I Married an Alien
Actor Adam Rodriguez explains how his Roswell character Jesse Ramirez was thrust into the world of the teen aliens

Jesse Ramierez (Adam Rodriguez) arrived on the Roswell scene like an alien ship crash - landing on Earth. He came out of the blue and quickly made his mark. Only Ramirez is a human interacting with aliens. And he doesn't know it. That's to say that the lawyer fell in love with and quickly wed Isabel Evans (Katherine Heigl), the lovely and significantly younger former blonde, without realizing that she - not to mention her brother Max (Jason Behr) and their pal Michael (Brendan Fehr) - hails from the planet Antar.

"He was definitely thrown in there and thrown into this whirlwind affair," Rodriguez acknowledges. "I think it was pretty cool of the writers and producers to go ahead, add this guy in and get right down to business. My first day of work, I walked in and my very first scene was a kissing scene with Katherine Heigl. That's not a bad thing at all. Who would mind coming into work to do that? But it's the way the whole introduction of the character has been: boom, here you go! Swallow him now, digest him later. It's been fun. I like what they're doing with the character. I like what's been going on with the show. I like Jesse and Isabel as a couple. She's certainly mature for her age because, number one, she's an alien. Number two, the alien kids have a tremendous responsibility knowing they're aliens and having to hide that from the world, and they have to watch every step they take. It gives them all reasons to be more mature than the average 18- or 19-year-old.

"I think that Jesse is also somebody who has, in his life, had to be very careful about every step he takes and has always had to do the right thing. He's had to do everything by the book to get ahead, at least as far as he sees it, so far as going to school, leaving Roswell and working hard at Cornell and then Harvard. He has a sense of maturity because of all that, plus he is older than Isabel by a few years, So they have this maturity in common. They're both very focused and they both feel like outsiders or have felt like outsiders. I don't think a Jesse Ramirez is a common thing at Harvard Law School or at Cornell. And in the same way, Isabel, Michael and Max are not the norm for what's on the planet Earth. So that's the commonality and the connection between them. You've got the simple fact that they're physically attracted to each other and are in love."

As Rodriguez has very accurately noted, executive producer and main writer Jason Katims wasted little time pairing off Jesse and Isabel. Roswell's third season had barely started when Kyle (Nick Wechsler) caught Jesse and Isabel making out. Things got even hotter thereafter and then in To Have and to Hold, they tied the knot. So what's on tap as the season continues to unfold? "We're on our honeymoon and certain obstacles are in our way," Rodriguez replies. "Some people tried to prevent us from getting married. Some people are trying to get in the way now that we are married. So we've got some really funny moments, some really dramatic moments and some intense moments where decisions have to be made about how much we really want to be with each other. Her parents aren't happy about us being together. Max isn't happy about it. Michael's not happy about it. And there are other people and beings who are not happy about us being together. So we're trying to overcome it all and prove to everybody that we really are in love with each other."

Of course there's still that major fly in the ointment: Jesse doesn't realize that Isabel's not from around here. "I don't know how long they're going to run with that storyline," Rodriguez says. "She's got this thing where she's got to hide it from me. It's her big secret. It's also a huge dilemma for her to decide whether or not to tell me. Once she tells me. My life will change forever regardless of what I decide to do, regardless of whether I decide to stay or leave. It's a big deal. I don't know how long it'll play out, but it's very interesting. It adds tension to everything that goes on for her. She's afraid I might run and she's also afraid that it might put me in danger, of in more danger than it's already putting me in. Jesse's just oblivious, which makes it funny."

Prior to stepping onto the Roswell set to play Jesse, Rodriguez knew nothing whatsoever about the series. He had to study, crash-course-style, all the fine details of a show laden with them. "I had to learn how they're from Antar, how Michael, Max and Isabel ended up on Earth, how they're mixed with alien and Human DNA and on and on," Rodriguez explains with a laugh. "The whole back-story was really cool. At first it was difficult to follow it all, especially some of the characters. People kept asking me if I was going to be Kivar. I didn't know who the hell Kivar was. Then I found out who he was and what happened there. So little by little I got more and more of the story, and I love to hear it. I like SF. It's fun. I love the fact that possibilities are endless and that you can always find a way to justify something. That makes a story entertaining. You believe all the crazy things the aliens can do because they're aliens. Any Human would love to do what they do. Since we can't, it's fun to watch them do it."

A native New Yorker, Rodriguez's early credits include a role as a regular on the series Brooklyn South, and guest spots on NYPD Blue, Law and Order, Ryan Caulfield: Year One and Resurrection Boulevard. He took a recruiting role on Felicity as well as a small part in the music video for the Jennifer Lopez song "If You Had My Love" and also the upcoming independent feature Rikki the Pig, which re-images Richard III in modern-day Los Angeles. The actor was also a regular on cancelled genre series All Souls. Rodriguez played Patrick Fortado, the wheelchair-bound computer whiz and best friend to Mitchell Grace (Grayson McCouch), the medic at a haunted hospital. Unfortunately, All Souls dies a quick death on UPN last season. "Oh man, you know what?" Rodriguez asks rhetorically, "I really loved that show. I thought it was great. The pilot was the only episode that I actually saw. My manager just got me the tapes of the other episodes and I'm going to watch all of them. But I loved doing the show. I think the problem with All Souls was that it was just a little ahead of its time. A year or two from now, I think people would eat it up. We really didn't get much promotion. But I thought it was something cool and really different. It was an ER meets The X-Files kind of thing. I thought that all the characters were really interesting and that what was going on in the hospital was really scary and worth checking out. I still don't understand what happened, to be honest. Everything happens for a reason. I'm doing Roswell now and I'm super-happy with that."

Roswell could well go the way of All Souls if its current home, UPN, decides that the railings don't actually warrant its continued investment in the show, which the network picked up off the scrap heap after The WB wielded the cancellation axe. And even if UPN gives the show a green light to conclude its third season, there's no guarantee that Jesse will remain in the picture. "I don't want to be presumptuous at all. But it looks as if I'll be around all season," Ramirez says, and make no mistake, he wants to stick around. He describes his co-stars as "very cool and very welcoming," and saves extra praise for Heigl, whom he describes as "a very good actress, lots of fun and very sweet". Then there's the simple fact that any other actor wants to keep working. And finally, there's the reality that just as there are very few students at Harvard and Cornell with names that sound like Jesse Ramirez, there are also very few working actors in Hollywood whose names sound like Adam Rodriguez. "That's true and it's a gross misrepresentation of what's here in America," Rodriguez elaborates. "There are a lot of Adam Rodriguezes out there. They're just not represented in Hollywood, unfortunately, and that's part of what I hope to bring to the table as my career progresses. I'd like to bring the Adam Rodriguezes of the world to the forefront and just provide a positive example for people and a positive representation of the Adam Rodriguezes that are out there. Jesse wasn't written as a Hispanic character. None of the other actors who came in to audition were Hispanic. I just happened to be, in the eyes of the producers, the best guy for the job. And that's great. That's the way it should be."

THANK YOU STACEY (Gingerhipi@aol.com) FOR SENDING ME THIS ARTICLE! :)