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By Brian Braiker
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Nate, the eldest, has married the mother of his child, but he's got unresolved Oedipal issues and an itch to flee. David, the younger brother, has moved in with his lover, Keith, but they are in couples therapy. The third season of HBO's hit "Six Feet Under" is in full swing and the gang, though amusingly disgruntled, is all here. But along with the frustrated Fishers, viewers will also be seeing a lot more Frederico Diaz, the young mortician with a knack for embalming.
For those who have been living in a grave, "American Beauty" screenwriter Alan Ball's series takes a darkly comic look at the Fisher and Sons family mortuary, where Frederico is a newly minted partner. The promotion of the character he plays means fans of Freddy Rodriguez will be seeing a lot more of him.
But the small screen isn't the only place you can catch Rodriguez these days. The actor, who grew up in Chicago and cut his teeth in community theater as a teen, plays a crook in "Chasing Papi," a film that opened Wednesday about a Latin lothario with girlfriends in three different cities. The 28-year-old also recently finished shooting the Scott Caan film "Dallas and Rusty," in which he stars opposite Jeff Goldblum. Rodriguez spoke with NEWSWEEK's Brian Braiker about his on- and off-screen roles in "Six Feet Under," what he's been doing on hiatus and how hard it is for Latinos to find decent roles in Hollywood. Excerpts:
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NEWSWEEK: You've had a quite a bit of creative input into how you'd like Frederico to evolve as a character.
Freddy Rodriguez: To a certain extent. Alan Ball is really open to suggestions and collaborations. At the beginning of every season, we usually meet with Alan individually and just kind of talk about where the year is going, where the season is going, where the character is going. He always asks us for our opinion and what we think. For example, in the second season there was an episode where we discover the origin of Frederico--where he came from and how he got to know Nathaniel Fisher. I pitched that story line to him. I said, "I kinda think that the audience should know how he met the Fishers," so I pitched him the idea and he liked it and used it.
Your character's a partner now. Are we going to see more of him?
Absolutely. We're going to see more conflict between Frederico and the Fisher brothers. The Fisher brothers are bad businessmen and naturally there will be conflict because Frederico was an employee before and now he's a partner. We see Frederico going through the pressures and anxieties that anyone would face with a higher position in their occupation.
That's at work. But what about his home life?
We see more of him at home as well in a certain deep family problem. We'll see how he handles it. Last year, I think we saw a lot of conflict between Frederico and Vanessa, his wife, with buying a house. A lot of it was conflict. It was unloving. This year, we see the other side of that. We see him deal with a personal issue that shows the other side of Frederico, which shows how much he loves his wife and how much he's willing to deal with it.
There's also been a little more class struggle this season. Is that fair to say?
Yes and no. Frederico is like the bastard child of the family. I don't know if you've seen the poster for this season, where they're all sitting around the table and he's not? He's like in the back, sitting on the counter. It's like, "Yeah, you can join us for dinner, but you can't eat with us. We can all be sort of like a family, but you're still my employee. You can sort of be part of it but we'll still s--t on you." It's the seesaw that keeps happening between Frederico and the Fishers.
He's kind of an angry guy.
I think anybody would be if they were constantly crapped upon like Frederico is. You see Frederico working his butt off while Nate is hanging out with his wife and his kid. And David's at therapy with his boyfriend.
He's a little homophobic, too.
Yeah. That subject was definitely explored in the first season. I think he becomes a little more tolerant of it this year. I think he's forced to, as anybody would be. If even you found out somebody you worked closely with is gay, whatever your views are, you would be forced to accept it. You would have to accept it because you have to work side by side with this person.
Frederico works with corpses for a living. What's the strangest job that you've ever had?
Actually the last job-job that I had was I worked third shift at a legal document copy place. I don't know if you've ever been up from midnight to 8 in the morning. Your body really goes through some weird things. You're up at 4 in the morning and you don't know if you're hallucinating or whether you're awake. It's a very, very weird thing for your body.
A lot has been said about how groundbreaking the show is, that it's one of the cooler shows out there, but it's also pretty dark. Would you watch the show if you weren't on it?
It is really cool. The coolest part about [being on] it is that actors you respect, or have respected all your life, all of a sudden know who you are and want to pay respect to you. You kind of sit there and say, "Wait a minute, you're so-and-so, I've watched you for years. What are you doing coming up to me?" That's the coolest part for me personally. It's not about the fame, it's just about the respect you receive doing a show like this. As an actor, we get such crappy material every single day to go in and audition for that when something like this happens, it's the most refreshing thing that an actor can receive.
More specifically, working in Hollywood you must also contend with the lack of Latino roles--or ones that are pretty one-dimensional.
Absolutely. My first film was [1995's] "A Walk in the Clouds." I played Anthony Quinn's grandson. And I followed that with "Dead Presidents." Those were two pretty classy films, and that was around the time when a lot of the films being released were gang-oriented films, just a lot of stereotypical films. I refused to participate in that--and no disrespect to the actors that did. We're all actors; we all have to work. I'm sure that there are certain projects that a lot of actors would love to forget. But I just felt like that was all there was out there and that's where Hollywood wanted to put Latinos and I didn't want any part of it. There were times [when] I was broke and I refused to play those roles.
What are you working on now?
I have a film out now, "Chasing Papi." It was produced by Forest Whitaker and Fox is releasing it. And I did a couple independent films over my hiatus. I just did one called "Dallas and Rusty," directed by Scotty Caan [James Caan's son]. Scotty's a good guy, we've known each other a long time. And I did another independent film that I starred in called "Pledge of a Allegiance."
Any more theater?
I would love to go back and do theater, but right now the films keep pulling me back in. The opportunities are presenting themselves. I sort of have to capitalize on the success of "Six Feet Under" and lay down the groundwork for what's after "Six Feet Under."
When will that be?
I'll stay with the show as long as the quality stays the same, as long as Alan Ball's on board and keeps it going the way it is. We have a great, well-oiled machine right now and hopefully nobody and no thing will throw a monkey wrench in it.
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