DVD Commentary: Double Jeopardy
Welcome to the Double Jeopardy dvd commentary. I think it’s quite an enjoyable commentary and I encourage those who haven’t taken the time to listen to do so sometime. Once again, I did a lot of straight up transcribing because I just couldn’t resist.
Michael Shanks introduces himself as “somewhat a director and somewhat an actor” for Double Jeopardy. James Tichenor introduces himself.
The show opens with a wormhole engaging on another planet. MS mentions that it wasn’t originally how it was going to open. JT chimes in that originally it was looking at the ground and going up. Instead it starts with the sky and pans down. MS goes on to say that as he’s looking at it, he likes it. JT mentions that there was a huge lens flare in the center of the camera that presented challenges in putting the puddle in. MS says he likes the way they bleached the color out to give a different feeling to the planet than the normal Vancouver forest.
As Jaffa surround “SG-1” on screen, MS calls out the guy playing the Jaffa who speaks. He says you’d think that the voice is affected, but it’s absolutely not. (It does almost sound phlanged.) They go on to talk about how he was discovered working in a gas station. MS says that he was blown away as soon as he walked into the casting room. He loved his voice. JT mentions that he was cast as one of the warriors in 13th Warrior.
MS points out the long hair underneath Daniel’s bandana. He identifies it as a clue that that something’s different without it being overt call out. JT asks if it’s hair extensions. MS says that it’s a wig. He chose to wear the bandana because otherwise it would be immediately obvious that 1) it was a wig, and 2) something was up. The length of Carter’s hair wasn’t terribly different, so just wearing a hat could deal with the wig pretty well. With Daniel there’s a far more dramatic difference. He also mentions that he looked ridiculous in the wig anyway so the bandana was a happy solution for him.
MS says that the makeup on the warriors (the ones native to the planet, not the Jaffa) was not quite what he was looking for. He wanted it to be like Titus but they couldn’t get the right consistency of mud. It became a bit of nightmare in the makeup room. It was especially an issue with turnaround with RDA. For starters, there was the issue of getting him to wear it [hee!], but also filming the makeup version and regular version on the same day wasn’t easy. MS likes the makeup okay, he just wishes it were heavier. JT says the implication is that they’ve been out the woods. MS thinks it looks like they’ve been in a food fight in the cafeteria. “But I still like it. I still like the uniforms and the outfits. I hate some of the cheesy stuff that we have done.”
They both compliment the beautiful matte painting of the pyramid. JT says that the artist did it based on the original Stargate model from the feature.
MS identifies Bill Croft as the First Prime of Cronus. He says that he was an actor in the first professional production that MS ever did as a teenager. He’d been in awe of him and it was funny to come full circle and have him walk into the casting room. MS says he was like a kid in a candy store.
JT asks how difficult it is to direct himself. MS says he finds it easier. They admire another matte painting. [It is lovely.] MS gets back to the directing thing. He says it’s easier because you know exactly what you want to do and where you want it to go. There is an element of difficulty in that you have to trust the people behind the monitor to let you know if you’re completely screwing it up because you can’t see it for yourself.
MS compliments the lighting. He points out Jack stepping out of the shadows, followed by the scenes in the prison cell. He likes the quality and texture. There’s a close up of Daniel with light and a shadow from the bars across part of his face that MS really likes. He’s extremely happy with the look of all oft the planetary stuff.
Onscreen Jack is talking to Darien and Hira. He’s fiddling with a cup. MS: “Always get Rick--don’t leave a prop with his reach. He’s always going to get some sort of buffoonery with it. I was just like “oh my God, what’s he doing now?” While he’s doing that we’re missing important exposition. But more often than not it turns out to be fun. But sometimes you go, oh my God, take that cup away from him. And the more you try to take it away from him, the more he wants to pick it up and play with it.”
JT: How was it working with the other regulars?
MS: It was good. Everybody was fantastic. They all knew I was up to my neck with it and they were all very supportive in terms of showing up exactly when they needed to be there, instead of the usual toe dragging that goes on. It was very much a team effort.
He goes on to say that it’s always nice to work with fresh actors too. You know that the regulars know their jobs. With new people, you don’t know what you’re in for. He was very happy with this cast. He talks about how well prepared Matthew Harrison (Darien) was and ready to work. He also mentions that he thinks actors like being directed by another actor. “Actors want to be directed. They want to do well.”
JT asks if MS finds it different working with an actor director as opposed to a more technical director. MS says yes. He refers to PdL as an actor’s director. He has a technical side, but he knows the game. He knows how to get past your blocks and obstacles and “it’s often funnier just to reinvent ways to mess with him a little.”
Onscreen there’s a reveal of a fallen warrior that O’Neill has taken a uniform from. It’s a reshot scene. Originally it was done from a crane with a reveal of a foot sticking out. MS says it looked absurd. The shot that made into the show is of a hand and he’s much happier with how it looks.
