Paula Malcomson cast in new Showtime pilot, Luke Camilleri in Arctic Air tonight, Falling Skies DVD release date, and more updates

A few quick updates.

To start with some frakking excellent news, Deadline writes that Paula Malcomson has landed a leading role in Showtime's new pilot, Ray Donovan:

A dark family drama with comedic undertones, the show centers on Ray (Schreiber), a professional “fixer” for LA’s rich and famous, the go-to guy in Hollywood who deftly solves the highly confidential problems of the city’s most intriguing personalities but can’t quite escape the damage in his own troubled family. Malcomson will play Ray’s wife Abby, a Boston tough girl who is still finding it hard to assimilate into the fast lane of Hollywood.

Luke Camilleri makes an appearance in tonight's episode of Arctic Air, "Hijacked," which airs at 9 pm on CBC in Canada. Michael Hogan is also back. Hit the pic to see a gallery of stills from the episode.

Here is the synopsis for Jane Espenson's next episode of Once Upon a Time, "Skin Deep," which airs on February 12 - Jessy Schram from Falling Skies and Emilie de Ravin from Lost guest star:

"Skin Deep" - After Mr. Gold's house is robbed, Emma keeps a close eye on him when it looks like he wants to track down the criminal and dole out some vigilante justice as payback, and Valentine's Day finds Mary Margaret, Ruby and Ashley (Jessy Schram, "Falling Skies") having a girls' night out. Meanwhile, in the fairytale land that was, Belle (Emilie de Ravin, "Lost") agrees to a fateful deal to give up her freedom in order to save her town from the horrors of the Ogre war, on "Once Upon a Time," SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 12 (8:00-9:00 p.m., ET) on the ABC Television Network.

People's Choice nominations & new projects for Paula Malcomson, Alessandra Torresani and Ryan Robbins

The polls for the 2012 People's Choice Awards are open for nominations and Caprica is on the list for the Favorite Sci-Fi/Fantasy Show.

You can nominate the show here. There are also several other categories with some write-in potential: Favorite Cable Drama, Best TV Drama Actor & Actress, and Favorite TV Guest Star.

Not sure how long the polls will stay open, so go nominate.

Cast updates:

Paula Malcomson has a new credit on the IMDB, for the TV pilot Outlaw Country, a new FX drama about organized crime in Nashville, starring Mary Steenburgen. Paula's Deadwood BFF John Hawkes is also in it. More details in this Deadline article.

Alessandra Torresani starts shooting a new movie, The Green Story, with Ed O'Ross, Shannon Elizabeth, Annabella Sciorra and George Finn in early November. Movieweb has some details:

Paula Malcomson in Prime Suspect tomorrow, general updates & new interviews with Leah Gibson, Jane Espenson, Scott Porter and Eric Stoltz

A bunch of updates and previews today. Let's start with the last minute catch.

Paula Malcomson will make an appearance in Prime Suspect, episode 1x02, "Carnivorous Sheep," which airs tomorrow (Thursday) at 10 pm on NBC. She will play a character called Noelle Tanner. The teaser is embedded below.

Here is the synopsis:

Jane plays second banana when Duffy leads the case of a murdered mother and her missing daughter.

We Have Your Husband, the Lifetime film with Esai Morales, has been licensed to several European broadcasters. From the Virtual Press Office:

Synopsis for Caprica 1x11, "Retribution," and some cast updates

Here is the synopsis for "Retribution," which airs this Tuesday at 10 on Syfy:

Lacy botches an operation launched by Barnabas, and the Adama brothers begin a campaign of coercion against Daniel's former colleagues while Amanda tries to cope with her losses. - TV Guide

The episode was written by Patrick Massett and John Zinman and directed by Jonas Pate.

Ron Moore, David Eick and Syfy's Mark Stern will be at the Syfy Digital Press Tour this weekend. You can find more details about the panels at Airlock Alpha and follow Michael Hinman on Twitter for updates in real time.

A round of cast updates:

SpoilerTV has a teaser for Glee 2x04, "Duets," directed by Eric Stoltz, which airs this Tuesday at 8 pm on Fox. If you want to hear the songs from the episode, they have them too - here. And file this under "rumour" for now, but daddy Graystone has been spotted around the set of Off the Map, Shonda Rhimes' new show currently filming in Hawaii, so possibly another directing gig to look forward to in the not-so-distant future (mid-season).

TheTVEvent has more details about Paula Malcomson's appearance in The Event 1x06, "Loyalty." The episode was directed by Jonas Pate and will air on Monday, October 25 at 9 pm on NBC.

John Pyper-Ferguson will appear on Castle, episode 3x08, "Murder Most Fowl," which airs on Monday, November 8.

Sanctuary, with Ryan Robbins, returns for a third season this Friday (Oct. 15) at 10 on Syfy. SpoilerTV has a clip from the season premiere.

James Marsters was at the New York Comic Con this week. You can find some clips from the panel at Buffyfest. Among other things, he talked about his character on Hawaii Five-0, Brainiac 5 on Smallville, and whether or not he will be back on Torchwood. He also gave away a few details about his character in Three Inches in this clip. His episode of Smallville also airs this Friday (Oct. 15) at 8 pm on the CW network. SpoilerTV has a preview and the teaser.

Also airing on Friday (at 9 pm) is CSI: NY 7x04, "Sangre por Sangre," with Battlestar's Edward James Olmos. The teaser is here.

Katee Sackhoff will make an appearance on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation on Thursday, October 28 at 9 pm in episode 11x06, Cold Blooded. She posted a picture from the set on Twitter the other day. :)

Patton Oswalt guest stars on Bored to Death tomorrow (Sunday at 10 pm on HBO). You can see a sneak peek here. You can also watch last week's episode of Community, in which he appeared as Jackie (male nurse) on Hulu.

