Allan Hawco talks home, pot, Christmas, gratitude (oh yeah) and Frontier in this sometimes touching, but often silly and playful, one-on-one
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With Christmas close, and weed legalized, Allan Hawco is in a playful mood.
“Ask me whatever,” he jokes on the phone from Montreal. With the ‘Pot’ cover of The Herald out on newsstands, we ask the star of Frontier what he thinks of it all. “I don’t know. It’s very strange to walk down the street and smell weed. They’ve all come out of the corners; all these chronic weed smokers – lovers of the pot – they don’t have to hide anymore,” he begins thoughtfully.
Not old Fashioned
He’s not in any way “old fashioned,” he explains, it’s just how things are – or were. “In a way, it’s part of our world to feel – this is illegal and it’s ‘slightly’ bad. But for some people, it was really bad –their lives were ruined by selling or dealing weed.”
Hawco knows the serious side of drugs “back in the day.”
“I still find it so weird, like the people I’ve spoken to who’ve actually lived that life. It seems ridiculous that (pot) was actually ever illegal. Now, it’s not my thing, it was never a world I went into because I don’t like not being in control of my own thoughts, so it sort of freaks me out a bit, but who knows.”
Each to its own, as the saying goes. Heavy thoughts this morning? He laughs. Mind wanders a bit, perhaps, when he’s away from home? He’s been blessed, he shares, when it comes to staying close to home working on quality projects like Discovery’s (and now available on Netflix) Frontier.
“I think it’s the same for any of us who are lucky enough to work from home; it’s not something I take for granted because at this very moment I’m working away from home. And it’s fine to work away from home when I know it’s not something I need to do all the time… I know the base of my work can be there and that’s just something I prefer.”
Stay at Home Actor
But home is special, he adds. “I’ll always live in Newfoundland. It doesn’t mean I’ll always get the opportunity to work and live there. It’s kind of the greatest, the best of all worlds, to be able to drive to work from my house and live there and have our production company contributing to the culture of our province and obviously to the economy. It’s a total dream come true for sure.”
Another dream come true is the opportunity to work with the calibre people he works with. From international sensation Jason Momoa to the ultra talented Shawn Doyle, it’s been quite the ride.
“Jason is a really hard worker and he’s really devoted to the show… it’s really interesting watching him work. He’s a producer on the show too and he’s in there doing everything he can.”
Momoa has killed it when it comes to attracting others to the Frontier fold. “He worked really hard to get a number of cast members to come and play with us over the years, a lot of his friends and connections he’s made. It’s just one of those shows filled with all these amazing actors.”
Every scene or every storyline is filled with an interesting combination of local as well as international talent.
“We’ve been given the opportunity to play with some of the greatest talents in the world and I know for myself that opportunity is never lost. It’s really cool to be bringing NL to the world through all of these surrogates. They come to NL and they fall in love with the place and they go and preach it to the rest of the world and Jason is no exception in that regard, he’s constantly screaming (how great NL is) from the rooftops.”
For our complete one-on-one with Allan Hawco pick up the Dec 16-22 digital issue here