Caprica City:
"Hello Aaron. This is your first convention in Germany. Is there
anything you like in particular, besides the really nice people and the
beautiful landscape between the airport and the hotel"
Aaron Douglas:
"I haven't seen anything else to be honest with you. The beer is really
good. This weekend is supposed to be for the convention and the people.
The people who run this hotel do a really nice job, they're very nice
people. It looks beautiful outside, I just haven't got out yet. Ask me
when my tour in Germany is over, than I'll have a better idea of what to
think. Until now everything has been great, it's fabulous. I haven't had
as much sleep as I'd like, but that's because I'm nine time zones away."
Caprica City:
"Is there a difference between German and American conventions?"
Aaron Douglas:
"Not really, no. Only in size. This convention is only about 100 people,
when you go to Comic Con in San Diego it's 100000 people. They host it in
the second largest convention centre in the world and the convention
floor itself is probably the square footage of two soccer fields. It's
huge with literally hundreds of dealers. Some of these booths are the
size of a large restaurant. It's just huge. 'Star Wars' had a booth
there and they had a full size Xwing fighter and another full size ship.
And they had this guy is in Storm trooper and Boba Fett costumes just to
man the booth. That was pretty cool. They have the small ones, too, but
America also has 300 million people and that's where the show is based,
so a lot more people are interested in visiting such conventions. The
next one in England for 'Stargate Atlantis' is about 450 people, I
think. So, other than size, you know, everybody is nice. In America you
got more odd questions than in Europe. You get sort of the random guy
who is a little to into the show and he's having a hard time differing
between the show and reality. There's a few more of those types over
there."
Caprica City:
"Could you give us an example for this kind of questions?"
Aaron Douglas:
"Oh, you get guys who go 'In episode six of season one, when you were
fixing the Viper and you were working on the screen you pressed a red
button which ran a diagnostic on this part of the engine. Now, in
episode thirteen of the second season you pressed the same red button,
but that button ran a diagnostic on the landing gear. Was this button
initiating a specific diagnostic system no matter what it's hooked up to
or was that a mistake?' I just said, like, 'what?'. The attention to
details is phenomenal, but some people take it to the Nth degree. Or
'how did you feel when you shot so and so or when you punched Starbuck
or whatever'. I say 'well, I didn't do this, my character did'. They
have a hard time getting into it and see the difference between Aaron
the person and Tyrol the character. They seriously do, they ask this
really really high end aerodynamic questions, questions about physics
and I have no idea."
Caprica City:
"Aerodynamic in space?"
Aaron Douglas:
"Yes, exactly. 'Why do you need wings on the ships in space?' I say,
when you enter the atmosphere you need this wings. 'Oh, yes, but this
ship is not designed to enter an atmosphere.' You know, when you pick on
a part long enough you gonna pick it apart. Yeah, you get some bizarre
questions."
Caprica City:
"How do you react to this questions? Like Shatner with a 'get a life'?"
Aaron Douglas:
"Oh god no! Never never never. I have some answers. When somebody asks a
question about the plot or the story that I can't answer, I say 'You
know, that is an excellent question, but rather than answer it, let's
see if anybody else knows.' And then you get like thirty people with the
answer. Or I say 'well, you know, some people haven't seen this episode
yet, so I don't want to give away any spoilers. We are not here for
spoilers, so ask me later.' And then I leave the building. But the
strangest one was the one with the red button."
Caprica City:
"You said you watch the show yourself. Who do you think will be exposed
as a Cylon?"
Aaron Douglas:
"Oh. I think Gaeta is a Cylon. Although, that's a little obvious. So I'm
kind of thinking it might be Gaeta, but maybe not. It'll be really
interesting to see which one will be the next Cylon. I don't think it's
me, I don't think it's Helo. I think Gaeta, or maybe make it, like,
Dualla. Dualla or maybe Apollo, which would be really really weird.
Gaeta is always like putting something up, putting something down. So
they either trying to set him up as a Cylon so people can look back and
go 'oh, that's why he did this and this. Or they're just making it look
like he is one so that you take the focus of everybody else and then
Dualla stands up and shoots Adama again."
Caprica City:
"What would be the easiest way to get on the set, besides taking acting
lessons for two years?"
Aaron Douglas:
"If someone wants to visit? Probably the easiest way is to contact the
head of marketing for the show, she's the on site marketing person on
the production office. If it's for instance somebody like yourself and
you tell her that you are journalists from Germany and you like to have
a set tour, maybe. If it is a regular person, there's a lot of security.
It's tough to get on a film set in North America, especially since
9/11."
Caprica City:
"Even in film studios? Is that a terrorist target?"
Aaron Douglas:
"Oh yeah, al Qaeda is looking to bomb film studios to fight the American
machine, I don't know. Its overkill in my mind, but yes, the security at
the gate is pretty tough, it's tough to get on the lot. The average
person needs to know somebody who knows somebody. Otherwise nobody gets
close."
Caprica City:
"On set you have a Viper in actual size. Did you ever climbed into it
and played pilot?"
Aaron Douglas:
"No, but I bring my nine year old son and put him in the Cockpit and he
flies around. It's funny, when he was younger, he watched the show but
didn't see it as fantasy versus reality. So he came down to see the
spaceship and he asked me 'can I go up in one?' and I said, 'no, they
don't fly'. 'Yes they do, I saw it on TV'. I said 'No, that are special
effects. They don't actually fly'. He was devastated, he was so upset.
It was really funny. He was heartbroken. Yeah, we have two of the old
Vipers, we have the one new one that Apollo flies, the Mark VII. We have
a full size Raptor and a Cylon Raider. And some props like missiles and
torpedoes."
Caprica City:
"Can you remember your first day on the set?"
Aaron Douglas:
"When we first toured the set they were almost done. I think it was the
hangar deck that wasn't quite finished. I was impressed by the size of
it, it was huge. I remember walking around the corner and see a Viper
for the first time. I haven't seen one since the original series as a
little kid. I walked to it and had to touch it to see that its real.
These studios are massive, they are like aircraft hangars. No pylons or
anything, just a huge box. It's like a IKEA, but three times that big
and they build sets in there. They're big enough to build houses in
there, sometimes a whole street. Incredible. Did you see 'Sleepy Hollow'
with Johnny Depp? A great movie. It all takes place in a forest, but the
forest was indoors, it's on a movie set."
Caprica City:
"What about those scenes on Kobol? Were they made on such a set?"
Aaron Douglas:
"No, we were outside in a rain forest near Vancouver, a hour and a half
drive away from the city. The climate is rain forest, that's why it
rains so much. It's always green and warm. It rarely snows, just once
every four years and then it goes away. It's five, six, ten degrees in
the winter time. Right now it's like 13 and raining. I love it. It's the
only city in Canada I could live in. Everything else is just f**king
cold."
Caprica City:
"You've been to a couple of conventions. What was the nicest actor
you've met?"
Aaron Douglas:
"I always had a great time with Alexis Cruz (Skaara, 'Stargate: SG-1').
He is a great guy. The first time I actually met Richard Hatch (Apollo,
Original 'Battlestar') was at a convention, the Comic Con, and he is one
of the best guys you ever meet. Laurette bg (Cassiopeia) and Anne
Lockhart (Sheba), who were in the original 'Battlestar', they're just
absolute dreams. Noah Hathaway (Boxey) is a great guy, too. Met him in
August. Those ones would stand up most in my mind, yeah."
Caprica City:
"We won't ask about the most unpleasant person. Earlier on the Panel you
mentioned Joe Flanigan (Sheppard, 'Stargate Atlantis')."
Aaron Douglas:
"I've never met Joe. I just heard stories. He could be the nicest guy in
the world. I probably meet him next weekend and I hope he's a great guy.
Jason Momoa (Ronon Dex, 'Atlantia') said, he's a great guy. I take
Jason's word and got my thumbs crossed. You know, rumors fly around and
people say all kinds of nasty things. You got to meet people for
yourself."
Caprica City:
"What about Dirk Benedict? Did you read his Article 'Starbuck: Lost in
Castration'?"
Aaron Douglas:
"I started to read this thing but then I put it down. I met him once or
twice and that's all I have to say about that."
Caprica City:
"How does the actors at the show interact with the other crew? We often
hear stories that the actors are separated and don't treat the crew very
well."
Aaron Douglas:
"We're not like that at all. Our set doesn't have that at all. You know,
that's very true, I've been on some shows where the actors thought they
were the king of the world. I worked on some movies with actors that
were just absolutely obnoxious assholes and that's painful. You just
want to flip them a quarter and tell them to buy some self esteem. I
hate that, it's brutal. Our set is great. We're all equal. Everybody
realizes that it takes us all to make the show and that nobody is better
or any job more important than anybody else's. They always say 'the fish
rots from the head', and the head of our show is Eddie (Edward James
Olmos) and Mary (McDonnell) and you could not find two greater people
and two greater examples of how to live life and threat people. If
anybody got out of line, Eddie would very quickly put him aside and go
'Who do you think you are? Knock it off!' And so, we're just trying to
follow that example and live respectfully with everybody else. We have a
great crew, they're very very cool. It's great fun to hang out with
them. You got to work with all those people all those time. If you're a
dick, it's just gonna be a painful experience for the entire season. We
try to keep it light and funny."
Caprica City:
"Are there people on set who are vital for the success of this show, but
never been mentioned?"
Aaron Douglas:
"Well, everybody knows who Richard Hudolin is. He's the set designer and
the guy who is responsible for the look of the ships. He and his crew,
those guys are amazing. Patricia Murray is the key make up artist and
she's fantastic everybody needs to get some accolades for what they do.
Mark Verheiden is executive producer, but he also is one of the writers
who does rewrites. He is just a tremendous hard working guy. I should
stop naming people, or I start leaving someone out. They're great."
Caprica City:
"Thanks a lot Aaron."
Aaron Douglas:
"You're welcome. That was fun."