'For Life' star Matt Dellapina says filming for the show actually made him feel like he was 'inside a prison'
The realm of television is abuzz with 50 Cent's latest legal drama series 'For Life' on ABC, which is loosely based on the real-life story of Isaac Wright Jr and his unjust incarceration for a crime he never committed.
Apart from a highly gripping plotline, 'For Life' has presented us with many intriguing characters, who have stretched their acting muscles to present us with an admirable piece of entertainment.
MEA Worldwide (MEAWW) caught up with actor Matt Dellapina, who essays Tom Hansen on 'For Life', the deputy of prison warden Safiya Masry. The latter character is played by Indira Varma, who is popular for essaying Ellaria Sand in HBO's 'Game of Thrones'.
Matt spoke at length about working with Indira, who he got along with like "fast friends". Admiring his co-actor, Matt said, "Indira Varma was kind of my scene partner almost throughout the season."
"A lot of my work comes hand in hand with hers despite the prison setting. She is a superlative actor, very funny and free-spirited. We got along like fast friends. So I thought I was very fortunate to be filming a lot of my scenes with her because she was really cool."
Matt further shared that the crew did a great job in building sets that looked very convincing and bland enough to suit a prison setup. He said the majority of scenes were filmed in the actual prison in Staten Island in New York City and in prison sets built in a studio in Queens.
"When you're filming you feel you are inside a prison. There are bars, institutional paint colors, walls of phones, gray floors and there's very little sunlight. So you can definitely pick up on that oppressive atmosphere after a long 12 hour day there," Matt said before sharing a harrowing experience he had on the sets.
"Harrowing is actually a good way to describe one moment I had because a lot of the scenes have been shot in tiny corridors or small offices or narrow hallways," he said.
Talking about a scene from Episode 3, which shows Aaron and Marie's surveillance footage being reviewed, he said, "So there were over a dozen people in a recently painted very small surveillance room."
"We did many takes of this shot because there are so many actors in it and you have to get the coverage of everyone's face. By the end of it, just before we wrapped out of that location, I started getting claustrophobic, actually feeling faint to the point where my vision was lost and I started doubling over."
Meanwhile, talking about his comedy series 'Adult Ed', which was recently picked up for distribution, he said, "It stretches more of my comedy muscle on the writing enacting side.
Sharing his experience working in comedy, Matt added, "It's all basically about context and the words you're saying, but the emotional preparation, I feel it often should be almost the same."
'For Life' airs on Tuesdays on ABC.
