Dope Thief is an excellent crime drama that just wrapped its initial season. Based on a bestselling book about two friends in south Philly who pose as DEA agents to rob drug dealers whose scam blows up in their faces as one of their outings goes very wrong. Academy Award Nominee Brian Tyree Henry plays Raymond, the main character whose life unravels throughout the season. His relationship with his adoptive mother leads to some heartfelt scenes. The wonderful Kate Mulgrew (Star Trek: Voyager, Orange Is The New Black) takes on the role of Theresa Bowers with a poignant resonance and toughness that is something to behold. Mulgrew spoke to Immersive via Zoom about her journey into the world of Dope Thief.
[This conversation has been edited for clarity and context.]
It’s terrific to meet you. Please tell me how you got involved with this series.
Naturally, it came from my manager and my agent that Sir Ridley Scott would like to speak to me. I was in Prague at the time doing other business. I said to my agent, “This is not a good idea. I don’t think I should talk to Sir Ridley Scott while I’m in Prague.” I don’t know why I felt so strongly about that, but it was Kafkaesque. When I returned to New York, they arranged a phone call, and I think I was with him for 10 minutes, maybe 15 minutes. He just went, “Bye, darling.” The next thing I knew, they offered me the job.
It was a confluence of splendid events because I loved playing Theresa Bowers. I just loved it. I loved every minute of it. I loved playing with Brian, an extraordinary actor. Peter Craig wrote a script I’ve never seen before in my entire career – I thought it was so good. So, all things considered, it was just a perfect thing at an ideal time. Excellent.
I would like to talk for a moment about Brian. He is an incredible actor. He plays these different emotions simultaneously. You can see your deep feelings for each other, even though they’re slightly abrasive. Talk a little bit about those emotions.
As I mentioned, I can’t emphasize this enough: I must underscore how rare it is to meet an actor like Brian Tyree Henry and have that immediate, instant chemistry. We’re the same kind of actor, we’re both fast, and we’re both a little facile. It was like jumping into extremely familiar territory with someone I’d never seen before. We had a marvelous rapport instantly.
I know that kind of woman—Theresa Bowers. I had considered her for some time a tough former prostitute but a very loving and devoted woman. I was Bart’s (Ving Rhames) favorite girl. They had a love affair, and when Bart went to jail, his son was alone because his biological mom had overdosed on heroin. Then Theresa became Raymond’s surrogate mom, and a genuine love developed. You see that love throughout the series.
He let me do what I wanted—play my lotto tickets, right? I smoke my cigarettes and drink my schnapps, and I let him do what he said he was doing: painting houses. Now we both know he wasn’t painting houses; he was putting on a little DEA hat and scamming drug dens, and that’s the story of Dope Thief.
How did you like shooting on the East Coast?
I live in New York, so doing a show in Philly was not only appropriate but Dope Thief was set in South Philly—that’s the whole story. Ray and Manny worked that little area, a radius of maybe 10 miles.
What was the greatest challenge of playing Theresa?
The greatest challenge for me as an actress was the accent. It’s a Delco Accent, one I’ve never done before. I’ve done everything else. The dialect coach told me that North meets South & East meets West – everything coincides with this accent. Every word had to be attended to carefully and drilled so that I didn’t make the mistake of falling into a New York accent or even a bit of a Southern accent. It’s the two combined and the oddest combination of sounds and cadences. I worked on that constantly.
There are many to choose from, but do you have a favorite scene from this season?
I love the scene where I tell Raymond I will have an intervention. I love that scene where I say sit down; you’re going to a place in Florida. It’s got flamingos in the front of the yard. You’re gonna love it there. It goes from zero to a hundred within two minutes. That’s what the lines with Brian and I are like: fast and furious with the spiking of emotions… It’s so deeply authentic because that’s how mothers and sons of that class, which I would call the working class, maybe even the sub-work class. That’s how they communicate. I loved that scene, and I loved every scene. I loved episode six, which took place in my living room.
Let’s return to Ridley Scott, who set the tone with episode one. Tell me more about that collaboration.
He’s one of the greatest spectacle directors of all time. When you think of Gladiator and Napoleon, he understands big… Sir Ridley Scott is an epic-thinking man, and that’s how he shoots. On the pilot he directed, he had six cameras, which means he had six operators, which means that it was just fast, furious, and wild. He was shouting at me from a distance, maybe he had a megaphone, “Go pick up the schnapps now. Drink it, throw it away. Now get the birthday cake, take it to the boy, slap the boy around, get the dog, go to the lotto tickets, do the thing.” It was wild and fabulous. I love to work like that.
I liked him very much. In our meeting upstairs, we had about two hours before we ever started to shoot; we talked about mortality. We spoke of God; we talked about wine. He has a vineyard in the south of France and drinks two and a half glasses of red wine daily. Everybody must do it. We talked about what it is to live the way he lives. His life has significant meaning for him. He loves to work, and that shapes his life. He was fascinating. When talking to somebody as sophisticated as Sir Ridley, there was no end to the questions that arose in my mind. He stimulated almost every part of my intellect.
What’s it like being on the other end of Dope Thief?
It was terrific. Despite the dialect I had to hammer into my brain, I was thrilled playing Theresa Bowers every day. I love that, too, because I love rigor, and even though the set was rigorous and disciplined, there was great fun. I was working with a champion. I think Brian Tyree Henry deserves the Emmy for his performance. I believe that Peter Craig deserves the Emmy for his beautifully sculpted script. I love Theresa. I love to play her. I’m at a point in my life where I understand that kind of woman, and I wanna go deeper as an actress. I wanna try things that are out of my comfort zone. So, it was nothing but a joyful experience from beginning to end. I wish we’d have another season.
Dope Thief is now streaming on Apple+.
