Ben McKenzie on "Gotham" & the Batman Universe Origin Story

He's the star of one of the most buzzed about shows this fall TV season.

I'm talking about Ben McKenzie.

Thank you so much for joining me on the couch.

Thank you for having me.

Welcome to our humble abode.

That's lovely.

It's it is.

Lot of color.

Yes.

Yes.

And we we got your name up in the background and everything.

Yes.

Correctly, which I'm really happy about.

No, honestly, like it's shocking how difficult McKenzie is apparently.

Really?

Yep.

Really?

People want to put an A in there.

It is very.

Wow.

You like almost hulked out there.

I almost hulked out.

You really did.

Batman.

Uh you did almost Batman out.

That was pretty good.

You're getting It's a nice nice subtle transition.

Yeah, I know.

Nice little segway.

Uh this up here not getting more subtle like what's going on with you?

Yeah, well, it's healing.

I I banged into a concrete wall doing a fight scene on Friday, yeah.

Wasn't very it wasn't my finest hour, but uh but it's all fine.

No concussion, stitches are underneath.

Nice.

They're probably dissolving as we speak.

That's legit.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Uh let's talk about the show which you are incurring injuries for already.

Um Gotham.

It is a Batman origin story.

Yes.

It's an origin story set in the world of Batman.

So it's an origin story for everybody including Bruce Wayne.

But um but it really focuses on Jim Gordon who's a rookie police detective.

Uh and he's uh he and his partner Harvey Bullock get assigned the case of the Wayne murders.

Jim meets Bruce and says, you know, I'm going to I'm going to get to the bottom of this.

And um and an un a larger conspiracy sort of unravels from there who's actually in power in Gotham.

Um what's going on and and the various powers are battling over control of the city.

Gotham is a story about the origins of the great DC super villains and we'll be seeing how they came to be.

Catwoman, the Riddler, Poison Ivy, the Penguin, what made the Joker, the Joker?

How did Scarecrow become the Scarecrow?

Why did the city get in such a state that they needed a masked vigilante to save it.

Our hero is James Gordon, played by Ben McKenzie.

When we join the show, he's only been two weeks on the job as a detective.

And no mustache yet.

That's a bold choice.

That is a very bold choice.

What tell me the thought process behind that?

Stop process was that would look ridiculous.

Really?

Really?

I mean, who knows?

I think it's like season two, season three.

You know, a guy my age who walks around with a mustache.

I don't.

Who does not wear suspenders and serve you lattes.

Like I don't.

I don't actually.

Who doesn't work at Intellijencia does.

Yes.

Not great coffee.

Yeah.

Don't want to look like.

Ridiculous outfits.

Yeah.

Ridiculous.

Yes.

mustache.

It's iconic.

It's iconic in the same way that Batman is iconic.

Right.

Um you know, the comic book fans are out of control.

Batman fans out of control.

I mean, how have you been handling the pressure of taking on this role?

I've been handling it fine.

It's great.

We we interacted uh at Comic Con.

Oh, we got to, you know, How was that?

It was great.

It was really fun.

Um you know, I I get it.

They're they're very passionate.

They uh they want it to be done right.

Right.

Uh I'm really proud of the show.

I think that it speaks for itself and uh I'm excited for them to see it.

Fantastic.

And you have a great cast with you as well.

You have Don Logue, Jada Pinkett Smith.

What's it like working with them?

Awesome.

Awesome.

We have a great cast up and down the line.

Um including people that you probably haven't seen before like Robin Taylor who plays the Young Penguin.

And he really kind of um he's really fantastic in this.

And it's a completely different Penguin than you've seen before.

There's no Danny De Vito Penguin, not that he that was great too, but this is like a completely different characterization.

Yeah, no shade to Danny De Vito.

Well, it's just a completely different.

At this point, Oswald Cobblepot is a is a low-level henchman for Fish Mooney.

And to see him kind of through Machiavellian twisted and turns work his way up the Gotham power structure with Robin's performance is pretty cool.

Machiavellian.

I like that.

Multi syllable.

You've gone to college.

Yes.

Uh I'm speaking of that.

Okay, so when I was doing my research about you, I love this.

You have a degree in foreign relations and economics.

I love this.

I have a degree in political economy.

Why are we why are we why are we here?

Because this is way more fun than working for the State Department.

This is true.

Um so, I mean, well, why what what led you down this path now you are playing a young Commissioner Gordon, uh but you graduated with a degree in foreign relations and economics.

I don't know.

I mean, you look good in a suit clearly.

So, I mean, I mean if this whole acting thing doesn't work out.

I could You could work for the State Department.

Oh, okay.

I got it.

Excellent.

Um, I I just took acting classes in college.

Uh I loved it and you know, you day at that age you don't really want to just kind of settle on some profession that is the one you ought to do and you want to kind of try to try something else.

So that's all I thought I was going to do.

I was going to try acting and if it worked out, then then great.

But I expected it to so just kind of I yeah, I got very lucky.

So because you have this fancy degree.

Yes.

I want to test your knowledge.

Uh from back yeah.

There aren't going to be like names involved.

Oh, there might be there might be there's not geography.

Not geography.

Okay.

Who is the current chairman of the Fed?

The current chairman of the Fed?

Yes.

Uh it is is it still Bernanke?

Is it Geitner?

No.

Uh close.

Janet Yellen.

It was Yellen.

Okay.

Uh you named the one last so after traumatic injury.

Uh it is Yellen.

Okay.

Name three countries in the G8.

In the G8?

Yes.

Japan, US, UK.

That's easy.

you know what?

That just makes up for for everything.

That's good.

Thank you.

I think it does.

I think it's pretty fabulous.

I think that's it.

You know what?

It it you know if this acting thing doesn't work out you could geography teacher?

Maybe.

Like yeah.

I could be a good geography teacher.

Anything else you want us to know about Gotham?

Um anything you want to tell the fans out there?

Nothing.

I think it's a good show.

I think people are going to like it.

Yeah.

That's it.

You're going to take care of that right.

We're going to work on that.

Yeah, yeah, a little bit.

A little extra makeup on that.

That's right.

Ben McKenzie.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you for for joining me on the couch.

Be sure to catch Gotham Mondays on Fox.