riskinghearts | Vancouver Creation Con Report 4/4

Part Four

Sunday April 5th

The last day dawned. I clearly remember rejecting the reality of the alarm going off. Unacceptable creature. I know I spent today running around on pure adrenalin. By the time we went to dinner much later that evening, I was slightly shaky. A banana and granola bar at breakfast - and my faithful diet coke - was all that had sustained me up until then. This is what happens when you still have 4 panels to sit through (as N John Smith plus Brad Wright and Rob Cooper did talks - I recommend you go HERE for some good scoop on the latter's panel) and 2 more photo ops to get done... a break was non optional.

Side-track and funny story: I got off the elevator with

samjackshiploveas we raced to our room for a brief break, and EH-T and

geekysamcontinued 7 floors up to theirs. We'd spent quite some time inter-room calling throughout the con because it was easier than trying to arrange things on an elevator ride. So anyway, we get back to our room and two seconds later the phone rings and I think it's them, so I pick up and say "We don't want your services." Turns out it's actually housekeeping, who after failing to convince us - twice - in person that we wanted our room cleaned two days in a row, had decided to ring up and ask. Well the person on the other end practically fell over herself apologising and I suddenly clicked that it was not our con buddies 7 floors up. I tried to tell the woman I was sorry but she hung up so fast, and I proceeded to die from embarrassment. Moving on.

First up was the photo op with Amanda Tapping, and I'm sorry to say that I have to wait until the end of April to get it which is why it's not posted here. The same goes for Michael Shanks op. At some point Eh-T came down to find the the three of us in line and informed us - for the 5th time! - that Paul McGillion had gotten on the same elevator she had. Eventually she just had to say to him "I think you're following me." I think he said something like "she might be right". 5 times! At least one of those times we were with her - although so was half the convention eager to get to dinner. My nose was practically pressed up against his arm we were so cramped. Also, Connor Trinneer was staying across the hall from our room. Of course we did not bother him, and we didn't tell anybody where he was. Anyway so

samjackshiploveand I wore our Squeee!! t-shirts for our double picture with AT and

geekysam wore hers for her single op, her Nubbin tucked under one arm. AT was amused. She'd also instructed us to wear them so we didn't want to disappoint. When I went in for the MS photo op I asked him if we could do a "huggie" one and he said "Sure c'm here" and squished me to him. He was really friendly and sweet.

So on to his panel!

Michael Shanks Panel
Sunday April 5th

I want candy indeed! I have to say that once again I am glad that I tend not to let other people's opinions shape my own thoughts and feelings. Of my 3 encounters with Michael Shanks, I found him playful, charming, and funny.

Michael: Hi Guys! Is there more of you than there were last year?

Audience: "Yeeaahhhh"

Michael:... they said disgruntledly.

Laughter.

Michael: Hi!

The audience yell back "Hi!"

Michael: So what did those two clowns (Brad Wright/Rob Cooper) say about that new show? (grinning) I don't work for them anymore.

The audience laughs.

Michael: They said nothing? Oh, they said it will be awesome and you should watch it.

An audience member yells something out.

Michael: What?

Audience member: It's going to be on TV.

Michael: It's going to be on TV. That's fantastic. What a great venue for it!

Michael starts looking about for questions when someone yells out "What are you doing right now?" to which he responds "What am I doing now? Sitting on a stage, what, are you blind?"

Another audience member tells Micheal that she's studying Archaeology ("I'm sorry") because of him. His reply: You know the best thing about what you're learning, and especially if you got the idea from following Daniel Jackson, is that if you ever need to apply your knowledge to things in the universe and go out and get captured by aliens and go into space, you'll know exactly what to do.

Q. Gary Jones was here the other day and he mentioned how he and Richard Dean Anderson are going to be in Universe, and they had scenes together. And we heard rumblings and I've seen stuff on your website of possibilities of you being in Universe, so I was just wondering, am I going to see my favorite character on TV again?

Um. I will answer that question by saying this: I'm not allowed to talk about it.

*much applause*

Now fortunately most of you are intelligent enough to glean from that there might be something to that because if I wasn't on it, would I be saying I'm not allowed to talk about it?

Q. Daniel Jackson spoke a lot of languages over the years. How did that work? Did you have someone coaching you on how to say a word or how you spell that?

(laughing) "Well, fortunately Daniel Jackson didn't have to speak too many of those languages." He spoke about completely mashing the German accent in 1969. He had a Hungarian woman who was teaching him the German dialect, so he was learning the German with a Hungarian accent!

Q. How do you compare yourself to Daniel?

How do I compare myself to Daniel? We're about the same height. Um... Daniel's a lot... ah... ah... he's nicer than I am! Yeah, yeah, you know that.

