From Season Two to Season Six of Stargate SG-1 Lynn Smith served as Location Manager for the series. This included scouting, negotiating with local home owners and businesses for filming, noise issues with P-90s, and everything else involved in turning Vancouver into Colorado or another planet. She sits down with Dial the Gate to talk about her amazing six years, as well as a trip to the Arctic to film Stargate Continuum!
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Timecodes
0:00 – Opening Credits
0:25 – Welcome
0:31 – Guest Introduction
1:54 – Ten Years in the Industry
4:43 – Lynn the Location Manager
6:53 – Duties and Responsibilities
10:04 – From Script to Shoot
13:58 – Principal Photography
16:25 – Changes in Weather
18:46 – Saving on Locations (“Chain Reaction”)
23:20 – Private Locations
26:28 – Evolving Locations
28:45 – Government Spaces and Private Businesses
31:40 – Contacts Rolodex
34:45 – Locations Around Bridge Studios
35:30 – Money Buys Everything
39:45 – Favorite Locations
42:10 – Sand Dunes
43:34 – More Favorite Locations
45:45 – Location Tours
48:30 – Filming in the Arctic
53:25 – Guinness World Records
54:49 – Thank You, Lynn!
55:30 – Post-Interview Housekeeping
56:36 – End Credits
***
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TRANSCRIPT
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David Read:
Hello, everyone! Welcome to another episode of Dial the Gate. My name is David Read, and I am your host. Lynn Smith: Location Manager for Stargate SG-1 is joining us for this episode. I’m really excited to have her and her perspective. She was a critical player throughout much of Stargate SG-1’s production and was involved in the Stargate: Continuum shoot up in the Arctic. We’re going to have some interesting stories for her to share with us. She is the wife of Stargate Executive Producer N. John Smith, and I’m delighted to have her. So, here we go! This is a pre-recorded episode, so the moderators will not be taking questions. I hope you enjoy. Lynn Smith, Location Manager, Stargate SG-1, Seasons 2 to 7. Lynn, this is a treat to have you because it’s hard for me to get people from behind the camera. They’re like, “Hey, I’m used to being back here doing my thing. No need to point a camera at me.” But you guys were so critical to the production of one of the biggest sci-fi franchises that have ever existed. So, I really want to thank you for taking the time to sit down and talk with me.
Lynn Smith:
Well, you’re welcome! It didn’t feel as important as that introduction when we were working because we just work, work, work, and there were lots of people higher than me, but sure!
David Read:
You know, when you look back on that body of work – you were in this industry for around 10 years. Does it feel like it was that much of a span of time? Or was it always just, “We got to get to the next thing, we got to get to the next thing. Okay, some break, some vacation over here, now we’re back to it”? What does that time frame in your life feel like when you look back on your career with Stargate?
Lynn Smith:
Well, ask me now, in this year, and it feels like I was in that industry longer. But now, the time is longer that I’ve been out. So yeah, I always feel like that was my life, and that’s where I sat the longest. But in hindsight, looking back at the years, it’s not – we’ve done so much afterward now and moved on. But yeah, I didn’t realize it was so short.
David Read:
Right. Were you a fan of the show? Did you and John watch it?
Lynn Smith:
John definitely would have, being he was… I’m not a huge sci-fi person, but if there was any sci-fi I was going to watch, it was that one. I think it was really well-written. I loved the actors and the characters, and I was a part of it. But to be honest, now that I can’t get fired as a result of this comment, I don’t think I ever watched one on TV from beginning to end.
David Read:
OK.
Lynn Smith:
I would watch snippets of it.
David Read:
You were busy making it!
Lynn Smith:
You know, we were busy making it!
David Read:
Yeah, you were busy making it. So, watching snippets here and there when you could catch it – I completely get that.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, and watching snippets, I was like, “Is there a butt bucket in the shot? Can I see anything wrong?” So, you’re not getting the flow of the show. And to be quite honest, it throws you off a bit watching it as a show because I will see a location, and then I see the plane take off, and we’re somewhere else. And I’m like, “Yeah, but we’re not. We’re right next door at that next house.”
David Read:
Absolutely! The magic is never going to be 100% there for you because you watched the cake get baked – you didn’t just get to eat it like the rest of us.
Lynn Smith:
That’s right!
David Read:
And it’s interesting – now, on Wormhole X-Tremists, which is our sister show, we’re going through and doing commentaries for every episode. One of the things we do on purpose is pick the show to pieces. So, “Oh, there’s a script in that shot,” or “We’re on another planet, but there’s a van driving by way off in the distance there.” Because it’s a new way for us to view the show and see it in a new light. And also, you know, fans love Easter eggs – whether intentional or not.
Lynn Smith:
Those fans are good!
David Read:
They are! They’re loyal.
Lynn Smith:
They are loyal.
David Read:
You had a huge job as Location Manager, and I would love to hear, step by step, how you went through a script. Because one of the nice things about Vancouver, especially in those early years, is that you had some varied landscape options – especially with the sand dunes, which I don’t even think exist anymore. You could turn Vancouver into a lot of different things. Before I get into that, how did you find Stargate? How did you get involved with the show? What’s the story there?
Lynn Smith:
Well, John and I were already together prior to Stargate, but we were working [on] some shows together, but we were working independently. I was still, for sure, going up the ranks: I started as a Production Assistant, Assistant Location Manager, Location Manager. So it was just at the cusp there. John was going on the show. There was an opportunity: they did need somebody in locations. So, finding it through that sort of realm. And it would work perfectly for us if he took it and [if] there was an opening and a situation for me, it makes life easier; family easier, holidaying easier. So that’s how I got onto Stargate. If he’s taking it and his wife could get on it could work, is there an opening there? So, it was choices at the time. I’m glad we did it because it had such a long run.
