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Home , Alexa Havins, Anna Torv, Anthony Simcoe, Azura Skye, Bob Larkin, Booth Colman

TWILIGHT Meet DVD Extras! INDIANA JONES Agent vampire Anna 1 hero Robert HELLBOY* QUARK* X-FILES Torv Pattinson Movie Magic presents debriefs

Animated Adventures FUTURAMA* BOLT MADAGASCAR 2 TV's Newest LEGEND OF THE SEEKER

James Bond returns for Qbloody vengeance UANTUM " OF S LACE Mm

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"09128"43033" www.starlog.com

NUMBER 371 • DECEMBER 2008 • THE UNIVERSE

STARLOC

17 QUANTUM OF SOLACE James Bond returns with vengeance in mind

22 LEGEND OF THE SEEKER BEGINS Ken Biller brings Trek expertise to this new fantasy odyssey

28 VAMPIRE IN TWILIGHT Fans are learning to love Robert Pattinson

32 WOMAN ON THE FRINGE Anna Torv is a tough but lovely FBI agent

51 VISIONS OF HELLBOY Wayne Barlowe unveils his artistic impressions

56 END OF THE X-FILES Frank Spotnitz ponders its secrets big & small

60 QUARK ON DVD Cast & crew salute the fabled spoof's legacy of laughter

66 INDIANA JONES & ME Dimitri Diatchenko recalls their escapades

70 INTO THE KNIGHT takes the wheel of KITT

74 TERMINATORS OF TOMORROW The Sarah Connor Chronicles hosts them today & yesterday

78 SF-TV SECRETS REVEALED! Planet of the Apes offered small-screen simians ANIMATION SCENE

36 HE'S AN AMERICAN DOG! Bolt's CC adventures take him cross-country

41 FORCE 10 FROM MADAGASCAR The zoosters ship out for sequel action

46 IN THE FUTURAMA DAZE David x. Cohen's just happy to be making more & more toons

Photo: Karen Ballard/Copyright 2008 Danjaq, LLC, United Artists Corporation & Columbia Pictures Industries?!" All Rights Reserved. BOOK OF NOTE President Prince of Stories: The Many Worlds of Neil THOMAS DeFEO Gaiman by Hank Wagner, Christopher Executive Art Director Golden & Stephen R. Bissette (St. Martin's W.R. MOHALLEY Press, he, $29.95) is simply terrific. Out this month, it's a massive volume examining all Editor DAVID MCDONNELL of Gaiman's comics, fiction, kids' books, QUOTE OF THE MONTH screenplays and other works (i.e. The Art Director "I am irked. And that will not do." Sandman, 1602, Miracleman, Neverwhere, HEINER FEIL —Malcolm McDowell, Bolt American Gods, Stardust, Coraline, Beowulf, etc.), complete with commentary, Managing Editor ALLAN DART STUPID DECISION character profiles, thematic influences and OF THE MONTH background info. There's a fascinating new Contributing Editors Gaiman interview and mini-chats with such issue sports a new logo for STARLOG. ANTHONY TIMPONE This key collaborators as Dave McKean and MICHAEL CINCOLD We're not all convinced it's a good idea. TOM WEAVER Charles Vess—plus an intra by Terry Are we stupid to even mention it? IAN SPELLING Pratchett.This is just JOE NAZZARO Do you like it? Or are you irked? essential reading for WILL MURRAY Gaiman fans (and who Executive Assistants WHERE TO BE... isn't a Gaiman fan? DEE ERWINE ...November 4. In a polling place, rflCE You? Well, you should SAMUEL ZIMMERMAN voting for the candidates of your be!). Highly STORIES recommended by Correspondents: (LA) pat Jankiewicz, Bob choice. Hail, Kodos the Magnifi- v (we read Miller, Marc Shapiro, Bill warren, Dan Yakir; >-- STARLOG and cent! v (NYC) Dan Dickholtz, Keith olexa; () loved it). Buy it! i-he many Kim Howard Johnson; (Phoenix) Bill Flo- —David McDonnell rence; (D.c.) Rhonda Krafchin; (Canada) CONGRATS TO... Worlds of Mark Phillips; (Booklog) Penny Kenny, Jean- ...Our pal favorite Marc & Randy Lofficier, Michael Wolff; STARLOG (Toons) Alain "bortQ." Chaperon, Mike Fish- George Takei and longtime com- Limits, The Wild Wild er, Tom Holtkamp, Bob Muleady, Leah panion (27 years) Brad Altman West, Tarzan, Land Rosenthal; (Photos) Donn Nottage, Lisa GAII1M of Orris. on their September marriage. the Giants, Voyage to Radio Staff: Diane Ferenczi, Mike Kostel, Nichelle Nichols served as Maid the Bottom of the Sea, Debbie Rochon. Websites: Fred Ehrhart, Danny Gonzalez, of Honor and as The Bionic Woman (the Tom Powers. Best Man! Many happy returns & Stephen R. Bissetle "Kill Oscar" three- Special Thanks to: Larry Alexander, Wayne to George Brad! parter), Barlowe, Cyb & Trlcia Barnstable, Louie & Quincy, Raw- Bosari, Barbara Broccoli, Michael Broidy, hide and Perry Mason. Justin Bruening, Tra-Mi Callahan, David x. WHERE TO FIND... (STARLOG #140, #159) Cohen, Booth Colman, , Bill Der- win, Dimitri Dlatchenko, Eileen Dietz, Josh ...FANGORIA RADIO? Check out Sirius Michael Pate (September) The veteran Friedman, Howard Green, Ron Harper, Leif Satellite Radio (Channel 102) Friday nights, actor who specialized in Westerns (like Helland, Joan Higgins, Herbert Hirschman, Daina House, Byron Howard, Conrad Janis, 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. (an encore of the live show Hondo) and horror flicks (The Black Castle, Elissa Johansmeier, Bruce , Jonathan immediately follows). See the website for sub- The Strange Door, 1962's Tower of London). Kaufer, Carman Knight, Erin Lawhorn, scription info (sirius.com/fangoria). Merisa Levine, John Locke, Ana Lopez, Scott Both strains merged when he starred as a vam- Lyons, Tom McGrath, Mindi Miller, Don Mur- pire gunslinger in Curse ofthe Undead (1959). ray, Tram Nguyen, Robert Pattinson, Bobby THE FAREWELLS His SF credits include The Maze, The Return Porter, George Robotham, Jacqueline Scott, Conor Sellers, Charles Sherman, Marc The science fiction universe sadly salutes of Captain Invincible and various TV guest Singer, Ron Sossi, Frank Spotnitz, Lisa these fantastic talents who have died. shots (Zorro, Tarzan, The Man from Stone, Shannon Sturcken, Tim Thomerson, Anthony Tollin, Anna Torv, Jeff Walker, Art Jud Taylor (August) The actor-turned- U.N.C.L.E., Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Wallace, Chris Williams, Michael G. Wilson, prolific TV director who helmed episodes of The Time Tunnel, , Thriller, John Wirth, Steve Zacharias. ("Let Cover images: Quantum of Solace: Karen That Be Your Last Battle- Men Into Space). He had the Felix Leiter part Ballard/©2008 Danjaq, LLC, United Artists field"), The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Captain in Climax's 1954 live TV broadcast of Casino Corporation & Columbia Pictures Industries, Nice, The Fugitive, Lou Grant and many oth- Royale. (FANGORIA #1 13) Inc. All Rights Reserved; Twilight: ©2008 Summit Films; Fringe: George Holz/©2008 ers. His TV movie directorial efforts include Don LaFontaine (September) "In a world . All Rights Future Cop, Return to Earth and the Emmy- where" there are many voices, he was the Reserved. nominated Tail Gunner Joe. "King of the Trailers." He narrated more than For Advertising Info, Contact: Oliver Crawford (September) The TV 5,000 coming attractions (not to mention a Bekah MCKendry, 646-666-7336 bekah.fangoria®yahoo.com scribe who wrote episodes of Star Trek ("Let reported 350,000 commercials and countless That Be Your Last Battlefield," "The Cloud promos). His fame increased when viewers Minders," "The Galileo Seven"), The Outer saw a Geico TV commercial, revealing the face of "that announcer guy from the movies." Bill Melendez (September) The (eight)

STARLOG (ISSN 0191-4626, Canadian GST number: R-124704826) is published monthly except for February & Emmy-winning animator who brought September by STARLOG GROUP, INC/THE BROOKLYN COMPANY, INC., 250 W. 49th Street, Suite 304, 3rd Fir, Charles Schulz's Peanuts to toon life in more New York, NY 10019. STARLOG and The Science Fiction Universe are registered trademarks of STARLOG GROUP, INC. This is issue Number 371, December 2008. Entire contents are copyright ©2008 by STARLOG than 60 TV specials (including A Charlie GROUP, inc. All rights reserved. Reprint or reproduction in part or in whole—including the reprinting or Brown Christmas), four theatrical films and posting of articles, photos and graphics on any Internet website—without the publishers' written per- numerous commercials. He voiced mission is strictly forbidden. STARLOG accepts no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts, photos or Snoopy other materials, but If submittals are accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope, they'll be con- and Woodstock. He also created animated TV sidered and, if necessary, returned. Please do not call the editorial office re: this material. Due to time versions of Babar and The Lion, the Witch and constraints, freelancer calls will not be accepted. STARLOG does not publish fiction. Fiction submissions are not accepted and are discarded without reply. Products advertised are not necessarily endorsed by the Wardrobe. Before Peanuts, he animated for STARLOG, and views expressed In editorial copy are not necessarily those of STARLOG. Please note: Due to Disney, Warner Bros, and UPA (the Oscar- a warehouse fire, back issues are no longer available directly from STARLOG. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and additional mailing offices. Subscription rates: $56.97 one year (12 issues) delivered in U.S. winning "Gerald McBoing-Boing"). only. Canadian and foreign subscriptions $66.97 in U.S. funds only. New subscriptions, send directly to Don Wilder (September) Co-creator of STARLOG, 250 w. 49th street, Suite 304, 3rd Fir, New York, NY 10019. Notification of change of address or the comic strip Crock. renewals, send to STARLOG, 250 w. 49th Street, Suite 304, 3rd Fir., New York, NY 10019. Printed in U.S.A. Brian Thomsen (September) The SF/fan-

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! Art: Tom Holtkamp tasy editor who worked at Warner Books The latest volumes (Questar), TSR Books and Tor Books. He co- include #21 (Hex and wrote Julius Schwartz's autobiography Man of The Running Skele- %mit$wgLOGwmmwm fa Two Worlds: My Life in Science Fiction and tons); #22 (this month's Comics. A nice guy. Mystery Under the Sea, m r**M pLANETiipES Paul Newman (September) The philan- with its deleted chap- INTERVIEWS WHERE APE ACTORS DON'T thropist and iconic actor known to us for voic- ters restored, and its ing Doc Hudson in Cars and making certain sequel The Red Ter- COMPLAIN ABOUT THE MAKEUP genre films (Alfred Hitchcock's Torn Curtain, rors; available both in Fat Man and Little Boy, The Towering Inferno, classic pulp and James When Time Ran Out..., Quintet and the Bama paperback cover W£Afc IT AUU comics-derived The Road to Perdition). More variants); #23 (The UCVSP If/ THE time;/ mainstream movies include Cool Hand Luke, Fantastic Island, which Hud, Harper, Hombre, Butch Cassidy & the may have inspired Ian Sundance Kid, The Sting, Somebody Up There Fleming's Doctor No, Likes Me, The Verdict, Absence ofMalice, The and Danger Lies East); Hustler and its sequel The Color ofMoney (for #24 (The Black, Black which he won a Best Actor Oscar). Witch, Hell Below and The Shape of Terror, BY OUR CONTRIBUTORS three WWII yarns pit- Kim Howard Johnson's next book is Monty ting Doc against the Python's Tunisian Holiday (Thomas Nazis) and #25 (The Dunne Books, he, $25.95), a fascinating diary Red Skull and The of his days spent as an extra in and on-set Awful Egg). The best observer on Monty Python 's Life of Brian in way to get them (and

1978. Remember: Always look on the bright NV's Shadow reprints) is by subscription (six boys (Wild). side of life! volumes, $72 first class mail, $66 media mail; December: : War Zone (12/5), The

Stan Nicholls' Ores omnibus edition is 12-issue sub $144 first, $132 media; check or Day the Earth Stood Still (12/12), The Curious back with a striking new cover (Orbit, tpb, Paypal) directly from Tallin, P.O. Box 761474, Case of Benjamin Button (12/19), The Tale of $14.99). It collects his first trilogy (Bodyguard San Antonio, TX 78245-1474. E-mail address: Despereaux (12/19), The Spirit (12/25), The of Lightning, Legion of Thunder, Warriors of [email protected] Or see the website Time Traveler's Wife (12/25). the Tempest), plus a short story ("The Tak- (www.shadowsanctum.com). 2009: Inkheart (1/9), Underworld: The Rise of the Lycans (1/23), Coraline (2/6), Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li (2/27), Watchmen (3/5), i Race to Witch Mountain (3/13), Knowing (3/20), Monsters vs.

Aliens (3/27), Dragonball Z (4/3), The Wolf Man (4/3), Whiteout Dames, Dice and Origins: the Devil (4/24), X-Men Wolverine (5/1), Star Trek (5/8), Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins (5/22), : Bat- tle of the Smithsonian (5/22), Up (5/29), The Tooth Fairy (6/19), 2: Revenge of the Fallen (6/26), Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (7/1), 2012 (7/10), Land of the Lost (7/17), Harry Potter fOUR COMPLETE NOW* BY the -Blood Prince Anatole Feldman and Half (7/17), G-Force (7/24), Piranha 3-D Here are three more volumes for your new, second STARLOG Contributors Library bookcase. (7/24), G.I. Joe (8/7), Hotel Tran- sylvania (9/25), (in 3-D, ing"). Nicholls is working on a new trilogy Murray provides the introduction to The 10/2), Where the Wild Things Are (10/16), (Ores: Bad Blood) featuring Stryker and the Gangland Sagas of Big Nose Serrano: Volume Astro Boy (10/23), The Fantastic Mr. Fox Wolverines. Its first volume (Weapons ofMag- One: Dames, Dice and the Devil (Off-Trail (11/6), Planet 51 (11/20), The Surrogates ical Destruction) will be published next year Publications, tpb, $20). It's the first of three (11/20), Avatar (12/18), A Christmas Carol by Orbit. projected volumes, each collecting four of the (12/25), The Princess and the Frog (12/25). Michael Mallory has written his third col- quirky novels by Anatole Feldman originally 2010: Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs lection of Mrs. Watson mysteries: The published in Gangster Stories in 1930-31. Ini- (1/15), Toy Story 2 (in 3-D, 2/12), Alice in Exploits of the Second Mrs. Watson (Top Pub- tially a gangster take on Cyrano de Bergerac, Wonderland (3/19), How to Train Your Dragon lications, tpb, $14.95). Big Nose became an unforgettable anti-hero (3/20), 2 (5/7), The Chronicles of James Swallow has two Warhammer improvising poetry aloud as he shot it out with Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader (5/7), 40,000 novels we've not noted: the newish colder-blooded baddies. Goes Fourth (5/21), Prince of Persia: Blood Angels: Red Fury and 2007's Faith & The Sands ofTime (5/31), Pandamonium (6/3), Fire (both Black Library, pb, $7.99). FILM FANTASY CALENDAR (6/4), Toy Story 3 (6/18), The Green Hor- Those great reprints of by Release dates are extremely subject to net (6/25), Rapunzel, Harry Potter and the "Kenneth Robeson" (mostly Lester Dent) con- change and may shift without notice. Deathly Hallows I (11/19). tinue from Nostalgia Ventures, complete with November: Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa 2011: The First Avenger: articles and commentary by series editor (11/7), Quantum of Solace (11/14), The Road (5/6), The Avengers (7/15), Newt, Harry Potter

Anthony Tollin and STARLOG's Will Murray. (11/14), Bolt (11/21), Twilight (11/21), Fan- and the Deathly Hallows II, Cars 2.

Doc Savage: Copyright 2008 Advance Magazine Publishers Inc./The Conde Nast Publications. 6 mm/December 2008 Doc Savage is a Registered Trademark of Advance Magazine Publishers Inc. d/b/aThe Conde Nast Publications Valerie Hoffman

Andrew Gabriel was awakened from his catatonic slumber by the fragrance of love's passion lost long ago. Andrew's diaboli- cal half brother, Craven Maxwell, politically manipulates his way

into the White House. It is Andrew's fear that this most evil and cun- ning predator may gain access to the highest authority, using his posi- tion to dominate America and, eventually, the world.

Andrew's odyssey into the world of politics, forgotten and renewed love and

passion is hindered by Craven's thirst for power and sadistic scheme to revive his hidden and dark practices. Both Andrew and Craven are what legend refers to as Vampires. Both Andrew and Craven come from the same unholy disposition, the place that allows them to function for hundreds of years, maintaining the illusion of assimilating into humanity while walking a fine line between their need for life sustaining

nutrients and their suppliers. Andrew is compelled to purify his people while protecting his race and humanity from the corruption of Craven's absolute supremacy.

Andrew is the only one with the power to put an end to Craven's depraved schemes. Craven, how- ever, has no compunction about using Andrew's one vulnerability against him—his new found love. To purchase, please go to: vampireroyalty.net UPDATES Holmes, she "was always The Woman." Jim Morris has been named General Manag- Whoopi Goldberg, Harry Potter's Richard er of Pixar Animation Studios. Morris dis- Griffiths, Uma Thurman and Jesse L. Martin cussed producing WALL-E in issue #368. And co-star with some beloved fantasy fabric crea- Andrew Millstein has been upped to General tures in next month's NBC TV special Letters Manager of Walt Disney Animation Studios. to Santa—A Muppets Christmas. Morris (with Lindsey Collins) is also pro- mum Jonathan () Hensleigh will ducing John Carter ofMars for Pixar. Director By DAVID MCDONNELL script and produce an adaptation of Kim Stan- Andrew Stanton is co-scripting the Edgar Rice ley Robinson's Red Mars. But, surprise! It's a Burroughs adaptation with veteran Pixar Story TV movie for AMC cable. guy Mark Andrews. ing the unfinished The Mystery of Edwin will (again) become a It's official. Imagine Entertainment has Drood serial). If all that doesn't make him . Bluewater Productions has made acquired rights to all seven volumes of E.E. busy enough, del Toro is also co-writing a tril- a deal with the actor to do four Shatner-centric

"Doc" Smith's classic Lensman saga. As ogy of vampire novels with Chuck Hogan. The comics titles. Three will adapt previous Shat- already noted, J. Michael Straczynski is script- first, The Strain, will be published next sum- ner-bylined book series: The TekWar Chroni- ing. Imagine's will probably mer. cles (the saga ghosted by STARLOG con- direct the first film. Kung Fu Hustle's Stephen Chow will tributor ; once a Marvel comic), The SCI FI Channel has ordered 13 direct The Green Hornet. He'll also play Kato Man O'War and Quest for Tomorrow. The episodes of (pilot scripted by to Seth Rogen's Hornet. Rogen and Evan fourth will be an all-new creation. TekWar is

Rockne S. O'Bannon & Jane Espenson, direct- Goldberg co-scripted this movie version of the an ongoing title; the others are mini-series. All ed by Brent Mote). Eddie McClintock and radio hero. debut next year.

Joanne Kelly star as FBI agents dealing with a Roger Moore is part of an effort to do yet Raiders ofthe Lost Ark-like warehouse of another incarnation of The Saint. Barry Levin- PREOUELS/SEQUELS artifacts. Veteran character actor Saul Rubinek son and Tom Fontana are producing a two- Scooby-Doo: The Beginning will explain co-stars. It'll premiere in July. hour TV movie/series pilot (along with Moore, how the gang got together. This live-action Since Stan Winston's death, his remaining his son Geoffrey Moore and Bill Macdonald, prequel will go direct-to-DVD (after a premiere) in fall 2009. Brian (The EPIC Flintstones) Levant is directing from a script DOWN UNDER by Daniel & Steven Altiere. Similarly, Warner Bros, is planning a pre- Nicole Kidman and quel to I Am Legend, chronicling how humani- Hugh Jackman embark ty died. Original film director on a great adventure/ Francis war story// Lawrence and Will Smith are on board this romance directed by questionable project. Baz (Moulin Rouge) Stephen Sommers—who helmed the first Luhrmann. What else two recent Mummy movies and Van Helsing could they call it but while flirting with making Flash Gordon—has Australia"} It bows finished G.I. Joe (from a script by Stuart Beat- November 26. tie). He'll next direct a new Tarzan adventure, also written by Beattie and produced by Jerry Weintraub for Warner Bros. Disney has new installments of both Pirates of the Caribbean (with Johnny Depp FX company partners (John Rosengrant, who produced the Val Kilmer Saint film). back as Captain Jack Sparrow) and National Shane Mahan, Lindsay MacGowan, Alan Levinson will direct the pilot (which will be Treasure (with Nicolas Cage) in the works. Scott) have decided to rename Stan Winston offered to the networks after it's made). Finally, Sony is working up a Ghostbusters Studio. It'll now be known as Legacy Effects. With a live-action Land of the Lost in post- 3 (to use mostly a younger, cheaper cast). The production, Universal has picked up the rights Office's Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky COMICS SCENE to another Sid & Marty Krofft creation, Sig- are scripting. Robin is jumping to the CW—like Super- mund & the Sea Monster. Dana Gould (a man in and Batgirl, Black writer-executive producer for ) is CHARACTER CASTINGS Canary and the Huntress on Birds ofPrey. The at work on the screenplay. Betattlestar Galactica's Katee Sackhoff is network has greenlit a pilot for The Graysons Hey there, it's Ash Brannon! The co-direc- 'shootings a new pilot for Law & Order's (the adventures of young Dick Grayson before tor of Surf's Up will helm a live-action-CG Dick Wolf: Lost & Found. So, she won't have he met ). Executive producers are animated combo version of Yogi Bear for the time to do several guest shots on Nip/Tuck

Smallville' % Kelly Souders and Brian Peterson Warner Bros. Joshua Sternin and Jeffrey Ven- after all. Rose McGowan replaces her. and Supernatural' % McG. timilla are writing it. Yes, Yogi Bear. Galactica's Mary McDonnell is moving to Kenneth Branagh will direct the film ver- Grey's Anatomy for a guest star arc. sion of Marvel's Thor. SF PEOPLE Invasion's Kari Matchett will have a recur- Tim Burton is lining up his Alice in Wonder- ring role (as Dennis Hopper's daughter) in the THE REMAKE CAME land cast. So far, it includes Johnny Depp new TV series version of Crash. After he finishes the Hobbit films in four or (the Mad Hatter), Helena Bonham Carter (the Thomas Sangster—the young actor who five years, Guillermo del Toro has his next Red Queen), Anne Hathaway (the White played Liam Neeson's drummer son in Love projects already lined up. He'll direct remakes Queen) and Little Britain's, Matt Lucas (as Actually—is Tintin in the upcoming movie of Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde and both Tweedledee and, of course, Tweedle- adaptations. The first one's based on Herge's Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five for Uni- dum). The Secret of the Unicorn and Red Rackham's versal. He'll also do the film version of Dan Jude Law will be Dr. John Watson to Treasure. Simmons' new novel Drood (which follows Robert Downey Jr.'s Sherlock Holmes in the Johnny Depp will saddle up as Tonto in the fictional exploits of Charles Dickens short- adventure being directed by Guy Ritchie. Pirates producer Jerry Bruckheimer's new ly before the author's death while he was writ- Rachel McAdams will portray Irene Adler. To Lone Ranger movie for Disney.