If you didn't see the last episode of Hellcats, Aaron Douglas was back this week. You can catch it on Hulu (as soon as they upload it). It's episode 1x05, "The Prisoner's Song."

More updates hopefully coming before Tuesday.

Paula Malcomson talks about Sons of Anarchy and Caprica

My Take on TV has uploaded a video interview with Paula Malcomson from the Sons of Anarchy premiere earlier this month. In the clip, she talks about how she landed a role on that show, where her character fits in, and mentions some twists and turns down the line. She also briefly comments on Caprica's hiatus and the cliffhanger in the mid-season finale, and talks about what we can expect to see in the back nine episodes. The interview is completely spoiler-free.

You can catch Paula in Sons of Anarchy (she will appear in eight episodes this season) on Tuesdays at 10 on FX. This of course means that, like The Good Wife (with Scott Porter this season), the show will run directly opposite Caprica starting October 5, so enjoy it live while you can.

Here is the interview:

Where to catch the cast this fall

August 15 has come and gone with no news about the actors' contracts getting picked up for a second season or any word on what Syfy is thinking these days, but with the cast appearing in about a gazillion other things this fall, the hiatus blues should be getting easier.

If you're in New York some time between September and January, you can catch a short film, Untitled, with Eric Stoltz starring, at MoMA (see article.)

No release date has been set yet for his last feature, Fort McCoy (pic left), but IMDb still says 2010, so fingers crossed.

And this is still unconfirmed, but an extras casting director tweeted yesterday that our daddy Graystone will direct one of the new episodes of Glee. If true, the episode should air in the first half of the season. The show returns on Tuesday, Sept. 21 at 8 on Fox.

Alessandra Torresani has been cast in Playback, Michael A. Nickles' new horror flick that starts shooting this week (synopsis here). You can follow her on Twitter for updates and make sure to check out the interview she gave EW after being voted the Ultimate Sci Fi Hottie of 2010 earlier this month. The interview is on her site. Here is a snippet:  

Since a second season is still up in the air, could these last 10 episodes wrap up the narrative on their own?
Alessandra: It would be really disappointing if it didn’t go to a second season. At Comic-Con, [executive producers] Ron Moore and David Eick sat us all down, and [told us] probably the most genius second-season plan I have ever heard. It would be mind-blowing to me if we didn’t get to do that, because there’s so much more to tap in. There are so many secrets that no one knows about, that only [Moore and Eick] do. I would be disappointed if we didn’t go to a second season, because the back ten explain a lot.

Esai Morales has just wrapped filming Gun Hill Road, a family drama set in the Bronx, directed by Rashaad Ernesto Green and also starring Judy Reyes and Vincent Laresca. You can see some pics from the set on Esai's Facebook page.

He also appears in Cherry, a comedy with Laura Allen (The 4400) and Kyle Gallner, that will be shown at the Boston Film Festival on September 20 (updates at CherryTheMovie.com and on Facebook), and in Panic Nation, a documentary on immigration laws that recently won the Best Documentary Award at the Broadway International Film Festival. The film will be screened at several festivals in the next couple of months. For dates and venues, go to PanicNationMovie.com or follow Panic Nation on Twitter. Another recent movie of his, King of the Avenue, will be out on DVD on October 26. You can get it on Amazon.

Paula Malcomson will appear in eight episodes of Sons of Anarchy this season. You can see a couple of previews here. Season three kicks off on Tuesday, September 7, at 10 on FX.

Polly Walker will guest star in a couple of episodes of Sanctuary this fall (will tweet air dates when they show up). The show returns on Tuesday, September 28 at 10 on Syfy. This is also a good opportunity to get acquainted with Ryan Robbins, who will appear in five episodes of Caprica in Clarice's storyline and is a series regular on Sanctuary. (You can also catch him in the new horror film Manson, My Name Is Evil, which is out on October 12 - link).

Polly Walker also has a role in Disney's live-action adaptation of John Carter of Mars. The film was shot earlier this year, but won't see the light of day until June 2012. For updates, keep an eye on JohnCarterMovie.com.  

Clash of the Titans, in which Polly briefly appears as Cassiopeia, was released on DVD and Blu-ray in late July.

Sasha Roiz will guest star on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation alongside Elliott Gould this fall. The episode, "Pool Shark," was directed by Michael Nankin and will air on September 30 on CBS.

You can also see Sasha in the web series Crazy/Sexy/Awkward (episode one). Back in June, he also mentioned doing a short film, but no details on that one yet.

His last movie, Unthinkable, was released on DVD on June 15.

Magda Apanowicz, Genevieve Buechner and Liam Sproule (Keon) can be seen in the TV film Bond of Silence, which premiered the other day on Lifetime. You can see the trailer, find the airing schedule, or watch the film online on Lifetime's site. Magda joined Twitter this week, so you can follow her there to see what else she's been up to.

Genevieve Buechner has also joined Richard Harmon in Judas Kiss (article here), an independent movie currently in production in Seattle. Michael Hinman posted a podcast from the set this week. You can check it out on Alpha Waves Radio.

Genevieve also has a part in Daydream Nation, a drama that will make its debut at the Toronto International Film Festival in September. For the trailer and screening schedule, visit TIFF.net.

Richard Harmon will appear in Dear Mr. Gacy, a film that will be released some time later this year, and Tower Prep, Cartoon Network's new show that premieres this fall.

If you're attending the Toronto Film Festival, you'll probably wanna catch A Night for Dying Tigers, an independent drama with Caprica's Leah Gibson and John Pyper-Ferguson in the main cast (TIFF listing, trailer and screening times). Pyper-Ferguson has two other movies premiering in Toronto: Score: A Hockey Musical, (TIFF listing) and Tony Goldwyn's Conviction (fka Betty Anne Waters - TIFF listing), starring Hilary Swank, which will get a limited release in October.

