Connecting with Six Degrees Star Anthony Head of Buffy Fame

Anthony Head might have been another one of Britain's many fine working actors, were it not for the international prod that was given to his career by starring on TV as Rupert Giles in Buffy, the Vampire Slayer. The TV sensation made the performer something close to a household name. Now he is back on the London stage (at the Old Vic) for the first time in nearly five years playing art dealer Flan Kittredge in Six Degrees of Separation, David Grindley's revival of John Guare's defining play about a Manhattan couple whose lives are forever changed by the sudden arrival on their doorstep of a young black stranger. Broadway.com chatted with the amiable actor about topics ranging from Patrick Stewart's recent knighthood to the allure of TV to whether or not we really are in fact all separated by six degrees.

It's interesting that you did a British film several years ago [the 2007 Sparkle] with Stockard Channing, who famously originated this play in New York and London and starred in the movie version.
And Lesley Manville [the current production's Ouisa] was in that film as well. It's one of those uncanny six degrees [laughs]. But I can't say my first thought when I got this was to give Stockard a call. She's a charming woman, but this has been all about the play. It really is a stupendous play.

Do you believe that humankind has that link to one another implied by the play's title?
I think it's been proven, absolutely, to the extent that often we're separated by far less than six degrees, in many cases. As Lesley's character says, that's comforting in one way and infuriating in others because you have to figure out who [the people that separate us] are. I think one is constantly reminded that we are extraordinarily interconnected: look at the number of times one says, "My God, what a small world." The title encapsulates in a phrase our interconnectedness and at the same time how far away people can sometimes be—that we are incredibly close and yet all in different worlds.

I've heard your director describe the character of Flan as a "sophisticated thug." How do you see him?
What happens is that Flan for a moment finds himself back where he started, back to his roots as an aesthete working in the world of art as a business, so that the arrival of Paul [the black conman, played here by Obi Abili] represents a moment of hope for him. He's then turned off by what he and Ouisa discover and doesn't go on the imaginative journey that Ouisa does.

It's as if he's left out of the triangle of sorts that develops between Paul, Ouisa and Flan.
It's not so much that he's left out as that he is seen to be Ouisa's polar opposite. Flan is given that choice that a lot of us have at one time or another in our lives either to make a change and go down whatever road or opportunity there is or to stay resolutely where you are and not to change. I, to mine own embarrassment, did say once upon a time that this is me, and I don't think I can change. Thankfully, since then, I have changed a lot of things.

How did that happen? Did you have an agent of change in the way that Ouisa and Flan do in Paul?
Absolutely. I met a teacher in L.A., Milton Katselas, whose whole ethos was about enabling change in oneself as something consummately, devoutly to be wished and that you should seek to change others because change, in turn, enables the whole idea of the imagination that John [Guare] writes about in this play. Milton was all about opening the doors of perception; unfortunately, he died [in October 2008], the bugger.

Since you’ve lived in Los Angeles, I assume the American accent is no problem.
John right from the beginning urged us not to get hung up on the accent, though, having said that, some new Yorkers came Saturday night and they all said it was spot on. Also, Upper East Side New York is about as English an accent as you're going to find in America so in a way, it's just there. It's a sort of mid-Atlantic thing.

You began in the theater in Godspell and, later, at the National in Peter Shaffer's Yonadab, playing the son of Patrick Stewart, who is now Sir Patrick Stewart…
Is he really? Good God! Well, I guess I must do Star Trek! [Laughs.]. I should congratulate him, the old bugger.

Well, your TV career hasn't exactly sat idle.
Don't I know it. I did five seasons of Buffy as a series regular and then two as a recurring character. I said to them that I'd been away from my family for too long so can I go, and they said, "Of course, but we don't want to lose you: Would you be up for seven episodes in season six?" and then it went to more in season seven. Originally, my character was just called Giles and when they were looking for a first name, I said, "Why not Giles? Then he could be Giles Giles," [laughs] and I had a line about my father saying I had no imagination. It then became Rupert, Rupert Giles.

You don't get more English-sounding than that!
Yeah, it was everyone's concept of Britishness. I loved it very much. The truth is I would jump at the chance of working with [Buffy mastermind] Joss Whedon again; he's incredibly gifted, a very sweet man. If he said we were doing a spin-off tomorrow, I'd be there, but it's complicated: There are so many people now involved in the Buffy vehicle, the Buffy gravy train. I don't know how possible it would be, to be honest.

It's so interesting how many British actors then and now continue to find themselves on American TV, and they often play Americans.
Maybe it's possibly that we're cheaper? [Laughs.] I think so. It's also about that misguided idea that has suddenly become fashionable again that [does fake American accent], "Omigod, they're so good!" Though when it comes right down to it, British actors are no better or worse than American actors.

Do you still keep a home in California?
No, I had a rental apartment for Buffy and then tried to sublet it but don't have it any more. We [Head and his partner, Sarah Fisher], live just outside Bath, from where, this winter, I've been reading the weather reports daily to see if I'll be able to make it back from London each night.

British actors often say that returning home helps them keep their feet on the ground. Is that true for you?
I often do say when someone shakes when they meet me, "Look, dear, I'm absolutely the same as you or your dad. The only thing that separates us is I'm occasionally on a stage or screen." Actors can be very temperamental: they're notoriously self-serving and very insecure, which is why we like dressing up and pretending to be other people.

You've played the Prime Minister on TV's Little Britain. Any thoughts, then, of a career change to politics?
Good God, no. The country would be in dire, dire straits.