MS points out RDA in his warrior disguise inside the pyramid. “This is the only take we could use where he wasn’t mocking the helmet we made him wear.” Both of them laugh. MS says that for the scene itself they shot a lot of film. A lot of characters and a lot of coverage had to be done. He’s glad he had all that coverage, but at the time it was a chore. JT mentions that he remembers storyboarding it out with him and how endless it was. It was pretty much the whole day to shoot that scene. MS elaborates further that with twelve actors all needing coverage, a lot of beats, there’s a lot to be done. They both agree that it came together well.
MS is really happy with the end result of the scene and the reactions when Daniel is offed. JT asks how it felt to get to kill Daniel. MS: “I love it. My directing debut, I get to blow my own head off.” They talk about how they handled that bit with the pulling back wide and being fairly subtle with the head separation. MS talks about it being a difficult shot to do and have it not be comedic to have the head bouncing around. When the head is lying there, MS is beneath a false floor, turning his head. Then they replace the neck with a CG image to complete the look. JT also explains that when the head came off, they shot it in two parts. One where MS reacts, then one where they throw the head. RDA got to throw the head--he got the right bounce to it.
MS is happy with the cut from the shocked looks in the pyramid to the red lights in the SGC.
MS wants to know how Harlan translates “Comtraya” to the base computer. The question remains unanswered. [I speculate that it’s basically one computer talking to another.]
JT points out that from this point forward, Daniel is out of the picture so MS is free to direct. MS cites that as a good thing because, among other reasons, he can learn more about the whole process if he doesn’t have to worry about watching himself in front of the camera.
They talk about the excuse for OriginalDaniel to be away. JT asks if they ever contact OriginalDaniel. MS says that in the first draft there was a scene with them watching him on a planet, but it was cut for time and to keep the story moving.
MS refers to Jay Brazeau as the funniest actor on the face of the Earth. And, they note, hard working. They think he’s in everything that’s shot in Vancouver.
On screen Cronus is barking at RobotTeal’c. MS laughs that CJ is an actor that is not easily intimidated. There’s a close up of RobotSam, and MS says that it’s the only shot of AT that he doesn’t like because he thinks the wig is too apparent.
MS says that everything in the control room and briefing room was his favorite day of shooting because it was just people talking. “We got eight pages in one day!” JT asks him about his approach to shooting in the briefing room.
MS: We still had eight pages to shoot, so it was a matter of getting on with the story and just simplifying everything. The exposition was important, but it was more a question of saving my difficult shots and saving my complicated--I love these guys’ dynamic [Teal’c and Harlan] and I sat them beside each other just get those little subtle beats--but yeah, the briefing room was let’s get to the story. Everyone was great with their lines, picked up their pace and picked up their cues and told the story. Sometimes you just have to accept that it’s the briefing room and there’s not too much... it’s the exposition room and that’s it.
They both giggle at Harlan’s “oooh. [so do I]
The tent scene in the village was done in the studio and not outside. The lighting really does give it an outside feel.
MS refers to the jacket that Darien is wearing as shoehorn jacket. It’s supposed to be some sort of mail, but it looks like a collection of shoehorns.
MS mentions that he would have liked to have started the second half of the briefing exposition from a different spot, but time was the enemy and it was simpler and faster to keep things the same. “I was getting enough grief for the other stuff in other places.”
MS says it’s a problem that there can be too many pages of dialog for a briefing room scene (it sounds like he’s shuffling pages as he talks), but you need that exposition. It takes you away from the story, but you need the information. MS and JT agree that after five years, there’s little you can do to spice up a briefing room scene.
Onscreen, the SGC is dialing into the planet to see if the gate’s been unburied. They talk about how originally there had been more going on on the planet with the firefight, but time became an issue again. Most of the battle took place off camera. MS does regret that we didn’t get to see that RobotO’Neill who’s faster and running around all Bionic Man like.
JT asks what it’s like to act to yourself like what RDA is doing. (RobotJack and OriginalJack are speaking through the MALP.)
MS: Well, you know, the thing about Rick is that he comes in, as much as he resists a lot of things that directors tell him to do, he is, most of the time it’s because he’s got a firm idea of how he wants to do things. More often than not, his way works for him and that’s why he sticks to it. He came in really well prepared with an idea of what kind of dynamic there was going to be and love it or hate it was his notion and his choice to make. And it works. The dynamic that he chose as opposed to it being wishy-washy is very clean and clear. He had no problems with it. Almost like he’d done it many times before.
JT: And seeing that these are sort of clone robots, they’re almost identical.
MS: Yeah, there are some subtle different characterizations. The whole “lying to yourself” aspect. The subtle but ironic humor. [MS chuckles] I just love that he played this as surly and surlier. He could probably have his own series as the Two Grumpy Old Men.
[both laugh]
JT: The person he gets along with least in the world is himself.
