Mariana Klaveno : Movieline

There wasn’t a new episode of True Blood last Sunday, but then again, you probably needed that downtime to decompress from the previous episode’s insane final scene. On a show that commingles sex and violence as a general rule, that last encounter between Bill (Stephen Moyer) and Lorena (Mariana Klaveno) may have shredded the envelope: testing the limits of vampire-on-vampire hate-sex, Bill twisted Lorena’s head completely around between thrusts — and true to Lorena’s malevolent nature, she loved it.

Did Klaveno feel the same way about having to shoot it, though? With True Blood resuming its run this weekend, she called up Movieline to discuss exactly how they made it work, why Lorena just can’t get over Bill, and how J.J. Abrams is inadvertently responsible.

 

So you had a very, shall we say, “head-turning” scene in episode three?
You could say that. You could say “twisted.”

 

I’m sure you’re going to hear all of those jokes.
We were making them on the day of filming, trust me.

 

Please tell me what your reaction was when you read that.
I think my jaw dropped to the floor, and my initial thought was, “Oh, my poor parents.” [Laughs] There was sort of an anxiety about it, but upon reflection, I realized it was going to very much be a water-cooler scene for the season, and given the choice, I’d rather be in the water-cooler scene than not. I made my peace with it, although I’m nervous to actually see it! I’ve seen it in pieces because I had to go back and do sound for it, but I have not seen the finished product yet.

 

It’s insane.
It was kind of insane, wasn’t it? Unfortunately, so many great scenes happen in episode three, and I don’t know that anyone will remember them when the last moment of the episode occurs.

 

Well, how the hell did you film that? I want to know everything.
I think it’s CGI magic, but they actually built a puppet — a Mariana puppet, or a Lorena puppet, I should say. I did a lifecast of my torso and my face, and it came out perfect. It looked exactly like me, and her head could twist around. We kind of did it in stops and starts all day long. [Laughs] We did it with Stephen and I facing up, Stephen and I face-down, Stephen with the puppet…there were many different versions that we filmed, and they sort of pieced them all together with post-production magic to make it all look, I’m hoping, horrific.

 

On a show like True Blood, it’s kind of an honor to have the most talked-about sex scene, isn’t it?
Yes, yes. I mean, I had a pretty gruesome sex scene last season when we were rolling around in blood, but this one pushed the envelope for sure, as far as incorporating violence and sex. It’s actually one of the things I love about the show: it knows what it is, and it does what it does very well. Alan Ball just knows how to keep upping the ante and how to keep viewers on the edge of their seats. Once you think you have the show figured out, they pull something like this, and it’s like, “Wow, I’m speechless.”

 

What was it that you so enjoyed about the flashbacks in that episode?
I love these particular flashbacks because you get to see the beginning nature of their relationship and Bill really not having a handle on his vampire life. He makes mistakes and crosses lines, and you see Lorena acting as his maker in a maternal sort of way, which you really haven’t seen before. I don’t know if you were surprised, but I was surprised about how things were handled in that scene.

 

Why do you think Lorena is so obsessed with Bill?
I think he represents everything that she wants. The irony is that the very things that initially attracted her to Bill are the qualities in him that keep him from returning her love: He’s this honorable, dignified man who has scruples and morals. She’s been waiting to find a companion; she’s a very lonely character, and I have my own ideas for why that is, that she was never really loved in her human life either. The problem is that she’s very much in tune with her vampire life and she wants him to indulge in those vampire things, and this season, you get to see a darker side of Bill. I think it’s as twisted — again, sorry for the pun — as it seems that it excited Lorena that she starts to see her input in Bill. The more violent he is, the darker he is, the more he pushes away Sookie for his vampire life, the better it is for Lorena. She thinks, “This is the vampire I made.”

 

Do you mind playing such a villain, or do you want fans to like you?
I do want the fans to like me a little bit! This season, she does have her evil moments still, but the way she deals with Bill’s wife, I think, is very surprising. You leave that moment where she starts to glamour her and you think, “Oh my God, she’s going to do something horrible to his wife and I’ll never like this character,” but she doesn’t. She’s sort of taken care of in a way. Further on, in episode ten, I think you’ll see more of those moments. I think it makes her a more interesting character and it’s so much more rewarding to play a character who has those sides to her.

 

You’ve taken a lot of abuse this season, but at least you get to wear some fabulous clothing. I thought Lorena’s riding outfit that she got burned up in was kind of insanely wonderful.
Thank you! Yes, they worked very hard on that outfit. It’s a shame that it was only onscreen for about two seconds. [Laughs] I was set on fire, but I think I had about four different fittings just for that outfit. I’m an extremely lucky girl that I get to wear all these fabulous clothes.

 

So tell me about this chance meeting with J.J. Abrams that helped launch your career.
Oh, yes. I used to work at Morton’s in Burbank, for about seven years. J.J. used to come in to write when he was working on Alias — he’d come in with his laptop late in the evening and have a steak. I was an insane fan of the show and I knew who he was and I didn’t want to approach him and say anything, but we kind of struck up an acquaintance because I was a hostess and I knew he needed the one table with an outlet next to it for his laptop. So, after about four or five of these times when he’d come in and need that table and we’d have a bit of a back-and-forth, it came out that I was an actress. He started scolding me that I hadn’t mentioned it before and hadn’t been giving him my headshot.

 

But you couldn’t have!
I know! I said, if I’d done that, he would have been turned off. He was very generous and very gracious and he said, “Please send me your stuff,” which I did, but I thought, “If I just send him my picture and a resume with nothing on it, it’s not going to go anywhere.” So I started to come up with a very clever cover letter about why I needed to be on Alias, full of inside jokes about the show like how I look amazing in colored wigs or how I can pretend that Glendale is the Czech Republic. Apparently, they loved it there and passed it around at the writer’s table or something, and a few weeks later, I got the call from their casting office that they were offering me a little part.

 

And who did you play?
I play the girl who blows up. I’m literally onscreen for a couple of seconds, and then I blow up.

 

You’ve gotten blown up, burned up, your head’s gotten twisted around…you have a very interesting resume, Mariana.
I have. I think I’ve died many, many times on TV, and this show is adding interesting some new atrocities to the list.