8 Smm/December 2008 Earth is no longer the SAME FDR THOSE ON BATTLESTAR CALACTICA action figures (Hiro, Elle, Nathan, Peter, the the starship New episodes of its fourth (and final) 22- Haitian) will be out this month. NBC.com episode season resume airing on SCI FI offers more webisodes in December. Ratings Leapfrog. in January. A two-hour standalone prequel are declining. TV movie will follow the series' end. Galactica's props, costumes and sets will be LEGEND OF THE SEEKER auctioned off next year (circa the last The syndicated series, formerly known as episodes' airing). There will be two live auc- Wizard's First Rule and based on Terry tions in LA, and several on the Internet. See Goodkind's Sword of Truth novels, bows the the website (www.battlestarprops.com). weekend of 11/1. Showrunner Ken Biller previews the odyssey on page 22. CHUCK Airs on NBC. Renewed for a 22-episode LIFE ON MARS season, airing Mondays, 8 p.m. NBC ew Americanized version of the BBC .com offers Chuck episodes and Inside Buy N series airs on ABC Thursdays, 10 p.m. More (complete with career advice from Big The producers say, "It's not science fiction." Mike). Ratings are disappointing. Does that mean we shouldn't watch? ELEVENTH HOUR PRIMEVAL e\v series on CBS, an Americanized ver- ^Phe British series (both first and second N sion of the British show. Airs Thursdays, I season episodes) airs on BBC America 0 p.m. Saturdays, 9 p.m. Titan Books has published another original Primeval: The Lost Island FRINGE by Paul Kearney (he, $11.95). Volume One ew Fox series created by J.J. Abrams, DVD Set is out 1 1/4 (see Videolog, page 10). N Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman. Airs Tuesdays, 9 p.m. Anna Torv debriefs on page PUSHING DAISIES 32. Ratings are promising. It's a hit. Renewed Renewed for a second season by ABC (air- for the rest of the season. ing Wednesdays, 8 p.m.). Ratings are sadly disappointing. GHOST WHISPERER Airs Fridays on CBS. Titan Books has REAPER Whisperer Spirit Guide for a second 13-episode season published Ghost Renewed Lost in space for over ten thousand (tpb, $16.95). It's by Kim Moses (one of the by the CW, to debut at mid-season. Now series' producers) and Ian Sander—and in production. The first season is out on DVD years, the crew of Starship Leapfrog focuses on both the show and the "reality" of 1 1/4 from Lionsgate. waked from deep cryogenic sleep communicating with ghosts. SANCTUARY to find earth no longer the same. ew TV show based on the Internet series A DNA and nuclear holocaust has ew series revival airs Wednesdays, 8 N airs Fridays, 10 p.m. on SCIFI. N;p.m. on NBC. Ratings are rather disap- triggered a de-evolution among pointing. Justin Bruening drives up for action SMALLVILLE humans .rendering the inhabitants on page 70. Airs Thursdays on the CW. Titan Books has published Smallville: The Official soulless Neanderthals. The surviving Companion: Season Seven by Craig Byre HEROES crew attempts to re-colonize Earth Renewed for a third season by NBC, airing (tpb, $14.95). Mondays. The fourth set of Mezco Toyz only to discover that a new ultra- ATLANTIS evolved creature now predominated SUBSCRIBER SERVICES Renewed for a fifth 20-episode season, its Receiving Missing copies? Moving? Renewals? last. A direct-to-DVD movie will follow. and ruthlessly rules the top of the duplicates? Subscription questions? Write to: A spin-off TV series {Stargate: Universe) is STARLOG food' chain. in the works. Titan Books has published 250 West 49th Street, Suite 304, 3rd Floor : The Official Companion: New York, NY 10019 NEW SUBSCRIBERS: Season Four by Sharon Gosling (tpb, $14.95). LEAPFROG See subscription ad in this issue. Attach Mailing Label Here S T E V E HENDRY TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES NAME ^Jenewed by Fox for a 13-episode second mK season (airing Mondays, 8 p.m.). IS BN# 9781 9.33836508 ADDRESS Producers Josh Friedman & John Wirth dis- Trade Paperback cuss the series on page 74. Declining ratings Sctgnce Fiction (and high production costs) make this an US $15.95 / CDN $17,95 unlikely candidate to continue. CITY ••••••••••••••••••••••••••a NOVEMBER 2008 . . Note: Airdates shift without notice. Airtimes are EST. Series are only listed for which STARLOG has new info. STATE /til. MEDALLIONPRESS.COM MONSTER MATTERS to deliver the first child born in all the post-apoca- as mankind reached the end of the evolu- lyptic years since "The Bombs" fell and plagues

ttionary road? That question is posed by the ran their course. A director's commentary and BBC America series Primeval, along with the behind-the-scenes glimpses add to the fun.

even more pressing question of whether its main Special agent Jason Priestley races to save the characters—Professor Nick Cutter (Douglas world from, yes, complete annihilation when a Henshall) and his team—can survive encounters rogue scientist (Lou Diamond Phillips) disappears with terrifying creatures suddenly loose in our with time-travel technology in Termination Point, modern world (raptors in a shopping mall, a a Sony release ($24.94) with a behind-the-scenes saber-tooth tiger at a theme park, giant insects). featurette. Still not enough total destruction for Primeval: Volume One (BBC Warner, $49.98) is DVD you? ALIEN Predator Total Destruction Collec- a 13-episode box set with audio commentary on By TOM WEAVER tion (Fox Home Entertainment, $69.98) picks up two episodes and bonus featurettes. For more some of the Doomsday slack by combining

dino-fun, The Discovery Essential Dinosaur Pack (Image Entertain- ALIEN and its three sequels, Predator, and the two ALIEN ment, $29.98) compiles seven Discovery Channel programs like vs. Predator flicks. A good time will be had by all! When Dinosaurs Roamed America (computer animation, live-action If simply seeing NY destroyed will scratch your itch, the masked backgrounds and the latest scientific finds show how dinosaurs lived arch-villain the Ghost tries to accomplish that via tidal wave in the- and died in our own backyard) and Dinosaurs: Return to Life? (scien- 1941 Republic serial Dick Tracy vs. Crime, Inc. (VCI, $29.99). In tists ponder the possibility of creating a living dinosaur). Flood (Genius Products and RHI Entertainment, $14.95), there's more Were you as shocked and disappointed as we here at STARLOG rub-a-dub-dub disastertainment as a raging storm coincides with high were when the frozen Bigfoot body recently found in Georgia turned seas, unleashing a tidal surge that threatens to put London underwater. out to be a fake, a rubber Halloween costume? I mean, who saw that Pass the soap! M. Night Shyamalan returns to his roots with The Hap- coming? While the hunt for the real Bigfoot continues, divert yourself pening (Fox, $29.98), a thriller following a group of people on the run with the animated The Legend of Sasquatch (Image, $27.98), about a from inexplicable events that threaten humankind. Bonus material family that moves into a secluded log cabin and discovers a Bigfoot "too intense for theaters" (Fox press release) includes a gag reel.

clan hiding nearby. The voice artists include William Hurt and John Does all this talk of impending cataclysms make you feel a little Rhys-Davies; the come-ons include "Special Faux 'Furry' Packaging." paranoid? Find the truth alongside agents Mulder and Scully (David Duchovny and ) in The X-Files: I Want to Believe, available as a single disc (Fox, $29.98) and three-disc Special Edition with beaucoup bonus features ($34.98).

This he TV Yeti ON DVD salespi According to the latest issue of Science, epilepsy sufferers have a will bri brain cell that fires when they watch The Simpsons and goes into Mumm action again whenever they simply think about the series. (This same Tomb < cell is activated to a lesser extent by Seinfeld—and has absolutely no Dragot reaction to Friends\) As science marches on with important new find- Empen ings, seize your wallet and brain cells (in a pinch: wallet only) and directly march on to the local vidstore to pick up the 22-episode, extras-laden your d< The Simpsons: The Eleventh Season (Fox, $49.98). Guest voices Just ca include , Lucy Lawless and Ron Howard, Operat and among the standir extras is footage of the Simpsons receiving their star on the Holly- wood Walk of Fame. Brain cells. ..mmmmmm! Rhys-Davies is back in Anaconda 3: Offspring (Sony Pictures Home There's a choice for cartoon companionship this year at Thanks- Entertainment, $24.96), starring David Hasselhoff as a mercenary who giving and Christmas: Alvin and the Chipmunks (Paramount's Alvin's joins a team out to capture a pair of genetically altered anacondas that Thanksgiving Celebration, $14.99, and Alvin and the Chipmunks (let's all say it together) have escaped from a top-secret lab. Classic Holiday Gift Set, $37.99) or Charlie Brown and the Peanuts Are we done with monsters? Not yet-i! China is the new setting for Gang (Warner's Deluxe Editions of A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving the Mummy franchise's recent The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon and A Charlie Brown Christmas, both $19.98). Cartoon-wise, there's Emperor, with hero Brendan Fraser returning to combat a resurrected also 's $16.98 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Season Two: ruler (Jet Li), and also contending with a sorceress (Michelle Yeoh) Part Two of Two (love those catchy titles), which features 1 3 episodes; and, yes, you bet, the Yeti. The "I just wanna see the movie!" set will Sony's $24.94 Storm Hawks: in the Skies, which features happily settle for Universal Home Video's $29.98 single disc, while the final 13 Season One episodes; plus, the every-episode The Flint- you sports out there can check out the extras-packed Special Edition stones: The Complete Series (Turner Home Entertainment, $129.98) ($34.98). and Speed Racer: The Complete Classic Series Collection (Lionsgate, $49.98), the latter putting all 52 1960s episodes in a tin shaped like the Mach 5, and tossing in a disc of bonus material including (says the I AM LONGER press release) "an actual episode from the new series." Geez, an actu- Four extra scenes (with filmmaker commentary) are among the al episode—these guys ain't foolin' around! Another catchy title extras on Warner's new boxed set of / Am Legend, starring Will comes at us via Speed Racer: The Next Generation: The Fast Track: Smith as the last man on Earth, somehow immune to an incurable The Movie, a feature-length (well, 66 minutes) adventure. virus, and battling the mutant plague victims who lurk in New York Going back a ways, Warner is giving us Looney Tunes Golden Col- City shadows waiting for him to make a fatal mistake. The Ultimate lection: Volume Six ($64.98) and Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection

Collector's Edition ($49.92) contains two versions of the film, one ($26.98). Also being exhumed from the vaults is the Keir Dullea-star-

with a controversial ending, plus hours of additional content ("Mak- ring live-action series The Starlost, a VCI collection of all 16 ing of featurettes—including one with Richard Matheson, the origi- episodes, some of which haven't been seen since their original 1970s nal novel's author—animated comics, etc.) and a 44-page concept airdates. Keir Dullea and gone tomorrow, and now back for $49.99. sketch book. Other complete collections include the aptly named Knight Rider: The The world ends yet again in the SF thriller 20 Years After (MTI Complete Collection (Universal, $139.98), The 4400: The Complete Home Video, $24.95), about a young woman's (Azura Skye) journey Series (Paramount, $99.98), I Dream ofJeannie: The Complete Series

10 mm/December 2008 www.starlog.com (Sony, $174.95) and The Munsters: The Complete Series (Universal, DVDS IN BRIEF $69.98), the latter tossing in the feature films Munster, Go Home! Futurama: Bender's Game (Fox, $29.98): When the Planet (1966) and the made-for-TV The Munsters' Revenge (1981). Express crew infiltrates the world's only dark matter mine—source of all spaceship fuel—they discover a medieval land of dragons, sorcery and intoxicated knights (see page 46). HEROIC LORE Abbott and Costello: The Complete Universal Collection (Univer-

saga of the world's toughest kitten-loving hero continues to sal, $1 All 28 of Lou's Universal films, including all The ; 19.98): Bud & of unfold in director Guillermo del Toro's Hellboy II: The Golden their ghost and "Meet the Monsters" titles. They have been digitally Army, coming this holiday season in a $34.98 Special Edition DVD remastered and feature five new audio commentaries—including featuring collectible lenticular packaging, del Toro commentary, cast Richard Scrivani and Tom Weaver (that's me!) discussing the fine commentary, deleted scenes, early screen tests and lots of mini-docu- points of Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. What fine mentaries. For the ultimate fan, Universal will also be releasing a points?? deluxe gift set ($64.98) featuring a collectible Golden Army statue. The Polar Express: Presented in 3-D (Warner, $20.97): All aboard

For the casual fan who, yes, just wants to see the movie, there will be for a journey like never before: The 2004 kid-pleaser is back in three a $29.98 single disc. dimensions, and with four pairs of 3-D glasses. Murium, Borzage and Fox Box Set (Fox, $239.98): Cinema legends F.W. Murnau and Frank Borzage are showcased in this deluxe 12-film collection which includes the latter's Liliom (1930), about a poor man who turns to thieving to support his new family, loses his life in a holdup, but then returns to Earth years later in an attempt to set things right. Yes, this was later reincarnated as the musical Carousel. Kung Fu Panda (Paramount, $34.98): DreamWorks' recent ani- mated hit about an unlikely martial arts hero comes to home video accompanied by the brand new companion story Secrets of the Furi- ous Five, again featuring the voices of Jack Black as Po and Dustin Hoffman as Master Shifu. By law, we're required to quip, "It's panda- monium." By law, you're required to smile. Strait-Jacket (Anchor Bay, $19.97): Anime-hem about a world where sorcery and science co-exist, and humans who don't take the right precautions are transformed into demons... You smilin' yet? Tyrone Power Matinee Idol Collection (Fox, $49.98): From the

Better-Late-Than-Never Department: It didn't occur to us at the time to mention this summer release of 10 of the vintage star's movies, but

Children get a chance to be in The Chronicles ofNarnia: we do now since it includes 1948's The Luck of the Irish with Cecil

I Prince Caspian (Walt Disney, $29.99), battling an evil king in a mag- Kellaway giving an Oscar-nominated performance as a leprechaun,

I ical land; a two-disc Collector's Edition ($39.99) packs in even more and 195 l's I'll Never Forget You with Power as an atomic scientist (in added-value material. The grandson of the first chimpanzee in space black-and-white scenes) time-traveling back to 1784 (which is in turns hero in the CG-animated Space Chimps (Fox, $29.98), teaming Technicolor!). Co-star Michael Rennie was next seen in... with two NASA apes to retrieve a wayward spacecraft (and then, on a The Day the Earth Stood Still (Fox, $19.98): Loaded with extras distant planet, battle yet another evil dictator). Same-priced, and also old and new, this two-disc Special Edition of the 1951 trailblazer can- from Fox, Meet Dave stars Eddie Murphy as a one-inch alien captain nily cuts in on the publicity surrounding the upcoming remake. I in command of a six-foot spaceship. ..that is an exact replica of Mur- Sleeping Beauty: 50th Anniversary Platinum Edition (Disney, phy, and must pass for a human in Manhattan. We don't write 'em, $29.99): Sleepyhead hits the half-century mark, and the Mouse House folks, with a digital restoration, a new "Making of and an we just report 'em. commemorates |

A superhero for a new millennium, Wesley Gibson (James I 'All-New Enhanced Dance Game." Sleep or dance! Your choice!

McAvoy) is a cubicle-dwelling hypochondriac who discovers his pow-

I ers and becomes the latest recruit in a society of assassins in Wanted,

I based on the graphic novel series, co-starring Angelina Jolie and Mor- NEW IN BLU-RAY (Universal, issue's releases include Paramount's Kung Fu I gan Freeman, and now a Special Edition DVD $34.98) This new Blu-ray

I with hours of bonus features both wanted and unwanted ("Director Panda ($27.95); Disney's The Sixth Sense ($34.99), The Chroni- Timur Bekmambetov Discusses the Concept of Fate"). There's also a cles ofNarnia: Prince Caspian ($35.99) and WALL-E ($40.99); Uni- single disc ($29.98) and a gift set ($64.98) with packaging pierced by versal^ John Carpenter's The Thing ($29.98), Wanted and The a bullet. Will Smith, a sarcastic, hard-living superhero, has fallen out Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (both $39.98), the latter title

I of favor with the public and agrees to an extreme makeover in Han- also available along with The Mummy and The Mummy Returns in The cock, new from Sony on a single-disc DVD (theatrical and unrated Mummy Trilogy Gift Set ($79.98); Sony's Southland Tales and Mirror- versions, $28.96) and as a two-disc Unrated Special Edition DVD mask (both $28.95), the 2006 Casino Royale ($38.96) and Hancock ($34.95). Value-added material includes umpteen featurettes. ($43.95); New Line's Elf ($28.99); Lionsgate's Universal Soldier Is there anyone out there who thinks so little of heroic Flash Gor- ($29.99); Castle Rock's The Shawshank Redemption ($34.99); Criteri- don and his 1936 debut serial that they would buy the new Hermitage on's The Man Who Fell to Earth ($39.95); Fox's In the Name of the

Hill Media release Rocket Ship ($17.95)? Number one, it's a feature King: A Dungeon Siege Tale ($29.99), the 1951 The Day the Earth

version of the serial, so you're only seeing a fraction of it. Number Stood Still, The X-Files: Fight the Future (both $34.99), The X-Files: I

two, it has been bogusly rendered into "widescreen." And thirdly, it Want to Believe ($39.99), a two-pack of the aforementioned X-Files has been colorized via a new technique—that employs only three col- titles ($59.98), Meet Dave, Space Chimps (both $39.99) and Firefly:

ors! Whose idea was this... Ming's? Why not run it upside-down and The Complete Series ($89.98); and Warner's Constantine, Interview backward, too? Along the same lines, Legend Films commemorated With the Vampire (both $28.99), : Doomsday ($29.99), Pol- Bela Lugosi's 126th birthday (a day late) on October 21 by releasing tergeist ($34.99), The Polar Express: Presented in 3-D ($34.99), Fred colorized versions of The Devil Bat ($9.95) and Bride of the Monster Claus ($35.99), A Christmas Story ($49.99), I Am Legend: Ultimate ($14.95). In order to use the same 1920s photo of Bela on both covers, Collector's Edition ($59.99) and Austin Powers Collection: Shagadel- the box art for the latter has a half-woman, half-octopus growing out ic Edition, Loaded With Extra Mojo ($74.98), which incorporates

of Bela's nose. Yes, he does. Snort! You just can't make this stuff up, Austin Powers: International Man ofMystery, . . . The Spy Who Shagged folks. Poor Bela! Me and ...Goldmember. Yeah, baby!

STARLOG/Occemier 2008 1 1 COOL.' JENNIFER CONflEU-Y &oim& to Be im the RE/w\KG of THE DAY F@nLOG THE EARTH Stood ST/LLf now EARth SURE To SURVIVE '.

This column showcases web- sites for SF, fantasy, comics & animation creators and their cre- ations. Websites are listed for free entirely at STARLOG's discre- tion. Site operators may nominate their sites for inclusion by send- ing relevant info via e-mail only to [email protected]

MADAGASCAR 2 WEB PAGE Central Park Zoo animals Alex the lion (voiced by Ben Stiller), Rob Tapert serving as the execu- adaptation of Stephenie Meyer's Abrams certainly has a track Marty the zebra (Chris Rock), tive producers. Follow the ex- bestselling vampire book series. record of turning his leading Melman the giraffe (David ploits of Richard Cypher (Craig Twilight's last gleaming can be ladies into stars. For the time Schwimmer) and Gloria the Horner), who discovers he has seen at being, uncover a little more about hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith) end up magical powers, the mysterious www.robert-pattinson.co.uk Torv this issue, and take a peek at in the wilderness of Africa in this Kahlan () and the this web page sequel to the 2005 CG-animated old wizard Zedd. MARLEY SHELTON www.anna-torv.net hit. The crate escape begins at www.legendoftheseeker.com WEBSITE www.madagascarmovie.com Shelton is a Warrior of Virtue QUARK WEB PAGE WAYNE BARLOWE who once lived in Pleasantville A short time ago, in a galaxy pret- BOLT WEBSITE WEBSITE and was David Boreanaz's ty close by... there was Quark, For super-dog Bolt (voiced by In 1979, his first self-generated Valentine. However, some Dark Buck Henry's short-lived but

John Travolta), every day is filled book, Barlowe's Guide to Extra- Shadows have tainted her wickedly funny SF satire. Hitting with adventure, danger and terrestrials, was published. Since American Dreamz, so now the DVD October 14, the 1978 show intrigue—at least until the cam- then, this artist has created 100s former Uptown Girl hangs out in starred Richard Benjamin, Tim eras stop rolling. When this hit of book and magazine covers, Sin City and at the Grindhouse. Thomerson, the Barnstable TV show star is accidentally illustrations and paintings, as Enjoy Internet travels with Mar- Twins, the late Richard Kelton, shipped from his Hollywood well as a toy- and trading-card ley at Bobby Porter and Conrad Janis. soundstage to NYC, Bolt begins line. As a concept artist, STAR- www.marleyshelton.org "May the Source Be With You at" his biggest adventure yet: a cross- LOG readers are familiar with his www.quark.name country journey through the real contributions to Galaxy Quest JUSTIN BRUENING PAGE world to get back to his owner and the Hellboy and Harry Potter If you only have , SAM WITWER WEB PAGE

and co-star, Penny (Miley Cyrus). series. His work will next be seen why not live it as Mike Traceur, On Battlestar Galactica, he hero- Find out more about Disney's in the Day the Earth Stood Still the heir to the Knight Rider title? ically died as Crashdown. On animated film at remake and 's You can catch Bruening in the Dexter, he had the shocking www.disney.go.com/ Avatar. The excellence bar is set new NBC series, or discover answers to Dexter's past. After disneypictures/bolt high, not lowe, at more about this Knight in shining being thrown into The Mist, www.waynebarlowe.com armor at Witwer experiences another type LEGEND OF THE SEEKER www.myspace.com/ of Doomsday as Smallville's PAGE ROBERT PATTINSON PAGE justinbruening Davis Bloome. 's popular Sword As Cedric Diggory, he died in www.samwitwerfans.com/ of Truth book series receives the Harry Potter and the Goblet of ANNA TORV WEBSITE index.php?start_from=5 TV series treatment, with Ken Fire. Now, as Edward Cullen, he Could this Australian actress be &ucat=&archive=

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CONVENTIONS Questions about cons? Send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to the con's address. Do NOT con- NOVEMBER Glendale, CA 91202 tact STARLOG. Note: Listed guests may not appear and cons may be cancelled without notice. VULKON (818)409-0960 Conventioneers: Send info (with phone number and e-mail address) no later than three months prior www.creationent.com to the event to STARLOG Con Calendar, 250 West 49th Street, Suite 304, 3rd Floor, New York, NY October 31-November 2 Guests: , Kent McCord 10019 or e-mail [email protected] This is afree service. STARLOG makes absolutely no Orlando Hilton North (Friday); , , guarantees, due to space limitations, that your con will be listed. Orlando, FL (Saturday); , Virginia Vulkon Entertainment Hey (Sunday) P.O. Box 551437 tosemont, IL venue) Ft. Lauderdale, FL 33355-1437 Creation Entertainment Guests: (Firefly) Summer Glau, Adam www.vulkon.com STARGATE CON See earlier address Baldwin, Ron Glass, Jewel Staite; (Stargate) Guests: Michael Dorn, Terry Farrell, Bill 7-9 November Quests: Gabriel Tigerman (Friday); Samantha Jason Momoa, Alexis Cruz, Rachel Lutfrell, Tricia Heifer, Stephen Furst, Nicki Mumy, Clarion Hotel Smith (Saturday); Jensen Ackles, Jared David Hewlett Clyne, Peter Jurasik Cherry Hill, NJ 3adalecki (Sunday) Creation Entertainment STARBASE INDY OFFICIAL See earlier address FIREFLY-STARGATE CON November 28 Guests: Bill Dow (Friday); Kavan Smith FAREWELL November 21-23 Indianapolis Marriott Center East (Saturday); Jason Momoa (Sunday) November 7-9 iurbank Airport Marriott Indianapolis, IN Burbank Airport Marriott Burbank, CA Vulkon Entertainment Burbank, CA SUPERNATURAL CON Creation Entertainment See earlier address Creation Eniertainmenl November 14-16 See earlier address Guests: John de Lancie, Gil Gerard, Felix Silla 1010 North Central, Suite 400 Wyndham Chicago O'Hare two separate cons simultaneously held in one

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JOKES THAT DON'T WORK ON HOBBITS. 16 STARLOG/ZtamAerW UM OF By JOE NAZZARO SOLACE

Longtime producers Barbara Broccoli & Michael Wilson unveil James Bond's dark, new quest for vengeance. Bond is back.. .and it's just a matter of time before the body count starts piling up. After the events of Casino Royale,

the embittered superspy is looking for

answers to his betrayal at the hands of Vesper Lynd, but his investigations soon entangle him in an ever-growing web of murder and deceit. That's the starting point for Quantum of Solace, the 22nd James Bond adventure, and the second featuring Daniel Craig in the lead role (which premieres November 14). Unlike previous outings, which have generally been standalone films, this one directly follows Casino Royale. "It's a sequel" producer Michael Wilson announces. "The place we

left Bond was pretty unsettled, so we thought we should try to finish his story." "At the end of Casino Royale, Bond has been betrayed," continues Wilson's long- time producing partner Barbara Broccoli.

"He fell in love with a woman and let his guard down, so now he has emotionally shut down. He accepts that she betrayed him,

which is why he says, 'The bitch is dead!' Bond believes that Vesper [Eva Green] was an evil person who betrayed him, but the

reality is quite different. In Quantum of Solace, Bond has to find out who was behind Vesper's death, so from a profes- sional point-of-view, he must uncover the true villain. And from an emotional point-of- view, he has to come to terms with that loss.

It's an exciting place to start a new movie. "By the film's end," she adds, "the result of Bond's journey is that he has found a quan- tum of solace. That's the comfort that he had to seek emotionally: an understanding of why Vesper did what she did. And also, he man- ages to penetrate the organization that was behind her death, which is the Quantum Organization." A Lover Deceived It's autumn in London, and along with director Marc (Finding Neverland) Forster, both Wilson and Broccoli are overseeing the final stages of post-production on Quantum of Solace (named after an obscure Ian Fleming short story that debuted in Modern Woman in 1959, and was later included in a 007 story collection). "Right now, we're completing the scoring and visual effects and doing the mix- ing," explains Wilson.

STARLOG/DeremAer/TO 17 Photo: Patrick Demarchelier characters," says Wilson. ...And so is Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright), "And don't forget that Bond believes that who finds himself in a tricky situation with the CIA's kili-or-capture order out on 007. Mathis betrayed and turned him in," notes Broccoli. "So when Mathis and Bond meet again, there's some unfinished business. And in this film, Felix Leiter and the CIA have a

kill-or-capture order out on Bond, so Felix is in a sticky situation. "M also believes that Bond's emotional state may be clouding his professional judg- ment; there's an internal conflict going on between Bond's heart and his head. She ques- Veteran 007 Longtime series tions him, and there are times when the out- producer Barbara producer Michael side forces believe that Bond isn't in control of Broccoli found more Wilson notes his destiny. It's an exciting rollercoaster for the than a Quantum of that this latest audience—and a treacherous rollercoaster for Solace in Casino Bond is actually a Bond." Royale's sequel that Quantum the overwhelming follows up of Solace continues tone success. Casino's storyline. established in Casino Royale, which largely dispensed with the humor and outlandish

"We're very happy with the way it has devices of past 007 films in favor of a grittier, turned out," adds Broccoli, "and we're pretty more realistic atmosphere. While the new excited. A few people have seen it and think it direction was embraced by critics and movie- holds up well, so fingers crossed!" goers alike, it was still a gamble to shake With a second Bond film under his belt, things up so dramatically after the incredible Craig has now made the role his own, erasing success of the previous Bond outings. any lingering comparisons with his illustrious "Part of the series' longevity and success is predecessors. "He's a remarkable actor," says that the films have adapted to the times and are it was accepted by the public; most people Broccoli, "and we knew that before we cast very much of their time," maintains Broccoli. were pleased with the direction. A few people him. But what I think Daniel suffered from ini- "This version, or reinvention, is appropriate said, 'Oh, you don't have Moneypenny or Q in tially was that people —particularly in the for the time that we're living in. It's a tense it?' But we're just trying to keep it on this U.S.—weren't aware of who he was and what and dangerous existence for people like James track for the moment." he was capable of. But people do know now. Bond. Even with all the sophisticated machin-

They've seen him as Bond, and in other roles ery we have, it still comes down to the most An Agent Betrayed as well, and it's obvious that he's one of the important thing: the human intelligence and The new direction may have been accepted most important actors we have." men and women on the ground doing these by today's audience, but prior to release, nei- Also reprising their Casino Royale roles risky things." ther producer had any idea what the response are Dame Judi Dench as Bond's boss M, "We've discussed this before [in STAR- to Casino Royale was really going to be. "We Jeffrey Wright as his CIA counterpart Felix LOG #351], but what we wanted to do is take would be clever if we did," admits Broccoli. Leiter and Giancarlo Giannini as Rene Mathis. things in a new direction," says Wilson. "We "What happened was that we got our hands on "We haven't gone much further than that in were going for a fresh approach to Bond, and the book and tried to do as faithful an adapta- terms of all the traditional Bond movie series I think that was achieved in the last film. And tion of it as we could. Then we found the most talented people around and attempted to make the best film possible. When you're making a movie, that's all you're really concerned

about. We certainly weren't smug about it. We

were very clear that it was a big change, and

we felt that the public would embrace it, but

you never know. It's all meaningless until the

film is finished and out there, because after all, we don't make movies for ourselves. We make them for the audience. "Everyone was excited when we finally got the rights to Casino Royale, which has always been the Holy Grail for us. [Producers] Cubby Broccoli and Harry Saltzman had wanted to make Casino Royale, which had already been filmed twice: once as a live tele- vision play [in 1954, with Barry Nelson as Bond], and once as a spoof [1967, with multi- ple 007s]. We spent a great deal of time mak- ing some important decisions, but we were confident, because we had the book, [screen- writers] Rob Wade and Neal Purvis did a great adaptation and then [writer] Paul Haggis

sprinkled his magic on it. And we were also confident about Daniel. So we were thrilled

that the movie turned out so well, because it was a big step, and we were fortunate that Miss Moneypenny and Q have yet to return in the retooled series, but M everyone involved in the creative side was on (Dame Judi Dench) is back... the same page."

