[IMG:L]It’s official. There will be one more year of Scrubs. Though speculation had Zach Braff stalling his contract negotiations and ABC possibly airing the last season, Scrubs will reunite the entire cast for a seventh year on NBC Thursdays at 9:30 p.m. The sixth season finale airs this Thursday at 9 p.m., with an hour-long episode.
Among the show’s ensemble, Judy Reyes will be back as Carla. This year found Carla suffering post partum depression after having her first child, and singing her ire at her husband for not knowing her Latina heritage. Already busy on her summer travels, Reyes found time for a phone call to Hollywood.com between trips to the airport.
Hollywood.com: You’ve been keeping busy!
Judy Reyes: I was traveling. I was in New York City and Argentina and then back, flying around all over the place!
HW: In the Scrubs‘ season finale, can we expect a cliffhanger with your character Carla’s storyline?
JR: Not too much of a cliffhanger with Carla. I think you’re going to expect more stuff with J.D. and Elliott. Carla’s going to be participating a little bit in all the storylines I would say.
HW: Really, after a baby and depression, what else is there for her to do?
JR: Yeah, I’ve been through a lot the first half of the season. I have to say, Carla’s been through a lot with the baby, the post-partum depression and losing Laverne. I think the rest of the season is about recovery for Carla.
[IMG:R]HW: Zach renewed his deal for season seven. Was there ever an issue with the rest of the cast?
JR: I’m not so sure about that. We got together at the very beginning of the season and Bill Lawrence made sure that if we all had it in us, he did too. We have so much fun doing the show that it was not a question. We’re an ensemble and we love working together so much–and it shows I think in the episodes, particularly this season. It really wasn’t a question for any of us that we would all come back together.
HW: Your big song in the musical episode was “I’m Dominican.” Have people often guessed your heritage wrong?
JR: Yes, yes. Particularly when I first came out here, I think people have always made the assumption that I’m Puerto Rican, and upon my correction, people always think that I’m offended by the assumption and I’m not. I’m just merely correcting them as to my origins.
HW: Carla’s offended though, right?
JR: Carla’s offended by the fact that her husband never gets it right, as he should. The man’s married to her! So yeah, Carla is pretty pissed that the man she’s married to can’t remember where she’s from.
HW: In the beginning, was she written as Dominican or any more specifically than Latina?
JR: No, just Latina and I think it just kind of surfaced from me always reminding folks on the set and the writers. The assumption, me being from the East Coast, was “So, you’re Puerto Rican?” No, no, no, I’m Dominican. “Oh, oh, I’m sorry.” No, don’t be sorry. I’m just letting you know that I’m from the Dominican Republic. “Oh, where’s that?” You know, where Sammy Sosa‘s from? “Ohhh. The best baseball players in the world are from the DR, yo.” So it would always kind of transpire and it just became part of the whole writing life of the character.
HW: Could you believe they wrote a song with rhyming words about it?
JR: I love it, I love it, I love it–and I appreciate it! I think it’s just genius on behalf of the writers.
HW: Zach and Donald Faison became best friends in real life. Is there a girls club like they have?
JR: We get all kitchy and catty and flirty and fun on the set and run around, so yeah. We often team up and do silly girl things. Not to the extent of the boys but certainly some girl-like equivalent of that. Christa [Miller] has children so we certainly do like the makeup girly-girl stuff in the hair and makeup room.
HW: Has it been odd playing depression on a comedy?
JR: No, because the writers always have such a clever way of injecting humor into it that it’s kind of often challenging just to balance the sadness into it. I guess in that way, it’s a little odd but I always look forward to being able to put the headiness into it. So no, I look forward to that stuff. Scrubs has never shied away from the heartfelt or the touching or the scary moments of all that and we get often advanced notice of “Your character’s going to be dealing with such and such” so I get a chance to prepare myself for that kind of stuff.
HW: Can you even find other projects that give you this much range?
JR: You know, no, and just coming from New York and theater and the kind of training, I always thought of myself as a dramatic actress. I never thought I’d be doing a sitcom or comedy. So this gig has been a true dream come true. As an actor, you always dream of being able to, for myself, coming here again, coming from New York, you want to be able to sing and dance and act and cry and make people laugh. This is a dream job. You’re never going to get a chance to be able to do this on a day-to-day basis.
