Nick Creegan on Law & Order Organized Crime, Batwoman and Interviewing Derek Jeter
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“There are certain scenes in Batwoman where I'm playing the Joker, and I have to go to dark places, but I always remember that I've been to dark places in real life, and I've been able to still be joyous and happy outside of it.”
Photographs by Ammar Thomas
Your experience in front of the camera started as a journalist. You studied journalism at the University of Albany. Do you think your on-camera experience telling stories as a journalist helped prepare you to tell stories as an actor?
Yeah, I would say that it did for sure. I feel like being on camera as a journalist, I had to be number one, quick on my feet. It was some improv involved. There are certain times when there was no teleprompter so it all came, from my head. You had to be good at asking questions. With that, it translated into acting. Whenever I would get a script, I would have to ask myself questions about the character, who is this character? What's his story? Where does he come from? So journalism helped me in terms of my introspective skills. Also, if I was having a bad day as a journalist, I couldn't let that show, on camera. It's the same thing with acting, you have to put your personal life aside and dive into your actual work, so they're very similar, believe it or not.
During your time as a journalist, I read, I think on Backstage, that at that time, being a sports journalist felt like a part of your dream. Did you have any memorable interviews with any pro athletes?
It was probably with Derek Jeter. I got to interview him when he retired from baseball, he was transitioning into owning the Players Tribune and starting that and talking about going into MLB team ownership. Derek and I had an awesome conversation, and I'm a huge Yankee fan and grew up a Derek Jeter fan so that was a full-circle moment. Another interview I had was with Alvin Kamara, who played for the Saints. He and I had a conversation just about life and our upbringing, and how similar our upbringings were, both of our mothers being immigrants and how they raised us. So yeah, I got to talk to some great athletes, but the best conversations weren't about sports, they were more so about just life overall.
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Your oxtail gravy skit is the one that went viral and it kind of help give your acting career some trajectory. How many skits did you make before that? Were you cranking skits out like really taking IG content seriously?
I wasn't doing them super often. I was doing skits whenever it felt right. Honestly, whenever I had a gut feeling about a skit, if I got an idea, then I would just record it and see what happens. The Jamaican character started maybe three videos before the Oxtail gravy skit. I made a video about this woman being super shocked that I had a Jamaican accent when I ordered food, she thought I was Puerto Rican. I made a video about that and I started to see that people were enjoying this. I made a second and a third, and the fourth one was the oxtail gravy skit. These skits were all spread out probably over about six months, so I was doing like one every two months.
You started the skits as a creative outlet for you to get yourself back into acting you once did in college. In hindsight, do you see acting as your purpose?
It’s interesting, I feel like I have more than one purpose. I don't see myself as just a one-dimensional type of person. I feel like I don't look at life or time as linear. I feel like at different times in our lives we do different things. For the time being, journalism was the outlet I was supposed to be going down. I think it led me to this point. I feel like acting is my current outlet. I love to inspire people. I love to motivate people. I feel like my story is pretty unique and pretty inspirational in the sense of it doesn't matter where you start it's where you finish. I feel like, right now it's acting, but, you know, 10 years from now I have no clue what it might be. It might be directing, or it might be Documentary Film Producing. I also enjoy motivational speaking. So I think acting is just one of my purposes, but I don't think I have a singular purpose.
We can find you in two very iconic franchises, and I'm going to start with Law & Order: Organized Crime. Onset when we were talking, you said that you weren't necessarily aware of the hype around Law & Order. Now that you've been on Law & Order, do you understand the fanfare? What was it like to just be a part of Organized Crime?
Well, I think being a part of Law & Order: Organized Crime, just the Law & Order franchise is one of the dreams of any New York-based actor. I feel like most actors have gone through the Law & Order universe. For me, it just kind of solidified me as a New York actor. I think that's one of the questions people might ask one day, 'Have they ever done any New York procedural shows,' especially Law & Order. The fact that I can check that off means a lot to me. I got meaningful relationships out of it as well. Dylan McDermott is one of my mentors and close friends and I got to work alongside some amazing people. Danielle Truitt is one of my close friends. Law & Order professionally was a great opportunity, but personally, it also meant a lot to me because I gained some meaningful relationships from it.
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Then, Batwoman. The first thing I noticed was how black and brown the cast was. I've never seen a Batman show in the franchise with so many black people. Is that something that you noticed on set and how were the energy and vibes on set for Batwoman?
