If Zachary Quinto had his way, he would be returning to the second season of American Horror Story.

Quinto played Chad Warwick, the gay former owner of a spooky mansion, in four episodes of the first season of the new series.
In American Horror Story, the Harmon family (Dylan McDermott as Ben and Connie Britton as Vivien) moves from Boston to Los Angeles after a miscarriage and affair rock their family. But the mansion into which they move is anything but healing.

“I had an amazing time and I only did four episodes of the season,” said Quinto, “so it was just a little bit of an appetizer for me. I would love to work more.”

While the second season will feature a new storyline in a new location, Executive Producer Ryan Murphy has said that some of the season one cast members could return in different roles.

The Trevor Lifeline & Chat is a place where trained counselors are available 24/7 to assist young people who “are in crisis, feeling suicidal, or in need of a safe and judgment-free place to talk.”

Quinto shared a story about fifteen-year-old Corey, who had called a counselor from the woods where he had gone to kill himself. “He had a long history of suicide attempts…,” said Quinto. “On the call, he was sitting in the woods with a knife to his throat.”

The counselor was able to persuade to go home to get the help he needed. “Though Corey had suicidal thoughts and was very depressed early in the call, he began to express his intense interest in computer programming,” said Quinto. “The more that the Trevor counselor encouraged him and provided verbal affirmation of his talent, the more Corey opened up.

“By the end of the call, Corey was feeling good. He expressed to the counselor, ‘You probably saved my life with this call. You probably don’t know this, but you just gave me a lot of reasons to live.”

The Trevor Lifeline and TrevorChat website is located here.

http://youtu.be/d0519pSv84o

Quinto’s work on Margin Call, where he was one of the producers of the financial crisis thriller as well as one of the stars, led to learning new skills for the actor.

“It was like a master class every day,” said Quinto. “Even when I wasn’t working with a particular castmember, as a producer I had the luxury of being on set everyday and watching them work, and I really, really grew and learned a great deal. I imagine it would be impossible not to.”

Quinto would like to direct in the future, but admits that he’s not quite ready for do that just yet. “I’m a little ways off from it,” he said. “There’s still a lot of things I want to accomplish as an actor and producer, but it’s certainly an ambition that I have on my list of to-dos.”

What kind of movies would Quinto like to make? “Films that are intelligent, that are socially relevant, that are a little bit surprising,” he said, “that tell a story a little left of centre and have a little different perspective or point of entry, that are character driven and really rooted in connection and in honesty and integrity.”

Quinto will reprise his role of Spock when Star Trek 2 begins shooting next month.

“I would have never imagined that he wouldn’t come back or that…a lot of the key players wouldn’t have returned for the second one,” said Quinto. “But I guess it was a possibility, so that I’m glad there’s not doubt about that [ the Abrams return]. It’s really starting to ramp up in a big way…”

“I think it would be unimaginable to make that film without J.J.,” said Yelchin, “so to know that he’s going to be at the helm again and sort of manning the ship so to speak is pretty amazing,. We all have such tremendous respect for him and he’s such a brilliant human being that it gives you great confidence in going in to make this again…”

Both actors are preparing to reprise their roles as Spock and Chekov. “I think figuring out the point at which we reenter the story will be informative and define a lot about how I prepare for it,” said Quinto. “There’s a transformation that takes place as we get ready to start. And actually the physical part of it is pretty significant.”

“It’s going to be a lot of stuff,” said Yelchin, of his preparations to play Chekov. “It’s going to be going back and rewatching the shows and going back and looking at my notes on the original because I think there were insights that I wrote down and things that I studied and going back and rewatching the movies and…going back and watching the first movie that we made and studying what I did there to try and capture that and see…how I can combine the two.”

Some actors don’t mind unexpected publicity, but Quinto is not one of them. “…It’s like our culture is so rooted in voyeuristic obsession and the exposure of people’s lives in order to feel validated,” he said. “It’s terribly empty and sad. It leaves me with a diminished faith in humanity.”

Quinto once walked out on an interview for New York Magazine when the interviewer asked too many personal questions.

So if Quinto ends up breaking up a street fight as did Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson) a while back as reported by TMZ, he would prefer that the news of his involvement not get out. “I’ll step in and do my part,” he said. “I just don’t want to have it recorded. That’s the weird part, you know?”

Some actors have definite ideas on what they want their characters to do or how they want to see them develop, but Quinto is not one of them. “I just am excited to read what those guys have come up with,” he said, when asked what he would like to see when it comes to Spock.

“I have such implicit trust in their ability to tell compelling and dynamic stories that I’m just really eager to know where we’re going,”  Quinto added. “I’ll go wherever they take me. So, I’ll be interested and ready whenever the time comes.

And what about the Spock-Uhura romance and fan reaction to it? “I tend not to get too caught up in people’s reactions to stuff, creatively,” said Quinto. “For me, it worked one hundred percent in that movie. It created a different kind of dimension to both of those characters than we’ve ever seen in the Trek universe before. And there was a real undercurrent of heart to that part of the storyline, I thought. I’m actually really interested to see where it goes from here.”

Now working on American Horror Story, where he plays Chad, the former owner of a haunted house, Quinto’s next project after that will be Star Trek 2. “I’m going to be in full prep for the next Trek movie by the time I get back to L.A. in November,” he said. “I’ll finish American Horror Story in that time and then we start (Star Trek 2) in January.”

Quinto made the decision to come out after the suicide of fourteen-year-old Jamey Rodemeyer, and he hopes that his decision to come out publically will make people stop and think and act when it comes to prejudice and bullying. “We have to change the discourse and we have to let people know that there’s a real spirit of openness and acceptance, and not of judgment and hatred and intolerance,” he said. “And if me standing up and making this declaration in any way feeds that notion, then I’m even happier to do it.”

