Interview: Marc Kudisch Talks Playing Agent Rathbone on THE TICK

Marc Kudisch is a three-time Tony Award Nominee, Drama Desk Award winner and two-time Outer Critics Circle Award Nominee who has spent over three decades on the stage. Currently, he joined the cast of The Tick for its second season.

He plays Agent Ty Rathbone on the series, which centers around a world where superheroes have been real for decades. An accountant with mental health issues and zero powers comes to suspect his city is owned by a global super villain long-thought dead. As he struggles to uncover the conspiracy, he falls in league with a strange blue superhero. They launch into an adventure brimming with crazed archvillains, blood-soaked vigilantes, and superhuman freakery.

Kudisch took some time to talk with BroadwayWorld about joining The Tick, his character, and his love for the comics!

---

The Tick is such a fun show, but it is very different from being on Broadway, what has it been like to be a part of the series?

I mean, everything is its own thing, you know? Just doing television and film is very different from doing stage, period. Each has its obvious joys, specifically with The Tick, the joy of it is the material, it's the creation. I'm a comic book geek, so like when I was in college at FAU, I was a big fan of The Tick, and what Ben Edlund was writing, who is the showrunner on the show. I mean, he's always had a creative hand in every version of The Tick that's ever existed, because it's all from his mind. And I loved independent comics when I was in college. The Tick was just such a cool character because it was independent and it was satirizing the comic book genre, and so to work on a show with the creator Ben Edlund and to actually have a new character created, and you're working in tandem with the creator to come up with the character, it's really cool.

And what's great about The Tick is how it uses comedy to talk about serious issues in a different way.

What I love about what Ben writes is, again, he's satirizing the comic book genre in general, but then he's also sort of satirizing that cynical side to our society, satirizing life. If I'm being really honest, the whole Lobstercules thing, when I first read it myself, I was like, oh my lord, what? A monster lobster? But then you find out that Lobstercules is a mother, and she's being forced to do things because they have her children. As we were shooting it, the whole issue of immigration came up, it was weird that suddenly what seemed like absolutely absurd suddenly took a whole different tone. And it had already been written. And yet, suddenly, it had a new resonance to it. And all of us had far more empathy to this fictional character, and so comedy is a great way to really get to the truth of certain arguments in society, and I think that there are ways in, and what I love about The Tick is that at the core of the show is this just completely positive non-cynical character surrounded by the cynicism of others, and just how he, The Tick, brushes off automatically, immediately onto Arthur, who also carries a lot of that positivity, and then on to everyone else around him. Like, that's what I've loved about it. It's just really good writing.

There are so many superhero shows out on TV today, but The Tick feels much different then them.

The show is aware of itself as being this satirization of other. I mean, obviously Ratbone is kind of like a Nick Fury, but then I can also tell you that he's based on some characters from the film Dune, from the 1980s, and I tell people that he's the lovechild of Nick Fury and Robert Duvall. Like, that's kind of where I got my angle on the character from. I just felt like that Robert Duvall character who's like, "I love the smell of napalm in the morning." That kind of guy. But after you get past the satirization, they're completely original characters that exist on their own in a really great way. So we're taking- Ben has taken, and the cast, and the writers- have taken this satirization of other characters and then created characters that are unique to themselves. And I could go through the list of everybody, but I like that everybody on the second season has like a really cool arc. Like, the whole season is about characters coming into a better awareness of themselves.

So what does Rathbone mean for you?

For me Rathbone is an absolutist. He's old school. He's an absolutist and he believes sort of in right and wrong, but that it's never perfect and that it can get messy. And that sometimes you're making a decision for the right reasons, but because you're sometimes stuck in your idea of what is right and wrong, you can miss something that's right in front of your face, you know? And like, you know, he always holds his cards very close to his vest, so you're never quite sure where he's coming from, or if you can ultimately trust him. I mean, at the end of the season, he turns out to be a good guy, but obviously he's hiding something, isn't he? He's hiding a big old f-ing secret, I mean, which is literally sort of heavily tipped in the last episode. So there's a big old something that he's not telling you at all, and I think that's a season three story line for sure.

You must be excited to get to work on the third season.

