Top Of The Flops schrijfsel: Een goed gesprek met Jeffrey Combs (Engels)

Random Animé -Tonari No Totoro -Akira -Saishû Heiki Kanojo -Koroshiya 1: The Animation Episode 0 -Chevalier d'Eon, le Laatste Recensies (Update 11/07/11) -Ame Agaru -Walk the Line -Nude Nuns With Big Guns -Return of the Living Dead III -Thor Laatste Schrijfsels (Update 10/06/11) -B.O.T.S. 2011 -Reinert Kiil over de Hora Trilogie en meer (Engels) -RRFFF 2010 -BUTFF 2010 -Lloyd Kaufman over Troma en meer (Nederlands)		Titel: Een goed gesprek met Jeffrey Combs (Engels) Auteur: Frank Categorie: Interview Datum: 22/10/05 Dankzij de organisatie van Utopia heb ik de mogelijkheid gekregen om een icoon uit de horrorwereld te interviewen. Via deze weg wil ik Utopia nogmaals bedanken voor deze mogelijkheid en bij deze geef ik al aan dat ik volgend jaar het weekend van 20 tot 22 oktober weer aanwezig zal zijn voor Utopia VII en hopelijk ook 25 maart bij het Outlawed effent. Voor meer info over Utopia kijk eens op de website: www.utopiasite.com en hopelijk zie ik jullie ook de volgende keer. What made you want to be a actor? Thats a good question I guess. Hmm, I guess an easy grade, girls. There were a lot of cute girls in the acting class. Well, you know, you start things for one reason and then you find better and better reasons to do what you do and my first reasons were pretty selfish. But then, as I started exploring it as a craft I began to appreciate the honour of being able to bring a character to life and tell a story and explore the human conditions. I think you’re most famous part is that of Herbert West in Re-Animator. For what? Herbert West in Re-Animator. I don’t remember that! (laughing) Yeah, so I think I’m best known for that. You’re seen as a horror icon, what’s you’re opinion about that? I’m honoured. I had no idea when I made that movie it would be as iconic as it has become. It became pretty clear afterwards with the response of the movie when it opened that it had a popularity to it. But even then I had no idea that 20 years later I would be sitting here talking to you about it, or that we would still be talking about making more of them, even now. Actually I feel honoured. A couple of years ago I made a third sequel for that movie and that’s like kinda rare for a actor to play a role that he began 20 years before. An example of that I can think of is Sean Connery and James Bond or something like that. It’s a pretty unique situation. Most movies you’re in are horror movies. Is it hard for you to get out of the horror genre? Yes. It’s the way this business is. When you get known for something, then it perpatuates itself. I suppose it’s natural human nature for the way business is. If you’re a succes in that then that’s what you’re a succes at. It gets a little frustrating for me. You know, you have some power in some ways and then you’re powerless and you’re always a bit of a victim to the system. And so what I try to do is when I do get offered something I try to make everything a little different. I’m not interested in playing the same guy over and over, even though I may be stuck in a genre I try to mix it up a little bit and then I’m not always the same sort of guy. I’m never always the same mad scientist coming around with a needle. Are you a horror fan? Well, I am a horror fan of good horror. I suppose that’s a subjective thing but I think there’s a lot of crap. Could you give me an example of good horror? There are things that I like or there are portions of movies that I like. But I really don’t like mostly the formulaic, set them up to kill them. I mean it’s so predictable. A carload of young people, a house full of young people and then it’s just who is gonna die first and how, who’s gonna die second and how. Oh, that one’s got a spike through the head, then the next one’s gonna be… you know. To me there’s no drama there. It sort of speaks a deal, a business deal that’s based on every 15 minutes we have to have a cool death as supposed to: what’s our story and what happens next and why are people doing what they do? And to me that’s much more exciting and thrilling when you don’t now what’s gonna happen next. Most of them you know what’s gonna happen next and yet there you sit there and watch it. They make money and its just not interesting. If you could pick a role what you would really like to play, what kind of role would you like to play and why just that kind of role? Euhm, not one particular role but I really like to play things completely out of the genre. So I sort of had my run of it. So I’ve always wanted to play in sort of historical drama's. I’m very much an avid sort of reader of historical fiction and none fiction. Euhm, westerns. I’d love to do a western. I did a movie many years ago that nobody probably has seen that’s called 'Love and a .45'! Ok that’s a coincidence, I wanted to talk about that movie as well. Well, it’s not a western but you can see that I could do that and I had a great time making that movie, and I think in it’s way it’s one of my top five favorite movies that I’ve