In the Watchmen graphic novel, the Comedian is a cigar-chomping, gun-toting superhero seemingly without morality –- but possessed of a punch line to a sadistic joke about humanity that only he gets. He also sports a Burt Reynolds-grade mustache, which is pretty friggin’ sweet. As part of my ongoing series of interviews with the cast and filmmakers behind the Watchmen movie, I chatted with Jeffrey Dean Morgan about what it takes to play a homicidal superhero-assassin–rapist. The actor, probably best known as Denny Duquette –- the ghost who won’t move the hell on from Grey’s Anatomy –- arrived sans sweet ’stache. I tried not to hold it against him.

Cole Haddon: You’ve had a lot of success over the past couple of years, what with Grey’s Anatomy, Supernatural, and P.S. I Love You. Now this, of course. How are you feeling?

Jeffrey Dean Morgan: I just feel exceedingly lucky and humble about the last couple years. I’ve been doing this for 20 years now, and before everything hit at once, all the television stuff, I was done. I was, “I’m done, I made a bad career choice, I’m going to be 40 soon and can’t pay my rent. What have I done with my life?” In this business, a lot of it is luck. There are a lot of good actors out there you [as a journalist] will never get to meet, and then there are a lot of crappy actors out there you get to sit down and talk to all the time. It’s just a weird business. So to get this opportunity to be in Watchmen and sit here to talk to you about this movie, it’s really a pinch-me moment. I’m really humbled by this whole f**king thing. But hey, if the other shoe drops [as it often does for actors], then it’s just back to business as usual for me.

CH: So how do you stay humble? It seems like it would be easy to buy into the hype around you.

JDM: Because it wasn’t long ago that things were really hard. And I think it helps when good things happen later in life. It’s not like I’m going to be out whooping it up with Paris Hilton on Sunset Boulevard. [Laughing] I don’t think the likelihood of that happening is very good. What’s important right now is the work, not the scene. Right now, it’s about making the right decisions in my life and career. The most exciting thing about doing a movie like this is I suddenly get to read scripts that are a lot better [than I’m used to], and that’s kind of a cool thing.

CH: How do you feel your Grey’s Anatomy fans will feel about the Comedian?

JDM: [Laughs] Oh, I think they’re in for a shock. I may lose a few Grey’s Anatomy fans, but I might make a few Watchmen fans. Maybe it’s an even trade.

**Slight Spoilers ahead if you haven’t read the graphic novel.**

CH: Director Zack Snyder likes to put his actors through some pretty hellish training. What did you have to go through to prepare for the big fight that opens the Watchmen movie?

JDH: Well, the big fight with me is just a series of taking punches. I didn’t get to land one, and I’m still mad about that. I was like, “Just let me hit him once, for crying out loud.” We did so much training. I was in Vancouver for two months before filming just to work on that fight, and it was just how to take punches and apparently not hit anyone.

CH: You did manage to connect a few times in later fights. It was just with women. The Comedian obviously has some deep-seated issues with women.

JDM: Yeah, you think? I never noticed that. [Laughs] Yeah, I think he had deep-seated issues with everyone. He just seemed to connect more with women, no pun intended.

CH: And how did you feel about that aspect of your character?

JDM: That’s kind of who he is, unfortunately. How do I feel as Jeff? Well, I don’t go around beating women, so there were a couple of moments in there that were hard for me to do as an actor because those were vicious hits. It’s not like I was pushing them against walls –- not that that’s right either. But I just gave [Carla Gugino as Sally Jupiter/Silk Spectre I] a smack down, I gave her a beat down. There was nothing nice about it. We weren’t holding back anything. Again, you’re looking at a graphic novel where you’re looking at four panels of Sally Jupiter getting beaten, so you have to fill in the reality of what’s in between them –- and it’s vicious. There’s just no other way about it. We took no prisoners in anything in this movie, I think. We made it as real as we possibly could, the fight scenes in particular. They’re not pretty fight scenes or stylized. Especially the Comedian or Rorschach. These guys would bite you just as soon as kick you in the balls. They were just that brutal.

Like what you read here? Check out my interviews with Watchmen co-creator/illustrator Dave Gibbons and star Billy Crudup, too.

Tags: jeffrey dean morgan, the comedian, watchmen