Baby Pictures, Beanie Babies, Mothballs, Vampires: Alyson Hannigan is, and isn't, "Willow Rosenberg"
By Mitch Persons
They don't call her BUFFY for nothing. Her exercise regime includes vampire exterminations (tough workout), practicing martial arts and purging her home turf of nuisances like an overgrown praying mantis and insurance salesmen. But sometimes she leans on modern technology to smoke out these critters, so Buffy inevitably bonds with a a shy computer nerd...
"I knew it! Not in the sense that I had the slightest idea what was going on, but I knew there was something I didn't know."
Willow Rosenberg
Willow is portrayed by the very extroverted Alyson Hannigan, a loquacious youth with large, doe eyes and a mischevious, sexy smile. After a few minutes of conversation, it dawned on me that the only thing Hannigan shares with Willow is the same body.
"When we first started shooting Buffy," recalls Hannigan, flashing her pearly whites, "I thought to myself, 'Yes, we are very, very different.' But then, as time went on, I was like, 'You know what? We're kind of similar.' Willow obviously has computer smarts beyond belief, and that aspect is more about her than me. But I think we're similar in a lot of ways...like we're both in our own little world, and sometimes people just don't really understand that. I don't think Willow is as weird as I am. Sometimes I can go off on tangents, where Willow never really does, but it's at the point now where the crew and the cast of BUFFY have gotten used to my quirkiness. So it's okay."
Hannigan's societal disposition--her resistance to conformity and inclination to perform--is rooted in her preteens. "I come from Washington, D.C., where both my parents were photographers. When I was a baby, whenever they needed an infant in a shot, they would use me. I really believe that my fondness for acting stemmed from those experiences because--even as a toddler--I loved being in front of the camera.
"When I was four years old, my mom and I moved to Atlanta, Georgia, and she would do magazine jobs, print jobs, stuff like that, most of the time, using me as a model. A commercial agent there some some of my pictures and got me some TV commercials. When I was about 11, I was visiting my dad here in California one Christmas vacation. He took me around to some California agents and they said to me, 'Yeah, we would definitely sign you up if you lived here. I told my mom when I got back to Georgia, and she said, 'Okay, let's move!' And we did. I've been working ever since.
"My first picture was MY STEPMOTHER IS AN ALIEN, with Dan Aykroyd and Kim Basinger. After that, I did a short-lived sitcom called FREE SPIRIT [1989-'90]. It was sort of a BEWITCHED-kind of show. It went for 13 episodes, then got cancelled. I did some guest spots here and there, nothing really too wonderful--movies of the week and all that stuff. But nothing great until BUFFY.
"I almost didn't get the part of Willow. My agent had submitted me, but, for some reason, they wouldn't see me. They had cast someone else for the presentation, but then she got fired when the show was picked up. I finally was able to get an audition for the recast...and I auditioned for what seemed like forever. Then I waited and waited, but didn't hear anything. I'm not the most patient person. After a while, I was at the point of, 'Oh please, just tell me yes or no, because I will kill myself if I don't find out!' I figured, even if it was bad news, at least I would know. Well, I was at a 7-Eleven store one day when I got a page to call the producers. After all that auditioning and waiting, they told me I had gotten the part! I was like, 'Allll right, cool!'
"On the first day of shooting, I was a little bit nerous, Nick [Brendon], Charisma [Carpenter], and Sarah [Michelle Gellar] had all known each other from the pilot episode, and I was pretty much a stranger. But it didn't take very long for all of them to become very good friends of mine. During the first season's hiatus, I had my tonsils taken out, and Sarah visited me in the hospital and brought me a little Beanie Baby. That was so sweer of her--and so typical.
"Then there's Charisma. She is so funny! Cast as Cordelia Chase, she always seems to get the show's best lines. During the first season, she was always insulting my character and now, in our second season, she seems to be directing her venom at Xander. It's so weird because Cordelia is such a bitch and Charisma, in real life, is just the opposite. She is an extremely nice person.
"Anthony Stewart Head, who plays Giles, is another nice person. I really love him, he's just the sweetest man. He's smart and so wonderful, and has a heart of gold. But he has a deep, dark secret: he puts mothballs in his clothing---!
"During the first couple episodes last season, I was getting these headaches. I couldn't figure out why. But these headaches were getting really painful. And so this one time, we were sitting in the library doing a scene and I was sitting in a chair. Tony's coat was on that chair. I said, 'What is that horrible smell?' And Tony's like, 'Oh, there are mothballs in my pocket,' and he goes into this explanation about how he is a Method actor and that this smell brings the character to him. He had 12 monthballs in his pockets and I said, 'What, are you crazy?' So he says, 'Yes, I guess it is a bit much.' So he narrowed it down to two mothballs and my headaches went away.
"There was another scene with Tony, where he was supposed to have been fighting or something and had been dragged across the floor; so he went outside and rolled around in the dirt to get the 'dirty character feel.' He came back in and I--oblivious to what he had been doing--said, 'Oh Tony, you have some dirt on you,' and I was wiping it off and he goes, 'No, no, no! I was just rolling around in the dirt for 15 minutes, trying to get this filthy,' That's Method acting--I just don't understand it."
Willow: Xander, wanna stay and help me?
Xander: Are you kidding?
Willow: Yes, it was a joke I made up.
Hannigan attributes the credibility of the show's characters, and their relationships, to executive producer, Joss Whedon: "He's always there for us. There have been times when one of us has said, 'I really sucked in that last scene. I just couldn't get with it,' and Joss has dropped whatever he's been doing to offer his support and steer us in the right direction. I honestly don't know what I would do if he weren't around. He could have such an attitude--and that would be okay--but he's really smart. He could be such a jerk, but he's not.
"I have never respected anyone more than Joss. He's just brilliant. I would love to get inside his brain for an hour and look around. He has idea after idea after idea. And his ideas are so great. It's true that we have a terrific set of writers on the show, but there's a Joss Whedon touch behind every plot twist, and behind every occult force that Buffy and the gang face.
"Willow's belief in these supernatural forces was one of the most difficult things for me to get used to. I subscribe to the 'Prove it, and I'll believe it' theory. I'm not going to say, 'No, vampires don't exist' because, if they do, I wouldn't want to offend them. But who am I to say what exists and what doesn't? I think I really would like to take somebody's word for it, like if they had pictures or something. I don't think, though, that I would need a demonstration of a vampire--especially right in front of me.