David Read:
Yeah, absolutely.
Lynn Smith:
But as far as the job being so hard – yes, it was, and it had its challenges. But I had a great team. I had the likes of Jamie Lake, who was fantastic, charismatic, and great at the job. Later on, after a few years, I had Terri Brooks as a Location Scout, and I think she’s just retired, but she went on for many more years after that. She was fantastic at it. The team was great. We had wonderful Production Assistants – often many of them. So yeah, I had good people at my back.
David Read:
When someone hears, like me – a layman, “Location Manager,” my first thought is, “You pick the location.” But it’s more complicated than that. Can you give us a rundown of your duties and the things that you would allocate out to your Assistant Location Manager and [Jamie] Lake, for instance? How would that unspool?
Lynn Smith:
OK. So, in the early years, when things were just starting up, we didn’t know how long the show was going to go. Maybe things were smaller and lighter. It was Jamie and me. So yeah, everyone assumes I found all the locations, but Jamie was a big part of that. I would send my assistant out… OK, from the beginning, I’d read the script, run down the hall, I talk to the likes of the Production Designers, Producers, sometimes the Director’s not in town at that point, the Writers – what they envisioned. Sometimes, the writers in the later years would say, “When you get to this location, this is what I was writing it around or for or envisioning.” So, they were almost setting me out the door, to say, “OK, I’ll see if we can get it for those dates.” Sometimes if the scene was small and there was a larger scene, we would concentrate maybe on a house that we could blow up. But we know that we needed another look of a house – well, we’re gonna have to piece that together in the same neighborhood. We don’t want to move all the trucks and all of this. So, we did that in the office – myself as the head of the department with other heads of department – and they would give me a picture of where I’m going. Sometimes they’d say, “Try and keep it close to the studio because the rest of it is all in the studio.” I would then send Jamie out and say, “Look, we’re looking for this particular house, but we also have a school, so try and find them close together. Go find the school. We’ll have parking for the trucks there. We’ll be inside the school. Find the house in that neighborhood.” So, you know, some teamwork. So then he would go out and look for it. Later on, that was all Terri Brooks’ job because it was so busy, and doing both episodes, Jamie would be on set, I would need a separate scout for the locations. Then they would bring it back to me, and I would shortlist it. Then I would bring that shortlist… when I knew that this house didn’t work because it was too far out, or nowhere to park the “circus,” as we called it, or it’s, you know, a one-way in, and it’s not going to work.
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
So I’d shortlist it, and then I’m bringing… and at that time, we didn’t have digital – it was file folders with pictures all taped together, and you would go boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, and you would have that panoramic. So, then I would bring that to the writer that wrote that episode, John’s sitting at the helm, the production designer – all of this – and then we would often narrow it down to maybe three. Sometimes they knew right away, “Yes, that’s it,” but sometimes we would nail it down to three and then go on a survey and see which one would really work because you have to see it live.
David Read:
Of course. Absolutely. You have to be there in person. When you’re first handed that script, when you begin the process, how many days [or] weeks out – ideally – from shooting are you?
Lynn Smith:
Oh, sometimes overlapping. You know, it was really fine-tuned. It’s not like, sometimes, you know, you’re hearing that we don’t even have the next script. We kind of knew, even if it wasn’t on paper or handed to you, [because] you’re talking in the office. The writers are across the hall from me, so they’d say, “Hey, coming up in a couple of episodes, we’re going to be doing something in the snow,” or, “There’s going to be a big camping scene,” or whatever. Or because we knew it was Stargate” we’d say, “In a couple of episodes, we know we’re going to the dunes.”
David Read:
Right. Absolutely.
Lynn Smith:
So you start the conversation. I was given good lead time on where I was going and what I was doing. But sometimes those episodes were a lot of locations – location-heavy. And some, ahead of time, they’d say, “This one’s location-heavy, but the next one’s going to be all in the studio.” So you had time to come up for air or to work on the one after that.
David Read:
It seems, when we look back at these shows, that it was very much a mix of, “OK, this episode is almost, or is, exclusively off-world,” that you could anticipate that the next one was probably going to be in-house. You get the feel, the sensation, just in terms of the ebb and flow of a season, that at the beginning of the season, they’re going to spend a lot of money. Then it’s going to go down a little bit. They’re going to do some typically more budget-refined episodes. Then the midseason comes up, and we’re going to get a bigger boom there. And it does the same thing on the back end of the season with a bigger finale. So am I kind of getting it right in terms of the ebb and flow of a season in terms of budget?
Lynn Smith:
I’m sure you’re getting it right.
David Read:
OK.
Lynn Smith:
I’m sure you are getting it right, and in terms of budget, and that’s going to be more where John steps in with some answers. I didn’t see it as that. I was just too into what I needed to do for locations. And as you say; the locations wasn’t the hard part often, especially years down the road, because we already knew: we’re going back here, we’re going back here. We knew where things park, who to talk to with the city reps. The hard part was if it was production assistant-heavy. At the time, you had a hard time getting maybe 20 production assistants because you’re going to be on Robson Street, or you’re talking to the liaisons for the city. And as you know, much of our show was gunfire and explosions – that was the hard part because you had to get their blessing. If we were going to the dunes, that’s me talking to the tower at the airport for a flight path. And believe it or not, yes, sometimes they would work in our favor.
David Read:
Wow.
Lynn Smith:
So, not with the big stuff, but they could keep the small stuff away from us, right? Or they would tell us, “Oh, you’re going to run into a problem that day,” because they had something going on, whether it be training or winds, whatever. So that’s the part that people don’t see. They see the location manager: you just find the locations. Well, no. My assistants and my scouts find the locations. Mine is often in the… office-heavy, and dealing with all the reps – from the cities, the liaisons, the towers, gunfire. You know, it started, in my 10 years in film, you could just call that in. But a few years later, you had to have a police officer on set even if there was a gun visible, even if it was plastic, rubber, or otherwise, because of an incident that happened. So, you know, you had to get… it was booking all your people.
