Richard Hatch Dishes on Early Elimination From ‘House of Villains’ and Hints at Actuality TV Future

Her character, Tara Maclay, first appeared throughout the season’s tenth hour for just a bit episode titled “Hush,” merely one in every of many excessive tier installments of the current’s seven-season run. In it, Buffy and the rest of the Scooby Gang uncover themselves with out voices, as terrifying supernatural forces commonly known as The Gents float spherical metropolis ripping out the hearts of their victims.

Ahead of the anniversary of her arrival in Sunnydale, TooFab sat down with Benson at an event celebrating the current thrown by Tubi, as a result of the gathering is now obtainable in full — with out value — on the streamer.

“As soon as I auditioned for Buffy, I didn’t understand what this was. I knew it on account of I was associates with Alyson, and I had watched the current to help her,” Benson knowledgeable TooFab, referring to Alyson Hannigan, who moreover carried out her future on-screen love, Willow.

“I was like, ‘That’s good,’ [but] didn’t understand the custom of Buffy. After which to get the job, I didn’t even get to attain out to [Alyson] and inform her, I merely auditioned and was like if I don’t get it, then, you notice …. after which I obtained it,” Benson continued, calling “Hush” an “iconic episode” for her to make her debut.

“It was bananas,” she talked about of her first day filming, which was actually a night shoot on the varsity set used for School of California, Sunnydale.

“It was getting darkish, and I walked up, they often had video village organize. That they’d the TV show that displays you what the digicam sees. Everybody appears to be type of spherical it and watching,” she recalled. “They’re capturing this scene with The Gentleman and I’m watching the monitor, and likewise you see this unimaginable nightmare creation floating by on show. Then I see them current up and cross video village, all standing on a platform on wheels, a bunch of the grips are pulling them, and I was like, ‘Boy, that’s Hollywood.’ So, it was such a like iconic second.”

Tara’s place solely continued to develop over Seasons 4, 5 and 6, as her romance with Willow obtained right here to the forefront. In 1999 and the early 2000s, seeing illustration of a loving lesbian couple on the center of a group television current was a pretty big deal … which made it all the further painful when Tara was killed by a stray bullet in Season 6.

In 2023, Benson obtained to revisit the place of Tara on a Buffy assortment for Audible, which she and Christopher Golden co-wrote and co-directed. Fellow costars James Marsters, Charisma Carpenter, Anthony Head, Juliet Landau, Emma Caulfield Ford, James Charles Leary, and Danny Sturdy all returned for the gathering as properly, a few of their genuine roles and others in alternate variations of their characters from one different universe.

“For myself and for Christopher Golden … we very lots checked out that continuation as an answer to type of give a higher ending to among the many beloved characters we had. Points I had about, how Charisma and Cordelia went out, how Emma/Anya went out, Tara went out,” she talked about, referring to the deaths of characters carried out by herself, Charisma Carpenter and Emma Caulfield.

“Using an alternate universe type of system, we have now been able to offer these characters the ending we felt they should have. It was very satisfying as a creative explicit particular person, however moreover satisfying like a fan of the current,” she added. “I actually really feel like a number of of those character truly didn’t get the due that they deserved. To supply them that was truly explicit and magical.”

Sadly, the Audible assortment wasn’t picked up for yet another season, with Benson telling TooFab, “I need we’d do further, nonetheless I really feel have been type of executed with that for now. Which is a bummer on account of I’d like to return.”

For now, followers can revisit the distinctive assortment … or watch it for the first time … on Tubi, with Benson calling the current a kind of “comfort meals.”

“I really feel the reality that Tubi is now streaming like the complete seasons, it’s free, you presumably can return, and also you’ll rewatch it as many situations as you want. It’s such a comfort,” she talked about, praising the “entry” the free streamer permits for the current, which she believes “nonetheless speaks” to followers and newcomers alike.

“You would possibly uncover somebody that’s your explicit particular person on the current. I really feel that’s the part of the rationale the current has sustained vitality, on account of you might discover somebody that’s your explicit particular person, your spirit animal,” she continued. “The current is about discovering your self, discovering your found family, discovering your tribe and that might be a theme that may go on endlessly.”

And she or he’s already seen new generations of followers at conventions.

“I’m 47 now. The reality that I’m going to conventions, and I meet the followers. I uncover children of their mid-teens, children in early twenties who’ve been like, ‘I knew nothing about Buffy, my family didn’t watch Buffy, and I was merely fussing spherical and I found it, and I watched the complete factor,’” she knowledgeable TooFab. “I’d say Buffy is a drug. You get hooked on it. Whenever you start watching it, you’re in trouble. You’re ours, you belong to us.”

Get hooked now on Tubi!