18 SWm/December 2008 www.starlog.com Mathieu Amalric plays the film's antagonist, Dominic Greene. The French actor co-starred with Craig in Munich.

Bond has "unfinished business" with Mathis (Giancarlo Giannini), whom As Camille, Ukrainian Olga Kurylenko he believes is a double agent who is the latest in a long line of international betrayed him. Bond Girl beauties.

While the choice of Craig now seems rock- many times, T don't believe the good stuff, Royale, but there were still more than enough respect, it was solid, it was a controversial decision at the and I don't believe the bad stuff.' problems to deal with. "In that time, with critics and fans dissecting every- "Daniel just gets on with it, does his job easier," agrees Wilson, "but this is a big pic- thing from the actor's height to his hair. "It and gives 150 percent every single day. And on ture with much more action and locations, so was silly," complains Broccoli. "People were a movie like this one, he's not only shooting logistically it was very difficult. There are also saying things like, 'He can't drive a stick shift' six days a week, but also doing all the training lots of visual effects in this film. So although and that kind of nonsense, which was really that goes along with it. Daniel is certainly as some of those emotional issues were behind absurd. The fact is that Daniel is a fine actor. dedicated on this film as he was on the previ- us, [making this Bond] picture is as hard as it He's highly motivated, disciplined and trained ous one. When he decided to take on this role, has ever been." in the theater. Daniel is at the top of his game, he said, T will give it my all,' and he has defi- "The expectations are obviously much and he also has broad shoulders. He has said nitely lived up to that—but it's no walk in the higher," Broccoli notes, "so that has been a park!" challenge, too. We have to meet or surpass Most of that baggage had been jettisoned people's expectations." by the time the producers began putting With Purvis and Wade working on the together plans for a follow-up to Casino script, the producers began searching for a director. The assignment ultimately went to Despite all the Forster, whose eclectic body of work also pre-release Ball, Stay, negativity, Daniel includes Monster's Craig won fans over Stranger Than Fiction and, most with his formidable recently, The Kite Runner. "It's performance hard to find a director who's as the right for these movies," says - iconic 007. Broccoli. "We usually start by asking ourselves, 'Who's a good storyteller?' And Marc certainly wins hands-down there. His films are diverse, and he's always up for a chal- lenge. When you look at the last couple of movies he has done, they're very different. "When we approached Marc, he initially didn't take

an interest in it, but he want- ed to work with Daniel, and after several meetings, he found the emotional hook that he was looking for to connect with the material. Marc also got very involved with the scriptwrit- ing process, and everything evolved from there. He's someone who has to be emotionally invested in the story, and given where Bond starts off in this

mi%/December 2008 1 9 —

film, I believe that Marc saw it as an exciting "For example, if we had picked an path. We're very grateful that he decided to do American Hollywood star to play Dominic as it." a Frenchman, [the audience would have] to get over quite a lot before they could accept that A Man unbowed actor in the role. It's a luxury to be able to hire In Quantum of Solace, Bond is still suffer- the finest actors from various countries and ing from Vesper's deception and is determined put them in our films. I think it's more excit- to uncover the truth. After interrogating the ing for the public to discover people, and mysterious Mr. White (Jesper Christensen) Mathieu in particular has come to real interna- whom he shot in the leg at Casino Royale's tional attention because of his Cesar Awards end—Bond discovers that the people who were [for Best Actor] and his extraordinary perfor- blackmailing Vesper are much more dangerous mance not just in The Diving Bell and the than anyone realized. Tracing an MI-6 traitor to Butterfly, but also Munich [in which he co- a bank account in Haiti, Bond encounters the starred opposite Craig]. He gives a riveting beautiful Camille (Olga Kurylenko), who has performance as Dominic, and Mathieu has her own personal vendetta, and eventually such charisma and intensity. But it's also a leads Bond to the ruthless businessman Do- very internal performance. Mathieu plays this minic Greene (Mathieu Amalric), a major play- neurotic, intense, internal villain, and he's er in the Quantum organization. Agent Fields extremely effective."

Wilson praises Ukrainian actress Kury- lenko, who essays the enigmatic femme fatale Camille. "Her character has a very different kind of personality," he remarks. "She has her The director of Monster's Ball, Finding Neverland and The Kite Runner, Marc Forster own agenda and mission. Camille and Bond (left) was a surprising choice to helm this Bond adventure. clash, but they're also on a parallel course for

(Gemma Arterton) is also on hand—perhaps to help 007, perhaps not. As Bond's mission takes him across Austria, Italy and South America, he learns that Greene is hatching plans to take control of one of the world's most vital natural resources, and is forced to manipulate his contacts with- in the British government as well as the CIA. Trying to track down the man he believes to be responsible for Vesper's death, Bond also must stay one step ahead of the CIA, a group of international terrorists and even his own supe- riors...

Consistent with previous Bond films, the producers assembled a top-notch group of international actors to fill out the cast. "That was something that Cubby and Harry started in the very beginning," recalls Broccoli, "because being based in Europe, we have access to some of the finest European actors. Cubby always believed that when you saw someone new in a role, it was much easier to believe them than is someone who well- Gemma Arterton is Agent Fields—and the face of Avon's Bond Girl 007 fragrance. known. She's currently filming Prince of Persia.

20 mm/December 2008 Quantum of Solace sees Bond on the run from enemies and allies as he tries to penetrate the organization behind Vesper Lynd's death.

a while. She has her own issues, just like Bond." While Quantum of Solace is filled with hard-hitting character moments, Wilson is quick to point out that there's no shortage of action. "When you have someone like Daniel, you can take things in a slightly different direction and make it more realistic," he observes. "You're seeing a guy who gets banged up, hurt, cut and bruised, but he keeps on coming. It's more emotionally engaging than stunt-driven. We do have spectacular action, but it's more in the reality zone. The fights are tough and hard and take their toll on the characters." With Quantum of Solace nearing comple- tion, the producers are understandably enthu- siastic about what they've put together for the latest Bond adventure. "Daniel is extraordi- nary in it," declares Broccoli. "And Marc did a great job. It was the best of both worlds: We had our fabulous team of people, and Marc With Quantum of brought some of his key people as well. The Solace, the 22nd entry in the collaboration between everyone was extraor- series, Broccoli dinary, and the movie delivers. Cubby always " and Wilson said, Tut it all on the screen!' wanted Bond to think that says it all," concludes Michael "I finish the Wilson. "We started out with an idea for fin- journey that he ishing Bond's journey, at least up to a point, so began in Casino that he would be relieved of this burden, and I Royale. It bows " truly believe we've achieved that." y^5 November 14. www.starlog.com WIZARDS RUEE AS SHOWRUNNER KEN BIEEER & COMPANY BRING THE SWORD OF TRUTH SAGA TO SYNDICATED EIFE.

Biller admits that his latest television Kenouting poses some exceptional chal- lenges. That's saying a lot for a man who has brought the Starship Voyager home from across the galaxy, as well as punched-up Superman's already power-packed teenage

years. But the challenge Biller is referring to is actually rather prosaic: He has never before had to produce a series from half-a-world away.

"The show is filming in New Zealand," ex- plains the LA-based executive producer of the new syndicated series, Legend of the Seeker.

"The biggest challenge for me is probably try- ing to keep up with and track of everything

that's going on in New Zealand where, as I eat

lunch in LA now, it's 7:30 tomorrow He's a far way from morning." New Zealand, It's no cake walk, especially where Legend of since Biller's duties go far beyond the Seeker is shot, board meetings and budgets. "There but showrunner are a number of executive producers Ken Biller is in the television world who are keeping an eye on euphemistically referred to as show- the exploits of runners; I'm one of them." Richard Cypher (Craig Horner) and That makes Biller one of Legend Kahlan Amnell of the Seeker's most hands-on peo- (Bridget Regan). ple. As a showrunner, he's responsi- ble for managing all the day-to-day details that will bring the series—adapted from the Sword of Truth book series by author Terry Goodkind—to life on the small screen. It's a full-time occupation even when a show lenses locally. "I spent an enormous amount of time on the Star Trek: Voyager set, which was shot on the Paramount lot," explains Biller (who prev- iously discussed his Trek work in STAR TREK: VOYAGER #18). "I was only steps away from the set, and everything was right there, so I could do exactly what was needed when it was needed."

And while Smallville is shot in Vancouver,

"That's still the same time zone as LA," he adds. "It was easy to take a call from the set,

22 STARLOG/DecemAer 2008 —

and to get answers from the actors and direc- Richard Cypher, who lives in a fantasy world, which is from the books. The pair travel with tors about a certain scene or dialogue. I could in a region called the Westlands. where magic the wizard Zedd [The Road Warrior's Bruce do video conference calls for production meet- has become myth. But all that changes when Spence], and encounter many other elements ings and those sorts of things. So even though Cypher saves a young woman, Kahlan from the novel."

I couldn't walk out of my office and be on the Amnell, from death at the hands of agents Other characters from the initial book such set, I had that important communication from a distant realm. From Kahlan, Cypher as Darken Rahl (Craig Parker) and Chase (Jay between the production and writing staff. In discovers not only that magic exists beyond Laga'aia), will also show up during the course this situation, because Legend is filming in his woodland home, but also that he's destined of the series. "Characters will appear here and New Zealand, the [showrunning] has become to use that very magic and become a hero. there, but we won't be following the book's a divided job." Cypher travels with Kahlan to the kingdom narrative on a week-to-week basis," Biller That on-set half of the job falls to executive of D'Hara, and learns how to use the Sword of notes. "We aren't telling a serialized story, but producer Rob (Xena: Warrior Princess) Truth, as well as other magical powers, to lib- we are trying to stay true to the books' themes: Tapert, whom Biller notes, "is pretty much full erate people from the ruthless tyranny of the good vs. evil, and personal responsibility time in New Zealand, running the production powerful despot Darken Rahl. He's aided by especially a hero's responsibility. They're there. I have lots of interaction with Rob on a Kahlan, his most trusted ally, and the wizard standalone adventures that take place in daily basis. We make casting decisions togeth- Zedd, who trains Cypher in the ways of Terry's world." er, review auditions that are posted on-line and magic—and shares the wizard's rules, which Biller understands that sometimes a story discuss [all aspects of the show]. We talk to the figure strongly in the novels. As time goes on, needs to be changed in order to make it right directors together, and select the sets and Zedd proves to be much more than he appears. for television, and that includes modifying the props and things like that. But I still don't have The Sword of Truth weaves an intricate major characters. Horner doesn't cut the exact as much direct involvement as I would if I narrative tapestry; the 11 -plus book series is image of the tall, brawny, grey-eyed Cypher were in the same location where the show is brimming with rich characters, daring adven- from the novels, but even these tweaks were actually shooting. tures, dark perils and unspeakable monsters. only arrived at after careful consideration.

"The biggest part of my job is essentially But all that has to be distilled in order to trans- "We're faithful to the characters, particu- being the head writer. In addition to the vari- late into a successful series. Enter Biller. "I got larly to the leads," Biller asserts. "Although ous production duties that I've mentioned, I'm involved with Legend of the Seeker because we're taking more of an approach, especially the principal person who talks to the produc- various studio execs—whom I had been affili- with Richard, of [telling the story from the tion people and tries to translate what we're ated with for a number of years on different beginning]. In Wizard's First Rule, Richard is looking for from a given script into produc- shows—approached and asked me if I would more of a fully-formed hero. In the TV series,

tion. I do this along with Rob, and I also be interested in working on a series." we're presenting more of an origin story.

manage the writing staff, with whom I He's as passionate about Legend of the Although Richard is heroic right from the get- develop what we call 'break stories.' I Seeker as Tapert, and Sam Raimi—who fought go, [audiences will] watch him develop into a assign scripts and stories. I work with to bring the series to life, and will direct future hero and learn what his role is, as well as what

i% the writers on the scripts. I give notes episodes. "We're trying to be true to the he's destined to do."

i and I rewrite." books' spirit," Biller says. "And we're ab- That isn't a trivial shift, and any author solutely using and embracing the mythology might chafe at such a change. For years, Wizard's Rules that Terry created. Our show is now called Goodkind (who discussed his novels in STAR- Legend of the Seeker, which Legend of the Seeker, so the Seeker is still LOG #334) rebuffed the opportunity to have premieres the weekend of there. Richard Cypher [Craig Horner] is still his works adapted for the screen, and for just has faith that his books 4 November 1, is adapted from the hero. We're starting with the story in those reasons. But he Goodkind's fantasy novel Wizard's First Rule, and we're maintaining are in capable hands with Biller and company.

Wizard's First Rule and its sequels. It's a Richard's close relationship to Kahlan [Brid- "Terry has entrusted the show to us," Biller story about a young wood guide named get Regan]. She's still called a Confessor, says. "A number of producers approached him

SIS

The TV series is faithful to Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth books (especially the leads), although Cypher isn't quite as heroic at first.

STARLOG/Deremier 2008 23 about making his books into a TV series or

movie. As Sam said to me, 'If you sell a mil- lion books, the studios are going to start sniff- ing around.'

"Terry was resistant for quite a while to sell his novels to TV or film, but based on Sam's passion for the series, he agreed. Terry spent a good deal of time early on talking to Sam and Rob about how he envisioned this series. But Terry also understands [our position]. He knows that the TV show is a new animal, and that he's a novelist, and an extremely success- Biller points out ful one. Terry realizes that certain things need that Cypher is to be adapted. He's privy to story material, the "both a hunted and he's scripts and all that, but he doesn't have a day- man hunting an enemy." to-day role in the writing of the show." Life-and-death situations are all Writer's Rules part of this Another consideration are Goodkind's syndicated fantasy fans, some of whom might expect the novel to adventure. appear completely unadulterated on the screen, and will carp over the smallest changes. "We feel a certain responsibility to the fans," Biller explains. "Goodkind's novels

are compelling, so the big challenge is: How

do you take this big canvas and turn it into a TV series? We have the constraints of hour- long storytelling to consider. We have a need

to tell standalone stories. It's not that we won't have some serialized elements, but we have to tell closed-end stories every week. So how do we mine the spirit of these books and turn them into their own thing, as well as some- thing suitable for TV?" Fortunately, because Legend of the Seeker is a fantasy series, many creative doors are open, but that comes with its own set of issues.

"Legend is a very challenging show, it's a totally different from those in several respects. wide-open canvas, and everything is invent- The humor in and Xena was very ed," Biller notes. "For that broad, and the characters would often wink at very reason, it's unlike the audience, which was fantastic and a other shows. And while delight to watch, of course, but we aren't strik- that's terrific, you can't ing quite that tone with Legend of the Seeker. simply say, 'They go to Our tone is a little closer to something like the hospital' if a character Lord of the Rings. I'm not equating our show gets seriously hurt, or, 'They to a film series as unique and special as Lord end up in the back of a police car' if of the Rings, except to say that ours will be they're . Even on something 1 [dark and gritty]. There will be humor, but our Star Trek, the cast is on a ship, so you can characters are constantly dealing with life and say, 'They're on the Bridge,' or, 'They're in death situations." Sick Bay.' You can say that and it's under- Besides the high fantasy association, stood. Legend of the Seeker shares something "[Another complication] is that Richard's else in common with Hercules, Xena story is a bit of a fugitive tale," Biller contin- and The Lord of the Rings: their ues. "He's both a hunted man and he's hunting location; namely, New Zealand. an enemy. Richard is constantly on the move. "There are some beautiful set- It's a challenge to figure out what he's doing, gs in the two-hour pre- where he's going and what his goals are in miere," Biller promises. each episode."

Biller's co-producer should make that dif- ficulty a little easier. Tapert—the man behind Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, Xena, and Jack of All Trades— Native understands a thing or two about how to film New Zealander and The Road vagabond heroes. However, just because Warrior and Tapert (and Raimi) are helping stir this fanta- Revenge of sy cauldron, doesn't mean that Legend the of the Sith actor Seeker should be regarded as a wink-wink, nudge-nudge Hercules knock-off. essays the "Legend will appeal to many Hercules and wizard Zedd.

Xena fans," Biller explains, "but this series is

24 STARLOG/Decemier/TO Assigning and writing scripts and "breaking stories" are Biiier's main tasks, but he doesn't give his notes to Regan. Executive producer Rob Tapert handles the on-set obligations.

who has lots of magic at his disposal. We see "In another," Biller adds, "Richard finds how Cypher comes to terms with the fact that himself pursued by bounty hunters, and he has

he isn't who he thought he was, and now he to face what it means to be a hero. Does he put has to embrace this bigger mantle. That's a his own safety ahead of someone who desper- pretty exciting two hours of television. He'll ately needs his help? Does he flee the hunters be facing some scary people and some fright- who may bring about his death at the expense ening things." of not aiding someone as the Seeker? So, as

Biller even guardedly highlights some you can tell, there's lots of emotion, romance upcoming episodes. "In the third, Richard and action." finds a town that has been troubled by a mis- Legend of the Seeker is poised to enter the use of magic, and he meets another wizard world of high fantasy—a genre that endures in who has gone rogue," Biller remarks. "He's popularity leaps and bounds over many other using magic for his own purposes, and we subgenres. Goodkind's Sword of Truth books "We sent the crew down to the South Island, watch Richard have to come to terms with alone have sold more than 25 million copies. where there are terrific shooting locations. what it means to use magic. In subsequent Yet not even Biller can say what the magic is Rob has plenty of experience producing in episodes, Richard arrives at the town where he that draws so many to the fantasy realm. "If I New Zealand because of Hercules and Xena. I was born, and where he was wrested as a baby knew exactly what people wanted to watch believe he was one of the first people to pio- from his mother's arms. His presence brings and why they wanted to watch it, I would be neer the idea of shooting down there, and he danger to the town, but he also inspires the much more successful," he chuckles. discovered some excellent crews. people to stand up to its enemies. "I think it has to do with our nature as "Rob found the country to be full of expe- human beings: We love the idea of adventure rienced craftsmen and technicians, and, of and magic. We love to be transported to other course, he also found these incredibly beauti- places and realms of the imagination. Fantasy ful and diverse landscapes. Although we shoot has been an enduring and successful genre some of Legend on soundstages, we hope to whether it's in books, film or television. We capitalize on the New Zealand scenery. The have a real opportunity with Legend, because country has that otherworldly feeling that is this genre isn't on TV right now. There's an perfect for this kind of storytelling." audience out there that's hungry for it." Biller suggests another need for these Producer's Rules heroic stories. "They show people who battle Legend of the Seeker's first two episodes evil in the face of incredible odds. We like to will air as a two-hour movie event. "It's a pret- believe that there are heroes out there who ty epic picture," Biller says. "Along with would do that for us if we were in that situa- Cypher, they learn about the legend of the tion, and we also like to put ourselves in that

Seeker, what the Seeker is and about his quest. situation: 'What if I was told that I have to risk

[The first two shows are] about a young guy my life to save someone else, or save the living a rather ordinary life in a forested area in world?'

a friendly town, and then his life is suddenly "Most people have difficult things going turned upside down when this woman Kahlan on in their lives," Ken Biller concludes. "We crashes through a boundary that has existed for have difficult jobs, difficult circumstances. many years. She brings magic into a world Look around at the world; look at the polls. It where magic hasn't previously existed. doesn't matter your political affiliation, our "She also tells this guy that he's much leadership in this country has failed us. And turn to when we're in trouble? So more than he thought he was, and that he's Cypher's introduction to Kahlan, and her whom do we destined to be this hero and savior of the disclosure of his destiny, has the young it's a chance to escape. We live in a world now,

oppressed people on the other side of the wood guide struggling with what it truly particularly, where our audiences crave boundary who are being terrorized by a tyrant means to be a hero. heroes." i& www.starlog.com SWm/December 2008 25 .starlog.com/store CLASSIC BLACK HANDLE PHASER 40th ANN. BRONZE PHASER w/ light/sound, removoble Type 1 phoser 1

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i tend to sell fhe item is ready to ship! GET ONLINE AND ORDER NOW! www.Starrog.com/Store Operated and maintained in partnership with the STOREWERX brand of SphereWerx, LLC. 28 SWm/December 2008 stared because their faces, so different, as an American, so it's really strange." seeing this demigod who can't even handle a

I so similar, were all devastatingly, inhu- In Twilight, Bella arrives in the rain-soaked normal relationship with a 17-year-old—and I manly beautiful. They were faces you town of Forks, Washington to live with her he's 108! Also, Edward is in almost every sin- I never expected to see except perhaps on father. The new kid in school, she eventually gle page of these enormous books." I the airbrushed pages of a fashion maga- meets the handsome and mysterious Edward, Having spent several months playing zine. Or painted by an old master as the face of who not only possesses superhuman abilities Edward, Pattinson now has a pretty good idea an angel." but also hasn't aged since 1918. Edward and what makes him tick. "When you're doing a That's the reaction of Isabella "Bella" his family are vampires who have foresworn character like this, you get to a point where " Swan, a lonely transfer student, after encoun- human blood, but the closer Bella gets to her you think, 'Yeah, I have this down,' he says. tering Edward Cullen and his adopted brothers new boy friend, the more she risks unleashing "And then you spend a couple of more months and sisters, unaware that they're actually vam- playing him, and it becomes way pires posing as teenagers. But these aren't the bigger than you thought it would stereotypical garlic- and cross-fearing preda- be, which is good, considering tors. While blood is still their primary dietetic this is probably going to be a requirement, Edward and his siblings can trilogy. So there's still a good nonetheless go out during the day—although deal that I don 't understand. direct sunlight causes their skin to sparkle, "I see Edward as an incredi- revealing their unique nature. bly desperate person. I tried to

That first encounter leads to a tempestuous abandon the entire vampire thing romance, which forms the basis of Twilight, and just play it as a 17-year-old the mega-selling Young Adult novel by guy whose parents have died, Stephenie Meyer. Part-teen romance, part- and he thinks he's going to die, unconscious and sud- , Twilight's phenome- too. He's nal success was followed by three sequels, and denly wakes up and has eternal against the first book is now a feature film premiering life, but it's pretty much November 21. Directed by Catherine Hard- his will and knowledge. Edward Prior to Twilight, Pattinson acted (as Cedric an unquenchable desire wicke, it stars Kristen Stewart as Bella and now has Diggory) opposite Daniel Radcliffe in Harry Potter Robert Pattinson as the inhuman object of her to kill humans and drink their and the Goblet of Fire. affection, Edward Cullen. blood, whereas before, he was a his monstrous appetite. And as the couple normal, moral person. So I was trying to cap- | Blood Relations comes to grips with their growing feelings for ture that struggle. life such For Pattinson, a British actor in his mid- each other, another group of vampires arrives "Edward has limited his down to have no compunctions about a small scope of experience because he's 205, playing the century-old North American in town, and they ) to Cullen afraid of killing people and acting upon his vampire might have been a daunting prospect using Bella as a pawn destroy the j

Pattinson observes. "When you : if he had known about the massive popularity clan. primal urges," can of Meyer's debut novel. "It's really weird, but Prior to his work on Twilight, Pattinson's close yourself up that much, you become intensely depressed and lost. Edward doesn't magician , I hadn 't even heard of it before," he admits. "I biggest credit was playing young what to do with himself. He didn't even know it was big, and if you just Cedric Diggory, whose competition with have any idea can't read the script without having known the Harry during the Tri-Wizard Tournament ends wants to die or be human again. Edward limbo state that he's in, and the book, it's like, 'What the hell is this about?' tragically in Harry Potter and the Goblet of handle the that's keeping there is Carlisle "At that time, I had done all these little Fire. While that film may have given him an only thing him surrogate family, he loves. But movies and things in Europe, and I simply felt introduction to big-budget genre moviemak- and his whom can't live entirely for like doing an American project, so I guess I ing, it didn't quite prepare him for his role in at the same time, you

got lucky. As for being an American, Edward Twilight. Love at first bite? Bella (Kristen is supposed to be 100 years old, so maybe my "Harry Potter was a bit different, because I Stewart) falls for Edward, Englishness translates as that, as being a bit only did one of those, and Cedric never really but will she put her neck line to protect older, but I have no idea. I'm [playing Edward] did anything bad, so you couldn't judge him. on the Pattinson explains. "He was a good guy the him from another vampire clan? whole time, but with Edward, in many especially in the later books, he's a ways, \ bit of an asshole. It's interesting, because he

gets jealous and possessive, and it's funny other people—especially if you're living for what I was doing, though. It was a small part,

eternity. I was 17 years old and I dropped out of school "There's also this crisis when he meets this for four months to go to Capetown and be an girl, who threatens to destroy 80 years of tem- actor. That was one of the most fun periods in

perance, denial of his true self and discipline. my life, even though I can't claim it was that

That's incredibly frustrating at first, and then deep of a performance. I had my sword and

discovering that the only way to be truly satis- my long hair and that was about it.

fied—in terms of loving the girl or killing "But that was a long time ago, and now I her—is to lose control of himself. Edward is have a different attitude toward work. Back

afraid of losing control, because he has no idea then, I didn't even know I was going to act for

what would happen. The whole [message] is a living. After that job, I thought I was going that it's better to have loved and lost than not to attend university. Harry Potter changed

to have loved at all, if that makes any sense." that, because I shot the film for such a long

time that it ran over the period where I had to Blood Lines make up my mind whether or not to go to uni-

A relative newcomer to the business, versity. I just kept working, and it's only fairly

Pattinson began acting in the suburbs of West recently that I got serious [about acting]. I

London with the Barnes Theater Company don't think I would have been able to handle

before landing small roles in Vanity Fair and this when I was 17." Ring of the Nibelungs (a.k.a. Dark Kingdom: Pattinson landed his Goblet of Fire role a The Dragon King). It was the latter project, week after meeting with director Mike Newell, which retold part of the Richard Wagner Ring who decided the actor was perfect for Cedric Cycle, that gave the actor his first glimpse into Diggory (who is killed by Voldemort in the

the genre. movie's climax). It was Pattinson's biggest

"I think that was my second job," he film to date. "I learned a huge amount from it, recalls, "and I had a great time. I didn't know and then I did some projects that were very

small," he says. "I did a film [Little Ashes] in

Spain last year that had the tiniest budget. I

played Salvador Dali, and it required more thought than I've ever put into a character

before. I ended up learning a huge amount about execution. It's funny, you start accumu-

lating things. I never went to drama school, so

I'm learning as I work. But Twilight was very different. It was my first American job and a new environment." The actor credits Newell with helping him create a well-rounded performance as Cedric. "There were so many visual effects, and Mike had never done a film like that before, so he

said, 'I don't care, I'm still going to direct you Run, in the forest, run! Edward may be immortal, but that doesn't mean he can't be as if you were doing a completely normal killed. The bloodsucking coven wants Bella, too. scene!' " Pattinson notes. "Mike was fantastic

Breaking a mirror gives you seven years of bad luck. But for the immortal Edward, that's not such a long time.

Pattinson notes that Edward is "afraid of losing control." Unfortunately, Edward's relationship with Bella will test his ability to repress the killing urge.

30 mi%/December 2008 He worked cinemagic before in Harry Potter. Now, Pattinson hopes he can do it again with Twilight, without a wand.

