The Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson, September 27, 2007 (transcript of Marg’s appearance on the show)

THE LATE, LATE SHOW WITH CRAIG FERGUSON – TRANSCRIPT OF MARG’S INTERVIEW

Craig: My first guest today is a fantastic actress. She stars on the mega hit show ‘CSI.’ The 8th season starts tomorrow at 9 o’clock right here on CBS. Take a look at this.

(clip from CSI is shown)

Craig: Marg Helgenberger everybody!

Marg: Thank you! Hi!
Marg: What a cool crowd!
Craig: Aren’t they lovely?
Marg: They are.
Craig: Yes, they’re very nice people. And how lovely to see you!
Marg: You too Craig!
Craig: You look lovely. You look absolutely lovely!
Marg: Thank you!
Craig: A little softer than you look on the show if you don’t mind me saying so. No, you don’t look like so arrrghhh (makes a fierce face) you know, got to get it done.
Marg: Well, yeah and I always have on tight pants.
Craig: Yeah. I’m not against the whole tight pants thing, but ah, but this is lovely. This is a lovely…
Marg: No. Thank you! I seldom wear skirts on that show.
Craig: Yeah, yeah, why?
Marg: ‘Cause I’m always like crouching down, picking up… you know?
Craig: Exactly my point!
Marg: (laughs)
Craig: Eight seasons you’ve been doing this thing…
Marg: It’s about time that I crouch down in a skirt, isn’t it?
Craig: Well, anytime you can make it, Marg. I’m good.
Marg: (laughs)

Craig: What about the… do you get bored after eight years of doing the same?
Marg: The answer to that would be yes (laughs). But, honestly, you know what, when you do a long show, as I’m sure you will learn, ‘cause this is your third year?
Craig: Third year, yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve done six hundred of these or something…
Marg: You know, it becomes about, it’s so much it becomes about the people, you know, that you hope you love all the people in whatever profession that you work…
Craig: I routinely every six weeks fire them all.
Marg: To keep it fresh, I understand that.
Craig: Keeps, keeps, keeps everyone on their toes.
Marg: Absolutely!
Craig: Yeah.
Marg: You know, you need that edge.
Craig: Do you have a lot of different, you’ve worked with the same people for these eight years?
Marg: It’s been the same cast and a lot of the same crew and many of the same writers. Of course, you know, we spun-off on two, two other shows…
Craig: Yes, CSI Miami and CSI “can’t believe there’s no butter”, CSI…
Marg: (laughs)

Craig: All of these CSI’s… it’s a huge deal though.
Marg: The show really started, kind of started, this all new genre of forensics…
Craig: Yeah, yeah, yeah I know the procedure all draws us in…
Marg: Yeah, the procedural for… and is forensics.
Craig: Forensics thing…
Marg: Specifically, yeah.
Craig: You do a lot of a blood spatter business.
Marg: That seemed to be my specialty when I was first starting off, now… and then it became like umm finding, illuminating proteins. You know what I mean by that, right?
Craig: I don’t have any idea what you mean by that.
Marg: (laughs)
Craig: Why is it everybody…
Marg: I’ll get in trouble if I say what it is. I got in trouble once for saying what I did, but…
Craig: Oh, I see!
Marg: Can I use a euphemism for…
Craig: Proteins!
Marg: For proteins, for, for sperm. I used a euphemism that wasn’t quite, I guess appropriate for… it was at another late night show, wasn’t yours, but…
Craig: There is another one?
Marg: (laughs) It’s not on anymore.
Craig: Oh, it was?
Marg: (laughs)
Craig: Pat Sajak?! You’ve been going that long?
Marg: (laughs)
Craig: Marg! That’s a miracle, I know. So you’re the expert on the… do you know anything about this stuff really? I mean…
Marg: Oh, yeah, well I do now, yeah, yes.
Craig: Right, did you pick it up?
Marg: Yeah, yes, but we have, you know, we’re having to say a lot of the same things. (rolls her sleeves)

Craig: Are you gonna beat me up? Why are you rolling your sleeves up? What’s going on?
Marg: I don’t know why.
Craig: I’ve had enough of this crap, buddy (pretends to roll sleeves). Come on! (shakes fists)
Marg: I see why you keep it cool in here. It was cold out there though, but it’s kind of warming up in here, isn’t it?
Craig: Oh no, it’s cold everywhere else. It’s just gonna warm up here, that’s all I’m saying.
Marg: I know. It’s your presence.
Craig: That’s it.
Marg: Aha.
Craig: It was the whole conversation about crouching down in the skirt. It went in a different direction.
Marg: And sperm (laughs).
Craig: Then I thought it was gonna go.
Marg: Crouching down in the skirt and sperm.
Craig: Yeah, yeah. Now, how was (laughs)…
Marg: That’s where it took a turn.
Craig: That’s where it took a turn.
Marg: Heat it up! (laughs)

Craig: How’s your husband and your young son? How are things there?
Marg: They are really good.
Craig: Yeah, how’s, I was…
Marg: My son is a senior in high school now.
Craig: Stop! Really?
Marg: Yeah, so I ahh…
Craig: You must’ve had him when you were ten!
Marg: Oh well, yeah, I did. You know, it’s like the empty nest thing is, I’m, I’m, I’m, I have to face that now.
Craig: You have been going to colleges. Yeah.
Marg: Yeah.
Craig: Where is he gonna go?
Marg: I’m not sure ‘cause, you know, the quote-unquote experts now tell you to umm shoot for ten schools, apply to ten different schools…
Craig: Right.
Marg: Elite schools, safety schools, schools in between…
Craig: Yeah.
Marg: I don’t know, he wants a big school, big…
Craig: What does he wanna do? Does he know what he wants?
Marg: … like Division One athletics, would it… it doesn’t, he doesn’t know what he wants to do.
Craig: Right, well then he’ll definitely have to go to school.
Marg: (laughs) Yeah.
Craig: You gotta fill the time until you can think of what you’re gonna do. That’s what it’s all about!
Marg: I know, exactly! Yeah.