ever done. Ok that bring’s me to me next question which is about 'Love and .45'. I’ve read on the internet that you said that the role you’re most proud of is that of Dinosaur Bob. Well, it’s not the role I’m most proud of but it’s certainly on one hand. I can say that’s where I was given a opportunity to do something other than a mad scientist or someone running around in a castle with a hatchet, well you know what I mean. And so I really just really enjoyed that variety. And so let's do more cutting edge sort of straight ahead independent movie like that. You know, look at that cast, it’s Renee Zellweger’s second movie. Yeah, her first was Texas Chainsaw Massacre… (finishing my sentence…) 4 Which she sort of “euhm, let that one not be known.” Well we know! And Gill Bellows I believe, Rory Cochrane’s in there, Peter Fonda. It’s quite a cast. Yeah it’s quite a cast, but you know, that movie suffered because it came out just after 'Natural Born Killers'. And it was criticized because it was accused of being a 'Natural Born' Killers rip-off. But in reality it was made before 'Natural Born Killers'! What’s you’re most memorable experience on set? Ah, that’s a difficult one, really there’s no way to answer that. There were a lot of memorable moments on set. Well, I think that the best time that you have on set is kinda like the best time that an athlete has on a playing field where he’s just doing it and you don’t remember it until afterwards, you know? Some of the greatest performances happen when you’re not even thinking about it. When a great athlete makes a kick in a goal he’s not taking it down and thinking about saying: “wow, this is a great moment that I’m experiencing right now as I kick the ball.” It’s just like the Nike ad, he’s just doing it. You know what I mean, you’re not conscious of the before and after in the moment and the best acting is like that. Only afterwards can we sit back and go: “well, gee, that was really good.” I think great acting is all about “was that any good, was thát any good, I don’t know?? Somebody tell me , I hope it but I don’t know!” I’m still staying with the movies here. A lot of the movies you’re in are made by Stuart Gordon and Brian Yuzna. What’s the story behind that? Well, they were certainly there when.. actually, we were all there when it kinda started, and we are friends and both of them are quite loyal. And so whenever they’re doing projects thankfully you know, they think of me and offer me things. And sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t. We have always left those doors open and it looks like we may be working together again because we’re talking very strongly about doing at least one more 'Re-Animator'. Maybe three! Brian has an idea of making three 'Re-Animators' and they whoop ass all of 'em. Within a years time, just do three at a time. It’s kinda like the horror version of 'The Lord of the Rings' business model or something. I don’t know but that’s sort of his thinking. The backup position would be to do at least one. It all depends upon the business response to the preposal. You know what I mean, he’ll go to film rockets and talk to buyers and see what their reactions will be. Well, I certainly hope there will be another Re-Animator. Well, I can imagine that they would at least want to finance one. And the first one would be with Stuart! Stuart back as director? Hmhm. In fact I’m trying to get these people here to get me on the internet because my wife called me and said that I had gotten an email from Bryan about euhm, well he just backed down the story from Stuart and wanted me to read it. So I’m in the Netherlands waiting to get connected so I can read this. So were on the lip of it here, on the edge of it. I really hope it comes through. Cool, thanks. Well, Re-Animator, Lovecraft. A lot of Lovecraft movies. Have you read Lovecraft? I never read 'em before I started, you know. I sorta bullshitted my way through audition and Stuart said that this was Lovecraft’s 'Re-Animator'. And I went ohh yeah okay, cool, yeah!! Well, I heard the name but I didn’t really know em, it could have been a dildo manufacturer you know what I mean. Since then I’ve read some Lovecraft, I’m not a visionada of him, but I find a lot of it not very plot driven, very sort of a general atmosphere, disease, things lurking in the dark, an unease about things. So he’s very difficult to adapt to film because film is very plot driven and visual and a lot of the time Lovecraft is not particulary visual as he is kinda atmospherically disturbing. So it’s very difficult to adapt a lot of his stories to film. And I think it’s kinda hard to read some of his stories because what’s going on here, what’s the goal. There’s only an atmosphere and you see nothing. But then again he has a resurgent, an appreciation by a lot of people. I think 'Re-Animator' sort of wasn’t the first but it certainly kicked in a new awareness of Lovecraft. But Lovecraft hated the 'Re-Animator' story, he didn’t like it. It was a series that he did for a magazine (Home Brew, 