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• Cupid
• "Cannavale, Hoffman Lead The Cast Of THE GINGERBREAD HOUSE"
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Emmy-winning actor talks about being stopped by police for walking down the street in L.A. (2:38)
 

Full interview. (11:21)
 

Tavis: Bobby Cannavale is an Emmy-winning and Tony-nominated actor who has enjoyed success in film, TV, and theater. Next week he's back in prime time in the new ABC series, "Cupid." The show premieres next Tuesday night at 10:00 p.m. Here now a sneak previous of "Cupid."

[Clip]

Tavis: What kind of Cupid are you? (Laughter) You're not happy, you don't want to do your job, you consider it punishment, you're a bartender, you ain't got no bow and arrow. What kind of bootleg Cupid is this?

Bobby Cannavale: Well he's, you know, the Earth-bound Cupid, which is not quite as effective as the original Cupid. And according to the story I've been sort of excommunicated from Mt. Olympus and set down without my powers, which isn't a lot of fun. I think the most fun about it is that I finally get to be in an adult body, and that he's in New York City. Thank god I didn't get sent to Albuquerque or something - he's in a great city. (Laughter)

Tavis: You see a script like this and what makes you, Bobby, want to play it?

Cannavale: Well, the fact that it's really - the possibilities of where I can go with the character are endless. We don't say definitively whether he's a god or whether he's crazy, and so that becomes a question for the audience. And so for me, it lets me play something very specific in my head and allows me to have a big secret that I can just have fun with.

And either way we go with the show, at the end of the day, when it's all said and done, if Rob decides, if the writers decide that he was in fact crazy, well, it works for me either way, for what I'm playing.

But it really allows me to just play it to the hilt without really running into any corners like a lot of parts can tend to do when you're doing a long-term thing like a television show.

Tavis: I am always amazed, and maybe I shouldn't be - this may sound stupid to even say - but I am always amazed at the storylines that can be developed around this thing called L-O-V-E. It, like, never ends. The storylines never end.

Cannavale: Yeah, right? Just when you thought you've heard it all, you have somebody else give you a story, you go, "Wow, really?" So yeah, I think it's one of those things that is elusive and that there are a million different stories to tell. I don't think that there's been one on the air, though, that has been - I don't think it's been mined quite so much in the last few years.

I think in the last few years we've sort of been inundated with a lot of procedurals and crime shows and supernatural kind of thing, and I guess this has an element of that in the whole god thing. But it's nice to see a show that's focusing on love, yeah.

Tavis: I agree with you. This isn't for you, necessarily, to figure out, but I am curious as to your take on it, since you went there. So you've got all these procedurals and TV, to me - this is my own assessment - so much of it is the same stuff, and obviously, it's working for somebody. But it's the same procedurals on every channel; they play it over and over and over again.

Again, it's working; I ain't made at whoever's making money for doing it. But how does a show like this, that's not in that vein, find its way? How do you get traction on it?

Cannavale: Well, that's a good question. I think by virtue of being just different and an alternative to what is out there. I don't watch any television, but I do keep up with it through my family, who watches a lot of television. And it seems to me like the only shows that they watch are the "Law & Orders" and "C.S.I.s" and those kind of things, and I think that there's a glut right now of - there's a real spot for a show like this.

And so I just think by virtue of it being the only thing like it coming on, I think maybe we have a shot. But then again, you're talking about business that I don't really understand how it works, so.

Tavis: This is not setting you up or asking you, even, for a bashing of television, because I don't watch a lot of TV either and I do this every day - I do watch the "Tavis Smiley Show" on PBS, though. (Laughter) That said, what's your reason for not watching a bunch of TV? I'm just curious. You're not the first guest who's said that to me.

Cannavale: For me, my particular story is just that I literally work - I work all the time. I'm rehearsing a play right now and getting ready to do another thing, and so I work a lot and I spend a lot of time reading, I spend a lot of time with my work, and I have a teenage kid who I just - a teenage boy who I don't particularly want to spend all my time with in front of a television.

So I'd rather read. I'm going to be one of those dudes that when I'm about to kick it I'm going to go, "Oh, I didn't get to read this." It's not going to be, "I didn't get to see the fourth season of 'Lost.'" (Laughter)

Tavis: How do you - since you went there again - you're giving me these great segues - how do you interact with your teenage son about his choices? Dad isn't spending a lot of time watching television, but so many kids plop down in front of a TV and that's all they do - the games, whatever. As a parent, how are you navigating that relationship?

Cannavale: Well, we just have sort of simple rules. And it's not that he doesn't watch any television. I did that to him for two years - I didn't have a television in the house, and it was just I couldn't deal -

Tavis: Oh, wait, yeah - how did that experience - I want to hear about this. How did that go?

Cannavale: It was good for me but it was terrible for him. (Laughter) And so he was spending a lot more time at his friend's house, playing video games and watching episodes of "Family Guy." So I finally broke down.

Tavis: So in other words, you didn't see your kid for two years.

Cannavale: (Laughs) Yeah, right. So I had to finally break down and get a television. And he's big now; he's going to be 14 in a month. So he'll wake up on his own now. He wakes up early so that he can watch a little something. He's, like, obsessed with "The Twilight Zone" right now. So every morning I get woken up by "The Twilight Zone" theme that he's watching - he'll watch two episodes while he's eating breakfast and getting ready for school.