Q. When you choose a role, if money wasn't an issue, what would make you choose a role? The people you work with? The specific role? What is the priority?

It's all about the character. It doesn't matter what venue it's specifically is in. Right now I'm more interested in doing film and TV work than I am in doing stage work, so I'm looking for characters that are complex, usually flawed, those are the... I find the most interesting to play... provides the most opportunity to explore within yourself. So I think the more complex the character the more interested I am in playing it.

Somebody in the audience yells out "Is that why you picked Mega Snake?"

Absolutely! You know, a paramedic whose father was killed by a snake who has to take on the mother of all snakes...

Q. Have you ever pulled any pranks on set and if so, which one was your favorite?

(this one is way better if I post it in his words)

Michael: We were up filming on Capilano mountain, there's forest all around us on/ And Christopher Judge – for those of you who don't know – is deathly afraid of wildlife... And I'm not just talking about he's afraid of, you know, just the big wildlife. He's afraid of everything, he's afraid of possums, he's afraid of raccoons, he's afraid.... anything but a dog or a cat he's afraid of. You know, we were in a place called Reunion Island and they have jumping spiders there? And he just about shit. But he has a terrible fear of bears. So, of course, being the guy that I am... we were sitting there, and he kept listening and whenever you'd hear a sound of in the woods he'd go "Stop' shhhh shhh... Dude! What was that?!" And, um, so finally I got sick of this so... there was a grip that was digging in a... you know where the team comes up and they're sitting by the side of the road waiting for when the bus comes in so they were digging a sort of deeper hole for us to lie in, for the camera to go in. And all you saw was this black t-shirt pop up every now again on a guy with black hair. You sorta saw this' and he had a beard and everything so I went...

(Michael mimes thinking)

So at a certain point we were having a conversation about something, and this guy's digging the hole way off on the side all by himself, and Chris and I are talking about maybe hockey or something like that and blah blah blah and I go "Shhh! What was that?!" "No, no, no, seriously dude, what was that?!" Chris went "Come on..." "No, seriously... I know the sound. What was that?"

Michael mimes seeing something in the distance.

(breathing heavy) "Dude..." He said, "What?" "It's a bear man..." And just at the perfect moment this guy pops up out of the pit, his back to us and all you see is this black t-shirt, beard, whatever... Chris goes teaaarrring down the mountain... ... at full speed, and he's fast, too! So, about 20 yards, he's running down there, we start pissing ourselves laughing. The crew starts pissing themselves laughing, and sure enough, he turns around and starts sprinting back up the hill. And I start sprinting up the hill. That was a pretty good one cos I scared the hell out of him.

Q. When you saw the Star Trek trailer – assuming you have – did you also think "Wormhole Extreme" with a younger cast or was it just us?

I didn't think of it... you know what? I've only seen part of the trailer so I'm not entirely sure and, you know, everything that whatshisname touches turns into gold these days, so...

A few in the crowd yell out J.J. Abrams.

What's his name?

Repeated.

No, that's not who I'm thinking of.

Laughter.

Yeah, I know. It was funny when I was... obviously I'm not in the production, but when the breakdown for Stargate Universe came out, though, that was the first thought to go through my head.

Laughter and applause.

Didn't we just mock this?

Q (from a young boy) What was it like to work with Richard Dean Anderson and Amanda Tapping?

It was great. Richard is a lot of fun, he's a very funny man in real life. A lot of the really funny sequences that he did were of his own invention, he made them up himself, some of the funny stuff. Um... Amanda's a dear to work with. She's very smart, she's very funny, she likes a good laugh and she's very mom-ish to all us kids on the set. She was like the big sister to the three petulant brats that Rick and Chris and myself were. It kept us in line a lot of the time. They're both very funny, very nice people.

MICHAEL SHANKS PHOTO GALLERY

And a fitting close to the convention, was the appearance of Amanda Tapping herself. She was received with so much applause and enthusiasm, I thought the roof must have shook. As always she is electric on stage. Such a strong presence, and oh so incredibly funny. My poor camera shook so much it's a miracle I got any pictures at all! There's something about AT that makes you feel so inclusive, and as an audience you feel that you're receiving so much more. With down-to-earth flare, and witty intersections she entertains with style and aplomb. She has the remarkable ability to make you feel special, and I don't think there's anyone else who could close a show quite like she did.

Amanda Tapping Panel
Sunday April 5th

She jogs out onto stage grinning like she just found a room full of candy - not that she doesn't have her own candy-guy on set! - and comments on the Sam fanvid that just ended. The video was about Sam and her men. She starts joking about how she's really got to kiss so many good looking guys over the years. Then she shrugs "Sorry, it's my job".

