Smallville's Michael Rosenbaum Didn't Get Along With One Cast Member: 'He Was Weird'
When a show goes on for ten seasons, it's only expected that the series is going to rack up its fair share of guest stars. The format of a show like "Smallville" and its monster of the week sensibility makes this doubly the case. However, that doesn't mean that the main cast jived with every single guest star.
On the "Talk Ville" podcast, Michael Rosenbaum broke down "Smallville" Season 4, Episode 2 ("Gone") with his former co-star, Tom Welling, and revealed that he didn't really get along all that well with Michael Ironside. The actor appeared in three episodes of The CW series as Sam Lane, two of which featured Rosenbaum's Lex Luthor, and he did not have a good experience with Ironside. "[I] didn't really get along with [Sam Lane actor Michael Ironside]," Rosenbaum revealed. "Didn't have much interaction with him, but he just wasn't very kind to me. Maybe he was having a bad day." Welling jumped in to add some context for the memory, showing that he recalled it as well.
"Michael walked on the set 'cause he was in the next scene, and Ironside and I were doing a scene," Welling recalled. "Michael kind of waltzed in, you know, had his banter with the crew, and turned to Ironside, and Ironside looked at you and went, 'Oh, you're that guy.'"
The two Smallville actors had different experiences with Ironside
Michael Rosenbaum went on to explain the memory and picked up the other side of the conversation. "And I said, 'Yeah, I'm the guy who's friendly with the entire crew," he recalled. "He was just weird. It was weird. I don't hate the guy; I just didn't love his vibe."
Still, the "Smallville" actor offered a bit of consolation and even commended Ironside as a performer. "I think [Michael Ironside] is a good actor; I just wasn't impressed with this character," he explained. "I just wasn't impressed by it, that's all." However, the Luthor actor did admit that Sam Lane may have been a very linear character, not offering Ironside the chance to flex his creative muscles. For his part, Tom Welling acknowledged that he had nothing but good experiences with the actor. "I want to go on record saying that [Ironside] and I got along great," Welling said. "I loved it. I loved working with him."
Though the "Smallville" actors definitely had very different experiences working with Ironside on set, it's clear after all of these years that the duo still enjoy working with one another, especially on their "Talk Ville" rewatch podcast.