If that's not enough, you can also catch him in the recently released drama Hungry Hills (official site), martial arts flick Tekken (trailer), and the upcoming horror/thriller Die (pics and synopsis).

Leah Gibson had a brief appearance in The Twilight Saga: Eclipse and did a comedy called Indie Jonesing, currently in post-production. For more updates on her projects, you can follow her on Twitter.

Hiro Kanagawa (Cyrus) has written a play, The Patron Saint of Stanley Park, that opens at the Arts Club Theatre in Vancouver in late November (link). He also did a TV movie, Earth's Final Hours, that won't air until June. In the meantime, you can catch him in the action flick The King of Fighters (trailer), starring Maggie Q and Ray Park, that will hopefully get a release date before then.

Brian Markinson (Agent Duram) will be a series regular on Shattered (article, trailer 1, trailer 2), a new show that premieres on September 1 at 10 on Global. He will play shrink to none other than Callum Keith Rennie. James Pizzinato (Drew, Graystone's lab boy), will be another familiar face in the pilot.

And to round up the guest appearances:

• Patton Oswalt has signed on to guest star on Bored to Death (article). No mention of specific episode(s) yet. The show returns on September 26 at 10 on HBO.
• Scott Porter will appear in episode 5.07 of Friday Night Lights (executive produced by Jeffrey Reiner, with Patrick Massett and John Zinman serving as consulting producers) and he will also have a recurring role on The Good Wife this season (article). The final season of Friday Night Lights kicks off on October 27 on DirecTV and The Good Wife returns on Tuesday, September 28 at 10 (CBS).
• James Marsters will be back on Smallville in the show's last season. He will appear in the 200th episode (tentative air date is October 14). Before that, he will guest star in the Hawaii Five-0 pilot alongside Grace Park -- the show premieres on Monday, September 20 at 10 (CBS). As a sidenote, Marsters starts shooting Three Inches, a new pilot for Syfy, in Toronto this week (press release). His castmates will include Stephanie Jacobsen (Razor, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) and Naoko Mori (Torchwood).

Two other shows to keep an eye on are AMC's The Walking Dead (non-U.S. friendly trailer), for your regular dose of Bear McCreary, and the CW's Hellcats, which shares showrunner Kevin Murphy with Caprica. Aaron Douglas and Ryan Kennedy (who will have a recurring role in Caprica 1.5 in Lacy's storyline) will both appear on the show. (Quick note: Kennedy has also been cast on Facing Kate, USA's new "anti-law" drama starring Michael Trucco, which starts airing in January.) 

The Walking Dead premieres on Sunday, October 31 at 10, and Hellcats will see the light of day on Wednesday, September 8 at 9.

Cast & creators discuss morality on Caprica + new BTS clip with Alessandra Torresani

SyFy has released two new clips today. In the first one, the cast and producers talk about the concept of moral responsibility on the show and how it relates to the main characters.

In the clip: David Eick, Sasha Roiz, Mark Stern, Paula Malcomson, Polly Walker, Alessandra Torresani, Esai Morales, Jonas Pate and Eric Stoltz



And here is the second part of Alessandra Torresani's "Take Me Away" video (this time doing ADR with Sasha Roiz):

Interviews: Paula Malcomson & Esai Morales

Here are a couple of interviews that showed up in recent days:

Paula Malcomson - New York Times Syndicate

“Amanda does become more human as this series goes on,” Malcomson said. “I think she becomes more real. She’s been wound tightly for a long time, I think, career-achieving, married to a gazillionaire, becoming a public fi gure, all these things. And then all these things get stripped away, and we get to see the layers of her.

“The plot really thickens each week. It starts to fl y and there’s more, I don’t know... deception, chicanery and betrayal. Amanda and Daniel are in trouble, and we watch them come together and fall apart. It gets crazier and crazier.”

For the moment most of Malcomson’s scenes put her before the camera with Stoltz. The two actors spend much of their time confronting each other, while also trying to allow viewers to glimpse occasional flashes of love and aff ection.

“Eric is a tremendous actor, a great partner in many ways, in terms of trust and commitment and hard work,” Malcomson said. “He’s so sophisticated, and it’s really, really lovely to work with him. And we’re very, very diff erent in our styles of working. The nice part is that we really respect each other’s methods.

“It’s highly complementary, this relationship. I’m a lot wilder in terms of how I approach the work, and he’s much more structured and prepared, but we come to this really nice, happy medium with it, and I think it comes off well.”

Esai Morales - Uinterview

Q: So much of this show is very resonant with what’s happening today. For example, the society that’s depicted in the show seems to be obsessed with technology and success. What do you think the parallels are between the show and today? - Erik Meers
A: I think what I’ve always felt about our media and our technology – it outpaces our spirituality, our connectivity. We’re being outpaced. It’s like giving a loaded gun to a child who at five years old, you may or may not know what they have or how permanent the damage they can cause can be. I don’t want to explain too much of it, but I see this as a way to look at ourselves and what makes us human. Why do we get up? Why do we love? I have so many different directions I could go in my head, but to answer your question, I think it’s a perfect mirror of how, if we’re not careful, the ghost could be destroyed by the machine.
Q: There are parallels with today also in terms of terrorism. Obviously, that’s a big strand that goes through the series as well. What do you think about that? - Erik Meers
A: It’s just that things are not as they seem, in the real world and on the show. I don’t think the show can afford to mirror the real world exactly, I think it does it in broad strokes. It gets quite detailed for a weekly television show. It’s quite an undertaking, but if it gets too deep we’ll lose some of the audience. We have to deal with these on an unemotional level because the great shows tell these stories on a gut level and make us identify in these characters and beware in our lives. I don’t even think we have to try. If you watch it and you connect with it, then it resonates. If you stick with the show, it will stick with you.
Q: What can we expect in future episodes? - Erik Meers
A: You have to give it a chance. I do believe that the first act of what we’ve done with the cast and the crew as writers and people who are behind the scenes they were literally finding themselves. And by the second half, it comes togther. The show is finding itself through characters living and eventually making adjustments to those things and that takes the season to happen.
Q: Do you have any experiences that sort of sum up your experiences of working on the show? - Erik Meers
A: Our director, what he does is, he’ll let you bring your best shot to the table and he’ll go, “That stinks,” and it makes you find things that you weren’t aware of and that’s what I think he captures – great performances. You don’t plan for that. The general feeling is that we really love our jobs, and we want to make special moments happen.
Q: Are you almost done with shooting? - Erik Meers
A: I’m done completely. I think the show is wrapped shooting. We’re in the post-production process, just have to do some ADR, which is looping, some additional dialogue. I’ll do that tomorrow and in the remainder of the episodes and hope the audience enjoys this ride as much as we did making it.