David Read:
It makes sense, too, that regulations evolve as you move forward. I’ve been fortunate to talk with a number of different people in different arenas of the back end of this process. Things just aren’t done the same way decade after decade. Some things are refined, some things are added, some things are taken away. But the process is streamlined as you move forward. So this is really cool. So you’ve selected your locations. John and his team – production – give their blessing on it. Are you there for principal photography on these locations to, you know, rub elbows and grease gears? Where do you fall in when the cameras are rolling? Or are you busy working on the next episodes?
Lynn Smith:
I am busy working on the next episode. And again, that’s the harder part than filming. Now, it’s all set. The trucks are parked. But I always would because it’s a long day, and Jamie and I had to overlap. So, often… I’m still, as a result, an early riser. Often I would take the early shift 4AM or 5AM. I do want to go down there as a location manager, it’s my responsibility, and my conversations with the rep and my organizing – putting up those signs “No Parking.” I want to know that when the cameras are rolling at 7AM, they actually can roll. Or the trucks can get in. So I typically would go early in the morning, make sure the trucks can get in, or if it was the night before parking, the trucks are parked. I want to make sure it’s set up and ready. Often, we could be there for a day, but we could be there for several days. So I want to know the cones are lined up along the circus on the street. I want to know that the PAs showed up. I want to know that simple things, like the garbage cans, the buckets, are set up and we’re ready to go for this day or days. Then Jamie would come in, typically, at call. Say, if it was 7AM on a Monday, he would come in, and I would overlap. We’d have conversations [about] how I want the day to go, what my promises were to the reps, what we talked about on the survey. He would be there at 7AM, I would be there at 7AM, I’d overlap maybe an hour, grab that delicious breakfast, and then I’d head to the office and off I go to the next episode.
David Read:
Gosh. Man, oh man. How often… because you go back and you watch the show, and you watch from shot to shot. One side is sunny or cloudy, the other side rain. And they’re doing a pretty good job of hiding it, but it’s definitely raining. How often would rain be an issue for production? How often did you have to change plans? How often was it like, “We can’t shoot today. Is there any set stuff that we can [shoot]”? How often would that be a problem, Lynn? I’m really curious.
Lynn Smith:
Not my issue now!
David Read:
Talk to the big guy upstairs.
Lynn Smith:
They were more scrambling. I wouldn’t say it affected myself personally or my job a lot. I mean, they know we’re in Vancouver. They know it rains. They know it rains and then stops. They know it’s not always scheduled, and it can start. So I think they had it dialed in that they already always had that in the back of their mind, “What if?” Or, the locations are picked a week prior and now we’re… you can’t flip some things. You can’t say, “We’re not going to be outside the art gallery because that day is outside and inside” …and we’re booked with them. You can’t just say, “We’re going to flip there till tomorrow.” That doesn’t work for them. So, often, they could change things in the day. “OK, let’s go inside instead of starting out and hope it subsides.” If it’s absolutely coming down, but they have the means and the technology to cover up. They’re quick on paper and in their heads: “OK, you’re not going to walk from the door to the car. It’s pouring out. You’re just going to stand and do that scene standing at the door, inside the door now.” But I don’t think we actually had to ever change days. We could flip hours or afternoon and morning. Snow, maybe a little bit more. And John was hands-on, so he often had a shovel and was helping. So, you could move it.
David Read:
Wow. Team players.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah. So, I would say if they had to do that in a real pinch, it’s just moving it from [an] outside scene to now it’s inside. And close the blinds.
David Read:
One of the things that I love – it was probably just something that you just internalized from the beginning – time and the picking of location. You know, if you can make one space look like many spaces, you’re going to save on time, you’re going to save on budget, you’re going to save on, you know, gasoline. I remember we just watched, on Wormhole X-Tremists, an episode from Season Four. And I’m 40 now, so the episodes don’t fly in my brain as much anymore. I used to have these things just on a Rolodex in my brain. And the episode was – ‘causeI want to have it… “Chain Reaction.” And in it, you have Senator Robert Kinsey’s house, played by Ronnie Cox, and you had either Hammond’s house or his child’s house in this episode. And we went back, and one… behind the house, there’s a lake, you know, there’s a lot of shrubbery. And then the other house, it looks like it has Greek columns, it looks like, you know, it could be a government building. It’s the same building! It’s the same one! You just use the same location for two different ones.
Lynn Smith:
Always, you have to – you can’t keep moving hundreds of people and hundreds of feet of trucks to stand at a door and do a talking scene.
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
And I would say that’s, you know, where I kind of prided myself. It was where I tasked myself to go, “Oh, we’re at a school, and then there’s a house, and then there’s a parking lot. I really want that circus to stay parked.”
David Read:
Right.
Lynn Smith:
And I feel that I did a good job at that. But there are lots of opportunities to do it, and that’s why I would start with where the bigger locations was. So, if it’s a school, obviously, it has to be now worked on a day that they’re out, or in an area of the school that they’re not, and you’re not hearing kids outside at recess and bells and everything. So, that would be my concentration. Once I found that, we can find a house. We can find a house in that neighborhood, or we can find a church because five days a week the church is quiet. We can figure that out. So, that’s how I started with the location of where we were at and if we can get several locations in one stop for those trucks – obviously, a lot: we are moving those trucks, or we’d have the bulk of the trucks in one place, and we would just have to move maybe the camera truck. So that is the task of a location manager – figuring out that aspect. You’ve got to get a lot of hours done in a day. You don’t want to waste it on a move, but inevitably, there are moves in a day. And even now, there’s a local film in town, and I look, and I see, “Wow! Why would they be moving two and three times in a day to go from house to house?” Because I don’t think that’s always necessary. Now, maybe their hands are tied, and they’re saying, “No, we want that particular house,” and we want that particular house that’s 10 miles away.