MS: Yeah. [laughs again] I just find it amazing the outright contempt he has for saying some of the science fiction mythology lines. “Jaffa everywhere!” Like he’s just PO’d that somebody put him on a science fiction series.
[They both laugh again. Written out that sounds kind of crass, but I don’t think it comes across that way in the commentary.]
They talk a bit about the female Goa’uld character. MS: “I like the outfit for starters.” But he goes on to say that he tried to create some sort of dynamic between her and Cronus.
RobotJack and OriginalJack confront each other in person.
MS: Most of this staging is Rick’s own idea, the whole wrestling match. Originally it was just a bantering conversation that they had between the two of them, with a lot of--
JT: You guys actually sprung it on me the morning of--
MS: Because that was the first I’d heard of it! I had an idea of how to interact between the two which was that whole branch idea--I was going have one O’Neill when he was leaving smack the other one.
JT: That’s right.
MS: And Rick said “no no no, I want to wrestle.” All I’m thinking is oh my God how many more shots is this going to take and how much is it going to cost me that I don’t have to spend? But, you know, when the executive producer says he wants to do it, you kind of have to listen.
JT: It’s funny. The first time we see them together is the really classic, traditional 50/50 that you never see unless people are going to kiss or something.
MS: Exactly.
JT: It’s a shot that we just never do because it’s so flat. But then these moments where finally he gets to talk to the gang behind him. Those shots really work well for me.
MS: And I almost like the fact that it starts in a 50/50. We make no bones about it, we’re doing a duplication shot. That’s what makes this stuff more interesting is that we--I love that [the O’Neill’s are wrestling]. How was that to put together?
JT: It took a bit of work but it was really well shot so it was just a matter of drawing--
They both start laughing at RobotJack’s glasses hanging at a crazy angle from his ear.
MS: Again, he just, all these little beats, these little nuances. You can’t teach that. It’s just someone that’s so comfortable, like I said, it’s almost like he thought about this way more than he let on that he did.
JT: He did such a good job of acting with himself you really believe that the two people are talking to each other. It’s tricky stuff. It’s all in how it’s shot.
MS: Originally I didn’t like the shot where I had one in the foreground and one in the background, but I wanted to have that depth difference to stay away from the 50/50 shot.
JT: It’s so hard because if you’re going to sell that two characters who are identical in the same frame, the only way you can do it is with a 50/50 or [have them] looking in the same direction.
MS: Just the subtle things of him leaning down to pick up the zat gun. With the audience it doesn’t really register, but it sells the whole idea.
MS talks about how happy he is with the look of the torture chamber. He likes that it’s a completely different stage. He also compliments the Goa’uld’s outfit again. [hee!] He talks about how there was a big conversation about getting Daniel’s head into the scene along with the rest of the robot body. Everybody wanted to know where the head was. Why wasn’t it with the rest of his body? MS didn’t want it anywhere near there drawing attention. JT mentions that it would have been fun to have the head there and looking a different direction every time we saw it. MS: “Everybody had an idea for what to do with the head.”
Onscreen SG-1 and Darien are conferring about what to do. MS and JT talk about how they didn’t do any screen duplication for the O’Neills for this scene. MS says that he regrets that in retrospect. We see them from Darien’s POV, but we never see them together, interacting. MS thinks that they could have used it to sell the whole thing, but he just wanted to get on with it. JT chimes in that they take a lot of time, what with the costume, makeup, and hair changes for the actor, it’s extremely time consuming. MS feels that he didn’t do the Master Shot as well as he could have. With pretty much only close ups, we miss the geography of the characters as a whole. It would have been nice, he says, to have that tie in.
MS laughs at RobotJack’s “static” which is all an improv.
MS talks again about the brief dynamic between Cronus and his first Goa’uld in charge. He likes the combination of loathing and sucking up.
MS laughs that everyone that has an accent and comes on the show is evil. “She’s English, she much be evil!”
They compliment the interior design of the pyramid again. MS says that it’s the set that was Daniel Jackson’s control room in Absolute Power. It’s just repainted and touched up a bit. JT says that it’s amazing how many times they reuse a set. MS: “And you can never tell.”
[The action has picked up because the plan is in motion now. SG-1 is about to ring aboard the ship, RobotSam is verbally sparring with the Goa’uld about the RobotDaniel corpse.]
JT: This is where the show gets very complicated.
MS: Yeah
JT: I remember reading this and thinking “oh poor Michael! His first show.” The whole last 10 minutes is as hard as any action show we’ve ever done.
MS: [laughs] It’s amazing. And it took me awhile to talk Rick into carrying the two handguns in there because he immediately thought “oh Mr. John Woo, what are you doing?” Then in watching it I go it worked really well. You couldn’t have sold the fact that he would have shot that many people with one handgun it was rather silly. I wanted the Jaffa to have their original presence in the film which is, they’re tough to kill. They’re wearing armor and all this other stuff. And to cheap out that is to make it easier on the team than it should be.
