Great interview thought you would enjoy it
By Don Lipper
Special to SPACE.com
Gordon Michael Woolvett plays Seamus Harper, the Andromeda Ascendant’s resident fix-it man. Space.com’s Don Lipper talks to the Canadian actor about the high-strung character that’s holding the ship together while he’s coming apart at the seams.
SPACE.com: Ready for your close up?
Gordon Michael Woolvett: I’m glad you guys finally called me, I’ve been seeing everybody’s entries everywhere. I know they have been trying to hide me, they are afraid to let me loose on the public.
SPACE.com: So what are they afraid of?
GMW: They are afraid of what I’m going to say.
SPACE.com: So give me the dirt on everybody.
GMW: The dirt on everybody? Well, actually I can give you some dirt on me and Kevin. I’m actually a big, big, psycho fan of Kevin’s. I’m been stalking him for 10 years and this was the only way I could get close to him.
SPACE.com: So you get paid to be a stalker?
GMW: That’s right.
SPACE.com: Wow.
GMW: It’s pretty darn good. No I’m not a stalker. You really want to know the real story?
SPACE.com: Sure.
GMW: Okay, it’s a short story. [My wife and I] live [permanently] in California now. But [while we shoot] we are here in Vancouver. So they called and wanted to see me for the role when they were first auditioning for it and I turned it down the first time, because I didn’t want to [move back to Canada]. I love Canada, I think it’s a great country, but I spent many years working up a large enough body of work to finally get my green card and move to the States.
My first year, I had a CBS holding deal and you know that’s the cat’s meow even though I didn’t really work for a year. So Andromeda called again. I guess they were having difficulty casting the part and it was almost eight months later. They were to going to camera in like a month and a half or something. So by this time we had lived in L.A. for a year, but with the holding deal, they pay you not to work with those things and you are not allowed to audition for other networks. I was really getting kind of antsy, so I went in and auditioned for it. Seth Howard, Director of Creative Programming, at Tribune Entertainment [was there].
He’s basically me. I walked into the audition and it was like looking in the mirror. He has the same sense of humor and everything. He was running the audition, so we hit it off really well. Long story short, they called and booked me for it. And after our first year in L.A. [my wife and I] had to pack up the bags and move to Vancouver for an extended vacation. We keep my place in California and go back when I have time off.
SPACE.com: So what did CBS do? Were you in violation [of your contract], or did it expire?
GMW: No, it had just come up a month or two before that. There was a film that I was up for in Mexico at the same time, but they were waiting on my SAG [Screen Actors Guild] papers to come through. I never bothered [joining] SAG, because I didn’t need it for the CBS holding deal. I didn’t want to go ahead and do it until I got my first gig in the States. [LAUGHING] Which is great, because if they go on strike I won’t have to, I’m not a member yet.
SPACE.com: Your co-stars Keith [Hamilton Cobb] and Kevin [Sorbo] are.
GMW: Yeah, Keith and Kevin are, so Keith and Kevin go on strike and that means Andromeda can be about Harper. I wouldn’t be entirely opposed to it.
SPACE.com: Unfortunately, the writers are all Writers Guild [of America], which is also scheduled to go on strike, so you’ll have to write the puppy too.
GMW: That’s okay, I’ve already started to do that quite a bit. I think I’m probably the furthest from the script [with ad-libbing] than everyone. Which is probably why they won’t see Harper next year. He’ll probably be pissing people off.
SPACE.com: How do you get off the script?
GMW: I do a lot of ad-libbing. I did a lot of ad-libbing in the audition. I knew some of the producers were aware of my work. God knows from where, maybe Bride of Chuckie or something, I don’t know. From the beginning I made sure that when I do ad-lib, I keep the initial text in there and then just add other lines in between that, if they don’t want use, they [can] cut away.
And then, when I know they’ve got a take that they can use that is definitely verbatim to the script, then I’ll go right off the script and start sort of making things up and throwing things in.
Although, I did get a call from [co-executive producer and writer] Robert [Hewitt Wolfe] last week. I called him to discuss the script and I found out that I was a little bit in the doghouse because in the last episode, I strayed a little bit too far. And the thing is, he is a really good writer so, I do sometimes need the reins to be brought in. But that’s collaboration and that how you come up with fun stuff.
SPACE.com: So who is Harper?