David Read:
Is it really necessary, though?
Lynn Smith:
Is it necessary?
David Read:
How much can you save to put toward other things? And not just money, but time, you know?
Lynn Smith:
Right, right.
David Read:
How often would a pickup need to be done at a location where you’d have to reach out and schedule more time at a place? Did it ever happen? I would think from time to time there would be, “Hey, we need this shot, we didn’t get this,” or “something has changed, we have to go back to this spot.”
Lynn Smith:
Yes. We often had to do that. I don’t think it was ever a huge hiccup to go back. I mean, you could still say, “We missed this scene,” or something didn’t look right when they watched the dailies or otherwise, and you have to go back. But they typically would go back with a second unit or a handheld camera to do something if it was doable. If it was an actor, again, that’s more the producers, because now you’re bringing that actor back or having to ask that actor if he’s even free or has, you know, has he gone on to another show? But they did a great job of it too. It could be having a voiceover of the actor, but he’s off-camera now instead of on camera.
David Read:
Wow.
Lynn Smith:
Magic.
David Read:
Movie magic. It’s a lot of moving parts. I would imagine that dealing with public entities versus private individuals would be a little different. One of the big locations that for the Gatecon events that was always in circulation for the bus tours was [Smantha] Carter’s house. It’s a private residence. When you approach a private residence for a house, what’s the policy? Do you just knock on the door and slip an envelope, you know, under the door if you miss them? Saying, “Hey, we’d like to consider this house for our location. Here’s the budget we’re looking at. Here’s the money we’re offering you for our time.” What was the process for… I want to get to public in a little bit and government, but what was the process for a private home?
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, pretty much. You nailed it. It would be doing… now, if we just knew we wanted a house in that neighborhood, because, like I said, we had already needed that school or the church or whatever, we would just… Jamie or Terri or a PA… I would draft the letter up, saying, “We are filming the show” – and obviously throwing names of the actors – “it stars Richard Dean Anderson and we’ve been on our second or third season, and we are looking for a location in the neighborhood that calls for a house.” Now, we would do it to the whole block, maybe,in the vicinity of what we’re trying to marry with. Sometimes we’re not trying to marry with something, but we’re going to like all the houses on that street, because if you like this house, typically the neighborhood is similar. And we don’t know if it’s going to work until we go inside because if they’re hoarders, it’s not going to work. Or if the house is very chopped up, it’s not going to work. Or if they, you know… China and stuff we can take out, but some things you can’t change. So, you don’t know from the exterior if the interior works. We might need a backyard, and I can’t see the backyard from just not meeting the people yet. So, we do the block or, you know, both sides, and then Terri would often take all those fronts of the houses, and we’d see a few that they would like. And now she’s knocking on the door, “Hi, we put out a letter a couple of days ago. Did you get it?” Yes? No? “Well, here’s what we’re up to.” And then we get a yes or no. And sometimes it’s just an absolute no – “Oh, yeah, we have twin month-old babies,” not being convenient, there’s a wedding, they’re leaving town, whatever. So then it starts narrowing it down, and we find the house. But Carter’s house – those people were fantastic, thank goodness. Because you always go into a location thinking you’re using it possibly once or twice, and then it becomes a recurring location. You know, the cabin that Ric [Dean Anderson] always went to. So, you find the location, and then you are blessed if the people aren’t crazy, and they’re easygoing, and it all worked out, and we can move and groove in there with cameras and dollies and all this kind of stuff.
David Read:
I would imagine, you know, in a situation where you have a really amazing spot, you wouldn’t want to be in a position where one of your people would have to tell the writers, “Yeah, I know you really want to go back to that location, but they hated this process. We’re not going to get it again. We’re going to have to find something similar.”
Lynn Smith:
You know, I have to say this: I’ve never had that comment where they’ve hated the process. I’ve had the comment where, “We’re moving.” And then you see a “For Sale” sign, and you’re like, “Oh no, let’s hope the next people want us.” But we’ve never been really… you know, the crew was fantastic.
David Read:
“You don’t tear up our walls with tape!”
Lynn Smith:
I was strict. I was strict. You know, I was younger then, and I’ve relaxed a bit now, but I was really strict. I would not be happy if I walked in there and something was not protected. Or they decided, “Oh, we’re not going to go that way with the camera, we’re going to go this way,” and now that wasn’t the plan, so that room wasn’t protected or whatever. But it happens. It happens. I mean, I remember starting in this industry, and when John and I were working together, they sometimes would want to just, “Hey, we’re just gonna go down to the seawall and do this one scene of the guy walking.” It’s like guerrilla warfare. It’s like, “No, you can’t do that anymore.” But they lived in the day you could just grab a camera and out you go. And when I started, those days were over. And, of course, it’s on my name that signs at the city. So, no. We don’t just change direction and gears and run out with the camera. I need to make a call. And, usually, asking worked. They’d say, “Yeah, no worries, thanks for letting me know.” But they didn’t like when all of a sudden the public would call and say, “Hey, did you know there’s a film crew down here?” “Uh, no, they were supposed to be here.”
David Read:
Oh my gosh.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah. But, sometimes the camera ran faster than me.
David Read:
Oh, that makes a lot of sense. So that’s private individuals and private homes. Was the process for public spaces, for private businesses, and government spaces… can you tell me about those kinds of situations and how different were they? Or was it pretty much the same thing?
