NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

British actress on ‘Burn Notice’ says she’s conflicted about violence

new york

Gun-toting vixen Fiona takes great pleasure in firing off guns and explosions in the TV series “Burn Notice.”

But the woman who plays her isn’t comfortable with that. Actress Gabrielle Anwar says she’s “adverse to any kind of weaponry and violence.”

The 41-year-old British-born actress describes herself as an “ardent pacifist” and says she has a “really hard time” with handling weapons that sometime come from the military and may have been used in actual warfare.

The USA Network show, airing Thursdays at 9 p.m., describes Fiona as the “trigger-happy ex-girlfriend” of Michael Weston (Jeffrey Donovan), a spy is stranded in Miami after he’s discredited or “burned.” Among those he turns to for help is Fiona, a former IRA operative with a violent streak.

Fiona knows her weapons, but Anwar does not. She says she is “faking everything” she does with weapons. The show’s prop master instructs her on how to look like she knows what she’s doing and “how not to fire the gun by mistake,” she says, noting there are often live weapons on set.

Anwar has a 10-year-old son and says she worries about glamorizing violence. She says it “bugs” her on a “personal level” when her son visits the set and sees her in heels and makeup shooting people.

She admits she’s “in denial” over the conflict.

‘Breaking Bad’ actor breaks out

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No matter how bad life gets for Aaron Paul’s character on “Breaking Bad,” it’s hard to hold it against him.

He plays Jesse Pinkman, a drug-dealing slacker turned (spoiler alert) murderer in the show’s fourth season.

He works with his former high school chemistry teacher Walter White, played by Bryan Cranston, to produce meth. Cranston’s character has cancer and turned to the drug trade to provide for his family after he dies. As a job in meth would have it, he’s gotten more sinister over the course of the show, too.

Many fans find something good about Jesse, and he’s someone they’re rooting for.

Critics and Emmy voters are also rooting for 31-year-old Paul. He has been nominated for an Emmy twice and won in 2010 in the Best Supporting Actor category for his work on the show.

Associated Press