1922, red.), he’d write a chapter and next week another chapter and another and he did it for a little bit of money and he just did it very quickly. I’m sure at the time he had no idea that it would be turned into a 80's movie that would lush him out of and give hem notoriety that he would never even imagine. Next to playing in a lot of movies, you’re seen in a lot of supporting roles like Shran in Enterprise. What’s the big difference between playing in movies and series? Time! Television is much more of a factory. Its go, go, go, go, go, but all movies are that too though. It’s all about “this is costing us money, what are we getting today, and how far behind are we, and how do we shoot this scene so we can get out of here and shoot the next one?” Rarely is there a sort of “we have all the time in the world” attitude on a movie set but certainly not on a tv set, it’s much quicker. And so in that world you have to be very prepared. At least I always took it as having the responsibility to be prepared, because when it comes time for you there are a hundred people standing around and looking at their watches, but the same time that doesn’t mean you have to hurry through the scene, you have to do it right. But you have this responsibility to make it in time. With Star Trek there’s all that make-up, so most of the time I went to the studio at 4:30 in the morning because you have to be in the make-up when the rest of the crew shows up at 7 o’clock ready to work. So otherwise if they called you in and they called the crew in, the crew would be sitting around while for two and a half hours you are getting in the make-up. So better me than all of them, it’s a lot cheaper. So maybe you get out of there 8:30 maybe 9 o’clock at night and come back tomorrow to do it again. So it’s very houred, it’s very time intensive but for a short period of time, before you can be at home. Are you a Star Trek fan? I’m a original series Star Trek fan. I thought that the original series, the reason why there are all of the others, is because of the flair and energy and swashbuffling sort of attitude and the ideas of the original series. Even though now if you look at them technically they are a little cheesy, you know the sets are clumsy and the costumes are hooky and the sounds and the special effects are kind of stupid, but at the time they weren’t. They were very cutting edge. So if it hadn’t been then there wouldn’t be all of the others. And I think to greater and lesser degree some of the other series have come close to the original. Like 'Enterprise'? I think 'Enterprise' in last season started getting a real flavour of the original series. I’m not quite sure it started out that way, I know it didn’t. I thought that, the beginning of 'Enterprise' would be before the Prime Directive. You know what the Prime Directive is? Yeah, I know. It says don’t interfere with other species and right away they were not interfering. See I was expecting more, a little more reckless. I wanted more of a reckless kind of come in a room and not think about the effects and coming in like explorers through history. You know, like you step ashore and say this is ours get of our way, were better than you and not realising they were bringing corruption and disease and destroying whatever, either on purpose or accidentally, destroying entire cultures. So I was kinda hoping a little bit of that but it wasn’t there. Although through my character I sort of tried to convey some of that. Shran would definitely be well intentioned but just barges in, knows what he wants, “get out of my way, I don’t care, we will do it anyway.” You know what I mean! Yeah I know what you mean. Are you proud of the fact that you’re a part of the Star Trek saga? Very much so. I’m old enough to have been a kid when the original series was on tv. It greatly affected me, entertained me. I had no notion that years later I would be part of that lineage and that I would have done almost 50 episodes of Star Trek. That would have never occurred to me. That would have been a little dream way back in my head that I wouldn’t have imagined to be true. Having said that while I was doing it, I knew that I was lucky. Every time my agent would call and say: “They want you for another one.” I’m happy and I know that I’m lucky. I never complained about any of it, I’m just blessed and lucky to be there. And they were always happy to have me there too so that was also a good thing. You know, we knew each other’s value I guess. It also afforded me a way of being able to say: “See, I’m not just horror!” It gave me another outlet so that people would go: “You know, he doesn’t do just that, he also does that.” That’s a really important thing for people to be aware of. The more people you work with, the more work you get, they know that and hopefully it perpetuates itself. Through Star Trek you got a foot in the Sci-Fi world, you already got a foot in the horror world… (Finishing my sentence…) What’s next! Yeah, what is next? I don’t know, that’s a good question. I never know. I never knew that