Kirsten Vangsness Brings Levity to Criminal Minds as Penelope Garcia

Criminal Minds is a dark show. A great, fascinating, and smart show. But, a dark show. And without Kirsten Vangsness as Penelope Garcia providing some light in that darkness, the show wouldn't be nearly as fantastic as it is.

"I think she provides a certain kind of levity that nobody knew the show was going to need because no one knew it'd be a nightmare," Vangsness said of her character on the show. "She's so slick and so smart and such a geek rock star."

That's why, in the season one finale, The Fisher King Part 1, when Garcia had an emotional breakdown for accidentally allowing an unsub to crack into the BAU computers, the scene was so riveting. Garcia is usually so cheery and smiley and the one that provides the laughs. So it hurt viewers to see her break down.

"We did that scene and Mandy [Patinkin] totally went off the page and started screaming at me. I knew he was going to do it, but it was so helpful and actually kind of exciting... It was that moment where you forget for a second, 'Oh my god, I didn't really just bring my laptop into work and use the WiFi access...' In these moments the lines blur," Vangsness explained, referring to what she called "The Patinkin Factor." When you act with Mandy, she said, "You just rise to the occasion."

No matter if she's laughing or crying, Vangsness says of Garcia: "I love her so much I can't tell you."

In my interview with Paget Brewster, Brewster, who plays Emily Prentiss on Criminal Minds, said, "Garcia is Kirsten. Kirsten walks around with these magazines on computer animation and she's learning about computers... I can't speak highly enough of her. I think I have a crush on Garcia."

Vangsness laughed while responding, "I think I have a crush on Prentiss. Watch out for that storyline in season three!"

In describing the similarities between herself and Garcia, Vangsness said, "I haven't used my eighth grade math skills of Venn diagrams in a while, but if there was a Penelope Garcia and Kirsten Vangsness Venn diagram, the middle part would be really full."

Explaining more fully, she said, "My humor and all that is sort of a front. I'm like ridiculously sensitive and I know she's the same way. In terms of modalities and what comes easier to both of us, she's got a certain type of confidence I wish I could bottle, but I get to pretend like I have it for a few hours or so a day. And she's smart about technology in a way I'm not. And I come from a stock of people who use pencils and paper a lot. I've used a hardcopy journal since I was in fifth grade. I have an emotional intelligence she doesn't have. But we certainly live in the same village me and her."

Vangsness continued, "I do dress really strangely. My clothes seem to have more holes and soup stains than hers do. We're both incredibly nearsighted. Both of us think Shemar Moore is dreamy."

As for Garcia's relationship with Agent Morgan (Shemar Moore), Vangsness definitely thinks their flirtation will continue. "I know that what Garcia and Morgan have together is this fantastic alchemy that you can really live off for quite some time."

And, according to Vangsness, she doesn't think any other man will be getting in the way of that any time soon. "I would be quite curious to see who could rein Miss Thing in... She's so passionate about her job and writing code and all of that. That's really her first mistress. Anything else right now I think would be cheating on that. The technology is what she lusts after mainly."

Of course, that doesn't stop Garcia and Morgan from flirting during their phone conversations. Vangsness usually comes up with the nicknames she uses for him in those scenes. She joked, "I use a little inspiration. I make Shemar stand in good light and I gaze at him and make them up." Seriously though, "We get along in real life. I call him pet names anyway, and those tend to work."

One of the scenes that Vangsness most enjoys is one from the Guantanamo Bay episode Lessons Learned, when Hotchner and Morgan were in a house that exploded. When Garcia saw the explosion on the news, she tearfully called Morgan to see if he was okay. "That show was written by our Quantico advisor," Vangsness said. "It was a really great way to really make it clear how deep the waters run between Morgan and Garcia. I was very grateful to be able to do that scene."

Vangsness couldn't say enough good things about the rest of the cast as well. "I am in love with every single one of the people on our show. All six of them. They're all exactly their own person. One of the appeals of our show is that you've got people doing this job and each of them has their own demons and quirks and strengths and weirdness..."

Vangsness got cut off then because she saw Shemar Moore walk by and she commented, "Oh that's my little lovebug Shemar going up the stairs!"

It's not just the cast that makes Vangsness' heart flutter: "It's so much fun. I have the best part. I get to go to the writers and say, 'Can I say this instead of this?' They almost always say yes and when they don't it's because my idea was really lame. It's a safe enough place to do something really lame and feel okay if you mess up."

