Usually on Wednesday nights, several students sit in front of their televisions to watch the hit show American Horror Story (AHS). This week, students got a double dose of AHS when Evan Peters paid a visit to campus on Wednesday night in the Student Center Ballroom.
Evans entered the Student Center Ballroom to a warm welcome from several screaming fans. While drinking a Starbucks coffee and wearing a Slippery Rock hoodie, he seemed to feel right at home.
For Peters, his acting career all started on a couch. He explained to the packed ballroom that he was sitting on the couch trying to figure out what he wanted to do with his life. He didn’t have any desire to work a regular nine to five. He was watching a show that stared the Olsen twins and thought, “How do I do that?” From there, he went to several different agencies for auditions and started landing roles in commercials, television shows and movies.
“AHS was my first big role on television. I was definitely nervous. Everyone just kept telling me, ‘Okay, this is Ryan Murphy, so don’t fuck it up.’ Yeah, there was no pressure at all,” he joked. “All my past acting was horrible! I had no training and I barely knew what I was doing.”
In AHS, Peters plays three characters throughout the three seasons, Tate Langdon (Murder House), Kit Walker (Asylum), and Kyle Spencer (Coven). He expressed that his favorite character to play on set would be Tate Langdon, but he thoroughly enjoys all three roles. While some would think that playing three different characters with the same cast can be tricky, Peters explained that it’s not so bad.
“I mean, I don’t really focus on playing different roles. When you see this amazing cast playing all these different characters as well, you just see what they’re doing and adjust. I just try to connect to the roles that are given to me so that I can portray that onscreen,” he said.
The characters Tate, Kit, and Kyle are different in their own way. As the tone on AHS changes, so do the characters. This season (Coven) is a lot lighter than the previous seasons, explained Peters. While one character is being tortured in one season, another character is facing injustice in another. The storyline of each character is unique and exciting, according to Peters.
After filming, Peters expressed that it is sometimes hard to shake off a character once the cameras go off.
“You want to go in knowing that this is something different and separate from you, so you sort of strike it and that way, you don’t bring it home with you and you leave it with the office,” he said.
Along with AHS, Peters is staring in the new film, X-Men: Days of Future Past. Peters plays Pietro Maximoff, whose alter ego is Quicksilver. Quicksilver’s superpower can be classified as super speed. Peters said that he is very excited about the movie, but really nervous at the same time.
“I’m really excited to see this come together. The producers were showing me some special effects stuff when we were actually shooting because the technology is so good now. I’m really nervous actually too. I don’t want to screw anything up,” he explained.
This movie is very different from the recent projects that Peters has worked on. According to Peters, this is the biggest budget movie that he has ever worked on. The X-Men movies are part of a massive franchise and Peters was a little hesitant going into the movie, but feels as though he did his role justice.
“There is a huge cast that’s already been in the movies before and they’re kind of like bringing on me, this little guy, so it’s like I don’t really know what to do. I’m just trying to do the best I can and fit in,” Peters expressed.
As the event came to a close, Peters gave advice to students who wish to become an actor/actress. Among his advice, he told students to find their own technique and keep at that technique. He suggested that students find what inspires them and go after it.
“Oh, and my biggest piece of advice, don’t fuck up!” he said.
