Daniel Vincent Gordh discusses his Lizzie Bennet Diaries audition, his involvement in new series Welcome to Sanditon, and more, in part 2 of our exclusive interview.

In part 1 of our interview, Daniel Vincent Gordh gave us the inside scoop on “Gratitude” – episode 99 of The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, as well as his personal experiences on playing one of the most popular characters in fiction, and how he developed that steamy onscreen chemistry with co-star Ashley Clements.

In part 2 he shares about his Darcy audition, answers your twitter questions, and tells us exactly what he would do with an army of Daniel Vincent Gordh clones.

Hypable’s interview with Daniel Vincent Gordh:

Can you talk us through your audition process?

That was a long time ago. I first learned about the show because I was working with a friend on an audition for Caroline. But once I had an audition, I was like “Wait a second. Isn’t Darcy a big part in this? How could they not have cast him yet? I was working on that audition a long time ago.” And then once I looked at the project I was like, “Oh, they still haven’t shown him.”

But I got the script, it was some version of episode 60, and I luckily had enough time to go into research mode, I immediately went okay, this is based on something that has been around a long time, and so I need to spend a few days just in absorption and research mode. So I did that, I gathered all the information, I worked the hell out of the audition, and then I came in. Ashley [Clements, Lizzie Bennet] was actually in the room, which I didn’t know and I was a little awkward about it. I was like, “Hey! I’ve seen you on the internet!” and she was like “…Okay.”

It was kind of funny because once I started working on the role, I felt this instinctive connection to it, where there were a number of things that were mentioned in the breakdown that felt really right for me, that really resonated with me. There was the physical description which they put in and which matched me. Then there was a weird mixture of confident and socially awkward, and somehow I was like I get this character – so I had an instinctive connection to it.

And then once I first read with Ashley, Bernie [Su, co-creator, executive producer, head writer, directer] looked at me for a second kind of quizzically, and was like “That was really good. You obviously understand the character really well. Let’s just do it again, was there anything you wanted to do different?” And I was like “There’s a moment that I’d like to go through and finesse,” so we ran it again, and Bernie to me always felt like “Huh. He seems to get it.”

Then I came in for another audition with a different version of episode 60, and episode 78, which they gave me with about 10 minutes to prepare so I cold read that one. But that was a month later, I thought I had lost the role already, it was a long time between auditions. That one went great too, and then it was a few weeks and I assumed I had lost it again, and I had another audition. At that point I could tell they were being very careful, that it really mattered who they cast.

It’s funny, because it happens on the show too, but usually when you’re working on a project, you don’t have these long hiatuses between playing a role. But there were months where I was not playing Darcy sometimes, and I was like “Well I hope I’m doing the same thing I was doing before.” There was these hiatuses where I was given a break from it, and I had to rediscover him every time.

So eventually I got the role, and it was probably the same day that I find out that a possibly recurring role on the show 1600 Penn, that I didn’t get the role. So I was like, “Okay, well, that’s nice.” I had been written out of that episode, I was thinking “Oh shucks,” and then “Oh wow.” It was one of those close the window, open the door type of things.

You mentioned the hiatuses – did you have any tricks to get back into Darcy’s head, or was it fairly instinctual?

I think the first thing that gets me into the Darcy mindset is physicality. I couldn’t play the role if I were wearing loose fitting clothing, and my shirt not tucked in. The first thing that is my entrance point to the character is physicality, which is often how I work. But for Darcy, that really puts me there quickly. It’s like I’m putting on a Darcy suit. There’s a certain kind of mannered and specific way that he moves and he interacts with the world, that allows me to get into the role instinctually without going straight into cerebral mode.

While we were speaking, the ‘Lizzie Bennet Diaries’ DVD Kickstarter surpassed its goal of $60,000. It had been online for less than three hours:

The DVD Kickstarter was released today. How does it feel to know someone is happy to pay $250 to have you record them a voicemail message? You look worried, did you know that’s what you’re going to be doing?

Oh yes, Bernie was wise enough to ask for my permission before offering. It’s not like, “‘A lock of Daniel Vincent Gordh’s hair’ – what? I didn’t agree to that.”

‘The ability to clone him in 30 years.’

Oh well, I wouldn’t mind a few more Daniel Vincent Gordh’s running around. They would be my army!

I don’t think the fans would complain.

Hopefully no one would complain. I would have them working on really good stuff.

More shows?

Yeah, more shows, or maybe build me a spaceship or something.

How does it feel? It feels a bit surreal. Throughout this process I don’t really know how to conceive of it. I have been doing this a long time, but this is the first time in my career that I have had this amount of engagement with me, and people have cared this much about my work. It’s still at a point where I have nothing to say except for thank you. To me, I’m just a normal human being, who’s trying to get by and living my life, but at the same time I have people whose work I really respect. It’s surreal.

It’s a strange way to quantify it, because while there are a lot of fan appreciation things floating around tumblr, now you know someone will literally spend $250 just so you record them a voicemail.

I also like to think that they believe in the project and want to support it. There’s an amount that it feels, to me at least, that it’s really nice to see people who are willing to pay for something that, a lot of it, they can see for free. Because I think there’s partially a realization from people that we’ve gotten this gift, people have done this for us.

