CASTLE: Cameron Mathison Teases ‘One Life to Lose’ and Working with Rebecca Budig in Primetime

As we’ve previously teased, tonight’s episode of CASTLE revolves around a murder mystery on a soap opera set.

For fans of the ABC Daytime series ALL MY CHILDREN, the hour will be especially enjoyable, as several of the scenes take place on the Pine Valley sets and AMC’s Cameron Mathison and Rebecca Budig guest star.

I caught up with Mathison and we talked about his guest spot on tonight’s episode of CASTLE and how the experience defied his expectations…

How did you come about landing this role?
Cameron Mathison: It wasn’t a typical involvement — it’s not like I went out and auditioned for the part and all of that kind of stuff. I think what happened — from my understanding — was there was a regular meeting at ABC to talk about what’s happening in primetime, what’s happening in daytime and I guess it came up at that meeting that CASTLE was doing a story about a murder mystery on the set of a soap opera. And Brian Frons who is in charge of ABC Daytime said, from my understanding,  “You gotta use some of my people!” Rebecca [Budig, who plays Greenlee on ALL MY CHILDREN] and myself fit the bill and on we went.

Were you a fan of CASTLE before you got this role?
CM: I was a fan of CASTLE in the sense where I think it’s a phenomenal show. I really love the show — it’s a quality, quality show. I wasn’t a regular watcher, I just don’t have the time to watch shows these days, but I’m a big fan of the actors who are on it, as well as the show itself.

Obviously you are in the middle of a huge storyline on ALL MY CHILDREN, so was there any conflict with you filming this guest spot?
CM: [ALL MY CHILDREN producers] Julie Carruthers and Nadine Aronson have like the toughest job that I can ever imagine because there are so many things they have to juggle and twist. It’s unimaginable and I promise you I’m not even blowing this out of proportion. The hurdles they have to deal with…it’s amazing. And this was just an added one. I mean, it could benefit ALL MY CHILDREN, obviously, by getting some viewers and some hype around the show, but in general it was purely for Rebecca and I and for our best interests because we wanted to do it. They were completely game and they worked it out in the middle of a very busy storyline. I think it was peak story time and they really went out of their way.

As far as the stuff they shot on our [ALL MY CHILDREN] set, we happened to be dark that week so it worked out pretty well. I think CASTLE had to delay shooting a little bit, but essentially ALL MY CHILDREN was dark — meaning we weren’t shooting for the week — and what they did was use those days to shoot on the set of ALL MY CHILDREN for the fictitious soap that takes place on CASTLE. There was no one there, so we were able to create our own soap that day.

Was it a little weird for you to be on your normal set playing an entirely different character?
CM: You know, it’s funny, because I got the script and I was so sure — I didn’t have a character name, I didn’t know what character I was playing, it was just, “here’s the script you’re going to be in” — and I figured I knew what character I was going to be, it was whoever the male soap lead was. So I’m reading the script and I’m thinking, “Oh, they’re going to have me shirtless and in a love scene or something very typical of what you think” and it wasn’t!

At first, I was looking for the character and the male lead of the show is older and a little bit out of shape — that’s how it was written anyway — and so I’m thinking to myself, “Wow, is that how I come across? I better get to the gym or something.” I was starting to get a complex. But it turned out, Corbin [Bernsen] played that part. And obviously he’s not that out of shape, but originally I was looking at it thinking, “There it is, that’s how they see me. I better whip myself into shape.” It wasn’t that at all. I was so happy and surprised to see they wanted me to play the director on the show, which I thought was so cool.

Without giving too much away, were you hoping to have some sort of tie-in with Rebecca’s character?
CM: Yeah, I was. I was mostly hoping I’d be able to work with Nathan [Fillion (Castle)] and Stana [Katic (Beckett)], that was my number one hope and it turned out that was the case.

Rebecca and I have so much fun together and we’re so close and it would have been so cool to play totally different characters, but together, but the only [scene we shared] was the one set scene that I was directing and she was on the stage. She was hearing my voice over the loudspeaker and it apparently cracked her up because she literally could not take me being the director seriously. I can make her laugh really bad anyway, but she had to get through that, she had to stay in character hearing my voice calling action. She was just cracking up.

So in other words, AMC fans should be hoping for some fun bloopers from this episode.
CM: Yeah. She just couldn’t stop [laughing], with my voice over the loudspeaker. It was very cute to watch because I was giving her notes in how lousy she was in the scene and she just couldn’t take it. It was pretty cute.

And because you are on a soap, was there any concern about the way the soaps and the soap fans were portrayed in this episode?
CM: Yeah, I think [the genre] sort of has a stigma around it and I think these days, it’s not really like that anymore. I don’t think soaps are overly soapy. I think there are certain aspects that you have to stay true to. You can visually tell you’re looking at a soap opera — I don’t want to get into it, but you have to have it conditioned [a certain way] because we shoot so much material and cameras and lighting and all of that — but yeah. You know they’re going to have a little fun with that. And even though I don’t think soaps are all that soapy anymore — I think we’re trying to make it a lot more of a primetime feel these days — you have to have a little bit of fun with the differences. Everybody’s already thinking of it anyway.

I think Rebecca did a good job of not playing her character over-the-top. It was written originally that she was a really soapy actor. I haven’t seen the episode, but from what I understand, she didn’t really play it like that, so I think that was a good call.

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Are you looking forward to CASTLE’s take on the soap genre?

Related:

Jane Seymour Teases Her CASTLE Guest Spot
CASTLE: Andrew Marlowe Teases ‘The Final Nail,’ Lanie-Esposito, Upcoming Cases and More
CASTLE: Andrew Marlowe Teases the Castle-Beckett Relationship and Debunks the MOONLIGHTING Curse

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