Kristin Bauer Interview Transcript – At Last!

By Liz | February 19, 2009 2 Comments

Boy, it’s been busy around here! With True Blood going back into production for season two and appearances and awards ceremonies, Mel and I have barely been able to keep up. Then there’s the interviews – oi! We’ve been having so much fun that time has just flown by without our noticing.

We finally have the second part of Kristin Bauer’s interview transcribed and ready for your reading pleasure. Thanks again, Becky!
Enjoy!

KB: But it’s just an interesting thing that shape-shifter thing you know.

TB.net: Right

KB: To see all the Star Trek analogies you were catching that most people don’t.

TB.net: We had the Vulcan mind-meld thing earlier.

KB: I say that to people and they just uhh?

TB.net: You know let your geek flag fly.

KB: That’s it exactly. Please if I can’t be a geek and play Pam. Pam allows me a lot of leeway in geek-land.

TB.net: You know you really ought to have Pam make a Star Trek reference, just to give us Trekkers a little more cool. Up our cool quotient.

KB: (Laughs) Yeah, wouldn’t that be hysterical?

TB.net: It would be really funny.

KB: I will e-mail you…I see your email here from my manager. I’ll email you the picture of me from Star Trek.

TB.net: Okay. We could add that to this, ‘cause we’re going to transcribe this.

KB: Okay, good. Just so you can laugh. For Vegas, they needed promo pictures of me so I sent them that picture.

TB.net: No- you did not? Oh my gosh.

KB: And I’m thinking ‘that’s funny’… and I never heard a word. So like two days later I sent the real pictures and never a word. They had to go through my people… and nobody laughed. I thought that was good.

TB.net: We would have caught the humor.

KB: Yes, thank you. Good Mid-Westerners.

TB.net: Right. Solid stock here. We’ve got to stick together.

KB: Yup. We’re good people.

TB.net: We want to ask you a little bit, actually a lot about your art. I’ve been to your website and you have some beautiful, beautiful pieces up there. Which movement do you find most inspirational?

KB: I like the old, basically all those painters you see in the museums where they’ve painted old rich people with their dogs. They’re not old when they painted them, but like those people who could really paint. You know, like Sargent and that’s probably what I’ll spend my life working on. Those guys got to be so good because it’s all they did 12 hours a day. So I just paint when I can, or draw when I can. So I’ll probably spend my whole life trying to just be as good as they.

TB.net: There’s one, the one of the woman that’s kind of reclining on the couch. My niece is an art student in college right now. She did a picture similar to that.

KB: Oh yeah? Where is she going to school?

TB.net: She’s going to Northern Illinois University.

KB: Oh great. I think if you go to university, they’ll try to teach you how to really draw and really paint.

TB.net: Yeah, hers was… it reminded me very much when I saw that I thought of my niece’s picture. I’d probably send that to you if I could. If I had a way to send it to you. She added a picture in a window on the wall and in the window is a picture, I think it’s a picture of Van Gogh or one of the Masters. It’s very subtle.

KB: Yup.

TB.net: You miss it if you don’t know it’s there you miss it.

KB: Oh neat.

TB.net: I don’t know she just seems very inspired. I’m pretty proud of her. But when I saw that I thought of her work. I would love for you to see that.

KB: Well when I send you the Vulcan, you’ll have my e-mail address now. Then you can send that back to me. I’d love to see it and I love to see what people are doing. So many schools right now that skip to the modern arts express yourself phase. Which really initially was… I find it a really valid thing on any level, but in a school I feel like you should only be extrapolating on the human figure if you really know how to draw the human figure. If it’s on your own and you want to go out and do whatever you want to do, that’s great.

TB.net: We’ll see where she goes with this. I don’t know if she wants to teach or… It’s difficult, as you have said already, to make a living just being an artist.

KB: It is… yup. I tried to go into graphic design and it’s really corporate. So I’ve just always just been a rebel that way and didn’t want to live in that world. There are… I have a friend who makes his living out here in Hollywood. He’s incredible, but he’s an illustrator for the business and he works for a couple of people doing that. So he will design say all the characters for the new Star Trek movie. He will do all the characters that will be in the background and in the bar. He will do the movie poster and all the artwork for say the new Keanu movie, I forget the name of it.

TB.net: The Day the Earth Stood Still.

KB: Yes. So he’ll design the poster for that. So there are ways, but if you want to do fine art… I think it’s a tricky road right now because the galleries just want modern art.