Deleted scene from The Imperfections of Memory

Here is a bonus scene from "The Imperfections of Memory:"

Bonus scene from Know Thy Enemy & promo for The Imperfections of Memory

SyFy has put up a bonus scene from last week's episode, "Know Thy Enemy," and a couple of previews for episode 1x07, "The Imperfections of Memory."

The deleted scene, with Eric Stoltz, Paula Malcomson and Alessandra Torresani:



The teaser for this Friday's ep:



A preview clip, with Alessandra Torresani and Alex Arsenault:



The synopsis:

Amanda’s life spirals out of control as she begins to see visions of her brother, who died years earlier. As a result, Clarice sees an opportunity to gain her trust and we learn a dark secret from Amanda’s past that could have major implications for her life with Daniel.

And some promotional stills:

 

  

 

New Caprica event at Paley Center in NYC in March

From the Paley Center:

Preview Screening and Discussion
Syfy's Caprica

Wednesday, March 17, 2010
6:30 pm ET
New York
In Person

Ronald D. Moore, Cocreator and Executive Producer
David Eick, Executive Producer
Paula Malcomson, "Amanda Graystone"
Polly Walker, "Sister Clarice Willow"
Alessandra Torresani, "Zoe Graystone"
Magda Apanowicz, "Lacy Rand"
Sasha Roiz, "Sam Adama"

Syfy’s new Battlestar Galactica prequel—more futuristic family saga than space opera—is a provocative, superbly crafted drama that, like its predecessor, tackles complex, highly resonant themes, such as religion, race, terrorism, technology, love, and the very nature of humanity. Like all quality drama, Caprica is not just emotionally and intellectually gripping, but also compels viewers to confront their own reality, even as they are swept up in this visually arresting, preapocalyptic world of sentient robots, avatars, and interplanetary travel.

The Paley Center will preview an upcoming episode from Caprica’s first season, followed by a discussion with members of the cast and creative team.

Paley Center Members: $15, tickets on sale now.
General Public: $25, tickets on sale Wednesday, February 24 at noon.

Caprica podcast and cast interviews: Alessandra Torresani, Sasha Roiz, Magda Apanowicz

More interviews today.

Sci-Fi Talk did a podcast with Magda Apanowicz and they also have a couple of pics of Lacy meeting Barnabus (James Marsters). They'll have a podcast with Marsters on Friday, Feb. 26. Link: Sci-Fi Talk

The official Caprica podcast for "Gravedancing," with David Eick, Jonas Pate, Paula Malcomson and Sasha Roiz, is up on SyFy's site.

And Chicago Now talked to Alessandra Torresani and Sasha Roiz.

Even though the original Zoe is dead, we'll still see her this season. "She's not completely gone. You see flashbacks of a young version of Zoe at like seven years old. You'll get to see how she came up in the mindset of the STO."

The actors said that none of the Zoes will cause the chaos coming in Season 1 of the series. That will come from the humans.

"The whole world's got this ominous feeling that you know something is approaching," Roiz said. "There's this foreboding sense that it's going to spin out of control. The ecology of the planet, the religious fervor--all of these elements are going to come together to just unravel this world. And you can see it happening.

"I think that's one of the most exciting things about watching the show because you're literally watching people tear apart this world as you know it." -- Chicago Now

Interviews: Paula Malcomson, Sasha Roiz, Jane Espenson, Scott Porter

Okay, three new interviews today. Paula Malcomson talked to TV Star, Sasha Roiz was interviewed by Chicago Now, Jane Espenson explained the history behind Sam Adama's tattoos in the same article, and Scott Porter briefly discussed his role in Caprica while promoting his new film, The Good Guy, which opens this weekend. Links below.

Paula Malcomson:

What makes Amanda interesting to play and, in your opinion, to watch?
I'm not sure what makes her interesting to watch, other than that she's got the same problems as everybody else. Maybe it's just a little bit more exaggerated. She's watching these rich people kind of fall from grace in some ways, and that might be interesting for people to watch. For me, she's just enormously interesting to play because of all the complications that she's going through. That's always interesting to me. It's always interesting to me about playing anyone. What are their problems? What's their pain? Where is their pain? How does it affect them? And then, how do they deal with it? How do they conquer it? How do they arm themselves in the world?

In the upcoming weeks and months, what are you eager to discover about Amanda and about the story in general?
I think that what we're trying to do is make these characters really real and easy to empathize with, the loss in Amanda's life being easily identifiable to everyone. But the thing I love the most is wondering if, eventually, she'll get to see Zoe in whatever form it takes. I think the idea of being able to see your loved ones after you've lost them is pretty appealing. People would literally kill to do that. They'd give anything to be able to spend two minutes with someone they don't see anymore. I think that's the most beautiful plot part of playing this role, but there are 100 other reasons why I love playing Amanda.

