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Tavis: Jason Clarke stars in perhaps the summer's most acclaimed new TV show, 'Brotherhood.' The Showtime series follows the lives of two brothers on opposite sides of the law in Providence, Rhode Island. It airs Sunday nights at 10:00 PM. Here now a scene from Showtime's 'Brotherhood.'

Tavis: I don't know how you Aussies do it, but you lose those accents so nicely. (Laughs) Congratulations on that.

Jason Clarke: Thank you very much.

Tavis: (Laughs) How are you?

Clarke: I'm good, I'm good. It's my birthday.

Tavis: It's your - happy birthday to you.

Clarke: Thank you very much.

Tavis: Let me shake your hand again. (Laughs) We got a cake anywhere? Anyway.

Clarke: I'm well.

Tavis: You are well. It's a blessing to be around another year, that's a good thing.

Clarke: It is. It is, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tavis: It's a good thing. And things are going well for you on the show.

Clarke: Things are going very well. Yeah, my father used to tell me that another year above the ground is a good one.

Tavis: Yeah, exactly. Your father was here not long ago.

Clarke: My father was here when we finished shooting the series.

Tavis: When you finished shooting the series. We'll talk about the series in just a second. (unintelligible) Showtime happy. But your dad first, 'cause without your dad, you wouldn't be here celebrating another birthday.

Clarke: No. (Laughs)

Tavis: So we'll start with your dad. Your dad was here visiting after you shot the series.

Clarke: Yeah, he came and watched the last week of shooting, yeah.

Tavis: And you guys drove around the country, I'm told, for, like, three weeks.

Clarke: Yeah, we did.

Tavis: And you didn't stop in my home state of Indiana. (Laughs) How did you go all across the country and didn't get to Indiana?

Clarke: I know, I know, I know. We had a look at the map, and we worked (unintelligible) north or south or straight through the middle. And we kind of, and we wanted - he wanted to see the Grand Canyon. There's a couple of things that he really wanted to see. And we wanted to go horse riding down in Texas. And we went down there, and Indiana just didn't make it.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs)

Clarke: Where should I have gone?

Tavis: (Laughs) Oh, man. We'll talk about that off camera. Now, we don't have a Grand Canyon, we got potholes, but we don't have a Grand Canyon in Indiana. So you made the right choice. Was that your dad's first trip Stateside?

Clarke: He'd been here really quickly to Denver. My sister married an American. And they lived in Denver for a few years. So he'd been over there then. But yeah, that was pretty much the first time he'd seen America.

Tavis: He must have enjoyed that, though. You and your dad, for three weeks, traveling all across country.

Clarke: Yeah, it can get pretty weird in a car with your old man for three weeks, (laughs) I've gotta tell you. But he did, he loved it, yeah. He kind of, he loved it. We ended up in Vegas. We went down the Appalachians, we went to Nashville and had some ribs, and he'd never really experienced ribs, so we ribbed our way across Tennessee there for a while. (Laughs) And then ended up in Vegas, which he found very surreal. My father's a (unintelligible)...

Tavis: Wait, wait, wait. You went to Vegas and not Indiana? Just teasing. Just teasing, yeah.

Clarke: But my dad's a really working class, he's a sheep shearer, so he was pretty kind of - he was blown away by the whole, just the variation and the size of this place.

Tavis: Now, either I read or my producer or somebody told me, your father, to your point, is a sheep shearer. He literally is a sheep shearer.

Clarke: He shears sheep, yeah.

Tavis: Shears sheep.

Clarke: Yeah.

Tavis: Say that fast five times. He shears sheep.

Clarke: Shears sheep. (Laughs)

Tavis: So I'm told that when he came to visit you on the set, your father had some interesting remarks to make to you (laughs) about stealing money? Did I hear this correct?

Clarke: Well, Dad gets paid per sheep that he shears, and it's not very much. And so yeah, when he came on set, and you get fed, and somebody brings you a water, and you get up and you shoot a wide shot, and you sit down for an hour (unintelligible), yeah, he came up and he said, Son, you're stealing money.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs) Only a father who's a sheep shearer could say something like that.