"I kind of made things up and went with

the bones of the story and tried to approach it that way. Edward has no clue what to do, so it was almost impossible for me to figure out why he makes certain decisions, because sometimes there isn't a real answer. Edward knows the right way to turn, but he's dictated by his needs. His whole life is out of his con-

trol, and his body and everybody else are telling him to do [different] things. Edward has no idea what's going on half the time,

which is what I liked about the character. "There's a tragic element about him that's

fall love with some- to work with. Most of the stunts were done [by "I got to Portland two months early, before very human. When you in other people], and everything was set up to be pretty much anybody else was there," one, there are always problems, but they're and [so Edward is con- smashed down. I don't think I even did any Pattinson offers. "I obsessed over the script very big problems, greenscreen stuff on that film." and book, and I didn't really read anything else fused]. He can't do without the girl, because for a long time. I started writing my own ver- she provides everything that he's missing, but Blood Tests sion, because the entire book is from Bella's at the same time, she also threatens to destroy When Hardwicke began assembling her perspective. You can't really trust anything everything. So Edward is in a bit of a tricky cast for Twilight, Pattinson flew to America, that's said about Edward, because it's from the predicament." where he screen-tested with Stewart at the point-of-view of this girl who's instantaneous- With his work on Twilight now finished, realize the director's Venice, home. At one ly madly in love with him. So I tried to write Pattinson is only just beginning to early Internet point, he even acted out a pivotal scene on notes and things from Edward's perspective. I popularity of Meyer's series. An Hardwicke's bed. Stewart had already been also found out that Stephenie wrote another received a phenomenal number of hits, appearance by the cast cast as Bella, and Pattinson believes that actu- version of Twilight that's from Edward's point- while a Comic-Con biggest reac- ally helped his own work in the audition. of-view. That book is still unfinished, but prompted one of the weekend's "Kristen had read with a bunch of other there's a manuscript, and she gave me that. It's tions. Perhaps not surprisingly, sequel talk has with three bestselling fol- people as well on the same day, and I had no different from what I had come up with, but already begun, and and his fellow cast mem- idea at all what I was going to do when I went there are also many similarities. low-ups, Pattinson these characters into the room," Pattinson says. "Maybe it's bers could well be essaying because she had already been cast or read with for years to come. other people, but Kristen was relaxed and had "That's why I put more time in in the

I normally think is nec- done the scenes quite a few times, so I [based] beginning than would essary," explains. "And I believe that there's my performance by reacting to her. I was com- he material to carry the three movies. ing into it completely blind, and I had enough absolutely no idea how to play a 100-year-old There's loads of stuff that we can mine out of I like what happens to vampire. It's an intense thing to walk into a [the novels], and becomes a dif- room and be told, 'OK, you're madly in love, Edward in the second book. He in second and third novels and yet the person is someone you desperately ferent person the and Eclipse]. want to kill!' I didn't want to seem like a psy- [New Moon reaction, I chopath in conventional circumstances, and I "Also, seeing the fan had no Robert didn't know how to do that, but Kristen was idea how passionate people are," play really cool." Pattinson allows. "It's interesting to After being cast as Edward, Pattinson trav- someone like that—especially when it's differ- ent from the book. It will also be interesting to eled to Portland, Oregon, where Twilight was Saved by the Bella. Pattinson says the see what the people who are in love with this shot, and spent a couple of months working on movie's main message is Edward's like. It should be an his American accent and absorbing the realization "that it's better to have loved character like and don't script—not to mention Meyer's original novel. and lost than not to have loved at all." intriguing experiment." ^

www.starlog.com STARLOG/Decemier 2008 31 The spotlight is on Fringe's Anna Torv, who plays FBI Agent Olivia Dunham alongside, in shadowy silhouette, John Noble (as Dr. Walter Bishop, left) and Joshua Jackson (Peter Bishop).

Piecing together the puzzles, Anna Torv investigates on the Fringe of stardom.

week on Fringe, Anna Torv Eachexamines some very strange stuff. But right now, sitting on the set, the actress' tale of how she landed the role of FBI Agent Olivia

Dunham on the J.J. Abrams series is pretty darn strange, too.

"I tested for it in Australia through a cast- ing agent there who April Webster, who was doing the casting in LA, got in touch with. He had sent them an [audition tape] that I had done for a different project," Torv explains.

"After that, I had a conversation with J.J. that made me think, 'My God, what a lovely man to work for.' And the things that he talked When Special Agent about and asked me were genuine. Then, a lit- John Scott () who is tle while after that, came the contractual stuff. — also Dunham's boy In America, you negotiate the contract before friend—is seriously you get the job, but in Australia, you're injured during an offered the part and then you negotiate the investigation, she contract. Everyone [thought that it was funny turns to Dr. Bishop that] I was camping in the middle of nowhere, for help.

32 SMLOG/December 2008 —

out in the bush, because they had watched my gruesomely killed the people tape and wanted to bring me in, but my phone aboard a flight into Boston's was out of range. Then I came back on a Logan Airport. However, dur- Friday, and they all went, 'A-ha! We found her ing the pilot, Dunham and the in the Outback!' Bishops discover that a host

"What is even funnier is that the contracts of deadly events are actually were going through, and I wasn't even in connected. Subsequently, the

Sydney. I had been in London and came back, FBI keeps the team together and I was staying on the Gold Coast. My in an effort to solve the big- Mom was away, so I had no access to a fax ger crisis of who's conduct- machine. It was really late at night, because of ing such illicit experiments, the time difference, and my agents were on why and to what end. the phone, and we finally got [the contracts] Other important figures in through. But I had to sign and fax this thing, the Fringe mix include Broy- and 1 didn't have any friends to go to and les (Lance Reddick), Dun- everything was closed. ham's boss, and fellow agents "I was driving along the highway and Francis (Kirk Acevedo) and Trish, my agent in Australia, said, 'Would you Farnsworth (Jasika Nicole). just find a service station.' So I went into a And then there's the elusive, server and asked the guy if I could use his fax bionic-armed Nina Sharp machine. I signed it, thinking, 'This is the best (Blair Brown), a key figure job I ever got,' and sent it through to them. I and executive at Massive Dy- asked the station clerk, 'How much should I namic, the powerful corpora- give you?' He said, 'Don't worry.' So I gave tion that appears to be front him $5 and said, 'Please buy a drink. You'll and center of the alarming " never know how important that was!' scientific intrigue. At the time of this inter- Strange Days view on the Long Island City, Jackson once lived on Dawson's Creek, but now he's up As viewers know by now, Dunham initial- New York set Fringe is set the creek, as Peter and Dunham constantly deal with scientist Dr. in Boston, the pilot was ly brings together the ^eccentric dark, disturbing matters. Walter Bishop (John Noble) and his long- filmed in Toronto and the "But it's nice that the estranged, brilliant-in-his-own-right son Peter production is now settled in NYC—the cast find our feet," Torv says. shifting. Initially, in Olivia's (Joshua Jackson) in order to save her gravely and crew were working on the show's fifth relationships are needs everybody to serve a particu- injured boy friend/partner John Scott (Mark installment while finishing bits and pieces of mind, she suddenly, she needs them Valley) and help try to understand what so episodes three and four. "We're still trying to lar purpose. Now, "We're a little in the dark about the overall story."

Dunham will keep pursuing these cases till the cows come home—and they do! She's on a mission to unravel the Pattern of these strange phenomena.

www.starlog.com Smm/December 2008 33 —

dering, but that works for "I just had a phone call with [co-producer] the story. Olivia is going to Jeff Pinkner the other day, and he told me

end up having this weird some stuff that still hasn't been made clear in emotional life with her dead the episodes so far. I'm thinking, 'Oh, maybe boy friend, and it will be the that will connect,' but I don't know how that best thing that has ever hap- will kick in. Like David Mamet says: 'What's pened to her." in the script is what you should focus on.' But What would Torv like to other philosophies say that you should detail see in terms of Dunham's everything, and that you should have a story

development? "So much," for every item in your room. So it's tricky,

she replies. "I want to see because I want to play the scene for the scene,

her personal interactions, but I have to constantly remember and think but that's very hard to about where I'm going and where I've been'' answer, because we're under these particular rules Strange Nights whereby I can't say any- Odds are that most STARLOG readers thing. So I get into this spi- hadn't heard of Torv until the Fringe hype ral of thinking, 'What can I machine shifted into hyperdrive. She's an say and what can't I say Aussie actress who has worked regularly in that's disconnected from the Australia and England, and she counts among script and doesn't give any- her credits the television series Young Lions, " thing away?' The Secret Life of Us and Mistresses, the film So Torv can address the Travelling Light, the video game Heavenly issue, the question is re- Sword (in which she voiced the main charac-

worded: How much of the ter, Nariko) and the British Frankenstein tele- big picture does she want movie. or perhaps need to know "I never saw a play or a film Fame is a Fringe — and went, 'Oh in order benefit of being on a to do her job? "This my God, this is what I want to do!' I just successful TV show, has been a massive learning always did it," Torv remarks. "Then, right out

but the exhausted curve, because we're a little of school, I auditioned for NIDA [the Torv would prefer a in the dark about the overall National Institute of Dramatic Art] in little R&R from the story," she explains. "But Australia, and I got in and I loved it. Acting intense shooting we're doing TV, so there's has sort of been my life. I haven't done any- schedule. never a finite story where thing else, which is embarrassing, really, isn't you can sit down and say, it? Actually, I took one year off and tended bar for different reasons. 'OK, this is going to come here, and this is on the Gold Coast!" "And I'm really excited about scenes my going to come here.' Also, I'm fearful to make Fringe could be a major game-changer for with John. Olivia is a little cold, and she's on clear and detailed decisions about Olivia's Torv. Expectations for the show are enor- a mission, and I like it that there's [another past, because we keep getting fed new pieces mous, and if Torv follows in the footsteps of character] to balance that. She has been floun- of information. previous Abrams leading ladies Keri (Felicity) "People will sometimes think they know me."

Russell, Jennifer (Alias) Garner and Evangeline (Lost) Lilly, she

could become a major star.

However, Torv refuses to let either the prospect of fame or the burden of assuming the top spot on Fringe's, call sheet get the better of her. "I let go of the responsibili-

ty," she says. "I can't carry that.

It would paralyze me, to tell

you the truth. I simply do my

work. The show is great, and I

think people will like it, but I

don't know. You can only put it out there [and wait and see]. "And I haven't had [serious fame yet], I've been working for There has been a a while, and people will some-

learning curve times think they know me, but I to her character, haven't [experienced that level and while Torv of stardom]. I don't know if that doesn't know will come, and I don't know everything about what that will be like. I've gone Dunham's past, out and had all my fun. I'm she continues to receive pretty quiet now," Anna Torv clarifying clues. smiles, "so I don't even think about it!"

34 Mm/December 2008 www.sfarlog.com

Co-directors Consider Bolt's dilemma. He's a white German Shepherd endowed with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal dogs. He's Byron Howard & faster than a speeding car. More powerful than a rocket. Able to wipe out an entire battalion with a single 12- Chris Williams believe bark. Together with his year-old human companion, Penny, he fights a never-ending battle for .their animated truth, justice and a loving pat on the head. There's only one problem: It's just a TV show. Bolt and Penny are dog is best actors. His powers are fake. And our canine hero doesn't know it. in show. By accident, Bolt is shipped to New York, far away from his Hollywood studio. Bursting free from confinement, he treks back to the West Coast to find Penny and, in his mind, save her from the Green- Eyed Man. Along the way, he teams up with an abandoned cat named Mittens and his number-one fan, a hamster named Rhino. How can Bolt cope in the real world? Can he reunite with Penny without the BOB benefit of superpowers? Does he even need superpowers to be a hero? /A BV Luckily for Bolt, his biggest obstacle has been removed: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which was to have been released November 21, has been rescheduled to July 17, 2009. So our hero's sponsor, the Walt Disney Company, has scooted Bolt up two weeks to that November slot. To meet that release date on a truncated two-year schedule, Disney's CG artists have been working many overtime hours. "People have really knocked themselves out," director Byron Howard observes, "to make the film as good as they can."

Co-director Chris Williams adds, "Everyone knows this is

John Lasseter's first Disney movie, where it has been done

entirely under his leadership. And John is very good at opening up creative channels, so that people's energy can get on the screen. That's why everyone has been jumping onto that oppor-

tunity and giving it everything they have." Dog Days The film's origins predate Lasseter's management of Disney Feature Animation. Four years ago, in January 2004, the project began as American Dog. Its writer and director was Chris (Lilo & Stitch) Sanders (STARLOG #301). And Bolt was a brown hound dog named Henry. The premise was roughly the same, that of a Hollywood canine star who's abandoned, but in this version, it was in his trailer in the desert, and his sidekicks were a one-eyed cat and a radioactive rabbit.

Then, discontented with its animated feature lineup, Disney man- agement acquired Pixar Animation Studios for $7.4 billion in early 2006. Lasseter became chief creative officer of the feature animation division, while Ed Catmull, CEO of Pixar and Apple Computer, joined Disney's board of directors. The new leaders took stock of the ailing unit, ordered revisions of the works-in-progress and shuttered the Circle 7 unit that had been working on Toy Story 3. Some of Sanders' crew moved on to assist Steve Anderson's , while Sanders reworked American Dog. Meanwhile, Lasseter initiated a new shorts program for Disney to nurture new talent and ideas for the stu- After working on such Chris Williams is the other (and is) the case with Pixar's films. dio, as was animated films as Lilo & half of this directing duo. "John is a big short film fan," says Williams, who had been a key Stitch, Brother Bear and His short "Glago's story artist on Mulan and The Emperor's New Groove. "Early on, I Chicken Little, Byron Guest" helped him land pitched a movie idea to John. He didn't greenlight that, but I guess he Howard makes his the gig (and it's on saw enough in that film that he asked me to pitch some short film ideas. directorial debut with Bolt. the bill with Bolt).

I ended up pitching five shorts to him. The one that he really took to was 'Glago's Guest.' " And so Lasseter commissioned the short about Feature Animation laid off some 160 of its crew. Among the casualties: American Dog's a Russian soldier at a Siberian outpost, and what occurs when he's vis- Sanders, who was reportedly let go by Lasseter over he's current- ited by an extraterrestrial. creative direction. Sanders moved to DreamWorks, where writer Dean As usually happens during a company merger or acquisition, down- ly directing How to Train Your Dragon, reteaming with Williams. sizing occurs and employees are dismissed. In December 2006, Disney DeBlois. As for his replacement, Lasseter turned to "We were early in production on 'Glago's Guest' when he asked me to jump on the movie," Williams recalls. "From working on the short

with John, I guess he thought I would be a good guy to [be one of the directors]." January 2007. The crew had less than two years to complete the already-delayed project and meet the commitments to licensees and merchandisers for Thanksgiving 2008. And the movie's title changed to Bolt. Howard notes, "We had a blank slate storywise—with the exception of the premise—so we all dove in as a story team to figure out what kind of film we were making. It has been going full steam ever since. The whole crew has been killing themselves to get it done." Several months into production, Williams asked Howard to co-

direct. "It's such a massive undertaking to helm an animated movie,"

Williams says. "Byron is an animation machine. He writes and draws really well, and he does great character designs. Byron has been a great

2-D animator for a long time, so it was a natural choice." Howard's cred-

its include being the supervising animator for Cobra Bubbles on Lilo & Stitch, Kenai on Brother Bear and a story artist on Chicken Little.

"It has been good for both of us," Howard says. "Chris takes the helm on story, editorial, scene planning and several other departments,

and I head up the character animation work. There's lots of overlap. Both of us chime in on character designs. It's a shared partnership, and

it has worked out really well." Hot Dogs For the role of Bolt, Howard says, "The only person we had in mind from when we came on board was John Travolta. We were looking for an actor who could portray a tough guy, but a sympathetic character as well, and play off both sides equally well. In so many of John's live- action roles, he gets to play tough guys, but as tough as he is, he still has that likable quality about him. We needed Bolt to be that kind of character. He can still be a Bruce Willis In Disney's new tough guy, but there's also this charm in CG-animated Bo/f,the his voice where you feel like he can be titular canine (voiced loving and sweet and you relate to him." by John Travolta), Rhino Says Williams, "We cast Susie the hamster (Mark Essman as Mittens the cat. She's really Walton) and Mittens Your Enthusiasm. Susie is the cat (Susie Essman) funny in Curb take an incredible from New York, and her natural New journey to LA. York attitude comes through. Her charac-

STARLOG/Deremier 2008 37 ter is very funny. Rhino the hamster is voiced by one of our story guys, Mark Walton. He was doing the scratch recording for the film. We have in-house people who temporarily act out the part so we can get a sense of how the story is playing, before we record the actual production dia- logue. But Mark was so fantastic as Rhino, we realized that he was the right guy. He was Rhino. When you hear Rhino's crazed, manic acting,

that really is Mark. And that's why Rhino is so endearing."

"It's 100 percent genuine," Howard adds. "Mark is a genuine fan

guy. His cubicle at Disney is filled with toys. Legend has it that his

house is as well. I've never seen it with my own eyes, but I hear it's something to behold." "And we have James Lipton from Inside the Actor's Studio; he plays the director of Bolt's TV show," Williams says. "James has a strong and amazing presence in the room; he's a fascinating person. And Malcolm McDowell is our villain, the Green-Eyed Man, on Bolt [the TV series within the movie]."

"Chris had the big task of actually going out and recording all these folks," Howard notes. "We have probably one of the most diverse voice casts in animation history. Some are Chris' personal heroes: Randy 'Macho Man' Savage and The Bold and the Beautiful'* Ronn Moss have cameos. Then there's James, Malcolm and Miley Cyrus [as Penny], So it's a very broad palette."

"It's a fun cast," says Williams. "The big thrill for me was working with Randy. I've been a big fan of his since his earliest wrestling days. Randy is one of the nicest guys in the world to work with. He's noth- ing like his wrestling character."

"Randy is in wrestling?" Howard quips.

In February 2007, word leaked regarding Bolt's revised plot, which

had similarities to the direct-to- video 101 Dalmatians II: Patch's London Adventure, whose co-producer Leslie Hough wrote to the web- site CartoonBrew.com about the matter: "Our film Dalmatians II fea- tures a German Shepherd deluded by his own stardom named

Thunderbolt. In our version, Patch, the puppy, is Thunderbolt's biggest

fan and has memorized all the episodes of his show. When I first heard

about American Dog, I thought the story was similar, but now it is too close for comfort. Disney is welcome to rip itself off, but we, the film- parks and to capture the essence of those places. People from makers of the first film, are kind of shocked." Ohio are struck when they see the scenes that are set there, by the intan- "I've never seen it," Williams attests, as does Howard. gible qualities of the light that are so specific, which the crew nailed for Usually in feature animation, key production artists visit the locales the movie. That subtle lighting is some of the most difficult stuff to do in which the story takes place. Such is true for Bolt, but with a surpris- in computer animation." ing exception. "We didn't go on any cool field trips. Not Byron and I "For the cinematography, we studied Ridley Scott films and Edward anyway," Williams laments. "I went to New York to record, because Hopper paintings," Howard says. "It's a very mature look for a film. We many of our actors are based there. However, we did send an intrepid used light to create mood and help the story along." crew to New York, Ohio and Las Vegas. The characters visit identifiable places, so there had to be an authenticity to the look, textures and light- Three Dog Night ing of those areas. In recent years, "3-D" has been used interchangeably with "CG" "Our artistic leadership is committed to the idea of creating immer- animation. Now, the term "3-D" is being applied more appropriately to sive worlds that you can really believe in, so they went out there to the stereoptic presentation of a film, in which a moviegoer wears spe- study the light, and they took lots of pictures in New York and Ohio cial glasses to perceive dimension. Disney calls their process "Disney Digital 3-D," which will be applied to sev- eral hundred Bolt prints playing in selected theaters. Howard points out, "Unlike previous films done here [Chicken Little, Meet the

Robinsons], this is the first one where the stereo was made hand-in-hand with the movie, as opposed to a procedure done later

on. They were kind of 'faking it' a bit before, because they were catching up to films that had already been printed. They were trying the best that they could." "Beforehand, much of the 3-D was done with little cheats," Williams explains. "It was like sliding levels of animation around to create a forced 3-D look." "But this time we had a team from the very beginning," Howard says. "And they're able to take the scenes as we're ani- mating them. They use Maya files to create

Both directors wanted Bolt's locations to look and feel authentic, so when it came to the stereo in a much more realistic, accurate realizing , Howard and Williams had to have pigeon extras. way. So the 3-D effects promise to be more

38 Mm/December 2008 www.starlog.com where we want a more dynamic look and Unlike Underdog, Bolt doesn't feel, so they pump up the stereo quality, and really possess superpowers. you really sense the dimensions, and then But that doesn't stop tone it him from making a heroic attempt there are other times where they to reunite with Penny. down. It's one more tool to help sell the story. And it's the best 3-D I've ever seen." For their next project, the directors sum

it up in one word: "Sleep."

"Obviously, it has been a ton of work," Williams states. "I've been solely focusing

on getting Bolt done and making it as great

as it can be. And I've been trying very hard not to think about work beyond this film.

But it has been a fabulous experience, and I feel an amazing sense of purpose at the stu-

dio with this new John Lasseter era. It has been a fantastic environment in which to

make a movie, and I would definitely jump at the chance to make another one." "Definitely," Howard agrees. "This promises to be a great place to make films over the next 10 years. Once we're rested, you'll see both of us jumping in on the next project! "So much of what we learned from John about 3-D, you do get an idea of the mag- nificent scope of this medium. You can move the camera around. You can change

lighting. Back when I was working on Lilo & Stitch, I saw the first shots from Finding

Nemo, and I looked at those coral reefs in the water and the light... Things are limit- less with 3-D. As a storytelling tool, it's great. The more tools you can give your-

self, the better. immersive and much better. But at the same time, the folks who are "At the same time," Howard adds, "John and Ed are committed to doing that are very conscious of the storytelling, and they're trying not creating 2-D projects for this studio. That's part of the Disney tradition. that audiences to be distracting, which is a nice thing. Often in 3-D films, it's 'Super I think it's about finding the right type of 2-D movie

3-D' all the time and in your face. But our team is sensitive to letting want to see." people enjoy the movie for the movie's sake." Chris Williams concurs. "I have a love for both. I love the worlds I love the charm of 2-D. "They did a presentation of it recently, and we were all really that 3-D can open up. At the same time,

it. I would be open to either impressed by how easy on the eyes it was," Williams remarks. "They're There's something magical about I guess truly trying to temper the 3-D and support the story. There are areas medium, whichever serves the particular story." ^

Besides co-helming their first feature film, Howard and Williams got to work with "Disney Digital 3-D" for the first time. Bolt premieres November 21 in both 3-D and regular formats. Pinkett Smith Photo: Trademark & Copyright 2008 DreamWorks Animation L.L.C All Rights Reserved.

The Matrix Reloaded and Revolutions' Jada Pinkett Smith gets animated behind the mike as she speaks up for Gloria the hippo STARLOG toonmeister Bob Muleady in Madagascar: (wearing a T-shirt designed by cartoonist Escape 2 Africa. colleague Tom Holtkamp) poses with one of our very favorite legends, the beloved voiceover virtuoso June Foray (alter-ego to Rocky, Granny & hundreds of others).

WALL-E writer- director Andrew Stanton was excited to land Sigourney Weaver as the Axiom's computer voice. His next project is John Carter of Mars. Weaver has two genre films coming up: The Tale of Despereaux (another voiceover job) and Avatar.

DreamWorks Animation is moving full speed ahead on Pandamonium, the inevitable sequel to Kung Fu Panda. Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger are

once again writing it. Jack Black (pictured) and Angelina Jolie are already signed to reprise their roles.

Film voiceover actors usually work Janeane Garofaio alone, but for See Movie, Matthew has a bunch of Broderick and Jerry Seinfeld animated projects on got together for recording her resume, including sessions—and a few laughs. King of the Hill, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Bee Movie Photo: John Clifford/Trademark & Copyright 2007 DreamWorks Animation L.L.C. The Wild and, most All Rights Reserved. recently, voicing Colette in Ratatouille.

Garofaio Photo: Copyright 2007 Disney Enterprises, Inc. & Pixar Animation Studios. All Rights Reserved.

40 mm/December 2008 —

Alex the lion (voiced by Ben Stiller) embraces his Ijk wild lionish roots. M Mission FRONV

By BOB MILLER

hen we last saw Alex the lion and his friends, they were stuck on the island of Madagascar with only one hope of ever returning to their home at the Central Park Zoo: a sequel. Luckily, for them, Madagascar earned more than $530 million in theaters worldwide. With grosses like that, in addition to DVD sales, how could DreamWorks Animation refuse to make a return trip? Thus, Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa.

"Normally, it's based off domestic box office, but Madagascar was at the Speaking so well-received worldwide that they felt certain they could do the local watering hole, sequel," says co-director Tom McGrath. "When they were opening in Norway [in December 2005], it got greenlit, and we started working on zookeepers the story. We knew that it would revolve around the watering hole, but that was about it. The story we wanted to tell was about Alex and his Tom McGrath & backstory—how he was taken from his parents, and how we could reunite them." Eric Darnell The Zooster Gang—Alex (voiced by Ben Stiller), his best friend Marty the zebra (Chris Rock), Gloria the hip hippo (Jada Pinkett detail their Smith) and Melman the hypochondriac giraffe (David Schwimmer) manage to leave Madagascar in a plane restored by King Julien, the crate escape. ring-tailed lemur. Piloted by the four penguins Rico, Skipper, Kowalski and Private, the plane ultimately crash-lands on the mainland continent Melman (David ^ «^ of Africa. There, they find themselves in a wildlife preserve, where Schwimmer) they mix with their own species while the penguins try discovers that all to repair the plane. giraffes are Alex reunites with his father Zuba, the hypochondriacs. alpha lion of the pride, who is delighted that his son is "The King of New York"—not realizing that it's just a stage name for per-

forming at the zoo. Marty, who has always wanted to be in a herd, meets the other zebras, who look and sound and act exact- Marty (Chris ly like him—and say "crackalacka." Rock) finally Melman discovers the giraffes in meets other Africa are even bigger hypochondri- zebras in the acs, and they ask him to be their new African mainland. witch doctor. And Gloria falls for a hunky hippo, Moto Moto ("Hot Hot" in Swahili), unaware of Melman's crush on her.

into Africa Six months prior to the first film's release, McGrath and fellow co-writer- director Eric Darnell (who both pre- viewed Madagascar in STARLOG #335) had already begun thinking about a sec- ond story. Says Darnell, "When you work

on a movie like this one, so much of it is about developing the characters. You get Gloria the hippo (Jada Pinkett to know them really well. We could imag- Smith) loves to ine all kinds of places we could take them

move it, move it! next. There were even things that we had tried in the first film, ideas that we had played around with that weren't fitting

mm/December 2008 41 into the story. But the ideas hung around, and we were able to use them in the second film." "For example," McGrath says, "the Melman and Gloria romance that's in this movie was originally in the first one, but we didn't have enough screen time for that and Alex and Marty's story. "Working with Ben, Chris, Jada and David again was so much fun," he continues. "On the first movie, Ben and Chris were excited because they wanted to do a movie together. Then they found out that they had to record separately, and they were bummed out about that. So on this film, we wanted to make sure that we got them in the room together. They got the chance to play off of each other for a couple of key scenes.

