'Fear the Walking Dead' Postmortem Q&A With Cliff Curtis: 'We Don't Treat It as a Zombie Show'

Warning: Storyline and character spoilers ahead for the series premiere of Fear the Walking Dead.

Is he the West Coast Rick Grimes? That remains to be seen, but Cliff Curtis’s Travis Manawa makes a good start in the series premiere of AMC’s Walking Dead companion series, Fear the Walking Dead. Between trying to help his girlfriend’s drug-addicted son, forge a better relationship with his own estranged teen, and keep everyone safe in a health crisis that only hints at becoming more epic, Travis has so far proven himself to be a devoted paterfamilias to his blended — or rather, still blending — family.

New Zealand actor Curtis, who has also starred on dramas like Trauma, Missing, and Gang Related, talked to Yahoo TV about what attracted him to the Dead universe (despite not being a fan of the genre), how Travis will evolve through Season 1, how Travis earned the trust of his girlfriend’s traumatized addict son Nick, and the big trouble ahead for happy (relatively speaking, in the beginnings of the zombie apocalypse) couple Travis and Madison.

Were you a fan of the original series, or of the zombie genre, before you signed on for FTWD?
The genre, actually, I find it scary. I was introduced to the genre through this show. Both Kim [Dickens] and I were told by the studios and the creators that it wasn’t necessary for us to read the comics or watch the series, because the less we knew about this genre, the better, in terms of treating it realistically. We don’t treat it as a zombie show. We deal with it as real people and real situations. We both opted to just keep a distance from the other show, and turn up to work and do it a day at a time, discover the world with the audience.

Related: Take a Bite Out of Our ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ Premiere Recap

What attracted you to the series, to playing Travis?
I thought the script was a very good study of people and characters, and I loved the sort of ordinariness of the people. It wasn’t an action hero-type show; it was more about ordinary people who’ve got a long way to travel to be able to deal with the kind of devastation that is going to happen in the world. I was really intrigued by seeing such realistic characters in this genre, and then treating it as real, as opposed to a gimmick. And Travis, he’s a fixer, he’s an idealist, and he’s an optimist. He loves fixing things; he is very grounded in his family life and his community. He’s a really good guy, and it’s a great way for me to explore the character who’s essentially good in a world that is chaotic, and how to hold onto the best of himself and believe in the best of humanity.

By necessity, with this storyline, we’re probably going to see a pretty big evolution for him, then.
Yeah, it’s going to be very extreme, and I think we’re going to draw that out for as long as we possibly can, and make it as difficult as we can for him to accept the new world that is about to come down upon him and his family. I really enjoyed that, and it’s been great working with the creators of the show, because they’ve been very open to small suggestions I’ve made, and it’s changed the trajectory of the character. I wanted to make sure that he was believable as an English literature teacher, that he didn’t suddenly start turning into a kick-ass action hero straightaway. I wanted to have some time for this guy to come to terms with what he has to do to protect his family.

When we meet Travis and Madison and their kids, it’s obvious they have not happily blended their families yet, but they are making attempts to do that, particularly Travis and his efforts to help Nick. Will they be able to continue that as they get deeper into the apocalypse?
I think it’s a very topical, very rich, and very natural social environment for us to explore this world through. It’s something we can really empathize with. We all know people that come from broken families, and the contemporary antidote to that is to become a blended family. It’s like, “Yeah, Dad’s now got a new family, but it doesn’t mean that you have to be excluded from that. Mom might be a widow, but it doesn’t mean she has to be alone for the rest of her life… No one can replace your father, but here’s a good man who can become a part of your life.”

I think when you’re dealing with a very strong genre like ours, with zombies and an apocalypse, to capture an audience’s imagination, to get them to engage emotionally, the core characters have got to have something going on that the audience can relate to and empathize with. A blended family is a really great aspiration for many families, and that we meet this family when they’re in the middle of that process and the apocalypse comes right when the family is at its most vulnerable, I think it adds tension to that process.

It doesn’t mean that we give up on those things at all, because those are the things that mean the most to us. A time of natural disaster or crisis does two things for families and society: It pushes them together, because they need each other more than ever, but also it increases the stakes and the level of threat upon the family. They become divided at the same time as being pulled together.