I would ever do Re-Animator. I was doing a play and the casting director said: “I’m casting a film”. Next thing I know, I’m doing that. You know, I got an audition for Star Trek for one role, one episode and had no idea or notion that it would turn into close to fifty. That’s the glory and wonder of this business that you never know where the seed for the next opportunity is gonna land. Working with young directors, and that young director one day turns into a major director or some kid somewhere is watching my work either now or years ago and says: “Wow, I’d really love to work with that guy someday, if only I could.” You hear about it all the time. Some director goes: “I love that guy when I was a kid, so now I’m doing this big movie and I want him in it!” It can happen, it happens all the time. The more work you get the more exposure you get, good work begets good work. It’s been a good career with a lot of blessings and a lot of travel, I’ve seen the world. Australia, New-Zealand, London, Spain, Italy, Rumania, Bulgaria... The Netherlands! The Netherlands of course, last but not least. Is there anything else that you would like to share with us or comment? Well, you know I’m continuing to try to do good work. Well I’m recurring in a show right now called “The 4400” which I guess you guys don’t get here. It’s really kind of a cool Sci-Fi show that has got a bit of a following in the States. In february it’s starting it’s third season. It’s about 4400 people that have suddenly reappeared, they’ve disappeared. They are like missing people for over the last fifty years like the people on milk cartons and stuff. Where did they go and all of the sudden they show back up. They’re all by a lake shore, so the government wants to know where did they go why are they back, why do some of them have special powers. They wanna study them, and the people don't want to be studied. So it’s sort of a interesting dynamics. I’m proud to be doing that and there’s talk of a new 'Re-Animator'. I’m intrigued about exploring Herbert West a little bit more so we’ll see how that goes. At that moment the P.A. of Jeff comes in and tells us we have gotten 5 more minutes!!! We didn’t talk about 'The Frighteners'! Indeed we haven’t, 'The Frighteners' by Peter Jackson. THE Peter Jackson. The one and only. Sir Peter Jackson. Phenomenal, one of my hot points. Also in your top five? Yeah indeed. I just wished that that movie had gotten a little more recognition when it came out. It was not well publicized. I don’t know when it opened in Europe but in the States it was originally going to be a sort of october release, but they changed their mind and released it in the summer. It’s not a summer movie, it’s more a winter movie or autumn. It was kinda stupid and I think that kept people away. It also such a unique movie, it was shot in New-Zealand and Universal, the studio, didn’t know how to categorise it. You see, these big studios, if something is complicated or unique they freeze in their tracks and they just like to keep it simple. And Peter Jackson is not simple. No indeed, just look at 'The Frighteners', 'Bad Taste', 'The Lord of the Rings'. He has done a lot, all very different and unique and well thought of. And what he wanted to do with 'The Frighteners' I think was start at one place, which was light and accessible and then just corkscrew down into a very dark place. And that’s where the studio's didn’t know what they have here. So they promoted the light, sort of a Michael J. Fox meets 'Ghost', a big live action 'Casper', as a comedy. Well, it is but it is just not that. People who are horror fans maybe wouldn’t go to that because it seems to thin, and so people who thought it was a comedy would go to it and kinda felt they hadn’t been told enough about the movie. They didn’t know what to expect. So it split the audience, and then you put it out at the wrong time, wrong campaign, but in retrospect people loved that movie. Because of the incredible brilliance and success of 'The Lord of the Rings' people started exploring it again. It’s kinda like a musician whose third album explodes and they go: “What were his first two like?” So people come back around and explore it afterwards. You’ve done some comic adaptations as well like Faust and Dr. Mordrid. Yeah, that’s true. You know, you do some things for some reasons and you do other things for… frankly, you get paid! You get paid to do things and some things aren’t as successful as others. But you try to do something interesting within what you have control over. I haven’t thought about Dr. Mordrid in a while, it’s a complete and total rip-off of Dr. Strange, but still I had fun doing that. Jeff, thank you for your time! (Later that day I asked Jeff if he had gotten his email from Brian and if it was what he was expecting. His answer was: Yeah, I got it and I started reading the story, so far it’s just hilarious!)
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Titel: Een goed gesprek met Jeffrey Combs (Engels)
Auteur: Frank
Categorie: Interview
Datum: 22/10/05