"That's rare in [feature] animation, but it's great, because it gives a dynamic and energy you don't get when recording actors separately. Although we write the scripts, the actors contribute to the dialogue. All of them are comedians, so they can improvise. And when Ben and

Chris play off each other, it's simply gold."

Zuba was voiced by Bernie Mac, who died of pneumonia in August. "When you spend time with someone and get to know them, they become a part of your family, so to have a sud- den loss like this has been very hard on all of The Zoosters us," laments executive producer Jeffrey prepare to head Katzenberg. "We loved Bernie. He made an home to New York, amazing contribution to this movie. Bernie but things don't quite brought a heart and soulfulness to Zuba. work out that way in There's this amazing heartfelt connection Madagascar: between Alex and his dad. Escape 2 Africa.

"And when you put that [his death] in the context of somebody who was as young and

vital as Bernie, it makes it all the harder to

come to terms with his passing. It has hit everybody hard, particularly because we're

still filming the movie. But we're also animat-

ing and living with his contribution. It's pretty special." Also returning to the cast are Bonn's Sacha Baron Cohen as Julien; Cedric the Entertainer as his righthand man, Maurice; and Andy Richter as Mort, the pygmy mouse lemur. Alec

Baldwin voices Makunga, the lion who is Zuba's main rival, and tries to sabotage Alex's

rite of passage in the pride. And Moto Moto is

played by musician will.i.am, who is also col- laborating with composer Hans Zimmer on the film's score. Political unrest in Madagascar prevented the filmmakers from going there to research the first movie. Such was not the case with the sequel, where they traveled to Kenya for inspi- ration. "It made a huge difference in terms of Julien (Sacha Baron Cohen), King of the lemurs, is a friend to the displaced the design," Darnell reveals. "In the first film, Zoosters. He lets them eat cake. they go to Madagascar, a place most people

Private (Christopher Knights) and the other penguins King Julien and Maurice (Cedric the Entertainer) enjoy first-class are getting their very own TV series. treatment aboard Penguin Air.

42 STARLOG/Decemier 2008 www.starlog.com As someone familiar with sickness, who better to be the new witch doctor than Melman?

Marty stand out from a million other zebras? That actually became one

of our story points, in realizing, 'What if every Marty was the same?' The other characters are slightly different variations. All of these ani- mals are designed to hide in the savannah, and so we had to do things to make them read against the grass and trees and pull them out of the environment. So we played around with the color palette saturation." "One thing that confirmed the story we were telling, which centers

around the watering hole, is how valuable water is," says Darnell. don't know that much about. Some people, we discovered, didn't even know that it was a real place. They thought we made up this fantasy island. We realized, early on, because people didn't already have a vision of Madagascar in their heads, we could create a fantasy world. We could create these exotic jungles based on [Henri] Rousseau's naive French paintings. It gave us lots of freedom.

"Madagascar is a part of Africa, of course, but the African continent, the mainland, is a different story. People, whether they've been there or not, feel like they know something about it. They've seen it in books. They've seen it in films. They've watched The Lion

King. And so it was critical that we actually go there and get a real sense of the place, but we didn't necessarily want to deliver a photo-real version. We wanted to show an Africa in the first film's style, one that people would under- stand and recognize, but was also completely unique." "Which was a big challenge," McGrath An unplanned crash-landing launches the Zoosters' latest exploit—this time on the notes. "We knew they were going to meet vast African veldt. other animals like themselves. How does "People have to dig wells really deep into the riverbeds to get water for their animals. It con- firmed in our minds that we were going in the right direction." And yes, the filmmakers did encounter lions on safari. "Oh yeah!" McGrath confirms. "We drove right past them. They don't really see you as people, I guess, unless you get out of the jeep." "We almost witnessed a kill," Darnell adds.

"We saw a lion try it. He actually had a baby wildebeest in his sights, When massive and he made a charge for repairs are it, but then a buffalo got needed on the between them and said, fallen plane, 'Not today, buddy.' He Skipper (Tom McGrath) takes defended a different charge of his species from this lion. flightless crew. Those buffalo are mean."

mm/December 2008 43 In the sequel co-directed by McGrath and Eric camera, because it's expensive to render a background when it's mov- Darnell, Alex reunites with Dad Zuba (Bernie Mac) and ing. When it isn't, you can do one render and then the characters ren- Mom (Sherri Shepherd). der on top of that. But when you're moving the camera around like on a crane, every frame in the background, every blade of grass, has to be

re-rendered. So it's incredibly taxing, but now there are ways to do it quicker and make the calculations faster. So that was very freeing, especially as directors, to be able to choose the cinematography with- out as many limitations." "These days, we're at a place where you aren't really limited by

what the technology can do," Darnell says. "If you can think of it,

there's a way to get the technology to help you accomplish it. Tech- nology has advanced significantly since Madagascar. On top of that, the people who are working in this industry are getting better and bet- ter at what they do, and the tools that we're using are getting more and more defined and refined. We've more than doubled the processors that

are generating the frames for this film. And I think that our rendering

time is more than double the first movie's. We're definitely

throwing more at it, with just the hardware, which helps Out of New York a great deal." The directors refer to the films' animation as "the wack fac Even with the creative freedoms allowed by these tor"—the simplification and caricature of designs, with no advances, filmmakers still have to be mindful of the straight angles, and "cartoony" and exaggerated character move- budget. "We've tried to be smart about where we put ments. But for Madagascar 2, there were times when the wack our money," McGrath says. "We knew that we factor needed to be restrained. "We knew that in this sequel, we wanted to invest in the plane-crash sequence and were going to take these characters to places where that big, ^ the end of the movie. A big cost is water. broad action might not always be the appropriate way to approach Generating that effect is pricey. But knowing an acting moment," Darnell says. "Some of the most difficult that going in, we could figure out how we were things that we had to do were really subtle—tiny little movements, going to shoot something [with water] and flickers of a cheek muscle into an eye, pushing a lid up, the kinds l|j minimize [the cost] so that we could do more of things that, as humans, we all feed off of and recognize and can lj effects in another scene. As Eric said, there's understand the emotional content behind those subtleties. It's a chal- nothing you can't do. It just takes time and lenge to communicate that in an animated character, and we had many money!" more opportunities to do that in this movie." "We were never told, 'Oh, you can't Since the first film, technological advances have enabled the direc- tell that story because that would be " tors to upgrade the riggings for the character models. McGrath hard,' Darnell adds. "If it's important describes them as "like high-end sports cars. They're all custom. As for the storytelling, then we do it. If it advances come in from other movies, people continue to try to make isn't as critical, we don't. You don't stage a scene things better for the animators. They get a model tune-up. We didn't in a rainstorm if it isn't part of your story, any change the designs; we just made them easier for the animators to con- 30 Rock Emmy-winner more than y°u would in a live-action trol." voices film. It only creates extra challenges,

"For example, we used to have two versions of Alex," Darnell Makunga, Zuba's chief problems, expense and effort. But if it's explains. "One where he could get down on all fours and walk like a competitor for the pride. crucial to the story, then you make it lion, and one where he was standing. Now, the animator can go from happen." him running on two legs to four pretty easily. They have better tools "And the studio will back and help us," McGrath offers. "[The now to do what they need to do." crew] and effects guys are invested in this movie, so when we worried McGrath reveals, "In the first movie, we often had to lock down the about whether we could do something, they would go, 'No, we can do

it,' and they figured out how to get it done." Says Darnell, "We would ask, 'Can we Poor, lovesick Melman have a million zebras in this shot and pull isn't happy when he out?' And they would go, 'Is 8,000 spots Gloria taking a OK?' late-night dip with 'Well, it doesn't look like a million.' And it Moto Moto (will.i.am). would end up being [something like] 50,000." Eighty percent of Madagascar 2 was pro- duced at PDI/DreamWorks in Palo Alto, California. The other 20 percent was complet- ed at DreamWorks Animation's Glendale, California campus, which entailed quite a bit of commuting for the two directors. "On the

first movie, I counted about 400 trips," Darnell

recalls. "On this one, I lost count. It's a hard

commute, but after a while it's like getting on a bus. "Our editorial department was in Glendale. We had lots of animators and writing and tech- nology people down here, too. Tom was down here; this is where he lives. Our producer also

lives down here. It was hard at first, because it's a different way of communicating. But everybody got used to the idea, and pretty much everything was done over videoconfer- encing. And this wasn't Apple iChat. These

44 miOG/December 2008 — "

In the meantime, the Zoosters franchise is Inspiring the African denizens, expanding to television. On the heels of The King Julien addresses the issue of Madagascar Penguins in: Christmas Caper the depleted watering hole. A (2005), another 30-minute holiday special is forthcoming this year. Featuring the entire

Madagascar cast, the special is being directed by David Soren, head of story on Shark Tale. Next spring, the Madagascar penguins will star in their own series on : 26

1 half-hours divided into two 1 -minute misad-

ventures. It's a prequel to the movies, with Skipper, Kowalski, Private and Rico headquar-

tered at the Central Park Zoo. "Julien is in it,

and our main characters are in the zoo, so it's kind of a parallel universe," Darnell explains. (Which means, McGrath says, that the produc- ers don't have to explain how Julien got to New York.) Darnell and McGrath are consultants on the series, reading scripts and ensuring charac- ter continuity. And, as he does in the films, were rooms where the entire wall was a high-definition screen!" Beyond Madagascar Asked to describe his working relationship with McGrath, Darnell replies, "We pretty much stay joined at the hip as much as we can. That's where the strength of a partnership can fly. We feed off of each

other. The sum is greater than the parts, ultimately, if we're doing the job right."

"But where the vision comes in is in the writing," McGrath points out. "That's where we hammer out how to do the scenes. We bounce

things off each other. Once we get it on the page, we give it to the crew

and have it drawn out." "And the producer, Mireille Soria, was vested in the story like the rest of us; she was there every step of the way," Darnell notes. "Her story sense is impeccable. Whenever we would go wandering— off down some comedy road or something that was too far afield " " said, 'Do remember this story?' —She pulled us back and you Monkey business! Hoping to fix the plane, Skipper must deal McGrath interjects. with Mason (Conrad Vernon) and the chimpanzee union. "It was truly a three-way partnership pulling this story together," Darnell says. McGrath voices the lead penguin, Skipper. "It's weird," he says. "I'm Thanks to the first Madagascar's phenomenal success, did not an actor by trade, but it's fun. However, I didn't know what I was Katzenberg give more creative slack to the directors? "Yeah, he did," getting into. It's a lot of shows!" McGrath confirms. "Jeffrey didn't have to check in on us as much. But "It doesn't take too much time out of our day," Darnell says. "They

we valued his opinion when he gave it. He's really supportive, and he's keep us up to date as far as the stories, scripts and storyboards, and we

really funny. Jeffrey is a C.E.O. with a sense of humor. When he's down give our two cents. But after that, we stay out of their way. They know in editorial, he's one of the guys who's cracking jokes." what they're doing. They're pros at this. They can use some of the sets "He's jumping up, dancing around, acting stuff out..." Darnell [from the movies], but they have to build the characters because they're

chimes in. using different software. And they have to do it on a television sched-

"We're all a bunch of goofballs!" McGrath smiles. ule. But from what we've seen, it's really good. It's quali- According to Katzenberg, the corporate strategy at ty TV."

DreamWorks is to release two animated features a year, Meanwhile, the Zoosters in Madagascar: Escape 2 one of which will be a sequel to an existing franchise Africa have their own challenges to overcome. As Tom such as Shrek, Madagascar or Kung Fu Panda. He McGrath relates, "Things are taking a turn for mentions a sequel beyond this one, but even so, the fate the worse, not only for our heroes, but for of the Zoosters is contingent on the popularity of their everybody in the wildlife preserve, where the next adventure. This leads to an interesting dilemma: river that feeds the watering hole has stopped If the follow-up flops, the Zoosters may remain flowing. No one knows what to do about it, until where they are. But if another sequel is com- Alex, who sees an opportunity to redeem himself, missioned, the characters could get stuck offers to leave the protection of the wildlife pre- in another location. Will they ever make serve and head upriver into the African jungle with

it back to Manhattan? his best friend Marty to see if they can bring water "In our minds, they'll get back to back for everybody." New York," Darnell offers. "We definitely Will Marty find his individuality again? Will can take them there, if we're given the chance Melman survive the dreaded witch doctor's disease?

to tell another chapter in the story. But that's Will Gloria realize that she's not in love with Moto not to say that this film ends with a question Moto, but the giraffe next-door? Can Alex save the Skipper gets a love interest (!) necessarily. It's a complete idea with a begin- day, the entire wildlife preserve population and redeem mark, in this sequel. He'll lead can the penguins get the ning, middle and an end. And it stands alone. But his penguin squad into toon himself and his family? And again, if the opportunity presents itself, there are exploits on Nickelodeon plane flying again? Audiences will find out all that and definitely more places to take these characters." next spring. more November 7.

www.starlog.com mm/December 2008 45 a

Co-creator David X. Cohen savors the series' second life as direct-to-DVD movies.

gerous mission to infiltrate the source of all spaceship fuel— dark matter mine. But what they discover deep below the

surface is even stranger: a medieval land of magic and sorcery inspired by Dungeons & Dragons. D&D is an area that series co-creator and producer David X. Cohen says they have sur- prisingly never tackled before. "It's natural material for Futurama, to go into fantasy," he notes. "We were shocked ourselves. When we went into the writers' room and started

discussing it, we said, 'Didn't

we do that?' It seemed like too

big of a target to have never hit before, and everyone got excit-

ed. We're all fans of that kind of stuff, and hopefully that comes through." Bender's Today When the Futurama TV series ended, the cast and crew had no idea that they would eventually be coming back. "We hugged each other good- bye, turned out the lights and left the office," says Cohen (who previously discussed Futurama in STARLOG

#269). "We thought that was it, because there aren't many The crew of Planet Express has defied the odds of the TV gods. examples of TV shows that have been resuscitated—in any form. After battling back from certain cancellation, Futurama has found Family Guy sort of led the way for us. They did a DVD release and then new life in a series of full-length direct-to-DVD movies. The came back on the air. I think Fox noticed that they made money on that newest is Futurama: Bender's Game (20th Century Fox Home proposition. Entertainment, DVD, Blu-ray), out this month. It sees former present- "Meanwhile, the Futurama reruns started to do really well in syn- day pizza delivery boy Philip J. Fry, his great-great-great (etc.) grand- dication on . [Co-creator] and I had been son Professor Hubert Farnsworth, the beautiful one-eyed Leela, Dr. repeatedly suggesting doing some kind of project, and when they saw Zoidberg and Co. back for their third video feature. Not bad for a pro- the evidence mounting, they called us up and said, 'Maybe we should gram that was scrubbed five years ago. talk about this.' But when we went off the air, we had no expectation of This time around, the intergalactic delivery crew sets out on a dan- doing more, so it was a pleasant shock to us when word came down that

46 Smm/December 2008 Like Family Guy, Futurama has found a new life (after cancel- a feature feel, or as much as we could," Cohen reports. "They aren't lation) on DVD. Fry, Professor Farnsworth and Leela began going going to theaters, but we wondered what we could do to give people the back to the future earlier this year with Bender's Big Score. experience of watching a feature film. That's why we went with widescreen and Surround sound, which we had never done before. Also, we're releasing Bender's Game on Blu-ray, and they've all been animated in Hi-Def, which we never did before. The first two exist in

Hi-Def, and we're waiting to see if Fox will also release them in that format. "The third and fourth ones are definitely being released on Blu-ray on the same dates as the regular DVDs. All of those things will give the movies more of a cinematic feel. We also looked for settings and ideas that were grander and could support the longer material. A trip to this

fantasy world is a rich enough area that we could have written three films around them—as certain directors have done!" Cohen notes that the producers decided to center each picture on a

different type of SF-fantasy, beginning with the first and second, Bender's Big Score and The Beast With a Billion Backs, through to the fourth, Into the Wild Green Yonder. "With each one, we picked a fairly big SF area that we thought could carry a larger production," says

Cohen. "The first one is a time-travel epic that intrinsically introduces

lots of complications to deal with, and the second is a monster movie

with an intergalactic romance sandwiched on top of it. The third is

In Beast, Kif asked Amy to be his "Fonfon Ru," which, in Amphibiosan, is akin to marriage. Unfortunately, things don't work out so well for the newlyweds.

Is Dr. Zoidberg afraid of The Beast With a Billion Backs? Co-creator David X. Cohen describes the second direct-to-DVD feature as "a monster movie."

we were coming back to life. And much of D&D fantasy, and with the fourth, we've the credit goes to the fans who kept watch- gone for a grand space opera and a battle ing Futurama and buying the DVDs, that has spanned billions of years." because that was the evidence Fox needed At one time, a Futurama episode incor- to bring us back. The fans genuinely saved porating D&D would have been considered the show." off-limits. "The rules that we live by have The entire voice cast reunited for the loosened up over the years," Cohen four Futurama movies. They include Billy explains. "Initially, it was, 'This is the West (Fry, Professor Farnsworth, Dr. Zoid- future. This is a sci-fi show. We want to berg, Zapp Brannigan, etc.), Katey Sagal comment on how things today will affect (Leela), John DiMaggio (Bender), Phil the future.' In the early days, doing the LaMarr (Hermes), Lauren Tom (Amy) and show in medieval times would have Maurice LaMarche (Kif, etc.). (Bender's strained our self-imposed rules. But we've Game also has a brief but hilarious cameo come to realize that anything we enjoy is by George Takei). The writers from the good fodder for Futurama. It just took original series also returned. "Everybody building up our confidence over the years

came back, which is a nice testament to the to know that. The show is really about these show's behind-the-scenes aspect," notes characters more than space or planets or Cohen. "One of the best things about rockets. So as long as we stick with the

Futurama is that we get to work with many characters having concerns, emotions and interesting people who are very good at relationships, I think we'll do fine. what they do. The cast was enthusiastic, "We don't like to do shows where and people really wanted to get back something crazy happens in the setting or together, so there was a good mood plot development and the characters don't

throughout." react to it in a relatable way. If Fry and One of the benefits of making feature-length Futurama's resurrection as a series of Leela find themselves in this medieval fan- Futuramas, notes Cohen, is the four direct-to-DVD movies allowed the opportunity to expand upon the TV show—as tasy world, they have to be shocked and producers to expand upon the TV show. well as explore previously uncharted confused, and you have to be able to sym- "We were determined to give them more of territory in the final frontier. pathize with them. As crazy as the setting

www.starlog.com SMWG/December 2008 47 —

is, we need our people—or machines or lobsters—to respond in a way and oil today—the growing scarcity of it, and the environmental con- that the viewers can relate to. That's our goal, anyway. We've figured sequences of mining and drilling for it. Then we have Mom, our stan- out that we can go crazy with the setting, but the characters' emotions dard fill-in Mom, who controls her oil company, Mombil. And their and reactions have to play as real." logo coincidentally looks a little like Mobil's. So, we had satire in mind on the fuel front." Leela's Tomorrow The Futurama staffers aren't afraid of satirizing current events, but In a year when gasoline has topped $4 a gallon, Bender's Game, most of their humor has a broader base. "As far as the fantasy goes, our which deals with a futuristic energy crisis, is eerily prescient. Cohen intent was to do satire that doesn't have as much of a topical factor," admits that it was actually lucky timing. "When we started writing this, says Cohen. "One of the things we were thinking about is the huge gas was creeping upward," he says. "This is a long process, and these amount of violence inherent in these [types of] movies. We make a DVDs take around two years from when we start talking about the story point of that by showing how violent Leela becomes when she gets to the release date, and gas was starting to increase. People were grous- caught up in the medieval world. Even the good guys are killing every-

ing a little bit about gas prices body left and right! They just grow numb to it. That isn't topical, but it

then, so we said, 'Let's make that is satire. Our lives are a little easier when we stick with that kind of the movie's opening.' Mean- humor!" while, when we were in produc- Although there's apparently no satirical intent, "Bender's Game is tion, gas prices dropped quite a being released on Election Day, which is a pretty odd choice by Fox," bit, and we were thinking, he points out. "When we first saw that, we said, 'Hey, don't you think

'We're the only people in the the country might be paying attention to something else?' But they still

country rooting for the price to thought it was an OK day. For one thing, many of our orders are made go back up!' Well, our wish in advance on-line. They're also running ads on The Daily Show and came too true, unfortunately! Comedy Central, and they think there will be an exceptionally large

As the production entered its audience in the week leading up to that day. I want people to remem- final stages, that's when gas ber that on Election Day, there's something very important to do, and

Bender's Game is the latest DVD release (available this month). The story sends our heroes on a quest to find the source of spaceship fuel. The Planet Express crew, however, ends up in a medieval land of magic and sorcery. Inspired by Dungeons & Dragons, the third installment also features homages to The Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia. Like Bender, Cohen was "shocked" that the show had never tackled D&D before.

went up to $4 a gallon. We said, 'That's that's to go out and buy the Futurama enough—we think people will get the DVD!" joke!' Of the Futurama characters, Cohen

"It's always a gamble when you put in says that the robotic Bender is probably his any topical aspect. We assumed gas prices favorite. "It's the most fun to write for would be going up, up, up, but there was Bender, because it's liberating and he has lots of fluctuation from start to finish with no shame. He doesn't have my attitudes that. It ended in a way so the movie makes writers tend to be the opposite of that. sense, though it won't make anybody too They're people who sit quietly in a room happy! We draw a pretty close parallel and don't go out and party like crazy and between the fuel of the future, dark matter, get drunk and shout from the rooftops. So

48 mm/December 2008 —

"It's the first [DVD feature] we've done that is truly interactive. There's also our first-ever on-screen video commentary on the Blu-ray version. We always do a commentary track, but on the Blu-ray, you'll get to see our lovely faces—if you wish. So that's a plus or a minus.

But you do have the option of just listening to it. We also have 'Bender's Anti-Piracy Warning' for anyone who's thinking of illegally copying the DVD. There's a stern warning from Bender on the disc!" Those, along with several other extras, are to ensure that buyers get their money's worth. "We've really gone out of our way," comments Cohen. "On The Beast With a Billion Backs, there's a full half-hour episode that appeared in bits and pieces on the Futurama video game.

No one has seen it, but it's actually a full-length episode. We've put

You've heard of "the beast with two backs," right? Well, a tear in outer space leads to a one-eyed, tentacled creature coming through the anomaly and

attacking Earth. But if you want to know the (very funny) reason behind the assault, you'll have to check out The Beast With a Billion Backs on DVD. As for further exploits for the Planet Express crew, Cohen declares that the upcoming Into the Wild Green Yonder is an SF story of truly epic proportions.

together some excellent bonus features for

all of the discs." Into the Wild Green Yonder is the fourth—and, as of now, final Futurama writing for Bender is fun, but it isn't film. "We're going out with a bang—a big entirely representative of my real SF story that spans the entire history of the life!" laughs Cohen. universe!" declares Cohen. "It's an epic "As far as my voice," he adds, "I battle between powerful forces, and the would say that it's possibly the crew gets caught in the middle of it. The Professor, given my science back- story has an environmental theme, which is ground, although he still has a cou- something we've tried to return to periodi- ple hundred years on me! I don't cally, but this one is on a grand scale. We think that there's anyone who's had to work especially hard on the ending, exactly like me, but that's the joy of because we aren't sure if we're ever going

Futurama: I get to be these crazy to see these characters again. So we came characters that I'm not in real life." up with something that will be satisfactory

if [this is the last Futurama], but there's Fry's Yesterday also some wiggle room if we do return." In the past, the Futurama cre- Everyone is hoping that Wild Green ators have paid tribute to D&D with Yonder isn't really the last hurrah. "We various references, and even had don't know yet," Cohen cautions. "I've creator Gary Gygax in an episode been telling people that we're cautiously (as one of Al Gore's Super-Nerds). optimistic, but that's based on nothing but A special feature on the DVD my eternal optimism. Actually, it's based chronicles the association in more on a little more than that. We know that detail. "There's a lighthearted dis- sales on the first two DVDs have been very cussion of Dungeons & Dragons' good. The first one greatly exceeded their influence on Futurama, because expectations, and the second has been out some of the writers and myself for a while now. But they've been released were big D&D players in our youth," says Cohen. "I was inspired by a little bit later in the rest of the world, so they've had less time to see the fact that we had gotten to work with Gary on the show, and he was how it's doing elsewhere. A good chunk of the market is outside the on our minds when he passed away. We did this discussion, and remi- U.S. So they're gathering their data, but everything we've heard so far nisced a little bit—although the whole thing is pretty ridiculous!" has been positive. There are plenty of other special features as well. "One that I think "If that keeps up, logically, they would ask for more. ..but logic

is going to be fun for people is called the 'Futurama Genetics doesn't rule this business!" David X. Cohen laughs. "I was just talking Laboratory,' " reveals Cohen. "We have an array of characters, and you to Matt yesterday about a crazy idea that I can't give away. We also get to pick two of them, and the on-screen DNA scrambler will show have ideas for a feature film, a really big movie for theaters, should we you the result of merging their DNA. The animators got a little too ever have that opportunity. But that call hasn't come yet, either! We're wrapped up in this project, and came up with some really good designs open to Futurama returning in any form—TV episodes, DVDs or fea- for the cross-bred characters! ture films. I'll be waiting by the phone!" www.starlog.com SlimG/December 2008 49 RECORDS

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Don't want to cut magazine? Write order on any plain piece of paper. Artist Wayne Barlowe draws from his dreams and nightmares to create

memorable creatures. .