You've said in other interviews that you're unpredictable as an actor playing Amanda, that you like to mix things up, change things around. How open are the show's powers that be to your unpredictability?
Well, let's just put it like this: they're in L.A. and I'm in Vancouver, so what are they going to do? It takes them at least six hours to get there with security these days. -- TV Star

Sasha Roiz & Jane Espenson:

The actor who plays the Tauron assassin, awesome uncle and gay family man has to spend hours getting the make-up applied.

"Well, 2 ½ hours and like three or four makeup artists. So, I've got like six to eight sets of hands on me," he said, sometimes standing with his arms spread out. "It's a bit of an ordeal, but ... I just stand there and take it all."

Tattoo-prep for scenes when he's full clothed, which would be the art on his hands and neck, is about a half hour.

Roiz also told me that writer/producer Jane Espenson came up with an entire history of Sam's tattoos, which he said tell Sam's story as a Tauron and a member of the Ha'la'tha gang. (...)

RIGHT HAND
These tatts indicate accomplishments, points of pride and skills.

• The "Tauron sun" on the back of his hand represents years in service. Each protruding line represents two years in the Ha'La'Tha--these seven lines means Sam's been in for 14 years. Obviously, a new line is added every two years.
• The two squares on Sam's right index finger indicate Tamara and Willie--children he has dedicated himself to. Ruth (Joseph's mother-in-law) would have many marks like this--for children and grandchildren and godchildren etc. She happens to wear these marks higher on her right arm, not on her hand--it doesn't make a difference.
• The "Tauron Bull" glyph on the middle finger says that Sam is an earner. This is bestowed on younger ha'la's by their immediate superior. A salesman or businessman would also have this mark.
• The star on the little finger represents skill with knives. Cooks and butchers bear the same mark somewhere on their right hand or arm. Keep reading

Scott Porter:

Q: What's going on with Caprica?
Scott: I did 10 out of the 18 episodes in the first season. I play this terrorist. It was a great turn for me to have, to move into a different realm. I've played a number of different roles, but never something that was so out there. I play the smart computer nerd/terrorist on Caprica. I was so excited. I'm a huge Battlestar Galactica fan, and how I got that show was such serendipity that it was amazing. I presented the Best Horror category at the Saturn Awards last year, because I was in Prom Night. I saw the Battlestar people there and I walked up and said, "I'm a huge fan of the show," and they said they were huge fans of Friday Night Lights.

Two weeks later, I got a call and they offered it to me. I didn't even audition. It was very, very cool to know that my work in the past led me to be a part of a canon that I just love. Battlestar is amazing. It's a pretty great role. You're going to see Nestor pop up a lot. And, it was awesome to work with Polly Walker. She's phenomenal. -- IESB.net

More interviews: Alessandra Torresani & David Eick

A couple of really good interviews emerged online in the last couple of days. IGN talked to Alessandra Torresani and Techland.com has an interview with David Eick. Some snippets below.

Torresani:

IGN TV: You've got a really fascinating part here. What was the audition process like?

Alessandra Torresani: They didn't give me the script at first, so I went into casting, directors and everything, and [it was] not a cold read, but just a script, and I just knew there was me, the regular girl, and then this avatar. At the time, we knew what an avatar was, but you know, you read a script and then suddenly you're talking to yourself. You're like, "Ehhh, this is a little weird." So it was very confusing to me, but it immediately hit me, as if I was born to do this. I just thought, "You know what? This avatar, Zoe, is a child. Everything's brand new." And that's how I treated her. She doesn't realize she can talk, and then she learns to talk; you'll see that in a couple flashbacks. You'll see how she first learns to walk; it's like she's a child.

IGN: Is it interesting for you now, knowing that is the future of your world and pondering what role your character plays in that?

Torresani: Yeah, obviously, I'm the reason why Caprica died. I can't think about that right now, because I'm just thinking about the birth of the Cylon and how it's still just a 16-year-old girl stuck in a 7-foot robot body.

IGN: That is a fascinating aspect of the show. I was talking to David Eick earlier and saying how you hear "16-year-old girl trapped inside a killer robot" and it could come off really goofy, but it doesn't. The second episode establishes the technique where we see the Cylon the characters see and then cut to you, Zoe, trapped inside, watching what's going on. What's it like playing those scenes where you are the robot? You don't have any dialogue, obviously; so it's a lot of reactive stuff.

Torresani: It's really hard to show emotion without saying a word. I do this huge scene with Eric [Stoltz] and Paula [Malcomson], and Paula's just emotional and crying to Eric that her daughter's gone. And I'm there and I have to watch this and not be able to talk and not be able to touch, and it just has to be all in my eyes. And that was very difficult, because, are you kidding me, if I was the daughter and I saw my parents and I hadn't seen them and I'm stuck in this body I would wanna grab them and have them hold me. And that's what so sad about the whole character; that's a whole other aspect of it.

IGN: I've watched the first three episodes, and there are some moments where you, as the Cylon, get to show off your strength. Have you gotten to do a surprising amount of action in the series?

Torresani: I'm a blackbelt in tae kwon do, so it was funny, because when I did the show they didn't know that, and then slowly as this got picked up, I was like, "By the way, I'm really good at kicking butt. Really good." And I've always wanted to. You look at Jessica Alba in Sin City and all these girls, and you're like, "I can do that! I'm better! I want some action stuff!" And so they found that out, and they actually wrote a bunch of stuff of me getting in girl fights and kicking and roundoffs and this and that.

IGN: Can you hint at all about where the story is gonna go?

