[Interview] Michael Welch: starrymag

Q. Are there any projects that you are working on currently besides "Joan of Arcadia?"

A. You know "Joan of Arcadia" and school are pretty much taking up all my time. I am still in high school, I'm still finishing that up, I'm a senior this year so I am kind of in my last months of that so there is a lot of work to get done. I'm pretty much just focusing on those two things but I am auditioning and hopefully I'll be able to do movies this summer, that'd be pretty cool.

Q. What's a typical day like for you on the set of "Joan of Arcadia?"

A. Well, basically I show up, get into wardrobe, get into makeup and everything and then just hang around with a bunch of my friends for about ten hours. That's pretty much how it is, and you know, it's fun because we pretty much, the actors on the show pretty much have our characters down. We get along so well and we hang out off set all the time, so it's cool, it's basically like I'm going and getting paid to hang out with my friends and do what I love to do. It's just a blast, I have a great time with it, now sometimes with more serious scenes we kind of don't mess around as much but we still do, we can't help it.

Q. Recently both Haylie and Hilary Duff have guest starred on "Joan of Arcadia," what was it like getting to work with both Duff sisters?

A. You know it's funny, I've actually known Hilary Duff since before she was on Lizzie McGuire, I mean I've known her forever. Haylie I've known for years as well, so I mean they're really cool girls, really sweet girls. This is the first chance that I've gotten to work with them so it was a lot of fun, we had a good time, they really blended with our group really well. The episodes have come out really well so far, Hilary's episode just aired and two out of three episodes of Haylie's have aired and they're coming out really well. It was a lot of fun to work with both of them, they're really cool girls.

Q. What's it like for you getting to work with a cast that is so diverse in age?

A. That's fun, that's really a lot of fun, because I'm in with school stuff and family stuff, so I get to work with people my own age and then I get to also work with Mary Steenburgen and Joe Mantegna who are a little bit older. Yeah it's great, it's really cool, in fact Becky Wahlstrom plays Grace on the show, she's pretty much only is in the school scenes. So, there was one scene when she came over to the Girardi's house and she got to meet the parents and she was so excited that she got to work with adults, it was like a treat for her. With me, I get to do that all the time and it's really cool I am all over the place, it's fun that way.

Q. Do you have a most memorable moment from your time filming "Joan of Arcadia?"

A. Oh one moment, ah geez, that's a good question. On my first day I think it was last year when I turned seventeen, they made this really big deal out of it. Joe Mantegna plays Fat Tony on "The Simpsons" and "The Simpsons," by the way, is one of my all time favorite shows and he knows that. He brought me this jacket, this official "Simpsons" jacket that had my name on it, and only the cast is allowed to wear this jacket. That moment was just so cool for me that they did this for me. Another one is Jason Ritter is so insane, it's hard to just pick one moment, because every single day he's constantly entertaining us and is just all over the place. It was the episode where Cloris Leachman guest starred and she is one of my all time favorite actresses. It was a scene where her character Aunt Olive was getting the family to eat crickets and Christopher Marquette who plays Adam Rove on the show, he was also in the scene. In the scene he eats a cricket and he was just so grossed out that he couldn't do it, like there is no way that he could do it. He had to completely fake it and just bugs and things like that completely grossed him out. So, what happened was that Amber, Jason and I throughout the day would keep taking a cricket, 'cuz these were actual crickets that we were eating, and we kept putting them down his shirt. Every time he'd have the same reaction, he would start spazzing out and have to take off his shirt and just wipe his body and I mean it was nuts, we just kept doing it all day. Literally, about after ten times they had to tell us to stop but I cannot tell you how much fun it was to do that, I know it was mean, but he forgave us.

Q. Luke has gone for two different kinds of girls on the show, Glynis who is smart and nerdy girl and Grace is the smart and complicated girl. Which girl do you see yourself leaning more towards in real life?

A. In real life me, I think I'd try and find a little balance between the two girls, I definitely need a smart girl, I don't think I could handle anything else. But, Glynis is just so smart and so into Science and then Grace on the other hand is really smart and really independent. So, I guess I would lean more towards Grace but she's just so negative and such an anarchist and such a conspiracy theorists but it's hard to have a conversation with people like that in real life. But I do, I have friends like that in real life, but in terms of dating someone like that, I don't think that I'd want to do that. I definitely would lean more towards Grace but there has to be a happy little balance in between there I would think.

Q. Luke and Friedman have a great friendship together on the show, do you and Aaron Himelstein have the same happy kind of friendship off set?

A. Yeah we do, Aaron is another example of someone I've known for a long time. I've known him for a long time before the show even started and we really started to become good friends as the show progressed and as our relationship progressed. I think that it shows in the episodes, I mean if you watch the scenes with Luke and Friedman we're kind of just overlapping each other and it just really is real and alive. I think that kind of trust can only happen if we really are friends in real life 'cuz otherwise you try and be careful with stuff like that. You don't want to make the other actor upset that you are kind of trying to overshadow him or overlap his lines but we don't care. I think that shows on screen, so yeah Aaron and I have a really great friendship.

Q. The show seems to have a great message to it no matter the episode, as the show progresses, do you think that the show can sustain that?

A. I think so, I think we can, because A) there is a ton of reoccurring themes that we bring back several time and B) it's not the same formula each week. Sometimes you can see Joan, Joan can see exactly how she is help and exactly who she has helped. And sometimes she doesn't know, it's all over the place, sometimes she helps herself and sometimes she helps the people around her. It just completely is either in direct ways or indirect ways, 'cuz there are so many different ways that she helps people, kind of the ripple effect of what they've mentioned on the show, through what G-d tells her to do. Yeah they can come up with storylines forever, I know what you're saying it would be kind of difficult to maintain a consistent message each week and I think we're doing a pretty good job of it so far and I think that's going to continue.

Q. "Joan of Arcadia" has had a lot of great guest stars on the show, is there anyone you'd like to see make an appearance?

A. First of all, Cloris Leachman and Louise Fletcher have been two of our guest stars and that right there you can't ask for anything better than that, those two right there are a couple of my favorites. I would love to see you know this is weird, I'd love to see Christopher Walken play G-d, that's just something that strikes me as cool. I don't know why, but, it's probably never going to happen. But, I think that it would just be funny to see him play G-d and I don't think there would ever be a G-d like him again, I just think it would be fun.

Q. Is there anything that you'd like to say to fans and supporters of your career?

A. Well, the only thing that I can say to my fans and supporters, and I know this is kind of a cliché thing to do, but thank you. There is really nothing else to say, without you guys I don't have a job, or at least it's not as much fun. The most gratifying thing in the world is when someone comes up to me and appreciates my work and anything like that. I can't tell you how many times I've come home from work, because I'm very hard on myself, I've said "Why are you doing this? You are wasting your time! This is never going to work out, sooner or later they're going to figure out you're a hack and it's going to be the end of your career." Then as soon as I say that to myself this couple will come up to me or I'll get a letter that says I love your show or I love your work on it and keep it up. In a way that is what kind of keeps me going, what keeps me into it, I know that somehow in someway it is positively affecting someone, I think that's the most gratifying thing out of this whole business.

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