‘Sons of Anarchy’ Star Timothy V. Murphy Talks The Mystery Surrounding His ‘Bastard Executioner’ Role

Although he is set to play an important part in Kurt Sutter’s newest series, The Bastard Executioner, former Sons of Anarchy star Timothy V. Murphy has remained fairly mum about the details of his new part. While little is known about his mysterious part in the medieval drama, Murphy recently discussed some aspects of his role as Father Ruskin in an interview with UPI.

The Bastard Executioner centers on the story of a warrior knight named Wilkin Brattle (Lee Jones), who retires to a life of peace after years of violence and warfare. However, his life is soon changed after his village is destroyed and burnt to the ground. Following this event, Brattle changes his identity to Gawain Maddox and becomes a traveling executioner. From here, he comes into contact with Father Ruskin (Murphy) at Castle Ventris.

Beyond the fact that Ruskin is a priest who acts as the local man of God, little else is known how his storyline will develop as the season progresses. When asked how much he knows about his character’s future, Murphy admitted that Sutter keeps things close to vest when it comes to plot details.

“They don’t tell you too much in advance what’s happening with the character,” he stated.

Even still, Murphy did relay a few points about his character in the new drama and hinted that his character would play a large part in the overall story line. “Because religion was such a strong part of the Middle Ages and, I suppose, throughout the centuries, my character was definitely moved to the forefront,” he stated. “He is like a mystery character right now, but he is very much part of the show that goes on.”

Although his role is primarily as a priest, Murphy revealed that all of the cast members, no matter the role, had to go through special training in order to prepare for the show.

“Everybody [in the cast] went to ‘knight school.’ You were riding horses and playing with knives and swords and stuff,” he explained. “Whether you were going to be doing that [on screen,] one never knew. But everybody was sent to knight school for a couple of weeks.”

The first few episodes of The Bastard Executioner have already aired, but there is still a lot of mystery as far as the story lines of a lot of the characters are concerned. With that in mind, Murphy addressed this issue and promised fans that more would be revealed as the story develops.

“I can’t tell you much about the plot, but everybody has a back story. It’s very hard to include everybody in the first [2-hour] episode and see where they are coming from, so a lot of the mystery characters,” he stated in the interview. “I think, in the first episode, you will learn more about them as you go along.”

Meanwhile, this is not the first time Sutter and Murphy have worked together. As many may recall, Murphy played the role of Galen O’Shay through the sixth season of Sutter’s hit biker drama, Sons of Anarchy.

As far as working with Sutter is concerned, Murphy stated that he was thrilled to be given the opportunity.

“I was delighted. I love the guy. He’s great,” Murphy said of Sutter. “It’s fantastic to be working with him again. He’s so talented. It was one of my favorite experiences — working on Sons of Anarchy with him. I’m really enjoying this, as well.”

The Bastard Executioner, which also stars Katey Sagal (Sons of Anarchy), Stephen Moyer (True Blood), Sutter, and Flora Spencer-Longhurst continues Tuesday nights on FX.

[Image Courtesy: FX]