Ben Schnetzer: Deputy Van shares the Clyburns’ grief in ‘The Madison’

NEW YORK, March 21 (UPI) — Pride, 3 Body Problem, Happy Town and Y: The Last Man actor Ben Schnetzer says his character’s own personal pain helps him instantly connect to the family at the heart of The Madison.

The last three episodes of the contemporary drama became available on Paramount+ Saturday.

Schnetzer plays Van Davis, a Montana sheriff’s deputy and widower who unexpectedly falls in love with Abby (Beau Garrett), a New Yorker visiting the rural area with her mother Stacy (Michelle Pfeiffer) and sister Paige (Elle Chapman) after family patriarch Preston (Kurt Russell) dies in a plane crash.

“Van is a dutiful and obliging member of his community and public servant and, through a series of events, gets enmeshed with the Clyburns and forms a very unlikely bond with them through shared grief,” Schnetzer told UPI in a recent Zoom interview.

“Van has a bit of an absence of judgment when he meets people that he’s probably developed through his line of work,” he said.

“I think that’s something that’s very inviting and refreshing to the Clyburns when they come to this place and to be encounter by people for whom being a neighbor really means something. They experience that, I imagine, for the first time.”

Schnetzer said he admires how Van is a man rooted in his community, not someone who feels trapped by it.

“Your place in your community is a responsibility. It’s a privilege. It’s a purpose. In this part of the world, you’ve got to show up for each other because living in nature that is as powerful as this is, you depend on one another to survive,” he explained.

“Just because it’s simple doesn’t mean it’s easy,” he added.

Abby brings a bit of “spark” to his life that Van didn’t think he’d have again after losing his wife.

“That really draws him in. I think there’s a wildness to her that he is very, very compelled and intrigued by,” the actor said.

“These are people from totally disparate worlds, yet they find a counterpoint in the other and I think they find a common ground in their shared grief and that brings them together.”