[IMG:L]It was just another day at the office for Kathryn Morris, who invited the press to her fictional desk on the set of her hit show Cold Case. Her blonde hair loosely pulled back, sporting jeans and an AC/DC T-shirt, the classic rock fan was looking out of character compared to her more conservative onscreen persona Lilly Rush.
During the set visit, Morris chatted about the upcoming season, her recent trip to Japan and the unforgettable Mad TV sketch about her hair.
Hollywood.com: What can you tell us about this season?
Kathryn Morris: Lilly was shot in the season finale. I didn’t know what was going to happen. She comes back to work like everything’s fine, but what we’ve found out is that she’s really not okay. She had some moments on the table in the ER where she realized the state of her affairs, professionally, personally… Her mother dies, she has no family basically and now she’s going to have to get into it through the whole season. She’s going to start acting strange, she’s going to go to counseling, ordered counseling by the boss and she’s not really up for that.
HW: Would you say she’s in a dark place this season?
KM: Yeah. She comes back to work but all is not well. Lilly’s been a little overly angst ridden–I’ve been worried about her myself. I really felt like I needed to take Lilly Rush out for a girls’ night or go to the movies, try to set her up on a blind date, something for God sakes. I told the writers, “Look, I’m worried. Lilly, she’s just going to off herself. I just know it.”
HW: What’s going to bring her back to normal?
KM: I think she’s going to have to walk through the tunnel of dealing with the fact that she was shot and realizing her mortality and that, “Yeah, my mom wasn’t great. My mom was a drunk. My mom died the same day I got shot. What am I going to do about it? What do I have and it’s not just work and it’s not just miscellaneous boyfriends that come through.”
HW: Do you see Lilly getting into a long-term relationship?
KM: I don’t think she’s going to have a boyfriend-boyfriend, you know, like something serious. But I think she’ll have some other opportunities because of some of the things that she’s going through. She is going to start to investigate some old feelings she had for someone long ago.
HW: Somebody comes back into her life?
KM: Yeah. Yeah. Because of what happened when she died.
[IMG:R]HW: Music plays such a big part in the show. What can you tell us about the upcoming music using Nirvana? Are you a fan?
KM: My friends used to call me the female Kurt Cobain in that period. I had kind of the same haircut and so I went through that whole grunge era. This episode is about some kids that are getting into some trouble and they end up dead in a swimming pool and they really can’t seem to find out what happened. There are all kinds of twists and turns where there are a lot of people lying and so you just don’t know who it is.
HW: Is there a year you haven’t done yet that you would really like to see used?
KM: I would love for us to get into the ’60’s and that whole mod time. I think that would be awesome. I would like us to explore the ’70’s more too, but in the campier way. Sometimes I wish we had episodes that were a little bit more fun and about the culture and the ridiculousness of it. I would love to see something about the great fruit diet, something weird like that.
HW: You like the pop culture references?
KM: Yeah, roller skating! But sometimes, I don’t particularly always love a cause of the week where it gets a little heavy handed. Sometimes I’d just like to see something that’s about disco. We did a disco episode first season and we all can look back and say, “Oh yeah, my sister used to do that.” Or all about the Farrah Fawcett hair, or the ’60’s with the mod “Look at me. I take myself so seriously.” Everybody wearing fake eyelashes and it being so much more about what it said about the youth and how it related to the war, what it meant to be a girl and how short your skirt could be and why … I’d really like to know more about how society, church, parents, how they felt about the length of a skirt and what it meant. And what go-go boots are all about. I think we have a lot more to explore in that way and it would give a break from some episodes that are very heavy, very important and powerful. But it’s hard to watch two twins being thrown off a bridge and make you want to tune in next week. You might need to break it up with a go-go boot episode.
HW: You recently traveled to Japan to promote the Season 3 DVD release. How was that?
KM: The highlight of the trip for me was I got to meet all of the Japanese actors that dub our characters.
HW: What’s it like seeing your face, but hearing someone else’s voice? Was it strange?
KM: Oh, yeah. It was. And then the woman who played Lilly and the men who played all the characters and Tracie [Thoms], they all in a weird way were kind of like us. Like the guy who plays Thom Barry, he was Japanese and he had these huge eyes and he had a really low voice. And then the guy who plays Jeremy Ratchford‘s character, Vera, he started doing these funny hand puppet movements for me. So I was just like … this is so strange. You’re doing stuff that Jeremy does for me in person, in Japanese.
HW: What is it about the show that translates across the oceans?
KM: I think that people in different countries, depending on where a woman is in society within the workplace, it transfers in a different way to every different country. For example, in France, they are very worried about the way that Lilly Rush feels and will she have love. And then you go to Germany and they’re just like, “You’re forging a path for women in the workplace.” And then the Japanese are like, “What do you use to wash your face?”
HW: Everyone made such a big deal when you let your hair down. You have it back up today. Is that just the heat?
KM: Oh, it’s very dramatic, the whole thing. I’m really just a mannequin in the whole deal. But I just came from work. We were shooting in Pasadena and so it’s probably going to be a couple of different ways, but probably up more. I don’t think it’ll be distracting to the stories, that’s my vote. It is smarter to be real, like a real girl from Philadelphia.
[IMG:L]HW: Do you believe imitation is the highest form of flattery? Were you offended when Mad TV did a sketch about your character’s hair?
KM: I’ve never actually seen it, but I’ve heard about it. My feelings were hurt for about four minutes and then–I remember because we were in Philadelphia shooting–and I was like, “Wow, I guess that means we’re a hit.” I don’t really take it too seriously.
Cold Case airs Sunday nights on CBS
