actor Orlando Jones came across Neil Gaiman’s sci-fi/fantasy classic American Gods well before Starz decided to turn it into a series from genre TV buffs Michael Green and Bryan Fuller. But despite his Gaiman love, Jones never expected in his wildest dreams he’d land the role of Mr. Nancy/Anansi—one of the book and show’s many imported old-world deities vying for the increasingly fractured attention span of modern-day Americans. And Jones is attacking the role of the arachnid African trickster god with all the glee you would expect from a true fan. Mr. Nancy/Anansi is the only one of Gaiman’s American gods so far to warrant a spin-off novel—2005’s Anansi Boys—and speaking with Vanity Fair, Jones reveals his character might get the TV spin-off treatment as well.
But that’s all putting the cart well before the horse. American Gods has yet to premiere its first episode on Starz—but when it does, at the end of April, it’s Jones’s character who gets the splashiest intro. Fans of the novel will remember the “Coming to America” vignettes peppered throughout Gaiman’s book that explore how—over centuries of belief—immigrants have brought various gods to American shores. In the show, these vignettes become pre-credits cold opens plunked at the front of most episodes. Jones’s Mr. Nancy lucks out with the most memorable of those stories, set on board an African slaving ship bound for American shores.
With a fiery, showstopping speech, Anansi—clad in an anachronistically sharp plaid suit and occasionally morphing into his spider form—uses the full force of his charismatic power of persuasion to inspire an uprising among his followers. It‘s both incredibly socially relevant and one of the most memorable introductions a TV character has had in a long time. As Jones explains, it may also be a hint of much more Mr. Nancy to come.
V.F. HWD: In a show that’s full of incredible character introductions, I think you got the best one. What did you think when you first read that Mr. Nancy “Coming to America” scene?
Orland Jones: I thought, I had no idea that Bryan Fuller and Michael Green were black dudes! Like, what is this amazing oral history of the Middle Passage and the African-American experience? Who are these black guys? I need to meet them! No, it’s a wonderfully written, incredible scene clearly in keeping with the way Neil Gaiman saw the character. Like you, I’m a massive fan of American Gods, so I was really just excited. At first, I kept flipping the pages, and I thought, This is like eight pages long. This is going to be fun. But are they going to run out of tape? What is this, an eight-minute take? I’m so excited to play Mr. Nancy—one of my favorite characters ever—this is really like a pinch-yourself moment the entire way. I’m just giddy about it.
How did you first come across Gaiman’s book?
A friend of mine had recommended it, because they know I’m a comic-book/graphic-novel nerd. First, they introduced me to Anansi Boys, and I was like, I wonder what happened before this. I did the total nerd thing where I read it, then I went back and I listened to the book-on-tape version of it. Then I started sharing it with various people. I completely went full fangirl and followed Neil Gaiman on Twitter and sent him a message. Then he responded, and that kind of set my fangirl action into overdrive.
Then when Starz said they were making the series, several people were sending him messages saying, “Orlando Jones has to be Mr. Nancy.” Of course, I was thinking, Yeah, I don’t know if that’s gonna happen, but that would be completely awesome. Then somehow it actually ended up coming to fruition. I was amazed that the fans were pitching me to Neil without really caring what I thought, but I was super-excited about it.
Do you feel like either your contact with Neil or the fan campaign helped you land the part?
You know, I don’t know. I consider myself a fangirl—and not a fanboy, because I like all the squees and all the feels. I’ve been in the fandom community since MADtv came on the air many moons ago, and you could literally drive up to San Diego Comic-Con and park across the street. I would like to think that the fans had some say in it. It’s always exciting when a group of fans you don’t know are like, “You’d be perfect for this.” Believe me, there are times when I’m like, “No, not me. Not that one. Uh-uh, no thank you.” But in this case, I was very excited to have an army of people going, “This guy, this guy.”
I’d only worked with Bryan one other time, on Pushing Daisies. I’m a huge Bryan Fuller fan because I was a massive Pushing Daisies fan. So when Bryan called me and was like, “Hey, I want you to come on Pushing Daises and play a Norwegian detective,” I was like, “Really? You wrote a Norwegian detective, and you thought of me?” I have no idea how I found myself with the good fortune of Mr. Nancy, but hopefully it was something to do with a Norwegian detective, the fans, and Neil Gaiman.
How familiar were you with the Anansi folklore before you read Gaiman’s books?
Well, that’s actually what I was most aware of. I was born in Mobile, Alabama—the real home of the Mardi Gras. Anansi is one of those characters that survived the Middle Passage, began in western Africa, and made his way here and really proliferated throughout the southern United States. The Spider God, the Trickster God was part of stories that my great-grandfather would tell me when I used to sneak him cigarettes.
He had gout, so they had to amputate his leg. Literally my job was to sneak over into the pantry, get his Camel cigarettes, turn the fan backwards in the window, and sit while he smoked his cigarettes and told me stories. He would tell me about the Trickster God and Dr. Buzzard—this guy who lives on this island who supposedly would grant all your wishes. I began hearing them from my great-grandfather when I was around seven, eight years old. Not in my wildest dreams did I think I would ever get to play one of them—but Anansi’s a huge character in African folklore, and African-American folklore as well.
In your “Coming to America” intro, you get to wander in between some accents and dialects as you’re giving all the different angles of this African and African-American experience. Can you talk about some of the vocal choices you made there?
For me, one of the interesting things about American Gods is the way the world is laid out: it’s the old gods versus the new gods. Because Anansi is a trickster god, for me, his speech definitely had to have some African element to it—some patois. It was key that at certain moments, particularly when communicating on a slave ship full of Africans who are soon to be sold at market, he communicate in a tone that is familiar to them. That’s just the nature of communication.
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