James Marsters, known for his portrayal of Spike in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, has revealed one particular episode sent him to therapy, a day he considers “the darkest professional day” of his life. Speaking to the Inside of You podcast with Michael Rosenbaum, the former Torchwood actor discussed the fallout from a controversial episode in the show’s sixth season, Seeing Red.
“Buffy sent me into therapy, actually,” Marsters admitted during the podcast (via ComicBook). “Buffy crushed. me. It’s a problematic scene for a lot of people who like the show. And it’s the darkest professional day of my life.”
In the episode, Spike attempts to force himself onto Buffy in a bid to convince her she still has feelings for him. For more context, they had been romantically involved in the show. A fight ensues as Buffy throws Spike at a wall, and as Marsters explains, the narrative had been designed from a directive by the writers to “slap metaphoric fangs” on a bad personal memory. The scene relates back to a female writer attached to the series.
You can watch the full interview below:
“The writers were being asked to come up with their worst day, the day that they don’t talk about, their dark secret, the one that keeps them up at night, when they really hurt somebody or when they really got hurt or made a big mistake of some kind — and then slap metaphoric fangs on top of that dark secret and tell everybody about it,” Marsters said.
The writer, Marsters added, had to contend with a difficult break-up, which he described in the interview as “one of the most painful memories of that time of her life.”
“[The show’s writers] thought that since Buffy was a superhero, that they could flip the sexes since Buffy could defend herself very, very easily from this. They thought that they could have a man do it to a woman, and it would be the same thing, I think.”
Buffy the Vampire Slayer stars Sarah Michelle Gellar, Alyson Hannigan, David Boreanaz, Nicholas Brendon, Charisma Carpenter, and Anthony Head.
