Scott Speedman embraces his fandoms, from “Felicity” to “Teacup”: “I never want to run from that”

Scott Speedman is in it for the tingle. The 49-year-old actor has racked up dozens of roles in long-running series like "Animal Kingdom," "You" and "Grey's Anatomy," as well as fan-favorite appearances in hit films like the "Underworld" franchise. And along the way, he's had a few moments where he's felt something a little extra.

He says he felt it for his new Peacock thriller series, "Teacup," where he plays a complicated father and husband whose family is thrown into a terrifying do-or-die mystery. "When I first read these scripts, I had a bit of a tingle," he said during a recent "Salon Talks" conversation, comparing the experience to the gut feeling that led to his memorable roles as a terrorized homeowner in the cult classic "The Strangers" and as the Y2K generation's dream boyfriend on "Felicity."

Embracing what he calls "the madness" of "Teacup" represents a more sedate kind of madness for Speedman, who talked with us about his "intense" years of early fame on "Felicity," why he thinks horror is "family drama," and how becoming a dad made him wish he could redo some of his earlier performances.

And though he's currently juggling a pivotal recurring role on "Grey's" and is hopeful for more seasons ahead for "Teacup," he knows that on some level, he'll never stop being the guy who made America chose Team Ben all those years ago. "I have a theory that whatever the thing that hits is what people remember," he explained. "You can't run from it. It's going to be there, and you've got to enjoy it."

The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and length.

Stephen King recently said that "Teacup" is "All killer, no filler." Not bad.

Not bad at all. He doesn't do that a lot. So when I saw that, I was very happy and very happy for our showrunner. He was really excited too. 

The buzz has been good. 

It's going well. You never know how these shows are going to go. When I first read these scripts, I had a bit of a tingle that happens [with] some of the other stuff I've done, like "The Strangers" and "Felicity." I thought this could connect with an audience. Maybe we'll do multiple seasons, and I think over time it'll build into something people connect with. 

For those who haven't seen it, you don't want to give too much away. What does the word "teacup" mean to you about this show? What does that represent? 

I know the writer well, and I knew there was a meaning behind it. I didn't want to ask, and he didn't want to even talk about it to me when I got the first three scripts. He was like, "Just let it be. You'll figure it out in the end." So for me, I don't know what I would say because I'll give it away. It's a metaphor for something and containment of some kind. Containment, that's what I'll say. 

You're playing the head of this family that is in jeopardy, but very quickly it becomes apparent that this is a complicated guy who has existed in a morally gray area. We, as viewers, may not necessarily be rooting for you. What is it like to play someone who has to win us back, and also his family?

That was interesting to me. Earlier in my career, I probably would've been a little scared off by that, of starting the character where we do, where he stepped out from his family. He's cheating on his wife. He's revealed it off-camera before we meet the family. He's talking about leaving the family for another woman to be with her. You don't see any of that. You don't know the whos and the whats and the whys of how we came to be and how our relationship fell apart to get us to that point. You're just jumping in with these characters, what [series creator and writer] Ian [McCulloch] did there as a writer was challenging. I thought, "Wow, this could be challenging for me as an actor to start there, knowing that they're going to hate me or not be with me, and then spending the next six, seven, eight episodes trying to win my wife back and win the audience back."

I actually like the idea of doing it that way, and not having the pre-requisite two episodes where you get to know the characters and the family, and just jumping in. He's not at the most balanced part of his life. I think he's probably a failed writer of some kind. He's an English teacher at the local high school, and he's not all the way there, but through the series, he finds his way back to his family. 

And the metaphor of the show, which resonates on multiple levels, is a story about trust. 

That starts with me and Yvonne [Strahovski]'s character, Maggie, obviously, and then descends into the madness of the show. You can't trust anybody. Can you trust your neighbors? There is very much that aspect and that metaphor comes to light. Can you trust the people in the same room with you? Can you trust the people you live with every day? Who knows? We'll see. 

