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February 17, 2006

The day before the day before the day before...

Ben Browder’s hair is really long. Apparently he had a serious playoff beard too but he shaved that off before we got to see him. Ben was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Actor in Television Series, along with Claudia Black who was nominated for Best Supporting Actress in a Television Series, for their performances on SG-1 last year. And both Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis were nominated for Best Syndicated/Cable Television Series. Nice.

I was chatting with Ben and Joe Mallozzi and Rob Cooper today, and Ben and Joe both agreed the Saturn Awards is a really fun awards show. Apparently, there are tons of fans there, lots of sci-fi genre people and some serious heavyweights also attend, such as James Cameron and Stephen Spielberg. Sounds like a good party.

Also just said hi to Joe Flanigan, who’s reporting for duty. You see, the first day of photography of each series for the new season is Monday, so everybody’s checking in. The production staff is up and running, but the actors are just arriving. Also saw Jason Momoa for the first time (he was getting over a bug he picked up traveling). And as you guys already know, David Hewlett’s been here the whole time writing, directing and starring in his own feature film “A Dog’s Breakfast”… A friend of mine is editing it, and I hear it’s going to be hilarious.

Now, tonight you’ll see Coup D’Etat on Atlantis and The Scourge on SG-1. Coup D’Etat is another Martin Gero script. Okay, now here’s a little side-note. Sometimes I go in to a writer or director’s office and ask them if they remember anything cool and interesting about an episode, any behind the scenes anecdotes, and they look at me, and I can tell they’re thinking, “why does this guy always bother me? What does he do here?” or “I forgot to pick up eggs at the supermarket”… stuff like that. And then they get that look like they’ve been playing Tetris too long and they don’t really have anything interesting to say.

NOT MARTIN GERO. That guy just immediately hands over the goods, such as:

· The part of Ladon in Coup D’Etat was originally written for Kolya, the recurring Genii character played by Robert Davi. Unfortunately, Robert Davi wasn’t available because he was busy directing and starring in his own feature, which he wrote. Seems like a bit of a trend, huh?

· Coup D’Etat has the longest tease in Stargate history, at 6 minutes and 44 seconds.

· Martin Wood told me to tell you to keep an eye out for the scene where we storm the Genii warehouse. The stunt guy that gets blown away from the door… He actually got blasted off his feet! A gnarly stunt for sure. And David Hewlett took a shell in the face in one of the other stunts.

· The Scourge underwent a VFX re-write. Apparently, doing those bug shots is costly, and that was why it was decided that they live underground.

· And Joe Mallozzi told me his absolute favourite Robert Picardo moment is when, at the end of The Scourge, the team and the IOC members are hightailing it to the tent, Picardo runs by everyone with his arms pumping. Hilarious.

ATL

Posted by Alex Levine at February 17, 2006 09:08 PM