Torresani: I play five characters. I have lots of guns. I wear red lipstick. I can go back and forth from different worlds. That's about all I can say. I wear really cool heels!

IGN: You have two wonderful actors playing your parents. What's it like to work with them?

Torresani: Gosh, it's absolutely brilliant. It's great. I mean, Eric Stoltz; I don't even need to say anything on that. He's just phenomenal. And the fact that he got to direct an episode is just great, because he's the ultimate actor's director. He gets it, and he really, truly acts as the father of our show, on and off screen. And then Paula's just a riot. She's just genius at what she does, and when she gets in that role, she is in that role. You're like, is this Amanda Graystone I'm talking to or is this Paula Malcomson? It's inspiring. It really makes want to try extremely hard to impress them as well as myself and the fans.

IGN: [Laughs] Lastly I wanted to also ask you about another show I was a big fan of, The Sarah Connor Chronicles. That was a one-episode guest appearance ["The Turk"] where you had to play a pretty heavy, intense character.

Torresani: I didn't even know how intense it was until after. Like, that character went throughout the whole season [after I was gone]. Yeah, that was a crazy character. I don't think I've ever had to commit suicide on a show.

IGN: That's what surprised me - that they didn't stop her from killing herself.

Torresani: It was a really deep character without even saying a lot. There was a lot going on there. That was a fun show. That was really fun. People always say, "Oh, don't you wish you had stayed on longer?" But, you know what, I'd rather do a quality character than quantity, and I'd rather have this one-episode arc that's so intense that continues on the show than some bulls**t, stupid, "I'm in a hundred episodes but I play a stupid character." I'd rather something with depth. I never knew how many people would actually recognize me from that, but it was sci-fi. But I didn't realize how huge that show actually was.

IGN: With that and now Caprica, has it given you a new perception of science fiction?

Torresani: I love it. I think it's so deep and so now. People say, "Oh, it's science fiction, it's crazy." but, you know, it's really not. We're 20 years away, if that. Ten years away from having Cylons walking this Earth. Honestly, we are. We're very close, and I think it's great. -- IGN

Eick:

I'm now three episodes into the show, and I'm surprised by how closely these episodes snap together. Clearly this was an intention, to go deep into these characters and to interweave the episodes – how did you decide that this is the direction you wanted to go after BSG?

It was really an unusual beginning to the process. Both Ron and I had done self-contained series before, Ron had done the Star Trek shows, and I had done the Hercules universe and it was in about the second season of BSG where we started to decide whether or not there was another story to be derived or hatched from this world that we were deeply immersed in. We knew we didn't want to have some sort of continuation of the story, where you'd have some paraplegic commander, some speed freak, in command this time. We debated doing another thing entirely, a Buck Rogers show that would take place in contemporary society and have an artificial person coping with reality.

Then we started looking at the big picture of something we had been discussing, about how many of the BSG episodes were self-contained versus ongoing threads. By the end of the series, I think by the beginning of the fourth season, the episodes were all essentially serialized. And they were great. And so we started talking about moving forward with something that was unapologetically a serial sci-fi soap opera, that from the beginning would be designed to be that sort of animal – free from all the responsibilities or obligations to carry through the artifice of having a beginning, middle or an end.

So once you knew you wanted to go serialized, how did you decide that Caprica would almost follow the likes of A.I. or Blade Runner, in dealing primarily with these issues of artificial intelligence, and this blurring line between computers and humanity?

Well we wanted to go broader, beyond Battlestar, and we thought wouldn't it be great if we went backwards and if we did a prequel that didn't in any way require knowledge of Battlestar. If it had no baggage. And you could still trade on those mythological strands, but now explore and tell stories in a completely different way. What was so unorthodox is that we pitched this to the studio in general terms and they said, ‘Wow, that's really interesting,' and then Remi Aubuchon, this successful television writer, approached them separately with this idea that was dealing with artificial intelligence and the creation of a sentient life. And they said, ‘ Wow, you should call Ron and David and put your heads together, you're all smoking out the same crack pipe.' And we met with him and it was this rare occasion where we had the foresight to put this all together.

It's interesting, though, how you use the notion of artificial intelligence here. It's not just for the sake of something flashy or high-tech, but there's a lot of emotional turmoil that's unleashed by this…

Well, we had thought of Caprica as replacing what oil is in our time with artificial intelligence – this resource that changes everything. And what we actually had a lot of discussions about was Frankenstein, about this need of one man to create life at any expense. And in that story, you have a brilliant man who goes mad with the implications of what he's done. Now imagine that taken to whole new level of moral questioning, when you're talking about the man's own daughter. That level of moral questioning almost runs the risk of a potential break with your own sanity, when you face what you're really trying to do, to bring back a replica of your daughter. -- Techland

Caprica news roundup - interviews, articles, reviews

Okay, with the show premiering this evening, a whole bunch of news, reviews and interviews showed up in the last couple of days. Here are some links:

L.A. Times has a couple of new interviews as part of their Caprica countdown.

Magda Apanowicz:

The old standby question: Were you a fan of "Battlestar Galactica" before joining "Caprica?"
I made a conscientious decision not to watch it until after we filmed the pilot. I was one of those people that looked at it and said, "Eh, I'm not really a sci-fi fan," but holy! I went back and watched it and I'm like "Holy!" How did I not know that this show existed in my life! It was unreal. I just recently watched the whole series again. It's so good. I can't believe that I was one of those people who said "I'm not really a sci-fi fan."