Although Vangsness knows Garcia well enough to know what she would typically say in a situation, so far the audience has not been privy to a Garcia back-story. "As far as people needing my back-story, I know it's very seductive... You watch a show that's got a character like Garcia, or like Chloe on 24, or Marshall on Alias. You think you want to know more about them, but the reality of it is..."

And that's when Vangsness gave me a fantastic explanation of why a Garcia back-story isn't necessary: "If Criminal Minds is a soup, I'm saffron. You only use a thread of it... You think you want more, but then it'll taste like f----- saffron. You put her on a slow burn and she runs for a really long time. I'm not some big flash; then it'd be over."

When I asked Vangsness about Garcia's upcoming storyline, she said, "I don't know, and you know what? To hear you say that my brain goes, 'You mean I might have a job next year?'...I've been waiting for the proverbial fat lady to sing... When my foot steps back onto the lot in July and they hand me a script, then I'll know I have a job next year."

For Garcia and Criminal Minds fans alike, it's impossible to imagine the show without her. Vangsness said, though, that "I've had many more years of rejection," so it's harder for her than the fans to acknowledge that she'll definitely be on set next season.

And with Vangsness being on set comes her blog on the CBS website. "I've written a one person show, I've written plays... I'm constantly writing in my journal and with Garcia being the technophile she is, it seems to be a good match."

Vangsness posts directly to the CBS blog herself - no one checks it beforehand. This aids in the blog's authenticity because it lets Garcia fans know that the woman behind the role is just as awesome. Yet she said, "Sometimes I have to watch it because you don't want to give away too much of yourself, but at the same time, I don't know how not to be myself."

While Vangsness may be typing the blog, an interesting factoid is that she's not typing in any of the scenes on Criminal Minds. She uses a gel keyboard on the show, and all the typing sounds are added in during post-production, because, Vangsness said, "When I'm nervous I bang [on the keyboard], so it sounds like two mallets."

Watching Vangsness on screen, it's hard to imagine she's actually nervous. Plus, she said she does all of her scenes in almost one take. "I'm a theater girl. I like to learn my lines last month... I work so hard on my lines. I'm the one take wonder." Being a one take wonder is probably fantastic for the crew, but it's not exactly Vangsness' favorite thing. "I don't get to do it again the next day... I watch it the next day and think 'Why did I do that?'"

That's because, like she said, Vangsness is a theater girl. And this summer she'll be performing at the Geffen Playhouse in Neil LaBute's Fat Pig. Vangsness was ecstatic to be cast in the role. She'd auditioned at Geffen many times, and this time, they called her and asked her to come in for an audition. "I get to do the same lines over and over and I get to do live theater again, which my soul is hungry for."

The play is about a good looking guy (Scott Wolf), who falls for an overweight woman (Vangsness), and how he has to deal with the terrible ways his co-workers react. "It explores all these issues of sizeism, which I struggle with myself. That's going to be fun. I get to wear 50 pounds of padding on my body," Vangsness said.

One has to wonder, how does anyone have the confidence to be in a play called Fat Pig? "I'm going to find out how you do that," Vangsness expressed. "I don't think I've done many things in my life I've had the confidence and bravery to do. Most things I've done in my life I don't think I've had the confidence or bravery to do. I think this is one of them."

She continued, "I've never been itty bitty in my life... I am a vegetarian, I exercise all the time, and here I am. This is the size I am... I got to audition for this part and I was really resistant to it... To do this play is such a gift because it's something I don't even understand myself. It'll help me understand it more."

As a huge Penelope Garcia fan, this was an interview I could not wait to do. It was a great pleasure to find out that Kirsten Vangsness is as wonderful in real life as she is on the show. Toward the end of the interview, Vangsness' cell phone lost service and we were disconnected. Many people would end the conversation there. Not Vangsness. She called me back immediately, apologizing profusely, saying, "When Mandy Patinkin talks to you, you listen. That's what happened. He was talking to me, I walked over to him, and I hit the pocket of the set where there's no reception."

It's official. Kirsten Vangsness is smart, entertaining, sweet, down to earth, and simply, real. Oh, and she's one heck of an actress too.

On a final note, Vangsness wanted to say, "Tread lightly on the earth and may we all be kind to one another, so that our show is even more entertaining because then this kind of s--- will never happen in real life."