Ride with Norman Reedus
Norman Reedus, everyone’s favorite bike-riding zombie-killing bad boy from The Walking Dead, recently took his new show Ride with Norman Reedus through Savannah. In an exclusive interview, South magazine gets his thoughts on the Hostess City, life on the road, and which of his co-stars he’d throw to the zombies.
Savannah’s social-media scene was ablaze this past February with the news that Norman Reedus and Dave Chappelle had been spotted at Rancho Alegre chowing down on some of the restaurant’s signature Cuban food. It turned out the pair was in town filming the AMC show Ride with Norman Reedus, which pairs the actor with a different companion each week for a two-wheeled travelogue down some of the country’s most beautiful roads.
With shooting on the second season wrapped and the first episode airing Nov. 5 (following the Oct. 22 premiere of The Walking Dead’s eighth season), we chatted with the multi-faceted actor and artist to discuss both of his shows, some of his favorite places to ride, and his best memories from the road.
South: You’re usually all over the place, so where are you these days?
Norman Reedus: I’m in New York at the moment. I had a little time off so I came back to New York to get my kid ready for school. He’s starting school tomorrow.
We’re done at Thanksgiving on the show (Walking Dead) and I don’t shoot Ride until January. That’s why we’re always picking the warmest locations. There are so many places around the United States I’d love to go, but it’s freezing…. We do have a New York episode, though, and we were so worried we were going to get caught up in the snowstorm or something, but it worked out. It was a little cold, but you ride in the cold, too.
“People say Walking Dead could go on forever — Ride would go on forever. You could do 20 years of this show and not hit everywhere.”
We did a New Mexico episode, which was actually really freezing as well, with Amy Nash who’s married to Ian (Astbury, lead singer of The Cult). We did that, we did Dave Chappelle, and we did one with Jeffrey Dean Morgan that we based around our press junket through Europe. So we shot that in Spain, Barcelona, and Sitgis. This season of Ride is really awesome.
South: What’s the reaction like on the street when someone sees Norman Reedus and Dave Chappelle hanging out in Savannah?
NR: They kinda geeked out, I won’t lie. It’s funny because I’ve known Dave for a while. When we were shooting the last season of Walking Dead, I had a little time so I’m walking around Manhattan through SoHo with a friend of mine and I hear “Norman!” I’m looking around and I see this guy cross the street and he goes, “Norman! It’s Dave Chappelle. I called AMC and I want to be on your motorcycle show!” and I’m like, “Done. You’re on.”
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