As soon as we find out what's going on, absolutely. I love it. The people are great. We all love it. It's fun to play those characters. There's a lot of joy, and I mean, I've worked on a couple of shows. Honestly, I feel really fortunate that I've gotten to work on The Tick, and a show like Billions, because they are two sets that I've been on where everyone is genuinely just stoked to be there. And not just the cast, but like the crew. I remember day one walking on The Tick season two everyone was like, this is the coolest show to work on. So much fun. And, you know, you're a kid in a candy store. The first day that I was out there, and I was there for a fitting, they took me on a tour of the set, like, there's green screens all over the place and I'm like oh my god, this is awesome, and I just wanted to meet Peter, but not PETER. I love him as an actor, I wanted to meet him in his Tick office, you know? Cause we're all kids at heart, you know? I got to wear the superhero outfit, you know, and I got a heart that has a black hole in it. I mean, come on! So, yeah. Boys will be boys I guess.

How did you find yourself becoming a part of the show?

There was an audition for the role and the minute I saw it was for The Tick, I wanted to do it, because I was already watching it. I had other friends that went in and auditioned for it, too. And it's funny, because initially I didn't hear anything from them at all, and I thought, 'okay, well, that came and went.' And then I found out, because a buddy of mine was like, 'I just found out that I got released, are you the other guy? Are you the guy that got it?' And I was like, 'no, dude, it wasn't me.' And then like a week later I called and I was like 'actually, yeah, it was.' I didn't know! And it was awesome. And so to create, to get in there and get a costume fitting and get talking about everything. It was really great to find the character along with Ben and the show, and as we went along to see the writing change course, because they were learning along with the rest of us.

It must be nice to have that ability to collaborate on a character, and have a bit of your own self and your own experiences go into the role that you're playing.

With stage or film, that's ultimately what you want to do. You want to collaborate with a group of really smart, talented people. You know. And I've been doing it on Broadway for, my god, almost thirty years now. And I've been lucky that the television and film that I've done mostly has also been very collaborative grounds. Like Billions. I love working on that show because the writing is great, and they're writing essentially knowing that your voice is in their head, and so like. They're really smart, great, just creative, smart guys. And pardon my language, but they're balls to the wall, so like there's no fear in going like really sort of throwing the line out there. You know what I mean? That's what The Tick is. And that's why it's so much fun.

Did you take any inspiration from any of your stage roles for this character?

No. Every character is its own. You know what I mean? I never think about, literally, every character is its own thing. So you read what's on the page, and then you just sort of go, and then you have to find an organic thing that you connect to in it. I just read it, and I was like, I don't know. I just pictured somebody like Tyrannosaurus--first of all, Tyrannosaurus Rathbone is the guy's name. Agent Commander Tyrannosaurus Rathbone. I just thought to myself, this is a guy that probably grew up feeding on roadkill. It was just what I had in my head. So for me, right? And from where we're from. He's like a deep south kind of guy. I remember when I read the script and I said, there's one line. "Son, you bet your severely leotarded ass there is." And it was just that that made me go, alright. That's where he's from. Cause who else would say that?

Does playing an agent alongside a superhero ever make you want to play a superhero yourself one day?

Oh, but I am a superhero. I mean, I am. That's the thing. I like Rathbone because he's an agent, but he clearly has some heavy connection to some serious power. What that is we're going to find out. I mean, lord knows if there was a force inside of him that I'm even interested to see where the hell they want to go with that.

Hopefully he does stay good and things don't change in terms of where his loyalties lie.

That's what I mean, I like who I'm playing right now. I just like him. I like the character. I don't know what happens next, but I know that I've already liked what they've done and where they're going with it, and I'm super interested to see where they want to go next, because they've really set themselves in a huge way for some great conflict in a next season, so I'm loving it.

It must be fun to be apart of such a big Amazon show with so many different elements and CGI effects.

I'll say this. It's just fun being a part of something that you believe in. If that makes any sense. Just purely and simply, I like being a part of something that I believe in. That at the end of the day I'm proud of. I mean, like, that's all. I'm proud of the show, and I'm proud to be a part of it. And any time I can feel that way, it's all good. Because it's not for us anyway. It's for you. It's for you.