TB.net: Yeah, and that’s kind of her niche. Contemporary, I would say more her thing. But she says its very difficult because you have to really be… do something that really stands out because there isn’t much left that hasn’t already been done.

KB: That’s it.

TB.net: So I don’t know where she’ll go but she’s also majoring in photographic journalism. So that might be her bread and butter.

KB: Oh interesting. That could be her day job.

TB.net: One of our members on our forums has been looking on your website there and there is a piece called “Mother and Child.” She wanted to know, could you tell me what inspired that piece and what are you trying to convey through it?

KB: I… that was a photo that I found and I thought that… I wasn’t exactly sure how to put it in words why I wanted to paint it but I just thought it was … that maybe it’s just the composition is so striking. But it just seemed so amazing to have this beautiful sweet child and this hand… the way it was holding this child’s head like you can tell there’s so much love. And then you have a woman, who for whatever reason has to be completely hidden and cloaked. It just seemed to be that the child gets to have its face shown. And I made it a little girl and in the photo you couldn’t really tell, so I tried to make it more a feminine child. I don’t even know, and it doesn’t make any statements or conclusions for me it just sorta raises more questions. You know, like well you know she’s maybe living in a different culture and having to hide herself, but she’s still just a mom… and still just a person.

TB.net: Right.

KB: So it just seemed to be a thing and a good sorta bond and humanize her. Because I have no reality in what her life is like.

TB.net: Well your work is so beautiful. I was awed. I didn’t know that when I went to your website. I thought I’d see all these glamour shots for movies but no, it was a pleasant surprise.
You’re also involved with the Amanda Foundation and the Forte Animal Rescue.

KB: Yeah. I help them when I can. These are two- I mean there are so many great rescue groups- because I’m extremely passionate about people going to the shelter to get a dog instead of buying. The reason is I’ve been to the shelters. So once you go or you walk through or you volunteer, which is what I did, it’s absolutely astounding how many incredible, sweet pure breed… any breed you want is in that shelter. These dogs are- I had this idea that the dogs at the shelter had something wrong with them. They had a health issue, they had a behavior issue, they were ugly… something. But no, it’s a symptom of the people, from humanity; it’s not a symptom of the poor dog. So I started… it was impossible for me- I have way too much empathy when it comes to animals, so I just kept bringing them home. You know, and then you find out how perfect they are. I mean these are just amazing dogs that got stuck in a bad situation. So the problem is really enormous. Six million are put to sleep in America every year. All because they don’t have a piece of paper that says their breed, and that’s so hard for me because that’s such prejudice.

TB.net: Yeah it is.

KB: You know it’s saying your DNA, your bloodlines are not pure enough. I go, wow there was only one other time that I can recall in recent history that we’ve seen that and it was a war. So I go, this is just awful and I’ve also seen them take the dog down the hall, like 20 or 30 a day at a shelter in LA get put to sleep. So these groups, the Amanda Foundation and Forte, they pull dogs from the shelters and they’ll keep them as long as it takes to find them a good home.

TB.net: That’s really great.

KB: Yeah, so I do just whatever I can for them and my dogs are all from different shelters and rescues. I got one of my dogs from the Forte Rescue.

TB.net: And you have pictures of them up on your website too.

KB: Yeah, I do.

TB.net: Your babies. They’re your babies.

KB: That’s my babies. That’s my family.

TB.net: They’re cute. Yeah they are. My daughter is probably going to be an animal cop when she grows up.

KB: Oh- god LOVE her!

TB.net: She’s been watching all the animal cop shows, the one from Houston, Miami and Detroit.

KB: I can’t watch those.

TB.net: Yeah, she sucked me into these shows.

KB: They are unbelievable what these people do. Isn’t it incredible?

TB.net: You know, I can’t get through a show without balling my eyes out.

KB: Me too.

TB.net: Here’s my 12-year-old daughter sitting there and I look at her and her eyes are dry. And I say- doesn’t that bother you? And she goes, yeah that’s why I’m going to be an animal cop when I grow up.

KB: Awww. That’s so great.

TB.net: Instead of crying about it she’s gonna go and you know, she’s been asking me… “Who can I talk to and where do I go? Is there someplace in Illinois?” So … ah-yup.

KB: And what is the training for that? Do you go through the police academy?

TB.net: I think, from what I’ve read, you do. You go through the ASPCA. That’s probably the best bet for us to contact them and ask them questions and I will do that. I home-school my kids, so I think it will be project I’m going to give her to do.

KB: Oh, that’s great.

TB.net: And we’ll see what she can find out on her own about this. I think there’s some… I think she’s going to have to know physics as far as animal physiology. You know, basic stuff.

