‘Mayor of Kingstown’ Star Lennie James on Frank Moses’ Wild Introduction and Power Move With Bunny (Exclusive)

[Warning: The following post contains spoilers for Mayor of Kingstown Season 3 Episode 1-3.]

The introduction of Lennie James‘ Frank Moses has been one for the ages on Mayor of Kingstown, setting the tone for a very eventful season indeed. The Season 4 premiere opened with the Detroit-based businessman casually talking about the makeup of a copper penny while waiting for a train to arrive and behead the remaining crew of Russian gangsters that were hog-tied on the tracks.

After that, Frank made his intentions in coming to Kingstown clear by seeking a working relationship with Bunny (Tobi Bamtefa) and, eventually, Mike McLusky (Jeremy Renner). The most recent episode, “People Who Died,” saw Frank giving Bunny a tour of his train depot as a lens on his operation and giving him an offer: Frank would deliver Bunny’s contraband by hiding it in boxes of refuse because the authorities just don’t sift through cars full of garbage. And Frank’s decades of legitimacy and staying off the radar more than proved his mettle at this game. He also offered to help settle some scores for Bunny (whom he defiantly insisted on calling Deverin) after an attack on his Grape Street Watts crew by the Colombian cartel in return for Bunny’s trust, which Frank knew he’d still have to earn. The episode ended with a counterattack on the Colombians’ headquarters with a flamethrower flaying people throughout the house… until one guy got away and fired back, with disastrous results.

To break down this sizzling character introduction — and get a sense of what else we can expect from Frank Moses — TV Insider caught up with Lennie James himself.

Your character starts out this season of Mayor of Kingstown with a bang — or more like a splat.

Lennie James: [Laughs.] Or a squish!

Yeah, exactly. How did you feel about that introduction and kicking off the season on such a violent note?

I thought it was a hell of a way to introduce a character. It was, it seems, a fitting way to introduce that character to this particular show. I actually had a conversation with Dave Erickson, the showrunner, about whether or not it was revealing too much about Frank too early on. I had a conversation with him and Hugh [Dillon, cocreator] about it. And actually, in the end, they were right about it, and I wasn’t, and I recognize that. I think it’s a hell of a, “How do you do?”

Yeah, sure is. It seems like there may be a little bit more significance to the copper penny thing that’s going on in that scene. Just out of curiosity, did you think that that token meant something to him more than we see?

Yes, it does. [Laughs.] I can’t really say more than that.

He’s also got some really funny quirks, like he’s singing “She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain” right before he’s having a huge business meeting. What’s it like to play this character with his many facets, where he’s at once kind of humorous and also very, very dangerous?

I loved it really, because that’s the trick of playing Frank Moses and bringing him to light. So if you’re putting the character together, you try — I do anyways, I try — and first focus on the facts about them, and whether it’s a fact or it’s not a fact, it is part of the legend of Frank Moses, is that he is from Detroit. He’s an old-school gangster who’s been at it for a very long time. He’s been at the top of the game for a very long time, and has never been to prison and has never been arrested. They’ve never put the cuffs on him. So it’s my job to create a man for whom that is true, and the way I went —because, as you say, there are so many facets to him — is to make him as almost as disarming as is humanly possible. Even when he’s doing a heinous thing, like having a train run over four men’s heads and decapitating them, he’s at the same time talking about the makeup of the penny and how much zinc and tin and iron is in there. And so once you’re given those tools to play, you just riff as much as you can. And the way that he’s dressed, the fact that he’s a glasses-wearing fellow, the fact that he’s full of advice and wants to mentor Bunny, all of those things are just a joy to play, as opposed to him just being the threatening, scary gangster.

Dennis P. Mong Jr. / Paramount +

Now that you mentioned Bunny, I’m glad you did. What do you think he really is drawn to about Bunny and wanting to work with him the way he is? And there’s this conversation that they have about trust. Does he trust anyone, let alone Bunny?

If he’s gonna trust anyone, it may well be Bunny. But you know, as they say, I think I saw or I read either Jeremy or Hugh said it, which is, “Beware of the man who’s grown old in a trade where the expectation is to die young.” And that you could probably put on Frank’s gravestone. I think what attracts him to Bunny is what attracts him to anything right now. It’s to prove that he’s still up to the game. It’s to prove that he’s still able to compete, able to do the job. I think that’s important for him, as he reaches a point in the game where he may well outlive it, that he may well be able to retire, which is rare for people who do what he does.

I want to talk about how he uses Bunny’s real name. It seems like he’s doing it as a sign of affection, but I read it a little bit as a power move. Where do you fall on the line of that?

It’s both. I think he means it to show affection, but it’s also a power move. It’s also a, “I know who you are because I’m going to use the name that your mother gave you.” And yeah, it is a power move… He says “Bunny,” but he references it being a rabbit. And rabbits are there to run… It’s almost like he’s saying, “That’s no name for a grown man. You’re not a Bunny. You’re a Deverin. Be Deverin because that’s who you’re going to be in the future.” And Frank has no nickname. He’s Frank Moses, and he’s constantly trying to see whether or not Bunny has the skills to be him, to be the next Frank.

I also wanted to talk about the scene with Mike. So Mike is dealing with someone who won’t work with him and respect his authority in Nina, the new warden. And then Frank comes in, and he does want to work with him. Can you just talk about establishing that dynamic with Jeremy and their push-pull? It’s not really trusting or anything, but it’s interesting, it’s respectful.

I think you’ve almost answered it in your question, really. I mean, I think generally, Jeremy knows Frank and Mike McLusky inside out. And when he comes on set, and we’re going at it, you’re meeting that guy. You’re meeting that guy’s energy, which is a very different energy than Jeremy has himself. So you’re instantly in the company of McLusky, and my job was to put Frank Moses in the company of Jeremy, so that those two could just go at it. And we found our dynamic by playing the scenes. We didn’t have a huge amount of time. Literally, finished a job on Saturday, got on a plane on Sunday, landed in Pittsburgh on Monday, and was filming with Jeremy on Tuesday. So there wasn’t a huge amount of room for us to navigate it. We just had to trust that we had — or that I had — done my homework, and I came ready to meet Mike McLusky as Frank Moses, and luckily, because Jeremy is such a fine actor, man, it was made easy for me with his help.

Frank mentions that he hasn’t lost anyone in a while, and then we see Bunny lose the Grape folks that were on his team there and then during the invasion of the Colombians, that ends badly. Is he going to hesitate at all going forward, seeing that there is this bloodshed that he’s kind of getting into with this team?

Yes, he is. He is going to have pause. He is going to have a moment where he’s forced to check himself.

Mayor of Kingstown, Sundays, Paramount+