By Jennifer Iaccino

USA Network’s hit series Psych will premiere it’s fourth season on Friday, August 7^th, at 10:00 p.m./9:00 a.m. Central.  The action intensifies this season as the crime fighting duo of Shawn and Gus save an old western town from a corporate take-over which ends with an old fashioned showdown and prove an exorcism may not be the only way to exorcise a demon.  On the personal side, Shawn and his girlfriend Abigail's (Cook) relationship grows and Shawn has to adjust to being in a relationship.  In the premiere episode, “Extradition: British Columbia,” Shawn and Gus outwit a notorious international art thief, Despereux (Cary Elwes), and when they travel to the ski slopes of Vancouver, they discover that he’s not an art thief but an insurance scam artist.  Series stars, James Roday and Dulé Hill recently spoke about the success of the show, and what we can expect in the new season.

Question> You’ve both played very different characters in other things.  I know that Mr. Roday had actually played alongside Maggie Lawson in Fear Itself and Mr. Dulé you had a wonderful part on West Wing for a while.  So how do you feel now about playing comedy?  Do you enjoy it better; do you like doing horror or drama more?  How does it feel?

Dulé>  I actually enjoy comedy; it’s a lot of fun.  After doing seven years of drama on West Wing to be able to come and work with Roday and the rest of the cast has been a blast.  It’s something different, especially working with Roday where he likes to improv a lot it challenges me to work on different muscles that I haven’t used before.

James>  Well, first of all I just want to thank you for reminding me that I did in fact appear in Fear Itself; I often forget that.  Secondly, I would say I’ve actually done a lot more comedy than I’ve done drama.  It’s weird the way that worked out, because when I came out of theater school I took myself way too seriously, so it’s kind of ironic that I ended up sort of going down the comedy path. 

But I think what makes this role special compared to some of the other stuff that I’ve done is just the fact that I’ve had the opportunity to live with it so long and sort of watch it sort of grow and nurture it, not unlike you nurture a plant.  And working with a great group and an unbelievable cast and sort of having the freedom to do what we do on the show sort of sets it apart from any role that I’ve played, comedy or drama.  It’s just been a special ride.  It’s been a special ride.

Question> What detectives, in real life or in fiction, have been an influence for the characters?

James>  You know what, I go to this movie called Without a Clue that not a lot of people saw.  It was Michael Caine and Ben Kingsley, and the idea behind the movie was that Watson was the brains of the operation and Holmes was just this very theatrical sort of charlatan that diverted people’s attention and got all the ladies.  It’s a very, very funny movie that not a lot of people have seen. 

But I love the fact that it was sort of rooted in the idea that these two guys absolutely, positively were dependent on one another to solve a crime, because Holmes was sort of the face of the franchise but Watson was the guy that sort of kept their feet on the ground and did a lot of the thinking.  That’s not exactly what the dynamic is on Psych, but the sort of ying yang element of it of there’s no way that either of these guys could work on their own and there’s no way that they could accomplish what they were doing without the other one is definitely sort of a big element of what we do on Psych.  So that’s my answer.  I feel decent about it.  I’m passing it off to Dulé.

Dulé>  I guess for myself it’s not any real I guess template that I came in to with a preconceived notion about like in terms of a previous detective team.  I guess if I had to choose one I would say Cosby and Poitier in Uptown Saturday Night.  I want to say that would be the equivalence that I could think of, but besides that there’s not really anything that I’ve thought about before to say yes, this is what the template is.

Question> What was behind the decision to actually feature Vancouver in the opening episode?

Dulé>  I think it’s that we work in Vancouver.  We’ve been working—

James>  Yes, it was an opportunity to finally not worry about everything that was in the background of all of our shots.  We actually could play the locations for the actual locations, and make believe stickers and Canadian flags all those things were good.  And it was actually a lot of fun; I’m glad we’ve lasted long enough to do one to do that.  It was fun.

