"The show is the star, not the two people having a relationship."
In an interview with the Star-Times in today's Focus section, Ball said Anna Paquin had "aggressively" pursued the role. "When my casting director said, would you be interested in Anna Paquin, I said, uh, yeah, would she be interested in this?"
Even though she has a glittering career in movies such as X-Men, Ball realised True Blood could allow Paquin to do things she mightn't on the big screen. He was right - it won her the 2008 Golden Globe award for best TV actress in a drama, to add to her 1993 Oscar for The Piano.
"She is the tent pole that this show hangs on. She is delightful in this role. She's charming, she's innocent, she's pretty, she's fiery, she's romantic, and you just really, really love her."
And she's just the same in real life, he says down to earth, professional, fun to be around.
But one of the big topics Ball had to canvass during casting was asking the pale and dark New Zealander a crucial question for her to truly become Sookie, the sassy and tanned southerner in the short shorts of Charlaine Harris's books: Are you willing to go blonde?
"She was like, 'Of course. This is something I would never do just on my own because it seems so superficial. But now I have an excuse to do it."'
