“The fact that they were willing to take a chance on me early was really remarkable,” said David Harbour (“Stranger Things”) to Gold Derby’s Ralph Galvan last December about playing Police Chief Jim Hopper on the hit Netflix series. “It truly was the best pilot script I’ve ever read. They really wanted me and they really believed in me. I think that’s a testament to their creative vision and that they were willing to take such risks.” Watch our David Harbour interview above.
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“Stranger Things” tells the story of a small town that bands together to search for 12-year-old Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) after he goes missing due to supernatural forces. Harbour admits that the emotional story of his character was hard to shake after the cameras stopped rolling. “I sort of got lost a little bit,” Harbour confessed. “I was kind of depressed the first season because there’s a lot of darkness there. He just kind of infected my subconscious.”
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Throughout the first season, Hopper battles drug addiction and deals with the memories of his young daughter’s death. The emotional impact is earning Harbour some of the best reviews of his career, including winning the SAG Award earlier this year for Best Drama Ensemble. “I never thought that I would be one to win awards or even be nominated,” he told us. “I’ve sort of worked for a long time at a certain level and it’s been great but now to be thrust into this new thing it feels a little silly. I just can’t really process it.”
Harbour also teases the second season of “Stranger Things,” which is set to stream on Netflix this Halloween. “Before we got the first scripts, I was nervous,” he reveals. “But then I read the first five minutes of Season 2 and it’s such an opener of the world that it just blew me away. I literally was reading the script and I went like ‘Yes!’ as soon as it ended.”
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