Star Trek fans have joined with others in giving Quinto their support after his announcement. “I have been met with nothing but support, from everyone, in the past couple of days since I made that announcement,” he said. “My Star Trek fans have always been incredibly supportive of everything that I’ve done, and I’m certainly glad to see that that remains the case. I’m just really overwhelmed by and grateful for the unanimous outpouring of love and encouragement from literally all over the world, which I did not anticipate when I made that announcement. I did not imagine what an impact it would have, and from the feedback I’ve gotten, what a positive impact it’s been.”

Asked if it was time for Star Trek to include a gay character, Quinto said that that would depend upon the motives for including one. “Oh…I don’t know the answer to that question,” he said. “Not just for the sake of having one. But if there’s a way to incorporate that aspect of our social structure in a creatively integrous way, then I certainly wouldn’t be opposed to it. But I’m not a big fan of doing anything just for the sake of doing it, so I think there’d have to be a real undercurrent of purpose if that was the case, and I mean creatively, not just politically.”

Speaking of Star Trek, according to Cinema Blend, Quinto is ready for the next Trek movie. Star Trek 2 is on the “imminent horizon,” said Quinto, and as soon as he finishes his publicity tour for Margin Call, he will, he said, “go back to L.A. after this trip and start to prep for it and we go in the beginning of the year and so everything’s gearing up.”

His role of Louis Ironson in Angels in America as the boyfriend of a man with AIDS who cannot deal with the changes that AIDS has brought to their relationship was “the most challenging thing I’ve ever done as an adult,” said Quinto, “and the most rewarding.”

Working in Angels in America, an AIDS-themed play, made Quinto realize how fortunate he is to live in these modern times. “Doing that play made me realize how lucky I was to be born when I was born and to not have to witness the decimation of an entire generation of amazingly talented and otherwise vital men,” he said. “And at the same time, as a gay man, it made me feel like there’s still so much work to be done, and there’s still so many things that need to be looked at and addressed.”

The recent suicide of fourteen-year-old Jamey Rodemeyer, after years of anti-gay bullying by fellow students, shook up Quinto. “When I found out that Jamey Rodemeyer killed himself – I felt deeply troubled,” said Quinto via his blog. “But when I found out that Jamey Rodemeyer had made an ‘It Gets Better‘ video only months before taking his own life – I felt indescribable despair.”

“I also made an ‘It Gets Better‘ video last year in the wake of the senseless and tragic gay teen suicides that were sweeping the nation at the time,” said Quinto, “but in light of Jamey’s death, it became clear to me in an instant that living a gay life without publicly acknowledging it is simply not enough to make any significant contribution to the immense work that lies ahead on the road to complete equality.

“Our society needs to recognize the unstoppable momentum toward unequivocal civil equality for every gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered citizen of this country. Gay kids need to stop killing themselves because they are made to feel worthless by cruel and relentless bullying. Parents need to teach their children principles of respect and acceptance.”

“We are witnessing an enormous shift of collective consciousness throughout the world. We are at the precipice of great transformation within our culture and government. I believe in the power of intention to change the landscape of our society, and it is my intention to live an authentic life of compassion and integrity and action.”

“Jamey Rodemeyer’s life changed mine. And while his death only makes me wish that I had done this sooner; I am eternally grateful to him for being the catalyst for change within me. Now I can only hope to serve as the same catalyst for even one other person in this world. That, I believe, is all that we can ask of ourselves and of each other.”

In Margin Call, Quinto plays a “hotshot rocket scientist-type” on Wall Street” who is the first one to see the 2008 financial meltdown coming. And in Star Trek XI, he was the cerebral Spock.

“I’m totally OK with being ‘the smart guy’ in the movies,” said the Carnegie Mellon-educated Quinto. “I’ve always been interested in being challenged by intellectually stimulating material. So if that puts me in the category of actors offered that kind of material, I’m happy.”

In Margin Call, the mindsets behind the 2008 financial meltdown are revealed, and the decisions made by those who saw it coming are shown. These decisions have everything to do with self-interest which does not necessary have anything to do with “ethics, morality, or human kindness.”

Quinto liked the fact that in Margin Call, “Nobody really gets raked over the coals; nobody is lionized. It really just presents an exploration of the human impact that these actions had on people who were somehow responsible for the decisions. It lets the audience formulate its own opinion, maybe generating a little dialogue afterward.

“I wanted to make a movie that requires people to really invest – no pun intended – to connect with the characters as the story unfolds. It doesn’t necessarily do the work for you. That’s something I value as a storyteller and as someone who goes to see stories told, I like when my participation, my close attention, is required.”

Margin Call opens October 21.

Quinto also spoke briefly about Star Trek 2, which will begin filming next year. “I’m starting to shift into that mode of preparation,” he said. “I have physical training and other ways of prepping for it. None of us have seen the script. We’re all very curious to see where he’s taking us this time. We’re going on rumors, little hints here and there, stories we’ve been told.”

Quinto is up for the role of Chad on FX’s “psychosexual thriller” American Horror Story, where he would play the gay former owner of a spooky mansion who befriends one of the new owners.

In American Horror Story, the Harmon family (Dylan McDermott as Ben and Connie Britton as Vivien) moves from Boston to Los Angeles after a miscarriage and affair rock their family. But the mansion into which they move is anything but healing.

Some of the characters that will be haunting the Harmons include “a burning man, a man in a rubber suit, a creepy maid and a nosy neighbor.”

Quinto is expected to first appear in a two-part Halloween episode.

American Horror Story premieres on FX on October 5.

http://youtu.be/JOugYXSfNow