Because none of us have done this for the money, it’s not like we’re making tons of money from these projects, we do legitimately need the support to create more of this content. And over the last year a tremendous amount of people have been watching this at no cost to themselves. So in that way, it feels like they’re saying thank you. So in that way I’m like, you’re welcome.

I don’t know anything about this book or next project though. I am probably behind a lot of people on what this project is – I read the Kickstarter too and was like “I don’t get it.”

So they haven’t asked you to be involved in Welcome to Sanditon? Because it’s Darcy’s company.

I know Allion [Paige, Gigi Darcy] is involved. I’ll probably talk to Bernie next time I see him and be like, “Spill it. What actually is this?” It sounds interesting, I just haven’t gotten involved in any part of that next project yet, but I am very curious to find out what it’s going to be. And I trust the team, because they all care tremendously, so I know that none of them take their jobs working on this stuff lightly. Whether or not people like it is another issue, but I know that they’re doing their best.

If they asked you to film a couple more of the Domino phone calls or something similar, would you be up for that?

I would gladly do that, if they asked me. Who knows what the future holds. I also love Allison, she’s a good friend and a talented actress and a wonderful person. As are everyone I work with, so I’d love to.

We also took some twitter questions which fans submitted to @hypable.

Everyone wanted to know about the resemblance between you and Allison, and the casting of Gigi. How involved were you in that audition process?

I was in the first reads with Gigi, so I read with a whole bunch of Gigis who came in. It was actually interesting – because I was already cast and they needed to find someone who resembled me, almost everyone who came in looked strangely like me. So to Allison’s credit, although she looks remarkably like me, it was absolutely not the overriding factor that made the team choose her. Because there were a lot of people who could have easily passed for my sister.

It’s funny because we had had the entire day, and we were packing up. We had read for all the Gigis, we were about to leave, and Allison comes in. She’s like, “I’m so sorry, I was running really late,” and she was so sweet about it but she barely made it on time. The space we were using, we had to get out of there soon, and Margaret [Dunlap, consulting producer] and Jenni [Powell, producer] were both there with me and had both had a long day. We were all trying to get out of there.

But we read Allison, who was just like a pro. She didn’t let the energy of the room throw her at all, and she did a great read and at the end, although we had a number of girls who could work and we liked already, it was like “Well, glad we read her, she’s great.” Then the callback I think she did with Ashley, and eventually I was secretly like, “So who’d you guys pick?” and when they said Allison, I was not at all surprised.

What was the most challenging thing about playing Darcy?

I have said this other thing before, which was that jumping in the middle of his character arc was the most challenging thing, because so much of my story happens offscreen. But I would say that actually the most challenging thing, now that I think about it, was the writing of Darcy. Because when I first got the script, having watched the show, if you took Darcy’s dialogue out of context, you would think it was taking place in its original period almost.

He is so overspoken, and using antiquated language, and he doesn’t speak like someone of our time, he really doesn’t. So that was one of the biggest challenges, was finding the need to say those words specifically. What is it about me that makes me choose to say “That was illuminating,” instead of “Thanks for letting me know,” or something that I [Daniel] am more likely to say. Especially when I very first got the script, that was one of the first challenges. How do I take these words and make them real for me in this time period.

What I ended up doing was the only thing I could do as an actor, which was to be someone who felt a little bit out of his time period, who felt a little conservative, and like he’s from another period. And that choice ended up working for me because there was an amount that everyone was like, “Well he’s so pretentious.” Those things kind of seem pretentious, so I thought, “Oh, it works.”

Now that you’re finished with The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, what is next for you?

Right now I’m filming this other webseries called Hipsterhood, and we’re still filming. If you haven’t seen that show, Julia [Cho, Charlotte Lu] helps produce it, and that’s been fun. I’m doing a guest arc on that, I think it will be out come Summer, and that’s a really fun show. The actors, Kit Williamson and Elizabeth Ferraris are really funny, and it does exactly what it wants to do – very digestible, short segments that are very poignant and well observed about hipster culture in L.A.

I’m writing some projects, I’m putting together a pitch for one webshow with my sketch group, The Natural Disastronauts, which we’re going to be pitching around. I just finished doing the audiobook for House of Secrets by the director Chris Columbus, who you may know did the first two Potter films, and Ned Vizzini. That audiobook will probably be coming out late April, and that was really fun. It’s an adventure young adult series about three kids who get pulled into a magical world, and I get to do a lot of voices and I had a good time doing that.

And the last project that I know I’m doing right now, I don’t know how much I can say about it yet, but I can say that Craig Frank [Fitz Williams] will also be involved, and this will be our fourth time working together – we keep running into each other somehow.

You must be getting sick of him.

Oh yeah, he’s such a jerk. And it’s also pilot season in L.A., so there’s auditions everywhere.

You’ve been going out for pilots?

Yeah. It’s funny, all the Lizzie Bennet kids are all keeping in touch and we will see a lot of each other, but I’m excited to see what will happen in everyone’s careers. Everyone is really talented and I think we’re going to see a lot of movement in everyones careers in the next few years.

Episode 100 of ‘The Lizzie Bennet Diaries’ airs on Thursday 28 March at 9am PT

Image credits: The Lizzie Bennet Diaries