When writer-director Guillermo del By JOE NAZZARO Toro began making plans for a Hellboy sequel, he knew from the outset that he wanted his cast of non-human characters to look unlike anything seen before on film. As he assembled a team of concept

artists and illustrators for Hellboy II: The Golden Army (out on DVD this month from Universal Home Video), his primary mandate was to think outside the box. Instead of trying to top Lord of the Rings or other well-worn fantasy traditions, del Toro instructed his

artists to look at everything from medieval engravings to Hindu graphics to Japanese suits of armor. "That's very typical of Guillermo," insists Wayne Barlowe, one of the core group of artists brought in during pre-production to help thrash out the film's major visual ele- ments. "He has already established a unique

look after two or three pictures that is so viral,

I think he runs the risk of people ripping him

off, analyzing it, figuring it out and saying,

'Oh yeah, I can do a Guillermo-like movie!' But with that said, he wanted a different look for this piece. THE PRINCE "The founda- Conceptual artist tions in tra- Wayne Barlowe ditional reunited with fantasy filmmaker Guillermo del Toro and comics saga creator Mike fantasy are much stronger in Hellboy II than Mignola to apply his they were in the first one," he adds. "I'm only talents to envisioning referring to the literary subtext, rather than the Hellboy II: The visual component, because Guillermo's aes- Golden Army. thetic really kicked in in a way that's unique to this film." Barlowe (who also worked on the original Hellboy) came aboard the sequel after a call from producer Lloyd Levin. "He asked about

my availability, so I came out to LA and we all sat around and had a big meeting," he recalls. "We were in the same offices that we worked in on Hellboy, but the furniture hadn't been delivered that day, so we sat on the floor and Guillermo doled out assignments and talked

about what he liked and didn't like in the first

Troll Marketing Although Barlowe (who discussed previ- ous artistic endeavors in STARLOG #259) would ultimately try his hand at several dif-

ferent characters, it was the creature-filled Troll Market sequence that gave him a chance "

SACRED LIQUID DISPENSER 'That's exactly what we need!' Because For more behind-the-scenes looks at the film's Guillermo wasn't there and Mike was a pro- eerie artistry by Mignola, Barlowe and their ducer, he was the next in line command-wise, see the Hellboy II DVD (Universal, colleagues, and he said, 'Why don't you spend the rest of out this month) and the book Hellboy II: the week doing these things, because this one The Art of the Movie (Dark Horse, tpb, $24.95). is really cool!' And that's essentially what I

did. It was one of those times where I had a

to shine. "I came to the table with a few ideas sudden burst of inspiration and each drawing that were appropriate for that particular scene, pretty much unhesitatingly followed the pre-

both with the creatures involved in it as well as ceding one. I enjoyed the hell out of the the setting," he explains. "I've always had an process. I went through all of my old books: interest in Orientalist painting, and way back 'Here's a guy selling a camel. What if he was

when I did some material, the Thype stuff, selling this instead?' It was an organic which is in the back of Barlowe's Guide. process—and a very enjoyable one." There's a super-heavy Orientalism infusion in In the end, Barlowe came up with a num-

that set of drawings and paintings, which I did ber of unforgettable characters for the Troll

back in college, and it never really went away. Market: the Traveling Cobbler, whose tail acts I've always loved that era—the exoticism and as a portable stool; the Limb Vendor, who sells realism of the lighting, color and all the com- appendages in all manner of shapes and sizes;

ponents—so I felt comfortable delving into : the mushroom-covered Organ Grinder and his that particular area. diminutive plant-creature companion; the Fish "Guillermo was in Budapest doing loca- • Monger, who looks a bit like his own wares;

tion scouting, and we were left to our own : the Street Musician, whose instrument is a creator] mummified creature; and the Pit Bull Trainer, devices: [Hellboy Mike Mignola, J

Francisco Ruiz Velasco, Pablo Angeles, : one of the few Barlowe creations that didn't

myself and Tracy Wilson, the storyboard per- : make it into the final scene.

son. I had pretty much finished my first Troll • "He was the last guy I did," Barlowe

Market image, so I was breathing a sigh of i reveals. "In the original script treatment, there

relief, because I wanted to do some drawings, : was supposed to be a big scene in the Troll

and I knew that these creatures needed to be • Market with these pit bull-type creatures fight-

addressed. So the day after I put my digital : ing each other. I came up with some primitive

pen down, I decided I would do a drawing and : wooden armor for that guy that would enable

see where it went. I still had my wonderful ref- him to be the trainer for these fierce, almost ;

erence photos of Arabic bazaars and Tibetan i blind, creatures. It would have been a fun

monks, and all that was kicking around in my : scene, and I'm sorry that he didn't make it in."

and I thought it be fun to take a • Hk, head, would whack at it. Monster Making

"I was able to plug back into that world : After finishing his work on the Troll

again—in my head, it wasn't a leap to go from • Market, Barlowe was asked to provide his

that vernacular to the Troll Market—so I just I interpretation for some of the other major dug into the same boxes of goodies," Barlowe remarks. "I started with the

Glowing Creature Vendor [a.k.a. the

Tadpole Vendor], and while I was

working on him, I wasn't sure if I would be doing more than that one drawing, because lots of people were in the studio. Francisco and Pablo were

working on other stuff at the time, and Mike was doing the various and sundry million things that he had to do.

GLOWING CREATURE VENDOR "After I completed that one crea- "I started with [this character, a.k.a. the ture, Mike saw it, smiled and said, Tadpole Vendor]. Mike saw it, smiled and said, That's exactly what we need!' " ^-^^MtrK Barlowe LIMB VENDOR recalls. Armed with book collections of his past illustrations, Barlowe sifted through them for new ideas, noting, " 'Here's a guy selling a

camel. What if he was selling this instead?'

TRAVELING COBBLER After completing the Tadpole Vendor, Barlowe reports, "I had a sudden burst of inspiration and each drawing pretty unhesitatingly followed the preceding one."

52 STARLOG/0ecem6er20flS www.starlog.com FISH MONGER "There's one part of that costume

that I was sad to see didn't make it ^ to the screen from my drawing," Barlowe comments. "He was supposed to be an invertebrate, so the thing around his neck is like the collar people with broken necks

wear. It was meant t to be a pedestal that holds j him up while he busily ^.^T' " chops up fish. Otherwise, he would just be a blob."

STREET MUSICIAN PIT BULL TRAINER "He was the last guy I did," says "Wonderful reference photos Barlowe of this unused of Arabic bazaars and character. "I came up with some Tibetan monks, and all that { primitive wooden armor that was kicking around in my would enable him to be the head," Barlowe remarks of trainer for those fierce, his inspiration for the almost blind, creatures." various Troll Market characters. The music- maker's instrument "L; is a mummified creature, a troll bagpipe.

\kk If

TOOTH FAIRIES "I don't remember the process on that character too well," Barlowe confesses. "Guillermo handed me the drawing and said, 'Make this look more biological.' ORGAN GRINDER He wanted to see the head with

"If you don't have that the mouth closed. I brought mindset where you're in a him an original drawing with fantasy zone, and you're a wing, and Guillermo said, looking at things from a 'No, make it look like a leaf,' practical standpoint, what are which felt very Pan's you going to say?: 'A giant Labyrinth to me—and

mushroom man is playing a music X. I liked that." box?' " Barlowe observes. "The little guy standing on the Organ Grinder's

shoulder has a larger role than I ever imagined. He's on-camera when Mr. Wink dies, and you see him running around."

characters, including Mr. Wink, the towering tle different than Francisco's, but it didn't get troll who acts as Prince Nuada's bodyguard used. Still, it was an interesting exercise to and enforcer. "After Guillermo got back and I take the same elements, change them around a had done the characters for the Troll Market, I bit and see where it went." believe Francisco was moving on to other Even though Velasco's version was pretty things, so Guillermo handed me Francisco's much the one that ended up on screen, ele- early pass and said, 'Do some costume fid- ments of Barlowe's design appear to have dling and let's see what happens.' I put my been incorporated into Mr. Wink as well. "The own spin on Mr. Wink's head, which was a lit- truth is, there's no ownership when you're an

<>mi%/December 2008 53 PRINCESS NUALA & • rogative. I may privately think, 'That was such

PRINCE NUADA j a great idea. I'm sorry it didn't get used.' But I

"When I design a also understand that if a director like Guil- character, I'm also J lermo decides not to use an idea, there's either creating the costume • an aesthetic or budgetary reason why. elements that go with it, "With Mr. Wink, if memory serves, the cos- as I did with Mr. Wink,"

: that I more or less came up with explains Barlowe. "So tume choice when Guillermo said, : was the one that stuck. Francisco's was more of

want you to focus on ! a strappy kind of leather corset thing. I can't

costumes' in the ! remember if Francisco had indicated hair on

I beginning, was : Mr. Wink's back, but I know I converted that

perplexed, because I • idea into spines that could be erected like a figured that goes with ; porcupine's quills when he gets angry. I think the territory. Some of the : the head that Francisco did had some subtle nfluences I drew on • differences the placement of his nose and were samurai and —

: other but I don't see too much Arabic ideology." some elements—

: of a difference between my drawings and the ." rest of him [i.e. the final version of Mr. Wink]

i One of the film's most memorable charac-

: ters, the Angel of Death, can be traced back to

• one of Barlowe's previous works. "The lin-

:* eage for [the Angel of Death] came from the

: cover of my Brushfire book," he notes. "That Decurion, has slightly viral i character, the a

! quality. You can also find something like that

: in The Lord of the Rings. There's an Ore : with a helmet that has a transverse crest,

and I got that from the Roman Centurions. Most of my Hell characters are based in Instructed to do some "costume / some way on ancient Roman and other fiddling" for Prince Nuada's aesthetics, because that's one of my pas- bodyguard, Barlowe "put my own sions. The Decurion has that transverse spin on Mr. Wink's head, but it didn't get used. The costume choice crest, and it's eyeless. I'm all about eye- less! So, yes, of those elements that I more or less came up with many was the one that stuck." were unconsciously infused into the Angel of Death."

illustrator, concept artist or anyone sitting at a While the character owes a debt to that

desk," he explains. "When it comes to this line Brushfire illustration, Barlowe's Angel of

of work, I go into it with a great awareness that Death designs were significantly altered in the

the director is the movie's author. So if they final version. "Guillermo wanted everybody to

want to do [things a certain way], it's their pre- have a go at it and not give anybody too much

THE ANGEL OF DEATH According to Barlowe, this character can be traced back to his Brushfire book's cover mage of the Decurion. "I'm all about eyeless!" he quips. The final Angel was significantly altered, with delToro placing its

\ eyes on the wings.

54 SWLOG/December 2008 Www.starlog.com ' ^

• In addition to contributing to many of The

: Golden Army's key characters, Barlowe took a

j crack at several secondary creatures and set- tings. "I did several versions of the stone giant

: gateway, which was fun, because I'm a big

: archaeology buff," he remarks. "There were

• certain archaeological sites that I plugged into

: the design, and [the final version] looks very

: close to one of my designs.

• "I also spent some time on the goblins,

; which I had fun doing. They're a bit different

: than goblins I've seen in other flicks.

• Guillermo wanted them to have a 'found object' quality, so they're festooned with

: garbage that they've picked up. I didn't have

• anything to do with the goblin in the cart. I saw

i Spectral Motion's maquette renderings of that

: before I even knew it was being worked on." i "They're a bit different Creature Designing than goblins I've seen in other flicks," Barlowe points out. : The Golden Army is only one of Barlowe's \ "Guillermo wanted them to have a • recent projects. Several of them, including a • 'found object' quality."

• top-secret Pixar film and a potential franchise i

: featuring a well-known DC Comics superhero, dise Lost. I with for five or six J worked him

• must remain under wraps for now. Even James weeks doing concept art on that, and the

i Cameron's much-anticipated Avatar, on which : promise was if Paradise Lost got going, it

: Barlowe worked for several months, is still a : would be about a year's worth of work."

• mystery. "I don't know if I can talk about that • As for The Day the Earth Stood Still,

i yet," he says apologetically. "But it was a great : "Scott called after I had done the Paradise

YRDR1G/DOG : experience." Lost stuff with him, and he asked if I would

"Originally, he played a larger role in the • • As if that wasn't enough to keep Barlowe take a whack at Gort. From what I've heard, film's beginning," Barlowe reveals. "He : busy, there's director Andrew Douglas' adap- : every pencil in LA took a shot at Gort, but I was a fun character, and I'm sorry that he ' j tation of the Tokyopop graphic novel Priest gather they've gone back to a more conserva- didn't make it in. I saw a mock-up

and Scott Derrickson's The Day the Earth : tive notion. I heard that he was going to look maquette [pictured] and thought he was I

I Stood Still remake. Derrickson has also started : like a crab robot, all sorts of nutty stuff. pretty awesome. It must have been cost- My ' prohibitive." pre-production on a movie version of Paradise version was inspired by something Scott saw

Lost. "I don't know the status of that right : in my Hell stuff. He thought that if I modified

input, because he wanted to see what would now, but it's a big one, and I got the feeling i it and made it a little more SF, that would be ' come out," he says. "When I read 'Angel of that if Scott did : the way to go. Scott fought long and hard for Death,' I recognized, through the script, that it 51b The Day the Earth that, but it just didn't fly." needed to have wings. I don't remember if Stood Still, the It isn't often that an artist can point to a

Guillermo suggested it or if I went that way, doors might open film with a great deal of satisfaction, but as far

but I was going for a more traditional view of wider for Para- as seeing his creatures come to life in Hellboy

the Angel of Death while trying to skew it a U: The Golden Army, Barlowe is thrilled. "I

little bit differently. Guillermo's instincts are haven't been as happy about characters since

brilliant when it comes to that sort of thing, Harry Potter" he declares, "in terms of seeing and he created an enormously memorable something come to life exactly the way my

character by removing the eyes and putting pencil fashioned it. I always feel lucky when I

them on the wings, which, if I recall, is a tra- get to work on movies, because that wasn't

ditional Biblical notion. One of the what I started out to do in my career, and it

archangels, or maybe a seraph, has those isn't what I do exclusively. As far as see- attributes." ing what I've done translated to the screen, my track record has been pretty THE STONE GIANT GATEWA good. Archaeology buff Barlowe offers "I don't know why that is," Wayne "I did several versions of the Barlowe offers. "Maybe people stone giant gateway. [The are looking for whatever it is that final ] looks very close to one I can bring to the table. I feel of my designs." very fortunate [when a charac- ter] is 80 percent [of what I originally designed]. And with some of the characters

in the Troll Market, it's more like 90 percent. There are tiny things that are different, but they were so faithful to what

I came up with that the

second I saw them on

screen, it put a big i«s smile on my face!"

SWm/December2008 55 very proud of the first X-Files movie," Writer-producer Frank wanted to believe I'mveteran X-Files writer-producer Frank Spotnitz that Agents Mulder Spotnitz says. "That film had to be a big (David Duchovny) and movie. It needed to be a summer movie expe- Scully (Gillian Anderson) would lay out their eight rience where people could make cinemagic bucks or whatever it cost at the time to go see once again. it, even though they could still get The X-Files in their living room every week. So there was

a good deal of pressure to make it a big movie experience—and to provide answers to the alien conspiracy that was ongoing at the time." X-Files: Fight the Future opened a decade ago—on June 19, 1998, to be precise—and it served to bridge the gap between Seasons Five and Six. The film grossed a very respectable $189 million in worldwide release, and fans figured that future big-screen installments would be a fait accompli. However, the series

ran for several more seasons, and then, when it finally wrapped, assorted behind-the-scenes legal entanglements involving creator Chris Carter—and then David Duchovny—further delayed the next adventure of believer Fox Mulder (Duchovny) and non-believer Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson). So the years passed. Other TV shows em- erged from the shadow of The X-Files, win- ning genre fans' hearts and minds. Duchovny and Anderson were busy with a wide range of projects, and were also deeply invested in their growing families. However, Carter and 20th Century Fox settled their issues, and the studio essentially issued a "now or never" decree. Suddenly, Spotnitz and Carter found them- selves tapping out The X-Files: I Want to Be-

It took years, but writer-producer Frank Spotnitz finally reopened The X-Files...... IB— I By IAN SPELLING [il Iff

Iff WBBRBBm

lieve (which debuts on video December 2 from would receive." 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment; Carter and Spotnitz (who discussed his X- $29.98 single-disc DVD; $34.98 three-disc Files work in STARLOG #244 & #298) came Special Edition DVD; $39.99 Blu-ray). up with the idea for / Want to Believe back in 2003, but the story changed considerably once Long waits the project came back to life. "The deal-mak- "It certainly wasn't my desire to wait this ing took forever, and then Chris had a legal long, but we really feel like people have miss- tussle with the studio that stopped everything ed these characters," says Spotnitz, who spent dead," Spotnitz recalls. "So when we returned

the years since The X-Files ended writing and to the story in 2007, we still liked it, but we producing the shows Robbery Homicide Di- realized that at that point, five years had gone vision and Night Stalker, and penning scripts by, Mulder and Scully were different people for films he hopes will eventually become and their relationship would have changed.

realities. That's what this movie is really about. There is

"We inadvertently gave the fans a chance an X-File in it [involving Amanda Peet, Xzibit

to miss the characters. So it has worked out and Billy Connolly], but it's really about Spotnitz (left) teamed up with X-Files creator Chris Carter to craft a standalone well. We feel there's an affection for the show. Mulder and Scully and who they are in their film that might also appease the show's When we were writing the movie last year, I lives. We started all over again, and, actually, hardcore fans. had no idea of the interest or reception we we lost the outline we had from 2003. So, to

56 ^kim/December 2008 www.starlog.com —

the degree we used that original story, it was only from memory." / Want to Believe had to serve four mas-

ters: It needed to reintroduce The X-Files all

these years later, please old-time fans and not only attract people who didn't know the show

at all, but those who only recently discovered

it in repeats and on DVD. "That's absolutely

right," Spotnitz acknowledges, "but I have to say that we have lots of experience trying to

put those kinds of puzzles together. The first movie had to do that, too, and during the show's final years, we wrote many episodes not knowing if we were coming back for another season. So with this film, we didn't want to presume that there would be any more after this one. We wanted this to be a fantastic, that does justice to these charac-

ters, gives audiences their money's worth and doesn't seem like a tease for something else.

"And, yes, it has to work for people who've never seen the show before. There are plenty of people who were young kids when

The X-Files was on the air, and who never had

the chance to watch it, and now they're grownups. So the chance to make those peo- ple fans, and to introduce our characters to them, was an exciting opportunity for us. But we had to be careful, because we didn't want to ignore or disregard the people who love the show. Much of the movie will work especial-

ly well for the fans if you know the show and characters, we honor that knowledge, and the movie will be richer for you as a result." Late Nights Just like the X-Files fans, the series' cast and crew have their favorite and least favorite episodes. Addressing what he considers the least appreciated X-Files, Spotnitz cites "any number of episodes" from Seasons Eight and Nine with Robert Patrick as John Doggett and Annabeth Gish as Monica Reyes. "They were among the best episodes we ever did,"

Unfortunately, / Want to Believe got an icy reception' at the box office. Perhaps its December DVD debut will bring more holiday cheer. Anderson hadn't played Scully since the show's finale.

Spotnitz says it took a little while for the two leads to fall back into character.

Spotnitz argues, calling out "4-D," "Redrum" Spotnitz, who actually announced the show's

and "John Doe." "But what happened was that demise before ABC made its decision public.

people, understandably, were so invested in "I loved the original Night Stalker. I loved

Mulder and his quest that they didn 't emotion- Darren McGavin. I'm second to no one in my

ally connect with Seasons Eight and Nine like love for Darren. I wrote him into The X-Files

they did when David was on the show every because I loved him so much. But nobody

week. I think as time goes by, people will [else could be] him, and I wasn't interested in appreciate those episodes more, as well as the having someone do a Darren McGavin imper-

contributions that those actors made. It was a sonation. So I departed from that, and every

difficult position to be put in, and they really die-hard Night Stalker fan I've spoken to has

shone." said, 'Well, of course you had to do that.' And Spotnitz and Carter have always said that Darren hated the original series. Some people

Kolchak: The Night Stalker was one of the don't realize that. He wanted them to cancel it.

greatest influences on The X-Files. And back He was miserable. It didn't work. And this is in 2005, Spotnitz wrote and executive-pro- no disrespect to [character creator] Jeff Rice or duced Night Stalker, an ABC series based on anybody else, but there were problems with the original show (which he discussed in the concept.

STARLOG #339). Stuart Townsend starred as "So I knew that I would be departing [from

Carl Kolchak, the investigative reporter who the original], and I understood that there buries himself in strange murder cases, hoping would be a knee-jerk hostility because we

that they'll help him solve the most personal were using a title that people love, but we

case of all: his wife's murder. weren't being true to what they remembered

Unfortunately, the redux never caught on, about the show. What I had faith in was that and ABC only aired six of the 10 episodes shot over time, people would see that we were up to

before axing it. Spotnitz looks back on the something that had integrity. But we were

series (now collected on DVD) with a mix of never given that time. So I took the heat for, pride, regret and frustration. "I loved doing didn't Night Stalker, even though it was a very diffi- Kolchak (Stuart Townsend) stalk the night for long, so if you missed cult experience," he offers. "It was a rough go it, you can check out Spotnitz's short- with ABC from the beginning, because they lived Night Stalker series revival on DVD. had mixed feelings about whether it was the type of show they wanted to put on their net-

work. And after they ordered the pilot, I found out they didn't want any monsters on the series! To say that was a shock would be an understatement, because the original Night Stalker was nothing but monsters.

"So it was a tough marriage. We had so many things stacked against us. You hear this

all the time when shows don't succeed, but

< there wasn't any advertising. I mean, literally not a dollar was spent on promotion. And we probably had the worst time slot possible, against CSI. The one bit of help ABC thought they were giving us was that Alias was our Alias didn't perform that year, and lead-in. But Contrary to most X-fans' opinions, the research showed, to the degree that Alias Spotnitz was pleased with many later did perform, it wasn't to our audience. episodes. He thinks that people will "We just didn't have any luck," notes appreciate them more as time goes by.

58 Smm/December 2008 was a reunion for the actors, producers, writ-

ers and much of the crew. It felt like everybody knew each other, and not only that, because

[so much] time had passed, it was like we were

all there [to return to] this thing that people

still like, think fondly of and want to see again. And that's a nice atmosphere in which to work.

"For Chris and me, it was instantaneous, getting back into The X-Files, and the same was true [of writing for] Mulder and Scully.

There wasn't any lag time. The first time I saw David and Gillian together [since the series ended] was in Chris' kitchen. They came to do

a table read of the script. I had seen David

[recently], but I hadn't seen Gillian in a long

time, because she lives in London. I immedi-

ately felt the chemistry between them. It's bizarre because, honestly, they have nothing in

common. But there is this thing, and it's very

real. I think they were happy to see each other. Call off the "As difficult and exhausting as the work search? was on the series and people don't under- Are the — it can be on a two-lead show, investigations stand how hard of the over? Is The where the actors are in so many X-Files done? scenes—they were glad to return. But both of After nine them said that it was hard to get back into seasons and character, because they had spent six years try- two movies, ing to be anything but Mulder and Scully. The X-Files Now, suddenly, they had to tell their minds, may finally 'OK, stop now, go back and try to re-embrace be closed down what you tried to push away.' It took a little while for David and Gillian to get back into it, for good. but they both worked extra hard on their scenes together, because they felt the pressure but never really got the chance to reap the story, and in a way that they usually weren't in of people's expectations, that they needed to rewards of, changing the concept. And I the series. There's a richness to them in this deliver. And they both were at the top of their believe that would have happened in time." movie that you didn't see in the series that game." often. Beyond that, there is an X-File that Curiously, things have changed since the Secret Truths they're dealing with, and we're trying to scare show's run. There was secrecy then, but peo- Even though Spotnitz knows this interview you. So it's very different from the first movie. ple today are more spoiler-fixated than ever. won't run until months after the movie's open- We wanted this to be a more intimate, creepy, And then there's the Internet, where the ing (and its disappointing, film-franchise-end- personal story." Average Joe can post a picture or video or ing box office performance), he doesn't want Spotnitz is more forthcoming when it mention seeing a certain actor on location. to spoil any surprises or reveal any secrets. "I comes to discussing the shoot. "It went well," "It's quite impressive," Spotnitz marvels. can't say," he apologizes. "People think they he notes. "It was challenging, and it wasn't a "When the series was on the air, we took steps want to know, but they don't really want to big-budget film. We shot for three weeks in to preserve surprises. For example, at the end know. freezing temperatures, but it was a warm and of Season Seven, the final scene was Scully "Mulder and Scully are at the center of the comfortable atmosphere on the set because it telling Skinner [Mitch Pileggi] in a hospital room that she was pregnant. That was a jaw- Scares. The supernatural. dropper, because she wasn't supposed to be The paranormal. [able to get] pregnant. We didn't tell anybody Unexplained phenomena. about that moment—not Gillian, Mitch or Yes, The X-Files explores director Kim Manners. Nobody knew. Chris all that. But the story's personally drove the pages to the set in Lake focus has always been Arrowhead the night before filming. Mulder and Scully. "So we kept that secret, and it worked. But nowadays people are far more savvy. They're looking at the casting notices and the break- downs. They're going to the locations permits and city council hearings to see what and where we're filming. On one of the first nights [of the new movie's shooting], a member of the paparazzi checked into a hotel room across the street. He was there all night, behind the glass. We had no idea that he was there film- ing and photographing. People were hanging out around craft services and looking at call

sheets. So it's really challenging to protect your surprises," Frank Spotnitz says, "and we

had to be equally creative to counter it." -^f www.starlog.com STARLOG/0ecemier200S 59 W Creator Buck Henry sent them off to spoof the science fiction universe: the Bettys (Patricia & Cyb Barnstable), i Captain Adam Quark (Richard f Benjamin), Ficus Pandarata (Richard Kelton), Otto Palindrome (Conrad Janis), Gene/Jean (Tim Thomerson) and Andy the Android (Bobby Porter).

1

t

THE QUINTESSENTIAL

By PATJANKIEWICZ —

Three decades later, Hmrk finally arrives on DVD in the Galaxy! Ad Infinitum]

At last, I ot all that long ago, in a galaxy not too "That's part of Buck's genius," says story far away, there was Quark, the short- Quark is editor Bruce Kane. "Having the girls be legally NI lived 1977 SF-comedy series. Now, clones? Brilliant! Buck was way, way, way available some 30 years later, the adventures of Adam ahead of his time. Look at the character names on DVD— Quark, Captain of a United Galactic on the show: Otto Palindrome, Interface, even and the Sanitation Patrol spaceship job the hero's last name. 'Quark' was a 10-year- —and whose world (as is to travel the galaxy collecting space junk we know old term only known in physics books. is finally making its DVD debut (Sony it) will Richard Benjamin referred to Quark as 'Star Pictures Home Entertainment, $19.94). never be Trek in the wrong hands,' and that was our The cult show was created by Buck (Get the direction for the series!" Smart) Henry, and has influenced everything same. "It was the first space comedy after Star from Mork & Mindy and 3rd Rock from the Wars came out," Thomerson enthuses, "and Sun to Galaxy Quest and Futurama. It only we were actually on the air before the movie ran for eight episodes, but Quark certainly opened." exposed SF cliches and poked good-natured The show lampooned SF cliches. "Both of fun at and Star Trek. And, up until my Quark stories, 'Goodbye, Polumbus' and now, the only way to have seen the series after 'The Old and the Beautiful,' came out of Star its cancellation was on blurry bootlegs sold at sets. The clone angle Trek" Kane reveals. "We sat down and looked SF conventions. was way ahead of its time. The term 'clone' at lots of stuff, like Forbidden Planet, the Quark's (Richard Benjamin) crew consist- didn't even fall into common usage until about Flash Gordon serials and, of course, many, ed of Andy the Android (Bobby Porter), a 20 years after Quark." many Star Trek episodes. lying, cowardly robot; Ficus (the late Richard Her twin sister Tricia adds, "Cloning was a "Looking at Star Trek for Quark, we start- Kelton), a "Vegeton," an alien-plant man; brand new concept when we did the show. I ed noticing recurring tropes and themes.

