Tomer Capone by Karen Fukuhara

 

With the wild success of The Boys, Tomer Capone and Karen Fukuhara caught up with each other before the season three finale to discuss their connection and collaboration since the first day they met and look back on career highlights and challenges.

PHOTOS: Pierre-Emile Havette

TALENT: Tomer Capone

INTERVIEW: Karen Fukuhara

STYLING: Barbara Ikkache

GROOMING: Emilie Plume

LOCATION: SUITE OPÉRA at Sofitel Le Scribe Paris Opéra

PRODUCTION: Jasmine Perrier at Studio J•T•P

SPECIAL THANKS: Craig Schneider & The Initiative Group

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This standalone feature is taken from Grumpy Magazine’s IN CONVERSATION series and exclusively available as a solo story in digital and print worldwide

Click HERE to order your exclusive solo print booklet featuring one talent and 20+ pages of INTERVIEW and PHOTOS, or head over to ISSUU to flip through this story digitally

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This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. Check out some extracts below.

KAREN FUKUHARA: Hi! How are you?

TOMER CAPONE: I’m good, love. I’m so happy you are doing this. Thank you.

KF: I’m really excited to do this. I did this last year with Erin [Moriarty], and it was really fun to get to know my castmate.

TC: Like we don’t know each other at all.

KF: To start off, I want to go back to day one, when we first met in Toronto. I came in a little late because it was episode four already, and Jack [Quaid] texted me right away and he said, “I’m getting the good boys together, let’s grab some drinks.” My first impression of you was awesome. I remember feeling really relieved because of how passionate you were about Frenchie and the relationship between Frenchie and Kimiko. It’s been awesome ever since. What was your first impression?

TC: When I met you for the first time, it was just horrible. No, I’m kidding [laughs]

KF: [Laughs] How did it feel going into The Boys?

TC: First of all, getting Frenchie’s role was super quick. I had four to six days to get my things together and fly to Toronto. I didn’t know anything about the cast or the show. I landed in Toronto, buzzed my hair, and went to the most funky, weird places in Toronto, just to hang out with some punk rockers. I had two episodes until you arrived and I was super excited to meet you. I remember us meeting at that place you talked about with Jack — you ordered a whiskey sour.

KF: Yeah!

TC: At that time, whiskey sour was my drink. I was obsessed with it, and I was like, “Yeah, that’s my girl!”

KF: Really?

TC: Yeah. So, that was a good start.

KF: That’s so funny. I remember that, good times. We’ve talked about this many times, but for you, that whole audition process was pretty short, right? 

TC: It happened at breakneck speed. If you’d told me that I would be Frenchie from The Boys, I’d like, “Really, what?” I can handle my French, but I’m not French. So, Frenchie was a dream role because it’s a transformation. I remember having fun when auditioning. I don’t know if you know the story, but one of the neighbors in Tel Aviv thought the toy gun I had was real, and they called the police. At the last minute, they recognized me from this Israeli thing I did. We shot another take after the cops left. So, I guess the intensity was real. You knew for quite some time that you would come in, right?

KF: I found out maybe a few months before.

TC: Did you have the script? Because I only read it on the plane to Toronto, and I was like, “Hello, Kimiko!” It was all very tense in the first season.

KF: Frenchie is a completely different character for you, and you were in Fauda before. Would you say that being a paratrooper helped with that?  

TC: A lot of my Israeli breakthrough roles were post-traumatic heroes, soldiers — let’s just say that I was in a surrounding that really understood those worlds.

KF: You were in the Forces but you were also the leader, right? So, bringing people together was also something that was part of being in that.

TC: I feel like when you are in any sort of intense, out of the ordinary environment, or group of people, at the end of the day, you know that you can only rely on each other. Similarly, between action and cut, we only have each other to complete the mission.

KF: Definitely. How did you get into acting from that life step?

TC: There is something that is very Israeli — after you finish your service, you get on the plane and regain yourself in a different situation. So, I was in India for a long time, just having fun. I thought I could maybe continue my army career when I started it, but it changed quickly. Traveling and knowing different people from all over the world opened up something from my childhood. I remember sitting in front of the television, watching movies, and being like, “I can be a part of this world.” As a five-year-old, I was certain that I would be this colorful wrestler in WWE. Then, I came back [from India] and my first love was horses and animals. I started working at a farm and flirted with the idea of trying something with acting. I was very shy but a good friend, who is now my mentor and my Israeli agent, opened it up for me. Then, I remember taking the train once a week from the north of Israel to Tel Aviv, where all the big stuff happens. It sounds cliché, but when I went on stage for the first time, something felt right. It was like being on a horse that knows you and you know him. I felt uplifted, but then, they said the scene that I did was horrible. 

KF: What? Why? [Laughs]

TC: It was so funny but I loved it. They gave me a scene from this play with this very old guy who is having this monologue about him wasting his life and not giving attention to his wife. I thought it was very strong, so when I went on stage, I dyed my hair white, hunched my back, took a cane, and did this crazy voice. They didn’t like it [laughs]. I understood that it was something that I had to learn.

KF: Did you take classes then?

TC: A lot of them. Two days ago, I did another session on this body language system with a great teacher. Learning never ends. How funny it is when we think a scene went horrible, but then, people say, “That was one of the best scenes you guys have ever done.”

FULL CONVERSATION AND STORY APPEAR IN THE PRINT or DIGITAL ISSUE. SOLO EDITION AVAILABLE NOW!

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