Dankzij de organisatie van Utopia heb ik de mogelijkheid gekregen om een icoon uit de horrorwereld te interviewen. Via deze weg wil ik Utopia nogmaals bedanken voor deze mogelijkheid en bij deze geef ik al aan dat ik volgend jaar het weekend van 20 tot 22 oktober weer aanwezig zal zijn voor Utopia VII en hopelijk ook 25 maart bij het Outlawed effent. Voor meer info over Utopia kijk eens op de website: www.utopiasite.com en hopelijk zie ik jullie ook de volgende keer.

What made you want to be a actor?

Thats a good question I guess. Hmm, I guess an easy grade, girls. There were a lot of cute girls in the acting class. Well, you know, you start things for one reason and then you find better and better reasons to do what you do and my first reasons were pretty selfish. But then, as I started exploring it as a craft I began to appreciate the honour of being able to bring a character to life and tell a story and explore the human conditions.

I think you’re most famous part is that of Herbert West in Re-Animator.

For what?

Herbert West in Re-Animator.

I don’t remember that! (laughing)

Yeah, so I think I’m best known for that.

You’re seen as a horror icon, what’s you’re opinion about that?

I’m honoured. I had no idea when I made that movie it would be as iconic as it has become. It became pretty clear afterwards with the response of the movie when it opened that it had a popularity to it. But even then I had no idea that 20 years later I would be sitting here talking to you about it, or that we would still be talking about making more of them, even now. Actually I feel honoured. A couple of years ago I made a third sequel for that movie and that’s like kinda rare for a actor to play a role that he began 20 years before. An example of that I can think of is Sean Connery and James Bond or something like that. It’s a pretty unique situation.

Most movies you’re in are horror movies. Is it hard for you to get out of the horror genre?

Yes. It’s the way this business is. When you get known for something, then it perpatuates itself. I suppose it’s natural human nature for the way business is. If you’re a succes in that then that’s what you’re a succes at. It gets a little frustrating for me. You know, you have some power in some ways and then you’re powerless and you’re always a bit of a victim to the system. And so what I try to do is when I do get offered something I try to make everything a little different. I’m not interested in playing the same guy over and over, even though I may be stuck in a genre I try to mix it up a little bit and then I’m not always the same sort of guy. I’m never always the same mad scientist coming around with a needle.

Are you a horror fan?

Well, I am a horror fan of good horror. I suppose that’s a subjective thing but I think there’s a lot of crap.

Could you give me an example of good horror?

There are things that I like or there are portions of movies that I like. But I really don’t like mostly the formulaic, set them up to kill them. I mean it’s so predictable. A carload of young people, a house full of young people and then it’s just who is gonna die first and how, who’s gonna die second and how. Oh, that one’s got a spike through the head, then the next one’s gonna be… you know. To me there’s no drama there. It sort of speaks a deal, a business deal that’s based on every 15 minutes we have to have a cool death as supposed to: what’s our story and what happens next and why are people doing what they do? And to me that’s much more exciting and thrilling when you don’t now what’s gonna happen next. Most of them you know what’s gonna happen next and yet there you sit there and watch it. They make money and its just not interesting.

If you could pick a role what you would really like to play, what kind of role would you like to play and why just that kind of role?

Euhm, not one particular role but I really like to play things completely out of the genre. So I sort of had my run of it. So I’ve always wanted to play in sort of historical drama's. I’m very much an avid sort of reader of historical fiction and none fiction. Euhm, westerns. I’d love to do a western. I did a movie many years ago that nobody probably has seen that’s called 'Love and a .45'!

Ok that’s a coincidence, I wanted to talk about that movie as well.

Well, it’s not a western but you can see that I could do that and I had a great time making that movie, and I think in it’s way it’s one of my top five favorite movies that I’ve ever done.

