For over a decade, Giancarlo Esposito has conjured one of the scariest, most fascinating slow burns of any TV character in recent memory. This quietly simmering, heavy-lidded expression, like a pre-Columbian sculpture of some pitiless Aztec god, first appeared in AMC’s Breaking Bad, on the face of Esposito’s indelible Gus Fring, a buttoned-down narco kingpin fronting as a fast-food manager in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Fring’s reign of terror, along with that unforgettable stare, cast its shadow over much of the show, and did so again in Breaking Bad’s acclaimed prequel series, Better Call Saul. “I suppose it’s someone who’s not quite able to suppress their rage or disappointment but is always calculating,” muses the 65-year-old Esposito. “It’s a look that expresses the thought, I already know what to do.”
Esposito has brought certain notes of this fastidious menace to the realms of space opera (crypto-fascist Moff Gideon in The Mandalorian), superhero black comedy (rogue CEO Stan Edgar in Amazon Prime’s The Boys), and now stylish British crime caper (Guy Ritchie’s new Netflix series, The Gentlemen, Danish-born actor, who debuted on Broadway at age 10 and gained notoriety in Spike Lee’s acclaimed films of the 1980s and ’90s yet often struggled with the whims of Hollywood, sought a project that would let him step from the shadows of illicit power and into the struggles of an everyman. AMC’s Parish, premiering March 31, gives him—and us—all that and more. In the series, Esposito (who’s also an executive producer) plays Gracián “Gray” Parish, the owner-operator of a struggling New Orleans limo company, a dedicated family man with a criminal past that entangles him with a local Zimbabwean mob family. The heart-stopping action and wrenching drama that ensue mark Parish as a colorful, higher-octane successor to AMC’s already impressive string of brilliant crime narratives. It’s also a show whose heart and soul are strikingly aligned with its star’s.
Your character in Parish has a desperation that makes him somehow more compelling than some of your other recent characters. How did you find him?
Oh, man, so much of this show was in my DNA. So much of this show, especially the family part, was really close to my heart. I wanted to tell the story of an everyman who has to rise to an occasion and do something extraordinary, but who doesn’t think of himself as a hero. He’s suffering. He’s not being respected by his wife because he’s not able to support his family, and there’s all this pain and hurt because he’s unable to stand up for himself, even though he’s doing everything he can. I wanted to play someone I see almost every day in our world: people who have no other choice but to do what they’re doing, who don’t have a vision anymore, because their dream has been deferred, they’ve been crushed, they’re broken—because that’s where I was coming from myself.
In real life, you mean?
Yes. I’m talking about sitting at my desk, years ago in Connecticut, bankrupt, losing my house—which meant I’d probably lose my family—and thinking that the only way out for me, since I was fairly well-insured, was to kill myself. I mean, that’s how this show came about, that place of not knowing if I could ever make it out. That’s the vibration we were looking for in the show, that desperation, because I know it. It’s a place where you will do anything. I mean, I can’t even tell you how many times I thought of robbing a bank. Thinking, Hey, I’m good enough. I can get away with this. Or just thinking [about] going from having a career where people kind of know who I am to wondering how I can go back into the world, swallow up my ego, and do anything to make money. I’ve been there. I’ve been up and down and all around.
How did you channel your real-life darkness into a New Orleans driver, a family man, someone who’s connected to the church?
Oh, so many threads from my life: as a Christian and altar boy in the church who was contemplating becoming a priest. Also, I love autos. I love driving. I was working in a restaurant during the snowstorm of ’96 in Manhattan, and because I had a Dodge Dart and knew how to drive in the snow, I was going up and down Ninth Avenue picking up passengers like a cab. Cars have been in my life forever.
In The Gentlemen, you play someone on the exact opposite end of the economic spectrum: Stanley Johnston, a shadowy billionaire who brings Gus Fring’s air of meticulous wickedness to the sphere of country estates and British nobility. What was it like navigating such a posh, insular world?
I love Stanley Johnston. He’s so smart and has such a visual sense about him. He’s like the conductor of all the chaos. To me, Stanley is the richest man in the world, and the richest Black man in the world. He’s venturing into a new territory, so in a way he’s a fish out of water, but he knows more about this new territory—about the manners, tastes, and history of the British aristocracy—than anybody else. I feel he’s in the U.K. as an American, because it gives him the cachet to understand human nature on a different level. He’s going to use every tool in his toolbox, which isn’t just money, but access and connections, in his quest for power.
