Harvey Guillén Says L.A. Wildfires Left Him in a ‘Depressed Dark Place’: ‘We Need to Create Entertainment Because We Need to Escape’
Harvey Guillén walked the red carpet Monday at the Los Angeles premiere of his new horror thriller, “Companion.” The actor said it felt good to be back at work after putting things on hold due to the Los Angeles wildfires. Guillén lives in Altadena. His house wasn’t destroyed by the fires, but it was left damaged.
“In these times of chaos and mourning and darkness, we need to create entertainment because we need to escape,” the “What We Do in the Shadows” star told me.
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He was able to visit the neighborhood a couple of days ago. “There was a mural on the side of this historic building,” Guillén said. “The building was burnt down but this sign on the wall, which was all brick, said, ‘Altadena.’…It was so poetic. It was what the city is – yes, it’s had a hard time, but it’s still standing.”
Guillén credits prayer and a neighbor’s advice just before evacuating for keeping his home intact. “I went into my backyard and asked the ancestors that night, ‘Please protect my house, please protect my house,’” he recalled, adding that his 80-year-old neighbor urged him to hose down the house before leaving. “So I hosed down the house, I put sprinklers on the roof. I turned the sprinklers on and left them.”
His video doorbell camera went on at about 4 a.m. “It was raining fire,” Guillén said. “The palm trees that caught on fire, they were falling down from the sky. It was balls of fire falling into my grass and it would dissolve automatically because it was puddles of water everywhere. I don’t know why but that’s how the universe worked and saved my house.”
He admitted to feeling a sort of survivor’s guilt after seeing how many neighbors lost everything. “I went into a sort of depressed dark place because I’ve never been in this situation where my community is mourning,” he said.
Even so, he said he’s having fun promoting “Companion: “It’s such a fun movie.”
Written and directed by Drew Hancock, the Warner Bros. film follows a group of friends whose trip to a remote cabin in the woods goes sideways when one of the guests (Jack Quaid) loses control of his robot companion (Sophie Thatcher). Rounding out the cast are Guillén and Lukas Gage as boyfriends, Megan Suri and Rupert Friend.
“We had to do the kissing scene so many times,” Guillén said of locking lips with Gage, before quipping, “I’m in therapy for it.”
He added, “It’s funny because were both in relationships at the time we were filming it. We were so madly in love that we brought that love to these characters and it will live forever on screen.”
“Companion” is in theaters on Friday, Jan. 31.
See more photos from the “Companion” premiere below.
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