Lynn Smith:
No, much more challenging. Much more challenging because they often are giving a certain corner of their space or allowing you to come into their space knowing that there’s still public around. You know, they may not be in the room that we’re giving to you, but you’re going to hear them in the background, or there’s a door opening and closing, or people forget: “Oh, the guy was coming to fix the alarm today” or “to fix something that’s noisy,” and a drill. And then you’re dealing with stuff that wasn’t expected on the day, and you’re running around.
I can’t tell you how many times… and it happens in public. Private homes as well – you know, everybody starts up the lawnmower on the day just to get some money. But I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said to Jamie, “Run and give them a Stargate hat. Run and chat.” Because he was on radio, he knew when they were rolling and cutting, and he would sit with them and chat and go, “OK, guys, stop the drills, stop this, stop that.”
David Read:
Someone would start, at some point, theoretically, a lawnmower in order to get a payout payout for them to stop.
Lynn Smith:
They would start things so that you would buy them out.
David Read:
Wow! What gall!
Lynn Smith:
Oh, yeah. It’s the leaf blower, it’s the lawnmower. Yes, it would happen. It would happen.
David Read:
I would think that you would have to have, like, a piggy bank set aside for things like that, you know? Just for incidentals, for overhead. I’m sure every episode had them. You know, you have unforeseen circumstances.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, they wanted money. But then we outsmarted that. Stargate was quite popular, so they would love to have a Stargate hat. The guys doing a job, I don’t know, for some other company – they would love to have a case of beer at the end of the day.
David Read:
Sure.
Lynn Smith:
So we reinvented: instead of always handing out money, we would just have gack. And Jamie was a gem at this. He has the gift of gab, he’s very charismatic, as I say, and he was very good at that.
David Read:
That’s awesome. To have resourceful people on your team who are like, “OK, dollars are not always the answer. We have a popular show now. What else can we do to accommodate people?” Because you’re interfacing with the public constantly, and you don’t want to leave a bad taste in their mouth. Word gets around town. I would imagine. Did you have just a Rolodex of contacts after a while in terms of places and locations? I imagine you documented everything: names, they like sushi…
Lynn Smith:
[shows paper lists]
David Read:
Wow!
Lynn Smith:
I am very list-oriented.
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
And I’m very organized. So every season, every episode… like, you’re rolling off this person’s house, that person’s house, when you did this scene – that means nothing to me. Many years later, I couldn’t tell you. Even referring, I’d be looking at this [papers]. But I always had this, so when they would say, “Hey Lynn, back when we did ‘In the Line of Duty,’ we were at someone’s house. Can you see if we can go back there?” I would just pull out my cheat sheet, look at it – well, now there’s not a house…
David Read:
It was a hospital, it should be.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, Shaughnessy Hospital. Look at you, wow! Shaughnessy Hospital and Buntzen Lake, on “Prisoners.” Buntzen Lake. “The Gamekeeper,” Foxglove Farms, Bloedel Conservatory. So I could roll off of this. I have the contact’s name and number. I have all my cheat sheets – who I had to go through, what incidents might have happened that we could be running into again. I have it all, I have it all here. And then it came in handy when I started doing the – after I left – bus tours.
David Read:
Oh, absolutely! And, you know, I’m sure that those relationships… there’s nothing wrong with networking. Especially if you connected with someone and it’s like, “OK, this is a great human being, this is a great person. We have this coming up; I’d really like to use them again because, A, I’d like to give them another opportunity, but B, they’re great to work with.”
Lynn Smith:
Yes! Or even just the neighborhood dynamics. So if there was another house, and I knew that we had filmed at this particular house on this street, and there was a church that was great for parking, and the neighbors were fantastic, and the guy next door let us put… the caterers, instead of a tent for eating, we used his empty, beautiful big garage – then the next time I had a house, yeah, I’m looking on that street. I can’t have the same house, but I could be down the street and know where my parking is already going, where the tent is going. The people are nice. It makes it easier. Call it cheating, but that’s what you do. That’s what you’re supposed to remember and do.
David Read:
Mel Harris once told me… we had Mel Harris on – Oma Desala – she said, “We’re illusionists. As long as you change things just enough, the most fastidious person probably won’t tell.”
Lynn Smith:
Right.
David Read:
And at the end of the day, you’re making it work!
Lynn Smith:
Yeah! Turn around the camera and suddenly you’re in Colorado.
David Read:
Just no big bodies of water!
Lynn Smith:
Yeah. trucks didn’t move.
David Read:
That’s it! I was amazed, when I would go to Bridge [Studios], how many locations were just right there. There’s a coffee shop in Season Seven where Amanda Tapping goes to meet David DeLuise, and in the shot, you can see the red girders of the studio in the background – because the coffee shop was right there! The crew was probably there all the time, right?
Lynn Smith:
Yeah! The “Stay and Save” was a motel scene. A minute later, it was a coffee shop – not supposed to be right there, but it was right there. And then a scene on the roof and coming out of the studio, and the trucks didn’t move from our Bridge Studios lot. Yeah. That’s money at its best!
David Read:
Absolutely! Were the local government typically easy to work with? I imagine as Stargate got more name recognition, as it went forward, were things easier to pull off? Were there places you just could never get?
Lynn Smith:
Nope. Money buys everything. So spend a little money here, less here. I mean, yes, there were some we couldn’t get because of dates or timing – some other film crew was there, or it didn’t make sense. Like, we’d really want to be here, but we also really want to be there, and it’s in the same episode, and that’s too much in a day. We’d change that up. We’d think we were doing that, and then we’d say, “Oh, camera needed a little bit more money, so something’s changing in location. We’re not going to that house; we’re going to build it in the studio.” Things like that happened for sure. The more studio the easier for me.