I saw you at the screening of the "Battlestar" finale at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences last year, talking to "Caprica" [executive producer] Jane Espenson. What have you learned from working with her?
Yeah. You saw me bowing to her because I am a huge "Buffy" fan, again from someone who said they weren't into sci-fi. Though I've realized over the past few years that I am a massive sci-fi fan. Pretty much every one of my favorite movies is sci-fi. Everything I've worked on is sci-fi. And meeting Jane Espenson was just jaw-dropping, not talking just in awe. I was like "You're Jane Espenson and you worked on 'Buffy' and how was that and that's awesome and you're awesome and this is awesome." There was more actual conversation once we got past that. I just felt really honored to meet her. Keep reading

David Eick:

So how long ago did the idea for "Caprica" actually come about?
The first time that myself, Ron Moore and Remi Aubuchon got together to discuss it was was five years ago. It's crazy cause it doesn't seem that long. Ron and I came from these franchises that had spawned offspring. In Ron's case it was "Star Trek" and in mine it was the "Hercules"/"Xena" world. At some point during the second season of "Battlestar," we started kicking around the idea of another story rooted in this world. We started kicking around the idea of a more human-based, terrestrial-based soap opera with a sci-fi undertone that would take place in the years before the events that were depicting in "Battlestar." In affect, it would be Dallas where the McGuffin would be artificial intelligence instead of oil.

We had a general conversation with execs at Universal, then we tabled it as we continued to make "Battlestar." We got a call from those execs some time later and they said that at some point in time they heard a pitch from Remi Aubuchon that they felt crossed paths in many ways with what we'd talked about for our "Battlestar" prequel. It just made sense to Ron and I to have another partner since we were so into just making "Battlestar" at the time. So we sat down with Remi and started to hammer out where this spinoff would be.

So I don't really need to ask if it was a harder sell than the original 'reimagined' "Battlestar" premise?
Our reimagined "Battlestar" premise was held back by a couple of things at different stages. One was title, which was a blessing and a curse. It opened certain doors, but there's a whole contingent ... who would not watch a show called "Battlestar Galactica" no matter how many trophies you win. And Bonnie Hammer said to me, 'You're gonna have to explain to me again when you come in to pitch this why the world needs another space opera.' And I think we did.

In this case, we had a leg up, you could say. We were coming at the "Battlestar" mythos at what did not feel like a lot of other shows. As unique as "Battlestar" is, it's still easy to lump it in with "Stargate" and "Star Trek" and "Andromeda" and I can't even name them all. Whereas with "Caprica" I think we're operating in very unique territory. Keep reading

They also reviewed the pilot here.

SpoilerTV has the full transcript of the conference call with David Eick and Paula Malcomson here.

BuddyTV talked to Jane Espenson about Sam Adama, the gay character on the show - link.

Airlock Alpha talked to Bear McCreary about the show's score.

PinkRayGun has an article about the Caprica set visit last October here.

Ausiello at Entertainment Weekly has a pic of James Marsters and says he will first appear on the show on March 5.

Times Colonist interviewed Magda Apanowicz - link. So did Dose.ca.

Wired talked to Alessandra Torresani - link. Sioux City Journal also has a new interview with her.

SeattlePi has an interview with Esai Morales here.

And the Wall Street Journal talked to David Eick - link.

AfterElton.com has a lengthy review/feature about some of the issues that will be explored on the show.

And here is the New York Times review.

New interview with Paula Malcomson and David Eick

Io9.com has a new interview with Paula Malcomson and David Eick. You can read the entire article here.

We took part in a conference call with Malcomson and Eick earlier today, and we got the chance to ask them about how you handle a bad mom like Amanda. Does Malcomson have a hard time playing such an unsympathetic character?

Malcomson says, "It's definitely something that occurs to you in the back of your mind, but as an actor you have to set aside your own judgments as to whether the character is good or bad... Being a good actor is sort of understanding the complexity of the human psyche and also knowing that we are none of us perfect. But yes, it was tough, and I did think that, particularly, men would find this character unsympathetic. I just tried to… tap into the loss and the pain, and the fact that she has made mistakes and go from there… you know."

Eick adds that he doesn't think there's any room for the trope of "sympathetic characters" on shows like Caprica, any more than there was on BSG. "Audiences like challenging characters. [There's] no room for black and white, [only] morally gray." And he adds that you'll find Amanda unpredictable and weird: "Sometimes you expect her to lose her shit and she holds it together, and vice versa. That's part of the charm of the show."

Also, Eick explained more about what's new and different in the version of the two-hour pilot that airs on Friday, as opposed to the version many of us already bought on DVD. "The version that airs Friday is tricked out with a couple of new shots and visual effects and some new scenes we reshot." Keep reading

Paula Malcomson interview (Caprica countdown)

Paula Malcomson is one of the Caprica actors who talked to L.A. Times for their Caprica countdown series of interviews. She discussed her character, Amanda Graystone, Amanda's relationship with her daughter Zoe, female characters on Battlestar Galactica and her experiences working on Deadwood among other things.

Who is Amanda Graystone?
She's a plastic surgeon who's married to a tycoon, if you will. She has her own hard-working, busy career, and I think she's well respected in her field. We don't focus a lot on her inner workings as we start on this journey with these people, then this tragedy happens and she sort of rips herself out of her career and separates herself from her work. While her husband goes into his work more deeply, she fires herself.

Emotionally?
Emotionally, she's in a tough place. She's dealing with the death of her daughter in the public eye. She's sort of a celebrity in this world that they live in; her husband's sort of the Bill Gates of their time. We find her dealing with all of this tragedy and terrorism and maybe implications that her duaghter... well, she's going down this road to find out what her daughter's involvement is and it's pointing towards the fact that her daughter has been complicit in this terrorist attack. She's sort of discovering how little she's known about her. Anything that she's know about herself and her life and her world is all in question now.

How was her relationship with her daughter?