Did you get to keep any of those killer tweed suits?
Oh, my gosh, yes, I was able to. I really love the costume designer, Loulou [Bontemps], and a lot of effort went into her work, along with Guy, who also has a sartorial flair. So yeah, I got some really nice pieces, and I’m really grateful for them.
Critics have tended to describe your most memorable villains as “fussy,” “ fastidious,” “punctilious,” or “buttoned-down.” Have you ever wanted to play a total slob?
[Laughs.] I love it. I think that may be next for me. To let go of all that will be a revelation. While it does fit with characters like Stanley Johnston and Gustavo Fring, it is a lot to keep track of, and though I know part of me is that way, it would be a cathartic process to let go of it all. I look forward to that one.
Is there any part of your real life where you pursue this kind of obsessive attention to detail? Origami? Dollhouse furniture?
Oh, my goodness. I love Mid-Century Modern furniture, though my accountant says I’ve spent way too much money on it. I have a Robsjohn-Gibbings chair in powder blue, with brass feet and a walnut rim around the seat. It’s really quite rare, and you just don’t find that kind of thing in this condition, so yes, I’m a little obsessed with it. I swear I’m going to find a place in Italy to be able to ship some of this stuff over where it can live.
Speaking of Italy, your dad is a carpenter and stagehand from Naples who met your mom, an Alabama-born singer, when she was performing in Italy. How Italian are you?
Well, I do speak some Italian, and I’m very proud of my Italian heritage. One of my largest fan bases is in Italy; when I go there, I can’t ride a moped without a full-face helmet because everyone’s screaming at me on the street. I was in Naples this July with three of my daughters, and our mouths dropped. People were literally cutting us off in traffic to get out and say hello. I was stopped by an off-duty police officer who said, “I like you—you are a hero in my life and my family’s life.” I’m trying to develop a project to do in Italy, so my Italian may be about to get a whole lot better.
As an actor, you’ve had the mixed blessing of tremendous ability and versatile looks, which means you’re able to disappear into African-American, Latin, and mixed-race characters—while also lacking the obvious fixed identity Hollywood often prefers.
I’m Black and I’m Italian, both. Years ago, Spike Lee told me, “You’re an Afro-European.” We would laugh and joke about it, but I’m championing both parts of me. If I can, I want to be the catalyst to bring people to that understanding and awareness. With the story of Gracián Parish, you can look at this guy, no matter what color you are, and go, “Damn, I’m in that situation. I can’t get a job, I can’t get unemployment, I’m at my wit’s end. They want to give me a pill to calm me down, but I can’t get a doctor to give me a prescription, and I’m in pain.” I want people of any color to look at a character like this and say, “I feel him.” I want to commit to telling the story of a human being.
You’ve been performing professionally for more than 50 years now. What’s the most formative piece of acting advice you ever got?
One of the main things I heard was from working on the [1981] movie Taps, something George C. Scott told me. I’d first connected with him years earlier, when he was doing Uncle Vanya at the same theater where I was doing the Broadway musical Seesaw. Back then, he came up behind me and said [in gravelly George C. Scott voice], “Don’t do [acting]. Don’t do it. Don’t do it. Don’t do it.” I recognized his voice, turned around to face him, and he smiled, saying, “Unless you really have to.” Years later, when we were shooting Taps, he gave me the other piece of advice that really stayed with me. It was, “Be true to yourself.” And that’s difficult, because we want to make it, we want to be seen, and we have to be somebody else in order to be seen. But do you see me as Black? As Spanish? OK, but being yourself means showing all of who you are, all your foibles, your positives, your negatives, and everything in between. It all becomes a very important part of who you are and the truth of the story you want to tell. I think I’m growing as an actor because I’m more confident in who I am as a person.
Is it true what they say, that the villain has all the best lines?
Oh, man. [As Stan Edgar:] “You are not a god. You are simply bad product.” [As Gus Fring:] “I will kill your wife. I will kill your son. I will kill your infant daughter.” I mean, come on. Villains definitely have the best lines.