David Read:
For sure.
Lynn Smith:
Right. And these recurring GVRD [Greater Vancouver Regional District] and stuff. I love my GVRD reps. And the Burnaby rep at the time – I don’t know who is sitting in that chair now – but [it] was easy and that was our home in Burnaby. So if we stuck close to the studio, the trucks could be there, we could be going back and forth. That rep was fantastic. And the more years you’re in the game on that same series, the easier it got, right? Because now people know you. Now people know it’s a popular show. Now you’re a priority. Some challenges… if you wanted to do something simple, and then all of a sudden, you found out a feature film was there a week before and paid three times as much as you’re capable of – that was hard to follow. You’re talking about buying people out. I remember being in Fort Langley – I don’t think he’s still there, so without saying too much of a name – it was a pizza place. And he was just going to say that he was losing out on a ton of business. He wasn’t. He was just saying that, and he wants thousands of dollars. Well, we’ll outsmart him. What I did was, I went in there and I bought pizzas. I said, “Well, how many pizzas would you say?” He said, “Well, probably, like, 30 pizzas.” I said, “OK, you know what? We’ll take 30 pizzas. I’ll take them tonight, and I’ll put them all out.” And that was a treat for the crew.
David Read:
Absolutely.
Lynn Smith:
He’s getting his money! He wasn’t happy, but it’s like, “You’re getting your money! You just said $300, or whatever. Here’s about $300 worth of pizza.
David Read:
“This is what you just said!” Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
Coffee shops, the same. Flower shops, I would say, “How much do you think you’re out?” “Well, at least $300.” “OK, can I have $300 in gift certificates?” But now, I have gift certificates to give to some neighbors as a thank-you, or somebody doing something kind, or a crew member. Yeah, we started to outsmart them.
David Read:
Talk about rolling with the punches. That’s just how you do it. Yes it is like outsmarting their position, but at the same time, you’re taking care of them. I can’t tell you how many times, Lynn, I have been up in Vancouver, I call a location because I want to do some photography at a spot, and they’re like, “Who are you with?” I’m like, “Well, I’m with myself now, but I’m going because this was used as a Stargate location.” I cannot tell you how many times the people on the phone are like, “Oh, I remember Stargate! They were great!”
Lynn Smith:
Yes!
David Read:
And it gets me in, because you guys took care of people. You made it work.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah. And, you know, I’m just going to toot John’s horn – he picked a lot of that crew, and a lot of the crew followed him around because he was a good boss. I don’t think very many people can say very many bad things about him. So, accolades to him for picking a good crew. They were respectful, they were good, and, as I say, you start working… I mean, that was my family. I saw more of them than my own family.
David Read:
Yeah. Absolutely.
Lynn Smith:
So it just gets easier as far as, “OK, we know that personality, we know we need to dance around them,” or “we know that guy’s really grumpy in the morning – just don’t set him off.” You get to know people, but we were family.
David Read:
What are some of your favorite locations from the show? You mentioned the GVRD – that’s the Greater Vancouver Recreational District. I want to get to the Arctic…
Lynn Smith:
I was the location manager, you know, at the North pole…
but the manager, you know –
David Read:
Absolutely, I’m going to get to that. So, the Greater Vancouver Recreational District – am I saying that right?
Lynn Smith:
I think, yes.
David Read:
That was used a lot for forests. Was that one department? Was that one group of people who managed that whole area? One contact?
Lynn Smith:
No, there were a couple, and it depended, you know… it was basically one guy, and in fact, I don’t think the crew cared for him. He was really, really strict – really strict. Like, if he caught somebody going just a little bit over the speed limit, they were out. Like, he’d love to use his power.
David Read:
Wow! King of his hill.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, somebody… like, one of the guys caught peeing in the water or something. He’d have a fit, and everybody would be going, “Is he kidding? Like, there’s deer and bear and doing all this stuff.” I said, “I know, but he’s like the rookie cop – you have to abide by his rules. He just doesn’t like that you could dishonor his rules.” He and I got along because I knew to baby him. Jamie was great with him, I think. Like, they were buddies, so he liked Jamie and I.
David Read:
It’s the people that you put in front of the people. You want to get the people who are compatible.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, well, the crew didn’t have to get that location the next time, so they didn’t have to play to his rules all the time. But it was a recurring location. And sometimes we would have to have talks and put it out there saying, “Guys, GVRD is important to us. This guy needs us to respect his rules. Absolutely. Nobody is to speed.” And it would go like this. And then there was times where we had to park down by the gate, like, as a punishment. Instead of being able to drive to set. And then people realize, “Yeah, I better slow down, or else I don’t get to drive to set. I have to park down in a parking lot.”
David Read:
It’s a good solution, you know. I get where he’s coming from.
Lynn Smith:
Yes. But we figured it out, you know, over the years and over the times going there a lot. We were probably his favorite crew.
David Read:
Yeah, no, well, you guys did a lot of business there, so…
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, we did.
David Read:
The dunes, correct me if I’m wrong: so this is a patch of largely sand that was near the airport, if I’m not mistaken? And what I was told was that it got smaller and smaller with each passing season as either it was zoned out or something was changed…
Lynn Smith:
It was an auto mall or something last time… I remember one time, oh, probably on a bus tour… because when I put them together, I sometimes would drive around to make sure things looked the same, or you could have access or the roads were the same access. And I remember going there, going, “What?” And it was full of – I wouldn’t even say cars – it was like an auto mall of big, huge trucks and buses and all this, and I thought, “Well, we can come here, and they could say, ‘hey, look what happened here.’”