Yeah, I noticed that. Before I got to set or even auditioned for the show, I like you, scrolling through HBO Max one day, and I saw Javicia’s face with the Batwoman costume on and I'm like, wow, that's a black woman superhero. That's pretty dope. I checked out some of the episodes, and then I got the audition and I realized I was going to be playing her brother if I was to get this role so I was excited about that. I get on set and the first scene is myself, Javicia, Lesley, and Robin Givens and I'm just like, wow, look at this, this is insane! I've watched Boomerang growing up and now Robin Givens is playing my mom. The directors and the writers, the other actors, it was just clear that diversity and inclusion on all sides of the spectrum were very important to the creator and showrunner. When you looked around, you saw so many different faces and people. The energy itself was just very inclusive as well. Just because diversity is a part of somebody's initiative doesn't mean that there's going to be a good vibe on set. You can have black and brown people and different types of people and there still be negative energy offset. So the cool thing about this was, that there was diversity, and important representation, but also just good energy and kindness on set, as well. The vibes were amazing. I loved working with that crew. I'm waiting to see if we get to season four. I have a feeling we will. I hope we get to season four because working with those people was one of the best experiences I've had.
Dope! Also, you play the Joker on Batwoman, which to me is just as iconic as Batman. It's a sinister role and people who've played the Joker in the past dive into that role. How are you able to decompress and separate yourself from maybe some of the depression or more gory things that go into playing the Joker.
I noticed early on that I'm the type of artist that can go to dark places and come out of it. I think a lot of that has to do with the life that I've had. I've dealt with loss pretty early on in life. I had to deal with my best friend, my grandmother passed away in 2017. It was one of the hardest things I've had to deal with, and I had to realize that it's a part of life, and I just had to kind of like, like, adjust, and keep going. I learned to appreciate the fact that she was around when she was, and then a year after that, my cousin, who was like a brother to me, passed away, he was 26 so I've dealt with very depressing situations outside of the art, and I used the art as an outlet to release. There are certain scenes in Batwoman where I'm playing the Joker, and I have to go to dark places, but I always remember that I've been to dark places in real life, and I've been able to still be joyous and happy outside of it. So I look at art as an opportunity to go to these places and use the art as a therapy tool, and an outlet to think about these things, release, take some of that emotion and have a healthy place to put it. When I leave set I do some meditation, I pray, and I have therapists. I do a lot of self-work and soul work to prepare myself for the darkness that comes with a role. But, it doesn't affect me once I leave work, I leave it there, and I try not to bring it with me. In the same way, when I come to work, I don't bring my personal life into it as well.
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One thing that you just mentioned is personal care and how you maintain your mental health. I was watching an interview on YouTube, and you talked about how the pandemic was great for you because you were able to kind of work on things like your meditation, eating healthy and stuff like that. Now that things are back up running and moving, have you maintained those habits that you picked up during the lockdown?
I'll be honest, I feel like when I was doing all of that work during the pandemic, it was easier to focus on that because nothing was going on. But once the world started again, and everything got busy, I did kind of lose track of all that for a second, but I remembered how good it felt to be centered and to be focused. I incorporated a lot of personal care into my everyday life, as opposed to how I was living before the pandemic. I've been able to gain some healthy habits, but I'm still you know, I'm not perfect. It's not an easy road to stay consistent with all of those things, but at least now I'm mindful that I've been able to do them and I know that I can always get back to it. I'm trying to figure out the work-life balance on all of those things because they're very important. If you don't have yourself right it's impossible to thrive outside of that. I believe in trying to be as intentional as possible with my mental state, and what I put into my body nutritiously and spiritually. That's a big part of my life, and I try to practice that even when I'm on social media. I try my best to stay as consistent as possible, but it's not easy, I will say that.
Looking at your resume, and your career trajectory, you're doing your thing. You've been able to take on some roles --some iconic-- and be a part of some dope franchises. What type of roles are you manifesting for yourself in the future?
Well, I really would love to, being that I've played a villain on TV, play a villain on the big screen. I would love to play like a cool villain. Whether it be in the DC world or the Marvel world on the movie screen, I would also love to play a superhero. I would love to be a Marvel superhero one day, that would be awesome. Being in an Avengers movie would be great. And then outside of that, I want to play in a comedy. I want to do some fun comedy stuff too because I think I'm naturally a funny person and a very energetic person. I want to be able to show that on the screen as well. I definitely want to be in some awesome films. There are some actors and actresses that I would love to work with. I would love for Viola Davis to play my mother in a project one day. I would love it if I got to act alongside Denzel Washington being that we're from the same area in New York. I think that'd be awesome. So yeah, there are a lot of roles that I'm trying to manifest for myself, but those are the ones that come to mind right away.
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Photographer: Ammar Thomas @manmeetsstyle
Styling & Interview: Nigel Isaiah @nigel_isaiah
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