Dulé>  And we finally didn’t have to move our palm trees with this; we could leave the palm trees—

James>  That’s right, our three movable palm trees got an episode off.

Dulé>  Right.  They were tired, you know what I mean; the palm trees were tired.  With every episode they were …

James>  We gave them a much-deserved break.

Question> If you could be in any television show of the past which would it be?  Or if you could spoof a show as an episode what would it be?

James>  Well, my answer is one in the same.  I would have given anything to be on Twin Peaks, and if we last another season we will be doing a Twin Peaks episode.  So there you go.

Dulé>  I guess for myself if I could have been a Cosby kid.  If I could have been on Cosby that would have been great for me.  And I guess if we could spoof any show I would say maybe Fame; I could be Leroy.

Question> If you could investigate anybody who would it be?

James>  I think I might have to just really roll up my sleeves and investigate Monica Bellucci and just make sure that she’s living her life along the straight and narrow, she’s not cutting any corners in life, in her work; just really get in there and make sure that she’s on the up and up.

Dulé>  And from my side I would investigate Halle Bear, who is also Halle Berry.

James>  That’s it; this is classy stuff you’re getting from us today.

Question> It just seems like you have a blast; the show is so fun to watch.  And I was wondering if the show is as much fun to shoot as it is to watch?

Dulé>  Yes. We have so much fun up there.  The cast is great, the crew is even greater, and we just have a lot of fun.  No one takes themselves too seriously; we all come to work and we are pretty much getting paid to laugh all day.  We sing songs; we have the best singing crew in Vancouver.  One day if you get a chance you come up there and we’ll have them sing you Happy Birthday just for no reason in particular.  We sing Happy Birthday about three or four times a day just because.  There’s a really great bunch of people up there.

Question> At Comic Con you kind of teased that Twin Peaks would be this season.  Is that not true?

James>  That is not true, unfortunately.  I think that something got lost in the translation there.  This season has sort of been locked for a while; there are no unaccounted for episodes.  That was us teasing with the hoax that if some of our executives were in the audience it was like a hint, hint listen to how bad everybody wants this.  You have to keep us on the air.  It’s a promise; it’s definitely a promise that if there’s a season five Twin Peaks will definitely happen.

Dulé>  I guess a little teaser too Twin Peaks would be Ray Wise doing our show this year.  A little prelude.

James>  That’s true.  It’s a Twin Peaks prelude.

Question> The references to The Mentalist in the premiere were really funny.  When that show started were you guys like going, “Hmm, that sounds familiar,” and was it sort of fun to sort of point that out on screen?

James>  It was.  No one is off limits when it comes to us, including ourselves.  We’ve made fun of our own sort of resumes on this show.  As long as they have a sense of humor over there I would think that they would be sort of flattered and get a kick out of it.  Obviously, it’s not malicious in any, but it’s what we do on our show and if you’re going to go make a bigger show that’s kind of like our show and get four times as many viewers and Emmy nominations then you should expect to hear about it when our show airs.

Question> Is there anything you can share about the coming season?

James>  In terms of sort of themes for episodes you saw that we’re doing sort of an expedition Canada, catch a jewel/art thief episode, and we’re doing sort of a Shawn and Gus save an old western town and everything that comes along with that that you could imagine, including a grizzled, gray bearded James Brolin.

Dulé>  Exorcism episode.

James>  Yes, we’re paying tribute to the Exorcist with our exorcism episode featuring the aforementioned Ray Wise, who is just fantastic in the episode I have to say.  Just really came in and knocked it out of the park.

Dulé>  American Werewolf in London homage.

James>  That’s right, a little love letter to American Werewolf in London and werewolf movies in general featuring David Naughton, obviously, and Josh Malina.  And lots of other fun stuff.  I have to say I think we’re kind of storming out of our gates this year with some really good stuff.  I think last year we stormed in our heads, but we were actually like trotting at a casual pace, and this year I actually think we’re storming out of the gates for real.