KB: That’s great. Like CPR and stuff.

TB.net: Right. Do something right on the spot for some of these animals.

KB: Oh my god, that’s so incredible. I mean, those are the heroes.

TB.net: Yeah, I don’t know how she watches them with a dry eye though. I can’t.

KB: Oh I sob. You know, I could just sob thinking about the last one that I saw, it was a Rottie that someone had starved to death. It only lived long enough to get to the hospital and I was done for a week. I definitely can’t watch those shows ‘cause I’ll just be ruined. So then I just… I had to stop volunteering in the shelters. I can only volunteer in the shelters where that they won’t kill them.

TB.net: Right. Otherwise you take them all home.

KB: Yeah, and right now we’re working on… I’m working hard on…there’s an elephant in the zoo… in the LA Zoo. Elephants are one of the animals that shouldn’t be in the zoo. They can’t survive in a zoo. They live to be 70 in the wild- they’re like people. They have families, they mourn their dead, they live to be 70 but they have to walk 20 to 50 miles every day. It’s because the pads on their feet are soft. They don’t have feet like we have, so if they don’t keep moving they die from foot-rot, which is their feet rotting up through their bodies. So I really want people to understand that you just can’t go to the circus. Because they electrocute those. And use these….they have poles with a dagger on the end and they stab them in the back of their legs to get them to do those tricks.

TB.net: Oh, oh wow.

KB: So the elephants in the zoo and the circus are basically being tortured. So we’re trying to get this elephant out of the LA Zoo. He’s been there for 20 years and I think he’s been alone now 10 years because his friend dropped dead of a heart attack. And it’s quite a fight, because the zoo people don’t want to lose their property. They’re like…don’t let them take our elephant, we want to see him.

TB.net: Well what would you do… what would they do once they got him out of there?

KB: Yeah, yeah. There are sanctuaries and they’re hundreds and hundreds of acres. They actually have one in Northern California that’s amazing. And then there’s one in Tennessee that is über amazing and they have 15 elephants or so and they have hundreds and hundreds of acres. I believe the Tennessee one has thousands. And they let them have families and they let them introduce friends to these groups and they have lakes and ponds and hills. They just roam and they have barns they come back to be fed at night and they have the same vet care which is good, if not better than the zoo.

TB.net: Hmm good.

KB: The zoo has incredible vet care, but so do our prisoners. They have great medical care for our prisoners. So we’re really trying, but… we got Bob Barker to come forward who said I’ll pay the $200,000 the amount that it will take to move Billy to the sanctuary… I’ll move him tomorrow. It’s really incredible, there’s so many areas we can make a difference. I think it just takes awareness … when you walk through the zoo wondering where did we get this elephant? Billy came from being taken from his mom in Africa when he was a kid.

TB.net: Awww.

KB: That’s where we got him, you know.

TB.net: Well, you know, if we put that information up on our website, you’re going to have a ton of people going what can we do? What can we do?

KB: Yeah what they can do is… ooh I could send you the information on what they could do. Basically how this is turned around is by calls and e-mails.

TB.net: Okay.

KB: And they were going to build Billy a bigger enclosure but… and it still would be just a bigger cage. It’s like giving prisoners time in the yard every day. It doesn’t substitute for a closer life to a natural life. So we were able to … they were gonna spend 40 to 80 million dollars of taxpayer money to build this larger enclosure in this economy.

TB.net: Oh great. Wow. That makes me feel wonderful.

KB: So through calls and e-mails we got that stopped. Now what we’re working on is just getting Billy out of there. And all the zoo people just say we want to keep out elephant. And I’m like well… I want to be able to fly, but the closest I can get to it is a skateboard in an alley, you know?

(laughs)

KB: So reality sets in and what would be better for Billy, and the zoo people look at what would be better for the zoo.

TB.net: Yeah, yeah. Well, do send us that information and we’ll put that up and we can spread the word on our website.

KB: That would be amazing. Because no we’re… the net hearing is in January and these are elected officials. So what they care about is what people think and they care a lot about what the country thinks. Most zoos have gotten rid of their elephant exhibits. And you can go to these sanctuaries and see these exhibits and that’s a really incredible experience that I’m going to be doing next month.

TB.net: Okay, take some pictures.

KB: Yeah, oh are you kidding? I’ll be sobbing and taking some pictures.

TB.net: We’ll post that up there.

KB: That would be amazing. We’re writing right now. We’re righting the newspapers. We’re writing Oprah.