Craig: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did you, did you do the whole college thing? Did you go? Did you study and…
Marg: I did, I went to college. Both my husband and I are college graduates, so we are very, you know, encouraging him.
Craig: What did you do, what did you study in college?
Marg: I did. I studied theater.
Craig: Really?
Marg: Yes, I did. I went to Northwestern and… which is a great school and I’d love it for him to go there, but it’s a hard school to get into these days.
Craig: Is it really?
Marg: Well, it was then too, but it really is now.
Craig: And you’re from, where are you from?
Marg: I’m from the Midwest, I’m from Nebraska.
Craig: That, that I see, you look, your outfit is a little bit Midwest. I like it. It’s very, yeah.
Marg: Really? Does it speak? It’s saying…
Craig: Yeah, I know, it’s, it’s kind of like “come on in and get some hot griddly cakes” now, you know that, I can…
Marg: (laughs) Griddly cakes.
Craig: That’s how it is in my head anyway, yeah (laughs).
Marg: (laughs)
Craig: Yeah.
Marg: Sausages, I guess, would’ve been from Nebraska, yeah.
Craig: And sausages are fine too, yeah, yeah, yeah. Now, you’re from the…whereabouts in the Midwest are you from?
Marg: Nebraska, very tiny little town, a rural town, called North Bend.
Craig: Do you go back there a lot?
Marg: A fair amount, yes, yes.
Craig: North Bend is the name of the town, lovely name.

Marg: North Bend, Nebraska. I actually have a, my street, a street named after me in my hometown in North Bend.
Craig: Stop it!
Marg: Helgenberger Avenue. Yes, the street, the corner in which I grew up.
Craig: They named a street after you?
Marg: Yeah!
Craig: I’ve got a street named after me in Glasgow, Drunk Road, right over there.
Marg: (laughs)
Craig: Drunk and Loser, I’m right in the corner of Drunk and Loser.
Craig: That’s quite an honor though, a street named after you. That’s amazing.
Marg: Well, it was really sweet actually. It was very, you know, ‘cause the school…there was a program at the high school. It’s a tiny town, twelve hundred people and they had done a program of some scenes that I had done when I was in high school, the kids had worked up you know. It was very sweet.
Craig: And were you an expert on proteins back then? Or were you just ahh…
Marg: No . No. (laughs)
(audience laughs)
Craig: Oh stop, I didn’t mean that! (to the audience)
Craig: God, they’re… so how did you…
Marg: Well I guess we took them down that road, didn’t we?
Craig: Well we did, that’s of course, yeah.

Craig: Do you, when, when this is all done, when you finish with the, with the show, will you stay in L.A.? Or would you think you’ll go back to the Midwest and just like come out and do movies and stuff and then go back there? What do you think?
Marg: I don’t anticipate moving back to the Midwest. Perhaps Chicago though, ‘cause I went to school in Chicago, yes, and you know, they have a really lively community theater in Chicago and it’s a great city.
Craig: Yeah.
Marg: But I’d, I had probably be more of a sort of urban, I’m, I don’t know, I…
Craig: You like, do you watch football ‘cause…
Marg: I fantasized about cities when I was growing up.
Craig: Really?
Marg: Yeah, I guess ‘cause I had, I had such the opposite experience.
Craig: To point out Los Angeles, just point to the rough area where you’d like to go.
Marg: I know. I actually didn’t fantasize about L.A., I thought I’d fantasize about it, you know.
Craig: Do you like it here? Do you enjoy it?
Marg: I, you know, L.A. has been really good to me and I, I…
Craig: Yes, I know. A lot of people say bad things about it but I…
Marg: They always do! It’s, it gets a bad rap a lot of the time.
Craig: Well, I think people late… it seems more sophisticated if you’re bitter. You know what I mean? You always, you always seem like “Oh, he must be smart ‘cause he’s very bad tempered”…
Marg: Yeah, I get it.
Craig: You know, it’s like a front that people put up “Oh yeah, I hate everything cause I’m so brainy”. It’s just rubbish.
Marg: Yes, I know.
Craig: It’s rubbish, yeah. Are you quite a cheerful person, or are you grumpy?
Marg: I’m on the whole, I suppose, I’m more on the cheerful side.
Craig: Yeah.
Marg: But, you know, when I make, when I’m back to myself in my own, you know, private moments, I suppose I’m sort of more (makes a grimacing face).
Craig: Really?
Marg: Yeah, yeah.
Craig: I think all artists are a bit like that, don’t you think?
Marg: Yeah, I guess so.
Craig: Like a big kind of “hmm God everything is so sad”.
Marg: (laughs) Yeah, it’s the comedy-tragedy thing.
Craig: Comedy-tragedy. You know, when I’m not on the air, I walk around and say “oh God” (makes a grumpy face).
Marg: It’s broo, brooding, like a brooding thing.
Craig: Sometimes during the monologue, I’m like “oh God” (makes a grumpy face again).
Marg: (laughs) But they think it’s an act, and they think it’s funny.
Craig: Oh no no no, that’s when I’m doing the (makes the face again and mumbles).
Marg: (laughs)

Craig: But listen, I, I’m so excited for this show starting again.
Marg: You are?
Craig: It’s a monster success!
Marg: Oh, thank you!
Craig: And you are fabulous in it, well done! Largely due I think to your presence on the show.
Marg: Oh, thank you!
Craig: Marg Helgenberger everybody! We’ll be right back!

*A special thanks goes out to Andry for transcribing this interview*