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Actress Emmanuelle Chriqui is known for her roles in Entourage, The Mentalist, You Don't Mess with the Zohan, and her leading role in the second season of the action packed show Cleaners on Crackle, which follows the life of assassins Veronica (played by Emmanuelle) and Roxie (played by Emily Osment) who run on an errand that turns into a fight for their lives.
Emanuelle spoke exclusively to MStars News about playing the lead role in an action show, her first time executive producing a project, and gives details of what fans should expect for the upcoming Entourage movie coming out summer 2015.
MN: How does it feel to release the second season of Cleaners?
Emmanuelle: It feels great! It feels really exciting. I'm just happy. It just seems to be a really positive response to the show. Our fans that were our fans first season are super into the second season which is nice. It's exciting, I love it and it's nice to be able to be like "Oh, yeah! You can go onto Crackle.com right now and tune in in."
MN: Talk about the cliff hanger and Roxie's twist after landing $10 million. What should fans expect to happen to Roxie for next season?
Emmanuelle: Should there be a next season? That's a question for the creator. A third season would be amazing. We had so much fun playing these roles.
MN: You were executive producers and you had the lead. How was it wearing so many hats?
Emmanuelle: It was really thrilling! It was a big learning curve. It's really exciting for the first time of my life to be an actor but also bring a project to life. To bring a project to Crackle with Paul Leyden — our creator — and have them excited as we were to make it. That was really exciting. I never done that before, and Ann Clements, our producer really made the magic happen, but it was great to experience. It's a lot of work!
MN: How long did it take you to train for action scenes on the show?
Emmanuelle: The first season, I would say, two months out we started going hard. Starting to train and doing gun training and fight training and all that stuff. You know we also had out stunt doubles because one, they're incredible and this is what they do for a living. Two, we shoot so fast, that we can't actually afford to do all the super elaborate stunts on our own because we can risk getting hurt and have no show at all. Especially if you're moving that quickly, it's very different — say you're on a film and you're training six months out — this was a lot more hurried. Because we still needed to train and do stuff and we did a lot of stuff, but just the elaborate stuff was our amazing stunt doubles.
MN: You were approached about the role By Paul Leyden at a BBQ. Did you think you were perfect for the assassin's role right then?
Emmanuelle: Paul and I are great friends. He's just a creative person, an actor, director, and writer, and we're just having one of those artist conversations and he sort of pitched this idea to me that it was just exciting. It was more the idea of like, "Oh my God, I would love to play something I've never played before." So it wasn't initially, "Oh my God, I would be perfect for this," it was, "Oh my God how exciting to be able to play something like this — I don't know if I could do this." Ironically, prior to shooting Cleaners, Paul has mentioned this to me years ago, so then before shooting Cleaners last year, I had the good fortune of working in the Mentalist where it was the first time I really dabbled in playing in a more action-oriented role. Like somebody who was a little crazy, working with guns and all that stuff in a more action way, and after that I was like, "Oh, wow! I love doing this!" I felt comfortable in it. Then it got more exciting when we knew Cleaners was going to happen. I was much more confident about going into that.
MN: With a tight budget set for the Cleaners, how long were your days filming and what would you say was the hardest part of shooting an action show?
Emmanuelle: Paul Leyden is such a genius. He always knew exactly what he needed for the shots that we were never over shooting anything. Our days were grueling, but they were never shooting like 17 hours a day or anything. I would say that the hardest thing about shooting our show, or certainly the most challenging part was that we were moving so quickly that a lot of the work, a lot of the character work — there wasn't a lot of rehearsal time — it was really like you had to show and almost just be ready to shoot. Maybe you'd work it as we were setting up the shot and you know go off and rehearse it, but we didn't have the luxury of that. That was scary, you know as an actor because we cherish rehearsal time. It was definitely a learning curve on trusting your instincts a lot more than normal.
MN: How was it juggling shooting roles for Cleaners and Entourage the movie?
Emmanuelle: Luckily for me I didn't have to go back and forth. I was able to finish Cleaners and then go right into Entourage, so I didn't have to go back and forth from Puerto Rico or anything like that, which I was so grateful for because they are wildly different roles and they look different and everything about them is different so that would have been not fun. I literally wrapped Cleaners, flew home, got off the plane, went to the hair salon, got my extensions taken out and then shot the next day.
MN: What's your opinion of Entourage being called misogynistic?
Emmanuelle: It's so interesting that people would say that. The sad truth is that it is a very real depiction of Hollywood. You know, you can bash the show all you want, but all these stories are inspired from things that happen — maybe exaggerated for our entertainment potential. It never really bothered me I never really felt that way. If anything I was super proud to be a strong woman on the show. Doug Ellin was always so protective of my character and I really appreciated that. I think the show — some people loved it and some people hated it and you know it's the nature of the beast, some people are going to be haters, but we had a lot of lovers too!
MN: Some may compare Sex and the City and Entourage and call your character Eric's "Mr. Big." Should fans expect any surprises between Sloan's and Eric's relationship in the movie?
Emmanuelle: Yes, there will definitely be more surprises! It'll be fun! For the Sloan and Eric lovers, I think they'll be very happy with the film version.
MN: Do you think you've gained more female or male fans from playing Sloan on the show?
Emmanuelle: It's a really interesting thing. I feel like I really have both. I feel like women really love Sloan, they have related to her, and Doug wrote her in such a way that she was so wifey material, so men were super into her too. I can't tell you how many times I'm out and about and I'll have girls come up to me, like, "Oh my God! Can I have a picture with you? My fiancé loves you!" And I'm like, "Yo that's really crazy!"
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