Constantine’s Matt Ryan on Honoring the Comics, Season Two Hopes and…Shakespeare?

Rumors are hot that the series could be headed to Syfy for a second season, although neither Ryan nor showrunner Daniel Cerone seem to have any idea, with Cerone saying that those kinds of decisions, if they’re being made, are being made above his pay grade in the NBC Universal office suites.

Ryan joined ComicBook.com to talk about this week’s episode, the challenges and thrills of playing John Constantine…and what he’d like to bring in from the comics in a Season Two.

Obviously, we have Papa Midnite coming back, and Corrigan as well. We’re going to see a development with John and Jim’s relationship. In the last episode with Jim, it was kind of Jim and Zed getting to know each other. I think in this episode you see John and Jim’s relationship moving on to a different place.

We also see a step toward Jim kind of being The Spectre in terms of his attitude, his outlook and his words, and that’s quite exciting for the episode.

It’s a great story, the end is a great thing and we do reveal a little about the Brujería and what’s going on there.

You have a lot of history with Shakespeare. Are there any characters in Shakespeare that you can draw on for Constantine?

Oh, interesting, interesting. I’m not too sure if there’s any particular characters to be precise about it but I think that generally, he’s so great at psychology, Shakespeare, about behavior, and I think what you do it, you take elements of all the work you’ve done. Especially the religious side of the work that Shakespeare does is definitely something that you can bring into this world as well. The fact is that ghosts and demons were very prevalent in the mind at the time and they were very real things. So I think that’s something that we can sort of draw on and bring into this world as well.

Yeah. I just finished doing a play; I was doing Henry V in West End in London, and obviously switching mediums, it always takes a little bit of time and a little bit of adjustment. You get back in front of the cameras and start remembering all the techniques and stuff that you’ve learned.

From a Shakespeare play to something like this, I think was a really interesting transition as well. The medium, I think…it’s so fast, the way you work in television, just working those muscles in terms of your prepping and learning lines and stuff, and kind of just getting up to speed with that takes a little bit of adjustment. But it’s a bit like riding a bike; once you get back on, it comes back pretty easy.

The culture of this is wildly different than most of your other work; every interview, it’s “Do you want to cross over with Arrow?” or “Do you want to be John in a movie? How do you answer those things, and how do you process a culture where the press and the fans are looking three projects ahead?

Has that been more or less prevalent as the season has gone on and there’s been questions about renewal?

I think less. I think when we first started this, it was interesting. It was a very new thing for me to be asked those kinds of questions and when you’re asked those questions, then you do think about it.

I think as time has gone on, I’ve been able to get used to it and been able to stay in the moment.

What would you like to see adapted from the comics, or what DC properties would you like to bring in, should you guys get a Season Two?

Wow, I think…

I also love, and what could be a possibility for Season Two I think, is the Family Man arc. What I like about that is, it’s not John dealing with demons and devils, it’s him dealing with human beings and I think that’s a very interesting place for John. I think there’s actually a line in the comic where he says, “Demons, devils I’m fine with, but the real life, the real problems that human beings have…”

I think that’s quite an interesting storyline that could be done over a few episodes or something, you know? That’s something I’d like to explore as well. I mean, there’s so much there, man. That’s the great thing about this job, this gig and the source material. There’s so much there that every time you pick up a comic, you’re thinking about how well it can be translatedf to screen.

Is it just Hellblazer that’s drawing your performance? What else do you draw on to craft the character? Obviously many in the audience really only knew the Reeves movie before this, which is a very different animal.

Hm. Yeah. 

There is such a wealth of the character in all the comics. I draw upon that. I think that what I’ve been doing as well as shooting, at the same time I’ve always got one of the comics with me.

I think visually it’s very interesting; so many different artists have drawn him, so you can get a real physicality from the comics. Also, the different great writers that have written him, there’s so many colors there. I think that I just keep on reading so that subliminally, subconsciously, the character is always working in the background. It’s digging and deepening and making it more full and rich, you know? More three-dimensional.

So, yeah. I think that the comics are definitely the main source of the character but at the same time as I was saying a little while ago, you do draw on all your experiences in life and all the other characters you’ve played before. There’s little bits in there at different times.

As somebody who has to watch these for a living and watch them several times, I think Constantine is the deepest and most layered of these shows. You guys have an awful lot in every episode and I feel like I get something different on every viewing.

I think we’re actually just skimming the surface. That’s the great thing about it. The source material, there’s so much we can do with it and the potential is so huge. So we hope as well that we get a second season and we can continue to do that.