Ok that bring’s me to me next question which is about 'Love and .45'. I’ve read on the internet that you said that the role you’re most proud of is that of Dinosaur Bob.

Well, it’s not the role I’m most proud of but it’s certainly on one hand. I can say that’s where I was given a opportunity to do something other than a mad scientist or someone running around in a castle with a hatchet, well you know what I mean. And so I really just really enjoyed that variety. And so let's do more cutting edge sort of straight ahead independent movie like that. You know, look at that cast, it’s Renee Zellweger’s second movie.

Yeah, her first was Texas Chainsaw Massacre…

(finishing my sentence…) 4 Which she sort of “euhm, let that one not be known.” Well we know! And Gill Bellows I believe, Rory Cochrane’s in there, Peter Fonda.

It’s quite a cast.

Yeah it’s quite a cast, but you know, that movie suffered because it came out just after 'Natural Born Killers'. And it was criticized because it was accused of being a 'Natural Born' Killers rip-off. But in reality it was made before 'Natural Born Killers'!

What’s you’re most memorable experience on set?

Ah, that’s a difficult one, really there’s no way to answer that. There were a lot of memorable moments on set. Well, I think that the best time that you have on set is kinda like the best time that an athlete has on a playing field where he’s just doing it and you don’t remember it until afterwards, you know? Some of the greatest performances happen when you’re not even thinking about it. When a great athlete makes a kick in a goal he’s not taking it down and thinking about saying: “wow, this is a great moment that I’m experiencing right now as I kick the ball.” It’s just like the Nike ad, he’s just doing it. You know what I mean, you’re not conscious of the before and after in the moment and the best acting is like that. Only afterwards can we sit back and go: “well, gee, that was really good.” I think great acting is all about “was that any good, was thát any good, I don’t know?? Somebody tell me , I hope it but I don’t know!”

I’m still staying with the movies here. A lot of the movies you’re in are made by Stuart Gordon and Brian Yuzna. What’s the story behind that?

Well, they were certainly there when.. actually, we were all there when it kinda started, and we are friends and both of them are quite loyal. And so whenever they’re doing projects thankfully you know, they think of me and offer me things. And sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t. We have always left those doors open and it looks like we may be working together again because we’re talking very strongly about doing at least one more 'Re-Animator'. Maybe three! Brian has an idea of making three 'Re-Animators' and they whoop ass all of 'em. Within a years time, just do three at a time. It’s kinda like the horror version of 'The Lord of the Rings' business model or something. I don’t know but that’s sort of his thinking. The backup position would be to do at least one. It all depends upon the business response to the preposal. You know what I mean, he’ll go to film rockets and talk to buyers and see what their reactions will be.

Well, I certainly hope there will be another Re-Animator.

Well, I can imagine that they would at least want to finance one. And the first one would be with Stuart!

Stuart back as director?

Hmhm. In fact I’m trying to get these people here to get me on the internet because my wife called me and said that I had gotten an email from Bryan about euhm, well he just backed down the story from Stuart and wanted me to read it. So I’m in the Netherlands waiting to get connected so I can read this. So were on the lip of it here, on the edge of it.

I really hope it comes through.

Cool, thanks.

Well, Re-Animator, Lovecraft. A lot of Lovecraft movies. Have you read Lovecraft?

I never read 'em before I started, you know. I sorta bullshitted my way through audition and Stuart said that this was Lovecraft’s 'Re-Animator'. And I went ohh yeah okay, cool, yeah!! Well, I heard the name but I didn’t really know em, it could have been a dildo manufacturer you know what I mean. Since then I’ve read some Lovecraft, I’m not a visionada of him, but I find a lot of it not very plot driven, very sort of a general atmosphere, disease, things lurking in the dark, an unease about things. So he’s very difficult to adapt to film because film is very plot driven and visual and a lot of the time Lovecraft is not particulary visual as he is kinda atmospherically disturbing. So it’s very difficult to adapt a lot of his stories to film. And I think it’s kinda hard to read some of his stories because what’s going on here, what’s the goal. There’s only an atmosphere and you see nothing. But then again he has a resurgent, an appreciation by a lot of people. I think 'Re-Animator' sort of wasn’t the first but it certainly kicked in a new awareness of Lovecraft. But Lovecraft hated the 'Re-Animator' story, he didn’t like it. It was a series that he did for a magazine (Home Brew, 1922, red.), he’d write a chapter and next week another chapter and another and he did it for a little bit of money and he just did it very quickly. I’m sure at the time he had no idea that it would be turned into a 80's movie that would lush him out of and give hem notoriety that he would never even imagine.

