Mary Ellen Matthews for Variety This interview is part of Variety and CNN’s Actors on Actors series. Watch the full video interview now at CNN.com/Watch (or on the CNN app) and on Variety’s YouTube channel starting at 11:59 pm ET.
Paul Anthony Kelly plays his first-ever professional acting role in “Love Story,” where he takes on the role of John F. Kennedy Jr. in his doomed romance with Carolyn Bessette (Sarah Pidgeon). Meanwhile, Patrick Ball’s character on “The Pitt,” Dr. Frank Langdon, has become a much-debated figure given his Season 2 return from rehab and attempt at redemption after stealing hospital narcotics in the first season. (As the season ends, Langdon urges Noah Wyle’s Dr. Robby, his sometime antagonist, to seek help.) After years of searching for the right part, Kelly and Ball have both landed in the right place — JFK Jr. and Dr. Langdon were among the TV season’s defining heartthrobs.
Paul Anthony Kelly: Let’s start it off. I heard that it took you quite a while to break into the industry. You were a theater actor before, correct?
Patrick Ball: I did theater almost exclusively for about 15 years, traveling across the country, doing regional theater and learning how to tell a story with an audience. It took until about a year and a half ago, when “The Pitt” came along, to get my first swing at television.
Kelly: What was that like for you when you got it?
Ball: It was a series of panic attacks for a while. The first time walking onto the Warner Bros. lot — they have these little plaques on the side of each soundstage that tell you all the historic things that have been filmed on that set. I walk onto the set and see that “On the Waterfront” and “Giant” were shot here.
Kelly: Cool.
Ball: It took about three weeks for me to breathe. And then, as I’m sure you know, after three weeks it just becomes the place that you work. We have this in common — this is your first big moonshot moment. And it took you a while.
Kelly: Pretty much the same timeline: It was 13 years of auditioning: A lot of nos, some close-to things, never really locking it in. I was thinking about giving it up and then this opportunity came.
Ball: What did that 13 years look like?
Kelly: A lot of auditions, a lot of silence. I always knew this was what I wanted to do. I knew that if I stuck it out, eventually something would hit. But after about 13 years, you’re like, “Maybe this isn’t for me.”
Ball: And the first thing that fell into place was playing a Kennedy. I don’t even know where to begin. How did you prepare for this role?
Kelly: I had three weeks to prepare from when I was hired, which was not a lot of time. But Ryan Murphy and his team took all the thinking away. Once they hired me, they got me a dialect coach because I’m Canadian — I have a totally different speech pattern to John F. Kennedy Jr. I had to learn everything about him — the way he moves, the way he talks, the way he walks. [They hired] an acting coach, a physical trainer, because I had to get a little bit bigger. John was a very active guy. He was always running, always biking, Rollerblading, working out.
Ball: Which is a stretch for you.
Related Stories