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
But I don’t know what it is today. I should take one of these tours and go around to see which locations are still around. But favorite locations… I mean, Stokes Pit I liked. That was, you know, South Surrey, 192 and 24th. I liked the locations that made it easy for me. So, if the trucks could park once and if the neighborhood was friendly and if the noises weren’t around, I liked it.
David Read:
It made a lot of sense. There were some cool ones. You guys had a… in “1969,” you went to an observatory. And that was in the location tour as well. The name is escaping me at this moment. But before I get to the Arctic, what was it like doing the location tours?
Lynn Smith:
By the way, I love “1969.”
David Read:
It’s a great show.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, it was fun.
David Read:
Absolutely.
Lynn Smith:
it was a lot of running around – here, there, and everywhere. But it was fun. It was really fun. We had fun doing that.
David Read:
Going cross-country in America
Lynn Smith:
Yeah.
David Read:
It’s like, “how can we make these locations look this way?”
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, that was fun.
David Read:
It’s illusion.
Lynn Smith:
Couple of challenging ones… like the art gallery – I loved the rep there, but it had a lot of surprises on the day, and parking was a challenge. And there’s one I wouldn’t sleep the night before because you never knew what was… I loved when the trucks parked the night before.
David Read:
Because you were, you were ensconced.
Lynn Smith:
Well, then if there’s any surprises, you have time to deal with it. But when the trucks were pulling in at 5AM, you know, I don’t know, on a Monday when everybody might have been downtown over the weekend and drank and left their car there and didn’t see the sign or whatever, and now I’ve got tow trucks, and you legally couldn’t tow a vehicle even though we had signs saying, “Do not park here, film crew coming in.” We couldn’t tow them unless they were ticketed, like to a tow yard. So what I would do is I would tow it down the street, out of our way so we can pull in the trucks. And then when you saw a person doing this, like, “Did I drink that much? I thought I parked here.” And then we’d say, “Excuse me, you looking for your car?” They’d go, “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I parked [here].” I’d say, “Don’t worry, we did you a favor. We just parked it – towed it to the end of the road. We didn’t tow it to the yard where you would have to pay $200. Just…” “Oh, thank you so much. Thank you so much!” So they weren’t mad you moved their vehicle. They were thinking, “Yay, I don’t have to pay, and it’s still conveniently right there.” But we would just tow it across the street or at the end of where our trucks needed to be.
David Read:
Wow, that’s very smart. That’s great. What was it like meeting fans and doing the location tours for the show?
Lynn Smith:
I like the… you mean after I was over and done off of it?
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
I like doing those, yeah. It was lots of fun. And man, they would outsmart me. They’d be on that bus, and again, you know, I was a few years out of it, and they’d say, “So, when so-and-so dipped his toe in the water, was this at a pool, or was it right at [inaudible]?” And I’d be like, “When did he do that?” “You know, in the second part of this episode.” I’m like, “OK, you got me.” I’d have to look at the scene.
David Read:
Now, we can pull it up on our phones and say, “Where is this?”
Lynn Smith:
Yes.
David Read:
You have a better shot of, “Oh, OK, yeah, it’s one of these two places.”
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, or they would correct me. I’d say something, they’d say, “I don’t think so. I think you did that at such-and-such because when you turned around,” like you, right, “I saw the red on the building or whatever.” I go, “OK, you’re right. I’m wrong.”
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
But then I started to put… I started to really do a lot of prep for those bus tours because they paid a lot, so I didn’t want to just sit there on a mic, “this, that, the other thing.” I started to get the buses that would have the VCR. I’d have the tape of the show, and I’d put it in, and I’d literally have my notes, ‘go to six-minute, 28-second mark’ and I’d play it.
David Read:
Wow, look at you!
Lynn Smith:
Yep, as we were heading to that location, so they would see the scene, maybe at the art gallery. And then I would stop it, and then we’d arrive at the art gallery, and then we’d talk about the scene. So I tried to do that. And I started having a silent auction. Like, I would have maybe a Stargate hat… I had toques made. I shaved my head to raise money for cancer, and I had toques made that had Stargate, and then Richard said to John, “I’ll give you X amount of money if you shave your head on the day.” And John was not prepared for that, so he did, and then I did. And then two weeks later, we moved into a new neighborhood, and I had to location-manage my own neighborhood, going, “Hey, we’re Johnny and Lynn Smith, we just moved here, and we are not Hare Krishna’s. We shaved our heads for cancer.” Anyway, long story short, I had toques made, and they were beautiful. I still have some. And so I would bring one of those on the bus, and I’d bring something else, and I would silent auction them. And by the end of that bus tour, sometimes people would pay$100, $200 for whatever I had – a signed script or whatever. And then I’d give that to charity, so yeah. So it was fun. We made it more than it was cut out to be, those bus tours, it was fun.
David Read:
Tell me about going to the Arctic. What an experience. We’ve talked with Barry Campbell, who set it up…
Lynn Smith:
[presents picture] Front and center.
David Read:
[gasps]
Lynn Smith:
Yeah. Loved that. I was not location manager when we went there. Yeah, the show was over, said you were doing DVD movies at this point. “Ark of Truth” and “Continuum” were both done in 2008, I believe – 2007. What an amazing experience. What was it like finding out: “this is happening, and would you like to go?”
David Read:
Yeah, so, my title was sort of ‘photography.’
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
Take pictures of things happening, and…
David Read:
So you worked with Ivan a lot?
Lynn Smith:
Yes.
David Read:
OK.
Lynn Smith:
Yes. But we had a great time. That was an experience – from, traveling with Richard there to almost being weathered out getting there to the whole prep of it; learning that you can only have a little tiny bit in those, you know, 40 and more below weather with windchill. Like, it was such an exciting situation – just the prep – and having to put cream on every little inch of your face. And then, because it was military that allowed us to go there, I couldn’t stay in a hut with John, you know. You can’t male-female this up, so…
David Read:
You were with Amanda.