Next to playing in a lot of movies, you’re seen in a lot of supporting roles like Shran in Enterprise. What’s the big difference between playing in movies and series?

Time! Television is much more of a factory. Its go, go, go, go, go, but all movies are that too though. It’s all about “this is costing us money, what are we getting today, and how far behind are we, and how do we shoot this scene so we can get out of here and shoot the next one?” Rarely is there a sort of “we have all the time in the world” attitude on a movie set but certainly not on a tv set, it’s much quicker. And so in that world you have to be very prepared. At least I always took it as having the responsibility to be prepared, because when it comes time for you there are a hundred people standing around and looking at their watches, but the same time that doesn’t mean you have to hurry through the scene, you have to do it right. But you have this responsibility to make it in time. With Star Trek there’s all that make-up, so most of the time I went to the studio at 4:30 in the morning because you have to be in the make-up when the rest of the crew shows up at 7 o’clock ready to work. So otherwise if they called you in and they called the crew in, the crew would be sitting around while for two and a half hours you are getting in the make-up. So better me than all of them, it’s a lot cheaper. So maybe you get out of there 8:30 maybe 9 o’clock at night and come back tomorrow to do it again. So it’s very houred, it’s very time intensive but for a short period of time, before you can be at home.

Are you a Star Trek fan?

I’m a original series Star Trek fan. I thought that the original series, the reason why there are all of the others, is because of the flair and energy and swashbuffling sort of attitude and the ideas of the original series. Even though now if you look at them technically they are a little cheesy, you know the sets are clumsy and the costumes are hooky and the sounds and the special effects are kind of stupid, but at the time they weren’t. They were very cutting edge. So if it hadn’t been then there wouldn’t be all of the others. And I think to greater and lesser degree some of the other series have come close to the original.

Like 'Enterprise'?

I think 'Enterprise' in last season started getting a real flavour of the original series. I’m not quite sure it started out that way, I know it didn’t. I thought that, the beginning of 'Enterprise' would be before the Prime Directive. You know what the Prime Directive is?

Yeah, I know.

It says don’t interfere with other species and right away they were not interfering. See I was expecting more, a little more reckless. I wanted more of a reckless kind of come in a room and not think about the effects and coming in like explorers through history. You know, like you step ashore and say this is ours get of our way, were better than you and not realising they were bringing corruption and disease and destroying whatever, either on purpose or accidentally, destroying entire cultures. So I was kinda hoping a little bit of that but it wasn’t there. Although through my character I sort of tried to convey some of that. Shran would definitely be well intentioned but just barges in, knows what he wants, “get out of my way, I don’t care, we will do it anyway.” You know what I mean!

Yeah I know what you mean.

Are you proud of the fact that you’re a part of the Star Trek saga?

Very much so. I’m old enough to have been a kid when the original series was on tv. It greatly affected me, entertained me. I had no notion that years later I would be part of that lineage and that I would have done almost 50 episodes of Star Trek. That would have never occurred to me. That would have been a little dream way back in my head that I wouldn’t have imagined to be true. Having said that while I was doing it, I knew that I was lucky. Every time my agent would call and say: “They want you for another one.” I’m happy and I know that I’m lucky. I never complained about any of it, I’m just blessed and lucky to be there. And they were always happy to have me there too so that was also a good thing. You know, we knew each other’s value I guess. It also afforded me a way of being able to say: “See, I’m not just horror!” It gave me another outlet so that people would go: “You know, he doesn’t do just that, he also does that.” That’s a really important thing for people to be aware of. The more people you work with, the more work you get, they know that and hopefully it perpetuates itself.

Through Star Trek you got a foot in the Sci-Fi world, you already got a foot in the horror world…

(Finishing my sentence…) What’s next!

Yeah, what is next?