You have played parents before in the past, but now, you are a dad. You have a young daughter, you have a brand-new baby. How does that change how you play these characters? Because you have said that parenthood is scary.

For me, it really was. The idea of having kids in my twenties and thirties just seemed crazy to me. I was not ready to give up that part of my life to be a dad. I am very happy that I had kids later because I'm bored of myself at this point and all the neuroses that go into everyday life. When I think back to playing multiple dads in different shows and movies, I want to go back and redo all those performances because you know so much more now innately, just having these kids running around. When I'm with my two-year-old, the heartstrings pull. She was just the flower girl at a wedding in San Diego the other night, and watching that, you know so much about fatherhood just doing that. It's a pretty crazy experience. 

It lends itself in a unique way to the genre of horror for you. 

I think a lot of thriller horror movies, and a lot of action movies too, when they're done well, they're family-based. The threat to family, I think everybody can relate to it, and you're rooting for them to solve the problem of the kids being in danger. It's a pretty easy one, but it's a tried-and-true thing, and I think it works well. If you respect the family dynamics and write towards it in a very earnest way, you can have something very exciting.

You've talked about getting that tingle when you were presented with this script. What is "the tingle" for you? 

It's, "Wow, I think an audience could connect with this. This is an earnest telling." A lot of times you read genre things and they're rushing. "Let's get through the relationship, the family, the character, to get to the things people are going to be excited by." But with "The Strangers," I remember thinking, "This relationship jumps off the page here, and if we can get that tone and feel on screen, the horror elements are going to be terrifying." For whatever reason, I connected with it in that way. And I think it's the same thing here with "Teacup." 

Ian McCulloch, the showrunner, I know his writing well from previous work, and we've written something else together on the side before this. I heard he was doing something in the horror space, and I immediately called my agent. I wanted to read what he was doing in that space because he writes these character-driven westerns, interesting dramas. I thought that could be a really beautiful marriage of the two things — somebody who's not necessarily into horror, writing a horror series. I had a feeling his style was going to merge well with [executive producer] James Wan's style, and it did. 

You have said this is a family drama. 

It is. It begins and ends there. I felt like if we could get the right time and space to have those scenes play out with what was on the page, we were going to be in business.

It's a family drama with horror moments that make you go, "Oh, damn." Were there times on set, even though you know how the literal sausage gets made, where you just are like, "Oh, oh, no, peace out"? 

Yeah. I think there's been this pullback to practical effects, which I love. I was weaned on those movies, and I just resonate much more with that type of horror. So when I got to set here, we had actual things to look at, not just a tennis ball and a tripod, which was fun for me. I think it just made it all the more real for the cast and crew, and it just was easier to do. 

You have been in so many different horror projects. You clearly have an affinity for this genre. What is it about horror that connects with you as a fan? 

Some of the movies that I grew up watching that I loved and scarred me were horror movies. I probably was too young to be watching those, and they've stayed with me a long time. There's something about that genre when it works, and it's an earnest movie. Some of the greats have made incredible horror movies. They just jump off the screen at audiences. We like to go to the theater and watch these things and be scared together. I think that's a huge part of the theater-going communal experience. As much as things are changing theatrically, I think those movies that still work are in the horror space. I watched "Midsommar" recently, and I love that. I'm always trying to find stuff like that, that we can all watch together. 

Is there a horror movie that you think, "I wish I could go back and be in that one," or "If there was a remake of it, I'd do it in a heartbeat."? 

"The Shining," in that way, again, the father dealing with going insane at this hotel. Stanley Kubrick and the gravitas of that movie was intense for me to be watching as a 12-year-old. When I go back and watch it now, I'm like, "What were you doing watching that movie as a 12-year-old?" Or "The Exorcist." I watched that recently too, and it's just got such a power. It's just such a big, big dense movie. It's intense. 