MS: That sequence lasted, what, ten seconds. [laughs] How long did that take to film.
JT: Day of your life at least.
MS says that he didn’t really like what they did with the flesh pack on RobotJack’s chest. He thought it looked too fake. It ended up being black underneath it. The first time he watched he didn’t like the look. Now, he thinks it looks like something beyond the flesh is oozing. He’s come around and is happy with it.
MS references the scene with the Teal’cs confronting Cronus as another sequence where they “couldn’t go easy on anything.” There’s action, stunts, and visual effects to start with, then the other Teal’c walks in. He references that Tin Man really only had them interact with their doubles in one scene. Plus Jack’s one on one with RobotJack. That, MS says, he remembers as complicated enough. He goes on to say that this time he was thinking “wait a minute, there’s two of each character in various scenes. And their fighting side by side with one another.”
JT: They’re always together too.
MS would have liked to have a bigger explosion from the RobotDaniel bomb. JT says they talked about it, but budget dictated it be smaller. MS says that he figured as much. It would have been nice to have an explosion that would have sold the setting off of alarms.
MS says that he and Michael Greenberg where going to cut the scene of RobotCarter rolling into the room because it looked a bit bogus at first. But all of the zats flying around provide enough distraction to make it okay. JT adds that sometimes it’s hard cutting a show together before you get all of the effects. Especially when half the frame is empty in so many shots. MS agrees.
MS suggested that Cronus needed to switch to decaf. “He’s always so worked up about something.”
Teal’c shows up to help RobotTeal’c with Cronus. MS says it didn’t turn out quite like he’d hoped. JT asks if it was the shield. MS says no, he wanted to sell a little more the shot going through the Jaffa that Teal’c was using as a shield. But setting a squib off so near CJ’s face is not safe. Since that was really the only way to sell it, MS says that they’re asking the audience to accept that the shot went through the Jaffa to hit Teal’c.
JT says that the shot with Sam working with the crystals while RobotSam is in the background is his sad moment. It’s AT in both the foreground and the background. And they had a great shot where they switch, but they couldn’t use it because the continuity was off with the shooting of the gun. MS makes sympathetic noises.
Cronus prepares to stick his hand into Teal’c’s pouch. JT comments that that’s “nasty,” MS agrees and says he elected not to actually show it. “If you watch the show, you’ve seen enough of what that’s supposed to do.”
We see a scene cut away just as Sam and RobotSam prepare to switch places. JT makes sad noises that we don’t get to see it happen on screen. MS commiserates.
MS: It was our one shot of selling the two of them together. It was sort of their golden moment.
JT: That’s right. We tried to do one for each, but we ended up doing just Rick because of time. [The one with Sam] we actually shot, but had to cut.
MS loves the effect of RobotSam reaching through the force field. He also comments that AT did a really good job with it. “I really put her through the paces with pulling those things out for an hour.”
They’re both appreciative of Cronus’ last seconds as he reacts to being shot twice and the fading of the eye glow.
MS says that the bit between Teal’c and RobotTeal’c could have been unintentionally comedic because of RobotTeal’c’s falling, but it all works because CJ really sold it.
JT mentions that a hallway door we see closing is actually a CG door. MS says you never would have known. In fact, the first time he watched, he’d forgotten that.
MS says that what surprised him when he watched it all put together was how much poignancy there was to it at the end that he didn’t expect. Especially when RobotJack dies. “Almost like you wanted to find out more about the life behind these characters that we only see part of. Why they went back through the stargate was to seek out their humanity again and prove to themselves that they were themselves even though they were machines. I lost track of that in the overall shooting, but in watching it does read.”
JT: I think it’s frustrating too because we do spend so much time on the visual effects. They’re such a big money spender and time waster in a way and a lot of times these [character] moments get relegated off to the side. This is what’s important, what the audience wants to see. Not the visual effects.
MS: The visual effects, if the story is stuck to, the visual effects become gravy on the fries as opposed to it’s just gravy and we forget what we’re eating.
[pause]
MS: I made a metaphor! [hee!]
RobotJack dies. MS: “It still gets me a little. And Rick played it so well in the sense of... he does that really well with the subtle reaction where he feels it but he doesn’t necessarily show it a lot of the time.”
The final scene is of the space ship descending.
MS: This is great.
JT: It’s a neat shot. Of course we realized as we were doing it that the interior of the space ship landing is four-sided but the pyramid that it’s landing on is three-sided.
MS: laughs
JT: [also laughing] How the heck to you land a four-sided....
MS: Off camera what happens is three guys come out with cranes going “oh no, get the crowbar.”
[credits]
JT: It was fun Michael. Nice work. You should direct again.
MS: I should direct again! Dammit. Someday someone else will... [laughs]
He thanks JT for all his help and says he enjoyed it. In retrospect. He’s glad he did it. At the time he wasn’t necessarily enjoying the process, but now watching it he feels like he could take on just about anything.
