Look who’s Stalking ….
Date: Christmas 2005
Source: SFX #138

 

 

 

 

 

The SFX Stalker asks the questions that really make the stars go … “Freak!”

AARON DOUGLAS

The 34 year-old Canadian actor plays Chief Tyrol in the excellent Battlestar Galactica TV series, and we cornered him at the Memorabilia event to uncover the truth about his secret history in Canadian logging and illegal egg-throwing.

 

What’s the most illegal thing you’ve ever done?

That I got caught for? I threw an egg when I was in my teens. Well, a couple of eggs. One after the other, in rapid succession. And they seemed to find their way to an officer of the law. I got in a lot of trouble for that, deservedly so.

 

What makes you angry day-to-day?

Rude people. Bad refereeing. Slow drivers. My putter. My three-iron. My four-iron. My five-iron. Sometimes my nine-iron – actually I broke my nine iron so it’s dead to me now.

 

If you were invisible for a day what would you do?

I would go sit in on meetings held in and around the white house and see just what is really going on there, and just who really is running that place.

 

And if you could have another superpower too?

I’d want the ability to change into anything. And change other things into anything. Like a shape-shifter. But also to turn a chair into a rock or something.

 

What sort of thing do you get sent by fans?

There’s a woman, probably my biggest fan – she’s absolutely delightful. She posts all over the web, talks about me incessantly. She sent me this massive, massive scrapbook that must have taken her literally months to make. It’s clippings and pictures and poems and it’s absolutely fantastic, and I’m stunned by the effort that went into this thing.

 

What’s the dumbest job you ever had to do?

Everything I did before this was dumb! Nothing I’d want to go back to. There was a braindead job, working for a guy who built docks, you know, for boats. I had to go and pick up the logs for the wood.

 

You were a lumberjack!

Basically I was a log mover.

 

What’s the most difficult line you’ve had to say on tv?

Probably the lines where it’s written in the script that Tyrol turns and see his man slipping away and has to yell “Noooooooooooo!” Those lines are the worst, I hate that stuff.

 

What are you most hoping will happen to your character?

That he’ll have an affair with every girl on the show! And I want Tyrol to save the universe and have his own spin-off show. Yeah, Adama gets killed and Tyrol now runs the Battlestar. He turns it into a giant floating bar! They call it The Tyrol Show.

 

Where do you hide your pornography?

I don’t hide it.

 

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Class Of ’78
Date: November 2005
Source: SFX #136

 

 

 

 

 

The cast of the original Battlestar Galactica are reunited … in Swindon! SFX was there..

“Where’s Face? Where the fuck’s Face?!?”

Swindon’s press pack is having kittens. Two limos have just disgorged the cast of Battlestar Galactica for a photocall, but Dirk Benedict (Starbuck) is missing. Everyone thought he was “in the other car”. Oops. They never had this trouble when they FTL-jumped through space…

We’re here for a signing by Galactica veterans at memorabilia store Infinitely Better. For the next few hours, a steady stream of fans files through. As Richard Hatch (Apollo) notes, that’s an achievement. “People keep forgetting, Star Trek was on three years before it came back but we were on one – one season! To impact so many people with a one year show is amazing.”

A lot’s changed since 1978. Noah Hathaway (who played Boxey) is now covered in tattoos and has a tongue piercing. Meanwhile, Anne Lockhart, who played female pilot Sheba recalls being given her jacket from the series a few years back. “I tried to put it on,” she laughs. “And I went, ‘Oh, this isn’t gonna work!’ The only person in the house who could get into it was my nine year-old son! I thought, ‘Was I ever that small?'”

“I had a black leather suit”, adds Laurette Spang (aka Cassiopeia). “I still have that! My husband loved that suit!”

The room erupts into uproarious laughter at the insinuation. It’s very clear that this mob is still family. When a bemused Dirk Benedict finally turns up, half an hour late, he’s greeted with whoops and applause.

“I’m sitting in my room going [mimes looking at his watch] and then they called me and they go, ‘Oh yeah, we forgot you! We’ll come back.’ I know it was on purpose … Hey! You guys ate all the sandwiches!”

Once the signing’s underway SFX says hello to Aaron Douglas [Tyrol from the new series]. We bet he does loads of signings.

“Nah. I’d rather go down the pub!” Aaron deadpans, “Tell me, what can you do on a Thursday evening in Swindon?”

Er … get out of Swindon?

“That’s what someone else told me,” sighs Douglas. “Why do we always end up in these towns?”

He’s got a point. Even the Cylons wouldn’t have followed Galactica to Swindon ….

 

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