You don't just stay in the horror lane, you have been recurring on "Grey's Anatomy." To come into this institution that is "Grey's," fans are looking at you. What is it like to enter that world? 

When I first started, there was no social media. There were not these fandoms that we think about today. So when I got into that show, I didn't really think about it. As a younger actor, I would've been bowled over by the fan reaction, for better and worse. Now, it's kind of fun to not worry about it and just go, and they write these great scripts for me. They're very welcoming to me. They have this amazing family atmosphere over there. I live very close to the set. I can walk there. I never do, but I could walk there in Los Angeles. It's great. I love doing it, and some of the fan reaction, they're so passionate about the Meredith Grey character. It's fun for me, it's been fun to see where I started four years ago and where I've come with the fans a little bit. I think they're a little more accepting of me now than they were, but I love it. I love doing the show with her. It's been great to me. 

You talk about that fan reaction and coming into a space where people are still very heavily Team Derek. He's been gone for ten years, people are still very attached.

But that's the whole show. You're not getting around that. The show's been on for 21 seasons based on many things, but a huge part of it was their chemistry and what those people started in 2005. That's a nice place. Getting bad reviews, they're very freeing in a certain kind of way. You can say, "Okay, well, is that the worst it can be?" You can go and be yourself and do what you can do and just have fun with it. 

To me, you were among the first group of actors on a show where fans became "Team this, Team that." I don't think I ever saw anything like that until "Felicity." What was it like for you? When did you realize that this was a thing? 

Pretty early. That show was a whirlwind. I sent a videotape down from Toronto. Three days later, I was on a plane down to Los Angeles. I'd never been there. Shot the pilot, stayed for the summer. The show got picked up. But when I read that script, I'm telling you, I knew nothing. I was a dumb kid at that point. I was a young actor. I had no idea, but I was like, "This is going to be something." I don't know why I thought so, I just did. Of course, it took off and when that all started, it was pretty intense. 

I think for Keri [Russell], it was super intense with that fan reaction. There's no school preparing you for what can happen when a show hits. I see these shows coming out now with these kids, and it's times a thousand with social media. We didn't have that, thankfully. It was intense. I put my blinders on and just tried to get through it on that level. Now, I'm much more able to do this. I really ran from press back then. It was a different time for me. 

You have managed to curate an entire career for yourself for 25 years now, making choices where you are constantly zigging and zagging. Is it based on, "I don't always want to be that guy from "Felicity"?

I have a theory that whatever the thing that hits is what people remember, and you're always going to have that. You can't run from it. It's going to be there, and you've got to enjoy it. I got to do a show with Keri Russell, Matt Reeves' first show, J.J Abrams' first TV show. It's magic. You don't know how good you had it. I never want to run from that. It was a great time in my life. I loved it.

Doing "Grey's" is sort of a callback to that. The way they used to shoot that show was very similar to "Felicity." So there are some similarities there that it's been nice to go back and do that. That's part of it too. 

You did not start out dreaming of being an actor. You were a swimmer, but you got injured. Would you say that was one of the good things that's happened in your life? Or do you still think, "I wish I'd been in the Olympics"? 

It's complicated, but it was one of the best things that ever happened to me. It also took me a long time to get over that. My mom was a big-time runner, actually, more successful than I was. She was very close to the Olympics and she ran at a very high level. We went to the Olympics together. I took her to Paris. We still have all of that, and we were very emotional when we were there. It was a beautiful trip. 

That's my family's thing. My mom and dad met at a track meet. My mom's father was steeped in athletics, in the culture. He was a coach. Swimming for me was very important. I was lucky to be at a special high school for gifted athletes and gifted artists, and when I got injured, I fell in love with the dancers, started hanging out with all the crazy artists, and that just pulled me real quick. I was very lucky to be in the right place at the right time. Not just big breaks — I'm talking about that immersion in that school was what brought me here. When I think about lucky breaks, being at that high school was the big one.