JT: No doubt.
They offer their thanks as the credits end.
Michael Shanks introduces himself as “somewhat a director and somewhat an actor” for Double Jeopardy. James Tichenor introduces himself.
The show opens with a wormhole engaging on another planet. MS mentions that it wasn’t originally how it was going to open. JT chimes in that originally it was looking at the ground and going up. Instead it starts with the sky and pans down. MS goes on to say that as he’s looking at it, he likes it. JT mentions that there was a huge lens flare in the center of the camera that presented challenges in putting the puddle in. MS says he likes the way they bleached the color out to give a different feeling to the planet than the normal Vancouver forest.
As Jaffa surround “SG-1” on screen, MS calls out the guy playing the Jaffa who speaks. He says you’d think that the voice is affected, but it’s absolutely not. (It does almost sound phlanged.) They go on to talk about how he was discovered working in a gas station. MS says that he was blown away as soon as he walked into the casting room. He loved his voice. JT mentions that he was cast as one of the warriors in 13th Warrior.
MS points out the long hair underneath Daniel’s bandana. He identifies it as a clue that that something’s different without it being overt call out. JT asks if it’s hair extensions. MS says that it’s a wig. He chose to wear the bandana because otherwise it would be immediately obvious that 1) it was a wig, and 2) something was up. The length of Carter’s hair wasn’t terribly different, so just wearing a hat could deal with the wig pretty well. With Daniel there’s a far more dramatic difference. He also mentions that he looked ridiculous in the wig anyway so the bandana was a happy solution for him.
MS says that the makeup on the warriors (the ones native to the planet, not the Jaffa) was not quite what he was looking for. He wanted it to be like Titus but they couldn’t get the right consistency of mud. It became a bit of nightmare in the makeup room. It was especially an issue with turnaround with RDA. For starters, there was the issue of getting him to wear it [hee!], but also filming the makeup version and regular version on the same day wasn’t easy. MS likes the makeup okay, he just wishes it were heavier. JT says the implication is that they’ve been out the woods. MS thinks it looks like they’ve been in a food fight in the cafeteria. “But I still like it. I still like the uniforms and the outfits. I hate some of the cheesy stuff that we have done.”
They both compliment the beautiful matte painting of the pyramid. JT says that the artist did it based on the original Stargate model from the feature.
MS identifies Bill Croft as the First Prime of Cronus. He says that he was an actor in the first professional production that MS ever did as a teenager. He’d been in awe of him and it was funny to come full circle and have him walk into the casting room. MS says he was like a kid in a candy store.
JT asks how difficult it is to direct himself. MS says he finds it easier. They admire another matte painting. [It is lovely.] MS gets back to the directing thing. He says it’s easier because you know exactly what you want to do and where you want it to go. There is an element of difficulty in that you have to trust the people behind the monitor to let you know if you’re completely screwing it up because you can’t see it for yourself.
MS compliments the lighting. He points out Jack stepping out of the shadows, followed by the scenes in the prison cell. He likes the quality and texture. There’s a close up of Daniel with light and a shadow from the bars across part of his face that MS really likes. He’s extremely happy with the look of all oft the planetary stuff.
Onscreen Jack is talking to Darien and Hira. He’s fiddling with a cup. MS: “Always get Rick--don’t leave a prop with his reach. He’s always going to get some sort of buffoonery with it. I was just like “oh my God, what’s he doing now?” While he’s doing that we’re missing important exposition. But more often than not it turns out to be fun. But sometimes you go, oh my God, take that cup away from him. And the more you try to take it away from him, the more he wants to pick it up and play with it.”
JT: How was it working with the other regulars?
MS: It was good. Everybody was fantastic. They all knew I was up to my neck with it and they were all very supportive in terms of showing up exactly when they needed to be there, instead of the usual toe dragging that goes on. It was very much a team effort.
He goes on to say that it’s always nice to work with fresh actors too. You know that the regulars know their jobs. With new people, you don’t know what you’re in for. He was very happy with this cast. He talks about how well prepared Matthew Harrison (Darien) was and ready to work. He also mentions that he thinks actors like being directed by another actor. “Actors want to be directed. They want to do well.”
JT asks if MS finds it different working with an actor director as opposed to a more technical director. MS says yes. He refers to PdL as an actor’s director. He has a technical side, but he knows the game. He knows how to get past your blocks and obstacles and “it’s often funnier just to reinvent ways to mess with him a little.”
Onscreen there’s a reveal of a fallen warrior that O’Neill has taken a uniform from. It’s a reshot scene. Originally it was done from a crane with a reveal of a foot sticking out. MS says it looked absurd. The shot that made into the show is of a hand and he’s much happier with how it looks.
