When we talk about well-known Superman actors in film and TV, we have to talk about Tom Welling. Making his premiere as Clark Kent in The CW show Smallville in 2001, Welling solidified himself up on the pedestal of great Supermen. But, Welling has been in other fantastic shows such as Supernatural, Lucifer, and more. He recently stopped by our friends over at The KJ Today Show and we’re happy to provide the transcript below.
Please enjoy!
KJ: Oh, are we geeking out today? Tom Welling, you know him from Smallville, Supernatural, and also Lucifer. And he’s got a new movie out called Mafia Wars. Here’s Tom Welling. It’s KJ Today. Hi, Tom.
TOM WELLING: Hey, how you doing?
KJ: Good morning. Welcome to the KJ Today show. Tom Welling. I have to tell you, we have this barrier because you can’t see me right now, but we have worked together through Celeb Photo Ops for many years. I have been ushering fans in and out of your photo booth and giving them their photo opportunity to meet you. I had to wrap my brain around the fact that we could actually have a conversation today because we never have.
TOM WELLING: There’s no, there’s no time. There’s no time. Those photo ops are crazy. I mean, they’re crazy fun, but they’re crazy. Thank you. Um, you know, I can’t do those photo ops without people like you. So thank you.
KJ: Oh, yeah, it’s so much fun, because I get to sit there and watch thousands of people have their most amazing moment meeting you. So thank you, because it’s always a blast to work with you. And I’m a fan of your work as well. So let’s start off, Tom, because today’s a big day. It’s kind of like a New Year’s Eve or a Christmas Eve when you have a new project that’s about to come out. Talk to us about Mafia Wars.
TOM WELLING: Yeah, Mafia Wars, I’m really proud of this. You know, we shot in Rome. Scott, who directed and wrote it, with the first conversation I had with him, one of the first things he said was, I’m not doing this movie unless we shoot in Rome. And I was like, I’m in. Because it becomes a character of the film itself. And it was so magical to shoot there. It’s really helpful as an actor to be on location when you’re shooting and being immersed in it. And Terry is a guy who’s He’s a good guy who got caught for doing bad things. He’s in a bad situation, but for good reasons. He’s really trying to help his family. So it’s an action film with a lot of heart driving it.
KJ: What is it like for you when you’re going into knowing there’s going to be a lot of action? You obviously have a lot of depth to your character with it being a good guy in a bad situation, but did you have to prepare a little bit differently to know you were going to be doing so much action in this film?
TOM WELLING: I love the action. Those are my favorite days when we have action. Because we’re on a tight schedule and it was a very challenging shoot. And actually, I want to give some props to the director because he really navigated day to day and moment to moment, sort of all the challenging things we had going for us. But a lot of the action we had, we had like maybe five, 10 minutes to get ready for. And thankfully, Cam, who plays the psychopath in the film, who is great to work with, it came to him very easily as well. So we were able to kind of figure it out quickly based on both of our experiences. So listen, it would have been nice to have like a John Wick six months getting ready for all the action, but it didn’t happen on this film, but I think we got away with it.
KJ: Mafia Wars is the new movie. It is available on digital and on demand October 11th, which is tomorrow. Tom, I always like to go to our fans here and there are, it’s so interesting. You’ve been a part of two really big fandoms between Superman, Smallville, and then with Lucifer. So I do wanna start off Devin asked me to bring up, and I had forgotten about this. You had this amazing moment through Smallville where you got to work with Christopher Reeve. And we’ve got the Superman Christopher Reeve story out now. Would you be willing to share a little bit about what that experience was like?
TOM WELLING: Absolutely. It was one of the most wonderful things I’ve ever experienced. I mean, we flew to New York from Vancouver to work with him. And he was only supposed to be there for about two or three hours. because we were going to shoot all his dialogue and then we were going to, you know, he was going to leave and then we would shoot all my dialogue and he wouldn’t leave. And to be honest, it got to the point, I think six and a half hours in, his nurse said to him, if you don’t come with me right now, I’m going to call the police because she had probably the attorney over him or more or less. And he just sort of laughed and he looked at me and he said, they’re always telling me what to do. Like, he was so funny, and he didn’t let you feel sorry for him. It was very inspirational, is what I take it. And every time I think about it, I get the chills because, you know, it was really, it just, it really, he was all about encouragement. I guess that’s my takeaway.
KJ: So are you telling me originally, you didn’t think you were actually going to be in the in the room with him?
TOM WELLING: Oh, no, I’m sorry. I knew I was going to be in the room with him. I knew I was going to do the dialogue with him. It’s just the way you shoot a scene. One person’s on one side, one person’s on the other. And we were told we only had three hours with him. So we were going to film his side of the scene. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry.
KJ: That’s amazing. Have you had a chance? I know you’re busy doing all of your press for the new movie, but have you had a chance to see the new documentary yet?
TOM WELLING: I have not. And I mean to see it very soon because I think, again, I’m going to come away with even more inspiration, I believe it.
Our very own Dom actually was able to speak to Christopher Reeves’ children in regards to the new documentary that just came out, Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story. You can give that a listen right —> here.
And to listen/watch the full interview between KJ and Tom Welling, check the video out below:
A girl with too many fandoms to count.
It’s Reeve NOT Reeves. Reeves was George