The world of science fiction television got a boost of sexiness lately when actress Kate Kelton ascended into the world of Haven, the SyFy series currently airing its third season. In the series, Kelton plays the mysterious Jordan who inhabits the trouble (the name for a power or affliction that someone might possess) of emitting jolts of electricity whenever she touches another human being. But she is also working with a group called The Guard that, at this point, seems to be up to no good.
While her “trouble” might keep Jordan at arms length, the same cannot be said for Kelton, who during our recent chat with her at West Hollywood hotspot The Abbey, exuded the kind of good cheer and gregarious conversation that is immediately engaging. (And I think you’ll agree that the same can be said for the photos we shot of her, too!)
During the chat with AfterEllen.com, the 34-year-old Kelton touched on the mystery of Jordan, how she’d love to see some hot scenes with Audrey (played by Emily Rose) and also opened up about her own coming out as bisexual, what she thinks of Lindsay Lohan and Portia de Rossi and what embarrassing song can be found on her iPod.
AfterEllen.com: My first question was going to be if your personal style was like Jordan’s on Haven but here you are in blacks and greys. Did you have a hand in shaping her style on the show?
Kate Kelton: Actually, I do wear a lot of black now that I come to think of it. It must be the black hair, right. There was a line of clothing that H&M put out that was specifically for, and in honor of an inspired buy I suppose, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. When they first started putting this character together, that apparently was a huge part of it, the way that she looked. And so it was interesting that they made those choices because they were falling right in line with I love wearing black, so that works.
AE: From the viewer standpoint, there’s still a lot to know about Jordan, but have you been clued into who this woman is or are you learning as we do?
KK: They gave me little parameters about who she was and what she would be doing specifically with Nathan (Lucas Bryant), but they didn’t really go into where it would go at all. We got every script as we shot it and so it’s been really exciting to see the fans reacting to it as they see them because it’s very similar. The questions that they’re coming up with to the questions that I was coming up with.
AE: Jordan cannot be touched, and if she touches people, she inflicts pain.
KK: That’s right. I’m human taser.
AE: When she does touch somebody it seems like she emotionally gets affected by it.
KK: She’s not a fan of her trouble. I think that’s something that they were really careful about. When they first started airing, it was around the same time that they show Heroes was airing. They really wanted to make a clear-cut differentiation that these were not super powers that they came with repercussions.
For her obliviously the repercussion is that she hates inflicting pain on people, and she hates the fact that she can’t touch anybody and nobody can touch her because it must be really isolating and really lonely, right? So, she’s not a fan of using. Even when she has to, she understands why she has to but it takes a toll on her for sure.
AE: So far with what we’ve seen, Jordan seems pretty confident and more than a little aggressive. Are those characteristics that you also share?
KK: I think it’s just dependent on when you catch me because I’m pretty mercurial like that. It’s night and day with me. I’m a bit mercurial like that. It’s just really dependent on the mood.
AE: What can you tease as far as where Jordan and Nathan are going? There’s definitely a connection happening, especially since you can’t touch people and he can’t feel!
KK: Actually something that they have in common and that he doesn’t have in common with others, and that’s a new thing for him. It creates a stronger bond then I think either of them anticipated in the beginning. And it makes the subsequent actions that much more difficult because there is some stuff where they will come into conflict again just because of the nature of one being a cop and one being in The Guard. It’s going to be tricky for them to navigate any kind of love relationship in the middle of all that.
AE: Even though Nathan says he can trust Jordan, in your opinion, should he trust her and should the viewer trust her?
KK: (big grin) I will say that Jordan absolutely believes that everything that she does is for an ultimate greater good. Whether everyone will agree with that or not remains to be seen.
AE: Now, it seems like your character is pretty much involved with Nathan at this point though she did interact more with everyone this past week. Does she become part of the group now?
KK: There’s a two-part episode that will air after that Halloween episode. It’s a cliffhanger. That first ending when it stops, you have to know that we didn’t get the scripts ahead of time. We just showed up to the table read that day, and we were handed the scripts. So, by the time we’d finished it, everyone got just blown away by the ending and then had to wait a week ourselves before the next table read to read what happened. That is a plot where we do tend to have to work together a bit more for the common goal.
AE: One thing I’ve noticed is that science fiction in general seems to be embracing different sexualities a lot more than they used to. At least at this point, it seems like Jordan is straight.
KK: There’s nothing in there. I wish!
AE: I think Jordan and Audrey [Emily Rose] would be kind of hot…
KK: I know! That would be awesome. And the irony is that the first time that I read, it was for Bree [Williamson]’s character [Claire] and she was a confidant for Audrey. When I first read those sides, I read subtext into it. I was like “come on.” These ladies have some screen time together. This is going to be awesome but that’s not really how it played out during the season.
AE: I think that being gay or bi that we’re always looking for those things even if it’s not clearly on the surface.
