TV Zone Article
"Peter Deluise: Jack-Of-All-Trades"

Back in the mid-Eighties, actor Peter DeLuise made, young girls' flutter with his performance as hip and hunky Officer Doug Penhall on 21 Jump Street. He also had the opportunity to direct three episodes. His work on both sides of the camera impressed director/producer Jonathan Glassner and producer N John Smith, both of whom ended up on Stargate SG-1. They remembered DeLuise and hired him to direct the second season episode Serpent's Song and then asked him back to do Show and Tell. Since then, DeLuise has become one of their most prolific and respected directors. For him, it is a match made in heaven. "I've always been a huge Science Fiction fan," says DeLuise. "As a young child I read a lot of Robert Heinlen. I've seen every single episode of Star Trek, classic and contemporary, and I even played the genetically re-engineered combat soldier Dagwood on seaQuest DSV, which was tons of fun. So, naturally, when Stargate came along I was ecstatic. It's very challenging and stimulating and, because I have a compulsive/obsessive work process, I tend to completely immerse myself in this reality. I must be doing all right because they keep giving me more work. Either that or no one else is available," he jokes.

"Directing drama is, for me, the easiest," adds the actor. "You grasp the idea, dramatize it and as long as it stays interesting you should be OK. Comedy is much more difficult because not only do you have to understand the concept, you also have to make fun of it. Well, I put it to you that directing Science Fiction is exponentially more difficult than either straight drama or comedy because you have to hold the interest of today's more sophisticated television viewer. You're competing with the big boys, namely feature films, in terms of visual effects. The viewers' thumb is hovering over the channel-changing button and if you bore him even for a second he'll change the station. With Stargate I have to appeal to his visceral side, his id, or something, so that his thumb doesn't switch channels."

Canadian Bound

Even with a vote of confidence in Glassner and Smith to work on Stargate SG-1, DeLuise had to meet other requirements. "The Canadian government subsidizes the film industry in the same way that some countries subsidize art," he says. "For your television show or feature film to qualify for such funding you have to guarantee a certain amount of Canadian participation. That means most, if not all, of your employees must be Canadian. Therefore, until I became a landed immigrant I was ineligible to work on these types of projects. Shortly after I got my landed residency I was put on standby status for Stargate. All the directing spots for the second season had already been filled but I was told that if any director backed out I could substitute for them. Sure enough, someone did and I got my chance." DeLuise began working on Serpent's Song in which the SG-1 team captures its old enemy Apophis (Peter Williams). The Goa'uld is dying and they reluctantly grant his request for sanctuary in the Stargate complex, even though the force pursuing Apophis is capable of destroying the base. Dealing with a doomed deity presented quite a dilemma. "I had 14 pages of scenes in which Apophis is slowly dying in the infirmary's ICU [intensive care unit]," he recalls. "Now, that amount of pages is daunting to begin with but considering the subject matter it had the potential to be boring. I'm talking Snoresville! Remember my metaphor about the hovering thumb over the television remote control? I thought, 'God, the fans are going to be changing the channel in droves. What am I going to do?' "I decided to visually stimulate the audience. First off, I put Apophis in a bondage jacket because he was an intimidating foe a la Hannibal Lecter. Next, he was supposed to have broken both his femurs, so we strapped some heavy-duty braces on him and that looked cool, too. The character also began ageing at an accelerated rate and his eyes were glowing, which gave viewers that much more to look at. "Poor Peter Williams was completely blind during the scenes in which Apophis has aged into a super-old man. We put white fogged-up contact lens in his eyes and all he could see were shadows. I'd go over and talk with him and, of course, I'd just be a voice in the darkness, so I'd touch his arm as if he really were blind and tried to make him feet comfortable. I remember thinking, 'This is quite a lot to ask of an actor. He's gone through three hours of make-up, we've blinded him and now we're asking him to act. 'Peter was a real trouper, though, and really gave all of himself and more in his performance."

Stiff Stiff!

When Apophis finally passes away his body is deposited back on the planet where SG-1 captured him'. Although it was quite a sombre moment in the episode, the behind-the-scenes antics were quite different. "Teal'c [Christopher Judge] carries Apophis's body, which is all wrapped up, through the Stargate and places him in a puddle of water. The 'body' was, in fact, a dummy, but it was stiff to the point that it looked phony. We couldn't have that, so we unwrapped it and broke its arms and legs so that it would bend more like a human being. Then we re-wrapped it, Chris picked it up and we re-shot the scene. Can you imagine, our stiff was too stiff," DeLuise chuckles. "Most of this episode was shot on the show's standing sets, but we did have one day out on location on what we call the Richmond sandpits where we film a lot of 'otherworldly' action. We set off quite a few explosions that day and we also had to bring the Stargate with us, which is a major financial undertaking. There was a def-glider crash in the story and we had an actual glider mock-up complete with fire and smoke which was pretty neat. Traditionally on this show you'll have two or three days out on location. Sometimes you won't be working in standing sets at all and you'll do the en- tire episode somewhere else. I shot one earlier this year called Demons and they built this gorgeous medieval village for me. It was 360' of stone masonry, thatched roofs and burning torches. I was really digging it."

