musings about the actor and the characters he brings to life
Another year, another birthday. Damian Watcyn Lewis turns forty-seven today!
We celebrate the occasion by offering a gift of quotes. Forty-seven of them to be precise. From all the people Damian has worked with, loved, and touched thru the years.
Happy Birthday Damian! May you have many MANY more! <3
Gingersnap brilliantly dove deep just a couple days ago into the recent DaVinci’s Last Supper photo shoot for Billions Season 3. Consider this reporter thoroughly scooped by her examination of the imagery throughout this heavily stylized promo. Nonetheless, here I am with my observations on what it all may mean for our beloved cast and characters this upcoming season, appended with a look at the fun behind the scenes vid of the photo shoot.
Promos certainly do the trick of whetting our appetites, don’t they? Especially when it seems like we’ve already waited forever. Fear not, just a few more weeks remain now till the Billions premier on March 25. (and the more promos they do, the more often you’ll see us here talking the heck out of them!)
We know how important music is the world of Billions. Showrunner Brian Koppelman recently said on his podcast The Moment that he writes to music. He shared that he wrote the penultimate episode of Season 2, “Golden Frog Time” with Tom Petty’s “Even the Losers” as inspiration and that song played during the writing of the show as well as within the show itself. When the question arose to whether they’d get the rights to use the song in the episode, Koppelman insisted that without the song there’d be no episode, literally and metaphorically. Thankfully they did get that song and many more memorable cuts for Season 2.
In a wee bite of a taste of what to expect in Season 3, we learned that “Born in San Antone” by Garrett T. Capps will open the first episode. Here’s some of his Lou Reed-ish styling here:
Just occurred to me and I had to go and listen and check to make sure they indeed haven’t used this song in either S1 or S2: LCD Soundsystem’s “North American Scum” totally brings up the ethos of the Billions world. Again, not one from the show as we know it, but certainly one metaphorically connected, at least in this viewer’s head.
In the spirit of getting geared up for another season of rich musical accompaniment to this show, let’s revisit Season 2’s playlist. Enjoy!
Driving into work today came the unsolicited thought, hey, we haven’t seen Damian in proximity to a car in ages. Then the mind went to one of the shots from the Billions S3 promo. The one where Bobby is gliding through a sea of lovely hot rods, perhaps picking out one to take out for a test drive. Of course, the mind said, you’re not crazy for randomly thinking about Damian and cars; You just saw that image recently, that’s all. (My mind likes to talk to itself, no biggie.)
So, when Damianista and I had our usual Tuesday late afternoon chat about what my weekly post should be, and since I didn’t have anything new, I thought, why not post Damian’s turn at Top Gear again?
Then, as serendipity would have it, on the drive home, listening to NPR’s “Fresh Air”, I heard Terry Gross’s interview with a lovely young woman, Patrice Banks, who had opened up a mechanic’s shop run by women, with the goal of making women comfortable with taking care of their cars. Is car care the last frontier for women, I thought? The name Danika Patrick rings a bell, even to those of us outside the NASCAR circle, so that diamond-cut chrome-plated ceiling must have been traversed on some level. But, yeah, it is kind of uncomfortable as a woman to go get a car looked at, with the ever-present thought that the guys are going to take advantage of the fact I know little and care little about my mom car, a little Mazda, accept for the expectation that it keep carrying me around town when I need it to.
Alas, sometimes the universe decides for you. So, here’s my post on bearded Damian’s appearance on British Top Gear. Enjoy!
It’s been a long winter, but now that Billions has announced a return date of March 25 for Season 3, bluier skies may be ahead. On Saturday, showrunners and stars graced the stage for this year’s Television Critics Association winter press tour, where they dropped the first promo and got the buzz up and running for the new season.
