Greyston Holt is a Canadian actor whose credits include Stargate: Universe, Fringe and Sanctuary. He also plays Clay Danvers, the male lead in new urban fantasy TV show Bitten, based on the cult novel of the same name by Kelley Armstrong. We caught up with Greyston at MCM ComicCon to ask some questions about this exciting new show.
Starburst Magazine: So, tell us a bit about the show?
Greyston Holt: Basically it’s about Elena, the only female werewolf known to exist. She’s trying to live this normal life in Toronto but ultimately she has her pack loyalties at Stonehaven which is where my character, Clay Danvers is. There’s been a recent uprising in mutt activity. Mutt’s are the bad werewolves who aren’t part of a pack and she’s called back to the pack to help deal with it.
Tell us more about Clay.
It’s fun to play two sides. With Elena she is my one and only love; so I’m more soft and open with her but I also have to play the pack enforcer and keep an eye on mutt activity so they don’t rise up, so it’s fun to play both sides.
It’s quite a dark story in places; how do you deal with that?
It’s some heavy material but we try to keep it light on set and we all get along very well. The heavy stuff is fun; as an actor it’s the dramatic stuff that is the most satisfying. I just hope the fans have as much fun watching it as we do filming it.
How would you like to see the series progress?
It’s hard to say, I know that we’d like to stick as true to the books as much as we can but it will take some artistic license because it’s a TV show so it’s not the same. It’s nice to have this wonderful source material so we’re doing our best to keep the fans happy.
Bitten and The Women of The Otherworld novels have a huge fanbase. How are they reacting to the show so far?
They’re loving it. With the first initial press release there was a lot of uproar with the casting and it’s so subjective. One person thinks Clay looks like this, another person thinks he looks completely different and there was a big issue with Jeremy because in the books he’s half Japanese but we just couldn’t find the right actor so we went with Greg Bryk who is amazing.
It’s great to have a passionate fanbase and they seem to be liking the show more and more as the series moves on.
Are we going to see any of the characters from other books in The Women of The Otherworld series?
I really don’t know. Initially we were just going to be sticking to the werewolf storyline and not including some of the other supernatural elements but I’ve been recently talking to our producer and I think we may be incorporating that as well. It’s hard to say at this point, we still don’t know if we’re going to get a pick up for season two. The writers are currently writing this series so we’ll see.
What would be your dream project?
I love doing period pieces. I’d love to do something that takes place in the sixteenth century, something like that. I’ve done a couple of westerns which was fun; I like stepping into the world of a character with the wardrobe and sets all set-up for that.
Is there any franchise you’d love to do?
I’m warming up to the idea of playing a super-hero. At first I couldn’t see myself as one but now I think it would be fun to do an action movie. Either that or the Godfather Part Four.
If you were stuck on a desert island with only one book for company, what would it be?
I’m currently reading Aldous Huxley’s The Island and I think that’s a book that I will get more out of each time I read it so I’m going to go with that.
Truth or Beauty?
Beauty. No wait a minute, Truth!
Photo credit: Anne Davies
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Bitten is currently airing on the SyFy channel in the US and will be coming to UK screens this summer.
