Anne Heche joins the throng of film actors migrating to television with her new show Men in Trees. Heche plays a relationship advice writer who finds out her relationship is over while on a book tour in Alaska. So she stays to try to figure out what real people are like outside of her sheltered city writer’s world.
Anne Heche Talks Men in Trees
“I was looking [for a series],” she said. “I have been looking since I knew that I wanted to have a son and I did not want to ever make my son follow me all over this country and this world because mommy is an actress. I wanted to be able to give him a home and a place where he could live and count on having a stable life. This pilot season I was guided very specifically by my agents and my managers and I would say very specifically Peter Roth at Warner Brothers. There was one script with the best female lead. It was a woman named Marin Frist in Men in Trees. Everyone thought that if this is what I really wanted to do with my life, that this would be the show for me.”
The role brought with it a change in look for Heche. If you’re used to seeing short haired Anne Heche, get ready for long haired bombshell in Men in Trees. “I’ve had long hair now for four years so to me it’s not all that different, but I know that people’s reaction is. I think what it does is, I think there is something to long hair. I think it does feel more feminine. I think Marin is a very feminine character and I like that about her, so I liked my hair for this role. And there’s a lot less hair cutting, I’ll tell you what. When you have short hair, you have to cut your hair every week. You're a guy, you might know. It was driving me nuts, the upkeep.”
Men in Trees comes from executive producer Jenny Bicks, who was a writer and consulting producer on Sex and the City. “Because Jenny Bicks of course is our writer and creator, we are very blessed to have the humor of Sex and the City. I don't know what’s necessarily different about it other than I understand that when you give someone not only an opportunity to write for a half an hour something that’s very funny, and then give them another half an hour to add, as Jenny says, the drama part of the show, it’s just so much more filled out I would imagine. It’s that humor and that soul that you get to explore in an hour that you just can’t possibly do in a half hour show.”
That doesn’t mean Marin is another Carrie Bradshaw though. “I think we’re both women in the world and I understand that she was a very popular character and spoke to women. So I’m flattered by that [comparison]. I think she’s a phenomenal actor and I think her impact in the world and what she did for women and allowed women to talk about was very meaningful and important. I hope that Marin has that same impact.”
Oh, and that Alaska thing. This isn’t the first show to be set up north, but Heche welcomes the Northern Exposure comparison. “I think it’s fantastic. I personally didn’t watch the show but I know it was a huge success and people really got involved in the life and that town and the beauty of not only the atmosphere but those interesting and unique characters that all had a journey that they helped each other go through. And I think that’s wonderful and certainly if we can be as successful as that show, bring it on.”
Men in Trees premieres tonight on ABC, and moves to its regular timeslot Friday.
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