Gene/Jean (' Tim Thomerson), a had never heard the word before. It meant that 'Shore Leave,' where the Enterprise crew goes transmute who, in moments of stress, goes one of us was real and one was fake; that's to a vacation planet and all of their from a devil-may-care Han Solo-type to Jean, how it was explained to us." come true, became 'Goodbye, Polumbus.' his feminine side; and the Bettys (Cyb & "Neither one of us wanted to be the clone!" Quark is sent down to this planet to look for Patricia Barnstable), two beautiful blondes in Cyb laughs. "Clones were the lowest creatures missing crew and, once there, he meets the girl love with their captain. One of the Bettys is a in the future. When it came to the script read- of his dreams. clone (both think the other is the replicant), ings, one of us had to read Betty #1 and the "For the girl, they cast this gorgeous and because sleeping with a clone is taboo, other had to read Betty #2, so we had to deter- actress, Mindi Miller. Quark has to destroy the Captain Quark can't do anything until he mine which one of us was the clone. There Limbicon—this machine that creates the fan- determines who is the original. wasn't any ad-libbing, because we had to do tasies. I named it after the Limbic Cortex, the "Adam Quark was the straight man to all of our lines together, and if one of us started place where dreams come from. I also paid these crazy aliens and creatures, but we knew improvising, it would have screwed everything tribute to Star Trek: When Quark asks where that any line we wrote for Richard would get up. One of us would begin a sentence and the the Limbicon is, a guy says, 'It's in the valley

200 percent more laughs," says story editor other would finish it, so everything was pretty beyond the Roddenberry Bush!' Jonathan Kaufer. "We saw Quark as a neurot- tight." ic, nebbish hero, and Richard was incredibly Tricia praises, "We were impressed cool in the role a Jewish super- — with Richard, because he was hero!" a big movie star who nailed every scene with a subtle Space Parody expression." Writer Steve Zach- arias—who went on to co- Story editor Jonathan Kaufer explains of create Revenge of the the Bettys, "We always Nerds—remembers Quark tried to come up "as a blast to make, second with new ways for only to doing Nerds. the Bettys to argue Quark's basic underlying who was real and premise was, 'Why do w who was fake." exist?' And this was played out in the middle of a spoof on Star Trek, Star Wars and Flash Gordon. We spoofed any planet, society and movie that had to do with space.

"Buck is one of my idols," he adds, "so to work on a show that he created was a dream. In my first meeting with Buck, he showed up with his supposed 'assistant,' a gorgeous girl in a Girl Scout outfit with a clipboard. He's an all-time great!"

"I'm so happy that Quark is finally going to reach its audience," declares Cyb Barnstable (previously profiled in STARLOG of the series. #294). "I have fond memories "Bobby was a great kid, also a hell of a We shot it on a spaceship set at the Burbank stunt guy," says Thomerson. As for his Studios, and each episode took about a week. own part, "Gene/Jean was a funny,

It was amazing to walk around those fabulous challenging character to play." www.starlog.com STARLOG/Deremier 2008 61 "

"Quark has to destroy this machine, but no emotions and be as cool as a cucumber. We McQueen fans. Richard had just bought a

Mindi says, 'Don't blow it up. Stay here with also wanted to mock those verbal chess games Triumph motorcycle like McQueen owned me and be happy!' He debates this, and when between Kirk and Spock. when he died."

he finally blows it up, he suddenly sees Mindi "Roddenberry always tried to make Star Kelton died shortly after shooting Quark.

as she actually is: the Queen of the Clay Trek episodes existential and philosophical He asphyxiated from a carbon monoxide leak People! She's really this muddy, drippy alien. treatises on mankind, and we just wanted to in his trailer in a bizarre accident while filming Richard gave me the best notes on this scene. take the piss out of that!" Kaufer says proudly. the TV mini-series Centennial. "I was shocked He said, This is a guy saying goodbye to a "We mocked that with Quark and Ficus argu- and incredibly saddened," Zacharias recalls. girl at the end of summer in the Catskills.' That ing about their races. We were sitting in pro- "Richard was an amazing guy, so for his life to

made it the perfect awkward moment!" ducer Bruce Johnson's office one day, and we be snuffed out like that, for no reason, was Miller found Quark "to be a hilarious came up with the idea that Ficus could be from really hard to take."

show, and the script was very funny. Quark is a race of vegetables. I came up with the term Thomerson agrees, "That was a bad deal." head over heels for me, until I change into this 'Vegeton.' We were flailing around for a name "He was an easygoing man with a fabulous mud woman, and then he can't wait to get for him, and then we noticed that Bruce had voice," Cyb adds. "His death was shocking

away! I had done Richard's movie Westworld gotten a plant..." and sad."

and had a lovely time on Quark—until it was Kane adds, "It was a congratulatory plant Thomerson recalls that "doing the show,

time to revert to the Queen of the Clay People. someone had sent him for Quark. I read the we laughed a lot, and it was hard to get

The makeup was slimey, gooey and gross and label, 'Ficus Pandarata,' and we made that the through, because it was so funny. Our produc-

kept hardening under the studio lights!" Vegeton's name! Richard Kelton played that er, Mace Neufeld, went on to do the Jack Ryan Another Trek episode that got zinged was character so well. He never wavered, and he movies. Mace was a cool, supportive guy. He " "Mirror, Mirror." 'The Good, the Bad, and gave Ficus emotion without showing emotion. knew that I was a McQueen freak, and he actu- the Ficus' was my favorite," Cyb says. "It was He dispassionately referred to ally knew McQueen, which impressed the hell so much fun going into a Black Hole out of me." and having everyone turn evil "We didn't have Conrad Janis played Quark's boss, Otto except Ficus, who remains the scenes with the Palindrome. "I developed Otto as a supreme

same, because plants aren't other [guest civil servant. The way I saw him is that he good or evil. We were 'the ^ star] space grabbed at what little power he had and wield- babes. Evil Bettys.' We played it ed it over Quark, who had to do what he said," Richard was diabolically, and it was a Janis laughs. "I loved Buck's script, and I with them delight to be crazy, sexy enjoyed Otto as a character. He was dictatori- alone" Cyb

and snarling." I comments. al to people below him and obsequious to Thomerson, the genre those above him. When the Head [Alan star LA Weekly once dubbed "the Harrison Ford of Empire Pictures," landed the Gene/Jean role "when Buck saw my stand-up act at and brought me in to audition. Once I read [the script], I figured out a way to do it. It was funny that he went from a gung-ho John Wayne guy to a full-on woman! He wasn't gay, he just became a totally female personality. Gene/Jean was a funny, challeng- ing character to play. You never knew when Gene/Jean would flip, and Richard Benjamin's reaction to it was always funny. His wife, Paula Prentiss, had her sister Ann do my voice as Jean. "The most fun for me was working with Richard Benjamin, who's a truly funny guy and a very subtle actor," adds Thomerson (STARLOG #179). "He could make you laugh with just a look! I remember shooting a scene where Richard snatched me by my lapel, and he accidentally grabbed all the hair on my chest. It hurt like hell, so they had to stop the scene. I also loved Hy Averback, who directed a lot of Quarks, and Bruce Bilson, who direct- ed a two-parter." Cyb adds, "Buck said that every guy has fantasies about twins, and he joked, 'I've been dreaming about you two since junior high!' told Galactic Shtick He us that our legs are what got us the part. On the set, he would always say, 'Show the legs!' Ficus Pandarata was the show's twisted take on Spock. "That character was added by the crew as, 'You animals.' It wasn't an insult; Caillou] or any other authority figure came us; he wasn't in Buck's pilot," Kaufer notes. it was simply an observation." around, I played him as a groveling toadie. But "It isn't uncommon for a show to be retooled Thomerson remembers, "Richard was a when he turned to Quark, he was a dictator. after a pilot, and many adjustments were made really funny guy, and just hilarious as Ficus. I That dichotomy was fun to play." on Quark. The pilot was dense with invention, was a fan of his before I had ever met him. He Palindrome had a furry alien sidekick and we couldn't service it all. We wanted a was always a bad guy on shows like named Dink, who didn't speak a word of Spock surrogate, and to riff on the fact that he and Mission: Impossible. We English. "I liked him," Janis smiles. "Otto had wasn't 'of our species.' We wanted him to have became friends, and we were huge Steve a strange affection for Dink, as he was a rela-

62 mm/December 2008 Despite risking injury in the "primitive"

suit, Porter admits, "I loved playing Andy.

It was an 'adventure' every time I stepped into my character."

Ironically, network scheduling trashed the SF spoof just as Star Wars mania ignited.

"Buck wrote a hell of a funny show," Janis declares, "and NBC screwed it up!"

months before they shot the Quark pilot, and I was walking by a special effects man and a producer on the set as they were discussing the

size of the actor needed to fit the robot suit. The effects man [Richard Albain] saw me and

said, 'Hey, would you lie down on this piece of

paper so I can draw an outline around you?' I said, 'Sure,' and he rolled up the paper and

handed it to the producer and said, 'Find an actor this size!' A few months later, even with

a broken wrist from a stunt gone bad, I was in the suit—and falling in love with the ship's

computer! I did my own voice as the robot." Being in the robot outfit was tough on the actor. "The suit was quite primitive," Porter recalls. "It was made of galvanized steel, stood

over six feet tall and weighed nearly 80

tively inanimate object. I think Otto felt that pounds. I weighed 81! The legs were round Dink was someone really nonthreatening who and straight, with no bend at the knees what-

couldn't overcome him. That's the kind of guy soever. I was constantly at risk of falling. I Otto was." wore a heavy battery pack around my waist, "The guy [Jerry Maren] who played Dink and the head was nearly 20 pounds all by Let him eat cake! Kaufer remembers was really cool—he was one of the Munchkins itself. Needless to say, it was an 'adventure' "specific things—like when I fed Alan remarks. every time I stepped into my character." in The Wizard of Oz," Thomerson Cailiou, the Head, cake at the wrap party." "He wrote a book about it [Short and Sweet: The late actor recalled Quark fondly in a "Bobby was a great kid," Thomerson says. The Life of a Lollipop Guild Munchkin]. And STARLOG #248 interview. "He was also a hell of a stunt guy when I he had all these great stories about Hollywood worked with him after the show." in the '30s and '40s." Ford—kicking alien ass—but if you look at The Barnstables were also fond of Porter. "I loved Otto Palindrome," says Kane, him in the pilot, he isn't that macho. We liked "Bobby was the nicest guy," Cyb states. "Andy "and Conrad was wonderful as the ultimate Tim, and he was more accessible than Richard originally wasn't in the pilot, but they got rid bureaucrat." Benjamin because he was single! There were of some characters and added him. Bobby was "Conrad was fabulous!" Cyb chimes in. "I some really humorous characters on the show." a good sport to be inside that box-like robot thought he saved the pilot. He made the One of those humorous characters was suit all day. Everybody loved him."

episode make sense, because he held it togeth- Andy the Android, a clunking, cowardly robot "I felt sorry for Bobby being inside the er with his great timing. Conrad was good who ran from danger, lied about his accom- robot, but he didn't have a problem with it,"

with SF and comedy, which is why he did so plishments and hit on the ship's computer. "I says Tricia. "He was excited about the show well later on Mark & Mindy." loved playing Andy," Porter smiles. "How I and happy to be playing Andy. / wouldn't have got the part is a classic 'right time, right place' wanted to be the robot, but Bobby was fine

interplanetary spoof story. I was on a Warner Bros, show a few with it." Although Quark was short-lived, the series

gathered steam as it went on. "By the end of the eight episodes, the Bettys had become more and more exaggerated, animated and confident," Cyb offers. "They had grown as characters. In the pilot, they were token babes, twin props. But as we got into the series, the Bettys developed real personalities. They were madly in love with Quark, and very jealous and possessive of him." Tricia adds, "Their relationship with Quark became more physical, and with Gene/Jean, nothing was too big! Gene/Jean was a chal-

lenging character, and Tim handled it with gusto." "And Tim became a big SF star after Quark, and it's easy to see why," Cyb com- That's Kaufer and writer Steve Zacharias on the set during the last day of shooting in ments. "As Gene, Tim was very Harrison January 1978. Zacharias remarks that Quark was "a blast to make." www.starlog.com Smm/December 2008 6 3 .

you ask me. Buck agreed, and ordered, 'Get restores him. A [Standard & Practices] guy " the Bettys out of those capes!' said, 'I know I should cut something here, but

Cyb remembers, "We changed the Bettys' I don't know what!' I named Princess Carna " outfits to Las Vegas hotpants, which wasn't after 'Carnal.' very SF, but at the time, there was lots of T&A Former Playboy Playmate Daina House on Wonder Woman and Charlie's Angels. has fond memories of her guest appearance as These beautiful babes were doing abstract Princess Carna's Handmaiden in "The Old and stuff on TV, so we were trying to stay in the SF the Beautiful." "I remember standing on the

genre, but also make it livelier. More men are spaceship platform and being rocked around into SF than women, so, coming from the and pretending garbage was flying at us!" she

modeling world, we wanted to jazz things up!" chuckles. "It was my first SF experience, and it

"We always tried to come up with new was truly 'out of this world.' Buck and I were ways for the Bettys to argue who was real and close, but we've lost touch over the years." who was fake," Kaufer explains. "A daily high- In an outrageous two-parter, Ficus "polli- light was when the Barnstable Twins would nates" with an alien leader's daughter. "I wrote tousle my hair! They were sweet, beautiful the Flash Gordon parody episodes, 'All the "Warner Bros, was an old, rundown lot girls. I was 22, and I was in college two weeks Emperor's Quasi-Norms,' which was based on back then,"Thomerson recalls, "and the before I started Quark, writing episodes of All the President's Men'' Kaufer offers. "I was stage that we shot Quark on was also stuff like Holmes & Yo-Yo. Quark was an excited to have Ross Martin as Emperor Mung where they filmed Casablanca." unusual congregation of interesting people. and Joan Van Ark as his sexy daughter,

One of the characters who got cut after the When I think of the show, I recall specific Princess Libido! The legal department made

pilot was Interface (Misty Rowe). "She was an things—like when I fed Alan Caillou, the us change Mung to Zargon, because it was too

alien with four arms, but Interface was a one- Head, cake at the wrap party. He couldn't eat it close to Ming. " joke character," Tricia explains. 'I can only otherwise, because he was stuck in the Head!" "We were in love with the idea of pollina- do so much. I've only got four arms!' The joke tion, and we couldn't believe that NBC has been told, now you can go!" Cosmic Satire allowed us to call Joan's character Princess "Yes," Kane confirms, "we felt we needed As evident from the DVD collection, Libido. We stuffed that episode with 10 other adventure characters, so we dropped some Quark was edgy. Kane recalls "writing 'The objectionable things to distract them from her others from Buck's pilot—the old doctor, Dr. Old and the Beautiful,' which spoofed Star name. And at the 11th hour, we pretended to Mudd [Douglas Fowley], and Interface. Andy Trek's 'The Deadly Years,' where Captain Kirk fight for all of them, and then, finally, cut the was a funny character. Every SF show needs a ages at an accelerated rate. Toward our climax, other 10 in exchange for keeping Princess

robot." Quark is 100 years old and needs an adrena- Libido! When we got pollination in too, I

In the pilot, "The Bettys wore these big line rush to save his life. Men on this planet thought we had died and gone to Heaven!" Ming the Merciless capes and collars," Tricia die during their honeymoons, and while we During the pollination scene, Ficus and

groans. "We successfully got rid of those never stated it, we implied that Quark had sex Libido lie on the floor muttering, "Bee- fast—after one scene! One scene too many, if with the alien girl, Princess Carna, which beebeebeebee." When Libido asks, "What do

Notes Tricia, "1 felt sorry for Bobby being inside the robot, but he

didn't have a problem with it."

n rrrT-T7:??r*t-fttimwt*?itt*! mmMMM —

"I always liked it when Richard Kelton spoofed Spock,

playing this plant man that had no emotions and threw it back in the Captain's face," Zacharias offers.

64 mm/December 2008 ssssrsas*-

Quasi-Norms' was one of our best," says were immediately labeled a freak. I had never

Cyb, "because we had Ross as the seen a Star Trek episode before I did Quark.

Zargon the Malevolent. Ross was a great When I was hired, I started watching them. The actor, and we were in awe of him. Ross gave other guys, like Steve and Bruce Kane, knew

a commanding performance as the bad guy." and loved Star Trek. I got close with them, and

"He was my favorite villain," Tricia I really miss those guys. Our producer Bruce

agrees. "Henry Silva did the show ["May Johnson pulled me into it. I had worked with

*ay rosea"" W» the Source Be With You"]; he played the him on a sitcom before Quark. Bruce was a Additionally? High Gorgon of this evil alien race. Henry great guy; we hung out a lot and talked." hit on me, and he struck me as a bit arro- "I owe Bruce Johnson a lot," Janis gant. He was no Ross Martin!" remarks. "After Quark, he brought me onto "In defense of Henry, we were the only Mork & Mindy. They wanted to recast the two blondes on the set—and we were the actor playing Mindy's father, and Bruce liked Page ST

a twr 'X"C la violent show's big space babes," Cyb chuckles. me on Quark. So Quark got me Mork\" "Any other guest space babes were gotten The show's demise came quickly. "I knew rid of immediately!" that Quark probably wasn't going to last long,

sc - 51 What about guest "space babe" Van because most SF series don't have long life- pages - As ****** and S3: spans," Kane points out. "Even the original

Star Trek, the most popular SF show of all time, only lasted three seasons. Quark was the PugO 67 most enjoyable working experience I ever had,

"AU. THE EMFOP.ER'S QUASI- so I was sad when NBC dropped it." "I discovered that Quark was cancelled

:;.'V!:\i:;r,T.:-.'.';, s\.-.:t eupcite on carafe!

1 r.l -;;: :;.!'. IcarJMf o! Ei!s I. ;-.t'if."f 0: 3 tiiwHraiMl when I drove by our sets and saw forklifts dis- Kaufer kept these ;o PicQTSm r.sM r (centra (udhar mcaiflcallon. Depart I mantling them in a most unceremonious man- Broadcast Standards Acceptability The Cycloid's ugly body Hill bo covered ner," Porter reflects. "No one was ready to Reports as evidence locally with long, shaggy hsir, right? Thus, we Hill not have to worry about tho viewers being offended when we show bin make light of SF yet, but it was a great ride of NBC absurdities. Story editor "wearing only s fur-lifce loin cloth."

The sane caution *pplios to this scone as while it lasted." Bruce Kane testifies, "I thought I we s directed at scene 46 (page ST). Tho laser blast Kill siatply freeze those Zacharias feels that "Quark should have had pushed the envelope with struck by it...vfe will not see anything evan remotely connected -with those violent effects associated with today's weaponry. Princess Carna, so when I read the been given a regular shot on NBC, but [then- Than!; you, Bruce Johnson. 'Quasi-Norms' script [by Kaufer] network head] Fred Silverman put all of his

and saw 'Princess Libido,' I fell on energy into Supertrain." the floor laughing." "We did the pilot, which got very good MAUHrE GOODMAN numbers, but then NBC became involved," we do next?" Ficus says, "We wait for Janis adds. "Quark was passed over—a long the bee to come." Emperor Zargon vacy Brora, Oarid Gerber, Bruce Johnson, Ron Rotb, Larry Kbits time went by before they ran the rest of the catches them, and screams, "MY episodes, rather than capitalizing on that DAUGHTER IS POLLINATING WITH momentum. They ran the episodes months A VEGETON?!?" Libido then says, later, and people didn't know what the hell we

"Oh, Daddy, it's 2226!" were talking about, because Buck's pilot set it "Those are two of my favorite jokes all up! All those wonderful characters and plot in the entire series," Kaufer grins. "I points had been established, and they didn't kept the Broadcast Standards even rerun the pilot. Buck wrote a hell of a

Acceptability Report for 'All the Emperor's Ark? "She was more terrified of us than we funny show, and NBC screwed it up!"

Quasi-Norms,' and it says, 'Page 28, Libido's were of her," Cyb recalls. "There was always As for Thomerson, "I always had the feel- costume should not be too clingy or female competition to see who was the biggest ing that Quark was gonna be a cult thing and

diaphanous. Page 67, it is also understood that babe on the set." wouldn't last long—because it was really the "pollinating" noises will be strictly "That's true," Tricia concurs. "We had all funny!" comedic and will not be—the sounds you or I the attention we could possibly want, and All these years later, Quark's DVD release might make.' I loved that 'the sounds you or compliments all day long from Tim, Richard is a thrill for its cast and crew. "I look forward

I might make' —and we have a Standards & Kelton, Richard Benjamin, the crew, the pho- to watching it with my son Jordan," Kaufer

Practices report blithely accepting the name tographers... It was an endless ego-booster. So relates. "He has never seen it. Jordan is 11,

'Princess Libido.' Already we've won!" when another female came on, the attention half the age I was when I wrote the show, and

Kaufer grew up watching The Wild Wild was divided, and we would think, 'What is she I can't wait to see his take on it."

West. "So I was thrilled to have Ross on the doing here?' Now, all the guys were telling the Surprisingly, Thomerson has never seen

show," he says. "When I saw his name on the guest girl that she was beautiful." the show, either. "I did it, so I didn't ever feel

casting list, I started jumping up and down. To Thomerson wasn't as threatened by the the need to watch it," he explains. "But I do

me, it was like getting Robert De Niro. When guest stars. "I met Geoffrey Lewis on the want to see it all cleaned up on DVD." Ross showed up in the wardrobe saying my show, and that was big for me," he recalls. "Quark will now be seen by people who

dialogue, it was like an out-of-body experi- "His movie, The Culpepper Cattle Co., is what weren't even alive when it first ran, which is

ence, because I had grown up worshipping made me want to be a film actor. Henry was really exciting to me," Cyb says. "Some view-

Artemus Gordon!" cool; I was a young actor, so I was impressed. ers will be meeting these characters for the

That episode was a favorite of Tricia's as Ross was terrific, as was Denny Miller. I loved first time. I hope they like it!"

well. "I loved 'All the Emperor's Quasi- Denny as Tarzan as a kid, so I was thrilled "The thing about Quark is that we tried to Norms,' because we left the spaceship and when he guested on the show." have a crossover appeal," Jonathan Kaufer went on location. Since we were the pilots, we concludes. "Any SF show set in outer space hardly ever got off the ship, but on that one, we Universal Comedy has to be loved by kids, but we also pitched it danced and then were captured, tied to a post Spoofing different SF cliches was difficult to a more sophisticated crowd, hip adults who

and left in a swamp for a monster to eat us! It for some. "I had seen Star Wars and liked it, would pick up on some of the other jokes. We was like a big field trip." but I wasn't an acolyte," Kaufer notes. "In wanted to be an outer-space version of Get "I also thought that All the Emperor's 1977, if you weren't a Star Wars devotee, you Smart]" # www.starlog.com STARLOG/DeremierOT 65 This year, Dimitri Diatchenko faced Indiana Jones, Maxwell Smart & Iron Man.

ention Dimitri Diatchenko's name to even the most avid cineaste, and you'll probably get a blank stare, a shrug of the shoulders and a "Who?" Yet this summer, he traded punches with Indiana Jones, further confused Maxwell Smart and countered the mechanized might of the invin- cible Iron Man. Diatchenko fights on a championship level, and he has played classical guitar in

concert halls. Even if he hasn't captured the

public's full attention yet, he has been noticed by some of Hollywood's elite and managed to turn a 10-day job on a blockbuster film into one that lasted four months. Initially, his turn as a KGB agent in In- diana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was supposed to be restricted to the Russians' confrontation with the adventurous

archaeologist near his college campus. "It

seemed like Steven Spielberg and I clicked from the moment we met," Diatchenko remarks. "He has a great sense of humor.

"I've managed these last two-and-a-half years to steadily increase my good roles," says Dimitri Diatchenko, "and, of course, nothing is bigger than , Steven Spielberg and Indiana Jones."

"Pulling Harrison Ford off the back of a moving motorcycle was probably the most nervous I've been," Diatchenko reveals. "I don't want to be the guy who drops Dr. Jones on cement!" By DANIEL DICKHOLTZ

66 mm/December 2008 g Steven will sit back and talk about a specific guide you through it since you don't have a as focused as when I had to pull Harrison off | part in a scene: 'I think this would be funny. script—and I'm not giving you one. Just trust the bike. £ Why don't we try that, and then try one with- me.' And I did." "Steven told me, 'OK, now grab ahold of ~ out it, so we have something to choose from in him. We'll [shoot] half of the scene, and then ~ the editing room?' Fight Scenes we'll cut there and the camera will pick up 5 "You know the scene where I'm chasing While his character had been brought in to Harrison being pulled into the car.' I said,

2 Harrison Ford and I get hit by the sign? threaten the two-fisted adventurer, the 6-foot- 'Yeah, but the car is still moving! Can't we go

E There's some funny stuff that I did that was off 2 actor was relieved to find that confronting in tight and I just pull him in from a stationary

1 the cuff, and after the take, I heard a bunch of one of the world's biggest movie stars wasn't vehicle?' 'No, no, we need to have it moving.' CO S people laughing. Then I was called over to an intimidating experience. "Harrison was So, I had one hand on Harrison's belt buckle oco Steven's tent, and I sat down next to him. He great. The guy is a man of few words, and usu- and the other on his lapel, and I yanked him in. 8 told me, 'Hey, we're going to watch this. Oh, ally, when he says something, it's of a very dry There were so many things that could have f, by the way, let me introduce you to George humor. That first day on the set at Yale, Steven gone wrong. As preparation would have it, | Lucas, Frank Marshall and Kathleen was shooting me in the car, just going by the everything went fine, but I was always think- o Kennedy.' I'm like [nervously], 'Hey, George.' camera. It was really nothing much to do, but ing, T don't want to be the guy who drops Dr. " 2 We watched it, and everybody laughed again. Harrison made it a point to note between takes Jones on cement!' | Steven said, 'That's great! I like an actor who that I was doing a magnificent job as an actor," Not all of the violence was staged. At one | has comic timing. I want you in the rest of the he relates, laughing. "To which I replied, point, while all the fake punches were being " £ movie. We'll write you in.' 'Harrison, you taught me everything I know.' thrown, Ford landed a shot to Diatchenko's CO 2 Upgraded from being a briefly seen goon "He just walked away, coughing, but I face. "When I pulled Harrison into the car, I £ to a member of Colonel Spalko's (Cate could see from his profile that he had a big threw him down on the seat and punched him, | Blanchett) task force, Diatchenko remarks that smirk on his face. Everybody on the set was and he threw a crossing punch and then a 2 his character is "pretty straightforward, still in wonderful, but I'm always afraid of meeting straight-on one. During one of the takes, he

«_ the Red Army, but a KGB secret service guy." these stars. I grew up watching this guy, and I actually connected with me. It was sort of a o However, at the start, such information was was like, 'Man, I hope he isn't standoffish. I flush chin/lip shot, and it must have looked

< classified. "These things are so secret, I had no hope he's personable.' And Harrison was every real from the camera angle, because that's the idea what my character was going to do or bit of that." one they took. So, Harrison popped me, and about his involvement with Harrison and Shia But once their mutual admiration was over, we kept struggling until we heard, 'Cut!' At

LaBeouf until the day I got on the set in Diatchenko had to try to pummel him into sub- that point, Harrison gave me this look like,

Connecticut. mission. "Pulling Harrison off the back of a 'You all right there?' I replied, 'Yeah, yeah.