Question> How many of the pop culture references come from you, including the Chad Michael Murray reference?

Dulé>   I would say about 99.9% of them do not come from me.  Maybe if there’s something in the ‘70s that might be something that I came with, but most of the ‘80s references I have no idea what I’m talking about.  It’s not until after I film it that I turn around and say, “Okay, now what was that about?”

James>  Who were the twins that you knew that I had never heard of in Tuesday the 17^th?

Dulé>  The twins?  Oh, the Mowli Twins.

James>  The Mowli twins.  That was your 0.01% man.

Dulé>  That and what’s the other one?  I don’t even know if it made it to air, the Gill Scott Heron.

James>  Oh, that was.  That made it two.  That made it two.

Dulé>  Gill Scott Heron.  That’s my two for the year.

James>  Yes.  Most of them come from the writers and then I throw in my fair share as well.  Chad Michael Murray became the target of some early jabbing for us after I saw some interview where it was like a behind the scenes of House of Wax and he was wearing a wife beater.  It was just a real serious interview, and I got such a kick out of it that we had to have some fun at his expense.  Hopefully he’s a good-natured guy with a sense of humor.

Question> How does becoming co-producers affect your roles on the show?

Dulé>  I don’t know what Roday thinks, but from my side I don’t think it really changes that much.  I think from the beginning of the show the dynamic has pretty much been what it is.  Maybe say from Roday’s side he may write a few more episodes, but he was already writing episodes anyway.  From my side I would think it’s more of a title; it hasn’t really changed the actual working dynamic that much.  Maybe a little bit changes, but nothing too major.

James>  Yes.  I think, like Dulé said, the dynamic was sort of set from the first season.  Because none of our producers are up in Vancouver with us it was just sort of a necessary thing that we take on a little more responsibility to help the show sort of run smoothly.  They finally decided to throw us a title for it.

Question> They released two books for Psych with your characters and everything from the show.  Have you read those, and what kinds of merchandise would you like to see from the show?

Dulé>  Well I would read it if I had one and if I knew there was one that was out.

James>  I was going to say it’s good to know that there are books out.  I didn’t know that.

Dulé>  Maybe I’ll try to read it one day on the set.

James>  Merchandise.

Dulé>  I would have to say a video game.  I love video games anyway, so a Psych video game somehow that I could play on Xbox or Wii would be great.

James>  I have to say I think the idea of a talking bobblehead was pretty solid, and someone actually came up with already and did it.  I love the idea of little Shawn and Gus bobbleheads.

Dulé>  Which, by the way, I have my President Obama bobblehead also.  So when I get my Psych bobbleheads it will be Shaun, Gus, and President Barack Obama bobbleheads sitting on my counter.

James>  I might give you Ichiro Suzuki bobblehead just so that you can add it and it would be a quartet.

Dulé>  Sounds good.

Question> James, have you visited any actual psychics in order to watch and observe them in action?  And Dulé, being an encyclopedia of useless knowledge that oddly becomes useful every week,  is it anything like the way your brain works in real life?

Dulé>  Well from my side no; I try not to fill up my brain cells with useless information.  So most of the time I’m pretty much just learning it as it comes in the scripts.

James>  And for me I visited a couple psychics back before we shot the pilot just because I was sort of interested to hear their back stories and sort of how the power manifests itself.  And of course you never know if they’re legit or not, but there were some interesting stories in terms of like physicalizing the gift.  I was interested to hear like does it ever take over your body, does your body heat rise, stuff like that; anything that I could steal.  Of course I did not tell them while visiting that I was going to be playing a fake psychic nor did they figure it out on their own, so maybe that tells you everything you need to know about the people that I met with.  And I have to say, for the record, my favorite line from Without A Clue is after Michael Caine pokes a dead body with a stick and announces to everyone, “It is my opinion that this man is dead.”  So there you go.

