NCIS: Origins’ Kyle Schmid Previews Launch of Mike Franks Flashbacks: ‘I Immediately Got Emotional’
When CBS’ NCIS: Origins resumes its freshman run this Monday at 10/9, as Narrator Gibbs might put it, “This is the story of… Michael” — as in NIS Special Agent Mike Franks.
“It is,” Kyle Schmid concurred at the top of an in-depth, Friday-night conversation with TVLine. “It is very much the beginning of jumping into the backstory of Mike Franks. And I think it’s a really important story to tell, because of the relationship between Mike and Gibbs (played by Austin Stowell).
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“The writers have just been giving me such phenomenal material,” the actor noted, “and I couldn’t be more grateful.”
It could be said that Schmid didn’t get his firmest grasp on who Mike Franks is until he had to walk a day not in the character’s shoes — meaning, a pair of well-worn, nile crocodile leather boots. That’s because the winter premiere opens with Franks thrusting his foot through the heel of one boot, forcing him to first wear a pair of Reeboks to the office, and later borrow a pair of Randy’s boat shoes.
“I’m the type of actor who when I put on my wardrobe, and slip on my boots, I ‘drop Kyle’ and I walk around all day talking like this,” he said, briefly slipping into Franks’ drawl. “For 12, 14 hours a day on set, I’m Mike Franks. My jokes are Mike Franks’, my attitude is Mike Franks. And when I put on those boat shoes, I think I forgot how to talk and walk like Mike.
“I’m being 100% genuine here…,” Schmid stressed. “I was worried I wasn’t doing my job well because I didn’t feel like myself, and there were moments when I had to run over to the director and be like, ‘Was my accent off? Am I doing this right, because I’m missing this big part of myself?’ It was such a strange, psychological hurdle for me to get over that when [showrunners] David [J. North] and Gina [Lucita Monreal] came down to set, I was like, ‘I don’t want to do this again. Don’t take away my boots, man.’ David looked me in the eye and goes, ‘That was the point,'” to underscore how important the boots are to Franks. “And I just went, wow. OK, that is a writer who gets it. That is a writer who understands their partner, their actor, and how to get what they want in something.
“It was such a beautiful realization that everything had been planned,” Schmid said, “and it really worked.”
The boots that Franks is not ready to part with play a key role in the first batch of flashbacks this week’s episode gives us, of a 21-year-old Michael (played by Berlin Station‘s Brandon Spink) being gifted with the nile crocodile leather by his mom (Gigi Bermingham) and older brother (Matthew Erick White).
“I read that scene with the younger Franks, where the boots don’t fit and he’s pulling them off, massaging his feet…,” Schmid recalled. “The older brother just walks up and doesn’t say a word. He takes off his own boots and Michael puts them on, and I immediately got emotional, because that’s the side of humanity that I think is such a building block for our culture — and maybe something that we’ve lost currently, the generosity to help one another.
“I’ve got a brother who’s seven years younger than I am. I love him more than anything in the world,” Schmid shared, “and that scene, for me…. Like, I would’ve done the same thing, and the fact that they were able to capture that relationship just kind of blew my mind.”
Spink, as 21-year-old Michael, doesn’t particularly favor Schmid in appearance. But Schmid said that what the young actor communicates from within is far more important that his look.
“His physicality had less to do with it than who he was as a person and what he brought to it psychologically as an actor,” Schmid offered. “He’s also a very dedicated young actor, which reminded me a bit of myself growing up and seeing the opportunity to make a meal out of a particularly good opportunity or scene. [Brandon] was hungry, and honest, and the way plays the younger Franks is, to me, so important because Franks has this armor — he’s this gruff man — but below that is this childlike sense of love for people and things, like [NIS K-9] Gary Callahan and the bird with Gibbs. And that was not lost on me when I watched Brandon read this material for the first time. There was a genuine authenticity of caring deeply about the world and what is right.”
All told, Schmid was not just surprised to embark on a deep dive into who Mike Franks was and is, but to actually see what all it will entail in this episode and beyond.
“I mean, when David mentioned it to me — ‘Yeah, we’re getting your backstory’ — I was like, ‘Oh, OK.’ I didn’t think much of it,,” Schmid admitted. “And then we get the script for [Episode] 11, and I immediately called Gina and David and just said, ‘Guys, thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you for writing just something that, to me, seems so meaningful.'”
Check back Monday night after the NCIS: Origins winter premiere to get Kyle Schmid’s thoughts on the episode’s big reveals… and the “heart-wrenching” Mike/Tish episode to come.
Want scoop on NCIS: Origins, or for any other TV show ? Shoot an email to [email protected], and your question may be answered via Matt’s Inside Line!
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