EXCLUSIVE: Shawn Hatosy On Benjamin McKenzie: 'He Scratched My Face'

Shawn Hatosy and Benjamin McKenzie got a little too close for comfort recently on the set of the TNT crime drama Southland.

“The other day [McKenzie] scratched my face in a scene, it couldn’t have been placed more perfectly right on the center of my nose,” Hatosy told Uinterview exclusively. “I have the scab. I look like Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer. It was because he didn’t cut his fingernails. So, we have this ongoing joke where I tell him his nails are too long. But we’ve spent so much time together that this is the type of thing we have with each another. My nose is still bloody that you can’t even f*cking cover it for all the other rest of the episodes to shoot. He then did a scene with an actor, who came in and had a stunt to do, and the guy scratched his face, and he was complaining about it, he was like, ‘You don’t scratch the main character’s face. You don’t just do that!’ And I looked at him with my big red nose and was like, 'Yeah!'”

It’s a good thing Hatosy and McKenzie can still get along even after a few scrapes because they spend an inordinate amount of time together on set. In fact, Hatosy rarely shares the camera with any of the other Southland stars.

"This show is interesting because there are four of us, but I only work with Ben. I think I’ve been in one scene with Michael Cudiltz, and maybe like two or three times before in a scene with Regina [King], and that’s pretty crazy since we’ve been around for 40 episodes. Ben and I have now done 12-13 episodes together, and we’ve become very close.”

Southland airs Wednesdays on TNT at 10 p.m. ET. Check out Uinterview’s full interview with Hatosy here. —Hal Sundt