you have done. >> right. >> rose: and sort of how do i become one up on you? >> right. >> rose: and how mandy unloads with him in terms of why i have got you. >> right. >> rose: and the recognition. >> right. >> rose:. >> yeah. >> rose: i know you have got me. >> and it is interesting this idea about, you know, you have to work in collaboration with bad guys. >> rose: yes. exactly. >> and so there has to be a kind of understanding if not kinship, you know, with the enemy who is -- >> rose: and the sense of if you do that to us we will do

that to you. >> right. >> rose: so don't even go there, even though you could. >> right. >> rose: because, you know, like the episode why didn't you just kill him? you had your hands on him? why didn't you kill him and mandy or saul is thinking about a larger place. >> right. yes. a lot of strategizing. >> rose: so do you think, what is next for you? can you think beyond carrie or right now in your life there is 11 month old baby? >> yes. and momma, da da, dada:love that. which i am very much looking forward to. yes. there is that and i don't know what is beyond that. i -- >> rose: is that okay with you? >> it has to be. but yeah, i am getting a little impatient, look i was busy creating a person, so that was -- >> rose:. >> that is very good. >> tha that is very involving ai have done that now and he is autonomous enough for me to go -- >> rose: and one hell of a

person. >> he is very, very sweet, my little boy. he is a good boy. but, yes, so we will see, i would like to do something lighter, i would like to do something where the stakes are a little less high but that is not saying much because they couldn't possibly be higher than they are in homeland. >> rose: thank you. >> thank you. >> rose: great to see you. >> nice to see you too. >> rose: claire danes for the hour, thank you for joining us. see you next time. >> captioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org