Question> You guys have such great chemistry on the show does that come naturally?

Dulé>  I think so; I think it comes naturally.  From the time we first got together there was a good vibe there, and we’ve had a cast that continued to grow with it.  I think even off screen we get along very well.  The cast as a whole we like hanging out with each, making each other laugh, going out having dinner, playing poker, playing mafia.  It’s just us up there in Vancouver, so if we didn’t get along then I think it would show itself on screen.  So I would say it comes pretty natural.

James>  I agree with all of that.

Question> Both of you play characters who are more complicated than they first appear, like it would be easy to play Shawn as just this grifting slacker but there’s more to him than that.  What do each of you think is your character’s most difficult trait to capture and what moment in the show has allowed that character element to shine?

James>  Well that’s very insightful and thoughtful indeed.  For me I would say the most challenging thing about playing Shawn is the tight wire act between slacker and man child, and then also somebody that you really do want to invest in emotionally and like every week.  And the line between wanting to rub his head and slap his face is very, very, very thin.  And sort of walking that line and always knowing when to stop is sort of the most challenging on a day-to-day basis.

 In terms of like a single event that sort of helped me with that I would say probably when we brought Shawn’s mother onto the show, first episode of season three.  Kind of we peeled back a layer that I think by tapping into it has allowed that sort of tight wire act to get a little easier just because you sort of saw a side of him that was way vulnerable that he didn’t have complete control over.  And once we sort of put that out there I think it made things a little bit easier in terms of the balancing act.

Dulé>  And then just for myself is one I don’t I guess get too cerebral with my character, so I don’t really think about it like that too often.  I guess when a question comes up it makes me think about it, but in my day-to-day action on the set I don’t really process it I just do it. 

I would say I guess for me it would be that Gus to not make him too nerdy but not make him too cool, because he is a nerd.  But at the same time you want him to be cool also, and I think too far in either direction would change the dynamic of the show.  So it’s always trying to find that balance of cool nerdiness or nerdy coolness or something like that.  That would be my answer to that.

Question> In the new episode you work with Cary Elwes.  What was that like and were there any Dread Pirate Roberts jokes going on?

James>  We went pretty light on him.  We went pretty light on him with The Princess Bride jokes.  He came in and he was very focused and he wanted to do a really good job.  He had given his character a lot of thought, and that was sort of enough for us, I think, just seeing an actor of that caliber come in and be definitely sort of concerned and tuned in as he was.  I mean don’t get me wrong; we had a great time with him and he was a blast to work with, but we didn’t rib him too much.

Question> In season three we got to see a lot more of the serious side of the characters.  Are we going to get more of that in season four?

Dulé>  Definitely.

James>  Yes, a little bit.  You don’t ever want to go too far in that direction, because I think people have plenty of shows that they watch to watch people be serious.  I think at the end of the day it’s always going to be important for us to mostly deliver what has made us successful, but there will definitely be episodes this year where you see us flip our serious switches.  Gus has a serious jackal switch where it’s still a jackal but it’s a serious jackal.

Dulé>  Yes.  That will have to make its way out some time this year.

Question> What’s it like being on USA, and do you feel that your in competition with the other newer series there?

Dulé>  From my side I think it’s great on USA.  They really take the time to nurture their shows, they give you the chance to grow, and they give you the freedom to try different things.  I would say everyone over there at USA, Jeff Wachtel, Bonnie Hammer, they all are very brilliant at what they do and they know what works.  They know what works for their network and their track record proves it.

 In terms of like feeling in competition I myself don’t.  I always feel that your journey is your journey and what’s good for one is good for all.  If the network is doing well then it’s great for all of us, so if they have a show that comes and premiers well great; that makes us that much more stronger.  As long as we can hold down our spot then I think we can keep going along for a good while.