Related: ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ Pilot Director: The Art of Embracing the Shadows and Building Tension

One of the best scenes in the premiere is between Travis and Nick at the hospital. Nick has been very flip about what he saw at the church. But then he opens up to Travis about his fears that he may just be going insane. They didn’t appear to be close, yet Nick chose Travis to confide in. Why?
Well, firstly, I think it’s really important for kids, and especially teenagers, to have adults in their lives they can talk to. They just need someone to talk to, because the conversations with their parents are so loaded, so emotionally charged — especially with someone like Nick, who has disappointed his mother many, many times. And Travis takes the time to be there when he doesn’t have to be. Nick’s not his son, he doesn’t need to take the time, but that’s the kind of guy Travis is. Nick’s run out of options. He’s got no friends left. Partly it’s that, and part of it’s because Travis is that guy. He’s a really good guy and will take the time to listen to people when no one else will.

Nick wants the love of his mom and Travis wants the love of the same woman, so there continues to be a very unpredictable relationship. There’s no easy road for Travis and Nick, I’m afraid.

What about Travis and Madison? Their relationship is very solid, and as you said, obviously he’s a very good guy who goes above and beyond. But there are some big challenges ahead, too, between the family issues and the impending apocalypse. Can they handle it?
Well, I think there’s nothing more trying on a new relationship than having a past relationship, like Travis’s ex-wife, in the [picture]. Liza is a very attractive and strong woman in her own right, and so it’s not so much that the women are competing… I think it’s more along the lines that Travis and Madison have a new relationship, and as strong as it is when we meet them, relationships are tender things. Because of the challenges that come, Travis and Madison get to know each other and themselves through the pending apocalypse, and it’s unexpected what they learn about themselves.

We can all pretend to say we know what we’re going to do when the apocalypse happens, but we really have no idea. Travis and Madison, they start off with a very strong relationship, but they’re still getting to know each other. What happens is that they discover they take opposing positions in terms of how to deal with certain situations. However, the relationship with the ex-wife… their marriage might have failed, but they had thirteen years together. They have a shorthand, and in crisis, they know each other, and they know what to do. They don’t even have to discuss things, and in a crisis, that’s really what you need. You need to know where the other person stands, and that you’re in agreement. Travis and Liza agree on things, and then Travis and Madison disagree, so it sets up a very fun dynamic within the blended family.

You mentioned you didn’t want Travis to be an unrealistic action-hero kind of guy, especially to become that overnight. But he is going to be called on to spring into action a lot…
I love it. I love doing action. I think action is fun, and there’s plenty of action in this show. I wanted to do it from the point-of-view of an English literature teacher who’s spent his entire career trying to convince teenagers to be good citizens, and to believe in social order and good conduct, and to believe in the goodness of humanity. He’s devoted as a teacher. I wanted him to be somebody who was good at something, but not necessarily at being an action hero.

And then he has to evolve. He’s certainly not a pushover, and he can handle himself if he’s pushed into a tight corner. But it’s not going to be his default. Travis is much more of an idealist, so he’s going to hold onto his ideals as a teacher. You know, “Come on, guys, let’s not have fighting be the first resort. We can talk this thing out.” Whereas Madison… she’s an act-first-and-ask-questions-later kind of gal.

Have you finished filming all six Season 1 episodes?
Yes. I’m doing ADR sessions now. For a couple weeks, I have to be up in a little booth and re-voice certain words and add a scream or a yell here and there, or a scared type of breathing, like I’m hiding behind things, looking out windows. It’s been really fun.

Related: ‘Fear the Walking Dead’: Showrunner Dave Erickson on What to Expect in Season 1 (and 2)

How did you feel at the end of doing those six? Was it hard to leave this story, and your character, behind?
I really enjoyed this show because I really enjoyed the script, each episode. They started with a relatively slow burn with the first couple of episodes, but then each episode, three, four, five, six, it builds in terms of stakes and tension. For me, it was really fun reading the scripts and then seeing the level of commitment of the creators to make it feel real. Like the riots in Episode 2, they feel real. Then when you see the infected, at first they’re not like zombies. They’re like people that have been infected with a very bad disease, and they feel very real.

But I tell you what, when we finished the six… I did not realize how much energy it had taken to do them. I was exhausted, but I was too busy having fun, kind of like kids in a park. They don’t want to leave the park; they just want to stay and play and play and play, and when it’s time to go home, they pass out in the car. That’s what happened to me. Once it wrapped, I suddenly felt how tired I’d been, and I passed out for like a week. I could not get up in the morning. I’m an early morning guy. I get up at like three, four, five in the morning, but that week, I couldn’t get out of bed.

You must be excited to jump back into it, then, for Season 2?
Yeah, I’m really looking forward to it. I’m really curious to see where we go in Season 2, because we left it on such a cliffhanger.

Fear the Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on AMC.