Swingtown's Grant Show Must Go On

Grant Show flashes back to the '70s with the sleeper hit Swingtown (Thursdays at 10 pm/ET, CBS). We caught up with him for a quick chat.

TV Guide: As a '70s wife-swapper in CBS' Swingtown, you spend a lot of time half-dressed. Does that create any awkwardness on the set?
Grant Show: No, but I'm telling you, I have to go to the gym all the time now! I thought I was done with that! As a matter of fact, as soon as I'm done talking to you, I'm going to the gym.

TV Guide: God bless ya! Here's a burning question: Is the mustache real?
Show: Yeah. I've had it since February of last year. I get some funny looks. Recently I was sitting at a restaurant here in Hollywood and a couple of girls who I didn't know were talking with us, and one of them leaned over to my buddy and asked, "Is your friend a porn star?" It's a boom-chick-a-boom-boom mustache, that's for sure.

TV Guide: The Parents Television Council denounced the show, called it "sexually indulgent" and said it shouldn't be on broadcast TV. How do you respond?
Show: They have their ideas of what marriage is, and they're afraid that this is going to jeopardize that. I'm sorry, guys, but this is America, and we have a right to do what we want to do as well.

TV Guide: Still, do you ever wish Swingtown were on pay cable and you guys could really let your freak flags fly?
Show: No. I think being where we are, we're required to be a little bit more imaginative, and the focus on the show isn't on the sex. It's on the relationships and the ramifications of the sex. Melrose Placewas far more risqué than this show is.

TV Guide: That reminds me: Are you still in touch with any of the Melrosegang?
Show: Yeah. I talk to Heather [Locklear] once or twice a year. Daphne[Zuniga] I see as often as possible. Tom [Calabro] came into my restaurant the Happy Ending [in Hollywood] a few times this year. Doug [Savant] and Laura [Leighton] live right down the street from me, so I see them at the grocery store every once in a while.

TV Guide: Since you were born in 1962, did you grow up feeling like you were just a little too late, that the '70s were more like the hangover than the party?
Show: Yep. Although I really loved going to discos when I was a teenager. I did it every weekend. I only had one disco outfit, and I wore it every single weekend. There was still some leftover fun. Before AIDS. AIDS really killed the party.

TV Guide: Do you have any personal experience with open relationships?
Show: No. I don't know if I could do it. I wouldn't judge against it — I just don't know that I'm that… evolved.

TV Guide: How does your wife (actress Polyanna McIntosh) feel about the behavior on Swingtown?
Show: You know, I'm an actor, and she knows that. And most of the work I've done in my career has had some kind of sex base to it, so I think she's used to it.

TV Guide: Ah, the burden of being a hunk….
Show: [Laughs] At 46!

For more on Swingtown, watch our Video Q&A with Grant Show!

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