James>  Yes.  I think what we do is fairly unique on Psych, and we just have to keep doing that because that’s what got us where we are.  So you can’t really worry about any other show, whether it’s on USA or not.  You have to stay true to yourselves and hope that people keep watching, and in the meantime just be, like Dulé said, just be happy for the family because it seems like everything they churn out right now turns to gold.

Question> What was your experience like at Comic Con?

Dulé>  I actually loved it.  I wished that I wasn’t so tired, because we had worked the night before in Vancouver and we flew down to LA I guess Wednesday and then I got up and flew to Comic Con Thursday morning.  So I was pretty exhausted, so I wish I had more energy to be able to walk around.  So I’m hoping to be able to go back next year and make sure I get some rest.  But I enjoyed it.  It was great being there with all the fans and seeing people’s reactions.  I enjoyed seeing the different outfits that I did see.  Hopefully we’ll get a chance to do it for many more years.

James>  Yes, I was absolutely blown away.  I mean working up in Vancouver, to an extent, sort of puts us in a bubble.  To be able to come face-to-face with our fans and see their reaction I felt like the fourth Jonas Brother and I feel like Dulé was the fifth black Jonas Brother.  Even though it was only for an hour it was just an overwhelming, heartwarming response.  I don’t want to go as far as to say it’s like a validating thing, but you really sort of felt for a moment there like wow what we’re doing is connecting with people, and that’s the best feeling you can have as an artist for sure.

Dulé>  Well there’s so much serious stuff going on in the world I think it’s a great show to come and sit back, put your feet up, and laugh for a little bit; just clear your minds.  I think anyone who comes and watches this show definitely laughs out loud at least once, so if you’re looking to just step away from all the stress for a second then I would say check out Psych. 

You know we’re like kids in a candy store, and it kind of brings people back to a time in their youth when people just dared to do anything, and that’s what we do on Psych.

James>  And there are so few rules that we have to follow in terms of making this show.  I don’t think there are a lot of other shows out there where one week you’re wearing chaps and spurs and riding a horse and the next week you’re running from a potato sack headed killer chasing you into the woods with a machete, and yet you’re still laughing both times.  I think it’s a pretty unique little hybrid; it has something for everyone.

Question> Obviously you’ve done some work on writing before, would you guys think about anything in the future that you would like to possibly write or direct?  Maybe a new version of Twin Peaks, knock on wood?

Dulé>  Well in terms of writing, I think in the future you will see me writing something called Nothing; it will be a blank piece of paper with nothing written on it, because I have no ambition to write so that’s not going to be happening.  I’ll leave all that up to James Roday.

James>  Yes.  I feel like this have been an invaluable sort of experience for me, because I’ve managed to kind of cut my teeth doing all of the things that I do aspire to do.  Hopefully by the time this show has a long and successful run I’ll have sort of banked enough stuff to sort of go out there and get myself another gig writing or directing. 

I can tell you that when we do the Twin Peaks episode it will probably either be myself or Steve Franks directing, and the two of us will certainly write it because I don’t think anyone else knows half as much about that show as we do.  So I don’t think we would feel comfortable handing it off, unless David Lynch wanted to come in and direct, in which case we’d make an exception.

Question> You’ve had a ton of fantastic guest stars.  Who would you like to see on the show and who do you think they would play?

James>  My answer is going to stay the same until we get him on.  The answer is David Bowie, and anybody he wants is whom he will play.

Dulé>  And for myself I would like to get someone like Chris Tucker on the show.  It would be great if he could play some kind of, I mean he could play anybody he wanted to also, but he could play some kind of relative of mine or something.  It would be a lot of fun.

James>  I think David Bowie could also play David Bowie if he wanted to, and Shawn and Gus could just have an episode where they hung out with David Bowie.

Dulé>  I think David Bowie could play Mr. Guster in season five.

James>  He could.

Dulé>  There you go—because we change my dad all the time.  Like dude, your daddy is David Bowie. … is not showing.

James>  That would be fantastic.