robert patrick lore

This fall Amazon is bringing its viewers an all-new series like you’ve never seen before with ‘Lore’! From the executive producers of ‘The X-Files’ and ‘The Walking Dead’, this new anthology series brings the legendary Aaron Mahnke’s “Lore” podcast to life that blends together elements of the podcast with live action dramatic sequences, archival footage, animated segments, and narration from Mahnke himself, to bring you the truth behind some of history’s darkest legends and terrors! The series is set to explore the true roots behind legends like Werewolves, Vampires, and much, much more! They’re only just getting started!

We were recently able to sit down with the legendary actor Robert Patrick, who stars in one of the episodes this season titled ‘Passing Notes’, to talk about what brought him to be involved in ‘Lore’, and where we can expect the series to take us! Check out the full interview below!


Can you tell us a little bit about your episode of ‘Lore’, which I believe is called ‘Passing Notes’?

Robert Patrick: I play a Reverend, Eliakim Phelps. His wife dies, and he’s a respected man in the community, and he has a strong flock of followers in his church. He grieves over her, he remarries a widow who has two kids. They move to a mansion in Connecticut, and spiritualism is coming into the fold! People are dabbling with it and he hears about it, and he’s curious about it! He sees it as a way to possibly communicate with his wife and in his mind prove once and for all, God’s existence. Which is the thing that everyone is really trying to prove. Even for a man of the cloth, certainty is what drives faith, or a lack of certainty. You know? Until we are certain, you don’t know! Everything is based on assumption and faith.

How much of Eliakim’s belief system as a character do you personally believe?

RP: Personally? I’m a believer. I’m a church goer, so it’s very appealing to me. And I have questions! I’m constantly questioning. But that’s how I choose to live. I get a great serenity from it.

How many of his words would you say are actually “your words”, things that you thought of and said?

RP: Very little, because they wrote the script and I stuck to it! You understand how I can empathize and sympathize with him because I have those questions! I do! Every day. There are challenges that are kind of like “is that going to shake my foundation, my faith?” Life is hard, it doesn’t get any easier. Everybody has got to have what they’ve got to have to get through life. 

Has being part of this show lead you to start getting more into folklore itself? Like in history being like “wow, that actually happened to somebody?”

RP: I know that stuff is intriguing! and I’d like to explore it more! I’d love to explore it more with Aaron and find more of his podcasts and explore more of these stories like that. I remember growing up as a kid, I grew up in Atlanta in the 50s and 60s, move to Ohio, Detroit, Cleveland, Boston… and it’s funny, wherever I moved, there was always that in whatever neighborhood it was with new kids, there was some new story about “oh that house over there? You don’t want to go there”, “oh, why?”, “well because that’s where blah-blah-blah”, you know what I mean?

I’m going to tell a  story, and this is kind of weird. It just dawned on me, I was in about the third grade, my dad was going to MIT, and I was living in Boston, and I was fresh from Georgia. The people that lived next to me, their father got hit by a car while changing a tire. And it was a huge tragedy! But I don’t know if it was just the age I was at or what, but I just couldn’t look at them the same. It was just like… it put something in me. Something happened and my relationship with them just changed. I don’t know why I thought of that, but that’s the sort of thing that comes to mind.

With such a storied career, including some of the best movies of all time-

RP: I agree!

What drew you to this role, and what do you look for in your roles these days?

RP: I love working! I feel the clock ticking, and I’m trying to get in as many roles as I can before it’s all over. I have one purpose, and that is to act! I love acting. I love trying to do as many different things as I can, and I’m a lot more confident now. Thirty years down the road, I’m willing to try more and more things, and I want to do the best work I can do, and I still think that it’s ahead of me. So I’m going to pursue some kind of… I don’t know what it is! But it drives you! And I really do feel like I’m running out of time and I’ve got to keep going and going and going! So when ‘Scorpion’ was on hiatus, I tried to find something that will take me out of that and be at the other extreme. Like with ‘Scorpion’, I don’t know if it’s a comedy or a drama or what it is, but it’s a fun show to make, I can tell you that much! It’s a very unique show, and it’s great writing and I love my character, but I want to do other things. And I want to do really dark things, and really light things, and one extreme to the other! This fell in and Gail (Anne Hurd) is involved, and she’s involved in great things! And Glen Morgan is involved in ‘X-Files’, so the pedigree of the show is great! And Aaron Mahnke? This is such a unique way to do a show and there’s so many different medias involved with the storytelling aspects. I just wanted to be a part of it! I don’t get to do period pieces that often! Put on all of those clothes, wear a top hat! Oh, I love it! I feel like I should have mutton chops! It was great!

Kind of building off of that, have you heard about James Cameron returning to ‘Terminator’, and would you go back?

RP: Absolutely! If anybody wants to ask me to do anything or return anywhere, I am there!

You’ve mentioned ‘X-Files’ and ‘Terminator’, and it’s kind of funny but they’re both back right now! ‘T-2’ is back in theaters this season for its twenty-fifth anniversary and ‘X-Files’ is back for another season this year! How does it feel as an actor to see these pieces of your past and good choices you’ve made in your career come back that are still out there and still entertaining people?

RP: I feel fantastic about that! And I didn’t really make choices! ‘Terminator 2’ was a gift! It came to me when I was a very struggling actor, and the situation worked itself out where I got an opportunity to get in front of the right people, and then Billy Idol getting injured, and the fact that his injury created this vacuum and that they were looking for somebody and I had the physical presence that they were looking for. What I did in the audition is what is in the movie! And I hadn’t even read the script yet, I was just coming up with stuff! There’s a lot of things I can’t explain, that just sort of came together and allowed this to happen. And as a result? I’ve had this wonderful career that I do look back on and think “Jesus man, you’ve been lucky as anybody! You’ve got ‘The X-Files’, and you did ‘The Sopranos’, and how you got ‘The Sopranos’ was an interesting thing and how you got ‘Copland’ was an interesting thing”. I’m just very very thankful, and it’s fun to see that ‘The X-Files’ is back! I wanted to stay with that show forever, I loved it! I love playing John Doggett! I was crushed, devastated, when Chris Carter said “it’s over”! I was like ‘Why! Our ratings are good! What is this happening?” you know? I was devastated.

Maybe you can remind them that you’re still around?

RP: You know, I am so busy, and I have a show! And I love this show that I do, ‘Scorpion’, and we’ve been doing it a few years. We’re in our fourth season, and I want to see it run for a long time! I love the kids I work with on that show, and it’s a different show because it’s an ensemble, and I love doing it! It’s a great thing for me to be doing right now, and in my hiatus I fill it up with a bunch of other great stuff!  I’m too damn busy! I feel very fortunate.


You can catch the entire first season of Aaron Mahnke’s ‘Lore’ featuring the legendary Robert Patrick streaming now on Amazon Prime! Robert Patrick can also be seen in ‘Scorpion’ at 10PM Monday nights on CBS! Be sure to stay tuned to ScienceFiction for all the latest updates on ‘Lore’ from Amazon and Aaron Mahnke!