GMW: You know it’s funny. I think the only people that truly understand Harper, other than the writers of course, are the fans. I’m a bit of a smart ass, and you don’t tend to take people like that very seriously. So I think people will, on first viewing, not take Harper very seriously. [They will] get a laugh out of him, they will either like him or they won’t like him. But I think the fans that come every week are going to start to see there is actually a side to Harper that does need to be taken seriously.
All this joking and all this sarcasm comes from a really tormented past. In an episode coming up called "Fear and Loathing" we actually start to see a very dark side to Harper. He is taken away from the ship, and we learn that while he’s with Dylan and Tyr and everybody, there is no pressure on him. He doesn’t have to be anything except the funny wisecracker, but if he does get stuck in a situation, he can be dangerous.
SPACE.com: He’s got a past too, with his family and Magog.
GMW: Yeah, it’s funny we haven’t seen Earth yet. I don’t know if we are going to see Earth ever, or in this season, but we allude to it. From what I gather, it’s pretty much a past war zone, just complete wasteland. [Harper] was born and raised in a refugee camp, but he survived. And he survived battle after battle, raids of Magog.
Probably everybody that Harper knew died. And he just managed to scrape up enough money to get some backyard garage job of a datalink rammed into his neck and get the hell off the Earth with Beka. Everything else is probably pretty damn dark.
SPACE.com: So would you say he’s sort of a Hawkeye Pierce [of M*A*S*H*] type, he’s laughing through the tears?
GMW: Absolutely. That would be a great analogy.
SPACE.com: So you’re the engineer. When you’re doing the engineer stuff, do you have Star Trek’s Scotty running through your head?
GMW: I don’t at all. Because he’s a landmark. There are allusions to him all the time. Things like Harper saying, "I know, I know, you need more power, like I’ve heard it before." Luckily there has been enough sci-fi [since], everybody understands that an engineer’s job goes beyond pressing the gas pedal. So we don’t have too much of that kind of stuff. He must have been getting so sick of those scenes, [DROPPING INTO A SCOTTISH ACCENT] "I can’t do it, Captain," "That’ll rupture the warp core," "I can do it in ten minutes." All that stuff. I have a different task, trying to do the job of a couple thousand soldiers.
SPACE.com: That would be kind of overwhelming. You seem to be alone, bouncing around that ship.
GMW: Yeah, I think that’s one of the reasons I am so high strung, because when we are in situations with major conflict, Harper is able to be sarcastic [while] thinking about 45 other things at the same time. The Andromeda is fully capable of running itself. It’s just the human complement brings…humanity. So it makes for better decisions, and for protocol missions, when they involve with other alien, sentient beings in large numbers. So, when people sometimes say, how can seven people run this ship that’s supposed to be run by 4,000 trained soldiers? That’s not really the case. Which is why I have time to build babes.
SPACE.com: That was the next question. So in your spare time you build fully functional women.
GMW: Only one, and I don’t know if Harper will ever do that again because it certainly went wrong. I guess in terms of that whole conversation when Rommie asks Harper, "When you made certain parts of me, did you wear gloves?" and he doesn’t answer the question, I think we all know the answer is no. But come on, the poor guy. I think all these ships can make a human avatar and so Harper was just kind of following a cookbook there. So while he can take credit for building Rommie, he can’t take credit for conceiving and having all the parts on hand. That’s just something [where] he opened up the cookbook and whipped her up and maybe a couple of extra little programs in there that we’ll find out about later.
SPACE.com: Hey, we’ve already seen her in that, studded leather bikini top.
GMW: That’s right. And I know how much [actress Lexa Doig] loved that. Don’t worry, you’ll see me in one too.
SPACE.com: So, we are only up to episode five. Where can fans look forward to Harper going?
GMW: "Harper 2.0" coming up is a really cool episode. I don’t know if you know anything about it.
SPACE.com: Go ahead, tell me about it.
GMW: I think I’m basically allowed to say this: Harper gets the knowledge of the universe downloaded into his brain, and in that episode we see a little bit more of Harper’s reaction to sort of the horrors of his past and the horrors of all [of history’s] past.
It’s neat, because people have said things like, "How come Harper doesn’t react towards [Magog character] Rev Bem the way we [think] his past would dictate, given that he’s survived Magog raids and stuff?" In that episode I become a complete mess and we see a lot of that. And we will see more and more of that come out down the road. [His] funny, sarcastic exterior is loosely, very loosely, keeping the hatches battened down on a fiery ball [that’s] ready to explode inside.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Next week Woolvett talks about getting in touch with his inner geek, using the Web to get a better contract, building hovercrafts for fun and fixing spaceships for profit.