And then we have an hour - he can have an hour to play video games every night, and that's really about it. Although my son and I have a great sort of tradition in which we've watched - we watch every movie. We watch a lot of movies together, and so his taste in films is very sophisticated because he's watched a lot of really - a lot of my favorite films, and so we have a good time doing that.

Tavis: Is this unwittingly pushing him into a career path that he's unaware of at the moment, you think?

Cannavale: I don't know if - I don't know - it might be unwittingly, for sure. I definitely enjoy doing things like going to the theater, and so I naturally take him with me. I just like taking him everywhere with me, and I do like going to the movies, and so I take him with me.

And he's sure got it in his genes; his mother's a writer and his grandfather's a director and his great-grandmother's a singer and his dad's an actor. So I think somewhere in there it's there, and he loves to write. And so I encourage it without sort of pushing him too much into it.

Tavis: How do you make choices - how does Bobby make choices - at various points in his career, which way to go with regard to stage, screen, big screen, little screen? Because you're one of those persons who literally has done all of this stuff and continues to do it all.

Cannavale: Yeah. Well, I first made the commitment to - I grew up in Union City, New Jersey, which is right across the Hudson River, right across there, and out my bedroom window, it's kind of corny, but, you know, it was the Empire State Building with the New York skyline, and I just spent my whole childhood wanting to get to New York.

And so that's the only real conscious decision I made was to stay in New York by all means, just not leave New York. I just always wanted to live there and be a New York actor. And so I started working in the theater there, and now with raising my son it's just not an option. I don't come - I don't leave home for more than a week at a time, if I can't help it.

And so that sort of limits me, but it limits me in the best ways. People always come out here looking for work, and they say, "Well, there's so much more work out here." And I think, well, yeah, but I don't think it's all great work, and I just find the quality of work to be more diverse, to be better quality. I find I have great relationships with writers in New York, I love doing workshops of things.

I've been involved with movies that start from the ground up that I then eventually end up doing, and that's because I'm in a sort of close circle there in New York. And so I'm really happy that I've sort of gotten a foothold there, and I want to keep it that way.

Tavis: You're taking me down a fascinating path, and I think - I was just thinking of all the conversations I've had on this program over the years, I don't think I've ever mined this particular field, so you're giving me something that I want to play with here for a second. Which is - and again, it's interesting, your take of the different types of work that New York provides or offers that L.A. offers.

Tell me more about your assessment of how you would characterize these two different cities where the work is concerned.

Cannavale: Where the work is concerned? Well, for me, primarily it starts in the theater because that's where I started and where I've worked for 20 years. And the times that I've come out here - again, I've never come out here kind of just for leisure. I've only come out here on a job, and I don't think the theater here - I know that they try to do good work and at times they do do good work, but I don't think that there is - it's just not where it is. The theater happens in New York City.

So I think that's a big difference. The kinds of movies that I like, it's not that I don't love "Chinatown," that's one of the best movies of all time, but I'm partial to Sidney Lumet films and DeNiro-Pacino New York guys films. (Laughter) So I want to work with guys like John Turturro -

Tavis: Just say it, Bobby - you're a New York snob. You're just a New York snob.

Cannavale: (Laughs) I guess I am a New York snob.

Tavis: You're a New York snob, that's what you are.

Cannavale: But there's something about the energy of the city, Tavis, it's like when I read the script for "Cupid," it was set, when Rob sent me the script, he had it set in Los Angeles. And I said, "You know -" and before I could get the sentence out, he goes, "I know, you don't leave New York. I'm going to re-set it in New York."

And I thought, well, you would have to. How's Cupid going to -

Tavis: I want to challenge you on that. Why is Cupid better suited for New York love or New York love challenges as opposed to L.A. love challenges?

Cannavale: Because when he steps outside of his door he's immediately thrust into a humanity of seven million people, whereas here he'd have to run along the 405 to, like, (laughter) shout to people all by themselves in their car talking on the phone to somebody.

Tavis: That was a lay-up. That was way too easy.

Cannavale: You set me up, man. (Laughter)

Tavis: I set myself up for that one; that was way too easy.

Cannavale: But that's the truth. (Laughter) That's the truth. And hey, I'm all for it, man - people like having their big cars, their nice cars and their nice houses out here and that's all good, but I like rubbing shoulders with people all day. I got stopped one time, man, for walking around. I was here doing a job and I was staying somewhere in Hollywood -

Tavis: Ah-ha! That's why you hate L.A.! (Laughter)

Cannavale: I got stopped by this cop, man, who said, "Can I help you?" And I said, "No, I'm good." And he said, "What are you doing?" I said, "I'm just walking." He said, "Why are you walking?" (Laughter) I couldn't believe it. I had no answer for that.

Tavis: So in L.A. you get harassed for walking; I can't get a freaking cab in New York, so what the heck? (Laughter) We've got to hang out - we've got to spend some time together.

Cannavale: Yeah. (Laughter)

Tavis: I got to hurry up and end this conversation, because I - there's something that tells me if I keep Bobby in L.A. for, like, another 10 minutes -

Cannavale: Yeah, I'm getting hives.

Tavis: - he's going to break out in hives. So I got to get this guy back to New York after I tell you that he's in "Cupid" and you got to check it out. But good to see you.

Cannavale: Thanks, Tavis.

Tavis: And all the best on the show.

Cannavale: Thanks for having me - thanks a lot. (Laughter)

Tavis: Nice to have you here. Now, go - just - I feel like the end of "Ferris Bueller."

Cannavale: (Singing) I love L.A. -

Tavis: Go - get to New York.