TB.net: Well…there ya go. Perfect. We can talk about it on our show. We get quite a bit of traffic.

KB: That would be great. I really would love people to just understand that and not support the circus. And if they do go to the zoo, to show concern to whoever runs the zoo. This animal has to live in that cage, and we go once a year, but they’ve got to live there the entire year until we go back there and go “oh neat!”

TB.net: Yeah, when you think about what they’re enclosed in. There are two major zoos that are right around me. You know which ones I’m talking about.

KB: Yeah, I’ve been to them and even as a kid, I had a hard time. I would see the one Racine… and I would see the tiger pacing. Pacing, pacing, pacing and then you watch the National Geographic channel or something and you see them in their natural habitat running and having families and you think oh man. This is what we do to people who murder people.

TB.net: Yeah. I don’t see the sport.

KB: I don’t get it. I don’t get it and you know their only crime is that they’re just stunning to look at.

TB.net: Right. You like to try and get up close and personal. There are plenty of places to do that, like you were saying, where you can see them in their natural habitat safely.

KB: Yeah, there’s the San Diego Wild Animal Park here. I went a long time ago… out here there’s a whole bunch. Tippi Hedren has a place where you can go see the cats. It’s a sanctuary for cats rescued from zoos and circuses.

TB.net: I’ve heard about that.

KB: Yeah. I can’t believe I haven’t been, because I really, really want to go.

TB.net: My kids were pretty excited when we took them to Disney World and their Animal Kingdom. It’s wide open and you just drive through there on a safari truck.

KB: Hey, okay that’s like the San Diego Wild Animal Park. That’s the way to do it.

TB.net: Sure, there’s ways.

KB: There’s ways. Well, that would be great I’ll send you guys that information as well. I’ve already sent you my Vulcan picture.

TB.net: Alright. Well- Mel, you done? Yeah, I think we’re about ready to wrap it up. Is there anything else that you’re doing, Kristin, you know, that’s coming up that you would like to promote?

KB: No, just that you get to see more True Blood in the summer. That’s not too far.

TB.net: Yay. We’re excited and we’ll be seeing a lot more Pam next one around. Yeah, don’t plan any big project because you’re going to be busy I think.

KB: That is awesome. I thought about reading the second book before we go back to work and I don’t know if I want to see the script first or the book first.

TB.net: You know, based on what little nibblet Alan Ball just dropped…

KB: He did?

TB.net: I don’t think you should read the book first.

KB: Really? Well I know it’s so much fun. I don’t even read the script before the table read. I read my scenes. But I like to just watch it as a play.

TB.net: Yeah, it’s the book…. He’s gonna depart even more in the second season from the book. Although, being that he is a fan of the books, he’s going to keep to the spirit of them. He’s been faithful and dedicated as much as… I think that’s why we trust him so much with the show because he’s a fan.

KB: Right, he’s a big fan. The first episode when I met him, he came and ate lunch with us and he said somebody gave him the book or he got a hold of it and he couldn’t put it down. And he had to go get the second one and couldn’t put it down. And then he had to get to Charlotte- is it Charlotte or Charlene?

TB.net: Charlene.

KB: Yup, Charlene Harris. He had to get to her and say “Please! Let me do this.”

TB.net: And we’re so glad he did and took it to HBO. Because it’s being made correctly there. If he had taken it to network TV it wouldn’t be.

KB: Can you imagine?

TB.net: Don’t get us wrong, Liz and I both loved Moonlight. We are huge Moonlight fans but…

KB: Is it good?

TB.net: It is good but you know for True Blood, for that story I think HBO is really where it needs to be.

KB: Yeah. I think he needs a network where they are not going to tie his hands creatively.

TB.net: Exactly. Where they’re not going to be like well we want you to be like CSI with a vampire.

KB: (Laughs)

TB.net: Yeah, a little more creative freedom at HBO.

KB: Well hopefully he’ll be keeping what’s in the books but adding to it. It seems like that’s what he did first season. You didn’t miss anything, you just got extra.

TB.net: Exactly. And, you know, that makes it fun for us who have read all the books already. It’s a different way to read the books, so to speak. These books we love so much and we get to see them in a different way. It’s double the pleasure for us.

KB: Yeah, oh good.

TB.net: We’ve been thrilled and enjoying them all and we love every time Pam is on the screen. I hang on her every word. You know, what can I write down and use in every day life.

KB: (Laughs) Right? She’s one of my favorite characters I’ve ever played. Because it’s just all upside. It’s all fun to just relish in being immortal, with no apology whatsoever. I love that. That’s a part of me that does exist and I wish it were a bigger part, but ya know.