MS points out RDA in his warrior disguise inside the pyramid. “This is the only take we could use where he wasn’t mocking the helmet we made him wear.” Both of them laugh. MS says that for the scene itself they shot a lot of film. A lot of characters and a lot of coverage had to be done. He’s glad he had all that coverage, but at the time it was a chore. JT mentions that he remembers storyboarding it out with him and how endless it was. It was pretty much the whole day to shoot that scene. MS elaborates further that with twelve actors all needing coverage, a lot of beats, there’s a lot to be done. They both agree that it came together well.
MS is really happy with the end result of the scene and the reactions when Daniel is offed. JT asks how it felt to get to kill Daniel. MS: “I love it. My directing debut, I get to blow my own head off.” They talk about how they handled that bit with the pulling back wide and being fairly subtle with the head separation. MS talks about it being a difficult shot to do and have it not be comedic to have the head bouncing around. When the head is lying there, MS is beneath a false floor, turning his head. Then they replace the neck with a CG image to complete the look. JT also explains that when the head came off, they shot it in two parts. One where MS reacts, then one where they throw the head. RDA got to throw the head--he got the right bounce to it.
MS is happy with the cut from the shocked looks in the pyramid to the red lights in the SGC.
MS wants to know how Harlan translates “Comtraya” to the base computer. The question remains unanswered. [I speculate that it’s basically one computer talking to another.]
JT points out that from this point forward, Daniel is out of the picture so MS is free to direct. MS cites that as a good thing because, among other reasons, he can learn more about the whole process if he doesn’t have to worry about watching himself in front of the camera.
They talk about the excuse for OriginalDaniel to be away. JT asks if they ever contact OriginalDaniel. MS says that in the first draft there was a scene with them watching him on a planet, but it was cut for time and to keep the story moving.
MS refers to Jay Brazeau as the funniest actor on the face of the Earth. And, they note, hard working. They think he’s in everything that’s shot in Vancouver.
On screen Cronus is barking at RobotTeal’c. MS laughs that CJ is an actor that is not easily intimidated. There’s a close up of RobotSam, and MS says that it’s the only shot of AT that he doesn’t like because he thinks the wig is too apparent.
MS says that everything in the control room and briefing room was his favorite day of shooting because it was just people talking. “We got eight pages in one day!” JT asks him about his approach to shooting in the briefing room.
MS: We still had eight pages to shoot, so it was a matter of getting on with the story and just simplifying everything. The exposition was important, but it was more a question of saving my difficult shots and saving my complicated--I love these guys’ dynamic [Teal’c and Harlan] and I sat them beside each other just get those little subtle beats--but yeah, the briefing room was let’s get to the story. Everyone was great with their lines, picked up their pace and picked up their cues and told the story. Sometimes you just have to accept that it’s the briefing room and there’s not too much... it’s the exposition room and that’s it.
They both giggle at Harlan’s “oooh. [so do I]
The tent scene in the village was done in the studio and not outside. The lighting really does give it an outside feel.
MS refers to the jacket that Darien is wearing as shoehorn jacket. It’s supposed to be some sort of mail, but it looks like a collection of shoehorns.
MS mentions that he would have liked to have started the second half of the briefing exposition from a different spot, but time was the enemy and it was simpler and faster to keep things the same. “I was getting enough grief for the other stuff in other places.”
MS says it’s a problem that there can be too many pages of dialog for a briefing room scene (it sounds like he’s shuffling pages as he talks), but you need that exposition. It takes you away from the story, but you need the information. MS and JT agree that after five years, there’s little you can do to spice up a briefing room scene.
Onscreen, the SGC is dialing into the planet to see if the gate’s been unburied. They talk about how originally there had been more going on on the planet with the firefight, but time became an issue again. Most of the battle took place off camera. MS does regret that we didn’t get to see that RobotO’Neill who’s faster and running around all Bionic Man like.
JT asks what it’s like to act to yourself like what RDA is doing. (RobotJack and OriginalJack are speaking through the MALP.)
MS: Well, you know, the thing about Rick is that he comes in, as much as he resists a lot of things that directors tell him to do, he is, most of the time it’s because he’s got a firm idea of how he wants to do things. More often than not, his way works for him and that’s why he sticks to it. He came in really well prepared with an idea of what kind of dynamic there was going to be and love it or hate it was his notion and his choice to make. And it works. The dynamic that he chose as opposed to it being wishy-washy is very clean and clear. He had no problems with it. Almost like he’d done it many times before.
JT: And seeing that these are sort of clone robots, they’re almost identical.
MS: Yeah, there are some subtle different characterizations. The whole “lying to yourself” aspect. The subtle but ironic humor. [MS chuckles] I just love that he played this as surly and surlier. He could probably have his own series as the Two Grumpy Old Men.
[both laugh]
JT: The person he gets along with least in the world is himself.
MS: Yeah. [laughs again] I just find it amazing the outright contempt he has for saying some of the science fiction mythology lines. “Jaffa everywhere!” Like he’s just PO’d that somebody put him on a science fiction series.
