There had to be an upside to playing slimy conniver Pete Campbell on AMC’s Mad Men. For Vincent Kartheiser, the benefit has been the ability to take on other lesser known projects, like the stage production of The Death of the Novel.
“It means I get to…champion projects like this one,” he told Mercury News. “From the first moment I read the script, I knew this was something I wanted to do. It’s genius. I’m inspired by this play, which is concerned with the world that we live in right now, a world where we are hyperconnected but also so detached from each other, it’s spooky.”
The production, which opens at the San Jose Rep on August 30, allows Kartheiser to immerse himself in another role. “I am an artist of emotion,” he said. “It’s hard, but it’s also incredibly cathartic. You go to that dark place, and then you get to let it go and go home. It’s a pleasure to inhabit a role like this fully, just like it’s a pleasure to be dishonorable under Pete’s armor [on Mad Men.] It’s like therapy, only faster.”
Kartheiser has also enjoyed acting in a different medium other than television. “There’s nothing like having an audience right there in front of you, breathing with you, living with you,” he said. “That’s what feeds me as an actor. I want to have it all on the line.”