"The audition material had nothing to do moving motorcycle was probably the most I'm fine.' He said, 'I thought you were going

with the script. And when I found out that I got nervous I've been, and I've done lots of to hit me back.' I told him, 'Oh, come on,

the part, I had no clue what my dialogue was stunts," Diatchenko says. "I've fought Chuck Harrison. I'm not going to hit an American " going to be. I had no conception of the char- Norris [in Walker, Texas Ranger], and I did icon! Are you crazy?' Diatchenko chuckles.

acter other than he was part of this group of G.I. Jane, where I was jumping out of Jeeps "Being somebody who does lots of tight

Russians who are looking for the same thing and shooting guns. But I've never been quite scenes, if I get nicked a little bit where it adds

as Dr. Jones. When we started shooting at to whatever I'm doing and I don't get badly

Yale, I got together with Steven, and he said, hurt, I don't mind. Most actors get touchy

'OK, your character is doing this, that and the about their faces, but I play football and kick-

other thing. Have some fun with it, and I'll box in national and international champi-

On having his Indiana Jones part But then on the other hand, "I hung out expanded: "It was a combination of with Shia LaBeouf quite a bit over understanding what Steven wanted and those four months," Diatchenko says. "To

giving me freedom as an actor. Everything be honest, I hadn't seen him in any came together, like a nice puzzle." movies prior to Indiana Jones."

Diatchenko notes, "I didn't really hang out with because she was balancing being on the set of the biggest movie in the world, doing a major role and spending " timo in.'ith hor Lirlc —

onships, so a little punch here and there isn't going to make me too aggravated. Now, you start grabbing my fingers, being that I'm a gui- tar player that's when you're going to have elbows flying!" Signing up for an extended tour of duty with the KGB, though, had its price. When the opportunity arose to confound CONTROL Agent 86, Diatchenko wasn't able to do what he originally intended. He had auditioned for a larger part in , but when the Indiana Jones job came up, he dropped out of the cast- ing for the comedy. "However, when Indiana Jones wrapped, they called and said, 'We have this role for the movie's opening sequence. Do " you want to do it?' Diatchenko recalls. "I play this Russian consulate security guy. The fight scene in the diner "was fun."That and the motorcycle sequence Maxwell Smart is doing surveillance on us, "were the two memorable action-packed scenes for my character. All the other stuff trying to pick up tidbits of information, and was just shooting guns and chasing." we're talking about everything but anything important to national security: ordering pizza, cess Diatchenko has enjoyed on screen, he called up and said, 'Do you want this role?' I avoiding an ex-wife, a mother-in-law might be says, "is thanks to that doctor." was like, 'Yeah. Is it a guest star?' And they coming by... [Director Peter Segal] gave me a As he got older, Diatchenko's first inclina- said, 'Well, no. It's at the beginning. You're a couple of lines that he wanted to get in, and tion as an artist was to hone his musical abili- Russian archaeologist, and you're digging for then he said, 'Just make up some stuff.' So, it ties. He began taking formal lessons when he this magical amulet. You have a fight with was pretty cool. Unfortunately, I didn't get to was eight years old, gave a solo recital at 11, your partner, and you kill each other.' 'Really. work face-to-face with Steve Carell. I really received a music scholarship to Stetson All right, whatever.' I went in and did it, but I admire his work." University in 1990 and earned a Master's figured when it finally came time for me to do

Iron Man was another of the summer's big- degree in music from State University. that show, I would have this love scene with gest films. Diatchenko didn't appear in that Over the years, he has given concerts, written —which still needs to hap- movie, but he can be heard bellowing chal- original works and recorded several CDs of pen," he laughs. "I'll write it myself if I have lenges in the tie-in video game. He is featured classical guitar performances. See his website to! as the Golden Avenger's Russian rival, the (www.dimitrid.com) for samples of his musi- "It was a bit scene, another of those things equally armored Titanium Man. Diatchenko cal work. you have to do when you're coming up as an wasn't familiar with the original comic book Diatchenko started acting while still in actor," he continues. "Sometimes, you get big incarnation of the baleful Boris Bullski, but he school, and landed a part as a trainee in G.I. roles, like I did on Walker, Texas Ranger, 18 was happy to voice the former Soviet super- Jane. Other jobs included episodes of Wheels of Justice and Pensacola: Wings of soldier. and Alias. "I was disappointed, because I had Gold, where I played the big bad guy of the "They gave me background on the charac- been auditioning for Alias for these big guest whole show. But Alias was a small part, for ter in the audition material, so I had an idea of star roles for a long time, and suddenly they sure." what he would look like and then could find a These days, Diatchenko is busy enough voice," explains the veteran of several video that he has decided to cut back on his concert game voiceovers. "I initially gave Bullski a schedule. In Remarkable Power, a forthcom- very heavy Russian accent, but they told me to ing comedy starring Kevin Nealon, Tom back off a bit. Bullski has a sense of humor, a Arnold and Chris Titus, he plays Ivan, a porn little laugh here and there, even in serious sit- director, and contributed a tango composition uations. And Bullski wants to be the boss; he to the film's soundtrack. On TV, Diatchenko doesn't like it when someone else tells him was in the pilot of My Own Worst Enemy—and what to do." may be back for more episodes. He guest stars November 18 on Without a Trace. wolf Traps Born and raised in , the actor Diatchenko's earliest fight scene didn't carefully cultivated the Russian accent he dis- involve mechanized powersuits or mysterious, played not only in this summer's efforts, but unearthly artifacts. He was only a toddler at throughout his movie, TV and video game the time, but his struggle in the jaws of a career. While he has used his natural accent in slavering beast was a life-or-death one. "When other roles, it's the Russian inflection that has

I was about two years old, my parents were garnered attention. And being typecast isn't camping up in Lake Tahoe," he relates. "They anything he's concerned about. were packing up the tent, I wandered off and "This business is a difficult one in which to the next thing you know, there were people become high-profile," he relates. "There are screaming. Dad turned, and a timber wolf had tons of actors who have done guest-starring me by the face and was dragging me into the and co-starring roles for years, and they never woods. There were enough people around to break into anything huge. I'm trying to get = outnumber the wolf, and he ran off, but not into another atmosphere where I can do stuff ^ before he took the whole right side of my face like Bruce Willis, and if I have to break f and put it where my neck was. My Mom said through that ice by being a Russian bad guy, i that she thought he had gotten my throat. I was then so be it." "Acting is like living, except that you get | bleeding, and you could see cheekbone, Dimitri Diatchenko it, "I my re-dos," actor-musician Diatchenko As sees would 3 teeth and eye socket. rushed to the rather be a Russian bad guy in a Steven * They me laughs. "You get to edit it, so people don't nearest private doctor." Some 250 stitches see how ridiculous you look sometimes." Spielberg film than a nice cop in a Joe Blow ~ were required to repair the damage. What suc- See his website (www.dimitrid.com). movie, you know what I mean?" a

68 STARLOG/Deremier 2008 www.starlog.com .

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H^ y his own estimation, Justin Bruen- rjH ing had to memorize "more than a MBMk. million" lines of dialogue during his IJH four-year run on the . But he isn't sure if that tour of daytime duty comes close to what's being asked of him in his primetime turn as Michael Traceur in NBC's latest reimagining of that 1980s staple, Knight Rider.

"I'll be honest with you, I don't know

which is tougher," he says during a lunch break on what has been a seven-day grind in

getting the first six Knight Rider episodes in

the can. "Emotionally demanding? Yeah, it's way more emotionally demanding than All My Children ever was. But physically? Man, there's no comparison to what I'm doing right now!" Bruening, a former model and down-to-

the-wire candidate for the title role in , found out how tough a gig Knight Rider could be when, while doing a

fight sequence for the two-hour pilot, he dislo- cated his knee, which sidelined him for three

weeks. Three weeks and one day later, he was back on the set, once again trading punches "HE ISN'T YOUR basis, the show offers up tantalizing glimpses with the bad guys. The actor laughingly of his secret past. "When he least expects it, remarks that things haven't gotten any less TYPICAL ACTIO these little fragments from his past surface, strenuous since Knight Rider went to series. TV STAR." which both deepens the character and the mys- "I get my butt kicked every week on this tery," Bruening observes. show," he chuckles. "We've already had one Bruening acknowledges that this parceling

episode where I get buried in the desert and than the original concept of a man and his car. out of information throughout the initial

am left to die while race cars drive over my "Michael has been an emotionally demanding episodes has, likewise, been an ongoing mys-

head. I just picked up the script for the next character to play," Bruening says. "And it tery to him. "I'll be reading a script and think, " show we're filming, and I have to jump off a doesn't just come from his relationship with 'Wow! I didn't see that coming!' Bruening

cliff! I'm nervous and curious at the same KITT. It comes from his past, and what he grins. "Every week, it's something new that time. What happens to Michael every week does and doesn't remember about his time in my character doesn't know and, even at that

has become a running joke on the series. It's Iraq and what happened in the years before. point, it's still a mystery to me what he really

like every week I almost die and then, some- When he becomes Michael Traceur, he gets rid does or doesn't understand. Right now, my

how, I get out of it." of his past—for the most part. But then there's feeling is that Michael knows more about his Despite having several stunt doubles at his his former girl friend, who he cares about past then he's letting on. Consequently, he

disposal, Bruening is proud of the fact that, to deeply, and who is once again in his life. She's isn't your typical action TV star. This cat is

date, he has done almost all of his own stunts. the chink in his armor. When something hap- very complex."

"It boils down to this: If it's a stunt where I pens to her or she's in danger, that impacts Episode seven, presently rolling before could really get hurt and never be able to work him." cameras on a cavernous Universal soundstage,

again, then they use a stunt guy. But if I do a Amnesia plagues Michael and, on a regular is typical of the way Bruening is being kept in stunt and end up breaking my arm, then they the dark. "I'm constantly surprised by this simply write the broken arm into the script!" guy," he says. "There are things going on in

this script that I thought were an absolute joke,

Knight Moves and then it turns out they're deadly serious. Bruening joins the chorus of Knight Rider I'm always talking to Gary [showrunner Gary insiders in his assessment that the two-hour Scott Thompson], and he'll tell me why pilot—which was more of a prequel in his esti- Michael is acting or thinking this way, and mation—is a completely different animal than suddenly it makes sense. Through talking with the new series (which airs Wednesdays, 8 Gary, I've discovered that there's always a p.m.). "Those two hours established our char- snippet in each episode that expands upon this acters, the gist of the storyline and how things character's mythology." will work out," he says. "Now, with the series, But as anybody remotely familiar with we can really dive into things. We don't have Knight Rider recalls, a big draw is the rela- to re-establish everyone, and now we have tionship between Michael and KITT, now a more time to get into these people and see who super-charged, shapeshifting car voiced by Val fj they truly are." Kilmer. "There's more going on than simply g Michael Traceur is a Jason Bourne type the car telling Michael what to do and vice = with a past shrouded in mystery and, at the versa," Bruening explains. "Their relationship § same time, linked to his present. "Yes, he's an is like one of those buddy-cop movies. KITT i action hero, but he's an action hero who has is Michael's partner. Michael doesn't bark

0 his demons and problems," Bruening explains. orders at him. KITT is like a fellow soldier. He isn't the off a building has Michael's back, and he'll always protect | "He guy who jumps This isn't an easy Riderfor Bruening, g without breaking a sweat. He's afraid. He's with the long hours and stunt demands, him. 1 worried. And there are people he cares about." but he loves "[getting] my butt "KITT is an advanced version of artificial # This retooled Knight Rider is much deeper kicked every week." intelligence. He's being updated all the time,

www.starlog.com STARLOG/flecemierzW 71 and he continues to learn and process informa- "I DRESSED LIKE MICHAEL with vague hopes of stardom. But fate, as it tion. Much of the evolution of their relation- often does, stepped in. While awaiting his ship comes from the fact that KITT learns a knight. I LITERALLY McDonald's breakfast special at 6 a.m., a pre- good deal about this world from Michael. lude to his then-day job at Blockbuster Video, KITT is about logic; Michael is about strategy. WANTED to be he noticed a woman staring at him across the And along the way, KITT begins to imitate KNIGHT RIDER." dining area. Michael. In many ways, KITT is a child, and "She approached me and asked if I had he looks to Michael for answers. But on the Knight Rider. ever considered modeling," notes Bruening. other side, if Michael needs to talk to some- "The show came on the air when I was four "She wasn't the first person who had asked me body, he usually goes to KITT. KITT is like years old, and I watched it religiously," he about that, but I wasn't really into it. However, the Dr. Phil of the show, and Michael is con- remembers. "When Knight Rider became syn- then she told me that modeling was a good stantly opening up to him!" dicated and it was on daily, I would rush home way to transition into acting." from school to sit in front of the tube. I had the Bruening took the bait and soon found

Knight Shoots lunchbox. I dressed like Michael Knight. I lit- himself on the catwalk for such high-end Born in Chandron, Nebraska on September erally wanted to be Knight Rider." clients as Abercrombie & Fitch. And true to 24, 1979, Bruening was raised in nearby St. Years later, after a stint at Chandron his agent's word, acting offers began to trickle Helena, Nebraska, whose population rose to College and such less-than-fun farm-oriented in. In 2002, Bruening made an appearance (in 85 with his birth. When he was barely old jobs as artificially inseminating animals, a swimming pool) in the video enough to navigate the television channel Bruening decided that acting might be his true "Boys"—an ordeal made all the more difficult selector, Bruening was already hooked on calling and relocated to Southern California by the fact that Bruening can't swim.

72 mm/December 2008 They say that hot cars attract hot women. Well, Mike certainly has two comely companions in Carrie and Sarah.

this. I'm working 16-hour days with no time

"EVERY WEEK I off, and I have most of my scenes with a car!" he laughs. "Tomorrow, we're filming scenes ALMOST DIE and for three different episodes, and they all of THEN, SOMEHOW, I GET revolve around KITT and me. Many my scenes with KITT are done with greenscreen, OUT OF IT." so there's that one day a week when the direc- tors come to collect their IOUs—and that day

buff guy. Sure, he's going to finish the mission is tomorrow! I'll be spending 16 hours sitting

and do the right thing, but he's going to do it in the driver's seat. On days like that, it's hard

his way." to keep the episodes straight. I could handle it

While Bruening acknowledges that his at first, but now that the shows are getting

work ethic has helped him keep a proper per- more complex, it's harder to remember where

spective on show business, he also concedes, I am emotionally and what just happened."

"Nothing I've done before has prepared me for Bruening is realistic enough to know that the mortality rate for new TV shows is high.

"The impact of all this hasn't really sunk in

yet. It comes and goes," he allows. "When I see monster Knight Rider billboards around Knight Riders cast includes (I to r): aul Campbell as Billy Morgan, Smith town, then it hits me that this is a big deal. But Cho as Zoe Chae, Russo, Bruening, at this point, I'm not thinking about longevity. Sydney Tamila Poitier as Carrie Ruvai, Bruce Davison as Charles Graiman and Yancey Arias as Alex Torres. "HE ISN'T THE GUY WHO JUMPS OFF a Then came the offer he couldn't refuse: the part of Jamie Martin in All My Children. "I BUILDING WITHOUT learned so much from being on the set on a BREAKING A SWEAT." daily basis," he reflects. "I learned how to memorize lots of lines in a short period of I just want the show to be good." time. And, of course, I ended up meeting my As he's called back to the set for another wife, [actress] , on the show." eight hours of shooting, Bruening gives him- But after four years of All My Children, self a moment to speculate on where Michael Bruening was ready to try something new. Traceur might find himself over the long haul. Guest shots on Cold Case and CSI: "I want Michael to start remembering the were followed by the offer to climb on board things he has forgotten. I don't know how long the Knight Rider redux. "From the moment I we can drag out this not-remembering thing. read the script and character description, I And it would add a different dimension to his knew that I was going to book this job," he character—to see if Michael really is such a says. "And even though we didn't touch on good guy, and if his horrific memories of Iraq deep character stuff in the two-hour pilot, I and before then are true." knew that the reality of who Michael is was Justin Bruening then lets out a mischievous It appears that the producers have somewhere in there. I immediately connected sexed up Knight Rider a bit. Here is laugh. "I mean, think about it. Maybe the with him, and I liked the idea that he's the hero Bruening's beefcake shot. What's next? memories he's having aren't his. Maybe and the good guy, but not the stereotypical KITT with his top down? they're somebody else's!" www.starlog.com STARLOG/flecemier200S 73 Josh Friedman and John Wirth are after the pilot, and it has been a great expe- the relentless James Ellison (Richard T. the proud executive producers of rience. Josh is one of the best 'pure writers' Jones). Terminator: The Sarah Connor I've ever worked with. He has great ideas "I named Cameron after James

Chronicles and no strangers to science fic- that we hope to explore throughout the Cameron, who made it all possible," tion. The bearded and boyish Friedman is series." Friedman explains. "Ellison is, of course, wearing a Sid Vicious T-shirt and may be Friedman developed the Fox series named for . Tribute must be best known for co-writing Steven Spiel- based on James Cameron's low-budget paid." (Ellison sued Hemdale, the company berg's War of the Worlds. "I don't think he original and its blockbuster sequel, Termi- that produced the first Terminator, over expected me to win the arbitration!" he nator 2: Judgment Day, which added young similarities to his Outer Limits episodes jokes. Friedman also penned Brian De John Connor to the Sarah Connor-vs.- "Soldier" and "Demon With a Glass Palma's The Black Dahlia. killing machines mix. The TV show follows Hand.") Sporting a green sweater, the tall Wirth the adventures of teenage John {Heroes'' has genre credentials as well, having Thomas Dekker), Sarah (300's Lena Head- Today's Determination worked on The Adventures ofBrisco County, ey) and Cameron (Firefly's Summer Glau), "The question always was: 'Can you do

Jr. "That was a great, underrated show," the beautiful but deadly Terminator sent to Terminator for television?' " Friedman ex- Wirth enthuses. "I came onto Sarah Connor protect them. The trio are being pursued by plains, as the films—especially the last

The future is in their hands: Producers Josh Friedman & John Wirth consider The Sarah Connor Chronicles. By pat jankiewicz

Lena Headey is used to portraying strong women, having played Queen Gorgo in 300. Now, she's the tough and obsessively driven Sarah Connor.

According to series executive producer Josh Friedman, Perhaps his time on Heroes gave Summer Glau is the furthest Thomas Dekker some insight into thing from a rotten apple. The

playing the future leader of Earth's agreeable actress gives it her all resistance, John Connor. as Cameron. two—have became famous for their epic prac- ninth episode, cut down from the intended 13, ing a Reese was important. The Reese family tical and visual FX, colossal cataclysmic and the finale's big cliffhanger was pure luck, is an emotional part of the series. I keep say- events and gargantuan action sequences. "We as it was meant to be a cliffhanger for the next ing that they're the ultimate nuclear family. I found a way. Necessity is the mother of inven- week's episode. Instead, it functioned as the actually wanted that to be the show's tagline, tion. It's the small moments of violence that I finale for the whole season." but Fox wouldn't go for it!" appreciate! In the first Terminator movie, Sarah (Linda " 'The ultimate nuclear family' is an inter-

"We had a pretty good plan, and even Hamilton) is saved from the Terminator esting take," Wirth notes. "The family thing is though the first season was hampered by the () by Kyle Reese compelling, but the Terminators and cast are

Writers' Strike, the nine episodes we complet- (Michael Biehn), who (SPOILER ALERT!) what I love about the show. I like the mother- ed [now out on DVD] actually came together fathers her son and is killed. Initially, son relationship between Lena and Thomas, much like we thought. I was pleasantly sur- Friedman wanted to change that. "I wanted to and Summer is intriguing as Cameron. prised that the show was funnier than I expect- bring Kyle back and have him on the show," he Sometimes I think, 'Who but these actors ed, and I was really pleased with Lena, reveals. "But [producer] James Middleton could play these roles?' I'm fascinated to find

Thomas and Summer's performances." convinced me not to do that, so my next out where the show is going.

As for the series' future, "I've mapped it thought was, 'What about his brother?' Kyle "In television, you're always being told to out and, yes, I know where we're going," has a sacred place in Terminator, and as a 'Dumb it down.' Nothing has been done to

Friedman says. "Season One ended with the show focused on a family unit, I felt that hav- dumb down this series. I was so impressed

with Josh's script for the pilot. It was complex, layered and smart—and that's true of the series, too. We rely on our actors to sell things,

and the audience totally gets it." While adding Reese's brother, Derek, had the potential for ridicule, the character caught on—despite online critics' comments about the casting of Beverly Hills 90210 actor Brian Austin Green. "Brian gave a fabulous audition, and he has done a great job," Friedman prais-

es. "He nailed it. I did think, 'Shit, I'm gonna cast Brian Austin Green!' But he's gonna be our Scott Foley on The Unit. When [some of

the writers] expressed doubt about Brian, I showed them his audition tape, and they were

all sold pretty quickly." "Brian really impressed us," Wirth adds. "He completely confounded our expectations with his portrayal of the character, which was

exactly as we saw it. There's a minimalism to The year is 90210. OK, the time is now—and the time was right for Brian Austin Green, his performance." whose impressive audition earned him the role of Derek Reese. A familiar Terminator face popped up dur-

76 SWm/December 2008 www.starlog.com Another addition to the Season Two cast Nash Bridges. Carlton is now on Lost. is Riley, Leven Rambin. She's a potential "Bruce Campbell was fantastic as the hero. (and human) love interest for John. I did lots of story work on Brisco, so I was

involved in all 27 episodes. I also wrote 'Deep in the Heart of Dixie,' which was about Brisco's girl friend, Dixie Cousins [Kelly Rutherford], another great character." While Sarah Connor Chronicles airs on Fox, McG is directing a big-budget fourth entry in the film series, Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins, starring Christian Bale as John Connor (due out May 2009). However, Friedman and Wirth aren't worried. "I would not want to be constrained by what they're doing, and I'm sure they feel the same way about us," Friedman states. "I know that some fans have been trying to make Terminator into one strict timeline, but you'll end up ripping

off your head. It's impossible!" Wirth agrees. "I didn't give [the upcoming movie] a second thought," he remarks. "The existence of multiple, contradictory Termi-

nator narratives is fine, because even without the TV show, you couldn't make everything Garbage frontwoman Shirley Manson hold together as one." had a hit with "Bleed Like Me," but the The producing pair truly live and breathe Scottish singer isn't quite as Terminator. "Rob Hall [whose Almost Human vulnerable as the tech company CEO is doing Sarah Connor's FX] gave me a Ter- Catherine Weaver (secretly a minator head that I keep by my desk," Josh Terminator T-1 001 model). Friedman grins. "I even made a holiday card of ing Season One. "We'll be seeing Tarissa Terminatrix (Rristanna Loken) seen in Ter- my three-year-old son with it. Rob sent me the Dyson again," Wirth promises of the character minator 3: Rise of the Machines. "We like our head in a box, just like in Seven, and my son originally essayed by S. Epatha Merkerson in Terminators polite!" Friedman jests. "I love walked over to it. I was worried that he would T2; she's played by Charlayne Woodard in the Summer; she's the ultimate employee. Sum- be frightened, but instead he said, 'Terminator, " series. mer simply says, 'Just tell me what to do, and welcome to your new home!'

The 13-episode second season, currently I'll do it!'" underway, has added Leven Rambin (as a "I like doing this kind of show," notes romantic interest for John) and Garbage lead Wirth. "I was born in the Midwest, raised in singer Shirley Manson (as another Terminator) LA and started out on Remington Steele. to the story mix. Despite its strong beginning Pierce Brosnan is a great guy, and I learned so in January, the ratings this fall have been fad- much from the show's creator, Michael ing for what is a very expensive series to pro- Gleason. I haven't learned so much from duce, leading to an uncertain tomorrow for working with another writer until I joined Josh

The Sarah Connor Chronicles. on this. "My previous fantasy show was The

Tomorrow's Termination Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., and I had a

Although John is the leader of future- great time on that as well. I loved [series cre- Earth, he hasn't exactly shown leadership ator] Jeffrey Boam and, as with Sarah Connor, qualities on the show. "It's his character arc," I came onto that show after the pilot. Jeffrey

Friedman smiles. "You can't have three alphas wasn't super-active on Brisco after the pilot; running around!" he was also writing movies. So I connected

Cameron is rather different than the female with Carlton Cuse, and we went to work on

It's impossible to match the size and scope of the Terminator films, but the series' producers manage to deliver their share of stellar FX moments.

Executive producer John Wirth finds this "ultimate nuclear family" compelling and, unlike Sarah, can't wait to see what tomorrow holds for these characters.

mKLOG/December 2008 77 Revealed at last! The movie primates went prime-time,

monkeying around in a short-lived TV series.

Star Trek was a favorite of Larry Alex- ander and his family. But on a Friday evening in 1968, the TV writer and his wife went to a NY theater to see Planet of the Apes, and they were mesmerized. "It was a By MARK PHILLIPS fabulous film," he says. "We then raced home c to see that night's Star Trek on TV. We Rod Serling's original screenplay (based ject's status. John Chambers' revolutionary

£ watched about 10 minutes, and had to shut it on Pierre Boulle's novel) had astronauts land makeup (which would win a special Oscar)

.2. off. We literally couldn't watch it. Its produc- near a modern-day ape city where gorillas was kept top-secret. Actors weren't allowed to < tion values looked so primitive compared to drove cars and flew planes. Michael Wilson leave the soundstages wearing their appliances.

6; what we had just seen. Apes had established did a rewrite, placing the apes in a stone-age Directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, Planet of the

higher standards for science fiction." setting and injecting more humor. Apes made $25 million during its 1968 release, 2 Yet selling Planet of the Apes had been a robust box-office take for its time.

1, nothing but trouble for independent producer Monkey Movies Burt Reynolds turned down the role of g d. Arthur P. Jacobs. Major studios turned down Planet of the Apes was still a huge gamble. astronaut Brent in the 1970 sequel. Instead, oo the project as too much of a financial risk, "The audience must accept these ape charac- James Franciscus plays the character in Be- g J Richard Zanuck, head of 20th Century Fox, ters as intelligent beings," a Fox press release neath the Planet of the Apes, in which he dis-

2. >• finally purchased Apes only after a screen test stressed. "This is no masquerade party. It is covers a subterranean world of mutant humans > | with Charlton Heston (as astronaut George very much for real." The casting of respected who worship a doomsday bomb (STARLOG g o Taylor) and Edward G. Robinson (Dr. Zaius, veterans such as Roddy McDowall, Kim #104). Heston, who briefly returns as Taylor,