Alison Bezzina

First published on Pink Magazine July 09

Meeting celebrities is usually one big letdown. As fans, we build up their on-screen personas so much that when we meet them we expect them to be as cool, as sexy or as witty as they are on TV, but usually they are not.

Being Addison’s (Greys Anatomy/Private Practice) biggest fan, I expected to be mercilessly pushed off the Everest of disappointment when I met Kate Walsh, but to my relief, she turned out to be even cooler in real life than she is in fiction.

California born Kate Walsh (40) is half Italian and half Irish. She studied theatre in Chicago before moving to New York in pursuit of an acting career. Rumour has it that she was once arrested for throwing a cue ball at a bar, but that’s as far as she’s ever gone in breaking the law. Seven years ago she landed the role of Nicki on The Drew Carey Show for which she had to wear a fat suit most of the time. Walsh hit the height of her popularity on ABC’s Greys Anatomy. Since then, life for Kate Walsh changed dramatically - in her very own words - ‘the paparazzi living at my house should start paying rent and part of my taxes!’

She joined Greys during the 9^h episode of Season 1. At first the character was a Prada-clad evil witch who broke up the world’s favourite TV couple, but Walsh's natural wit overfkiwed into Addison and soon, viewers wanted her to stay.

Here’s what she told PINK when I met her last month during The International Press Day organised by ABC studios in London:

She breezes in wearing a dark blue fitted suit with delicate white piping, her hair bounces to the tune of her signature walk and her handbag struggles to keep up with her pace. She sits down, drops her bag on the table, stretches her arms into mid air and with a warm hello turns on her mischievous look – a pouty smirk and an eyebrow spectacularly raised into her forehead as if to say ‘bring it on!’ Within minutes she has me in stitches and convinced that she’d quite happily eat a rotten apple just to get a laugh.

Given Greys popularity, did you feel short-changed when you were taken out of the show to start the spin-off show Private Practice?

She frowns and shakes her head frantically. ‘No I didn’t! We were all part of Grey’s success and we were all re-negotiating with the studio at the time. Personally I wasn’t in a very happy place, but creatively I thought that moving on was the right thing to do. Shonda (Rhimes – the show’s creator and producer) felt that Addison’s story line in Greys had been exhausted. Sure she could have kept me on to do the filing and typing but there was no real reason for Addison to still be there.’

Do you think that Private Practice will ever reach the popularity of Greys Anatomy?

Honestly I don’t know. I think that what happened with Grey’s was a first for Shonda and so many of us. It was such a huge hit for so many different reasons and I don’t know if that can happen again – I think that that sort of success and cultural awareness happens once in a lifetime.

You’ve played doctor for so long do you know a thing or two about medicine?

She covers her mouth with her hand and acts slightly embarrassed. ‘I get that question a lot and the answer is...... No! Once, my best childhood friend from Tucson was telling me a story about this woman who was in labour and was pre-eclaptic. Now I know I say that word all the time on the show but for the life of me I cannot remember what it is. There is some part of my brain that’s reserved for medical jargon and it wakes up in July when we’re shooting and goes to sleep as soon as the season is done. It’s gone like this,’ - she clicks her fingers in mid air and blows at them.

When you first came in on Greys you were not quite the most beloved character on the show, but then people did not want to see you go. What happened?

‘When I first joined Greys it was supposed to be just for five episodes as Patrick Dempsey’s estranged wife. That’s all I knew. Once I was done with it I went and shot another pilot for ABC - a comedy that didn’t make it. Then they called me back and asked me to be a series regular which obviously I accepted. This sort of thing hardly ever happens so I was flattered and delighted. Then they thought of the spin-off show. It was crazy. Addison’s story line was done on Greys – the marriage with Derek didn’t work, I slept with other doctors and that didn’t work – (not me Addison, let’s be clear about that), so the spin-off was the only way to keep me alive. The story line for Private Practice is a great way to go because everybody has the fantasy of dropping everything and starting over, moving to a different city and to have a different life. Reality is mostly always very different so it’s been great to play that part.’

What do you like to do in your free time?

‘I love reading. I love reading scripts and short stories before I go to sleep. When I’m off I try to cram as many novels as I can because it’s what feeds me. I also love travelling, and my pets - with which I a little bit obsessed. I also work with a couple of charitable institutions like Ocean Conservation World Wide for whom I’ll be shooting a documentary when I get back to Los Angeles. I’m also pretty passionate about politics. I campaigned for Obama during the writer’s strike which was amazing. ‘

What do you think of the election?