Lynn Smith:
I was with Amanda. And who else was I with? A couple of the gals – hair and makeup, I think. But we learned that when you wake up in the morning, we’d say, “Oh, why is there like a window in the door? That’s kind of silly.” Well, because you have the peak out there and make sure the ice, before you open that door and step out, that the ice hasn’t broken throughout the night and you’re stepping… bye-bye.
David Read:
And polar bears.
Lynn Smith:
Well, polar bears, yeah, and they’re top of the food chain, so you don’t just… they have to almost have their head in their mouth before the guy can, you know, tranquilize them. He’s not going to shoot them; he’s going to tranquilize. But we had a guy at the ready to do that. And even the submarine coming up – X marks the spot really is. I mean, there’s an X, and I don’t know how they do it, you know, there’s currents and all this kind of stuff, but they come up with that X.
David Read:
Yeah, it was the second or third try, and it was the last, the last one, and they got it. I can’t imagine what that even felt like coming up through the ice beneath you, you know.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, little shivers, even you just bringing it up right now. And the meals and how they coordinated that – I still have a recipe book from that gal that made the meals. The ice, like, blue. And chopping the ice. We put styrofoam cups… oh my god, I think I have our styrofoam cup. One moment…
David Read:
Yeah.
Lynn Smith:
Because we put it down… We have a lot of West Coast Native art in our house. We have lots of little [inaudible]. But [presents styrofoam cup: “A.P.L.I.S. 2007, J+L”] And Rick and Ben and… so that’s 2007. And then, and then I put one down for our family, because we were putting them down, and then they were just like [scrunch] and then you would bring them up, and then you’d get to keep this. So, yeah, so there we are. [presents styrofoam cup: “STARGATE”, longitude and latitude] There’s the Northwest Reading.
David Read:
Yeah. How many days were you up there?
Lynn Smith:
I don’t know. [to off camera] John, how many days were we in the North Pole? Four? Six.
David Read:
Wow.
David Read:
Got a good memory.
David Read:
Man, oh, man, I can’t imagine how itinerant you had to be, how careful you had to be. There were certain shots that you just… I know that there was like a must-have shot list, and it’s, “oh, this would be awesome if we could get these,” and Martin Wood was just brilliant.
Lynn Smith:
Yeah.
David Read:
How you guys pulled that off at that temperature and you set a record, I think.
Lynn Smith:
Yes, yes, it’s on our wall here as well. It’s on our wall. And also, what we were told – not that you don’t believe, but you realize how important it is – we couldn’t work at the pace that you work anywhere else in a studio or on the streets or in snow. I mean, you literally, you would run to get some… “Oh, can you go get me that?” And someone would, “Stop running! Stop running!” It was a very serious thing. It’s like, “Walk slow.” You can’t just speed up the game when you’re in the North Pole. But yes, you want to see this.
David Read:
Absolutely, I want to see this.
Lynn Smith:
There’s two on the wall, but here’s the one [presents Guinness World Record plaque].
David Read:
Wow! [reads plaque] “The eight 15-20 minute-long ‘webisodes’ of Sanctuary…” OK. So this is Sanctuary’s.
Lynn Smith:
That was Sanctuary. And then there’s another one. We have both.
David Read:
OK! The Guinness World Record – wow! Well done. Sanctuary. I’m trying to get Damian Kindler on the show. I’ve had trouble reaching him.
Lynn Smith:
[presents plaque]
David Read:
Wow. [reads plaque] “The longest running TV sci-fi series is Stargate SG-1, which has notched up over 203 consecutive episodes since first being aired in 1997, to N. John Smith, Executive Producer.” That is so cool!
Lynn Smith:
Yeah, we don’t have much Stargate stuff in our house, but we have a few here, right? Here’s a – oh, yeah, here’s another. [presents plaque] That’s the last one.
David Read:
[reads plaque] “Stargate SG-1 ran without a break for ten seasons. The first episode, ‘Children of the Gods,’ was broadcast on 27th July 1997, and in 2006, with episode 203, ‘Company of Thieves,’ It beat the X Files, which ran to 202 episodes.” Yeah, and I’ll never forget the day that Smallville dethroned you guys. It’s like, [angry]. But you had it! You guys got it and no one can take that from you.
Lynn Smith:
That’s right. That’s right.
David Read:
Lynn, this has been a treat for me. I’m really thrilled that we got to sit down and talk.
Lynn Smith:
Thanks for the invite.
David Read:
Absolutely. That was Lynn Smith, Location Coordinator for Stargate SG-1 Seasons Two through Six, and as you heard as well, she was also involved in Stargate Continuum. I was really excited to have her perspective on the show in terms of the back end and how a lot of this stuff gets made. This is why I do Dial the Gate – to get these stories and hear really how the cake is baked, because there’s a lot that goes into our favorite shows. Before I let you go, if you enjoyed this episode and you want to see more content like this on YouTube, Stargate content, click the like button. It makes a difference and will help continue to grow our audience. Please also consider sharing this video with a Stargate friend, and if you want to get notified about future episodes, click subscribe and giving the bell icon a click will notify you the moment a new video drops, and you’ll get my notifications of any last-minute guest changes. And clips from this episode will be released over the course of the next few weeks on the Dial the Gate and GateWorld.net YouTube channels. That’s all I’ve got for you this episode. My thanks to my moderating team, Sommer, Tracy, Jeremy, and Marcia as well for bringing this episode together. Big thanks to Frederick Marcoux at ConceptsWeb, he keeps the website up and running. And Brice and Matt EagleSG; my talented VFX team – they keep all the parts of the show going. My name is David Read for Dial the Gate, and I’ll see you on the other side.