By Don Lipper
Special to SPACE.com
Gordon Michael Woolvett plays Seamus Harper, the Andromeda Ascendant’s resident fix-it man. Space.com’s Don Lipper talks to the Canadian actor about the high-strung character that’s holding the ship together while he’s coming apart at the seams.
SPACE.com: Ready for your close up?
Gordon Michael Woolvett: I’m glad you guys finally called me, I’ve been seeing everybody’s entries everywhere. I know they have been trying to hide me, they are afraid to let me loose on the public.
SPACE.com: So what are they afraid of?
GMW: They are afraid of what I’m going to say.
SPACE.com: So give me the dirt on everybody.
GMW: The dirt on everybody? Well, actually I can give you some dirt on me and Kevin. I’m actually a big, big, psycho fan of Kevin’s. I’m been stalking him for 10 years and this was the only way I could get close to him.
SPACE.com: So you get paid to be a stalker?
GMW: That’s right.
SPACE.com: Wow.
GMW: It’s pretty darn good. No I’m not a stalker. You really want to know the real story?
SPACE.com: Sure.
GMW: Okay, it’s a short story. [My wife and I] live [permanently] in California now. But [while we shoot] we are here in Vancouver. So they called and wanted to see me for the role when they were first auditioning for it and I turned it down the first time, because I didn’t want to [move back to Canada]. I love Canada, I think it’s a great country, but I spent many years working up a large enough body of work to finally get my green card and move to the States.
My first year, I had a CBS holding deal and you know that’s the cat’s meow even though I didn’t really work for a year. So Andromeda called again. I guess they were having difficulty casting the part and it was almost eight months later. They were to going to camera in like a month and a half or something. So by this time we had lived in L.A. for a year, but with the holding deal, they pay you not to work with those things and you are not allowed to audition for other networks. I was really getting kind of antsy, so I went in and auditioned for it. Seth Howard, Director of Creative Programming, at Tribune Entertainment [was there].
He’s basically me. I walked into the audition and it was like looking in the mirror. He has the same sense of humor and everything. He was running the audition, so we hit it off really well. Long story short, they called and booked me for it. And after our first year in L.A. [my wife and I] had to pack up the bags and move to Vancouver for an extended vacation. We keep my place in California and go back when I have time off.
SPACE.com: So what did CBS do? Were you in violation [of your contract], or did it expire?
GMW: No, it had just come up a month or two before that. There was a film that I was up for in Mexico at the same time, but they were waiting on my SAG [Screen Actors Guild] papers to come through. I never bothered [joining] SAG, because I didn’t need it for the CBS holding deal. I didn’t want to go ahead and do it until I got my first gig in the States. [LAUGHING] Which is great, because if they go on strike I won’t have to, I’m not a member yet.
SPACE.com: Your co-stars Keith [Hamilton Cobb] and Kevin [Sorbo] are.
GMW: Yeah, Keith and Kevin are, so Keith and Kevin go on strike and that means Andromeda can be about Harper. I wouldn’t be entirely opposed to it.
SPACE.com: Unfortunately, the writers are all Writers Guild [of America], which is also scheduled to go on strike, so you’ll have to write the puppy too.
GMW: That’s okay, I’ve already started to do that quite a bit. I think I’m probably the furthest from the script [with ad-libbing] than everyone. Which is probably why they won’t see Harper next year. He’ll probably be pissing people off.
SPACE.com: How do you get off the script?
GMW: I do a lot of ad-libbing. I did a lot of ad-libbing in the audition. I knew some of the producers were aware of my work. God knows from where, maybe Bride of Chuckie or something, I don’t know. From the beginning I made sure that when I do ad-lib, I keep the initial text in there and then just add other lines in between that, if they don’t want use, they [can] cut away.
And then, when I know they’ve got a take that they can use that is definitely verbatim to the script, then I’ll go right off the script and start sort of making things up and throwing things in.
Although, I did get a call from [co-executive producer and writer] Robert [Hewitt Wolfe] last week. I called him to discuss the script and I found out that I was a little bit in the doghouse because in the last episode, I strayed a little bit too far. And the thing is, he is a really good writer so, I do sometimes need the reins to be brought in. But that’s collaboration and that how you come up with fun stuff.
SPACE.com: So who is Harper?
