Lance Reddick has a history of playing authority figures, hard-ass leaders. Lt Cedric Daniels on HBO’s The Wire. Chief Irvin Irving on Amazon Prime Video’s Bosch. Homeland Security agent Philip Broyles on JJ Abrams’ Fringe — all characters you don’t mess with.

In the John Wick movies, Reddick, 56, plays a different kind of law enforcer. As Charon, The Continental Hotel’s mild-mannered concierge with the armour-piercing stare, he makes sure that no business is conducted at the assassin sanctuary.

Speaking to 8 DAYS from LA over the phone, Reddick let us in how he flexed his action muscles in John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum. (A week after our chat, the studio greenlit John Wick 4, due May 2021.)

He also shares his experience working on Corporate, the boardroom comedy where he plays a sociopathic CEO. “Generally, I find people under 40 recognise me for Corporate,” Reddick adds. “And people over 40 tend to recognise me for Bosch.”

Warning: This interview contains some spoilers!

8 DAYS: What was Charon like when you first read the John Wick script?

LANCE REDDICK: When I got the script for the very first film, the only thing said about Charon was that he’s African. So any kind of back story and personality that I brought to the character I based them on the situation he’s in. One of the things that [director] Chad Stahleski said to me on my first day of shooting on the first film, and this was something I’d thought before, I should get the feeling that as mild-mannered as Charon is, you should get the sense that if something went down, he could reach under the front desk and grab a shotgun and take care of business. And the other thing was that I wanted to bring elegance to the character, which was part of the reason why I went with the African accent. Because it was a quick turnover time — from the time I received the script to the time I got the offer to the time I had to shoot — which was about a little less than a week. I kinda wrecked my brains for models to based Charon on, psychologically, and what came to my mind, believe it or not, was Hector Elizondo’s concierge in Pretty Woman, and Alfred, Batman’s butler.

We get to see Charon use a shotgun in Chapter 3!

The shotgun is the most effective tool (laughs). One of the cool things in the third film for my character is that you get to see how just cool he is. You’ve seen the caretaker side of him as a concierge, but you also get to see his warrior side.

Do you think he was a hitman — in the ‘service’ sector — before moving up to management?

I questioned whether Charon has an extensive career as a hitman as John Wick did, but I do think he’s definitely killed people before [he was a concierge at the Continental] and that he’s been part of this world for decades and that the closest ties he probably has in this world is with Winston [played by Ian McShane].

At the end of Chapter 3, Charon made some decisions which make us wonder which side he’s on, John’s or Winston’s.

His greatest loyalty besides his family is to Winston. And I tried to convey in that rooftop scene: He may go with Winston because that’s where his loyalty is but he is not necessarily happy about it. At the end of the day, he’s a guy about loyalty and order.

What do you and Mr McShane talk about between takes?

A lot of people did not realise this but [Chapter 3] is the first time where Winston and Charon are onscreen together. In the first two films, they were never onscreen together; they only talked on the phone. Ian and I talked about acting. Ian is very political and he is very progressive. He’s a huge football fan. Politics is something we can talk about but European and American football is something we don’t talk about (laughs). I don’t know anything about his game and I don’t know much about American football because I am not much of a sports fan. When we were shooting [Chapter 3], the World Cup [in Russia] was actually going on while we were shooting Chapter 3, it seemed that everybody was on their phones following it.

What was firearms training like?

Actually, I have no firearms training before this film. So I know it’s hard to believe because I played a cop almost 15 years straight but the only training I ever got was two hours when I was working on The Guest. So this is the first time I got a lot of extensive gun training. It was daunting. I was not used to handling live firearms, so it was a little scary and intimidating. As far as the fight choreography was concerned, I didn’t have to go through the rigorous training that Keanu and Halle [Berry] did. They did a lot of training, not just for the stunts in the film but a lot of jujitsu training independently. By this point, Keanu has years of that kind of training. So for me, it was for more specific stunts and specific moves I was going to do. Unfortunately, a lot of which didn’t get into the film. It was rigorous but a lot of fun.

You also got to work with John's pitbull. Was he easy to work with? Was he a diva?

Well, dogs are little kids, very little kids. Their attention span, even if they are well-trained, can be short. It’s just like when you work with infants or very small children. You usually have to have twins so you can to switch them around and give each actor a break. John’s Pitbull is actually played by two dogs. I don’t know if I would call them divas, but they were wonderfully affectionate, playful and sometimes a pain in the butt because shooting their scenes took really long. In the scene where John returns to the Continental and he’s sitting upstairs with Zero [Mark Dacasco] and the dog comes up to greet him and keeps licking Keanu’s face. I’m not sure how much that was on purpose (laughs). I think it worked very well for the scene but I think he really loves Keanu and that’s why he couldn’t stop licking his face.

Chad Stahelski knows how to direct action, but how is he at directing the dramatic scenes?

Chad is a director who knows how to cast well that he doesn’t have to give a lot of acting directing. One of the things that’s interesting about working with Chad as a director is that if he likes what you’re doing, he’s not necessarily very effusive. He doesn’t say a lot about the acting when he likes what you’re doing. Clearly, from the way, the actors were cast and the acting in the film, he knows something [about directing drama]. Of course, I'm biased.

From one management role to another, let’s talk about your character Christian DeVille on the workplace comedy Corporate. You’re known for playing hard-ass leader-type characters like The Wire’s Lt Daniels and Fringe’s Philip Broyles. But your guest appearance on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia introduced you to a whole new fanbase.

In terms of getting more comedy offers on television, [the guest-starring role on It’s Always Sunny] was the beginning of doing it a lot it. Believe it or not, the thing that got me more notice was a Funny or Die skit called ‘Toys R Me’. I played a psychotic toy store owner, a megalomaniac. He’s very much like Christian Deville of Corporate. As a matter of fact, the creators — Pat Bishop, Matt Ingebretson, Jake Weisman — told me that the two things that inspired them to choose me [to play Deville]: one, they were huge Wire fans, the other thing, the ‘Toys R Me’ skit. If you haven’t seen that, I recommend it (laughs).

Who did you base DeVille on?

I didn’t base him on anyone. However, I did read the autobiography of Reginald Lewis, Why Should White Guys Have All The Fun? He died very young. He was a black billionaire in the 1980s and 1990s. Also at that time, coincidentally, I had been reading a book about psychopaths. [The definition of a] psychopath is and how it is defined has evolved over the past 20 years. Rather than listing specific traits you have or not, it’s more of a scale. The higher up you measure on the scale, the more psychopathic qualities you have. In terms of the groups of people that tend to score very high on the psychopath scale, corporate CEOs are definitely up there.

What did you learn about comedy working on Corporate?

Comedy tends to be more improvisational than drama, and that’s kind of daunting because I came from theatre where I tend to want to stick to what’s on the page. But that’s what really been good for me working on Corporate because some of [my cast-mates] are stand-up comedians or they come from the world of sketch comedy.

John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum (M18) is now in cinemas. You can stream Bosch on Amazon Prime Video and Corporate Season 1 on Comedy Central Play. Corporate Season 2 airs Thur & Fri on Comedy Central (Singtel TV Ch 324 & StarHub Ch 516 ), 10pm.

The interview has been edited and condensed.

Photos: TPG News/Click Photos, Golden Village/Lionsgate