Joss Whedon, also known as The Man Behind Buffy, most succinctly known as “God,” is finally ready to reveal the secret behind his show-stopping turn as dancin' fool Numfar on a recent episode of Angel.

“I was with the Alvin Ailey troupe for eight years,” he confides, more deadpan than a whole posse of Xanders. “A lot of people don't know that.”

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

“Actually, I kept saying, ‘Oh! And there should be a guy in the background doing a stupid dance like this!!!’” he admits. "Finally, [David] Greenwalt and [Tim] Minear were like, ‘Why don’t you do the stupid dance? You already look stupid, we've just gotta put make-up on you!'“

Indeed. And that's how Joss ended up gettin' his groove on in the background of one of the two shows that make up his Slayerly empire. The free-spirited hilarity of that moment (”Numfar! Do the dance of joy!“) perfectly encapsulates the wonder that is Joss – a dizzyingly kaleidoscopic imagination that isn't afraid to go for that pure gut emotion. In this case, it's a whopper of a belly laugh. Other times, it might be a deeply felt moment of earnest romanticism, or a torrent of sobs.

Either way, the man behind the magic is rather modest about his accomplishments – he speaks easily in a self-deprecating tone peppered with occasional bits of sarcasm. Though he sounds most obviously like quick-witted regular guy Xander, you definitely sense a piece of each character in him. Like Buffy, he knows what makes a good leader – he might do another cameo, but only if it's good for the show as a whole.

”Just so long as I don't become one of those self-indulgent guys who's like, ‘Look, it’s all about me!'“ he says. ”[It took] two and a half hours in make-up to make me look that good, OK? I know what I am – I'm a writer. And when writers become about the business about themselves, they've lost sight. So I'd love to do some more [cameos], but only if it's still funny.“

Ah, but the fans are crying out for it!

”Well, you know, I keep saying to Greenwalt, ‘Yeah, this story’s interesting, Angel's going through a lot, [but] what's the Numfar of it?“ Joss says, sounding very much like Xander again. ”What's Numfar learning? What's Numfar dancing about? Let's really examine the important things!“

Certainly, Joss has plenty to dance about these days. He's just coming off of successful seasons of Buffy and Angel (and if you're living under a rock these days, the former show moves to UPN next season while the latter stays on The WB), his comic book effort from Dark Horse, Fray, bows next week, and he's got a possible Giles spin-off for BBC and a Buffy animated series in the works.For now, though, it's the eve of Buffy's 100th episode, and Joss is taking a break from his fantastically busy schedule to chat with me over the phone about the world of The Slayer and beyond. Today, Buffy Anne Summers is still alive and well, so the conversation turns to other matters…

I'd kinda like to do the dorky fan thing and say congratulations – not only on 100 episodes, but also on two amazing episodes from this year, ”Family“ and ”The Body.“ What was it about those particular stories that made you want to write and direct them?
Joss: Thank you! I really appreciate that. The ”Family“ thing – I've always believed that a family is the people who love and respect you, that you create your own family.

When we created the show, they said, ”Do you want [Buffy's] family?“ And I said, ”Well, mom and whatnot, but basically, she has a family. Her father is Giles, her sister is Willow, and it's already in place.“ I had some things go on in my life that made me say, ”I really want to get this message out, that it's not about blood." Tara was the perfect vehicle for that. And I actually love my family! [Laughs] We've been an unconventional family. I was a child of divorce, and there was a lot of shuffling around. And [there were] people who were not in my family who became of my family.

“The Body” – I just thought, “This is something Buffy needs to go through.” This is a rite of passage that people go through, that I in fact went through myself – I lost my mother several years ago. And I wanted to capture something there… I mean, “Family” is as much of a didactic message show as I've ever done. Hopefully an entertaining one, but it is. It was them standing there saying, “We're family,” all around [Tara], and hopefully you cried, if I did it right.

But I wanted to capture something much more abstract [with "The Body"]. Just a morbidly physical reality of death and of grief, of that first few hours after. The incomprehensibleness of it, and the different ways everybody deals with it.

You know, I worked my ass off on [that episode]. And my whole cast was extraordinary. But I really thought people were going to sort of hate it, because the whole point was, there's no catharsis. There's no point where you go, “We've learned this!” or “She'll always be a part of us!” It was just, “My mother is a dead body. And that's all.” But people actually did get a kind of catharsis from it. A lot of people who have lost people said it really helped them to deal with it or it really moved them. I was surprised by that, because my intention was just to capture that reality, not really to comment on it or be helpful about it. [Laughs]

The reactions of all of the characters were based on things I've done. My mother was not the first person I lost. The first person I ever lost, there was a whole thing where I had to go to the funeral, and I had to find a black tie, because I thought you had to wear a black tie to a funeral. Of course, it was California, so people showed up in Hawaiian shirts, but I didn't know that! And I couldn't find one anywhere in LA. I went to dozens of stores, and I was sweating and shaking, like, “If I don't find this, it'll be sacrilege!” That's where the Willow thing came from.

And then when I lost my mother, there was that numbness that I tried to capture with Buffy, but at the same time, I had already lost someone, and I was around a lot of people who hadn't, so then I was sort of in Tara's shoes – watching other people's reactions, and just trying to help and get through it. So it's all there. Everybody's got a piece of that.