GMW: You know it’s funny. I think the only people that truly understand Harper, other than the writers of course, are the fans. I’m a bit of a smart ass, and you don’t tend to take people like that very seriously. So I think people will, on first viewing, not take Harper very seriously. [They will] get a laugh out of him, they will either like him or they won’t like him. But I think the fans that come every week are going to start to see there is actually a side to Harper that does need to be taken seriously.
All this joking and all this sarcasm comes from a really tormented past. In an episode coming up called "Fear and Loathing" we actually start to see a very dark side to Harper. He is taken away from the ship, and we learn that while he’s with Dylan and Tyr and everybody, there is no pressure on him. He doesn’t have to be anything except the funny wisecracker, but if he does get stuck in a situation, he can be dangerous.
SPACE.com: He’s got a past too, with his family and Magog.
GMW: Yeah, it’s funny we haven’t seen Earth yet. I don’t know if we are going to see Earth ever, or in this season, but we allude to it. From what I gather, it’s pretty much a past war zone, just complete wasteland. [Harper] was born and raised in a refugee camp, but he survived. And he survived battle after battle, raids of Magog.
Probably everybody that Harper knew died. And he just managed to scrape up enough money to get some backyard garage job of a datalink rammed into his neck and get the hell off the Earth with Beka. Everything else is probably pretty damn dark.
SPACE.com: So would you say he’s sort of a Hawkeye Pierce [of M*A*S*H*] type, he’s laughing through the tears?
GMW: Absolutely. That would be a great analogy.
SPACE.com: So you’re the engineer. When you’re doing the engineer stuff, do you have Star Trek’s Scotty running through your head?
GMW: I don’t at all. Because he’s a landmark. There are allusions to him all the time. Things like Harper saying, "I know, I know, you need more power, like I’ve heard it before." Luckily there has been enough sci-fi [since], everybody understands that an engineer’s job goes beyond pressing the gas pedal. So we don’t have too much of that kind of stuff. He must have been getting so sick of those scenes, [DROPPING INTO A SCOTTISH ACCENT] "I can’t do it, Captain," "That’ll rupture the warp core," "I can do it in ten minutes." All that stuff. I have a different task, trying to do the job of a couple thousand soldiers.
SPACE.com: That would be kind of overwhelming. You seem to be alone, bouncing around that ship.
GMW: Yeah, I think that’s one of the reasons I am so high strung, because when we are in situations with major conflict, Harper is able to be sarcastic [while] thinking about 45 other things at the same time. The Andromeda is fully capable of running itself. It’s just the human complement brings…humanity. So it makes for better decisions, and for protocol missions, when they involve with other alien, sentient beings in large numbers. So, when people sometimes say, how can seven people run this ship that’s supposed to be run by 4,000 trained soldiers? That’s not really the case. Which is why I have time to build babes.
SPACE.com: That was the next question. So in your spare time you build fully functional women.
GMW: Only one, and I don’t know if Harper will ever do that again because it certainly went wrong. I guess in terms of that whole conversation when Rommie asks Harper, "When you made certain parts of me, did you wear gloves?" and he doesn’t answer the question, I think we all know the answer is no. But come on, the poor guy. I think all these ships can make a human avatar and so Harper was just kind of following a cookbook there. So while he can take credit for building Rommie, he can’t take credit for conceiving and having all the parts on hand. That’s just something [where] he opened up the cookbook and whipped her up and maybe a couple of extra little programs in there that we’ll find out about later.
SPACE.com: Hey, we’ve already seen her in that, studded leather bikini top.
GMW: That’s right. And I know how much [actress Lexa Doig] loved that. Don’t worry, you’ll see me in one too.
SPACE.com: So, we are only up to episode five. Where can fans look forward to Harper going?
GMW: "Harper 2.0" coming up is a really cool episode. I don’t know if you know anything about it.
SPACE.com: Go ahead, tell me about it.
GMW: I think I’m basically allowed to say this: Harper gets the knowledge of the universe downloaded into his brain, and in that episode we see a little bit more of Harper’s reaction to sort of the horrors of his past and the horrors of all [of history’s] past.
It’s neat, because people have said things like, "How come Harper doesn’t react towards [Magog character] Rev Bem the way we [think] his past would dictate, given that he’s survived Magog raids and stuff?" In that episode I become a complete mess and we see a lot of that. And we will see more and more of that come out down the road. [His] funny, sarcastic exterior is loosely, very loosely, keeping the hatches battened down on a fiery ball [that’s] ready to explode inside.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Next week Woolvett talks about getting in touch with his inner geek, using the Web to get a better contract, building hovercrafts for fun and fixing spaceships for profit.
