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INTERVIEW: HOLLY MARIE-COMBS
| THE SEVEN YEAR WITCH
She's been with the show since its pilot episode. Seven
years and 150 episodes on, HOLLY MARIE COMBS reflects on
the impact Charmed has had on her life with David Waldon.
. . It's been seven years since Holly Marie Combs made her Charmed debut in the show's pilot episode 'Something Wicca This Way Comes,' but the popular actress is still relishing the challenge of playing Piper Halliwell as much as she ever did. That's because, for Holly, Charmed has been (and continues to be) a life changing experience. Not only has the show made her a household name across the world, she also met her husband, David Donoho, on the Charmed set and following a fairy tale wedding on February 14, 2004, gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, Finley.
Here, Holly, who first shot to fame as Kimberly on David E. Kelley's award-winning drama Picket Fences, chats exclusively to Charmed Magazine's David Waldon about what the past seven years have meant to her, her career prior to Charmed, her hopes for the future, her views on fan conventions and her many, many pets. . .
How many more seasons do you think Charmed has in it?
I don't know. We've never tried to guess what our ultimate success would be and kind of left it up to the audience. And if they want to see it, we want to keep making it.
Following your lengthy run on Picket Fences, were you
a little reluctant to try TV again with Charmed? No, because Picket Fences was such a great family atmosphere where I had the best possible experience, I had no reason to not want to do it again. Because I couldn't have asked for anything better. I was surrounded by great actors, and I had great writing, and I had a great crew. And you just don't find those elements often. So I went into this with that experience, and I think we've attempted to replicate that experience, and we have. Our crew is great, and we have a lot of fun, and it's an easy show to make. Even though it's technically difficult, it's easy to be here, and it's easy to make, because doing this kind of stuff, you end up spending a large portion of your life here, and it's got to be the first place you want to be.
Because Picket Fences was so grounded in reality and Charmed is so well, not, was there an odd transition from that environment to this one?
Yeah, it's tough, because I had not worked with all these special effects before. Now I'm like, you know, an ol' hound dog at it, but before, it was all foreign to me. And now it's just second nature. But in the beginning, it was very hard. You have to ease the self-consciousness about yourself and not be afraid to look silly, because a lot of the time you're going to look silly doing what we do. And you just can't be worried about how you're going to look, because you're going to look silly. And it will be funny.
Do you
want to direct at some point on the show? You know what, I know, from being close to people who have directed this show, that it's a tough show to direct. It's really tough to deliver on time and under budget because we ask our directors to do a lot in eight days, and it's tough. So, no, I'd probably start with something easier! [smiles]
Is the show and the baby dominating your life to the extent where there are no other projects on the way for you?
Yeah, I'm afraid so. It's kind of — you divide up your time into what's important to you, and at this moment, whenever I have any free time, I'd rather spend it with him.
How have your many pets adjusted to the change at home?
It's tough. It's another way you've got to divide up your time, or at least my time, between all of the animals and the new baby.
How many animals do you have now?
Two birds, three cats — I've got to count the dogs — there are [David's] two, my two and the other one we got together, so there's five. There's three horses, a few fish, and I had a turtle, but we had to find the turtle a more proper home because we have the infant around the house. The E. coli, salmonella, all that kind of stuff. So he found a nice big pond to go to. It's nicer than anything I could have given him.
You probably get this question a lot, but why so many pets?
I don't know. You know what, I grew up around animals, and it seems like a natural way of being for me. My grandmother had a ton of animals — actually, more than I do, if you can believe that — and to me, it's weird to see people living their life without animals. I have no idea what they do with their spare time. [laughs]
Do you
have a favorite episode of Charmed? I liked the King Arthur/Camelot episode ['Sword and the City'] that I did last season. It was funny — well, it wasn't so funny, but it was kind of creepy, that we did that episode while I was pregnant, even though I got stabbed in the gut. It was one that I'll always remember for that. But that one was fun, and our guest star in that was really, really good, which makes our jobs so much easier than they are. Actually, a couple of my favorites are from last year, strangely. 'Little Monsters' was one of my favorites, with the baby demons. But I'm hoping I haven't done my favorite yet.
Do you have a least favorite episode?
[laughs] Least favorite? I don't know. I don't think so. I've had some least favorite costumes. The Glenda the Good Witch costume [from the season three episode 'All Halliwell's Eve'] was particularly uncomfortable. That was not fun. With the wig and the taffeta and the layers and layers of fabric.
Those episodes when you ladies go to new lands or play different characters — are they a curse and a blessing because they're a lot of fun but do involve extra costumes and settings and fuss?
Yeah. You know, you really do begin to appreciate normal clothes once you have an extravagant costume like that, because it's just so much easier to act when you're not encumbered by anything huge or uncomfortable or that is shifting or falling off of you. For example, the first episode that we've done this season ['A Call to Arms'], I had one of those bindi things here [points to the middle of her forehead], and it kept moving and kept getting lower and lower throughout the day on my forehead. And they kept trying to pull it up, and it kept sinking and sinking. And it's really hard to do a scene when you're distracted by something falling down in between your eyes. It was very hard to look serious when you're having problems like that.
Was it just the sweat from the lights that kept it from staying put?
It just seemed like the longer the day went on, the more my costume would start falling down. [laughs]
Have you ever gone to any of the fan conventions?
No, no time.
Would you want to after the show goes off the air and you actually have time to do it?
Absolutely. I hear it's very popular in Europe with very dedicated fans. So that's definitely something that we'll consider doing.
Holly Marie Combs interview courtesy of Charmed — The Official Magazine
