![]() From the very beginning, when I was first approached to do Tuco, I'm very collaborative. Speaking of which, who picked out that apron for him? It's like, which line do you wanna step on which side of? How far toward the bad side, how far toward the good side? Where do you find a happy balance? Tuco's balance is a lot different than Saul's balance.ĮSQ: Tuco's seems a bit more manic, swinging from doting grandson to cold killer. RC: I think we teach him as much as he teaches us. He's picking up negotiating skills from Saul.ĮSQ: And it seems like encountering you and your crew is going to rub off on Saul just as profoundly. RC: Oh yeah, cause you learn from every person you come in contact with. ![]() ĮSQ: He's probably studying and picking things up from them to. Every day he's dealing with life and death issues on a violent level, but all of a sudden he comes into contact with these people who want to talk to him. So there's a lot of playfulness in the character. ![]() He finds Walter White amusing and his approach to Tuco. He just doesn't take shit from anyone.ĮSQ: It's a compliment even that the guy to eventually take Tuco down was, in fact, smarter than everyone. He's very street smart and he's got great common sense. RC: Yes, you have to be to survive in that kind of business. My part on Major Crimes is very physical, so I always have to be in physical shape. Even on Major Crimes, all I mostly wear is an anti-shine. It's an intense character.ĮSQ: But physically, they didn't even dye your hair? But you can see his base is just ferocious. But when he's on the drug in Breaking Bad, then you realize it's heightened even more. So you realize he has anger issues, and his external display of how he feels he doesn't try to filter too much. The thing is, the difference between Tuco circa-2009 and what you say last is that he hadn't yet discovered the blue meth, the magic pill that alters his point of view because it heightens everything. Cause I'm so used to physically dominating someone, and to have to actually match wits and think about what he's saying, I find it amusing, so that's why I play along.ĮSQ: How did you try and differentiate 2002 Tuco from 2009 Tuco, especially now that it's 2015? RC: To Tuco, it's interesting and amusing. I do pretty much all my own stunts, so I get drained by the time I'm done shooting a scene.ĮSQ: So it must make sense to you that Tuco would be open-minded to Jimmy's negotiation of what's fair and just. It's a really difficult part, because it's so demanding mentally emotionally, physically. I look at it afterward and watch the show, I'm like, "He's a badass," but when I'm doing it I really don't think of it that way. What he thinks he's doing is right, so I don't really see him as being bad. I don't put those kinds of judgments on the character. It was interesting to go back and revisit the character after a certain amount of time.ĮSQ: Was it cathartic to take a break from Major Crimes and go back to being evil? And then when they were getting close to production, they called and asked if I would do the first two episodes. RAYMOND CRUZ: I heard they were makin' it, and I said, 'Wow, that's interesting,' cause I really liked Bob Odenkirk's character. We caught up with the man who is otherwise busy as Detective Sanchez on TNT's Major Crimes a few hours before the premiere of "Mijo" (Spanish for "my son," or how Tuco's none-the-wiser grandmother affectionately references him) and discussed Salamanca's second act, why Tuco isn't a bad guy, and Cruz's high threshold for blood and bone.ĮSQUIRE.COM: When did you first hear Better Call Saul was a go, and at what point were you looped into the process? It also gave us another chance to enjoy the work of Raymond Cruz, the veteran actor who so memorably portrayed the volatile Breaking Bad baddie, and see him incongruously don an apron while whipping up a mid-day meal. But as we know (or can quickly infer, if one hasn't seen Saul's predecessor), it would prove to be a fateful encounter for all involved. How Tuco and Walter White's future attorney arrived at a standoff in the New Mexico desert boiled down to a genuine misunderstanding (who would have thought that Tuco's grandma would drive the same car as an embezzling soccer mom?). Among them, none other than meth-snorting psychopath Tuco Salamanca, Breaking Bad's most colorful menace. On the second episode of Better Call Saul, our titular schlub (still known as Jimmy McGill) spends much of his time pleading for amnesty from a group of Mexican drug dealers.
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