“They are lunatics, aren’t they? Absolute lunatics.”
That’s what English actor Paul Blackthorne has to say about the fans of “24.” But it’s clear from his voice that he means it in the nicest possible way. The feeling’s probably not mutual considering he plays the dashing, yet despicable Stephen Saunders — the terrorist brain behind this season’s virus attack.
“It’s been happening a lot that people have been noticing me and looking at me in a slightly unnerved way,” he says.
It’s not the first time. It happened a few years back, the actor says, when he was making the promotional rounds for the Oscar-nominated Bollywood blockbuster “Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India,” in which he played an arrogant colonial official.
“A lot of India loves to hate me and now it seems to be half of America.”
Could be more, depending on how Fox ends this season. But Blackthorne already has plans to skip the country — for soccer, not for fear of “24” fans.
“I’m going back to the old country to watch England play in the European championships. I imagine the fever is just now starting up.”