KK: Exactly. And we’re more aware of them and we’re more aware of people saying things that they might not even intend that we know in ten years down the line, they’ll look back and say “oh, that was where it began.”
AE: Are you aware of shipping?
KK: Yeah. Everyone ships Nathan and Duke (Eric Balfour) because they are just adorable.
AE: Exactly. Like can’t they just kiss one time?
KK: Just kiss, kiss away.
AE: There should be an episode where somebody casts a spell.
KK: …a trouble, exactly.
AE: Yes! And everybody becomes attracted to the same sex. Lots of really hot scenes. I’d love that!
KK: Yes!
AE: Talk to me about your coming out process as a bi-woman. I feel naïve asking but how might it have been different from a gay person’s coming out?
KK: There wasn’t really like a clear-cut moment. I’ve noticed recently doing press and stuff just the fact that now I finally have a forum to sort of tell more people than just my friends and family and the people who are actually around me and become more visible in that way. But because my mom’s gay, I was raised to not limit my love to the body bag it came in. So, that’s how it started for me is that I just always sort of fell for the person first and then I’d noticed if they were male, female, black, white, big, tall, old. You know what I mean? It really just became a chemistry pheromone thing. I can never really predict who my next crush is because it just sort of happens.
AE: You would assume that because your mom is gay it would be very easy to come out to her but there some challenges there?
KK: The funny thing is I almost had to come out to her that I liked boys because she was so sad.
AE: She was pulling for the lesbian card.
KK: Exactly. She was “at least you’re bi.” She’s probably still crossing her fingers though that I’m just a fence-hopper and that I’ll settle one way or another, right.
AE: I remember on Sex in the City where they said that bi is just a stop on the way to gay town.
KK: That’s hilarious.
AE: Do you find that people give you a hard time with the bi label because some people just don’t buy it?
KK: Yeah, exactly. For that, I always want to say the fact is that if I’m with a woman, than I am sort of more identifying as being gay, and if I fall for a man, than I am sort of identifying more with being straight. The funny thing is that again is completely dependent who I fall for, right? So, I don’t know that there’s an end game, you know? If I do end up with woman for the next 40 years, then yeah, I guess that means I’m gay. You know what I mean?
But if I still find men attractive, I don’t know. It is a strange dichotomy and I’ve definitely heard all sides of the argument but I’m glad that…it sounds horrible to say but being a woman and being bi seems like the one completely across the board acceptable thing to every redneck in Middle America, every Republican. They’re completely fine with seeing two girls together, right? And that makes my stomach turn, but at the same time, it’s like an advantage that I’ve got, so alright.
AE: Talk to me about your status now. Are you single, dating or…?
KK: Single. The irony is that right now I’m just gunning so hard for work and it’s just the time restrictions, you know. Like even if I do find an inkling of an attraction of someone, I’ll find myself squelching it because I just don’t have the time for the heartbreak. That’s also the other thing is that because I’m not married with kids and have seen how a relationship can be successful [but] to me, every relationship ends. That’s the history that I know, so dealing with the aftermath is never as much fun as that first flush of honeymoon, and it’s not worth it.
AE: I know from your bio that you write and paint. Is that something that you’ve always cultivated?
KK: That’s right. Doing that since I was two, yeah, literally. Because my mom’s a painter and her father was a painter, a great photographer, my other father an architect. It runs in the family, right. So, being dragged to all sorts of art galleries when I was young. I grew up in Europe being sort of driven around Europe in a VW bus with hippies and gypsies and monkeys and stuff, crazy stuff, nudist communes, and definitely tons of art galleries. So, that’s definitely in the bones and it’s taken a bit of a pause here and there to make do for the acting because I realized that the acting is a little more time dependent, they demand youth of you, right.
AE: Any LGBT role models?
KK: Portia de Rossi is awesome. Because I heard her speak after there was a SAG event…I think they were showing her TV show at the time, Better Off Ted. She was talking a lot about her and Ellen and she’s just so stunning. I feel like there’s not a lot of really too many fem girls out there that are very in the public eye. Unless people just don’t believe them. They’ll say Lindsay Lohan, clearly not a lesbian. She’s so doing it for the fanfare of it. I’m like “no.” She really loved Samantha [Ronson], I’m pretty sure of it. If you’re on the outside and you can’t see it, then maybe you’re thinking that she’s doing it for attention, but no, I mean, that’s the outside world’s take on something that they can’t wrap their head around. You know, she’s got to be with a guy. She’s too girly, pretty looking. That stuff always drives me nuts.
AE: What would we be surprised to find on your iPod?
KK: I wondered if I’ve got anything super embarrassing. Oh! There’s absolutely one! To this day I can’t help but crack up when I hear Wham Rap by Wham. I actually still have it memorized! That song never ceases to crack me up. So, if I’m really down in the dumps, I will put that song on because I can’t help but start cracking up. It is the most ridiculous song in the universe, and I know every word.
Haven air Fridays at 10/9c on SyFy. For more on Kate Kelton, visit her website.
