Danny Ramirez And David Rysdahl Discuss Getting Into Their Characters' Mindsets For No Exit - Exclusive
The following article contains major spoilers for Hulu's "No Exit."
It's a terrifying "What if?" scenario to ponder. Darby (Havana Rose Liu) ends up in an isolated visitor center with a bunch of strangers. It's already uncomfortable enough, but to make matters worse, she soon discovers that one of the people she's staying with has a kidnapped girl in their van. Who could be behind such a heinous act?
Could it be the couple consisting of Ed (Dennis Haysbert) and Sandi (Dale Dickey)? Lars (David Rysdahl) certainly has the look and demeanor of someone who's hiding a terrifying secret. Then, there's Ash (Danny Ramirez), who seems like a nice, all-American kind of guy. As it turns out, it's those final two suspects — Lars and Ash — who are behind the kidnapping. They may have pretended to be strangers in the center, but they know one another all too well.
Both actors spoke exclusively with Looper to discuss their roles in the latest thriller to make its way to streaming. During the conversation, they talked about the respective ways they got into the mindset to play such horrific characters.
They each made themselves the heroes of their stories
It isn't easy playing a villain, especially one that comes across as so real. Danny Ramirez and David Rysdahl couldn't be nicer guys, so they really had to go the extra mile to convince audiences they were bad men. For Ramirez, it was all about finding a way for his character to justify what he was doing. As he put it, "Less darkness, but more desperation. He is a twisted character, in some capacity. Trying to justify everything he did in a human way made it scarier for me, because it also was, as David says, that it could be a human situation, that people stumbled upon."
For Rysdahl, he spoke about how he actually went into the streets dressed like his character and acting in a manner Lars would behave. He explained, "I'd go into Rite Aid, and see how people felt, how they treated me. I didn't really think about being sinister. I thought about being all misunderstood, and being a loner, and yearning for connection, and yearning for love, but having this block of what I look like."
For both actors, it sounds like it was merely a matter of getting into the characters' headspace. After all, no one likes to think they're the villain of their own story. They would find ways to justify what they were doing, and that's precisely what happens in "No Exit."
"No Exit" is now streaming exclusively on Hulu.