In the premiere episode of The Traitors, host Alan Cumming sweeps onto the screen, camp and menacing in equal measure, as he sizes up the cast of contestants which includes reality stars and regular civilians. Set in a remote castle in the Scottish Highlands Cumming proceeds to chew up every bit of scenery as the slightly sinister lord of the manor, laying out the rules for the forthcoming game. It’s a role that Cumming clearly relishes, and it’s so clear that he’s having the best time, you can help but join along with him.
The Traitors is based on the hit Dutch series of the same name and sees participants participating in a series of challenges to win a $250,000 prize. Standing in their way are three “traitors” who secretly pick off the contestants at night while they sleep. The only way to defeat them is to discover their identities before it’s too late. Paranoia and accusations abound as the tension ramps up with every “murder.”
Lording over it all is Cumming, who took the gig, frankly, because it seemed like it would be a gas. “I just felt like it’d be a laugh and something really bizarre to do,” he tells PRIDE. “I watched the Dutch version, which I really enjoyed. And then I spoke to the producers, and they explained why they’d asked me and what they hoped I would do, and I sort of brought my invention to it, and it became this weird campy thing. “
When it came to crafting his character, it was an amalgamation. “I guess Vincent Price is a good model,” says Cumming, who shares he was going for someone, “just sort of camp but sort of also menacing was the vibe I was going for. Like a James Bond villain, like a kind of meanie, or a kind of really well-dressed headmaster.”
It’s a character that’s familiar to anyone who has seen the kind of queer-coded, debonair, and vaguely villainous characters of classic Hollywood. It’s a vibe that Cumming says is intrinsic to his work. “Anything I do is sort of queer-coded, even when I’m playing straight people. I think that one of the things I like about the word queer is that it doesn’t just refer to what you do with your genitals, it’s about a sensibility and an attitude,” he says. “I think queerness is a really interesting, fun, sort of counterculture-ish way to look at things.”
So he made the most of the atmosphere of the series, taking the opportunity to be “brooding and wandering around the table whilst they’re deciding what to do.”
It was also a role that required Cumming to be very careful about what he let slip to the characters, as he was aware of who the traitors were among their ranks. It was a struggle for the actor, who confesses secret keeping is not one of his greatest strengths. “I can’t keep secrets in real life. I can’t. I’m terrible, which is not a very good thing to be in this situation,” he laughs. “But like in The Good Wife, when [my character] Will died we’d known for months that he was going to die and I told so many people. I sat down in a makeup chair to get my hair done at some fashion thing. And this guy said, ‘Oh, I really liked [The Good Wife], I went like ‘Will’s gonna die.’ I have Tourette’s Syndrome about telling people this huge television secret. Luckily, it didn’t seem to matter. Everyone was shocked — apart from the people I told. But with this... I had to be really careful, all the time.”
It was one of the reasons that Cumming tried to stay in character at all times, which was helpful during some of the more brutal challenges — some he had a hard time simply witnessing. “I was really worried for them. There were a couple of times, people really freaked out at some of the awful things they had to do,” he recalls. “But in my character, I’m just sort of ‘come on,’ very cajoling and I didn’t really have to have sympathy for them as the character,” he says, adding, “I would have hated to do some of the things they had to do.”
As for how he would have played the game himself, Cumming shares his plan. “I would just try and sort of ingratiate myself with as many people as possible to make them think that I couldn’t possibly be the traitor. And also stand back a little bit from it. Because that is also fascinating to watch. The people who stand back tended to be a little more successful.” And as for who he would murder first, he says he wouldn’t change a thing. “I think it was pretty fine the way it works on the show. I was quite happy with that murder,” he concludes.