She apologises for looking so different, but assures us that the blonde will be back when she resumes her role as Carter for the 3rd SG1 movie (much woo-hoo-ing) which has definitely been greenlit by MGM.

Q. Now that Samantha Carter is a Full Bird Coloneland outranks Mitchell, will she finally be in charge of SG1?

I hope so! she cries. Whenever a character is promoted, she relates whilst smiling, the actor would "strut" around set bragging about their promotion. When Carter was promoted, she couldn't help herself. She walked around set pointing to herself and tellin everyone "Look at me. I'm a Colonel. Full bird." She recalls walking up to Michael Shanks and saying "And what about you Mr. Jackson... still a doctor?"

Q. As far as Carter's relationship with 'O Neill is concerned, what's your take on it? Are they together? If not are you hoping they'll finally get together in the 3rd movie.

I think this is the first time I've ever heard AT rip off the veil of vaguery in response to the ship question. She was pretty direct, and I definitely had warm fuzzies inside. Firstly she still really, really wants an all out "go for it" scene with RDA. She'd have done a heck of a lot more with Jack in "Window of Opportunity", never mind what Sam and Jack should be doing by now! She'd have joined Jack at the pottery wheel ala 'Ghost'. She wants to see a resolution to the decade long ship, and angsty madness ladelled with sexual tension. She said that if they're not doing something by now then there's something wrong with both of them. As to Sam and Jack and what they're doing now, she would like to think that after all this time, there is some pay-off. She knows some people wouldn't want to see it, but "Carter and O'Neill are two vital people with healthy appetites, who have endured 11 years of puritanical rule, and it's time to go fishing." In the very least, they should have amazing sex... at least once, to say they finally did it. They've known each other for so long, been through so much, nearly died together, so yes, it would last.

Q. In Stargate you got to direct the episode "Resurrection". What was it difficult to juggle being a director and an actor?

The short answer is yes. Because you're essentially juggling two different jobs and you literally have to be everywhere at once. It's an incredibly difficult thing to do, and you have to be very disciplined when doing it. Doing both is no easy task. Saying that, she is set to direct the 6th episode of Sanctuary season two!

Q. Would you be open to doing a Sanctuary convention?

Amanda has been talking with her 'Gabit' girls about the possibility. And it's looking good so far!

Q. What was it like filming Requiem?

Intense. AT was giving it her all and Martin Wood (who was directing) kept pushing her for more. For the first time she can recall she got angry on set because she felt she was giving everything she could. In all of their years working together this was the first time she got really mad, and it resulted in her first ever fight with MW. Of course it lasted all of about 2 minutes and for the rest of the day they kept apologising to each other.

Q. On working with Chris Heyerdahl...

He's absolutely charming. When doing scenes with him, AT gets completely drawn in to the point that she starts making googly eyes at him. And Martin Wood can see her going there and has to stop and draw her back, gently reminding her that "He's killed women". It's become an on set joke because she finds it difficult to bear that in mind because CH is so mesmorising. So now, whenever Amanda gets too sucked in by Chris, someone (usually Chris himself) will remind her "I've killed women. Mass murderer."

Q. So do blondes have more fun?

"Yes" she nods still looking at the attendee. Then she turns her head towards the general audience and adds "For the brunettes in the audience, NO!"

Q. At some point in the panel, someone gave Amanda a lemon and asked if she could give it to Rob Cooper and Brad Wright and tell them to - Amanda interjects - "Go suck on a lemon?" (I can't really remember the reason why it was said. I'm certain it was related to some of the more intense questions asked of the producers themselves at their own panel earlier that day).

I'm not sure Amanda knew quite what to do with that one. But her loyalty to the Stargate franchise shone through. She said that the fans shouldn't always blame the producers as much as they tend to do. People think that they have this magical power to do whatever they want, when in reality that's not true. And it's something that she's learning everyday as an executive producer on Sanctuary. The financial strings are much higher up that even she (or any producer) is, and they are often bound by those chains. There's so much more to it than simply being about what the actors, writers, or even producers want.

AMANDA TAPPING PHOTO GALLERY

Bringing it back to closing the show, and as I'm writing this I'm humming the tune to "Nobody does it better". And I believe it, not because I think that anyone else couldn't, but simply because Amanda Tapping does it in a way that makes you feel that it was worth your time to be there. She smiles and does her quirky little bow, and in true fashion brings it back to the fans with her love, and with her thanks. And as the crowd stands and applauds and whistles their approval, I'm standing there remembering how 8 months ago I'm sitting in an msn conversation with

samjackshiplove and I casually throw out the idea that I'd like to go to the Vancouver Creation Con. And there I am now, geeked out to the max, surrounded by awesome memories and the experience of a lifetime.

♥ ♥ ♥