In Show and Tell, DeLuise's second outing as Stargate SG-1 director, a young boy comes through the Stargate and warns of an invasion by renegade out-of-phase Reetu. The Reetu plan to stop the Goa'uld from continuing to breed by destroying all species capable of serving as host to a Goa'uld larva, including Humanity. DeLuise worked both sides of the camera. "I played the uncredited role of a machine gun guard," says the actor. "If you've seen the episode you'll remember the scene in which security has been breached and all these guards come running into the gate room to confront this 'enemy' who's come through the Stargate. Here are all these strong, confident, heterosexual men pointing their guns at this little humanoid who, when he pulls back his hood, ends up being a tiny child. I thought, 'Someone's got to react to this and it may as well be me.' So I come out from behind the shield of my 25mm cannon and sort of give him a lingering look. Every once in a while I like to make a cameo appearance. It's almost like playing 'Where's Waldo' but with Peter DeLuise," he laughs.

"Show and Tell was particularly difficult because SG-1 is up against an invisible foe. The only way you could see it was to excite its molecules by using your trans-phase eradication rod, otherwise known as the TER. The TER was a new weapon introduced in this story to combat the Reetu, which are these giant bugs that resemble lobsters. The first blast from the weapon lights up the creature or excites its molecules so you can see it, and then the second part of the gun, the eradicator, allows you to destroy it. "On this show they're serious about making things look tactically sound. They have a technical advisor whose only job it is to say, 'This is how you would tactically approach this situation. 'Well, here's where we had a problem. SG-1 is moving down hallways trying to fight an adversary that has invisibility on its side. To my knowledge, there's no tactic that's been developed to fight an enemy you can't see. So Colonel O'Neill and his team have to manoeuver the best they can and I think they do just fine."

Preparation

DeLuise learnt a great deal from Serpent's Song and Show and Tell and has his own way of preparing to direct. "The first thing I do when I read a script is pay very close attention to my immediate reaction, as opposed to my, 'Hey, I've thought about this for quite a while and now I feel this way,' reaction," he explains. "My first impression is very important to me as a director because, like the audience, I'm taking in this information for the first time. If I'm going along and suddenly come to a line that makes me think, 'That doesn't make sense,' or, 'This could be better,' I'll make a note to discuss it with the writer/producer in charge of the particular episode. "After reading the script I just want the story to be clear and I want it to stay within the logic of the show's established parameters. I also don't want to counter any rules that have already been set up in other episodes because the fans who are watching will go, 'That was convenient. Last week this happened and this week it didn't'.

"The other thing is details. It may not be especially relevant to the plot of a story but I love crazy, cool Sci-Fi details! A scene in one of the episodes might call for Teal'c to open his staff weapon. I'll want to see the inner workings, what the wiring looks like, the whole schematics of the thing, so I can then show the audience. The props guys are constantly shaking their heads at me and saying, 'Do you really want to see inside,' and I'm like, 'Yeah, I want to see the fun stuff.' "I'm always taking the visual effects gang out to dinner so I can pick their brains. I'm a jack-of-all-trades but a master of none and I don't pretend to know half or even a quarter as much as the guys working in the specialty departments on Stargate. We'll be in a meeting and I'll say to them, 'Look, you've been with this programme since day one. You know what's good, so you tell me.' We're all in this together and the only thing I'm interested in is finding the good stuff so we can put it on television."

Latest Season

In mid-February DeLuise returned to start work on the third season. At the time of this interview (mid-May) he had already directed Legacy, Point of View and Demons, and was prepping for a fourth, Forever in a Day, and had been assigned a fifth, Jolinar's Memories. Each of the first three stories he shot features an old friend or enemy. "In Legacy, Michael Shanks's character [Doctor Daniel Jackson] suffers a major psychological breakdown after picking up one of Machello's anti-Goa'uld devices. Machello was a slightly loony, off-world inventor SG-1 first met in the second season (Holiday), and who was played under heavy, heavy make-up by Michael. One of his inventions is accidentally activated by Daniel and that's the catalyst for this story.

"Point of View is a sequel to the [first-season] episode There But For The Grace of God. Alternate incarnations of our characters use the quantum mirror being stored at Area 51 to cross over to our universe and ask for help. I love all that alternate reality stuff," says the actor. "One of my favourite Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes is the one in which Starfleet is at war and the Enterprise bridge is on fire and Picard [Patrick Stewart] jumps over the control board to fire the phasers [Yesterday's Enterprise]. In Point of View we stage a mini-war inside the Stargate complex. It's a yard-by-yard, fight-to-the-death type of battle sequence featuring an all-new lighting scheme and tons of destruction inside the base. "In Demons we re-introduce an alien race known as the Unas, which is a demon-like creature with superhuman strength that was first seen in the episode Thor's Hammer. They're pretty cool looking predator-like lizard guys with horns, fangs, the whole works. Fans will love them. The story itself delves into the pre-history of the Goa'ulds and how the Unas played a key role in their development, so I found that very interesting and informative."

Although he still remains active as an actor, DeLuise now spends most of his time directing, especially Stargate SG-1, and enjoys the challenge of telling a story from behind the camera. "When I'm acting I feel like a tiny wheel in a giant machine as opposed to a director who, granted, is not the end all and be all of what's happening, but he sure has a lot more say. "Stargate is a dream come true for me," he enthuses. "I started out as a substitute director and now they've started to refer to me as an in-house director. So this is basically all I'm doing right now and I couldn't be happier. I love these guys to death. I like to consider myself an optimist but I can't help thinking, 'This is going to end one day,'and when it does it will truly be a sad day for me."

TV Zone Article: Peter DeLuise: Jack-Of-All-Trades
Issue #118
By Steven Eramo