I don’t know, that’s a good question. I never know. I never knew that I would ever do Re-Animator. I was doing a play and the casting director said: “I’m casting a film”. Next thing I know, I’m doing that. You know, I got an audition for Star Trek for one role, one episode and had no idea or notion that it would turn into close to fifty. That’s the glory and wonder of this business that you never know where the seed for the next opportunity is gonna land. Working with young directors, and that young director one day turns into a major director or some kid somewhere is watching my work either now or years ago and says: “Wow, I’d really love to work with that guy someday, if only I could.” You hear about it all the time. Some director goes: “I love that guy when I was a kid, so now I’m doing this big movie and I want him in it!” It can happen, it happens all the time. The more work you get the more exposure you get, good work begets good work. It’s been a good career with a lot of blessings and a lot of travel, I’ve seen the world. Australia, New-Zealand, London, Spain, Italy, Rumania, Bulgaria...

The Netherlands!

The Netherlands of course, last but not least.

Is there anything else that you would like to share with us or comment?

Well, you know I’m continuing to try to do good work. Well I’m recurring in a show right now called “The 4400” which I guess you guys don’t get here. It’s really kind of a cool Sci-Fi show that has got a bit of a following in the States. In february it’s starting it’s third season. It’s about 4400 people that have suddenly reappeared, they’ve disappeared. They are like missing people for over the last fifty years like the people on milk cartons and stuff. Where did they go and all of the sudden they show back up. They’re all by a lake shore, so the government wants to know where did they go why are they back, why do some of them have special powers. They wanna study them, and the people don't want to be studied. So it’s sort of a interesting dynamics. I’m proud to be doing that and there’s talk of a new 'Re-Animator'. I’m intrigued about exploring Herbert West a little bit more so we’ll see how that goes.

At that moment the P.A. of Jeff comes in and tells us we have gotten 5 more minutes!!!

We didn’t talk about 'The Frighteners'!

Indeed we haven’t, 'The Frighteners' by Peter Jackson.

THE Peter Jackson.

The one and only.

Sir Peter Jackson.

Phenomenal, one of my hot points.

Also in your top five?

Yeah indeed. I just wished that that movie had gotten a little more recognition when it came out. It was not well publicized. I don’t know when it opened in Europe but in the States it was originally going to be a sort of october release, but they changed their mind and released it in the summer. It’s not a summer movie, it’s more a winter movie or autumn. It was kinda stupid and I think that kept people away. It also such a unique movie, it was shot in New-Zealand and Universal, the studio, didn’t know how to categorise it. You see, these big studios, if something is complicated or unique they freeze in their tracks and they just like to keep it simple. And Peter Jackson is not simple.

No indeed, just look at 'The Frighteners', 'Bad Taste', 'The Lord of the Rings'.

He has done a lot, all very different and unique and well thought of. And what he wanted to do with 'The Frighteners' I think was start at one place, which was light and accessible and then just corkscrew down into a very dark place. And that’s where the studio's didn’t know what they have here. So they promoted the light, sort of a Michael J. Fox meets 'Ghost', a big live action 'Casper', as a comedy. Well, it is but it is just not that. People who are horror fans maybe wouldn’t go to that because it seems to thin, and so people who thought it was a comedy would go to it and kinda felt they hadn’t been told enough about the movie. They didn’t know what to expect. So it split the audience, and then you put it out at the wrong time, wrong campaign, but in retrospect people loved that movie. Because of the incredible brilliance and success of 'The Lord of the Rings' people started exploring it again. It’s kinda like a musician whose third album explodes and they go: “What were his first two like?” So people come back around and explore it afterwards.

You’ve done some comic adaptations as well like Faust and Dr. Mordrid.

Yeah, that’s true. You know, you do some things for some reasons and you do other things for… frankly, you get paid! You get paid to do things and some things aren’t as successful as others. But you try to do something interesting within what you have control over. I haven’t thought about Dr. Mordrid in a while, it’s a complete and total rip-off of Dr. Strange, but still I had fun doing that.

Jeff, thank you for your time!

(Later that day I asked Jeff if he had gotten his email from Brian and if it was what he was expecting. His answer was: Yeah, I got it and I started reading the story, so far it’s just hilarious!)