[They both laugh again. Written out that sounds kind of crass, but I don’t think it comes across that way in the commentary.]
They talk a bit about the female Goa’uld character. MS: “I like the outfit for starters.” But he goes on to say that he tried to create some sort of dynamic between her and Cronus.
RobotJack and OriginalJack confront each other in person.
MS: Most of this staging is Rick’s own idea, the whole wrestling match. Originally it was just a bantering conversation that they had between the two of them, with a lot of--
JT: You guys actually sprung it on me the morning of--
MS: Because that was the first I’d heard of it! I had an idea of how to interact between the two which was that whole branch idea--I was going have one O’Neill when he was leaving smack the other one.
JT: That’s right.
MS: And Rick said “no no no, I want to wrestle.” All I’m thinking is oh my God how many more shots is this going to take and how much is it going to cost me that I don’t have to spend? But, you know, when the executive producer says he wants to do it, you kind of have to listen.
JT: It’s funny. The first time we see them together is the really classic, traditional 50/50 that you never see unless people are going to kiss or something.
MS: Exactly.
JT: It’s a shot that we just never do because it’s so flat. But then these moments where finally he gets to talk to the gang behind him. Those shots really work well for me.
MS: And I almost like the fact that it starts in a 50/50. We make no bones about it, we’re doing a duplication shot. That’s what makes this stuff more interesting is that we--I love that [the O’Neill’s are wrestling]. How was that to put together?
JT: It took a bit of work but it was really well shot so it was just a matter of drawing--
They both start laughing at RobotJack’s glasses hanging at a crazy angle from his ear.
MS: Again, he just, all these little beats, these little nuances. You can’t teach that. It’s just someone that’s so comfortable, like I said, it’s almost like he thought about this way more than he let on that he did.
JT: He did such a good job of acting with himself you really believe that the two people are talking to each other. It’s tricky stuff. It’s all in how it’s shot.
MS: Originally I didn’t like the shot where I had one in the foreground and one in the background, but I wanted to have that depth difference to stay away from the 50/50 shot.
JT: It’s so hard because if you’re going to sell that two characters who are identical in the same frame, the only way you can do it is with a 50/50 or [have them] looking in the same direction.
MS: Just the subtle things of him leaning down to pick up the zat gun. With the audience it doesn’t really register, but it sells the whole idea.
MS talks about how happy he is with the look of the torture chamber. He likes that it’s a completely different stage. He also compliments the Goa’uld’s outfit again. [hee!] He talks about how there was a big conversation about getting Daniel’s head into the scene along with the rest of the robot body. Everybody wanted to know where the head was. Why wasn’t it with the rest of his body? MS didn’t want it anywhere near there drawing attention. JT mentions that it would have been fun to have the head there and looking a different direction every time we saw it. MS: “Everybody had an idea for what to do with the head.”
Onscreen SG-1 and Darien are conferring about what to do. MS and JT talk about how they didn’t do any screen duplication for the O’Neills for this scene. MS says that he regrets that in retrospect. We see them from Darien’s POV, but we never see them together, interacting. MS thinks that they could have used it to sell the whole thing, but he just wanted to get on with it. JT chimes in that they take a lot of time, what with the costume, makeup, and hair changes for the actor, it’s extremely time consuming. MS feels that he didn’t do the Master Shot as well as he could have. With pretty much only close ups, we miss the geography of the characters as a whole. It would have been nice, he says, to have that tie in.
MS laughs at RobotJack’s “static” which is all an improv.
MS talks again about the brief dynamic between Cronus and his first Goa’uld in charge. He likes the combination of loathing and sucking up.
MS laughs that everyone that has an accent and comes on the show is evil. “She’s English, she much be evil!”
They compliment the interior design of the pyramid again. MS says that it’s the set that was Daniel Jackson’s control room in Absolute Power. It’s just repainted and touched up a bit. JT says that it’s amazing how many times they reuse a set. MS: “And you can never tell.”
[The action has picked up because the plan is in motion now. SG-1 is about to ring aboard the ship, RobotSam is verbally sparring with the Goa’uld about the RobotDaniel corpse.]
JT: This is where the show gets very complicated.
MS: Yeah
JT: I remember reading this and thinking “oh poor Michael! His first show.” The whole last 10 minutes is as hard as any action show we’ve ever done.
MS: [laughs] It’s amazing. And it took me awhile to talk Rick into carrying the two handguns in there because he immediately thought “oh Mr. John Woo, what are you doing?” Then in watching it I go it worked really well. You couldn’t have sold the fact that he would have shot that many people with one handgun it was rather silly. I wanted the Jaffa to have their original presence in the film which is, they’re tough to kill. They’re wearing armor and all this other stuff. And to cheap out that is to make it easier on the team than it should be.
MS: That sequence lasted, what, ten seconds. [laughs] How long did that take to film.
