Let's Talk About X

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Official Magazine
April 2003
ByAbbie Bernstein

We’ve heard what Nick Brendon thinks about Xander, but what do his Buffy colleagues think? Time to find out…

On discussing Nicholas Brendon and Xander Harris, executive producer Marti Noxon makes it clear that Mutant Enemy is totally jazzed to have him: “I think Nick is a tremendously talented guy. He can do anything. He can do humor and obviously serious drama.

“I thought his stuff in the wedding episode last season was so strong, where he and Anya did not get married. He can really break your heart. And the scene he had with Anya at the end of the Anya episode [“Selfless”] this season was just heart-breaking. So I think he’s evolved from being sort of the funny, cute kid to being a very dramatic, funny man. I think that you’ve definitely watched him grow up on the show. What I’ve seen definitely is him growing into his own, in terms of his own comfort level, knowing what his talents are and his strengths, and also knowing that he’s not just a funny guy, but also that he has a real strong ability as a dramatic actor.”

Xander gets so many funny lines that it’s sometimes easy to forget that he goes through more than his fair share of suffering, both emotional and physical. James Marsters (a.k.a. Spike), who knows a bit about playing a tormented soul, says that he thinks Nicholas does a great job of conveying Xander’s resilience in the face of great pain: “Xander, like all the characters in Buffy, that are Joss and Marti, they have to go to their fire. And no one goes through more fire than the character of Xander. He goes through more adversity and more getting put down – you’ve just got to believe that he will prevail. The character doesn’t give up, you know? Xander will prevail.”

Marti feels that Nicholas’ work as Xander gives the audience someone who stands for them: “I think we [the Buffy creative team] have become more conscious of what his role is, trying to define his role without giving him superpowers. At a certain point, we had talked about, ‘Well, maybe we’ll give him some kind of special power like the others.’ Especially this year, as we’re perhaps drawing to a close, we’ve been trying to be clearer about everybody’s strengths and what they bring to the party. In Nicky’s case, I think that what he brings to the party is the bravery of the common man and the loyalty of the common man. It’s easy to herald the general and the person with all the special talents, but really, what about the guy who’s in the field? And that’s Xander. I mean, he in some ways takes more risks than anybody, because he doesn’t have any special powers, so I think as a character, we’ve sort of defined him more as a hero, but also a hero that represents the rest of us.”