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Northerner John Schneider accepts typecasting as a Southerner
Sunday, April 16, 2000 By Rob Owen, Post-Gazette TV Editor
He was born in Mount Kisco, N.Y., but John Schneider just can't get away from playing Southerners.
Whether it's his most famous role, Bo Duke on "The Dukes of Hazzard," or his part as a Confederate captain in the musical "The Civil War," Schneider keeps getting cast as Johnny Reb.
Unlike some actors who cringe at the thought of playing one type too often, Schneider embraces his appeal, even if he can't explain it.
"It's a very odd thing," he said in a phone interview from his office near Burbank, Calif. "It must be the way I walk or something."
Schneider walks onto the stage of Heinz Hall Tuesday, as "The Civil War" touring company pulls into Pittsburgh for six nights of performances. Some actors with his credits might be tempted to try playing a Union soldier, but not Schneider.
"I don't think anybody would see it," he said. "I've played against type in television shows and movies, and none of them seemed to stick like the ones where I play someone from the South."
Schneider said the obvious reason is that Bo Duke is locked so firmly in people's minds, they simply can't see him as a Yankee.
"The only people who believe I'm not from there is anyone on the opposite side of my opinion on 'Politically Incorrect,' " he said. "They know I'm from New York."
Schneider will be seen on TV in a two-hour "Diagnosis Murder" episode at 8 p.m. May 11, and he'd like to return to series television because it would allow him to spend more time at home with his family. But for the next five weeks, he'll be on the road fighting the War Between the States in various cities.
Schneider said he's always been interested in the Civil War, which he calls "one of the most misrepresented periods of our history, the most oversimplified period of our history.
"Rich people owned slaves. Rich people don't fight wars. They don't pick up a gun and go out in a gully and fight. They do whatever made them rich," Schneider said. "In the Civil War, it's white people, lower- to middle-class, who went out with their guns and fought the Civil War. You cannot make a logical connection between a man leaving his wife and children to go out and risk his life on either side of the Mason-Dixon line for someone else's right to own a black man or woman. It does not make sense to me: How can someone fight for something that does not affect them?"
He said the musical "The Civil War" challenges audiences by asking tough questions patrons will have to answer for themselves.
"It's not a simple show. It's not a show where you come out and go, 'Oh wow, what a nice, light evening.' This is a pretty heavy, impactful night of musical theater, and I like that."
Schneider plays a Confederate captain who mourns the last waltz of Dixie on the eve of the final battle of the war.
"I know it's a lost cause, and it's a very heavy moment," he said. "People are not used to heavy moments with me. It's usually just, 'Do I jump the bridge or the creek?' That's been the extent of my decision-making in the past."
And in the future.
Schneider returns as his signature character in "The Dukes of Hazzard: Hazzard in Hollywood," a two-hour TV movie airing May 19 at 8 p.m. on CBS. This time, Bo and Luke (Tom Wopat, now on Broadway in "Annie Get Your Gun") go to Hollywood to sell recordings of musical performances in Hazzard to raise money for a new hospital. Along the way, the Dukes get exposed to a multicultural environment the likes of which these "good ol' boys" have never before seen.
Schneider's favorite scene involves the Dukes halting their pursuit of a thief when they see a guy getting pummeled by a gang.
"We see something over there happening that's unfair, and we disregard our best interests and go over and help this other guy," he said. "For me, that's the part of the 'Dukes of Hazzard' that stuck with you whether you know it or not. I don't think you can find another [pair of TV characters] that will throw aside their own best interests in order to help somebody else. That was the right thing to do because that's what Uncle Jesse [played by the late Denver Pyle] taught us."
But what would Uncle Jesse make over the debate about the Confederate flag that's raging in South Carolina? Or the one atop the General Lee, Bo and Luke's trusty '69 Charger?
"I really don't think anyone for a minute thinks there's a racist bone in Bo and Luke's bodies, and certainly not in Uncle Jesse's body," Schneider said. "There are those people who are intentionally taking offense to the flag on top of our car, but I think they are a minority."
Schneider said most people understand the intent of the flag on the General Lee, which he said differs from the intent of those who use the flag to inflame race relations.
"General Lee is still considered one of the most incredible strategists in the history of the United States, if not the world. No one will argue that on either side," he said. "When we're talking about a [stock car], which is what the Gen. Lee is [on 'Dukes of Hazzard'], we wanted to be the best and the fastest. It has nothing to do with running people through with the sword of bigotry.
"I'm not a Southerner waving a flag of discrimination; I'm a New Yorker saying let's examine this," he said. "On closer examination, unfortunately, we would find that racism and bigotry have lived and thrived under the real flag of the United States far longer than it ever lived under [the Confederate] flag."
Schneider will make a personal appearance at the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra's Curtain Call store, Downtown, from noon to 1 p.m. Wednesday.
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