Supernatural and LOST fan favorite Mark Pellegrino plays the resident bad guy, Jedikiah Price, in The CW’s upcoming remake of The Tomorrow People, which premieres in just nine weeks, October 9 on The CW.
We caught up with Mr. Pellegrino at this year’s Comic-Con International in San Diego to talk about the role — and despite some confusion that totally came from KSiteTV’s interviewer (sorry!), we also have some VIDEO of the interview which you can find below. But first… does Pellegrino really think his character is a good person?
“I do,” Pellegrino confirms. “I think he’s coming from experience. He’s coming from that academic world that knows that when a species arrives, the superior one wins and it’s merciless. Nature knows no compassion; the bottom line is the bottom line, and the stronger species will wipe out the weaker ones, unless we’re able to get the jump, and pre-empt destiny. So, I think he’s coming from his swath of evolutionary knowledge.”
Pellegrino has played many villainous roles in recent years, but he insists that you have to find the good in a character if you want to play someone like that. “You have to get morally behind the character, because a character is unaware of their sin, if that is what they are committing in this case, and what I like about the characters, they’re passionate and almost fanatical about achieving something, and are rather profound in their intellectual, moral justification for it. It’s kind of a gift as an actor to be able to play people that are smarter than you, which is an evolutionary biologist, and more passionate than you about pursuing something; more ambitious and less thoughtful about the consequence… I mean, we can’t do that in everyday life, but when you’re the villain you get to drive everything, and you bring out the best in everybody, because they have to meet up to your challenge,” he says.
Although we thought his character may have been faking it, Jedikiah is — spoiler warning — the brother of Stephen Jameson’s father, making him Stephen’s uncle, and something broke their brotherly bond sometime in the past. “Something did break, and I imagine we must [explore it]. It’s something that I’d like to see as a viewer. I definitely want to see what makes Jedikiah tick and what made the split happen. If there is a rift, what’s going on… there’s definitely a big mystery there that I’d like to uncover,” Pellegrino confirms.
One thing is for certain — Jedikiah’s desire to control the Tomorrow People might come from his own envy or evolutionary inferiority. “I am ashamed to say that I do think envy plays a part of Jedikiah’s personality and the fanaticism behind his desire to hunt these people down,” Pellegrino admits. “I think it’s a Cain and Abel kind of story between John Price’s character and me.”
The Tomorrow People premieres October 9 on The CW, right after Arrow. Take a look at some VIDEO of this interview:
