By April MacIntyre Jul 2, 2007, 0:08 GMT
Battlestar Galactica sets and cast panel at Vancouver Film Studios: video link below article:
Mary McDonnell - Battlestar © Glenn Harris / Photorazzi
While climbing through the maze-like Battlestar sets following Canadian production designer Richard Hudolin and art director Doug McLean, opportunities to glance and spy among set notes, left-open scripts and other bits of production detritus gave us all a bit of insight to what will befall Adama, Boomer, Roslin, Tyrol and Tigh on their swan song season.
With TVSquad’s Keith on my heel, and Twitch’s Andrew nearby, we spied an open script sitting in a dark corridor on an apple box as we marched to Adama’s private quarters, just begging to be nicked titled “Into the West” and a further conversation with Hudolin revealed the new ship being built at the moment is called the “Demitrius.”
Taking a tour of Galactica’s sets with the heads of the art department was heaven. The art director works directly with the production designer. Richard Hudolin is a veteran and noted PD, and has worked with AD Doug McLean for many years crafting these incredible sets that cost millions in materials and labor.
McLean told me that he had known Richard for near 20 years, working almost exclusively with him for the last ten. The two men work seamlessly, even creating and building the sets for the first season of ‘Eureka.”
Their collaboration is about capturing the essence of the written script, as their design becomes a character in its own right. Once a set is built and shot the two still find room for improving conceptual ideas - providing them opportunities to continue refining the design processes and execution.
The men bemoaned the fact the series was “cut too short” according to Hudolin, his frustration was evident towards the end of the tour when the rest of the digital press corps was looking over costume designs. He expressed that there was still so much more story left on the table, and hinted a three film follow up may be viable.
Both men were at a loss on what was to become of their enormous and expensive sets – at one point they had dismantled and gotten rid of the original Battlestar miniseries sets only to be called back to re-purchase and rebuild from scratch the Battlestar set in a three month period at astronomical costs.
The cast was assembled prior to our set tour for a panel discussion that included Aaron Douglas (Chief Tyrol), Jamie Bamber (Lee “Apollo” Adama), Michael Hogan (Col. Tigh), Grace Park (Athena/Boomer) and Tamoh Penikett (Helo).
Aaron Douglas was very funny, especially discussing his Cylon reveal that has been hard for him to deal with. The “Final Four Cylons” is part of the big twists expected in the last season. “I actually found out months in advance (accidentally) when I found a piece of paper lying around that I wasn’t supposed to read, but I read it anyways and I said, what the @%#frak!” Douglas approached Michael Rymer and was told that he wasn’t supposed to see it, and shouldn’t divulge to anyone else.
Learn what the cast reveals about season four in the video from the Sci Fi digital press tour, click on the link below:
Battlestar-Galactica-cast
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