Virtuality article on Scifi.com

[Almearafan]

Just found this in the new section of Scifi's website http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=0&id=58810

 

Looks like it could be promising, and I'm really happy to see Clea Duvall involved in the project...I tend to like her in everything she does so far.  This is the first I've read or heard about this show.  Anyone else have any lowdown on it? 

 

Sounds very 'we're the new Star Trek' to me. :D

 

Virtuality Characters Unveiled

 

SCI FI Wire visited the Vancouver, Canada, set of Virtuality, the SF pilot for Fox from Battlestar Galactica's Ronald D. Moore and Michael Taylor, and saw more--and less--of the show than we thought. But we got the scoop about the show's central characters.

 

Television shooting schedules are always changing at the last minute, and Virtuality's was no exception. Once we arrived on the set at Vancouver's Bridge Studios, the producers suddenly realized that all the scenes they were shooting that day contained one key spoiler after another. There were some very nervous people on the set and apparently a couple hushed meetings to try and figure out what to do with us.

 

Virtuality is a backdoor pilot expected to air on Fox as a two-hour movie sometime in 2009. The show takes place aboard the Phaeton, Earth's first interstellar starship, whose 12-person crew is on a 10-year voyage. To give them a break from the monotony of the journey, the ship allows each crew member to enter a virtual-reality module, or "virt module," where they can escape into a digital fantasy world.

 

In the end, we managed to watch one scene being shot. And that was a long, slow reaction shot in which not a word was spoken. The shot featured most of the crew looking very pensive and worried about something. But we're not entirely sure what.

 

From our interview with star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, it was also pretty clear that his character was having a really bad day. Coster-Waldau, who plays the captain of the starship, was in full makeup that made his entire body look like one solid bruise.

 

Despite the mysteries, we learned a great deal about the crew of the Phaeton, who are primarily scientists. Six of the crew are married couples, including a gay couple. (And sharp-eyed fans may spot a few science and SF references in the character names.) They are:

 

--Frank Pike (Coster-Waldau). The mission commander. Ex-military. Coster-Waldau reported that Pike has re-created a Civil War battle in his virt module and reruns it often, trying to solve a particular historical puzzle.

 

--Roger Fallon (James D'Arcy). Psychiatrist. A gifted therapist and producer of an onboard reality show in which the crew members are obligated to take part, the price of their interstellar voyage. Though those two jobs might sound incompatible, Taylor said that he combines his tasks with aplomb.

 

--Rika Godard (Sienna Guillory). Botanist, in charge of the hydroponics. Fallon's wife, though Guillory said that her character is having an affair with someone on the ship.

 

--Manny Rodriguez (Jose Pablo Cantillo). Mathematician and superstring theorist.

 

--Valentin Orlovsky (Gene Farber). Geologist and Rodriguez's partner.

 

--Kenji Yamamoto (Nelson Lee). Exobiologist. Married to Alice Thibadeau. Writer/producer Taylor described them as a young couple, very much in love and having something of a second honeymoon on the ship.

 

--Alice Thibadeau (Joy Bryant). Exobiologist, but with a different specialty from her husband.

 

--Jimmy Johnson (Ritchie Coster). Inventor of the matter/antimatter weapons technology used to propel the ship. In a wheelchair because of an accident in his past. Coster described his character as "an agent of chaos." He's vital to the mission's success, which is apparently the only reason anyone puts up with him.

 

--Julius "Jules" Braun (Erik Jensen). Longtime NASA scientist, designer of the ship and navigator.

 

--Adin Meyer (Omar Metwally). Ship's doctor. Born in the West Bank of Israeli and Palestinian parentage.

 

--Billie Kashmiri (Kerry Bishe). Computer expert. Interfaces with the ship's artificial intelligence, which is named Gene. Or perhaps Jean. Taylor declined to say whether the personality is male or female.

 

--Sue Parsons (Clea DuVall). Ship's pilot. An ex-fighter pilot and very much into physical activity. Her virt modules are mainly about extreme sports.

 

And then there's Jimmi Simpson. Perhaps best known for playing "Lyle the Intern" on CBS' Late Night With David Letterman, Simpson plays a character known only as "the green-eyed man." But nobody wanted to admit even that to us, and they didn't let us anywhere near Simpson while he tried on costumes and was briefed on a fight sequence by a pair of stunt performers.

 

We didn't mind the secrecy all that much, especially as it became clear that Virtuality isn't like other space-based SF shows. Virtuality's starship Phaeton is going to take a decade to get where it's going. It's not going to visit another exotic planet each week. There are no aliens. There's just empty blackness outside and a dozen people crammed into a too-small metal tube trying to fight their fears, get their jobs done and get along with each other.

 

Ultimately, we got the sense that Virtuality isn't really about the sort of things you can spoil. The show's world is deliberately very small, very claustrophobic. The point of the show is not space adventure or gadgets or cool alien ships: It's more about straight character drama in an SF setting. Virtuality is an ensemble show that's mainly about getting to know the characters aboard Phaeton and seeing how they deal with very intense pressures and unpredictable challenges. Stay tuned. --John Sullivan

[Tenshin_Xo]

Good eye Almearafan, I hadn't heard of this and now I'm interested.  Even if the title made me think of that movie Virtuosity.

[Almearafan]

Even if the title made me think of that movie Virtuosity.

 

LOL...met too...just didn't feel like typing out the word...LOL.  Virtuality was enough typing for me after my long ass blog post on myspace this morning.