Clarke: Well, his hands are huge. They're all callused, 'cause he's just, he's been working (unintelligible). So, mine are soft.

Tavis: Yeah. And he's watching you sit around a Hollywood set and do nothing.

Clarke: Steal money, yeah, yeah.

Tavis: And steal money.

Clarke: Yeah, I'll have some more of that salmon, thanks.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs) So, did you ever try the sheep shearing thing?

Clarke: I kind of did it as a kid, yeah. When I messed up a bit at university, they sent me out to the sheds to a rouseabout, which is where you pick up the fleeces and skirtle the edges, get all the rough stuff off them. And yeah, I did three months of that, on a thing called the hotron. (sp?) And I had, like, six nosebleeds in three days, it was that hot. It was so hot. And I pretty much knew what I didn't wanna do.

Tavis: Yeah.

Clarke: No way.

Tavis: Did that experience, and even your father coming now to see what you do for a living, does that make you appreciate more what your father has done all these years?

Clarke: Of course it does, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I still remember watching my father shear a sheep, and I remember I was 20, no, I was 22. And I'm watching him; I'm just thinking this is just no way to live a life. You're a donkey, basically. He's just busting his back. And so, for many years, I just wanted to get away from my father. I just wanted nothing to do with that type of life. I wanted to educate myself. And then, yeah, I kind of take my hat off to my father. He's got more resilience than I've shown for a while, yeah.

Tavis: Yeah. Well, I think this goes down in history as the first time I've had a guest whose father was a sheep shearer on this show. (Laughs) So you've made history on your birthday on our show, and I'm glad to have you here.

Clarke: Glad to do it.

Tavis: Tell me about 'Brotherhood.'

Clarke: Yes.

Tavis: Yeah, tell me about it.

Clarke: Well, it's good. We got called a masterpiece. You gotta be happy with that.

Tavis: Gotta be good with that, yeah.

Clarke: I don't think I've been called a master - been involved in something that's been a masterpiece before, so I'm kind of chuffed. We had a ball. All the guys and the girls and the people that work on the show, they're all friends. It's been quite remarkable. If I have a party or I wanna get together with people, I think about the friends that I want to invite, I ring the people that I work with. And I kind of, I love that. The show itself, I kind of, I got up each day and couldn't wait to get started.

Tavis: You play the good brother, though.

Clarke: I play the good brother, yes, the politician with three little girls.

Tavis: Right.

Clarke: And a loving, if promiscuous, wife.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs) I like the way you said that, a loving, so yeah, in the series.

Clarke: I still love her, even though she's promiscuous.

Tavis: Yeah, yeah. In the series, your wife is having an affair.

Clarke: She is having an affair, yeah. It still hurts, Tavis.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs) Your brother, you're the good guy, you're the politician.

Clarke: I'm the good guy. Yeah, I'm (unintelligible).

Tavis: Although these days in America, politician doesn't always equate to good guy.

Clarke: It doesn't. And that's kind of - I was very cynical about politics and politicians before I started this, and I spent a lot of time working with the politicians in Rhode Island. They were very, very generous to me. They opened their doors...

Tavis: So you did some research, then.

Clarke: Did a lot of research, yeah. The Speaker of the House basically kicked it off by just introducing me to everybody, from the Governor to the chief of police to the mayor to the youngest representative in the House. And I got to know American politics from the inside, basically. By watching them pass the budget, by sitting in their back room deal meetings, and by meeting the lobbyists, and sitting in when lobbyists would come in, by going to golf with them, and by door knocking.

I actually canvassed for a couple of politicians out there, knocking on doors, telling how we're gonna make it a better neighborhood for them. And so at the end of it, I came away with a lot more respect for politicians. It is a really complex, murky - it's just so complex, the issues you have to deal with. From passing a casino bill to getting somebody's tree removed from the front of their house in the same day.

Tavis: What specifically made you come out of the process with greater respect, when you started out with cynicism?

Clarke: Just how involving it is. You kind of, it takes over your life. It's no mistake that I think a lot of politicians end up gray-haired. And a lot of it's probably their own fault. You go down, you make your choices, you go along. But just watching the young guys and the old guys, and just seeing that they've devoted a lot of their whole life.