JT: Day of your life at least.
MS says that he didn’t really like what they did with the flesh pack on RobotJack’s chest. He thought it looked too fake. It ended up being black underneath it. The first time he watched he didn’t like the look. Now, he thinks it looks like something beyond the flesh is oozing. He’s come around and is happy with it.
MS references the scene with the Teal’cs confronting Cronus as another sequence where they “couldn’t go easy on anything.” There’s action, stunts, and visual effects to start with, then the other Teal’c walks in. He references that Tin Man really only had them interact with their doubles in one scene. Plus Jack’s one on one with RobotJack. That, MS says, he remembers as complicated enough. He goes on to say that this time he was thinking “wait a minute, there’s two of each character in various scenes. And their fighting side by side with one another.”
JT: They’re always together too.
MS would have liked to have a bigger explosion from the RobotDaniel bomb. JT says they talked about it, but budget dictated it be smaller. MS says that he figured as much. It would have been nice to have an explosion that would have sold the setting off of alarms.
MS says that he and Michael Greenberg where going to cut the scene of RobotCarter rolling into the room because it looked a bit bogus at first. But all of the zats flying around provide enough distraction to make it okay. JT adds that sometimes it’s hard cutting a show together before you get all of the effects. Especially when half the frame is empty in so many shots. MS agrees.
MS suggested that Cronus needed to switch to decaf. “He’s always so worked up about something.”
Teal’c shows up to help RobotTeal’c with Cronus. MS says it didn’t turn out quite like he’d hoped. JT asks if it was the shield. MS says no, he wanted to sell a little more the shot going through the Jaffa that Teal’c was using as a shield. But setting a squib off so near CJ’s face is not safe. Since that was really the only way to sell it, MS says that they’re asking the audience to accept that the shot went through the Jaffa to hit Teal’c.
JT says that the shot with Sam working with the crystals while RobotSam is in the background is his sad moment. It’s AT in both the foreground and the background. And they had a great shot where they switch, but they couldn’t use it because the continuity was off with the shooting of the gun. MS makes sympathetic noises.
Cronus prepares to stick his hand into Teal’c’s pouch. JT comments that that’s “nasty,” MS agrees and says he elected not to actually show it. “If you watch the show, you’ve seen enough of what that’s supposed to do.”
We see a scene cut away just as Sam and RobotSam prepare to switch places. JT makes sad noises that we don’t get to see it happen on screen. MS commiserates.
MS: It was our one shot of selling the two of them together. It was sort of their golden moment.
JT: That’s right. We tried to do one for each, but we ended up doing just Rick because of time. [The one with Sam] we actually shot, but had to cut.
MS loves the effect of RobotSam reaching through the force field. He also comments that AT did a really good job with it. “I really put her through the paces with pulling those things out for an hour.”
They’re both appreciative of Cronus’ last seconds as he reacts to being shot twice and the fading of the eye glow.
MS says that the bit between Teal’c and RobotTeal’c could have been unintentionally comedic because of RobotTeal’c’s falling, but it all works because CJ really sold it.
JT mentions that a hallway door we see closing is actually a CG door. MS says you never would have known. In fact, the first time he watched, he’d forgotten that.
MS says that what surprised him when he watched it all put together was how much poignancy there was to it at the end that he didn’t expect. Especially when RobotJack dies. “Almost like you wanted to find out more about the life behind these characters that we only see part of. Why they went back through the stargate was to seek out their humanity again and prove to themselves that they were themselves even though they were machines. I lost track of that in the overall shooting, but in watching it does read.”
JT: I think it’s frustrating too because we do spend so much time on the visual effects. They’re such a big money spender and time waster in a way and a lot of times these [character] moments get relegated off to the side. This is what’s important, what the audience wants to see. Not the visual effects.
MS: The visual effects, if the story is stuck to, the visual effects become gravy on the fries as opposed to it’s just gravy and we forget what we’re eating.
[pause]
MS: I made a metaphor! [hee!]
RobotJack dies. MS: “It still gets me a little. And Rick played it so well in the sense of... he does that really well with the subtle reaction where he feels it but he doesn’t necessarily show it a lot of the time.”
The final scene is of the space ship descending.
MS: This is great.
JT: It’s a neat shot. Of course we realized as we were doing it that the interior of the space ship landing is four-sided but the pyramid that it’s landing on is three-sided.
MS: laughs
JT: [also laughing] How the heck to you land a four-sided....
MS: Off camera what happens is three guys come out with cranes going “oh no, get the crowbar.”
[credits]
JT: It was fun Michael. Nice work. You should direct again.
MS: I should direct again! Dammit. Someday someone else will... [laughs]
He thanks JT for all his help and says he enjoyed it. In retrospect. He’s glad he did it. At the time he wasn’t necessarily enjoying the process, but now watching it he feels like he could take on just about anything.
JT: No doubt.
They offer their thanks as the credits end.