TB.net: And she’s happy being with Eric, too.

KB: Yes, she really is loyal to him.

TB.net: Yeah, she… without him having to make her that way. She’s happy to work with him and help him out when he needs it.

KB: Yeah, it seems like it.

TB.net: Be his right hand person.

KB: Yeah, that line that Bill had where he said “how is it being crawled up Eric’s backside?” and I said “it’s nice, you should try it sometime.” He loved it.

TB.net: I was going to use that as my signature on our forum.

KB: Yeah, that’s great.

TB.net: I was going to put it “how’s it being up Bill’s backside?”

KB: Yeah, it’s nice. I can’t wait to see what I get to do. You know, and they won’t tell us. It all has to go through agency managers and we have to be officially notified of table reads and so I just want to call up my friends on the set and go what’s happening? What’s Lafayette gonna do? Is he really dead, like what’s going on and, you know, was that his foot and… they won’t… they run a really tight ship. So I was grilling Alexander and Ryan in Vegas and they said they don’t know anything.

TB.net: Yeah, well we could tell ya, but that’s not necessarily how Alan’s going to play it out.

KB: Yeah, that’s why I thought maybe I’ll not read the book because then I’ll be expecting that.

TB.net: Let it be a surprise. You’ve already got the character nailed down, so it’s not like you need any…

KB: Yeah, she’s pretty easy for me. I don’t know what that says about me.

TB.net: (laughs) It says it was perfect casting. Yes, that’s it exactly.

KB: Well thank you guys.

TB.net: Be prepared for the onslaught of fans that are going to be appearing, crawling out from under rocks and stuff.

KB: Yeah, I’ve been amazed. I mean, this week three people just walk into my life which… I mean, I was on Seinfeld and that didn’t happen. And it’s really an astounding thing… and people just coming up to me saying “how do they do the fang thing?” I’m like, I don’t know that’s all CGI behind my back. So it’s been really interesting. What’s interesting and what I love about that is the huge cross-section of people. It’s not one type of person. Or male or female or any age group. I mean, it’s across the board the people that are coming up to me. He’s got an enormous fan base. Alan Ball has done a great job.

TB.net: Yeah. We’ve been surprised at the number of people that are participating on the forums on our site or e-mailing us.

KB: Really?

TB.net: Yeah, or interacting with us on the radio show. Like you said, you can’t generalize because it’s just across the board.

KB: Well I can’t wait to check out your site and that will be interesting to me.

TB.net: Yes, come see us and leave comments. We didn’t get to ask you about your accent.

KB: Well I’ll tell you they just…the night before the auditions, I got a call from my manager and he said they’d like you to do it in a Creole accent. And I was like oh sure that will be easy! I said, I don’t know how to do a Creole accent. I need a day with tapes or something. And they called back and said you can do Southern.

TB.net: Okay then. You needed to talk to Michael Raymond James. He would have hooked you up.

KB: Was that not the most amazing… and he was the only who ended up doing it. I guess they decided that- he was the only one- so I guess they decided they wanted it that way. Cause he’s the guy who plays…

TB.net: Rene.

KB: Rene, right. Because I would just see him at table reads and we didn’t have any scenes together.

TB.net: That’s too bad. We actually talked with him last week.

KB: He is great, isn’t he?

TB.net: He’s a doll.

KB: He’s a doll. He seemed like it anyway. I tried to go to everyone like Rutina and say hi to everybody. Hi! Hi! You know because then we’re apart.

TB.net: Exactly, you don’t have any scenes together. Unfortunately you won’t be having any with Michael, but who knows in season two and who you might be interacting with.

KB: That’s what I’ve wonder because they’ve had us cloistered in the vampire world. We got to go into Merlotte’s once.

TB.net: That was awesome. I loved that you guys were passing out coupons.

KB: (laughs) That’s hysterical. That was fun.

TB.net: Well, this is probably the most fun I’ve had.

KB: Good. Well it was awful fun talking to you guys.

TB.net: Yeah and you too, Kristin. Thank you so much and you’ve been on the phone with us for an hour and a half out of your day.

KB: Yeah, it’s no problem.

TB.net: We are honored and we’ll do it justice.

KB: Great, and thank you so much and thank you for your help with Billy. That is really huge for me.

TB.net: Our pleasure and we’ll keep in touch with you.

KB: Okay, good. Good-bye and have a good weekend.

TB.net: You too.

(Listen to part one here.)