HW: Have you had any baby thoughts of your own?
JR: Oh yes, of course. Yes. As a woman I think, particularly now, we’re surrounded by a team of about 12 or 15 writers, most of which who’ve had kids just recently which is why there’ve been so many babies in this last season. Yeah. Baby thoughts have lingered on my list of priorities. Some day.
HW: Has it offered you a stable life for six years?
JR: Not only a stable life but a good life and wonderful security for the future, thankfully. A hit show is an extremely rare and gorgeous blessing and security for an actor and it will offer me a chance to take some risks as an actor in the future.
HW: What would your plans be after season seven? This would really be the last…
JR: I would imagine so, and then after that I’d pursue some more riskier projects for myself as an actor, things that would go contrary to the character I’ve been playing over the last six and seven years. Film projects and things like that, things that I’ve been dreaming of doing. More theater, musical theater, things that I’ve been able to touch the surface of as the character of Carla on Scrubs and beyond. Independent projects, Spanish speaking projects and things like that. More producing, I’ve produced some independent projects along the way. I did an independent film called Glow Ropes: The Rise and Fall of a Bar Mitzvah Emcee that’s out on DVD right now and will be released on Warner Brothers and Showtime that I’m very, very proud of. There’s more ventures like that that I’d like to pursue as well as an acting career in film and more television projects.
HW: Are you bicoastal, or did you relocate to LA for the show?
JR: I was relocated out here for the show but I do keep my apartment in New York City. I have family there and I’m close to my theater community out there as well.
HW: Are they totally different lifestyles?
JR: They are. It’s a much more low key lifestyle out there. I live in my uptown community north of Washington Heights and I stay close to my family. I still take the subway, take taxis and things like that. So it’s much more down home.
HW: And in New York, no one cares if they recognize you?
JR: They do, they do. But because it’s still my neighborhood, it’s still a much more accessible reality as opposed to a more fascinated reality that it is out here. But when I step out of it in Marinatown, downtown, people are much more impressed.
HW: How did you become familiar with the Bar Mitzvah world?
JR: Well, my very dear friend and partner, George Valencia, is a very experienced dancer at Bar Mitzvahs and emceed for 10 to 12 years. He’s the one who wrote the script and directed the film so that’s pretty much how I became familiar with that world and he pretty much wrote the part for me of this evil party planner. That’s pretty much how I became hip to it.
HW: Not just from living in New York surrounded by it?
JR: No, no, not from being in New York. I didn’t realize the extent of this world and how deep it would go into, setting up these extensive, extensive, fancy, elaborate parties and how famous and particular the hosts of these events were about their Bar Mitzvah dancers and how popular these behind the scenes guys were to these events, how particular they were. So this wonderful parody of these events came along and George Valencia, who as I said was a party dancer and former actor as well, came up with this script idea and wrote it. One thing led to another and this wonderful idea sprouted and came along. The next thing you know, we were producing this great little indie that I shot in between, during hiatuses, flying back and forth to New York City, from L.A. to New York.
HW: How did you first get connected to George and producing with him?
JR: George and I were friends. We met through a mutual acting friend. We just got to talking and hanging out and I coproduced and then costarred in two of his short films, one of them award winning called Moment to Moment. It won best short film at Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival. From that sprouted another short, an Italian short that he wrote completely in Italian that I starred in. We went to Italy and shot it in a town called Meduno. Another short film that also made it through the round of film festivals and from that came Glow Rose. We just became really great producing partners. I just love his tenacity and his ability to just produce and direct these films, along with my now ex-husband who was a consultant and partner and DP and a wonderful collaborator in all the projects as well as codirector of Glow Rose as a matter of fact. Part of the process and throughout, raising the money all ourselves, George mostly raising the money himself. And pretty much self-distributed the project. Echo Bridge picked up the DVD distribution deal and went into distribution I think over the Christmas holiday, just before that.
HW: When do you go back for Scrubs?
JR: I believe it’s going to be mid-July/early august.
HW: Any idea what the story in season seven might entail?
JR: I couldn’t tell you–and I enjoy being surprised by whatever it is the writers have in store. But I would imagine it would be the terrible ones and twos for Izzy and the challenges of being a mom with a toddler, a toddler child and a toddler husband. And competing for the attentions and the affections of my husband–with J.D.!