New Blood! Joe Manganiello Reveals Sexy Werewolf Secrets Straight From the Set

New Blood! Joe Manganiello Reveals Sexy Werewolf Secrets Straight From the Set




It's time to get all kinds of familiar with True Blood's Joe Manganiello—of course, you One Tree Hill, How I Met Your Mother fans need not apply.

We just caught up with HBO's resident werewolf doing—what else?—working on his supernaturally fit bod, and in the midst of staring at all that eye candy, got the goods on Bon Temps' newest badass, Alcide...

Just so we're all on the same page, Joe's character Alcide pops up in the third episode of season three under strict orders of equally droolworthy Eric (Alexander Skarsgård), and so begins the story of True Blood's very own werewolf.

Now we'll let Joe do the talkin':

Shaping Up: Alcide is one buff motha, and the second he nabbed the role, he was in it to win it. "Knowing [creator] Alan Ball, you're probably going to be naked at some point is the first thought, and of course the second thought is, OK, wait a minute, now where's that trainer's number?" Joe didn't have to change too much, thanks to the many fan campaigns to get him onboard as Alcide. "The character was described pretty close to me physically, and so I started bugging my agents and managers for about a year to get me in, and sure enough, I auditioned and I got it. It's pretty wild."

Nakie Time: It was inevitable some serious nudity would come Joe's way—it is True Blood, after all. "I assumed it was going to happen because I'm playing a werewolf, and obviously when you shift, you can't bring your clothes," he tells us. "But right off the bat, from the first script there were shirtless scenes. So I knew I was going to be the resident piece of meat this year and that the abs were going to have to be in good shape." And trust us, they so are!

A Dream Come True: Get ready for the cutest story ever. "I was a big fan, so coming to set was a lot like being sucked through the TV set into your favorite television show," he gushes. "The only comparison I can make to my first table read with the cast is the way kids growing up idolize Michael Jordan, then actually make it to the NBA, and then get into a game and play against him—that was what it was like for me."

True Blood Return? You'll instantly fall in love when Alcide pops up in episode three, which begs the question: Might Joe be back in season four? "Alcide's in the 10th book, so I could be eating and training very hard for a long time," the fit celeb teases—a challenge he is on board with, by the way. "You never know. As long as [Charlaine Harris] keeps writing those books, I won't be able to eat carbs! I'll deal with it."

One Last Thing: Says Joe: "I hope the fans love me! That would be a true benchmark."