Tavis: And I would assume, I don't know, I haven't checked on this, but I would assume the folk in Rhode Island, those elected officials don't make a lot of money, either.

Clarke: No, they don't. Well, it's only six months, part time.

Tavis: Oh, it's only six months of the year; it's part time, exactly.

Clarke: Yeah, they get $12,000. And always (unintelligible), you'll be driving along the road somewhere, and somebody will just stand in front of you and wave you down, 'cause they wanted to tell you about their mail hasn't been coming on time or something. (Laughs) They wanna give you some information, or tell you how they feel. It's kind of, I walked away thinking that these people do work very hard. And I understood that essentially, it starts off as service. Where it goes from there is not always pretty.

Tavis: So what can you tell us about how this relationship is navigated between you and this brother who's on the other side of the law? It's one thing to go after somebody, to engage someone who is an outlaw who happens not to be an in-law. But this guy, if I can put it that way, is your blood brother.

Clarke: Yeah. I think it's the ultimate compromise. It's the ultimate in just a complex nature of two sides of one coin. You can't have me without having him, in a way. And so, I guess Tommy starts off, particular when my brother comes back, 'cause I'm compromised. And therefore, I work and drive myself so much harder to do good, to make a difference, to make my family name one that I can be proud of.

And we all can be proud of. And then there's the other side of the fence, where my brother is actually a weapon as well. I can use him to get certain things, be it a union boss that needs his arm twisting, or a whole bunch of things. And if I find out who's sleeping with my wife, I'll (laughs) (unintelligible). Listen, Mike, there's a small issue with this postman.

Tavis: That is an interesting twist. Not to say that in TV and in movies, we haven't seen this other side of the story. But typically, in the world of politics, certainly, what we hear and what we get and what typically happens is - first of all, there are more men in politics. Women are doing much better.

Clarke: Yeah, absolutely, yeah.

Tavis: In the Senate and other places, but not nearly as well as they should be. So it's always the man who's having the affair with the intern at the office, or whatever the case may be. But this is a fascinating twist on your character.

Clarke: Well, I'm being cuckolded, basically. (Laughs) (unintelligible) give me some kind of dream sequence or something, I don't know. But yeah, being made a (laughs) - there was a talk of somebody else coming in and sleeping with her. I just thought, dudes, we gotta sit down here. You can't make me look too bad.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs)

Clarke: No, it is an interesting twist, and I kind of don't really know what's gonna happen. Towards the end, she was reaching a place where she was maybe gonna tell me, I'm not sure. So yeah, I'd be very fascinated to see what goes on.

Tavis: If this thing doesn't work, it won't be for lack of promotion. I have seen this (laughs) series promoted, like, everywhere.

Clarke: Oh, good. Good.

Tavis: Yeah, there's just a lot of buzz on it.

Clarke: No, Showtime has worked very hard, yeah.

Tavis: They really have, yeah.

Clarke: And it is nice to see. If people are spending money, you know that they believe in it, as well. If they're prepared to put their dollars where their...

Tavis: So what are you guys drinking in Australia that has every one of you guys becoming, like, major thespians?

Clarke: Major thespians? Well, we're actually still drinking the water that doesn't come out of the bottle. We're still drinking out of the tap down there. I think maybe that's it.

Tavis: That must be what it is.

Clarke: Yeah, we're not paying for our water. (Laughs) And there's no work down there. We kind of - I've gotta say, we're lucky.

Tavis: Hey, there's always sheep shearing.

Clarke: Dude, no. No, no, no.

Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs)

Clarke: No, no, no, no, no. I couldn't do that.

Tavis: Not for you.

Clarke: But we're lucky to have America here, and a business that does open its arms to us, as well. We really are. 'Cause we've got a very small business down there, and it's hard to make a living. And so, I'm very grateful.

Tavis: Well, as you should be, as we are that you are in 'Brotherhood' on Showtime.

Clarke: Thank you very much, Tavis.

Tavis: Nice to meet you, Jason.

Clarke: Lovely to meet you.

Tavis: It's a pleasure. That's our show for tonight. Catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International, check your local listings. See you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from Los Angeles, thanks for watching, and as always, keep the faith.