Her daughter's a very precocious young woman. It had been a challenging time. You see the day before the bombing, that there's a big fight between them. She's sort of pushing her to the edge. She's a very smart kid; she challenges their ethics... she challenges them at all levels. She's an incredibly smart kid, and we get to see how incredibly smart she is later. Amanda has no idea what genius her kid has, but we see that the last thing before the bombing is they have this fight, and she slaps her. And that's how it's left. She doesn't get to say goodbye in some sentimental way and has all these feelings of guilt and remorse and is trying to work through some of that stuff.

Do you think that viewers will be surprised at how Amanda develops as the season progresses?
Yeah. I certainly was. ... As this character formed, it took a lot of turns that I didn't expect. You can take a lot of that with a pinch of salt in the beginning because things just sort of organically occur as part of the process. But as they see the character grow, it informs how they write for you.

I think that, if we're dividing the show into two halves of the season, at first we're seeing Amanda as more reactive in just dealing with the circumstances that she's in. Then as we move forward, in around Episodes 8, maybe 10, she becomes a lot more of an active figure in the series, with an agenda. Things heat up a lot in terms of what she's doing. Don't want to give it all away, but she becomes a force to be reckoned with.

Since playing Trixie on "Deadwood" and other smaller roles on things like "Lost" and "Law & Order," what drew you to this role?
The script of the pilot was a great script and it was a great character. The creative team comes with quite a pedigree, and I'd heard all sorts of wonderful things about "Battlestar," so I just wanted to work with them. After I'd done "Deadwood," it took me a while to figure out what I would do after playing Trixie because that was an incredible roller coaster. A real role of a lifetime. I wanted to find something I felt was very different from her and would afford me the opportunity that I got with working with [Deadwood creator] Dave Milch in terms of a writing team and in terms of real, grown-up, challenging acting. That was what I was interested in doing. It was a heavy-duty script, and I was interested in playing in a real relationship in a marriage as well. Not an idea of a television version. And certainly working with Eric Stoltz... we both work very similarly. Keep reading

Caprica - Winter Press Tour report

Ausiello at Entertainment Weekly has the first report from the Winter Press Tour. You can read the article  here.

“Caprica, like Battlestar Galactica, doesn’t treat the [sci-fi] genre like a toy department,” exec producer David Eick told reporters at Winter Press Tour. “We take it seriously.”

Translation: The drama, starring Eric Stoltz, Esai Morales, Polly Walker, and Paula Malcomson, will be brimming with BSG’s trademark moral complexity. “There are no stark good guys and bad guys,” said fellow e.p. Jane Espenson. “Everyone has moral shadings and we can tell very complex stories as a result.”

On the flipside, Eick stressed that non-BSG loyalists will not be lost if they tune into Caprica. “New viewers will find that there’s virtually no tether to BSG from a storytelling standpoint,” he maintained. “Legitimately, the show stands on its own… It’s not called Battlestar Galactica: Caprica [for a reason].”

8 new Caprica featurettes, new synopsis

SyFy has released eight new Caprica clips, including an exclusive scene from the pilot and a couple of behind-the-scenes clips with the cast talking about what's to come on the show.

This is the new official synopsis:

On the vibrant world of Caprica, in a culture recognizably close to our own, two dynamic families – the Graystones and the Adamas – live separately on opposite ends of society until they are brought together by tragedy.

Daniel Graystone (Eric Stoltz), a computer engineering genius, owns a large corporation that is spearheading the development of artificial intelligence. His unwavering professional pursuits are driven to extreme measures when personal tragedy strikes him and his wife Amanda (Paula Malcomson): their strong-willed daughter Zoe (Alessandra Torresani) dies in a terrorist bombing fueled by an underground religious dogma. Unbeknownst to her parents, the teenager had also been dabbling in these radical teachings, which were secretly propagated by her school’s headmistress, Sister Clarice Willow (Polly Walker).

Also living on Caprica but deeply entrenched in a cultural heritage that sets them apart from the rest of civilization, is the Adama clan. The family is helmed by Joseph Adama (Esai Morales), a renowned criminal defense attorney – with questionable ties and sometimes-devious methods – and father to William (Sina Najafi) and Tamara (Genevieve Buechner). When Joseph’s wife and daughter perish in the same attack that befell Zoe Graystone, Joseph’s path soon crosses Daniel’s, and the two become united in their grief.

Soon after, Daniel lets Joseph in on a sinister secret: he’s discovered that Zoe, a computer genius in her own right, had been experimenting with perilous virtual reality technology along with her friend Lacy (Magda Apanowicz), and managed the impossible: she created a life-like avatar of herself, a perfect digital copy. Obsessed with the possibility of seeing his daughter once again, and preying on Joseph’s shared emotions, Daniel implores his new confidante to help him make Zoe’s vision a complete reality. Appalled by the ethical implications of recreating a soul, but aching to bring his own daughter back to life, Joseph complies… and the fate of the human race is altered forever.

And here are the clips:

Caprica exclusive scene: "What If They Could Come Back?"



Caprica vignette: "Daniel Graystone"



Caprica vignette: "The Graystones"



Caprica vignette: "Friends or Rivals"



Caprica vignette: "Lacy and Zoe"



Caprica vignette: "The V Club"



Caprica video blog: "Shooting Star"



Caprica video blog: "What to Expect"

More from the Caprica set visit: reports, pictures, video

A couple of new reports from the Caprica set visit were posted in the last couple of days.

Media Blvd. has an article that focuses on the design of the two main sets - the Greystones' mansion and the Adamas' apartment. They also have plenty of pictures from those sets.

IESB.net has a lengthy report from the Q&A with Polly Walker, Alessandra Torresani, Magda Apanowicz, Esai Morales, Paula Malcomson, Sasha Roiz, and Eric Stoltz.

SpoilerTV has the video (embedded below) from the Q&A panel:

Caprica - Panel Video from DarkUFO on Vimeo.