Too Close To Home’s Robert Craighead on How a Heart Attack Helped Him Return to Acting [Exclusive Interview]

Chances are, you’ve seen Robert Craighead on your TV screen more than a few times.

He’s known for such films as Cujo and Return of the Living Dead, along with roles on The Bold and The Beautiful and The Young and the Restless.

Craighead has also appeared on shows like Castle, NCIS: LA, and New Girl, among many others.

Now, he’s playing a role that actually comes quite naturally to him. On TLC’s Too Close to Home, he plays Sheriff Mobly, and he’s the kind of small town Sheriff you have to love.

I recently had the chance to chat with Craighead about his role on Too Close to Home, how he got his start in acting, and why after taking time off for several years, he made the decision to return.

Craighead was inspired to get into acting at a young age.

“My mom was a movie buff. I’d stay up late at night watching TV with her, and watching these movies, and I fell in love with them,” he said.

He then became interested in theater, a passion which he carried through high school.

“By the time I turned 18, I came out to Los Angeles and went to The American Academy of Dramatic Arts — I was accepted there and studied there for three years before I ventured into the professional arena,” Craighead said.

“My very first job was a world premiere musical comedy called Ameritage, and it was a stage production in Beverly Hills that was produced by Dee Wallace, who at the time was working on a film called E.T. She played the mother in E.T., and we became great friends.”

Craighead was then part of another classic film alongside Wallace: Cujo — that terrifying film from the 80s based on a Stephen King novel.

After that, Craighead secured a role on The Bold and the Beautiful.

“I was on The Bold and the Beautiful for four years. After that ended, I decided I wanted to take a little break because my daughter was at an age where I wanted to spend some time with her, and the next thing you know, I wind up taking ten years off,” he laughed.

“I came back seven years ago, and everything had changed. I mean it was like, there were so many more opportunities available to actors and so many new mediums.”

Craighead’s decision to return to acting after all of those years can be attributed to a heart attack.

“I had a heart attack seven or eight years ago. I had like 98% blockage. Actually, my heart stopped on the operating table,” he explained. He was still great friends with Dee Wallace, and she offered some words of wisdom after that scare.

“Dee is very spiritual, and she said, ‘You know what’s happened is, it’s heart disease. Your heart is at dis-ease. You’re missing the passion in your life. You’re unhappy in your heart.’ And I got to thinking about it, and I said you know, she’s right.”

“At this point my daughter was grown and out of college, and my wife was traveling a lot with her work, and I said you know, I think I’m going to go back to it,” he continued. “And I’ve been having a blast.”

One of the reasons Craighead loves acting is the chance to embody different characters. “That’s probably one of the reasons why I turned around and left the business for a few years, was because I was kind of tired of playing the same character over and over,” he admitted.

“I was a big fan of Lon Chaney, and also like Al Pacino and Robert De Niro, Jack Nicholson — these actors that a lot of times you can’t recognize them in a role because they’ve taken on the persona of the character so well, that they have actually become someone else. To me, that’s what acting is.”

Now, Craighead feels lucky to be able to work on Too Close to Home, which was created by Tyler Perry.

“It’s really interesting the way that Tyler Perry works. To be on a television series is a fantastic thing just in and of itself. For an actor, it’s job security. Somewhat. I mean you never know when you’re going to be killed off or whatever [laughs], but you’ve got a steady gig.”

Craighead also spoke to the way Tyler Perry runs the show. “He takes care of his actors. He takes care of everyone who works there. It’s a first class operation. And so I go in there, I shoot my stuff, [and] I’m out of there in like a month. That leaves me the rest of the year to do movies and TV guest stars. I thought it was just an awesome opportunity.”

The biggest challenge in playing the role? It’s playing this type of character in a very different way.

“I’ve played a lot of sheriffs in my day, and I’ve played a lot of police detectives. And usually they’re hard-nosed kind of like the law is the law,” he explained. But the sheriff he plays on Too Close to Home is just the opposite.

“It’s a small town in Alabama called Happy. Happy, Alabama,” Craighead continued. “I come from a small town in Texas, so whenever I read for the part, I knew what they were looking for. They’re looking for a guy who knows everybody in town, who cares about the people in the town. He grew up with these people. It’s a community.”

Behind the scenes, the actors have already become close.

“We talk to each other every day,” he said. They also started gathering at one another’s homes from the very first episode to live tweet the show when it airs. “It’s so much fun, and the fans appreciate it.”

Craighead has several upcoming projects, including the films The Mustanger and the Lady and The Tiger Hunter.

He’s also just finished his own screenplay, which is currently in development. That film (the current working title is Catch a Falling Star) will feature original songs from Craighead’s good friend and Grammy and CMA award winner Paul Overstreet.

Be sure to catch Robert Craighead on Too Close to Home when it returns next year to TLC.