I’m thrilled and relieved. I think that it has changed the culture with more Americans participating in politics than ever before. This campaign was so grassroots and people were so active that no matter what Obama accomplishes, his campaign was already responsible for waking people up to a new consciousness. For the last eight years the country was politically asleep, people were demoralised as they stopped believing in the system and democracy. They felt that they had no control over what happens and with this election we realised that we can make a difference. No matter what happens with the leader of the country people now know that they can unite and stand together and make change happen; that’s how gay marriage will get legalised, in the same way civil rights and women’s rights happened.

Speaking of gay marriage, you’ve had a trilogy of lesbian parts in your career. How did that come about?

Laughs and holds her head in the palm of her hand. ‘Yes I had three lesbian parts which was real fun. I mean for me it’s a role, like all roles. Things sometimes come in threes. The lesbian roles were very different though...one was a housewife living in the suburbs who was coming out realising that she was in love with this woman and had an affair with her, the other one was a cop, and the other one was Under the Tuscan sun. I don’t know why it happened - maybe it’s because I’m tall.’

Has fame changed your lifestyle at all?

‘It’s a massive change. All of us on Greys were just working actors and I was very grateful for just being able to make a living, and then suddenly everything changed when Greys became a hit. One of the drawbacks is that as an actor you observe human behaviour, you soak up your environment, you watch and learn, that’s what you do, it’s what’s fun. You know in New York I would sit on the subway and just watch people, but when you become so recognisable you just can’t do that so much because people are now looking at you. That’s a weird thing to get used to. That’s the hardest part in fact, not the paparazzi, because it’s like I’m missing that piece of myself that observes, that sits on the outside looking in. You lose the anonymity that allows you to do that and that’s part of what helps you and feeds you as an artist to create characters.’

Did you bribe Shonda Rhimes into letting you kiss the two hot men on the two series?

Flicks her hair back and laughs uncontrollably. She stops and looks blankly into the air acting like she’s trying to remember if there was a bribe involved. And then she continues - ‘No I didn’t. I know it’s a strange way to make a living but it’s better than digging ditches, no disrespect for ditch-digging of course! You must remember however that there is quite a bit of schizophrenia to every kiss you see on screen. On the one hand you’re trying to make it look really real and to be present, and yet you’re surrounded by 75 people and somebody holding a light meter 2 inches away from your face. There’s a scene in Seasons 2 of Private Practice where whilst I’m kissing someone (who shall remain nameless), the director was standing right next to me talking into my ear saying ‘ok now open your eyes, now look down, ok now kiss his neck and now close your eyes.....’ so believe me there’s just no sex there, it’s just weird and creepy, but it looks amazing on screen.’

I read that you are volunteering in an LA hospital, is this true?

‘Ah! Yes I forgot to talk about that....probably because I’ve been through all the training but haven’t really started volunteering yet. One of the things I love about the show is that I get to hold new born babies. Sometimes they have a set of twins come in because the babies can only ‘work’ for twenty minutes at a time. I love holding the babies so one day I asked the nurse if there’s a volunteer program of some sort where I could go and hold babies. This landed me in a group called Cuddlers And Feeders where you can cuddle and feed babies in a hospital. But as soon as I got certified I had to leave for this trip. By the way, the training program includes a background check which I found rather funny. I guess they need to make sure that I won’t be taking any babies home with me!’

What goes through your mind when you see yourself on screen?

‘I don’t watch it. I try to wait because I don’t think you can ever be comfortable watching yourself on screen. It’s not only because of how you look or how you’re acting, but when you’re watching yourself it’s impossible to let yourself be transported into another reality....to forget about your life and be taken away by the characters that you’re watching. If it’s you on screen, it’s hard to believe. So I wait, and to varying degrees I forget certain things and some scenes that are cut out or the performance, and I am able to watch it with more objectivity...but it is still weird.’

If you had a magic wand and could change one thing what would it be?

‘The first thing that comes to mind is Africa – the incredible poverty, and the war, but for me personally I don’t know. I can come up with all these answers about the world but for my personal life it would probably be that I get to do everything that I want to do in my life.’ And then the wicked smile surfaces again and she goes on, ‘... I know it’s so selfish but I wish that I get to play all the parts I want to play, have great love in my life, be a contribution to the culture and do it all...and if I wasn’t acting I would probably go into teaching.’